On the outside, it feels like Mike Tomlin’s future hangs in the balance. Internally though, nothing has changed. That’s according to Pro Football Talk’s Mike Florio. Reporting an hour before Saturday’s kickoff against the Cincinnati Bengals, Florio says not only do the Steelers plan to keep Tomlin as head coach, they intend on extending his contract after this season wraps up.
“A lot of noise on the outside,” Florio said on NBC’s pregame kickoff show. “Inside, it’s business as usual. They have no desire to make a change at coach. They have no reason to believe Tomlin wants to go. They actually would like to extend his contract, which runs through the 2024 season. They’d like to get that done before next season begins. He’s already involved in roster planning from this year and the year after.”
Though Florio said it’s “not impossible” for a team to still try and trade for Tomlin, it certainly splashes cold water on The Athletic’s Diana Russini report of “chatter” over teams interested in trading for him.
Tomlin staying in Pittsburgh has always been the most likely scenario. And, as Florio indicates, Tomlin has shown no desire to go elsewhere. The biggest and most interesting question was whether he’d be extended. After signing a three-year deal in April 2021, he was heading into “lame duck” status for 2024. But it’s also common for Pittsburgh to wait until the final year of a coaches (or players, for that matter) contract before working out a new deal. Team president Art Rooney II tamped down concern when Tomlin wasn’t extended this past offseason.
In the article form of his report, Florio says Tomlin hasn’t expressed any unhappiness about his job.
“He’s giving no indication that he’s unhappy or disgruntled or ready for something new,” he wrote.
Publicly, Tomlin has offered a similar sentiment, embracing the challenge of the year. If Florio’s report is to be taken as absolute truth, it’s a matter of when and not if a deal gets done. It’s something Rooney will surely comment on after the season during his “State of the Steelers” address with local media.
But all signs point to Tomlin not only returning to the Steelers’ sideline in 2024 but well beyond that, too. But the results will have to change, a team tracking to not make the playoffs in two straight years and four out of the last six while its last postseason victory occurred in 2016.
