Ben Roethlisberger put together a Hall of Fame career with the Pittsburgh Steelers. For 18 seasons, he was their starting quarterback, helping them win two Super Bowls. Unfortunately, Roethlisberger’s career didn’t get a fairytale ending. In his final season, 2021, the Steelers made the playoffs but got crushed by the Kansas City Chiefs in the first round. Recently, Roethlisberger shared his thoughts on why the Steelers lost that game.
“Offensively, we just couldn’t do much, for whatever reason,” Roethlisberger said Tuesday on his Footbahlin’ with Ben Roethlisberger podcast. “I don’t know if we were overwhelmed going into it or what the deal was… I just remember that we struggled early to get going, and they just stayed on the field. They kept converting third downs and we couldn’t.
“It’s what our offense was. We didn’t have the ability that last year… We had a line that was maybe a little underprepared, coaching staff that was probably a little underprepared to have us ready for stuff like that.”
The Steelers lost that game 42-21, with their offense being sluggish for most of the game. The Steelers actually scored first that game, but it came courtesy of a T.J. Watt fumble recovery that he ran back for a touchdown. Unfortunately, the Chiefs’ offense started to get going after that.
Kansas City proceeded to score 35 unanswered points. Roethlisberger is correct that the Steelers’ offense couldn’t seem to do anything right. They didn’t move the ball substantially until the third quarter, and at that point, the Chiefs were taking their foot off the gas. They essentally already had the game under wraps.
Roethlisberger places some of the blame for that loss on the Steelers’ offensive line and coaching staff. That shouldn’t surprise Steelers fans, though. Those were two of their biggest areas of concern that season.
In that game, the Steelers’ starting offensive line consisted of rookie Dan Moore Jr., J.C. Hassenauer, Chukwuma Okorafor, Trai Turner, and John Leglue. That’s not exactly an all-star group. In fact, it may be one of the Steelers’ worst starting offensive line combinations in recent history.
Additionally, the team’s coaching staff featured some names that seemed to hurt the team more than they helped, specifically on the offensive side. That was Matt Canada’s first year as the Steelers’ offensive coordinator. There weren’t a lot of positive moments during his stint in that role.
He wasn’t the only name that limited Pittsburgh, though. That year, offensive line coach Adrian Klemm left them before the season ended to take up the same position at the University of Oregon. That left assistant offensive line coach Chris Morgan to take over the role with the Steelers, and he also left once the 2021 season ended.
Therefore, it’s easy to see why Roethlisberger highlights those two groups as reasons for the loss. Obviously, it wasn’t all on them, but they played critical roles. It was an unfortunate way for Roethlisberger’s career to end, although at least he got one last shot in the postseason.
