Mike Tomlin Downplays Significance of Reported Locker Room Argument

PITTSBURGH — Pittsburgh Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin downplayed the impact of a reported locker room argument between wide receiver Diontae Johnson and quarterback Mitchell Trubisky at halftime of the Steelers’ Week 4 loss to the New York Jets.

Tomlin did not confirm by Gerry Dulac of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, and said he wouldn’t say so even if it was true.

“Our business is our business and I understand in today’s climate, often times, there’s leaks — our business getting in the street,” Tomlin said. “But I’m not going to acknowledge it or confirm it or deny it in these settings, I’m just not. I ain’t got enough hours of my day for it.”

But he went on to say that if it did happen, he’s OK with it — which seemingly would not jive with that argument being speculated as a reason for Tomlin deciding to bench Trubisky in favor of Kenny Pickett.

“The things that happen among competitors from time to time is normal business,” Tomlin said. “Everyone wants to win. If it transpired, it’s good. It probably means there’s a couple guys that wanted to win. If it didn’t transpire, it probably mean that it should have, because we are aggressively pursuing victory. Sometimes, that’s emotional.”

Tomlin said at the time that he was just looking for a spark to the offense when the made the change from Pickett to Trubisky and made it clear the following week that he was not disappointed in Trubisky’s performance.

“Oftentimes, the quarterback position gets too much credit and too much blame,” Tomlin said. “We haven’t moved the ball fluidly enough to our liking. We haven’t put enough points on the board. The quarterback is a component of that, but not the only component. We’ve all got to absorb the responsibility that comes with what we haven’t done, particularly in that phase, including myself and starting with myself. 

“When you make a quarterback change, you’re really sensitive to that component of it because I don’t want to dump the responsibility of what transpired at Mitch’s feet. That’s not fair to him. He’s played better than that description.”