ESPN Ranks Tomlin as the 2nd Best Coach in the NFL

Coach Mike Tomlin has been nothing short of spectacular in his four seasons as Steelers head coach. Winning three division titles, taking the team to two Super Bowls and winning one is quite the resume for a guy that wasn’t even on the Steelers radar when they started looking for a head coach after the 2006 season.

With that, Tomlin’s stock has risen all the way up to being the 2nd best coach in the league according to a recent poll done by ESPN of their NFL writers and bloggers. The site voted on Pats coach Bill Belichick as the top coach in the league, and while I can see that, I can also see Tomlin taking the spot over if the Steelers can get to another title game in the next two years and if the Pats stay out of the title game.

Don’t forget, Belichick hasn’t lead the Pats to a SB since 2007, and they haven’t won one since 2004. The Steelers have won two since then – 2005 and 2008 with an appearance in this last years game (2010).

One blogger that for some reason isn’t all that high on Tomlin is Mike Sando, who is the NFC West blogger for ESPN. Here’s the burb about Tomlin from the site, along with what Sando had to say.

Pittsburgh Steelers coach Mike Tomlin was second in the Power Rankings, and the lowest he rated was sixth on NFC West blogger Mike Sando’s ballot. The minus-4 differential from Sando — not a substantial disparity at all — was the largest negative margin relative to final placement in the entire process.

Sando explained his deviance from the pack.

“I favored coaches that walked into tough situations, won relatively quickly and then sustained the improvement over more than one season,” Sando said in a statement issued through an NFC West blog spokesman. “Tomlin took over a healthy operation and kept it going. He deserves credit for that — I ranked him sixth — but not as much credit as if he had produced similar results after taking over a struggling franchise.

“We should view the success Bill Cowher enjoyed in a similar context. Both worked for an outstanding organization.”

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