Mike Tomlin Biography | Steelers Coach
Mike Tomlin born Michael Pettaway Tomlin is an American football coach who is the 16th head coach of the Pittsburgh Steelers of the National Football League (NFL), having led the team since 2007.
Tomlin became the youngest head coach in NFL history to lead his team to a Super Bowl championship, with the victory in Super Bowl XLIII on February 1, 2009 against the Arizona Cardinals.
Mike Tomlin Age | How Old is Mike Tomlin
Mike Tomlin was born on March 15, 1972 in Hampton, Virginia, United States. He is 50 years old as of 2022.
Mike Tomlin Height | How Tall is Mike Tomlin
Mike Tomlin stands at a height of 5 feet 8 inches (1.75m) weighing 85 Kg.
Mike Tomlin Family | Mike Tomlin Parents
Tomlin the younger of two sons of Ed Tomlin and Julia Tomlin. His father played football at Hampton Institute in the 1960s, was drafted by the Baltimore Colts, and later played for the Montreal Alouettes in the Canadian Football League.
His farther, Tomlin, died in January 2012 from an apparent heart attack in Ocala, Florida, at the age of 63. However, Mike Tomlin hardly knew his birth father and was raised by his mother and stepfather, Julia and Leslie Copeland, who married when he was six years old.
Mike Tomlin Brother
Tomlin has a brother, Eddie Tomlin, who is three and a half years older.
Mike Tomlin Wife | Mike Tomlin Kiya Winston
Tomlin married Kiya Winston in 1996. The two met while they were students at The College of William & Mary, where Kiya was a gymnast and a pre-med student. The couple got married in 1996 a year after graduating.
Kiya owns a fashion company called Uptown Sweats which focuses on modern custom clothes for older women. The family resides in the Squirrel Hill neighbourhood of Pittsburgh and attends the Christian and Missionary Alliance Church.
Mike Tomlin Children | Mike Tomlin Son
Tomlin has three children. He has two sons, Mason Tomlin, born in 2002 and Michael Dean Tomlin born in 2000 and a daughter, Harlyn Quinn Tomlin, born in 2006.
Mike Tomlin Contract
Tomlin has a three year contract with the PIttsburgh Steelers since April 2021 which runs through 2024.
Mike Tomlin Salary
Mike Tomlin earns an annual salary of $6 million as the head coach of Pittsburgh Steelers.
Mike Tomlin Net Worth
Tomlin has an estimated net worth of $16 million which he has earned from his successful career as a coach.
Mike Tomlin Education
Mike Tomlin graduated from Denbigh High School in Newport News, Virginia in 1990. He then attended the College of William and Mary, becoming a member of Kappa Alpha Psi fraternity. As a wide receiver, Tomlin was a second-team All-Yankee Conference selection in 1994.He graduated with a Sociology degree in 1995.
Mike Tomlin High school and college
Tomlin graduated from Denbigh High School in Newport News, Virginia in 1990. He then attended the College of William and Mary, becoming a member of Kappa Alpha Psi fraternity. As a wide receiver, Tomlin was a second-team All-Yankee Conference selection in 1994.
Mike Tomlin Coaching career
College football
Tomlin’s coaching career began in 1995 as the wide receiver coach at Virginia Military Institute under head coach Bill Stewart. He spent the 1996 season as a graduate assistant at the University of Memphis, where he worked with the defensive backs and special teams.
Following a brief stint on the University of Tennessee at Martin’s coaching staff, Mike Tomlin was hired by Arkansas State University in 1997 to coach its defensive backs. He stayed there for two seasons, and was then hired as defensive backs coach by the University of Cincinnati.
Mike Tomlin NFL
Positions coach
Mike Tomlin 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 (fewest yards allowed per game). During his tenure, the defense never ranked worse than sixth overall. In January 2003, when the Buccaneers won Super Bowl XXXVII, the team recorded a Super Bowl-record five interceptions, three of which were returned for touchdowns.
