Steelers Now
The Pittsburgh Steelers have had an historically bad start to the 2025 season.
Things have not gone according to plan for the Pittsburgh Steelers. After investing even more into the league’s highest-paid defense this offseason, they believed they had compiled one of the best defenses in NFL history. It has gone in the quite opposite direction, though.
Through the first eight weeks of the 2025 season, the Steelers currently rank as the 30th total defense in the NFL, according to NFL on CBS. If that stays true the rest of the year, it will be Pittsburgh’s worst mark in franchise history, surpassing the 1988 season when the team ranked as the league’s 28th overall unit.
Worst total defense rank for Steelers in franchise history
2025 30th
1988 28th
2021 24th
1991 22nd
1981 22nd pic.twitter.com/wkMLW5sxmO— NFL on CBS 🏈 (@NFLonCBS) October 27, 2025
The blame can’t be placed on any one person or player, but the Steelers clearly need to make some kind of change to avoid being on the wrong side of history.
Pittsburgh has the talent after adding veteran cornerback Darius Slay in free agency, drafting defensive tackle Derrick Harmon in the first round of the 2025 NFL Draft and trading for three-time first-team All-Pro cornerback Jalen Ramsey.
However, the unit has rarely been fully healthy at the same time, and when it has, it has greatly underwhelmed. That seems to hint a change in coaching could be needed.
The Steelers never move on from coaches mid-season. The last time they did so was with offensive coordinator Matt Canada midway through the 2023 season, and that was the first time since 1941 they made a mid-season coaching change.
If Pittsburgh’s defense continues to struggle, though, the team is going to have to entertain doing the same with defensive coordinator Teryl Austin.
Austin’s contract with the Steelers is up at the end of the 2025 season, but they must do something sooner if they expect different results.
Head coach Mike Tomlin still believes his defense has the capability to be special.
“We feel really good about the prospects of this group. We do,” Tomlin told the DVE Morning Show in August. “We’ve got to write that story. We’ve got enough talent, we’ve got enough schematics to do big, big things. When I say big things, I’m talking about historic things.”
However, settling for even an average unit would be a win right now.
This article originally appeared on Steelers Now: Steelers on Pace to Have Worst Mark in Franchise History
