On a day in which safety DeShon Elliott chastised himself for his decision not to "keep things more in house" while reacting to the Steelers' loss to Kansas City on Christmas Day, defensive coordinator Teryl Austin made it clear he welcomes such emotion being shown by his players.
"I would much rather have them be emotional and be upset about things not going their way than not giving a (expletive)," Austin maintained. "Our guys give a (expletive). To me that's important and that's an important thing to have and that tells me that they want to get it right and they're not satisfied with it going the way it is.
"I'm perfectly fine with that. We have good men in our building. They've been through a lot of stuff together and, you know, rightfully so, a little but frustrated. But out of that frustration I think we can find some prosperity."
The loss to the Chiefs was the Steelers' third straight and the third consecutive game in which the defense had allowed at least 27 points.
But Austin isn't concerned about resulting frustrations degenerating into finger-pointing on the part of the defense.
"I think we have good enough relationships in this building that we won't point fingers at people, we just know there are issues that need to be solved," Austin continued. "Because of the open dialogue and the transparency we have, starting with (head coach) Mike (Tomlin), and that we all aspire to have in our rooms, me as a coordinator, the position coaches that have their rooms, I don't think you'll have something like that.
"Guys are just frustrated right now."
Elliott also told the media today about an "extra walk-through" the defense intended to conduct prior to practice.
Austin is all for that and any other such player-inspired responses, as well.
"We'll do whatever we have to do to try to get right," he said. "The guys went out a little bit extra today, that was something the players wanted to do to get out to make sure they're in front of some things.
"We have passionate guys, guys that want to get it right and they're willing to do whatever it is and whatever it takes to get over the hump. They know we can be much better than we've shown and what we've played the last few weeks. They're working to get back on track."
Austin doesn't have a specific component of the defense in mind as an initial fix in advance of Saturday night's regular-season finale against Cincinnati.
But registering sacks and creating turnovers remain a priority.
The Steelers have 36 sacks on the season but just four in their last three games combined.
And they're tied for the NFL lead in takeaways with 31 but have only three of those during consecutive losses to the Eagles, Ravens and Chiefs.
They didn't generate a sack, a fumble recovery or an interception against Kansas City.
"Sacks and turnovers change the game," Austin emphasized. "Sacks stop drives. Sacks with strips and turnovers, interceptions, all that stuff, they change the game. That's part of what we do, we aspire to do that, and we just have to work.
"We know we have a process, the process works and sometimes there's a lull in the process in terms of our production during the course of the year. But it doesn't stop us from continuing to work at it, continuing to grind at it until it does flip back over.
"We know if you do give it the attention it deserves like we do, that the results will come. Right now they haven't come but they'll be back. I have total confidence in our guys and how we work. And the emphasis we put on rushing the passer, the emphasis we put on getting turnovers will show its head again."
