Here’s wishing Mike Tomlin a nice, relaxing vacation before the Steelers report to training camp July 25. The pressure on him will increase significantly once the season starts. If the Steelers miss the playoffs for the second consecutive year, he could be fired. The team also could be sentenced to “Hard Knocks” hell.
I’m guessing Tomlin is more afraid of the HBO/NFL Films cameras than he is of losing his job.
The NFL loves “Hard Knocks,” which follows a team through training camp and documents everything. I mean, everything. It is great exposure for a league that thrives on exposure. The behind-the-scenes drama makes for the best reality TV show going.
The problem is NFL coaches and general managers don’t like “Hard Knocks.” They don’t like their business being exposed to the world. They thrive on secrecy. Think Bill Belichick.
That’s why the NFL had to come up with a plan in 2013 that gives the league the power to force a team on “Hard Knocks.” A club is exempt only if it has appeared on the show in the previous 10 years or it has a first-year head coach or it reached the playoffs in either of the previous two seasons. If the Steelers miss the playoffs again and Tomlin isn’t fired — many believe he will get a contract extension before the season — they will qualify for “Hard Knocks” in 2020. They would be perfect for it because of their long history of much success, the six Lombardis. Inquiring minds want to know how they do it.
Art Rooney II, Kevin Colbert and Tomlin would hate it more than you can even imagine.
I would love it.
You would, too, right?
Not that any of us are wishing another bad season on the Steelers.
It’s just that it would be great fun to see the Steelers organization in ways we’ve never seen. Tomlin reacting with the players behind closed doors. Can he be a disciplinarian when he has to be? Tomlin working with Keith Butler. Who really runs the defense? Ben Roethlisberger interacting with his teammates. He can’t be as bad of a leader as many suggested during the offseason, can he? Tomlin and Colbert cutting down the roster. Who is the 54th man on a 53-player roster?
And, of course, JuJu, more JuJu and even more JuJu.
It would be must-see TV.
Maybe not as must-see as this summer’s “Hard Knocks,” but must-see nonetheless.
I thought watching Hue Jackson trying to convince himself that he was the Cleveland Browns’ head coach and interacting with Todd Haley last summer was about as good as it gets. But this season’s show with the Oakland Raiders has the potential to be a blockbuster hit. I don’t want to miss a minute.
Thank you, Mr. Big Chest.
Just seeing how Antonio Brown arrives at training camp in Napa, Calif., will be reason enough to watch. It’s going to be hard to top his arrival at Steelers camp last summer in a helicopter or his arrival in 2017 in a chauffeur-driven Rolls Royce, but I have faith AB will come up with something clever. I’m thinking he might parachute in.
“Hard Knocks” fans also are going to get Jon Gruden, the Raiders’ egomaniacal head coach who is comfortable in front of the cameras. They’re going to get Vontaze Burfict, the dirtiest player in the NFL, a man who Brown accused of wanting “to take me out … kill me … steal my dreams … ruin me … end me” after Burfict’s brutal head hit on him in the 2015 playoffs. They’re going to get Derek Carr, the quarterback who has cried on the field and threatened to fight ESPN analysts off it. And they’re going to get Richie Incognito, the offensive lineman whose past includes allegedly threatening a teammate with racial slurs, throwing a tennis ball and a dumbbell at a gym patron and threatening to shoot funeral home employees while making arrangements for his father.
Not much to see there.
The first “Hard Knocks” show is scheduled for Aug. 6.
I can’t wait.
And if the Steelers have another bad season?
August 2020 won’t get here soon enough.
Ron Cook: rcook@post-gazette.com and Twitter@RonCookPG. Ron Cook can be heard on the “Cook and Joe” show weekdays from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on 93.7 The Fan.
First Published: June 14, 2019, 11:00 a.m.
