The Pittsburgh Steelers are having trouble staying afloat in the competitive AFC North. The Steelers are 7-6, tied with Cincinnati at the bottom of the division. As a result, former quarterback Ben Roethlisberger is not happy about Pittsburgh's state of mind after losing 21-18 to a struggling New England Patriots team.
Ben Roethlisberger slams Steelers' ‘bad coaching'
After the Patriots game, Roethlisberger expressed his frustrations in an episode of his podcast:
“Maybe the tradition of the Pittsburgh Steelers is done,” the veteran QB boldly claimed, per ESPN.
Roethlisberger continued to criticize head coach Mike Tomlin, saying: “You can't afford in the second half of games to burn silly timeouts and not have them late in the game. To me, that's bad coaching.”
Still, Big Ben's criticisms did not end there. He feels like the Steelers are missing the mental toughness that past successful Pittsburgh teams possessed.
“Who is grabbing someone by the face mask and saying, ‘That's not what we do.' Is this happening? Yes, you have guys on defense doing it, but you need guys on other sides of the ball doing it,” Roethlisberger explained.
The 41-year-old has a point on Pittsburgh's offense. The Steelers' defense has kept the team in games, but the offense has not been able to execute to the best of its ability.
All in all, will Roethlisberger's criticisms wake the Steelers up and provide the team momentum as the late stretch of the 2023 season begins? The Pittsburgh faithful and Roethlisberger are certainly hoping that's the case.