Defensive coordinator
In 2006, Tomlin was selected by Vikings’ head coach Brad Childress to be his defensive coordinator.
Two of the players on the Vikings roster were older than him, and Tomlin had been a teammate of Vikings’ safety Darren Sharper while at William and Mary. The 2006 Vikings finished with the NFL’s eighth-best overall defense, but had the unusual distinction of finishing as the top-ranked defense against the run and the worst-ranked defense against the pass.
Head coach
After spending 2006 as the Vikings defensive coordinator, Mike Tomlin was selected to interview for the vacant head coaching position with the 2005 Super Bowl Champion Pittsburgh Steelers. With only a year of experience as a defensive coordinator, he was hired on January 27, 2007 to become the sixteenth Steelers head coach.
Mike replaced Bill Cowher, who retired after spending 15 years with the team. Tomlin had also interviewed for the head coaching vacancy with the Miami Dolphins, a job that eventually went to Cam Cameron.
With Mike Tomlin, the Steelers continued a trend of hiring head coaches in their 30s. The others were Chuck Noll (38 in 1969), Cowher (age 34 in 1992), Johnny “Blood” McNally (33 in 1937), Bill Austin (38 in 1966), Jim Leonard (35 in 1945), Aldo Donelli (33 in 1941), Walt Kiesling (35 in 1939), John Michelosen (32 in 1948), and Joe Bach (34 in 1935).
Tomlin is the 10th African-American head coach in NFL history and the first for the Steelers franchise. Dan Rooney, the Steelers owner, 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.
Although Tomlin’s ascension to an NFL head coaching job has been cited as evidence of the rule working as intended, Rooney Rule himself disputes this, as he had already interviewed a minority candidate prior to interviewing Mike Tomlin.
The terms of Tomlin’s contract were not officially released. The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reported a four-year deal paying $2.5 million per year, with an option for a fifth year. Tomlin is the team’s third consecutive head coach to win his first game, and the first in team history to win his first game against the rival Cleveland Browns.
In contrast to Bill Cowher, who only retained longtime running backs coach Dick Hoak from Chuck Noll’s staff (Hoak himself retired just before Cowher’s resignation), Mike Tomlin did retain many of Cowher’s assistants, most notably defensive coordinator Dick LeBeau, whose defensive philosophy contrasted with Tomlin’s. This was done in order to keep team chemistry with the players, since the team was only one year removed from a Super Bowl win at the time of Tomlin’s hiring.
The Steelers finished Tomlin’s first season as head coach with the top-ranked defense in the NFL. He led the Steelers to the 2007 AFC North Division championship and a 10–6 record in his first year as head coach. The team lost in the first round of the playoffs to the Jacksonville Jaguars, 31–29.
Mike Tomlin began his career with a 15–7 record in regular season play—as did his predecessor Cowher and all-time win-leader Don Shula. He set a Steelers record for most wins, after winning 22 games in his first two seasons as head coach; in addition Tomlin became the first Steelers coach to win division titles in his first two seasons.
When the Steelers defeated the Baltimore Ravens in the 2008 AFC Championship Game, Tomlin became the youngest NFL head coach to lead his team to a Super Bowl. Tomlin also became the third African-American to coach a team to the Super Bowl, following Chicago’s Lovie Smith and Indianapolis’s Tony Dungy, the two opposing coaches in Super Bowl XLI.
After two seasons, with a record of 22-10, Tomlin was the winningest head coach in Steelers history based on a win percentage (68.8%).
On January 29, 2009, he was named the 2008 Motorola NFL Coach of the Year. On February 1, 2009, at age 36, he became the youngest head coach to win the Super Bowl when the Steelers defeated the Arizona Cardinals in Super Bowl XLIII. The previous record was held by Jon Gruden, who was 39 when he won Super Bowl XXXVII with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
Coincidentally, Mike Tomlin was the defensive backs coach under Gruden when the Buccaneers won the Super Bowl and was a key component for the success they received that year.
