THE SYSTEM HAS FAILED

[NorthernBlitz]

Back when the Steelers were getting to 3 SB's in 6 years, at no time did they have to face Belicheat and Brady in the playoffs.
Either through a fluke tie-breaker or the Broncos took them out.
Neither Cowher or Tomlin ever beat Belicheat and Brady in a game that mattered.

Yep.

The team with the much better QB and HC won those games when they played.

Would have been nice to see what would have happened if Bell could have stayed healthy in the game where he went out early. But I don't think any of us were under the illusion that we were the better team.

Note: While Brady was a much better QB than Ben (than anyone really), Ben should clearly be a 1st Ballot HoF QB. And I'm actually kind of worried that the stupid new process they put in for HoF voting will take that away from him. Especially since Peter King still gets a vote. A guy who convinced himself not to vote for Troy. And wrote a column trying to justify it.

 

[NorthernBlitz]

It's funny you put Jackson on the list, because we play them twice a year. And even with subpar QB play, we have beat them 6 of the last 9 games since Ben retired. And that's who we faced in the playoffs. A team we know, a team we play twice a year. And Tomlin decided to play that game COMPLETELY different than any other time we've played them. Had our top OLB crash down on the RB no matter what, and let Jackson run all over us. If you're good enough to get TO the playoffs, you shouldn't get BLOWN out in every playoff game.

And since they want to rest their hat on not having a losing season, instead of doing a true rebuild and deal with a losing season or two, we're consistently drafting late in the first, and the way they have handled the QB position post Ben has been a trainwreck. Saying one thing, doing another, promising this, doing that...

The bottom line is that Mike Tomlin is no longer getting the job done. He still thinks that we are a player or two away from competing for a Super Bowl and we are not. So the constant chasing of these once great QB's, and not focusing on the things that is needed to make the team better is really just leaving us mediocre. Would you have your entire coaching and FO staff skip one of the biggest college pro days before the draft to meet with a 41 year old QB instead? Because that's what they did. They aren't focused on building for the future, they are living in the now, thinking that we are in that Buff, KC range of teams.

How many of those games did Lamar play in?

Because I think it's not very many.

If your argument is that we play a system that lets us steal games from better teams sometimes, I agree with you. Even though it's boring to watch.

FWIW, I've been OK with the idea of firing Tomlin ever since Ben got hurt. It will likely make the team worse in the short term. But having a down year or two is probably what we need to get a good QB. I don't think Rooney will buy in on something that actively makes our chances of making the playoffs less in the current year though.

 

[NorthernBlitz]

Why? We're talking about Tomlins coaching record. You're making the excuse that he hasn't won the past few years because he's had crappy QB's, and I brought up that he didn't have a crappy QB with Ben and couldn't win. So why would I name another QB that is Ben's caliber. I'm not understanding your post...

If you can give me a few QBs who you think were about as good as Ben, we can then examine what their success looked like.

That will give us an idea of what reasonable expectations were with Ben.

It's not going to be that we should have gone to a few more SBs and won a couple of them.

I think the success of Brady and Mahomes has kind of warped the idea of what reasonable expectations are.

 

[stillwright]

I would argue that the fact that our offense is very bad at generating explosive plays (and points) plays a pretty big role in the fact that we design our defense to prevent explosive plays (and points).

Have you ever heard of the TOX stat? It's Turnovers + Explosive plays. The differential in TOX is better at predicting who wins games than turnovers alone. And turnovers are the best single predictor outside of point differential (which obviously predicts flawlessly).

So when you have a team that doesn't generate points and explosive plays, you are forced into playing a defense that can't give up explosive plays. And has to generate turnovers.

I'd like to a couple articles about things like how turnovers (not even differential) really impact win%. But it's not from this site and my understanding is that we don't like outside links here.

My guess is that if we ever have a QB / offense that proves that it can score points again under Tomlin, we'll open things up more. Because the number one rule on this team is "consistently make the playoffs". That's the directive that comes from the front office. And they've been satisfied with that since we hired Cowher. Because they believe that making the playoffs more than other teams will ultimately lead to more SB wins (really revenue is almost certainly the main objective).

People hate Tomlin now, just like they hated Cowher before we drafted Ben. But the mission statement of the team hasn't changed.

