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Noll, Cowher, Tomlin…fire them all!

Hypocycloids

Hypocycloids

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Yeah, we wanted them all fired. And 2 have been vindicated.
Now that Tomlin has departed and things have calmed down, will vindication ever become a consideration amongst yinz?


Noll
Tenure 23yrs.
Yes, by the late 1980s and early 1990s, especially after the dynasty era faded, many Steelers fans and media began calling for Chuck Noll's firing due to years of mediocrity and playoff droughts, though there was also deep respect for his four Super Bowl wins and legendary status, with some fans defending him until his retirement in 1991.


Four Super Bowls. Enough said.
VINDICATED


Cowher
Tenure 15yrs.
Yes, many Steelers fans wanted Bill Cowher fired, especially in the early 2000s, due to playoff disappointments, home AFC Championship losses, and perceived underachievement with talented rosters, and losing crucial AFC Championship games at home before his eventual Super Bowl XXXIX win and resignation in 2007.

Eventually won ‘one for the thumb’.
VINDICATED

Tomlin
Tenure 19yrs.
Yes, many Steelers fans wanted Mike Tomlin fired, especially after recent playoff losses, leading to "Fire Tomlin" chants due to frustration with perennial underachievement despite never having a losing season. While some fans expressed discontent over playoff exits and lack of Super Bowl appearances, others acknowledged his ability to consistently win games and navigate tough situations, though the recent wild-card loss reignited calls for change before his eventual resignation.

Won a Super Bowl. An entire career having no losing seasons is still something. It’s never been done, despite having teams having no business reaching .500…this year included.
VINDICATED
 
There's a big difference between all 3 coaches.....

Noll built the greatest NFL team of All-Time.....they all retired....he was actually very close to rebuilding that team to a Super Bowl Contender in the late 80's.....if my memory serves me correctly they lost a nail biter to Denver in the Divisional Round by 1 point. In the off-season he lost all 3 coordinators to other teams for coaching poisitions but he had the team ready to contend for a Super Bowl for those who think the game passed Chuck by they were wrong!

Bill Cowher - Finally figured out you needed to play to win the game and not play turtle ball. The guy had nothing but journeymen QB's until Big Ben arrived.....Cowher stepped down because of his wife's progressively worse cancer diagnosis. He chose family over football while trying to care for his wife who died months after his retirement and his 3 children.....one who was still in High School. I hated how his career ended because he finally had a franchise QB. If Cowher stayed I think they would have won a couple more! Cowher's troubles in the late 90's were due to some terrible assistant coaches and the GM Tom Donahoe. Remember Ray Sherman?

Mike Tomlin - Was gifted a Super Bowl contender team with an All-Pro Roster both offensively and defensively! He won 1 Super Bowl and made it to another. Once the core of Cowher-Era players were gone his teams consistently under achieved. He was never able to rebuild that team into a serious SuperBowl Contender even with the 3 B's and the most high powered Steelers offense in Franchise History! He continued to hire sub-par Assistant Coaches. I'll agree with James Harrison & Terry Bradshaw when it comes to Mike Tomlin. He was ok but not as good as Cowher or Noll. As for the no losing season.....yeah ok....8-8 is not what I'd call a winning season! If Mediocrity is the new Standard that doesn't work for me!
 
Chicoman said:
Mike Tomlin - Was gifted a Super Bowl contender team with an All-Pro Roster both offensively and defensively!
Click to expand...
Yeah he was gifted a team that went 8-8 the year before he took over. Minor detail.

BTW, can anyone believe that Cowher is almost 69? That guy still looks good.
 
Fans forget a couple important details about that last season of Bill Cowher at 8-8.
Ben had a terrible motorcycle accident that almost cost him his life.
He suffered through an emergency appendectomy as well.
I’d say Ben was anything but 100% for that 2006 season and contributed greatly to the 8-8 season.
 
Hypocycloids said:
. An entire career having no losing seasons is still something. It’s never been done, despite having teams having no business reaching .500…this year included.
VINDICATED
Click to expand...

Yeah but to me that benefitted Tomlin and not the Steelers.
It's a great achievement for Tomlin but for the majority of 19 years it gave the Steelers no championships and guaranteed them a crappy draft pick every year which hamstrung rebuilding.
 
Hypocycloids said:
Yeah, we wanted them all fired. And 2 have been vindicated.
Now that Tomlin has departed and things have calmed down, will vindication ever become a consideration amongst yinz?


Noll
Tenure 23yrs.
Yes, by the late 1980s and early 1990s, especially after the dynasty era faded, many Steelers fans and media began calling for Chuck Noll's firing due to years of mediocrity and playoff droughts, though there was also deep respect for his four Super Bowl wins and legendary status, with some fans defending him until his retirement in 1991.


