Who's Afraid of Joe Flacco?

On the surface, Mike Tomlin’s most noteworthy answer at his Monday press conference could be construed as exactly what it appeared to be; a pretty direct shot at a division rival’s general manager.

Tomlin, in case you missed it, broke one of his press conference commandments - Thou Shalt Not Talk About Other Teams’ Business - to rip Browns GM Andrew Berry for making a rare intra-divisional trade and sending Joe Flacco, the team’s Week 1 starter, to the Bengals.

You know, to be honest, it was shocking to me. Andrew Berry must be a lot smarter than me or us, because it doesn’t make sense to me to trade a quarterback that you think enough of to make your opening-day starter, to a division opponent that’s hurting in that area. But that’s just my personal feeling.

On one hand, you could argue that Tomlin ripped Berry, very much an “analytics” GM, because he doesn’t like or respect the way he goes about his business. Tomlin is an old-school football guy, and while Omar Khan is more like Berry than not, the Steelers’ GM more or less reports to the head coach, and has a blood-and-guts personnel man in Andy Weidl working the football side of that arrangement.

You could also reasonably surmise that Tomlin, a man who would sooner lose a limb than give up on a season, is exasperated at the idea of a team, any team, waving the white flag this early in the year, particularly when the return for Flacco and a 2026 sixth-round pick was a 2026 fifth-rounder.

(It is here that I will pause to note that just about everyone who has offered an opinion on the trade thinks it was a good move for both sides. I say “just about” because Tomlin exists.)

The real reason Tomlin was so miffed by Cleveland’s move is, I think, much simpler.

He’s afraid of Joe Flacco. He wants no part of Joe Flacco. And he knows that the Bengals, quarterbacked by Joe Flacco, have at least a puncher’s chance to pull an upset tomorrow night.

Guess what? He should be worried. Flacco knows the answers to the test Tomlin’s defense is going to administer. The question is whether or not he’ll have time to fill them out.

Had Cleveland decided that Flacco’s veteran presence was worth keeping around and held on to their veteran passer, Tomlin would have been on easy street, relatively speaking. The Browns still would have gone with Dillon Gabriel against the Steelers, because their season is already circling the drain, and finding out about one or both of their rookie quarterbacks is more important than winning games, and the Bengals would presumably be stuck with Browning.

Tomlin feasts on rookie quarterbacks, and his defense chewed up Gabriel and spit him out, and Browning has turned into such a turnover machine that the Steelers would have had a chance at a Thursday night laugher in Cincinnati.

That calculus changed the second Cleveland and Cincy swung their deal. Tomorrow night won’t be an exercise in creating confusion and speeding up the game for a man with barely half a season’s worth of starts over three years in a league, it’ll be a simple, high-stakes either/or:

Either the Steelers’ pass rush gets home with regularity, sacks Flacco and forces him into mistakes, or he stands in the pocket with time and dices them up. Tomlin knows this. It’s why he openly admitted back on September 23rd, when asked about preparing for a veteran like Minnesota’s Carson Wentz, instead of a de facto rookie like J.J. McCarthy, that he told his defense to keep Indianapolis’ Anthony Richardson upright last year, lest he get hurt and the Colts have to turn to Flacco.

We were in a similar situation a year ago. We were playing in Indianapolis, and I commented to the guys to keep Richardson upright. Don’t put Flacco in the game, and Flacco ended up in the game. I think that’s oftentimes some of the things that you can run into when you run into a veteran guy, at least from a short-term perspective.

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While it might be tempting to suggest that the Steelers will be better prepared for Flacco because they know he’s the guy and have a few days to get ready, what exactly is Tomlin going to throw at him that he hasn’t seen before?

He’s played 22 regular-season games against the Steelers; only his current employer has seen him on the opposing sideline as often. He’s 11-11 with 27 touchdowns and just 12 interceptions. In other words, he’s been pretty good. Tomlin has a .633 winning percentage for his career. He’s a .500 coach against Flacco.

What’s more, Flacco has a full game under his belt with the Bengals. He wasn’t half bad against Green Bay, either. He only got sacked once, and threw two touchdowns and no interceptions. He had the Bengals within six points with just over four minutes left. Had Cincy gotten a stop, they’d have had a chance at a big upset.

It stands to reason that he’ll be more settled in for this one. The only real question is whether or not his offensive line, which is bad, will hold up. If it does, he’s got Ja’Marr Chase and Tee Higgins to throw to, and Chase Brown as a safety valve. Not exactly three chumps there, is it?

Oh, I should also mention, for the record, that Tomlin is 0-6 in Thursday night divisional road games. He’s 2-9 overall on the road on Thursday night. These situations are frequently ugly for him.

That said, the Steelers should still win this game. They’ve got an offensive identity now, and Cincy’s defense is terrible. The Bengals also can’t run the ball. Pittsburgh’s offensive line is coming along, and Aaron Rodgers continues to quietly pilot this ship in a smooth, confident fashion. A win would put the division in a chokehold, not even halfway through the year. There are a lot more reasons to be optimistic about this team than not.

So why was Mike Tomlin so annoyed on Monday?

Because he knows they’ve still got to go through Joe Flacco, and as last year proved, any stadium where he’s quarterbacking the opposition can turn into a house of horrors for the Steelers in the blink of an eye.