Steelers Hire Vikings’ Tomlin As Head Coach
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.
PITTSBURGH —Mike Tomlin, the defensive coordinator of the Minnesota Vikings, was hired by the Pittsburgh Steelers — the first black head coach in the team’s 74-year history.
He accepted the job Sunday night and the hiring was announced yesterday, with the contract to be completed later in the day. He was negotiating a fouryear contract expected to pay him about $2.5 million a year.
Tomlin, the team’s third coach in 38 years, was hired on the same day two black coaches made the Super Bowl for the first time: Lovie Smith in Chicago and Tony Dungy in Indianapolis. Tomlin was once an assistant under Dungy at Tampa Bay.
Tomlin also may have benefited from the NFL’s so-called Rooney Rule. Steelers owner Dan Rooney successfully lobbied in 2002 for a rule that requires all NFL teams to interview minority candidates for coaching jobs. After a successful first season as Minnesota’s defensive coordinator, Tomlin’s name was one of about a dozen on a list of qualified minority candidates given Rooney at a mid-December meeting in New York. Rooney is the chairman of the NFL’s committee on workplace diversity.