Four Super Bowls. Enough said.
VINDICATED


Cowher
Tenure 15yrs.
Yes, many Steelers fans wanted Bill Cowher fired, especially in the early 2000s, due to playoff disappointments, home AFC Championship losses, and perceived underachievement with talented rosters, and losing crucial AFC Championship games at home before his eventual Super Bowl XXXIX win and resignation in 2007.

Eventually won ‘one for the thumb’.
VINDICATED

Tomlin
Tenure 19yrs.
Yes, many Steelers fans wanted Mike Tomlin fired, especially after recent playoff losses, leading to "Fire Tomlin" chants due to frustration with perennial underachievement despite never having a losing season. While some fans expressed discontent over playoff exits and lack of Super Bowl appearances, others acknowledged his ability to consistently win games and navigate tough situations, though the recent wild-card loss reignited calls for change before his eventual resignation.

Won a Super Bowl. An entire career having no losing seasons is still something. It’s never been done, despite having teams having no business reaching .500…this year included.
VINDICATED
Click to expand...
No on # 3...not even close. Without going into all the details because it's lunchtime...won with Cowher's team, had Ben almost during his whole run, couldn't win anything with the Killer Bs...the list is exhaustive. Then you get into the negative records set...Jesus.
 
I dont get the point of this thread. Justify Tomlins mediocrity as he is somehow validated in your eyes?
In your opinion he is validated.

In others, the guy peaked with the talent he got and never was able to build a contender. It was past time to let him go. That doesn't mean he is terrible or a bad person or useless. It means he is not enough for the Steelers true standard.
 
As they say, time heals all wounds and we won't know the FULL scope of everything until many years down the road.
I vividly remember the end of both Noll and Cowher's tenures, and the circumstances surrounding each.
Going through it is drastically different then looking back at it.
Chances are likely we'll feel differently a few years down the road then we currently do regarding Tomlin.
What will not change are Noll, Cowher, and Tomlin's records, both the regular season and post season.
What will not change are the players each coached, the coordinators each employed on staff, and the GM in place for each tenure.
These are the constants that cannot change.
But soon, more and more information will leak out after people feel more comfortable setting the record straight and correcting misinformation in the media.

For me, with Noll, it was not winning another SB after a decade. As selfish and entitled as that sounds. But Noll was competing, winning playoff games with Mark Malone and Bubby Brister.
For me, with Cowher, it was the cardboard cutout lifeless emotionless statue on the sidelines that final year. No spit flying. No jaw extendedly protruding. It was the ghost of Cowher. But again, Cowher was competing, winning playoff games with Kordell Stewart and Tommy Maddox. And I felt like the biggest turd when the news broke about Kaye's cancer battle.
For me, with Tomlin, it was the waste of talent. It was not winning playoff games against Tim Tebow and Blake Bortles. It was seemingly never utilizing the middle of the field and/or making halftime adjustments. With Noll and Cowher, it was never about scheme and coaching. In Noll and Cowher's lean years, IF they made the playoffs, there was a hope they could win, even if they looked outmatched on paper.
With Tomlin, especially after the 2018 45-42 loss to Jaguars, making the playoffs filled me with despair and hopelessness. Even looking at the roster, I was filled with dread because of the coaching staff.

I sincerely hope there is SOME kind of explanation of something that explains the last decade plus of futility.
Tomlin did deliver #6 for the team and us, anyway you want to slice it, even if we see him as Barry Switzer II.
We can't change what was or wasn't, and we can "what if" until we're all blue in the face.
We can only accept the facts, and hopefully ALL the facts come out sometime down the road and we can fairly and accurately judge Tomlin.
 
I can’t take anyone serious who thinks Cowher won Super Bowl 39. Especially taking the time to do it in Roman numerals 😉.

**** this is sarcasm before anyone who gets their undies in a twist
 
DesertSteel said:
Yeah he was gifted a team that went 8-8 the year before he took over. Minor detail.
Click to expand...

There were obvious reasons for that record, it's not like it was a team bereft of talent and coaches. Tomlin had a SB hangover in 2009 as well.

Out of the last three coaches, Tomlin was left with the best team and left the worst team behind.
 
Noll >> Cowher >> Tomlin

They have been getting progressively worse. That trend HAS to stop now.

I actually think it's pretty easy to find someone better than Tomlin, because I think Tomlin was horrible. So my feeling is the trend will stop and if we can find a QB, things around here might turn around sooner than expected. But we have to have a plan to get a QB. Not just rehash old guys and hope we catch lightning in a bottle.
 
If they would have fired Noll in the mid 80's the team would have been fine... he accomplished little after 1980

Cowher legitimately beat the overwhelming odds to win a late career superbowl with a team he was with for over ten years...

Tomlin did nothing after 2017.. you can make the argument that while he didnt win anything after 08, he at least built the best offense in steelers history with the killer B's, which at least was entertaining, but from 18-25 basically the team was junk..

