Tick tick tick. As the Pittsburgh Steelers prepare to host the Atlanta Falcons on Sunday, Joey Porter Jr. continues his wait for a contract extension.
Being that Mike McCarthy's team doesn't discuss deals during the season, if something doesn't get done by kickoff, the budding young cornerback is going to have to wait until next offseason to see where he stands.
Factor in that Porter was listed on the Steelers' Wednesday injury report with a back ailment and was a limited participant in practice, his status for the matchup.
Where are Joey Porter Jr. and the Steelers on negotiations?
Neither the Steelers nor Porter have budged as they discuss numbers, as evidenced by, well, the fact that he hasn't put pen to paper on anything yet.
"I don't necessarily think there's an easy resolution here," ESPN NFL insider Jeremy Fowler said of the contract saga on Pittsburgh's 93.7 The Fan on Tuesday night. "(There's) an artificial deadline. Deadlines do spur some action, as we just saw with New England, right? They were two days from kickoff, they got a deal done with Christian Gonzalez. Now you're looking at all these cornerbacks making 30-plus million dollars a year. The Steelers have to prove, at least to me, that they see Joey Porter as either that or close to that, or $30 million adjacent. So far, their messaging has been that they don't."
Steelers mainstay Cam Heyward was the latest teammate to weigh in on Porter's contract situation, after practice on Wednesday. Fellow coverman Jalen Ramsey and linebacker Patrick Queen have also both voiced support for Porter since the team returned from training camp.
“I’d like for everybody to get paid, and I’d like for everybody to be taken care of,” Heyward said, per Steelers Now. “I’m not gonna act like I have every answer to a negotiation. As a player, selfishly, I’d like everything to be done so we can focus and just continue to be locked in, but guys gotta get their business done, and that’s part of the game. And you don’t run from that.”
Last year around this time, Heyward had to wait until the buzzer to get his contract restructured, agreeing on the night before the Steelers visited the New York Jets for their Week 1 matchup. He added that the situation hasn't had an effect on the locker room — especially with how many leaders are within it — and pushed back against the franchise tag, which the Steelers could use to keep control of Porter, for $23.1 million guaranteed, next campaign.
To answer the question you clicked on, it appears to be a maybe that Porter pulls on his black No. 24 jersey, helmet and shoulder pads on Sunday afternoon. It also seems that the Steelers themselves don't know what the second-generation star is going to do.
Porter obviously wants to be paid in the same sort of ballpark as New England's Gonzalez and Seattle's Devon Witherspoon. Things could certainly get interesting if something isn't done soon.
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