Steelers HC Mike McCarthy Postgame Transcript 9/20

STEELERS HEAD COACH MIKE MCCARTHY

POSTGAME PRESS CONFERENCE

September 20, 2026

Q: How do you explain the offensive struggles of the last two weeks?

MM: Offensively, clearly not good enough. That starts with me. Felt it in practice frankly, coming off of last week. As I stated, I felt we were real herky-jerky trying to get in the run and pass. The extra time that you put forth, what you’re expecting in a game and you don’t deliver, it just tells you you need to spend more time on it. What I’m referring to is we put a lot of time and energy into the protection component of how we felt today’s game was going to go. Expected pressure, got pressure. As an offensive coach, I always welcome the opportunity to play against pressure defense. I think it’s clearly an opportunity for big play potential. That was not the case today. We didn’t answer the bell. Our protections weren’t clean. We had opportunities, whether it was communication and breakdowns, clearly in the first half that took away some opportunities for big plays. The run game was a little bit herky-jerky. Don’t know what the numbers are. I haven’t looked at the stats yet. I’m sure it ended up similar to last. I know we were in the two-minute. A couple drives we were on the ball, no huddle, two minutes, so I’m sure it will push the numbers. I felt we were in a focus of run and pass, but we could be clean in the run game. I thought we got better in that area, but the consistency of winning in the trenches, we need to be better there. But the reality of it is the detail is not there, and that’s on coaching. It starts with me. I’m calling the offense. I have to get the detail better. If you need someone, fire away. I felt it on Wednesday and Thursday. I’m a veteran coach. I know better. I didn’t do a good job.

Q: Would you look at personnel changes, especially in the offense?

MM: It’s two weeks. I think the big thing is — the buzz words are to come in here and say everything’s correctible, we can fix everything. That’s a matter of fact, it’s true, but if you’re making the same mistakes, those are the things, whether you’re young or a veteran, that’s what we have to address. We’ve got to look at the volume, too. That’s Marty Schottenheimer, that was his thing. It was a great lesson for a young coach to learn, and here I am some old bastard that didn’t do it this week. If it’s not clean, you cut the volume down, and we’re not clean on offense. So, the volume is getting cut down. That’s the first starting point, and that’s my fault. I felt it earlier in the week. We’ve got a quarterback that could play at any volume of game plan, but at the end of the day, it’s a team game. We’ve got to give Aaron [Rodgers] better platforms to throw off of and have the opportunities because I don’t want to dink and dunk and play all day and play keep-away football. There’s a place for that maybe situationally, but that’s not the philosophy. We have to attempt to get the ball thrown downfield. If you look closely at it, we did. I thought actually Aaron, a few times, got the ball down to the backs on the underneath throws. Detail is not there on offense. I thought the defense played well enough to win the game. You hold them to 13 points, I expect to win every game we line up in. I thought two weeks in a row they played well. There’s correctible things there. We knew the crews were going to call it tight, and they did. We had a couple of big penalties there. We have to clean that up. Special teams was, frankly, kind of a wash right now. I’ll have to watch that. So, offense needs to be better. Mike McCarthy needs to be better.

Q: Mike, when you say you felt something in practice?

MM: Just volume. We’ve done this a long time. You know when the volume is up, and you know when you’re pushing the envelope, too. It’s also the first year of the staff and players working together. So you want to push your players, but end of the day, you’ve got to do it to win a game. We came here to win a football game, fully expected to win a game. Was in the game even for as many things as we didn’t do right on offense. Just the basics weren’t there, too, with the ball on the ground a number of times. When the detail is not right, that starts with the coaching, and we have to get that cleaned up.

Q: DK Metcalf and his quiet day, how much do you credit Christian Gonzalez?

MM: All this really leads to one thing, and that’s your players being confident. When you’re not having success, when things aren’t rolling, flow is important. We talk about getting up tempo, playing out of the huddle and putting our players in position through rhythm, timing, execution, and it’s not there, and that’s what happens. Whether you’re blocking, whether you’re catching footballs, whether you’re running routes, whether you’re throwing the ball. When the confidence isn’t right and it’s not peaked, the execution suffers. To me, I think that’s football.

Q: Not having [Michael] Pittman [Jr.], how much did that hurt the offense?

MM: Michael is obviously a veteran guy for us. He’s fought through some injuries, and thought he was starting to get into a rhythm with Aaron. With that, it’s opportunities for others. I’m going to have to take a look at Germ [Germie Bernard] and Roman [Wilson] and see how they played.

Q: What did you see from the Patriots from a pressure perspective that you think might have given you some problems today?

MM: Good pressure plan. I think the biggest thing is the pressure and the challenging our routes man to man. We expected that this week. That’s the way we prepped to come into the game. We did not execute. So, you’ve got to give them credit.

Q: Was Aaron’s coming out just situational, and is there any update on Rico’s [Dowdle] injury?

MM: I do not. I haven’t been in the training room.

Q: But Aaron coming out was just situational?

MM: Situational, yes.

Q: What’s the level of frustration in your locker room after this loss?

MM: You don’t win, I mean, hell, we’d better be frustrated. We had a game we prepared for, had an opportunity to compete there till the fourth quarter and win. Yeah, I hope they’re frustrated.