While Steelers HC Mike Tomlin is one of the great regular-season coaches of all time, his playoff record lags behind. Such a description is even being generous, especially after last night’s loss. Not only is it Tomlin’s sixth consecutive loss, it is his 11th loss. That loss now moves him into the top-10 coaches in all-time playoff losses in NFL history.
Notably, Ravens HC John Harbaugh was spared of reaching that mark, for now, but will join Tomlin if he fails to win the Super Bowl. The difference is Harbaugh (now) has 10 postseason wins, whereas Tomlin is stuck at eight. He has the third-fewest wins of the 13 head coaches all-time with double-digit losses. The only coaches with fewer are Marty Schottenheimer (5-13) and Chuck Knox (7-11).
Speaking of Schottenheimer, Tomlin is coming perilously close to joining him on another undesirable list. Including five in a row Tomlin now has eight one-and-done postseason appearance with the Steelers. Schottenheimer is the only head coach in NFL history to have more—with nine. So if Tomlin goes one-and-done one more time, he will tie the all-time record for playoff ineffectiveness.
In fact, Mike Tomlin just became the fifth head coach in NFL history to go eight consecutive seasons without a playoff win. Notably, of the previous four to reach that point, none were fired. One, Paul Brown, retired after eight winless seasons. The others—Don Shula (8), Jim Mora (11), and Marvin Lewis (16)—all retained their jobs. That’s still not company that you want to keep.
At 8-11, Tomlin now owns a .421 postseason winning percentage, a far cry from his .630 regular-season record. The remarkable thing is, of course, that before losing seven postseason games in a row, he was 8-4. The Steelers really had something going there for a while—but that was long ago.
Pittsburgh went one-and-done in its first season under Mike Tomlin, but claimed a Super Bowl title in 2008. Two years later, they reached the Super Bowl again, but lost. By them, Tomlin was 5-2. After two-one-and-done playoff runs bookending two years without qualifying at all, the Steelers started getting back on track.
In 2015 Tomlin and the Steelers won their first postseason game since 2010, then a year later won twice to advance to the conference finals for the first time in just as long. Unfortunately, that is not only as far as they’ve gotten since, but the last time they’ve won.
Even the regular season hasn’t been as peachy as it once was of, course. Tomlin’s Steelers have finished below .600 in four consecutive seasons and in six of the last seven. They finished over .600 in eight of his first 11 seasons. Over the past six seasons, the Steelers’ winning percentage is .586, substantially under his career .630 mark.
Largely coinciding with Ben Roethlisberger’s injury, Mike Tomlin has been nothing more than the king of “good enough” with the Steelers. Just good enough to make it to the postseason, but not good enough to win. And not bad enough to land on top of a better quarterback.
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