What’s Next: Is Brian Flores the Clear Choice to Replace Mike Tomlin as Steelers HC?

There is a profile for the Steelers and hiring head coaches, if you can say that about something that happens every 19 years.

Three coaches in 57 years is amazing. The Vatican has twice as much turnover. The Supreme Court has swapped out six of nine justices — all on lifetime appointments — since the Steelers last hired a head coach.

But if you look at their history, all with the Rooney family guiding the franchise, it’s a clear pattern:

• Chuck Noll was 37 and the Indianapolis Colts’ defensive coordinator when Pittsburgh hired him in 1969. 
• Bill Cowher was 35 and the Kansas City Chiefs’ defensive coordinator when Pittsburgh hired him in 1992. 
• Mike Tomlin was 34 and the Minnesota Vikings’ defensive coordinator when Pittsburgh hired him in 2007.

Young, defensive minds who have never been a head coach. All three won Super Bowls with the Steelers, so it’s hard to question their judgment or the longevity that comes with the job. Noll went 1-13 in his first year and had a losing record his first four seasons, but there was patience. Neither Cowher nor Tomlin required any, finding immediate, sustained success.

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If you’re trying to follow that pattern to the letter, the answer is probably Los Angeles Chargers defensive coordinator Jesse Minter, a little older at 42, but it feels like Minter has a history with the Ravens, where he coached from 2017-20. Maybe it’s Los Angeles Rams defensive coordinator Chris Shula, 39, whose name and roots could lead him, in sheer poetry, to the Dolphins.

But if you’ll drift a little from that profile, the candidate who makes the most sense might be Brian Flores.

Flores is 44 and has been the Vikings’ defensive coordinator for the last three years. Minnesota has had a top-10 defense each of the last two years. It was tied for second in the NFL with 60 sacks this season, and his contract is up, making him available and coveted by many teams.

Flores spent a year on Tomlin’s staff in 2022 as linebackers coach and senior defensive assistant, and Pittsburgh finished that season by winning six of its last seven games and holding all seven opponents to 17 points or fewer. This year’s Steelers had just five such games, holding teams to 17 or fewer all season.

The situation with Fores is a bit complicated, though, because in 2022, he filed a lawsuit against the NFL and three teams, citing racial discrimination. The suit is still active, but if you were looking for the right place to land, why not Pittsburgh, where the Rooney family that owns the team has its name on the league rule requiring teams to interview minority candidates before making major hires? 

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Flores won four Super Bowls as a New England Patriots assistant, so he knows how championship teams are built. The last time the Steelers made the AFC Championship Game — that’s back in the 2016 season — they ran into New England and the defense Flores helped coach, holding Pittsburgh to nine points until the final five minutes in a 36-17 rout. Flores was underwhelming as a head coach in three seasons with the Dolphins, going 24-25 and missing the playoffs every year.

But Flores’ skills as a defensive coach are clear. His Vikings were seventh in scoring, third in total defense, fourth on third down and second in the red zone. Minnesota won its last five games, holding opponents to 10.4 points per game in that final push, barely missing the playoffs at 9-8 despite starting three different quarterbacks.

Star edge rusher T.J. Watt is 31 and veteran defensive lineman Cam Heyward is 36, but Pittsburgh’s top two defenders in sacks — Alex Highsmith and Nick Herbig — are 28 and 24, respectively, still very much in their prime. There are young players to build around, and the Steelers have two extra third-round picks this year — one from trading George Pickens and the other as a compensatory pick, giving them five picks in the top 100.

The Steelers have many significant issues beyond just finding a head coach. Quarterback Aaron Rodgers is 42, his future uncertain, and a new coach will want to know whether he has to inherit him as part of his new team. Since Ben Roethlisberger’s retirement four years ago, Pittsburgh quarterbacks have combined for 72 touchdown passes (only the New York Giants and Tennessee Titans have fewer), and those two teams have combined for 41 wins, barely more than Pittsburgh’s 39 in that span. In those four years, the Steelers have scored 30 or more points just nine times. Only four teams have fewer such games, and teams like the Detroit Lions and Buffalo Bills have 35 each.

It’s unfair to expect Pittsburgh’s next coach to live up to the ridiculously high standards they’ve set. Two hires ago, they needed a phone line to look up coaches on the Internet, but Flores would give them a chance to reset as a franchise with the same high expectations the franchise has always had on defense.

The AFC North as a whole has a full reset this offseason, with the Baltimore Ravens and Cleveland Browns also searching for new head coaches and the Cincinnati Bengals coming off a 6-11 season that was their worst in five years. Tomlin’s legacy in Pittsburgh has been perennially good teams, avoiding a losing record every season. But his teams also have lost their last seven playoff games, so the cloud of complacency and stagnancy had hung over their middling success in recent years.

Unless they find a real answer at quarterback this offseason, Pittsburgh might have to take a step back before they re-establish themselves as a threat beyond the first round of the playoffs. Flores is the kind of coach who could build the Steelers back as a defensive power, and that long-awaited playoff win might not be far off once they get other things solved.

Greg Auman is an NFL Reporter for FOX Sports. He previously spent a decade covering the Buccaneers for the Tampa Bay Times and The Athletic. You can follow him on Twitter at @gregauman.

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