Are Steelers Fans Right to be Angry over Mike Tomlin’s Minecraft Hobby Reveal?

For years, Mike Tomlin was simply the coach of the Steelers. Nobody knew much more than that. Nobody thought, in a million years, that he went home and built Minecraft cities.

Now everybody knows. Tomlin nurtures the hobby, loves it and talks about it. And Rich noticed something funny about how that news is landing.

"Instead of it making him more relatable for many people, it's like, 'Oh, now we know why the Steelers had trouble making the playoffs,'" Rich said. Or why they made it and then did not win once they got there. Or why they hovered barely above .500. "Cuz he's too busy making his Minecraft city."

Rich's position is that a man can coach the Steelers, go home, turn his brain off for an hour and build a Minecraft city. "Most Americans do," he said. "Many Americans do."

That was not enough to stop the studio from running the numbers. With Tomlin's Minecraft habit dating back about 12 years, someone in the room started lining up the start of the hobby against his win-loss record, roughly 2013 or 2014 onward.

Rich caught it immediately. "Are you right now looking at when he started playing Minecraft and whether things turned for the worse in Pittsburgh based on his win-loss record?"

"Yes."

The finding: three playoff wins in the 12 Minecraft years. Then came the follow-up: "Trying to look for a quarterback. That's what we're trying to do."

Rich pushed back. Big Ben was still good in those years, he pointed out, running through 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017 and 2018. "So they didn't advance in the playoffs or win another Super Bowl cuz he goes home and he's not focused 100% on football? He can't have a hobby? NFL coaches can't have a hobby?"

The answer from the other side of the desk was honest. "I personally don't care, but I'm telling you what Pittsburgh fans are probably saying right now." That drew a nod around the room: probably right.

It got sillier from there. Ben Roethlisberger, someone pointed out, was incredible in 2018. The punchline wrote itself: if only he had not been building his Minecraft city, he would have had another thousand yards.

That is the absurdity Rich is pointing at. The same reveal that could make a coach nobody really knew feel human gets turned into a retroactive explanation for every playoff exit. The hobby did not cost the Steelers anything that the scoreboard can prove. It just gave frustrated fans a fresh place to aim.

Rich had a bigger explanation for those years anyway, and it had nothing to do with blocks and pickaxes. Tomlin and his Steelers lived in the era of Bill Belichick. "It's like living in the era of Jordan," Rich said. "You're not going to win."

Some things are just bad timing. Building a Minecraft city is not one of them.