When Pat McAfee interviewedPittsburgh Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin on Wednesday, Tomlin was as giddy as a schoolgirl about his new quarterback. Tomlin gushed about Aaron Rodgers and really made it feel Tomlin believes having Rodgers on the team is somehow significantly different than the quarterbacks Tomlin has had in the past.

We aren’t buying that. Not because we don’t think Rodgers can still play. He can. But so could Russell Wilson and Justin Fields, both of whom are now starters on other teams and signed big contracts in the offseason. And so could Ben Roethlisberger, who is a first-ballot Hall of Famer.

When you talk about Tomlin and his shortcomings with the Steelers, it all comes down to the postseason. Tomlin won a Super Bowl in his second year as the Steelers head coach with a roster built almost entirely by former head coach Bill Cowher. The Steelers did return to the Super Bowl in 2008 but lost to the Green Bay Packers.

But since 2016, the Steelers have failed to win a playoff game. This means over the last eight years, Tomlin hasn’t been able to win a playoff game. Four of those seasons were with Roethlisberger at quarterback and one of those with the combination of Wilson and Fields. So even if we give Tomlin a pass for the year when Mason Rudolph started in place of an injured Roethlisberger, there are still the Kenny Pickett years when Tomlin drafted him.

With this sort of resume, you will have to excuse us if we are staying cautiously optimistic that Rodgers is good enough to outplay Tomlin’s coaching.

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