Move over Will Smith: Stylish Mike Tomlin’s Super star on the rise

Mike Tomlin walked into his press conference on Thursday sporting a black sweatshirt and black sweatpants. For a guy who wears Versace shades and a cool, puffy black winter coat and gets weekly haircuts for his press conferences that he sometimes shows up for in a dress shirt, this was total dress-down mode. Think Bill Belichick, but hip.

“(Tomlin’s) always had a little swag about him,” Steelers wide receiver Hines Ward says with a laugh.

In a sport where head coaches dress as if they are making a midnight run to Wendy’s and have the personality of a day-old hamburger, Tomlin brings a coolness to the sidelines that even GQ has noticed.

“Mike Tomlin looks good in a suit, not like a teenager making his first court appearance (see Bill Belichick),” the magazine wrote last year.

“It is who I am,” Tomlin says when asked about his sense of style. “I am sure Bill’s sense of style is who he is, (I’m) talking about Belichick … We’re just different.”

Style and personality-wise, Tomlin is the anti-Belichick, a former Kappa Alpha Psi black fraternity member who used to entertain college crowds during fraternity step show competitions with his “Kappa Kane.” He still likes to crank-call his best friends at work and quote movies like “Rambo: First Blood” and “Rocky II.”

But football-wise, Tomlin, 36, will look downright Belichickian on Sunday if he can lead the Steelers to a victory over the Cardinals and win the Super Bowl in just his second season. Tomlin, the youngest head coach to reach a Super Bowl, is also aiming to follow his mentor Tony Dungy and become the second African-American to hoist the Vince Lombardi trophy.

“Things are changing,” Steelers safety Ryan Clark says. “It would be an awesome thing: (Barack) Obama in office, the first NFL champion he meets is coached by a black coach and on top of that, the Rooneys’ campaign (for other owners to hire black head coaches). The black coach meeting the first black President … it just shows it is possible.”

Gettin’ jiggy wit it

The Steelers’ coach has enjoyed an Obama-like ascension. It was only two years ago that Tomlin was Minnesota’s defensive coordinator, a post he held for only one season. Before that, he spent five seasons as defensive backs coach for Tampa Bay after bouncing around in assistant positions at Virginia Military Institute, Memphis, Arkansas State and Cincinnati over five years.

He’s come a long way from the days when he used to cruise around William and Mary’s campus in a red 1979 Toyota Celica with a high box-fade haircut that looked straight out of “House Party.” In the early ’90s, the 6-2 wide receiver was much thinner and looked more like actor/rapper Will Smith than actor Omar Epps, who many say he resembles now.

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