On July 13, 2010, he signed a three-year contract extension with the Steelers. In the 2010, Tomlin coached the Steelers to a 12-4 record and led them to the Super Bowl for the second time in three years. In Super Bowl XLV the Steelers lost to the Green Bay Packers 31-25.
Tomlin won his 50th game as the Steelers head coach with a 24–17 victory over the Cincinnati Bengals on November 13, 2011. Of the Steelers’ 16 head coaches in franchise history, Tomlin was the fourth to reach this milestone. On July 24, 2012, he received a three-year contract extension through the 2016 season. The financial terms were not disclosed.
The Steelers finished 8–8 in the 2012–2013 season after struggling with injuries to quarterback Ben Roethlisberger and the offensive line and adjusting to the system of new offensive coordinator Todd Haley. It was the second time that the Steelers failed to make the playoffs under Tomlin’s tenure as head coach.
On November 28, 2013, facing the Baltimore Ravens in a primetime Thanksgiving Day game with major playoff implications, Tomlin became the subject of controversy when video replay showed him possibly interfering with a kick return.
With the Steelers trailing, 13–7, in the third quarter, he stood just off the field along the visiting team’s sideline as Baltimore’s Jacoby Jones broke free on a kickoff return for a potential game breaking touchdown.
Mike Tomlin, with his back to the approaching play, appeared to glance over his shoulder then place his foot briefly onto the field as he jumped out of the way, causing Jones to veer inside where he was tackled. Several Ravens players claimed Tomlin had intentionally interfered with Jones; if officials had agreed, a touchdown could have been awarded to the Ravens based on the palpably unfair act.
However, no penalty was called for interference or for standing in the white border area reserved for the officiating crew. Whether it was intentional or not, Mike was widely criticized in the media.
Following the game, he defended himself, stating he had simply wandered too close to the field while watching the play on the stadium’s Jumbotron, a mistake he said coaches often make. The league subsequently announced it was investigating the matter, with the potential of a heavy fine and forfeited draft pick.
On December 4, 2013, the NFL announced that they had fined Mike Tomlin $100,000, and hinted it was considering stripping the Steelers of one or more draft picks because his actions affected the play on the field.
The $100,000 fine is tied for the second-highest for a coach in NFL history, and is also tied for the highest for a coach who does not also have the powers of general manager. Mike Tice the then-Minnesota Vikings head coach was fined $100,000 in 2005 for scalping Super Bowl tickets.
During a game on October 29, 2017, it was announced that Mike Tomlin became the 3rd coach in NFL history to finish with a .500 or better record in his first ten seasons with one team (Steelers). He is only behind Curly Lambeau (Packers) and John Madden (Raiders).
Mike Tomlin Past Teams Coached
- VMI (1995)
Wide receivers coach - Memphis (1996)
Graduate assistant - Arkansas State (1997)
Wide receivers coach - Arkansas State (1998)
Defensive backs coach - Cincinnati (1999–2000)
Defensive backs coach - Tampa Bay Buccaneers (2001–2005)
Defensive backs coach - Minnesota Vikings (2006)
Defensive coordinator - Pittsburgh Steelers (2007–Present)
Head coach
Mike Tomlin Record
- Regular season: 125–66–1 (.654)
- Postseason: 8–7 (.533)
- Career: 131–71–1 (.648)
Mike Tomlin House | Mike Tomlin and Omar Epps
It has been remarked that Mike Tomlin resembles actor Omar Epps, a resemblance that was referenced on an episode of the TV series House in November 2009, in Episode 8 of Season 6, “Ignorance Is Bliss”, when House mentions feeling like Mike Tomlin because of having his team back, but probably not as much as Foreman (Epps’s character).
Mike Tomlin Kneeling
Coach Tomlin banned his players from kneeling on the field in protest.