Winning games matters. Winning press conferences doesn’t. But there’s been a clear trend with Mike Tomlin every Tuesday (or occasional Monday presser). His defense will get dressed down in specific detail of its failings and in detail how it must get better. The offense? Hardly a peep.
It happened after the Jacksonville Jaguars game. Pittsburgh’s defense forced three turnovers but to Tomlin, not the “right kind” of turnovers. One came in Steelers’ territory instead of giving Pittsburgh’s offense a short field to work with. Despite holding a potent Jaguars offense to just 20 points, and the Steelers’ offense managing a meager 10, the defense received most of the criticism in his postgame presser.
In yesterday’s meeting with the media, four days after the Steelers’ 21-18 loss to the New England Patriots, a similar story played out. Both sides should be held accountable for another embarrassing defeat, the offense and defense not playing well enough to achieve victory. Tomlin began his presser with a 90-second dissertation on the defense’s struggles. Poor situational football, not making enough big plays, all valid critiques. Via the team’s YouTube channel, here are his full comments.
“Particularly in the last couple of weeks, I thought our situational defense was significant. Our inability to hold people to field goals in the red area. We’ve talked a lot about it, about the attrition component of the interior portions of our defense at linebacker and sub-package, and what that has done to us in terms of some schematics and some people, and some tight ends have made some significant plays in recent weeks.
“I’m excited about getting a full week opportunity to kind of clean some of that stuff up. First of all, some of the guys that we’re using, it’s reasonable to expect those guys to be better with more exposure. But also we’ll get a full week to kind of craft a plan to highlight what it is that they do well and divide the labor up in a way that can minimize some of those things that have transpired. We got put on a short field a week ago and we weren’t able to hold ’em to a field goal. And really that’s the difference of the outcome of the game. Under normal circumstances, as a defense man, we get off in those tough circumstances. We hold people to field goals. We keep ’em outta the end zone. We play better red zone defense than we have in recent weeks and so we got some work to do obviously there.”
A 90-second breakdown of the defense breaking down. Fair evaluations overall. Then, Tomlin turned to the offense. Considering the Steelers were a team that put up only 18 points, couldn’t even get into field goal range despite ample fourth-quarter chances to do so, and were the side that turned the ball over that led to the short field that the defense couldn’t defend, surely Tomlin had something to say about the offense, right? Drumroll please…
“On the offensive side of the ball, I thought Mitch [Trubisky] picked up his play as the game wore on. I thought that it’s a reasonable expectation for him to be even better because of that experience and because of the experience of having a full week’s prep this week in preparation for the performance. In-helmet reps and things of that nature, full speed reps. Excited about that component of it.”
There ya go. “Mitch got better” was Tomlin’s takeaway. That may be true, hopefully it is true, but not one negative comment about how the offense performed despite its obvious and continued struggles.
It’s been the theme of the season. The defense gets 20 lashes. The offense gets a pat on the back and a “we’ll get them next time.” Tomlin has been extremely protective of this offense, at least in the public view. The question becomes – why?
Expectations, most likely. Tomlin expects more from this Steelers defense. They’re the “A” student sometimes playing at a “B-” level. Pittsburgh’s offense is just trying to color between the lines. Tomlin knows this defense can be really good. He’s just hoping the offense doesn’t lose them the game.
And some of it may relate to Kenny Pickett. Though currently injured and not a factor in the Patriots game, Tomlin’s protective of his franchise quarterback, who has taken plenty of heat this year (and rightfully so). Tomlin has been careful with how he talks about him to the media to avoid creating a storyline of “head coach is critical of his supposed franchise quarterback.” He knows how the media cycle works.
It’s not necessarily the wrong approach from Tomlin. It’s easy to understand his intent. But if you’re a defensive player listening to these pressers, and Tomlin is talking to the locker room, not the media, it’s gotta at least be a little frustrating. The defense has to do its job and it failed in that mission against the Patriots, in the first half anyway, but in Pittsburgh, this offense is above reproach. Even if it’s far below results.
