Pittsburgh Steelers Head Coach Mike Tomlin is heading into his 18th season with the organization. He understands the team's brand of football and has seen the weather get less than ideal in some big games down the stretch. He also hasn't had a losing season during his tenure as head coach in Pittsburgh, but that doesn't mean it's been all sunshine and rainbows. Since 2010, the Steelers have made the playoffs eight times, but in recent years, it seems as if it's always a fight just to get in.
Being in a do or die position every week in December and January is something Steelers fans just expect at this point. Those late season games when playoff chances are dwindling and a loss might end the team's season are stressful, especially when the weather is poor. Tomlin understands the magnitude of late season games. He wants to give his team the best possible chance to prevail when times get tough, so he starts preparing his guys for the worst in the summer.
Former Steelers cornerback, Patrick Peterson was on The Rich Eisen Show where he shared his favorite Tomlin story from the 2023 season. It was Peterson's first year in Pittsburgh. He had heard all of the cliché things about "it don't matter what the weather is," but this stuck out to him.
"I'm like, God, dog, man look, the sky's about to fall. So we still got practice, the horn's still blowing... So coach calls us up, he says, 'Hey man, I just want to get in front of this right now. Yeah, we got bad weather, but there's gonna be some point in time in the season to where on Sunday, it's gonna be bad weather, and if you're not prepared for it, how do you expect to succeed in it?'"
Peterson continued.
"Coach T, he said, 'We're going to get this work in, we're going to prepare ourselves just in case we have to cross this road at that time.' We crossed that road a couple times last year and the team was prepared."
Last season's most notable bad weather game for the Steelers was Week 18 against the Baltimore Ravens with a chance to get the final Wild Card spot in the AFC. The Steelers ended up winning that game 17-10 in the pouring rain. The defense was stout and the run game looked great behind Najee Harris' tough 112 rushing yards.
Peterson also mentioned that some head coaches don't keep the team outside in poor weather. They'll instead opt for an indoor practice or walk through in order to get more quality reps in. Last season was Peterson's 13th season in the NFL, so the fact that he was surprised by Tomlin's decision says a lot.
Steelers Have The Advantage In Bad Weather Games
Practicing with a wet ball as much as possible helps the offense get used to playing in these types of conditions and it showed last season. Mason Rudolph went 18/20 in the the pouring rain for 152 yards and a touchdown in Week 18 last season. The Steelers' elite defense already gives the team an advantage when the weather gets wet and windy and teams resort to the run. Adding Patrick Queen into the mix this year will make the Steelers a tough team to beat in January.
The new scheme Offensive Coordinator Arthur Smith brings to Pittsburgh of running the ball and creating good play-action pass concepts off of the run game is the perfect offense for a late season AFC North game. It still might look ugly, but it can get the job done.