Cowher learned from his mistakes......Tomlin hasn't.

This offense was designed by Tomlin to be conservative because he believes we have an elite defense. Limit TOs on offense and generate TOs on defense. This obviously has a winning formula for the regular season. What has happened though when we play the best of the league in the playoffs?

 

[NorthernBlitz]

That's the thing, there's a disconnect somewhere because you'd think a coach who's never had a losing season in 18 years would have more than 3 playoff wins in the last 11 years and none in the last 8.

I'm going to make a hypothesis here. Based on other places I've posted. Maybe people here can chime in to say if they think it's true here too.

I don't know how good the search function is to see if it's testable though.

My hypothesis is this: People who hate Tomlin (or at least want him fired) talk way more about the non-losing season streak than people who are ambivalent about him / don't think firing him will fix the team.

It's certainly true from the few posts I've been on. My guess is actually that Burgundy posts about it more than the sum-total of the rest of the board. But I'm basing that on a pretty small sample size so far.

 

[NorthernBlitz]

Cowher learned from his mistakes......Tomlin hasn't.

This offense was designed by Tomlin to be conservative because he believes we have an elite defense. Limit TOs on offense and generate TOs on defense. This obviously has a winning formula for the regular season. What has happened though when we play the best of the league in the playoffs?

Did he?

Or did he just get incredibly lucky to have an elite QB drop to 11 because it was maybe the deepest draft for very-high level QB talent ever (and the Browns decided to draft a TE despite needing a QB)?

 

[Coryea]

It's not impossible that he doesn't care at all about things like winning championships and what it would do for his legacy. But I strongly doubt it.

I think it's way more likely that (1) the prime directive of this team is "make the playoffs every year". It was like that for Cowher. It's like that for Tomlin. Maybe because of how bad the team was in the 80s? and (2) the league is more QB centric than it's ever been. We're in the conference that has like 90% of the the above average to elite QBs. And 2 of those guys are in our division.

Pretending that your idea is the Gospel Truth is silly IMO.

Since you brought up Cowher, Cowher has one less playoff win with Neil, Kordell, Maddox, Tomcazk, in 11 seasons, than Tomlin has with Ben in 15 seasons. Cowher also made more AFCCG's with Neil and Kordell, than Tomlin did with Ben. Foles beat Brady, Tannehill beat Brady, Eli beat Brady twice, Flacco beat Brady, Rodgers lost to an inferior QB pretty much every post season, so the "having the lesser QB" is just an excuse, yes you definitely have a better chance to win with the better QB, but a good coach should be able to win one of those games at some point, Tomlin gets beat by double digits every playoff game.

 

[Ron Burgundy]

It's not impossible that he doesn't care at all about things like winning championships and what it would do for his legacy. But I strongly doubt it.

I think it's way more likely that (1) the prime directive of this team is "make the playoffs every year". It was like that for Cowher. It's like that for Tomlin. Maybe because of how bad the team was in the 80s? and (2) the league is more QB centric than it's ever been. We're in the conference that has like 90% of the the above average to elite QBs. And 2 of those guys are in our division.

Pretending that your idea is the Gospel Truth is silly IMO.

I’m not saying he doesn’t care about winning championships but getting 200 wins and the non-losing seasons streak are more attainable and more immediate priorities. It’ll be a long time before they can beat KC or Buffalo in the playoffs.

 

[Ron Burgundy]

It's certainly true from the few posts I've been on. My guess is actually that Burgundy posts about it more than the sum-total of the rest of the board. But I'm basing that on a pretty small sample size so far.

Not really. Just in this thread.
As local sports radio guys have noted, what the national media doesn’t get is that in Pittsburgh that “never a losing season” moniker is a punchline.

 

[Confluence]

That's pretty funny.

FWIW, in other places I've posted it seemed to me that the "non-losing season" thing is talked about way more by people who don't like Tomlin than by people who think he's an average to above average coach.

Personally, I think the biggest systemic problem we have is that we've been bad at drafting since TJ. And Tomlin wears a fair amount of that (although I'd probably put Colbert higher on the list).

I think I said this up-thread, but I think screwing up the relationship with Blount was his biggest specific mistake. Especially since relationship management with players is his best skill.

