Coach Tomlin talks Cam Sutton, JuJu, Gilbert situation

Pittsburgh Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin holds his weekly press conferences every Tuesday. Each week, we will take a glimpse at what stood out from coach’s comments about the previous week and heading into the Steelers next game.

Opening Statement

Good afternoon. I’ll start with a quick review of our last performance as I always do. I just thought it was great for us to perform in a manner of which we did and under the circumstances that we did. It was good to be back home. We have not been at home a bunch. I thought it was reasonable for our performance to reflect the venue that Heinz Field is and it did in a lot of ways. The cadence was a weapon for us on offense.

The first big touchdown to Antonio [Brown] was produced on a cadence play. We had a free play there. I thought crowd noise was a factor in terms of allowing our defense to execute.

I thought it was an asset and it was good to see our guys operate and utilize it as such in that environment. I thought as the game wore on, I thought the guys made play after play. I thought that it snowballed and I think that is another good sign. I thought that we built upon momentum throughout the course of the game. I thought we made significant plays in all three phases. I thought the blocked field goal attempt by T.J. Watt was a significant play in terms of maintaining control of the game.

Some things that we can be better at. Something that I think we need to focus on moving forward. I thought we had some one-on-one opportunities in the first half that we didn’t make offensively that could have changed the perspective of that half of play. We had some one-on-one situations that we did not cash in on. Like we talked about during the bye week, we have to do a better job of capitalizing on splash play opportunities. I thought we had some splash play opportunities that we didn’t, whether it was a lack of execution or penalty.

We had a penalty. We had an OPI down the field in one instance, for example. I thought on the defensive side of the ball, I thought we missed too many tackles. It wasn’t necessarily reflected in the run game total but I thought that had potential to be more dominant in the run game had we tackled better.

The same can be said for the big plays. We’re not going to be a dominant group until we minimize big plays and we tackle better. We gave up a big play the first play of the second half. We gave up a couple big plays in Indy. You are going to give up big plays from time to time but we also missed some tackles on those big plays, to be quite honest with you.

We have to get those plays on the ground. We get those plays on the ground we got an opportunity to hold those groups to field goals and that’s oftentimes the difference, of not only being dominant and playing dominant football, but winning games. We’re missing tackles on big plays and allowing people to score. We have to give our red zone defense a chance to operate by making some of those tackles.

Thought it was significant also that [Chris] Boswell hit on a 50-yard field goal. We’ve been challenging him to produce for us and in those opportunities and moments. I thought that was a big one at the end of the half that he was able to give us an additional three points with the 50-yard kick.

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Injury Updates

[Joe] Haden will be out again this week. The others we will watch their participation and the quality of their participation. Some of those guys did not participate in the last game. Those guys being Vance McDonald. We’ll watch him work. Mike Mitchell, we’ll watch him work to see if they are available for this week.

We have a few bumps and bruises from play. JuJu Smith-Schuster has a small hammy injury. It may limit him during the early course of the week. We’ll be watchful and mindful of that. He’s a young guy. He needs to have physical reps in order to perform and perform at an acceptable level. We’ll keep an eye on some of the other bumps and bruises. They may be less significant.

Re: Cameron Sutton’s return

Working is one thing. Playing is another. He has yet to play. Stay tuned…

I’m undecided as to whether he’s even going to play at this juncture. We have some options there in terms of the people we can utilize. We’ll see in terms of the work that we do. Preparation will provide the clarity that we need there.

Playing time aside, is it difficult for you to put much on a rookie corner, even in practice?

Absolutely. We teach from a global perspective. We teach that you have a better chance to execute your assignment if you understand how it fits into the bigger picture – specifically what those around you are doing. So, it’s not unusual for us to ask guys to learn a lot of positions and even execute it in a practice setting, but in a game setting it’s different.

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What was your reaction to the Marcus Gilbert suspension?

I really had no reaction. It’s just an adjustment, and oftentimes that’s the case. Sometimes you’re faced with adversity and the things that you do in terms of how you respond to it define you. Thankfully for us, Chris Hubbard playing is nothing new for us. He’s played a lot this year. He’s done an awesome job of upholding the standard, so from that standpoint, I’m excited for him and excited to watch him meet the standard of expectation.

The nature of the suspension is one where he won’t be in the building on a day-to-day basis, so there won’t be a bunch of interaction. All of those things will probably be answered in terms of when he comes out of it.

