The Pittsburgh Football Podcast

By Chris Gates | The Pittsburgh Football Podcast

The Pittsburgh Steelers are days away from opening the 2026 season against the Atlanta Falcons, and somehow we still don’t know what Joey Porter Jr.’s role will be on Sunday.

Will he have a new contract?

Will his back allow him to play?

Has he practiced enough to start?

Will he dress at all?

Those questions have hovered over the Steelers throughout the summer, and despite Week 1 finally arriving, we don’t have many answers.

What we do know is that the situation has become increasingly messy.

The cornerback market is finally set

One of the biggest developments this week actually happened in New England.

The Patriots signed Christian Gonzalez to a four-year, $135 million contract extension that includes $102 million guaranteed.

That deal matters for Pittsburgh because Gonzalez represented one of the final major dominoes in the cornerback market.

The Steelers and Porter can now look around the NFL and see what the position costs. They know what the best corners are making. They know what the top of the guaranteed-money market looks like.

There’s no longer much reason to wait for someone else to establish the market.

Now the question is simply where the Steelers believe Porter belongs within it.

My guess — and this is only my interpretation of how these negotiations have played out — is that Pittsburgh doesn’t view Porter as the best cornerback in football or necessarily even one of the top five.

But I also don’t think the Steelers view him as the 15th-best corner in the league.

He’s probably somewhere in that five-to-10 range in their minds.

The problem is that Porter understandably wants to maximize his value, particularly the guaranteed portion of the contract, while the Steelers have traditionally structured contracts in a way that gives them more flexibility in the later years of a deal.

Something has to give.

The Steelers have made their move

There was at least some movement this week.

NFL Network’s Mike Garafolo reported that the Steelers formally submitted a contract proposal to Porter.

Obviously, he didn’t accept it.

More importantly, the offer was characterized as not being particularly close to what Porter is seeking.

That’s where things stand as Week 1 approaches.

• The market has been established.
• The Steelers have made an offer.
• Porter hasn’t accepted it.
• And time is running out.

Pittsburgh has traditionally refused to negotiate contracts once the regular season begins. That policy has received plenty of criticism nationally, and people can debate whether it still makes sense in the modern NFL.

But if there’s one thing we know about the Steelers, it’s that they don’t tend to abandon organizational policies because of outside pressure.

Unless something changes, there’s a very real deadline approaching.

Then there’s Porter’s back

The contract situation would be complicated enough on its own.

Now add the physical component.

Porter spent training camp on the physically unable to perform list because of a back injury. Given the contract dispute occurring simultaneously, there was naturally plenty of speculation about how much the injury and contract negotiations were connected.

Eventually, Porter returned to practice.

That seemed like progress.

But Mike McCarthy has described Porter as going through a “ramp-up period” as he works his way back into football shape and gets reacquainted with Pittsburgh’s defense.

And this week, Porter was limited in practice because of his back.

So here we are.

• Porter didn’t practice throughout training camp.
• He returned as the Steelers began preparing for the regular season.
• He’s still ramping himself up physically.
• He’s now officially on the injury report with the same back issue.

And he still doesn’t have a contract.

That’s a lot to sort out with the Falcons game just days away.

At what point does this become a football problem?

For most of the summer, the Porter situation was primarily a business story.

Now it’s a football story.

Atlanta has legitimate weapons in the passing game.

• Drake London is a high-level NFL receiver.
• Kyle Pitts presents matchup problems.
• Kevin Stefanski is a good offensive coach who knows the Steelers extremely well after his years in Cleveland.

And Pittsburgh still doesn’t know exactly what it’s getting from one of its starting cornerbacks.

When the Steelers released their depth chart, Porter was listed as a co-starter with Asante Samuel Jr.

Some interpreted that as Pittsburgh sending Porter a message during contract negotiations.

Maybe there’s some of that involved.

But there’s also a much simpler explanation.

How could the Steelers confidently list Porter as their unquestioned starter right now?

Porter himself was noncommittal when previously asked whether he would play Week 1 without a new contract. He hasn’t participated in a normal training camp. He’s still ramping up physically. And now his back is bothering him again.

Pittsburgh has to prepare for the possibility that Samuel starts.

In fact, at this point, I’d be surprised if Porter starts and plays a normal workload Sunday.

Even if Porter dresses, asking him to suddenly step onto the field and play the majority of the defensive snaps against London and the Falcons after barely practicing all summer doesn’t seem particularly realistic.

Perhaps Porter progresses rapidly over the next couple of days.

Perhaps the contract gets signed and everything suddenly falls into place.

Contract negotiations have a funny way of appearing dead right before both sides find common ground.

But there are a lot of things that need to happen in a very short period of time.

Porter doesn’t have unlimited leverage, either

There’s another important piece of this situation that shouldn’t be ignored.

Porter ultimately needs to play football.

Holding out indefinitely doesn’t necessarily help him reach the payday he’s seeking. He needs to continue progressing through his current contract before he can reach the next stage of his career and maximize his earning potential.

That’s why I’ve never viewed simply refusing to play for an extended period as a particularly strong option for Porter.

• He can apply pressure.
• He can make the Steelers uncomfortable.
• But eventually, playing is in his best interest, too.

That’s part of what makes this entire situation so strange.

Both sides have reasons to get something done.

The Steelers clearly value Porter enough to make an extension offer. Porter obviously has every reason to secure as much guaranteed money as possible before putting his body on the line for another NFL season.

And yet we’re approaching Week 1 without a resolution.

Something has to happen soon

Maybe by the time you’re reading this, the entire story has changed.

That’s how quickly these negotiations can move.

But as things currently stand, the Steelers are preparing to open a season in which they have legitimate expectations while one of their most important defensive players remains caught between a contract dispute, a physical ramp-up and a back injury.

The frustrating part is that the NFL has now provided all the information both sides should need.

The cornerback market is established.

Pittsburgh knows what Gonzalez received. It knows what Devon Witherspoon received. It knows what the league’s other highly paid corners are making.

Porter and his representatives know those numbers, too.

Now it’s about determining what Joey Porter Jr. is worth to the Pittsburgh Steelers.

And if they can’t figure that out before Sunday, the question changes.

It stops being about Porter’s next contract.

It becomes about whether the Steelers can count on him when the games actually matter.