Blunt, Ingram, Deebo, etc.
For no good reason. Just like not playing Mike Williams or Preston Smith last season; why go get them? And Fields sitting after game 6.....
Disagreement with Khan/Weidel?
Just really wasteful player resource management leading to wasted picks on useless trades and wasted experiments on projects like Fields.....

Who is actually accountable for these messes?

 

[diver]

Since you brought up Cowher, Cowher has one less playoff win with Neil, Kordell, Maddox, Tomcazk, in 11 seasons, than Tomlin has with Ben in 15 seasons. Cowher also made more AFCCG's with Neil and Kordell, than Tomlin did with Ben. Foles beat Brady, Tannehill beat Brady, Eli beat Brady twice, Flacco beat Brady, Rodgers lost to an inferior QB pretty much every post season, so the "having the lesser QB" is just an excuse, yes you definitely have a better chance to win with the better QB, but a good coach should be able to win one of those games at some point, Tomlin gets beat by double digits every playoff game.

Why did Rodgers lose, but with Steeler fans, Tomlin loses?

 

[Coryea]

Why did Rodgers lose, but with Steeler fans, Tomlin loses?

That was in reference to, the "it's hard to win if you don't have the better QB" I think people put it on Tomlin because different QB's, different OC's, DC's, GM, etc. etc. and all the playoff losses over the past 9 seasons or whatever have looked exactly the same, getting blown out from the start, losing by double digits, not even being competitive.

 

[insaniti]

If you can give me a few QBs who you think were about as good as Ben, we can then examine what their success looked like.

That will give us an idea of what reasonable expectations were with Ben.

It's not going to be that we should have gone to a few more SBs and won a couple of them.

I think the success of Brady and Mahomes has kind of warped the idea of what reasonable expectations are.

I don't need to provide QB's that were as good as Ben because Ben was Ben. Simply unlike any other QB. And success can be determined by more than just Super Bowls. Playoff wins is a start, followed closely by just getting TO the playoffs. You have a HOF QB, who has more 500 yard games than any other QB in the history of the game, threw back to back 6 TD games, is at the top in fourth quarter comebacks, and you're telling me the best you can do is 7-8 in 15 years with him as your QB? And the success of Brady and Mahomes have nothing to do with judging Tomlin. Josh Allen has missed the playoffs once in his career, his rookie year. He's failed to win a playoff game once, his second year. When you have a franchise QB, a legit HOF QB, you are expected to win playoff games.

Tomlin ignored the OL in favor of adding skill positions, he runs this insane 2 DL defense that can't stop good rushing teams, and the fact that the defense has looked the same since LeBeau left, and the offense has looked the same since Haley left, just shows you that despite there being different people in the position of OC and DC, Tomlin dictates how we play. He claims to not live in his fears, and constantly coaches not to lose. Keep the game close and win it in the fourth quarter. And that is how you lose to teams that you shouldn't lose to, and put yourself into situations where you need help to get into the playoffs. That is the Tomlin mantra.

 

[gk1951]

Signing Aaron Rogers will not make the”system” better. All it will do is make the circus a three ringer!

 

[diver]

That was in reference to, the "it's hard to win if you don't have the better QB" I think people put it on Tomlin because different QB's, different OC's, DC's, GM, etc. etc. and all the playoff losses over the past 9 seasons or whatever have looked exactly the same, getting blown out from the start, losing by double digits, not even being competitive.

Yeah. I agree with you for the most part. I just know the QB play, even with Ben, hasn't been great since they beat the Jets in the AFCC game. And you more often than not need great play there to advance through the playoffs and too the Super Bowl.

 

[stillwright]

Did he?

Or did he just get incredibly lucky to have an elite QB drop to 11 because it was maybe the deepest draft for very-high level QB talent ever (and the Browns decided to draft a TE despite needing a QB)?

He drafted Ben didn't he? It was being reported he wanted Andrews but after Rooney swung the conversation back around to Ben they decided to go with the QB.

 

[Badcat]

He drafted Ben didn't he? It was being reported he wanted Andrews but after Rooney swung the conversation back around to Ben they decided to go with the QB.

A decision that put them from drafting 11th to 30th. Pretty damn great decision.

