Pittsburgh Steelers defensive back Joey Porter Jr. said Sept. 24 he intends to play when he's healthy and ready to go despite his ongoing contract dispute, but added that he's unsure whether that will be in the team's NFL Week 3 game against the Cincinnati Bengals at Acrisure Stadium.
One day earlier, Porter was listed as limited because of conditioning on the team's injury report.
Porter's back injury, listed on previous team injury reports, was not mentioned, as the team designated his status as "NIR (not injury related)/conditioning."
Porter was inactive for the team's first two games this season, with the back injury listed as a reason for the absences.
Porter, in his fourth NFL season with the Steelers, wasn't penalized for defensive pass interference
during the fourth quarter of Pittsburgh's NFL Week 7 loss at Paycor Stadium on Amazon Prime Video's Thursday Night Football despite pulling Bengals receiver Tee Higgins to the ground on Joe Flacco's pass to Higgins.
Porter, a second-round pick of Pittsburgh out of Penn State in the 2023 NFL Draft, injured his knee in 2024 against the Baltimore Ravens.
In 2023, the NFL shared video of an impressive catch the Bengals' Ja'Marr Chase made over Porter while Chase held a mouthguard in his hand.
Porter and his father, Joey Porter Sr., were featured in the second episode of "Hard Knocks: In Season with the AFC North." Porter Sr. said he refuses to eat in Cincinnati, Baltimore or Cleveland because of how NFL fans in those cities feel about him.
Porter Sr. is a former Pittsburgh linebackers coach who was fined $10,000 for an altercation with Bengals defensive back Adam Jones after Porter went onto the field to check on injured Antonio Brown following Vontaze Burfict's hit during Pittsburgh's 18-16 AFC Wild Card win against Cincinnati in Jan. 2016.
The "Joey Porter rule" in 2016 was one of four changes, clarifications or reminders the NFL established resulting from the Bengals-Steelers rivalry.
This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: Joey Porter Jr says he'll play if healthy, unsure of Bengals-Steelers