Re: Preparing young quarterbacks?

I think the same could be said for any position. And that’s the point I’m making in reference to Cam Sutton. What you see out here in a practice setting is one thing. What you see in a stadium oftentimes is something else. What somebody is capable of displaying in that setting may be very different than what they’re capable of displaying in an in-stadium setting. That’s one of the reasons that I value preseason games, because it is a different venue, a different atmosphere than a practice setting or a scrimmage setting for that matter. It’s more regular season game-like.

So, yes to your question – there are certain answers you can’t get until you put him into a stadium at that position, but my contention is it’s the same at all positions. It’s just probably less noticeable or reportable.

Do you feel like your offense clicked in the second half Thursday night, operating at the efficiency you feel it’s capable of?

I think they’re capable of even more. I’m optimistic. We’ll see. I think we found our rhythm in that game once we got a sense of how Coach [Dick] LeBeau was attacking us, and I think we went on from there. But we’ll have an opportunity to display that readiness and ability to adjust and those skills time and time again as we move forward.

With Chris Hubbard starting, does that limit what you can do with the extra tight end?

It does not. We utilized the extra tight end position when Hub [Hubbard] started weeks back with B.J. Finney. He’s probably as accountable and solid in that area as Hubbard.

Re: Using the extra day of tackling in practice this week

We have, but not in response to…I think there are certain skills that you have to continuously hone and tackling is one of them. It’s not necessarily the tackling itself. Obviously, at this point in the journey there’s not a lot of tackling, if any tackling going on in the practice setting, but the approach, the angles at which you approach the ball carrier, the speed in which you approach the ball carrier, the way that you come to balance and gather yourself, are all things that you can work on and things that we’re focused on with our guys. Their positioning relative to the position of others in pursuit and the knowledge of that is an element of tackling as well.

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Re: Coty Sensabaugh replacing Joe Haden. Not being able to do certain things without Haden:

He was very much above the line, but we expected him to be. That’s the mentality that we have here, but it’s fortified in the play of the men. He’s answered the call. Tyson Alualu has answered the call in the relief of [Stephon] Tuitt on several occasions. Chris Hubbard has answered the call on several occasions. Those guys make that mentality real. His contributions were significant in that area of the game.

The second part to your question is we do what we do. We have that level of expectation in terms of how he performs, so we’re going to play and play in the manner of which we normally play. I think that fortifies for him, our belief in him. We expect him to play at an acceptable level. He should expect us to operate in the way that we normally operate. And both thing occurred on Thursday night.

Do you have a timetable for Haden?

I haven’t looked at it. I just know he’s unavailable this week. I haven’t started asking any of those pointed questions yet.

Do you have to worry about T.J. Watt’s reps and hitting a wall because he’s a rookie?

No, I remember just about daily that he’s a rookie. There are things that go on between he and I that remind me that he’s a rookie. I’m glad that it doesn’t show up as clearly to you. He and all those guys are walking a journey that he hasn’t walked before. Largely, if you look at your calendar, the seasons that they’re used to are coming to a close. They’re getting ready for finals. They’re transitioning to bowl prep etc. etc.

Guys like him and JuJu [Smith-Schuster] and others, they’re moving into uncharted territory. It’s uncharted for them, but it’s not uncharted for us. We’ve been in these circumstances before. We’ve been in these circumstances helping people in their position before, so we’ll make it as tolerable for those guys as we can.

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Re: Being balanced

When I say balanced, I’m talking about capabilities because we’ve got to be able to ring up the scoreboard and get yards and chunks by every and any means. Sometimes we’re going to step into a stadium and people are going to be committed to minimizing our passing game and we’ve got to take that run game when it’s given to us and vice versa. The Tennessee Titans were not going to let Le’Veon [Bell] get going. It was obvious after a short period of time that that was their mentality, so we took what was given to us.

That’s what I mean when I say balance.

You can look at us at any given time and it may represent an imbalance, but I’m talking about capabilities and willingness. We’ve got to be able to cut it and slice it in any way possible, and I believe that we have the schemes and the personnel to do those things.

How do you feel about the pressure your no-huddle places on defenses?

We don’t always do it to apply pressure to defenses. Sometimes in a hostile environment, we might just do it to quell the crowd. We use it at different times for different reasons.


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