Steeler Fanatic
05-20-2007, 01:11 PM
New article over on cnnsi.com really puts the spotlight on what Tomlin is trying to do in Pittsburgh to get them back into championship shape.
You can read the article here (http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2007/writers/peter_king/05/15/tomlin0521/) .
A couple of quick hits that I thought were cool, though:
Steelers chairman Dan Rooney hired Tomlin for the same reason that Tony Dungy, then the Tampa Bay coach, hired him six years ago. They looked past his age -- something a few college programs couldn't get beyond -- and saw another Noll, a teacher. "He can make anyone understand what he's teaching," Dungy says. "That's the essence of what a coach needs to do at any level."
Just what a young, hungry team needs.
Tomlin got the job because of these traits: He welcomes change and does not shy from confrontation; he gets players to perform at a higher level than they had been before he coached them; and he has great determination to win, which can be described as about midway between Noll's quiet hatred of losing and Cowher's spitting fury in the face of defeat. "I am a sick competitor," Tomlin says.
A must have for any coach in the NFL.
And not a bad tactician, either. In his lone season as a coordinator, he took the same basic cast in Minnesota that finished 19th in the NFL against the run in 2005 and rebuilt it into a stone wall. Since the 1970 AFL-NFL merger, only one team allowed fewer than the 985 rushing yards the Vikings gave up last year.
This is one of the things that has me most excited about Tomlin, his ability to make the people around him better. He takes good players and makes them great. That's one of the traits all the truly great coaches have, and I think the Rooneys have a pretty good track record over the past 40 years or so of pciking coaches who embody the tough spirit that lives in every Pittsburgh fan.
Noll didn't lose sleep over what his players thought of him, and you get the feeling Tomlin will be like him in that way too. "You know what's funny?" Tomlin said late last Saturday, not sounding at all as if he thought it was funny. "People keep asking the players what they think of me. It's irrelevant. Their job is to play. My job is to evaluate them."
That's my kind of coach right there. :D
You can read the article here (http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2007/writers/peter_king/05/15/tomlin0521/) .
A couple of quick hits that I thought were cool, though:
Steelers chairman Dan Rooney hired Tomlin for the same reason that Tony Dungy, then the Tampa Bay coach, hired him six years ago. They looked past his age -- something a few college programs couldn't get beyond -- and saw another Noll, a teacher. "He can make anyone understand what he's teaching," Dungy says. "That's the essence of what a coach needs to do at any level."
Just what a young, hungry team needs.
Tomlin got the job because of these traits: He welcomes change and does not shy from confrontation; he gets players to perform at a higher level than they had been before he coached them; and he has great determination to win, which can be described as about midway between Noll's quiet hatred of losing and Cowher's spitting fury in the face of defeat. "I am a sick competitor," Tomlin says.
A must have for any coach in the NFL.
And not a bad tactician, either. In his lone season as a coordinator, he took the same basic cast in Minnesota that finished 19th in the NFL against the run in 2005 and rebuilt it into a stone wall. Since the 1970 AFL-NFL merger, only one team allowed fewer than the 985 rushing yards the Vikings gave up last year.
This is one of the things that has me most excited about Tomlin, his ability to make the people around him better. He takes good players and makes them great. That's one of the traits all the truly great coaches have, and I think the Rooneys have a pretty good track record over the past 40 years or so of pciking coaches who embody the tough spirit that lives in every Pittsburgh fan.
Noll didn't lose sleep over what his players thought of him, and you get the feeling Tomlin will be like him in that way too. "You know what's funny?" Tomlin said late last Saturday, not sounding at all as if he thought it was funny. "People keep asking the players what they think of me. It's irrelevant. Their job is to play. My job is to evaluate them."
That's my kind of coach right there. :D