Steelers Tomlin Credits Shanahan, But Purdy Still a Challenge (+)

Days before the Pittsburgh Steelers are set to host the San Francisco 49ers, Mike Tomlin held his weekly press conference with the local media. Among a myriad of different topics, the Steelers head coach was asked about Niners quarterback Brock Purdy and what made him such a smashing hit during his rookie season despite being a seventh-round draft pick.

“It’s less about Brock Purdy and more about how Kyle Shanahan chooses to utilize his quarterback within the schematics of what it is that he does,” Tomlin said, alluding to Shanahan’s previous success with other quarterbacks such as Jimmy Garoppolo and Matt Ryan, among others.

To the untrained eye, this might sound like a bit of a slight towards Purdy. However, this is more about Tomlin acknowledging the known fact of Shanahan being one of — if not the best — play callers and designers that the football landscape and the Steelers have seen in quite some time.

“We just see very similar things in terms of their approach to football. It’s very quarterback-friendly, it doesn’t put them in a lot of adverse circumstances, it keeps them on schedule and in doing so it minimizes the potential for negativity.”

Part of what makes Shanahan so effective is that he has a unique understanding of both the strengths of his offensive weapons and the weaknesses of each defensive coverage that they expect to see on a down-in, down-out basis. This unique skill set will surely cause the Steelers coaching staff several sleepless nights throughout the week.