Why Mike Tomlin leads NFL's most physical training camp: 'You can't box without sparring'

LATROBE, Pa. — No air conditioning in the dorm rooms. Horsehair-stuffed mattresses. Two padded practices per day, seven days a week, full of live hitting.

For 66-year-old former Pittsburgh Steelers offensive lineman Craig Wolfley, training camp at Saint Vincent College was a “totally different environment” when he suited up in the 1980s under legendary coach Chuck Noll. Every day, twice a day, the Steelers practiced in pads — first with a morning session to work on the running game and later in the afternoon to focus on the passing game.

“They didn’t even dry off your pants and jerseys (between practices),” Wolfley recalled. “It was just sweated up until finally you put (five bucks) in the ball boys’ hands and they would throw it in the dryer for a few minutes before practice.”

Wolfley, now a Steelers radio analyst, joked that he could have a degree from Saint Vincent after all the grueling, six-week camps he attended as a player. But even he heard the old-timers like Andy Russell talk about the marathon, nine-week camps that bruised their bodies and tested their will in the 1960s and ’70s.

“You came together as a team because it was blood, sweat and tears the whole training camp,” Wolfley said. “Chuck Noll training camp was never about making the team. It was about always surviving the moment.”

For generations of football players — from Pee Wee to high school to college and into the pros — long, physical days full of hitting were the norm. The more you hit, the tougher you became. At least that was the thinking.

But times change, and so too has the way teams prepare for the season.

Because athletes are now working out year-round, there’s less need to work them into shape in the preseason. At the same time, rules under the 2011 CBA eliminated two-a-day practices. The physicality has also been dialed back dramatically. Today, in many NFL training camps, if you see a ball carrier or a receiver tackled to the ground, it’s usually an accident.

“I don’t know how many NFL teams are full-on tackling,” Steelers quarterback Justin Fields said. “It’s got to be under three, if they are.”

Fields’ observation got us thinking. How many teams engage in live tackling during camp? In an informal poll conducted by The Athletic, 24 of 32 beat writers (75 percent of the league) said the team they cover very rarely or never tackles players to the ground. Four teams tackle in practice sometimes, but typically for short periods with second- or third-team players on the roster’s fringe. Three teams tackle often, including Andy Reid’s Chiefs, Mike McDaniel’s Dolphins and Dan Campbell’s Lions.

Mike Tomlin’s Steelers are in many ways an outlier. When veteran linebacker Elandon Roberts arrived in Latrobe last season for a three-week destination camp, he was, like Fields, initially taken aback.

“I was kind of like, dang, we’re really tackling in camp,” said Roberts, who spent four years with the Patriots and three with the Dolphins before joining the Steelers. “I was cool with it, but I wasn’t expecting it.”

On a typical day in pads, it’s common to see the Steelers engage in periods of full, live tackling. Each practice begins with a drill called “Seven Shots” — seven chances from the 2-yard line — that are often full-tilt with starters like Najee Harris or key rotation players like Jaylen Warren being tackled to the ground. In many other 11-on-11 settings, the Steelers still see the value in live tackling, including short-yardage and goal-line drills. Additionally, twice this training camp, the Steelers staged spirited backs on ’backers drills, where high-speed collisions simulate live pass protection situations.

Now, as the Steelers pack up and move out of their dorm rooms at Saint Vincent on Wednesday, they’ve completed what is likely the most physical training camp in the league.

“You can’t box without sparring,” Tomlin said. “We play an intense game, competitive game, and I’m not doing these guys justice if I don’t create an environment that is reflective of what’s waiting on us.”

In 2007, when  Tomlin became the NFL’s youngest head coach at 34 years old, he inherited a veteran-laden team full of many players who hoisted the Lombardi Trophy alongside Bill Cowher in 2005.

During his first training camp in Latrobe, Tomlin set the tone and — in a sense — made a statement that there was a new sheriff in town. This wasn’t Cowher’s team anymore.

“He came in and he wanted to set an example and establish his own toughness,” said former Steelers lineman Max Starks, who played three seasons for Cowher and six years under Tomlin. “He didn’t want anybody to seek comfort. We hit every day we could possibly hit, all the way until Week 13 of the regular season, which was unheard of.”

