Steelers former RB Najee Harris’ telling comments about Mike Tomlin prove his decision to step down was years in the making
Perhaps Mike Tomlin’s decision to step down as Pittsburgh Steelers head coach wasn’t sudden after all.
The prevailing sentiment among Pittsburgh Steelers fans was shock, dismay, and utter disbelief when Mike Tomlin stepped down as head coach. Just this past week, during a radio row hit at the Super Bowl, team captain Cam Heyward told Rich Eisen that minutes before Tomlin’s final team address, he thought they were going to go over the Houston Texans tape and prepare for exit meetings.
Just because it was a surprise to many in and around the Rooney Sports Complex doesn’t mean that it was a surprise to Mike Tomlin. In fact, when you hear what Najee Harris said Tomlin told him before his free-agent departure last offseason, you can start putting two and two together.
Najee Harris says Mike Tomlin told him to leave before free agency in 2025
“He said, ‘Najee, I always talk to you not as if you are a player, but as if you are my son,’” Harris told Marshawn Lynch on his Get Got podcast via YouTube. “‘If you was my son, I would tell you not to come back here’ [Pittsburgh]. I was like, alright bet. It wasn’t no hard feelings or nothing like that.”
Perhaps Mike Tomlin was just being candid with his former first-rounder. We know that players have subscribed to his honesty and straight-cut demeanor over the years. However, Harris and Tomlin we’re very tight.
Harris never missed a game with the Steelers. He was the first and only running back since Adrian Peterson to start his career with four straight 1,000-yard rushing and 5+ rushing touchdowns a season. He was never going to strike a big deal in the free agent market, evidenced by the one-year contract he signed with the Los Angeles Chargers.
Do you think Tomlin would just say see ya to his former first-rounder if he didn’t know the end was near? The Steelers drafted Kaleb Johnson in the third round, but he was inactive for a good part of the season. Kenny Gainwell was the team MVP, but if the Steelers had known he would be that good, do you think they would have signed him to a one-year deal and had him start the season as running back No. 3?
I think not.
Tomlin said in recent years that he was much closer to the end than the beginning. You don’t just wake up the morning after a playoff loss and say, “That’s it.” It’s clear that his resignation was in the cards for a while, and Harris’ comments just add to that.
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