Teams considering trading for Steelers HC Mike Tomlin.
There’s already a lot of blood on the football team’s hands when it comes to head coaches. To date, three head coaching vacancies have opened up as a result of the firing of head coaches in Las Vegas (Mike Vrana), Los Angeles (Mike McCarthy), and Carolina (Steve Spagnuolo), with two of those franchises also releasing their GMs. “It’s possible,” Fox Sports’ Jay Glazer said, “that there could be four or more vacancies by the time the playoffs begin.”
The Raiders let go of Josh McDaniels, Dave Ziegler and Brandon Staley, and the Chargers let go of Tom Telesco. These moves came on the same day the Panthers let go of Frank Reich. There’s a growing sense of unease in Chicago as Bears first-year coach Matt Eberfels has gone 9-23 in his first two seasons. Dennis Allen hasn’t had a winning record in nearly two seasons as head coach of the Saints. No one’s job is hotter than Atlanta’s Arthur Smith. Even legendary coach Bill Belichick could be on the cusp of leaving the Patriots this offseason.
In all of this chaos, one of the few bright spots is the head coach. Mike Tomlin may be getting his reputation back on track. After dropping four of five going into this weekend, Tomlin delivered a stunning win, Pittsburgh’s first of the season by more than one possession.
When Tomlin was on the brink of his first losing record in Pittsburgh, many thought he was done for good. But his ability to assemble some of the worst rosters in the NFL and still win more games than he loses has the Steelers thinking about extending him yet again.
“Pittsburgh isn’t the only team looking at Mike Tomlin as a future head coach,” Glazer says. “A lot of teams were hoping for a late-season collapse that would make him available after 2023.” With Tomlin’s contract set to expire in the near future, some teams haven’t given up hope of picking up the tenured coach, Glazer says.
It’s been a while since we’ve seen a franchise get acquired.
The last time we saw a head coach through trade was 11 months ago when the Denver Broncos traded a few picks to the New Orleans Saints for the rights to the final year of Sean Payton’s contract. In 2019, Bruce Arians requested a small trade from the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
You have to go all the way back to the late 2000s and early 2000s to find examples of coaches being traded for draft picks, including Jon Gruden and Herm Edwards, as well as Hall of Famers Bill Parcells (Mike Holmgren) and Bill Belichick (Mike Tomlin).
If a team hoped to entice Pittsburgh into a deal that would release Tomlin, it would likely have to build a substantial haul, particularly now that he’s one win away from stretching his winning streak to 17 seasons.
If a team does try to trade for a coach such as Tomlin, it will likely be one that already has plenty of talented pieces. Take the Chargers, for example. They have a lot of talented pieces, but they’ve been unable to find success in recent years. They just spent a first-round draft pick on a franchise quarterback, have a pair of strong, veteran wide receivers, and a talented, versatile running back on the offensive side of the ball. On the defensive side of the ball, they’ve got Derwin James, Khalil Mack, and strong contributors such as Asante Samuel Jr., Eric Kendricks, and Kenneth Murray, but it’s one of the worst units in the league in 2023. A coach like Tomlin — who has a history of building defensive stars in Pittsburgh — could be the spark that finally gets Los Angeles over the hump.
There have even been rumors that the Bills organization has a bad taste in its mouth due to a lack of playoff performance. It seems a bit far-fetched now that the Bills improved their chances of making the playoffs with their third win in a row, but if Buffalo brass thinks it’s the coaching that’s keeping them from making it to the Super Bowl, a deal for Tomlin could be on the table.
This post just opens the floodgates for what promises to be an active off-season. With seven to eight job openings, there’s plenty of room for speculation. Of course, plenty of talented coordinators will be vying for new jobs, but it wouldn’t be a surprise if the two most decorated head coaches in the NFL find themselves on the move in the offseason.