But over a long season, more is not always better. On a team full of veterans, the pounding took its toll. After starting 9-3, the Steelers fizzled down the stretch, dropping three of their final four regular-season games before bowing out of the playoffs in the wild-card round against the Jacksonville Jaguars.

“He got the appropriate result,” Starks said. “We’re out in the first round of the playoffs, because he had to learn the veteran-ness of this team and understand that we can we can go light in the week and go kill it on the weekends at games.”

Mike Tomlin, right, with Ben Roethlisberger at the coach’s first training camp with the Steelers in 2007. (Joseph Sargent / Icon SMI / Icon Sport Media via Getty Images)

Throughout his time with Tomlin, Starks saw the coach learn from the experience and tweak his approach. While the Steelers still hit often in camp, Tomlin tempered it and learned to take care of veterans with days off. Sure enough, in Tomlin’s second season, the Steelers surged down the stretch, winning six of their final seven to finish 12-4. They rode that momentum to the team’s sixth Lombardi Trophy.

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“He’s not too prideful with taking a step back or (saying), ‘Hey, you know, I can get better at this,’” Starks said. “And that’s why you see the sustained success model that he’s created. It was too hard in the beginning. OK, now pull it back.”

Now in his 17th season and at 52 years old, Tomlin has gone from the youngest head coach in the league to the NFL’s longest-tenured. His first training camp in Latrobe feels like a lifetime ago.

“Man, that was a different time,” Tomlin said. “That was medieval times.”

Even the oldest players on the Steelers’ current roster — Russell Wilson and Cameron Heyward, both 35 — never participated in two-a-days at the NFL level. The approach was banned under the new CBA in 2011, Heyward’s first year in the league and one year before Wilson was drafted. (The NCAA eventually followed suit and ended two-a-day practices with contact in 2017.)

There’s no question Tomlin’s philosophy has evolved, to a degree. In adherence with the CBA, padded practices have been scaled back considerably during the season. Often, if Tomlin makes the Steelers wear pads during the season, it’s to make a point that physicality is lacking on Sundays. Even early in camp, Tomlin will hold out veterans like T.J. Watt, Minkah Fitzpatrick and Heyward to protect them from themselves.

Tomlin also used to intentionally schedule training camp practices during the hottest time of the day to manufacture adversity. He has since changed his approach with a new strength and conditioning staff to practice earlier in the morning when it’s cooler.

At the same time, the coach still very much sees the value in creating game-like situations in Latrobe — and so do the players.

“Just how we do Seven Shots, I don’t think anybody else in the country does that,” Fields said. “The parameters of how practice is ran and just the intensity out of everybody, it’s very competitive out here. And you wouldn’t want it any other way.”

Beyond preparing starters for the season, the physicality of camp is an important evaluation tool. Two seasons ago, Warren arrived as an untouted and undrafted rookie running back with a junior college stop on his resume. In an early backs on ’backers drill, his pad-popping demeanor got the coaches’ attention and ultimately helped him earn a spot on the roster. Now, he’s one of the league’s best pass-protecting backs.

“I love it,” Warren said when asked about the environment Tomlin creates. “Although the days get hard, I love what it brings and what it creates.”

In this camp, especially, the word physicality has been on the tip of many players’ tongues. When the Steelers hired Arthur Smith — who is well-known for his run-heavy, tight-end friendly offenses — the new offensive coordinator made a point to say he wants to have the most physical offense in the league. That buzzword has carried over to the practice field.

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“Whether that’s being part of the run game or getting yards after the catch, he wants all 11 to be physical,” wide receiver Van Jefferson said. “He wants to be a physical offense. He’s instilled that in us from Day 1.”

What will it all mean when they finally start the season? Coaches often say that coaching a football team doesn’t come with an instruction manual. And while there’s no perfect answer when it comes to how much hitting is enough (and how much is too much), the Steelers believe that through their physical approach, they have begun to establish the identity that will carry them through the season.

“Other teams, they know what it is when they play the Steelers,” Warren said. “You can see what we built here.”

(Top photo: Joe Sargent / Getty Images)

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