Michael Pettaway Tomlin is the head coach of the Pittsburgh Steelers of the National Football League. He is the 10th African-American head coach in NFL history and the first for the Steelers franchise. At age 36, he is the youngest head coach to win the Super Bowl. He has never compiled a losing record during his 14 seasons with the Steelers.
About Mike Tomlin in brief
Michael Pettaway Tomlin is the head coach of the Pittsburgh Steelers of the National Football League. He is the 10th African-American head coach in NFL history and the first for the Steelers franchise. Tomlin has led the team to eight playoff runs, six division titles, three American Football Conference championship games, two Super Bowl appearances, and one title in Super Bowl XLIII. At age 36, he is the youngest head coach to win the Super Bowl. His father, Ed Tomlin, played football at Hampton Institute in the 1960s, was drafted by the Baltimore Colts, and later played for the Montreal Alouettes. His mother and stepfather, Julia and Leslie Copeland, who married when Tomlin was six years old, raised him. He graduated from the College of William and Mary, becoming a member of Kappa Alpha Psi fraternity. His coaching career began in 1995 as the wide receiver coach at Virginia Military Institute under head coach Bill Stewart. He was hired as the defensive backs coach for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in 2001, where he first learned the Tampa 2 defense that he would use in later coaching jobs. In 2002 and 2005, the Buccaneers led the NFL in total defense. During Tomlin’s tenure, the defense never ranked worse than sixth overall.
In 2006, he was selected to interview for the vacant head coaching position with the 2005 Super Bowl Champion Pittsburgh Steelers. He replaced Bill Cowher, who retired after spending 15 years with the team. The Steelers owner, Dan Rooney, has served as the head of the NFL’s diversity committee and proposed the Rooney Rule, requiring that teams interview at least one minority candidate when hiring a new head coach. He also interviewed for the head coaching vacancy with the Miami Dolphins, a job that eventually went to Cam Cameron. In contrast, Cowher retained many of his assistants, including defensive coordinator Dick LeBeau, whose defensive philosophy contrasted with Tomlin’s most notably defensive coordinator, Dick Hoak. This was done in order to keep the team’s chemistry with the players since the team was only one year away from winning its first game in team history to win his first game against the rival Cleveland Browns. He has never compiled a losing record during his 14 seasons with the Steelers, and is the third team to win a Super Bowl game in his first year in charge.
You want to know more about Mike Tomlin?
This page is based on the article Mike Tomlin published in Wikipedia (as of Dec. 05, 2020) and was automatically summarized using artificial intelligence.
