Getty Seahawks head coach Pete Carroll.
With Bill Belichick going for his 300th career win and Andy Reid shooting for number 250 in Week 4, coaching wins are in the news. But there’s another battle for victories going on further down the coaching food chain, and it’s just as fascinating.
That would be Pete Carroll versus Mike Tomlin. The two coaches went into the season tied for career victories in the regular season, and their respective playoff records are intriguing as well. Finally, there’s the question of whether they’re Hall of Famers, so let’s take a deeper dive and break it down.
Regular Season Records By the Numbers
Carroll and Tomlin entered the season with 161 wins each in regular season competition. Both coaches have now passed Mike Holmgren, who remains a legend in Seattle despite the fact that he won his lone championship in Green Bay.
But there’s a bigger game on the horizon. Four more wins would vault both coaches past the legendary Paul Brown, and ten more would mean they’d pass both Mike Shanahan and Tom Coughlin. A 12-win season for two mid-pack teams feels optimistic, but stranger things have happened.
Playoff Records Are a Close Call, Too
It’s way too soon to talk about the standings or the playoffs (cue the old-school Jim Mora sound bite here). But there are some intriguing nuggets in their respective playoff records that are well worth exploring.
Start with the simple playoff records—Carroll is 11-11, while Tomlin checks in at 8-11. That appears to give Pete Carroll a small lead, but these numbers are slightly deceptive.
Why? Because Tomlin had to go through Belichick and Brady to get to the next level, and the Steelers played the role of Patriots punching bag in at least a couple of those encounters. Tomlin did beat Seattle for his lone Super Bowl title, although that was before Carroll crossed back over from USC to the Seahawks.
Carroll, meanwhile, had the advantage of playing in the NFC, where no dominant team has emerged. The 49ers and the Eagles are the early favorites this year, and at the very least the Steelers have a solid shot at making a playoff run.
Are Pete Carroll & Mike Tomlin Hall of Famers?
Considering Carroll and Tomlin as potential Hall of Famers is a fascinating sports bar argument that can be broken down in any number of ways.
Start with the fact that both coaches have deftly negotiated quarterback transitions. Carroll and GM John Schneider beat the naysayers by trading Russell Wilson at exactly the right time, and Carroll deserves a huge amount of credit for picking Geno Smith off the QB scrap heap and developing him into a playoff starter.
Tomlin deserves just as much credit for overcoming the post-Roethlisberger hangover and developing Kenny Pickett. The jury is still out on Pickett’s long-term viability, but at the moment he’s trending up.
Carroll gets one other significant feather in his cap as a Hall of Fame candidate—his accomplishments as a college coach. Carroll turned USC into a Pac-12 powerhouse, dominating the conference and winning a pair of national championships. The sanctions that followed after he left constitute a black mark, but winning is always a brilliant band-aid.
Tomlin’s superpower is his longevity. He’s been leading the Steelers for 17 years now, and he’s a young 51. Moreover, he has shown no signs of the burnout that caught up to his predecessor, Bill Cowher, and he clearly loves what he’s doing when it comes to competing, motivating and getting in his players’ faces.
Both coaches could use a second Super Bowl win to strengthen their respective records. But if you took a Hall of Fame vote today, Carroll would likely get in based on his dual track record, while Tomlin would be a closer call.
But there’s a lot of football left to be coached for both of these guys, including a regular season match at Lumen Field on December 31. That won’t be the ultimate decider, but it will be a fascinating footnote in this numerical victory battle as the NFL season unfolds.