 

[Ron Burgundy]

Blunt, Ingram, Deebo, etc.
For no good reason. Just like not playing Mike Williams or Preston Smith last season; why go get them? And Fields sitting after game 6.....
Disagreement with Khan/Weidel?
Just really wasteful player resource management leading to wasted picks on useless trades and wasted experiments on projects like Fields.....

Who is actually accountable for these messes?

Shades has a history of lying to players to get them here and dicking them off once the season starts.

 

[Ron Burgundy]

Signing Aaron Rogers will not make the”system” better. All it will do is make the circus a three ringer!

Yup, I can’t wait. See my post above.
Every game will be fireworks night when Rodgers calls audibles, runs play action, and throws over the middle. Shades don’t play that risky ****.

 

[Ron Burgundy]

That was in reference to, the "it's hard to win if you don't have the better QB" I think people put it on Tomlin because different QB's, different OC's, DC's, GM, etc. etc. and all the playoff losses over the past 9 seasons or whatever have looked exactly the same, getting blown out from the start, losing by double digits, not even being competitive.

Scores 35 to 42 points in playoff games and still loses.
“But Ben had turnovers.” - Tomlin Fan Club
Right, so you see why Shades is very risk-averse now, but the results are still the same.

 

[NorthernBlitz]

I don't need to provide QB's that were as good as Ben because Ben was Ben. Simply unlike any other QB. And success can be determined by more than just Super Bowls. Playoff wins is a start, followed closely by just getting TO the playoffs. You have a HOF QB, who has more 500 yard games than any other QB in the history of the game, threw back to back 6 TD games, is at the top in fourth quarter comebacks, and you're telling me the best you can do is 7-8 in 15 years with him as your QB? And the success of Brady and Mahomes have nothing to do with judging Tomlin. Josh Allen has missed the playoffs once in his career, his rookie year. He's failed to win a playoff game once, his second year. When you have a franchise QB, a legit HOF QB, you are expected to win playoff games.

Tomlin ignored the OL in favor of adding skill positions, he runs this insane 2 DL defense that can't stop good rushing teams, and the fact that the defense has looked the same since LeBeau left, and the offense has looked the same since Haley left, just shows you that despite there being different people in the position of OC and DC, Tomlin dictates how we play. He claims to not live in his fears, and constantly coaches not to lose. Keep the game close and win it in the fourth quarter. And that is how you lose to teams that you shouldn't lose to, and put yourself into situations where you need help to get into the playoffs. That is the Tomlin mantra.

Sounds like you understand that looking at his peers will show that we outperformed reasonable expectations for a HoF QB that isn't in the conversation for being the GOAT.

I've done this before, and what it generally shows is:

1. Ben won a lot throughout his career. Including under Tomlin. Probably at least as much as you'd expect when you compare to anyone but Brady and Mahomes.
2. Ben has a higher INT% in the playoffs than his peers.
3. Ben's increase in INT% in the playoffs is higher than his peers (it makes sense that INT% is higher in the playoffs than reg season, because you're only playing the best teams).
4. This one is hardest to nail down, but I think Ben produced more magic than any QB I've ever seen (I agree that he was very special)
5. The other edge on that sword, is that I think Ben's been responsible for more DTDs than his peers in the playoffs.
6. Another one that's hard to know, but my guess is that Ben likely starts slower than his peers in the playoffs. IMO that was critical in the Jax game. Where we knew that the D was outmatched without 50. And we needed the O to start fast to take their running game away. Instead, we sucked on offense any time the game was within 2 scores (in both games that year).

It's also interesting that Ben could amass all of those accolades that you point out when almost all of his career was played under Tomlin. Especially when you look at the difference in his production under Tomlin and Cowher (Kenny threw considerably more than Ben did across their first two years...but Ben was amazing and Kenny isn't an NFL starter).

I think the reason that we didn't win more under Ben (even though we won as much or more than anyone but Brady and Mahomes) is because Ben is a high variance player. And the best way to win with a high variance player is to limit the number of plays they have and hope that you flip heads more than tails. This is exactly how Cowher played with Ben. But as he took up more and more of the cap%, you can't really justify not having him throw more and more.

Ultimately, I'll always be grateful that I got to watch all of Ben's career. I think you're right that he was one of a kind. And while he was maddeningly frustrating at times, I don't think I ever really felt out of a game when he was under center (even the debacle of the CLE game).

