Losers in five of their last seven games, the Pittsburgh Steelers are 6-6 as December football arrives in the NFL. Their playoff hopes aren’t dead, though they don’t look promising to fulfill after their Week 13 loss to the Buffalo Bills.
As the team spirals toward another disappointing finish under head coach Mike Tomlin, Steelers fans have reached a boiling point with the man who has commanded the ship in Pittsburgh for 18 seasons. Fans in Acrisure Stadium let out “Fire Tomlin” chants on Sunday. Past players, such as James Harrison, have voiced their disappointment in the team’s performance, too.
With Pittsburgh staring down two critical meetings with the Baltimore Ravens and the Cincinnati Bengals surging with the return of Joe Burrow, the Steelers appear to be collapsing with a banged-up quarterback who turns 42 on Tuesday and a defense that can’t find any ground for consistency.
Without a playoff win since 2016, the call from Steelers Nation to move on from Tomlin seems to be understandable for many respected voices across the NFL. Nonetheless, it doesn’t appear that Steelers fans should hold their breath that Art Rooney II will fire Tomlin if the season ends in as sour a state as it seems destined for.
Adam Schefter says Pittsburgh Steelers won’t fire Mike Tomlin despite fan unrest
ESPN NFL Insider Adam Schefter talked about the Steelers' potential for change at head coach multiple times on Monday, echoing many of the same points. The most emphatic of those is that Pittsburgh simply won’t fire its head coach after the season, regardless of how it ends.
“Yeah, maybe the Steelers fans, clearly, have had enough of Mike Tomlin,” Schefter said on The Pat McAfee Show. “They’re not firing Mike Tomlin. That’s not going to happen. We’re not going to get one of these announcements that the Steelers have relieved him of his duties the way that we get from other teams.”
Schefter hasn’t ruled out the possibility of a trade or a mutual parting of ways, both of which have been discussed in recent seasons without much expectation for either to actually happen. The current situation isn’t much different, with five games remaining and a shot at the postseason within reach.
“I’ve always felt like if a change ever occurs there, it’s going to be because Tomlin doesn’t want to be back there,” Schefter said. “I could say, if they didn’t want Mike Tomlin there, and maybe the message is stale, maybe he moves on like Andy Reid, finds a new home.”
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Tomlin has earned the respect to call his shot because of his early success in the postseason and his sustained regular-season success. That’s exactly why the Reid comparison is drawn so often.
Reid left Philadelphia in 2012 and has since built a dynasty in Kansas City. Meanwhile, the Eagles have gone to three Super Bowls with two different head coaches. It worked out for both parties then, and Steelers fans are hopeful for a similar situation with Tomlin out of the picture.
Of course, Reid suffered 8-8 and 4-12 seasons before he moved on from Philadelphia. There’s still a chance, as bleak as it may seem to Steelers fans right now, that Tomlin wraps this season with another winning record.
But that’s the frustration Steelers fans are going through. It feels just as likely for Pittsburgh to lose all five of its remaining games as it is that they win them all. It seems just as likely for them to win the AFC North as it is to finish third in the division. It’s just as likely for Tomlin to part ways with the franchise after another frustrating season as it is for him to stick around for a 19th season.