Chris Hoke Expresses Concern For Steelers’ Run Sport: ‘Simply Getting A Hat And Shifting Guys’

While the Steelers’ offensive line held up in pass protection, the work in the run game is still slowly developing. Last night’s starting running back, rookie Kaleb Johnson, found running lanes narrow, if not illusory. With four-fifths of the starting offensive line in the game, one would have hoped for better—one being Chris Hoke.

“Where I want to see improvement from preseason Game 1 to preseason Game 2 is at the line of scrimmage”, Hoke said on the Steelers Extra Point postgame show about the run game. “They did a good job protecting the quarterback. Let’s do a little bit better at getting some movement at the line of scrimmage. I thought the guys got knocked back a little bit. There weren’t a lot of running lanes. I think they’ll see that when they watch the film”.

The Steelers drafted Kaleb Johnson, in conjunction with the new offensive line, to jumpstart the run game. The rookie third-round pick gained just 20 yards, however, on eight rushing attempts in his preseason debut. His longest run was just seven yards, and it was a well-earned seven.

Of his eight official runs, Johnson did produce a successful play on five of them. In a three-play sequence, he picked up four yards on first down, five on second, and two on third down. It’s just 11 yards, but each run kept the Steelers ahead of the chains at that point in the game.

But the Steelers also struggled to keep their positioning in the run game, and the stats alone don’t show it. Johnson had a loss of two negated by penalty, for example, to pair with his three-yard loss. What Hoke took most umbrage with, though, was when they brought Johnson back on to convert on 4th and 1 and failed.

“I saw a couple of guys when they brought the receivers in from the weak side, there was that 4th and 1 that led to one of the touchdowns for the Jaguars and Kaleb Johnson ran the ball off the right side and Robert Woods got knocked back a little bit”, Hoke said of the Steelers’ run game. “He’s got to be tougher in there and seal off the inside so Kaleb Johnson can get downhill so there’s some improvement. There’s some improvement [needed in] run blocking but overall physically they played well. It’s just getting a hat on a hat and moving guys”.

The Steelers actually signed Woods perhaps as much for the run game as for the pass game, if not more. And it’s “just” the preseason, granted, but a failure like that matters. The inability of the Steelers’ run game to convert on 4 and 1 led to a turnover on downs on their own 44 and the Jaguars quickly took the lead. In a game that actually mattered, that could be the difference between a win and a loss.