 

[NorthernBlitz]

He drafted Ben didn't he? It was being reported he wanted Andrews but after Rooney swung the conversation back around to Ben they decided to go with the QB.

It's hard to know if he drafted him or not.

Rooney said that he made the call and Bill wanted Andrews.

Bill said that he was always on board with Ben (but I think he only rebutted Dan after he passed).

Either way, my point was that we were insanely lucky that Ben fell to us. That's a once in a lifetime draft for QBs (probably less frequent). And we still needed the Browns to be the Browns. It's not surprising that we haven't been able to repeat that. Especially since it's only been a handful of years since we have been looking for a QB (because we had Ben). And we tend to pick later than 11.

I think we'd all agree that if the Browns didn't go for the "soldier" at TE, Cowher ends with no SBs. Because we won because of Ben...even though we didn't use him all that much. Right?

 

[NorthernBlitz]

A decision that put them from drafting 11th to 30th. Pretty damn great decision.

Drafting Ben was certainly the right decision (thanks Browns!).

It's hard to know how that decision was made because there are contradictory stories from Rooney and Cowher.

But I generally believe that the Steelers make big decisions like that collaboratively (Owner, GM, HC).

 

[Badcat]

Drafting Ben was certainly the right decision (thanks Browns!).

It's hard to know how that decision was made because there are contradictory stories from Rooney and Cowher.

But I generally believe that the Steelers make big decisions like that collaboratively (Owner, GM, HC).

To be honest, I don't think Art II has as much say as Mr. Dan Rooney did. I could be wrong, but Art II doesn't come across as big a football guy as his Dad was in terms of knowing how to put a winning team together. Mr Dan Rooney built teams on doing things the Steeler way, bringing in kids and developing them as players and men with a common mindset and sense of unity with the city. I just don't see that anymore.

 

[insaniti]

Sounds like you understand that looking at his peers will show that we outperformed reasonable expectations for a HoF QB that isn't in the conversation for being the GOAT.

I've done this before, and what it generally shows is:

1. Ben won a lot throughout his career. Including under Tomlin. Probably at least as much as you'd expect when you compare to anyone but Brady and Mahomes.
2. Ben has a higher INT% in the playoffs than his peers.
3. Ben's increase in INT% in the playoffs is higher than his peers (it makes sense that INT% is higher in the playoffs than reg season, because you're only playing the best teams).
4. This one is hardest to nail down, but I think Ben produced more magic than any QB I've ever seen (I agree that he was very special)
5. The other edge on that sword, is that I think Ben's been responsible for more DTDs than his peers in the playoffs.
6. Another one that's hard to know, but my guess is that Ben likely starts slower than his peers in the playoffs. IMO that was critical in the Jax game. Where we knew that the D was outmatched without 50. And we needed the O to start fast to take their running game away. Instead, we sucked on offense any time the game was within 2 scores (in both games that year).

It's also interesting that Ben could amass all of those accolades that you point out when almost all of his career was played under Tomlin. Especially when you look at the difference in his production under Tomlin and Cowher (Kenny threw considerably more than Ben did across their first two years...but Ben was amazing and Kenny isn't an NFL starter).

I think the reason that we didn't win more under Ben (even though we won as much or more than anyone but Brady and Mahomes) is because Ben is a high variance player. And the best way to win with a high variance player is to limit the number of plays they have and hope that you flip heads more than tails. This is exactly how Cowher played with Ben. But as he took up more and more of the cap%, you can't really justify not having him throw more and more.

Ultimately, I'll always be grateful that I got to watch all of Ben's career. I think you're right that he was one of a kind. And while he was maddeningly frustrating at times, I don't think I ever really felt out of a game when he was under center (even the debacle of the CLE game).

Cowher had Ben for 3 years, comparing 3 years to 15 years worth of production is pretty dumb. Comparing how the two coaches used Ben is also dumb, as Cowher never had that seasoned vet in his prime version of Ben. You keep talking about Ben's peers, but how many sure fire HOF players at QB in the AFC were there? Rivers? Manning, Brady...It's not like it was littered with all pro's.

Keep coming up with excuses for Tomlin not winning more, you can love him and think he's not the problem, but the rest of us, and the national media are starting to see the real issue with the Steelers...