Former Pittsburgh Steelers nose tackle Chris Hoke wants to see the Steelers' defense clean up the communication errors during the bye week. A lack of communication in the secondary has been a major issue for the Steelers through four games, and really the last several years. It has become a recurrent theme.
"There should be no communication [issues]. Everybody should be on the same page," Hoke said on 93.7 The Fan . "It's happening far too often, where the Steelers defense, not everybody's on the same page. They're not running the same defense. If there's one thing that the Steelers need to work on this bye week, it's communication. It's everybody getting on the same page. Everybody running the same defense. It's happening too much."
Steelers defensive coordinator Teryl Austin took the blame for the 81-yard Jordan Addison reception in last Sunday's game. With the Steelers banged up at cornerback, Austin called too complicated of a defense, considering the personnel they had available at the time, and should have made a similar, easier-to-execute call.
For the play in question, cornerbacks Jalen Ramsey (hamstring injury) and Brandin Echols (cramps) were both off the field being attended to by trainers, leaving the Steelers with just two healthy cornerbacks in Darius Slay and James Pierre .
"I'm gonna take that one," he said. "We were struggling with who was in the game, and I probably made a call that probably wasn't simple enough for everybody, and so that's on me. … I'll make sure if that ever happens again, if we have some attrition the way it happened, I gotta give our guys something that's way more simple, and that they can line up and play."
Pittsburgh Steelers wide receiver Teryl Austin during a game against the New York Jets on Sept. 7, 2025. — Ed Thompson / Steelers Now
Not only did the big play nearly allow the Vikings to get back into the game, it let their offense continue to add points and yards against Pittsburgh's defensive resume.
Through four weeks, the Steelers are tied for 21st in points allowed and are 28th in yards allowed. But if they had gotten a stop there instead of giving up the big play, another 100 yards and seven points would come off their balance sheets. That would make them 19th in scoring and 25th in yardage — still not where they want to be, but a good bit closer.
"We've got to learn how to finish," Elliott said. "Can't have busted plays like that at the end. We gave up 15 points in the second half. That's not Steelers football. We've got to be better, communicate better, but we'll be all right. We're going into the right direction. We've just got to keep stacking up good days."
Alan Saunders and Brendan Howe provided reporting from Pittsburgh.
This article originally appeared on Steelers Now : Ex-Steeler Details One Big Issue Team Needs to Fix
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