Late in the 2021 NFL season, it came out that Pittsburgh Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin was actually the guy making the defensive gameplans and calling the plays and not then-defensive coordinator Keith Butler. This might not have seemed like a huge surprise but it does help give context to some issues this team has had the past two seasons.
Butler took it a step further when he did an interview on 93.7 TheFan on Monday. He indicated that in the final seasons of Dick LeBeau’s tenure with the Steelers, Tomlin actually took over the bulk of the defensive duties as well.
Really? This seems far-fetched but there’s no reason to believe Butler would make this up. If Tomlin doesn’t trust LeBeau to call plays, who is an icon and defensive genius, will there be any defensive coordinator the team could bring in that he would trust enough to give up control?
Keith Butler on @937theFan says that Mike Tomlin called the defensive plays in the last couple of years of the Dick LeBeau era.
— Andrew Fillipponi (@ThePoniExpress) January 24, 2022
