Short week, Thursday Night Football game on the road, and an AFC North opponent. It’s all a recipe for disaster for the Pittsburgh Steelers under head coach Mike Tomlin.
That’s exactly what the 33-31 loss to the Cincinnati Bengals in Week 7 was Thursday night at Paycor Stadium. Though the offense looked very good, the defense couldn’t stop anyone, and the Steelers’ tackling was their worst of the season.
Just a few weeks ago it looked like the Steelers had turned a corner in the tackling department. But on a short week, they reverted back to the ugliness in that department from early in the season.
Let’s check out this week’s missed tackles report from Steelers-Bengals.
TOTAL MISSED TACKLES AT BENGALS — 14
Patrick Queen – 3Â
Darius Slay – 3Â
Joey Porter Jr. – 2
DeShon Elliott – 2Â
Chuck Clark – 2Â
Alex Highsmith – 1
Juan Thornhill – 1Â
TOTAL MISSED TACKLES THROUGH SEVEN WEEKS (SIX GAMES) — 55 (9.16 PER GAME)
Patrick Queen — 9 (one on missed sack) (48 tackles on 57 total attempts, 15.8% miss rate)
Darius Slay – 6 (23 tackles on 29 total attempts, 20.7% miss rate)
Nick Herbig — 5 (two on special teams) (16 tackles on 21 total attempts, 23.8% miss rate)
Payton Wilson – 4 (one on missed sack) (48 tackles on 52 total attempts, 7.7% miss rate)
Chuck Clark — 4 (28 tackles on 32 total attempts, 12.5% miss rate)
Juan Thornhill — 4 (36 tackles on 40 total attempts, 10% miss rate)
Yahya Black – 2 (one on missed sack) (seven tackles on nine total attempts, 22.2% miss rate)
Keeanu Benton — 2 (12 tackles on 14 total attempts, 14.3% miss rate)
Derrick Harmon — 2 (missed sack) (nine tackles on 11 total attempts, 18.2% miss rate)
Cole Holcomb — 2 (22 tackles on 24 total attempts, 8.3% miss rate)
Alex Highsmith – 2 (15 tackles on 17 total attempts, 11.8% miss rate)
DeShon Elliott — 2 (33 tackles on 35 total attempts, 5.7% miss rate)
Joey Porter Jr. — 2 (11 tackles on 13 total attempts, 15.4% miss rate)
T.J. Watt – 1 (25 tackles on 26 total attempts, 3.8% miss rate)
Ben Skowronek – 1 (special teams) (seven tackles on eight total attempts, 12.5% miss rate)
Miles Killebrew – 1 (special teams) (four tackles on five total attempts, 20% miss rate)
Daniel Ekuale — 1 (six tackles on seven total attempts, 14.3% miss rate)
Jalen Ramsey — 1 (30 tackles on 31 total attempts, 3.2% miss rate)
Brandin Echols — 1 (16 tackles on 17 total attempts, 5.9% miss rate)
Jabrill Peppers — 1 (eight tackles on nine total attempts, 11.1% miss rate)
Jack Sawyer — 1 (special teams) (15 tackles on 16 total attempts, 6.25% miss rate)
Well, that was disappointing. Just two games after the Steelers had the fewest missed tackles in a game since I began tracking them here at Steelers Depot with two against Minnesota, they fell apart on Thursday night with the 14 misses against the Bengals.
It was a lot of key players missing tackles, too, on the short week. Patrick Queen had been playing some great ball in recent weeks, but he was a mess against the Bengals. So too were Darius Slay and Joey Porter Jr. in the secondary. And they weren’t alone. Veteran safeties Chuck Clark and DeShon Elliott each missed a pair of stops in the game.
When it rains it pours for the Steelers in the tackling department, and it was a Category 5 hurricane Thursday night.
The Steelers just could not tackle Ja’Marr Chase after the catch consistently.
Here on a short crosser into the middle, this should have been stopped for a limited gain by Queen, who closes and gets a hit on Chase. But he doesn’t wrap up, and Chase is too strong after the catch, allowing him to slide off and churn forward.
Porter then follows with a miss of his own, allowing Chase to step through the arm tackle attempt. Eventually, the Steelers get him on the ground, but Chase did great work to turn a short gain into an additional 11 yards by breaking two tackles.
When the Steelers signed Clark in training camp, he was lauded for his physicality and tackling. Thursday night he had a huge hit early, but after that he was a mess in the tackling department.
Here on a quick slant to Tee Higgins, Clark takes a bad angle, allowing Higgins to break free for the 29-yard touchdown.
Clark does a nice job of reading and reacting quickly, triggering downhill. But late in the rep he hesitates just enough and then takes a bad angle, putting him in a tough spot to try and tackle Higgins on the move.
He whiffs, and it ends up in six points.
Clark later missed a tackle behind the line of scrimmage in the run game, leading to an explosive play for the Bengals.
Moving down into the box for run support, Clark is in position to make the play, shooting into the backfield for a clean look at running back Chase Brown.
But he ends up diving at Brown, missing him with the arm-tackle attempt, allowing the speedy back to hit top speed quickly into the second level.
Brown is then able to twist through a DeShon Elliott tackle and is off to the races before the Steelers can corral him. Sloppy rep, which was a microcosm of how the Steelers tackled on the evening.
While the defense missed 14 tackles, the Steelers offense forced 11 missed Bengals tackles, meaning they lost the all-important tackles battle by a mark of -3, falling to 5-1 on the season in the game within the game.
TOTAL FORCED MISSED TACKLES AT BENGALS — 11
Jaylen Warren – 8Â
Pat Freiermuth – 1Â
Darnell Washington – 1Â
Scotty Miller – 1Â
TOTAL FORCED MISSED TACKLES THROUGH SEVEN WEEKS (SIX GAMES) — 74 (12.3 PER GAME)
Jaylen Warren – 33
Kenneth Gainwell – 16 (one on special teams)
Jonnu Smith – 7
Kaleb Johnson – 4 (two on special teams)
DK Metcalf – 3
Ke’Shawn Williams — 3 (special teams)
Trey Sermon — 2 (special teams)
Calvin Austin III — 1Â
Pat Freiermuth — 1Â
Darnell Washington — 1Â
Scotty Miller — 1Â
Who knows where this Steelers offense would be without Jaylen Warren. He played like a man possessed Thursday night, racking up 127 rushing yards and 31 receiving yards on 20 combined touches. Forcing eight missed tackles in his own right is very impressive.
You just cannot tackle the guy in space 1-on-1. The Bengals had to learn that lesson again.
Warren has a ton of space to operate with here initially due to some great blocking, but watch him force the two misses in space, helping him break off a 37-yard run. That’s what makes Warren special. He needs to be fed the ball more.
Then, there’s Pat Freiermuth. Invisible in recent weeks as his playing time and targets declined, Freiermuth showed up in a big way in the second half Thursday. He finished the game with five receptions for 111 yards and two touchdowns, and his 68-yard catch-and-run that gave the Steelers a late lead was incredible.
But it was his first catch of the night, an 18-yard bubble, that really thrust him into the passing game as a go-to guy.
Quick throw here from Rodgers, and Freiermuth does a great job of getting upfield, running through an initial arm tackle while using DK Metcalf’s block well. From there, he’s able to drag a defender a few yards and should have earned a late hit penalty on the Bengals linebacker.
It was a great sign from Freiermuth, and it was awesome to see him have a huge night, even if it came in a loss.
