The lethal combination of Tomlin and Rooney

FWIW, I'm hoping that this is the last year we have to keep playing the greatest hits on the "Tomlin vs. Cowher" arguments. Seems like we're all just trying to get it in one last time for old time's sake.



I'm excited for the change here. I think it will probably lead to a worse result than last year. But I also think we had a lot of things break right last year.

 

Winning the super bowl is very hard.It took 20 years for Andy Reid,Kyle Shanahan is still without one,Marv Levy did not win a single one despite 4 super bowl berth and I can name several other examples

But winning a playoff game look harder in the last 9 seasons....

 

**** off!

 

I don't care when was the last time he played a playoff game without turning the ball over .

 

That doesn't stop you from glazing him like he's Chuck Noll .

 

Sorry it came off that way. ETA: especially "biased" was taken to mean "<insert something here>__ist". I meant "biased" as defined by Merriam-Webster "exhibited or characterized by unreasoned judgement". Because I think the data pretty clearly shows they are similar.

Also in the edit (not going to write this again...all stuff in italics is edited to add): I do (obviously I think?) believe the my opinion is the superior opinion to have. Otherwise, I would hold a different opinion (which I would believe was superior). I think when you look at the data, they are close to each other. Again...I think it's fair to say either is the better coach. The data can be sliced in different way to make either look better. But I don't think the data can say that one is a lot better than the other. That feeling one is much better than the other would be based on more subjective or emotional criteria (which is how I would define "unreasoned judgement" above).

I think the comment I made is supported by the data. Which is why I think it's the superior opinion

That it's reasonable to either favor one.

But pretending there's a large difference is probably driven by emotion. Which is probably not surprising since "fan" is short for "fanatic". We all do it...it might be why I think Ben is clearly better than Brees. I have lots of data that confirms my belief, but I think when we're emotional about stuff (and I'm emotional about the Steelers), it's sometimes hard to really know if I had the belief before the data, or the data before the belief. Which is why I'm still sorry in the first line even if the word "biased" wasn't taken to mean "prejudiced" or whatever.

I think that's pretty true.

Re: non-losing seasons. I think this is mostly a trivia question. But it is pretty impressive. So impressive that even a very good coach like Cowher didn't do it even though he coached for 4 fewer seasons (that's ~ 26% of Cowher's total time as HC). I agree that it would be less impressive if Tomlin only did it with Ben. But one of those seasons was mostly Mason/Duck/Mason, with a small bit of Ben at the beginning. I don't remember every starting QB combination Cowher had, but I don't think he ever had QBs that bad. I'm also not sure he had QBs as bad as the Mitch/Kenny or the Kenny/Mitch/Mason seasons. But at the end of the day, not having losing seasons isn't really the metric for what makes a coach great.

And I don't think Tomlin was a great coach.

I also don't think Cowher was a great coach.

I wouldn't put either in the Hall.

The selection committee already disagreed with me on Cowher.

I won't be surprised if they disagree re: Tomlin too. Especially since a big part of this is that it's a popularity contest with the sports media folks...and I get the feeling they like Tomlin. Just like I think being part of sports media really helped Cowher get in. I think losing the popularity contest is why BB didn't get in on the 1st ballot (which he obviously deserves...and I think Tomlin doesn't - on any ballot). I also think it's the reason Ben is (or at least should be) worried about the 1st ballot. And it will be ridiculous if he misses.

If you want to look at playoff success/failure...I also think that there should be some metric that looks at playoff success/failure relative to regular season seeding. Because I think your regular season seeding is probably a better metric for team talent relative to the league than a single-elimination tournament. NFL seasons are still short relative to every other sport, so we never really have large samples, but regular season record is probably the closest thing we have to "true" talent(+coaching) relative to the rest of the league.

Cowher did more in the playoffs. But he also had higher seeded teams. AND he also won with a 6th seed. Which had never been done before that.

I don't think we ever had a 1 seed with Tomlin. And I think we only had one 1st round bye.

Again...I don't really think one is a better coach than another. In the grand scheme of things, I think the data says they're in the same tier.

Both very good coaches. I don't think either is a great coach who did anything revolutionary (i.e. "can't tell the story of the league without the coach"). And I think that should be the bar for the Hall (e.g., Bill Walsh inventing / popularizing the west coast offense).

To me the only coach we've had who deserves to be in the hall when I was really following the team by that metric is Dick LeBeau re: the zone blitz defense. I guess technically Noll too, since I was watching (but not deeply following) the team for the last couple years of his tenure.

 

I wonder if we looked at playoff games across Cowher's and then Tomlin's tenure if we find that any difference in how frequently different teams win playoff games in the AFC?

I don't know the answer to this question.

But I know that when I was looking at something somewhat similar before I got to this site that before last season in the recent AFC: Mahomes, Allen, Lamar, Burrows, and Stroud (who maybe doesn't fit in this conversation) had only lost games to each other in the AFC side of the playoffs (maybe outside of their first playoff experiences).

This model broke down this year becuase it looks like we got two more QBs in the conference who look like they could end up being very good in Nix and Maye (F-the Pats).

 

His last playoff game against the Chiefs he didn't turn the ball over.