Merril Hoge isn’t holding back his criticism of an underwhelming Pittsburgh Steelers defense. Dominated by the Cincinnati Bengals over the final three quarters of last Thursday in a 33-31 loss, Hoge took every facet of the unit to task. Run defense, coverage, scheme, and fundamentals, all were picked apart by a frustrated Hoge.

“The thing that was probably the most concerning was their defensive line kind of fell back into the first two weeks, how they kinda got manhandled,” Hoge said Wednesday afternoon on 102.5 WDVE. “Cincinnati manhandled them up front.”

The Bengals entered the game with easily the NFL’s worst rushing attack. A group struggling to break 55 yards per game, Cincinnati popped off for 142 yards on the night. Starting RB Chase Brown saw his seasonal yards-per-carry increase by nearly a full yard, averaging nearly 10 yards against a Steelers defense that had shut down Cleveland Browns rookie sensation Quinshon Judkins the week prior. Pittsburgh’s defense couldn’t get off blocks or make tackles, allowing Cincinnati to control the line of scrimmage and mute the Steelers’ pass rush.

“They didn’t tackle very well,” Hoge said of the defensive showing. “You can’t hit in this league. I just don’t get it, man. It’s probably the most disturbing. When I played, I’ll tell you, we would watch a team and go, ‘Okay, these guys are hitters or these guys are tacklers.’ And if they’re hitters, we’re like, ‘We’ll get runs, we’ll get runs.’ Three-yard runs can turn into five- and six-yard runs. But if they’re tacklers, man. I mean, you’re probably gonna get a three-yard run.”

Pittsburgh’s missed tackles were frequent in the loss. Per our Josh Carney, Pittsburgh missed 14 of them against Cincinnati. Linebacker Patrick Queen and cornerback Darius Slay “led” the way with three. To Hoge’s point, on this play, Queen fills the lane but doesn’t wrap up, allowing Brown to bounce off him and pick up more yards. Hitting, not tackling.

Hoge also chided the defense for not having a good feel for zone coverage.

“There was one time where they had a route, key routes on the numbers,” he said. “We had one of our linebackers between the numbers and the out of bounds. Well, there’s nobody over there, like you’re not covering anybody. You gotta move inside the numbers.”

Pittsburgh’s zone spacing has been a sore spot all season. Though this isn’t the example Hoge is referring to, the Steelers gave up one third-down conversion after ILB Payton Wilson vacated his zone. The releasing tight end found space, and it made for an easy pickup.

Pittsburgh has plenty to correct. The silver lining is the team is healthy and had the mini bye to stew and evaluate. But the mere passage of time doesn’t fix problems. Nor do things get easier facing a talented Green Bay Packers team this weekend. A unit that figures to test the Steelers in the same manner to see if their issues, of which there are many, have been fixed.