So Noll and Tomlin were clearly kept too long.. they were not vindicated
 
bermudasteel said:
He'll always be respected and revered in my eyes...
Click to expand...
Fair. Did you want him to continue to be head coach of the Pittsburgh Steelers? That is the question. Two things can be true at once. He us going to the HOF. He wasn't going to win a playoff game here even if he stayed 5 more years.
 
Noll: 13 years with HoF QB, 4 SBs, multiple other players with HoF awards; modest success without HoF QB

Cowher: 2 years with HoF QB, 1 SB, multiple other players with HoF awards; better than average success (several AFCCGs) without HoF QB.

Tomlin: 15 years with a HoF QB, 1 SB, not much else, declining success with HoF QB.
 
Noll: I only saw the end of Noll's career. He seemed to have two eras: the 1969-1984 where he built one of the greatest dynasties in all of sports before a final AFC Championship loss in the 1984 season. The rest of his career was mediocre to bad football.

Cowher: His career was incredibly consistent with a couple of dropoffs. His teams never went more than 3 years without making an AFC Championship game. He achieved this with 3 eras of QBs (O'Donnell, Stewart, and Roethlisberger) and just reloaded his defenses. The lack of Super Bowls stands out.

Tomlin: Tomlin started out hot with one Super Bowl win and two appearances in 4 years. The next segment of his career through 2017 felt like disappointment after disappointent as excellent teams in the regular season couldn't get it done in the playoffs. After a transition period at the end of Roethlisberger's career, Tomlin's final 5 years were just dreadful to watch because of how bad the offense was. While it was impressive he could make the playoffs with these teams, the terrible offense was also a problem he helped create.
 
Litos said:
I dont get the point of this thread. Justify Tomlins mediocrity as he is somehow validated in your eyes?
In your opinion he is validated.

In others, the guy peaked with the talent he got and never was able to build a contender. It was past time to let him go. That doesn't mean he is terrible or a bad person or useless. It means he is not enough for the Steelers true standard.
Click to expand...
I think this is a feel good about Mike Tomlin thread . I won’t rain on their parade. They can run down the street and wave their hands in the air like they just don’t care. Cheer like no man has done before.

Hey I am cheering too , I must have at least spent twenty to thirty minutes running around the living room in my underwear the moment I found out he stepped down. There was thrusts, fist bumps, leg whips, ten toes in I was a big stepper.

I get it I am still partying like it is 1999 with no end in sight.

I won’t fault them for their lists if they don’t fault me for my out of rhythm jubilee as I count down to a new sheriff being in town….
 
fedderone said:
As they say, time heals all wounds and we won't know the FULL scope of everything until many years down the road.
I vividly remember the end of both Noll and Cowher's tenures, and the circumstances surrounding each.
Going through it is drastically different then looking back at it.
Chances are likely we'll feel differently a few years down the road then we currently do regarding Tomlin.
What will not change are Noll, Cowher, and Tomlin's records, both the regular season and post season.
What will not change are the players each coached, the coordinators each employed on staff, and the GM in place for each tenure.
These are the constants that cannot change.
But soon, more and more information will leak out after people feel more comfortable setting the record straight and correcting misinformation in the media.

For me, with Noll, it was not winning another SB after a decade. As selfish and entitled as that sounds. But Noll was competing, winning playoff games with Mark Malone and Bubby Brister.
For me, with Cowher, it was the cardboard cutout lifeless emotionless statue on the sidelines that final year. No spit flying. No jaw extendedly protruding. It was the ghost of Cowher. But again, Cowher was competing, winning playoff games with Kordell Stewart and Tommy Maddox. And I felt like the biggest turd when the news broke about Kaye's cancer battle.
For me, with Tomlin, it was the waste of talent. It was not winning playoff games against Tim Tebow and Blake Bortles. It was seemingly never utilizing the middle of the field and/or making halftime adjustments. With Noll and Cowher, it was never about scheme and coaching. In Noll and Cowher's lean years, IF they made the playoffs, there was a hope they could win, even if they looked outmatched on paper.
With Tomlin, especially after the 2018 45-42 loss to Jaguars, making the playoffs filled me with despair and hopelessness. Even looking at the roster, I was filled with dread because of the coaching staff.

I sincerely hope there is SOME kind of explanation of something that explains the last decade plus of futility.
Tomlin did deliver #6 for the team and us, anyway you want to slice it, even if we see him as Barry Switzer II.
We can't change what was or wasn't, and we can "what if" until we're all blue in the face.
We can only accept the facts, and hopefully ALL the facts come out sometime down the road and we can fairly and accurately judge Tomlin.
Click to expand...


You SIR are3 my hero, well said and excellent post. I appreciate you SIR




Salute the nation
 
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