Cowherd: Brutal Schedule Could Make Mike Tomlin Go Into TV

The NFL certainly did the Pittsburgh Steelers no favors with their final eight games of the 2024 season. They have eight straight games against teams expected to have winning records, 6-of-8 expected to win over 10 games. On paper, it’s the hardest final eight games in the NFL, according to Sharp. All six of their AFC North divisional games come in that span, too.

Sharp said the eight-game stretch is off the charts, and ridiculous difficult for the Steelers. No other team comes close to the gauntlet that the Steelers will face from Weeks 11-18.

The Steelers have the seventh-easiest schedule from Weeks 1-10, so if there’s any year that they can’t afford a slow start, the 2024 season is it.

Colin Cowherd of FS1 recently said the Steelers have a top-5 roster in the NFL, but he thinks their 2024 daunting schedule will be too much for them to handle. He also suggests that Mike Tomlin could leave Pittsburgh after the season, I assume if it’s his first losing season or the Steelers don’t win a playoff game for the eighth consecutive year.

“Did you see the last six quarterbacks Pittsburgh faces?” Cowherd said on his podcast. “[Joe] Burrow, Deshaun Watson, Jalen Hurts, Lamar Jackson, [Patrick] Mahomes, and Burrow. Mike Tomlin is going to be on network broadcasting. And, by the way, I predict he’ll be great. I’ve talked to two network execs who would hire Mike Tomlin tomorrow.”

Cowherd previously mentioned that he thinks the Steelers will win 11 or 12 games in 2024, but it appears the  schedule really altered his outlook on the Steelers’ 2024 campaign.

“That is the toughest schedule I have ever seen, (from) Thanksgiving on, in league history,” Cowherd said.

There had been speculation from national media that Mike Tomlin could look to step aside after the 2023 season, but that obviously didn’t come to fruition. Tomlin is heading into his 18th season as the Steelers head coach, and is expected to have his contract extended at some point this offseason.

At the NFL owner’s meeting in late March, Rob King of Steelers.com asked Tomlin about coaching the Steelers for the foreseeable future. And Tomlin gave an answer that suggests he has more fire now than ever.

“Absolutely. I love what I do. I love where I do it. I love who I do it with. I answer that question rather easily, to be quite honest with you,” Tomlin said. “Certainly, we have things like contracts and things to address. But just in spirit, in terms what I do, the energy I bring to what I do, the desire to step out of that car every day and step into that facility, it hasn’t waned in any way. If it’s done anything different, it has intensified.”