The Pittsburgh Steelers figure to have a lengthy list of injuries on their Week 3 injury report come Wednesday based on the update that head coach Mike Tomlin gave on Tuesday during his weekly press conference.
“We have some new injuries to contend with,” Tomlin said. “Alex Highsmith with a groin. T.J. Watt with a groin. So, we’re dealing with something there at that positional group. Ben [Roethlisberger] has a pec injury of some kind on his left pec that could affect him in from a preparation standpoint. [I] don’t have an idea of how much as I sit here right now, but we better be ready to be adjustable and deal with that. And obviously we’ve got Devin Bush and Joe Haden who missed last week, who are working their way back and their participation will be our guide, or non-participation will be our guide, in terms of analyzing their availability. Diontae [Johnson] got hurt late in the game from a knee standpoint. He’s looking better, but not to be confused with great, so we’ll follow him and his health as we get through the week.”
That’s certainly a long list that includes four players, outside linebackers Alex Highsmith and T.J. Watt, and cornerback Joe Haden and inside linebacker Devin Bush, all currently dealing with groin injuries of some degree. Bush and Haden missed the Week 2 home game with their injuries. On Tuesday, Tomlin was asked about how tough it is for players to fight through groin injuries.
“And that’s why I’m not making any drastic statements about the availability of any of these guys, because the degree of the injury changes the prognosis and the man himself changes the prognosis,” Tomlin said. “And so, we’ll give guys an opportunity that are close enough to health to practice, we’ll give them an opportunity to practice during the course of the week. And if they practice, we’ll look at the quality of that practice or how much they practice and let that be a guide for us in terms of their potential participation.
“I’ll also say this, some more established players can play on less prep than others, and we’ve had that discussion in the past. And so, there are a lot of variables at play, but not overly concerned about it. It’s the tight rope that we walk week in and week out.”
As for Roethlisberger dealing with a pec injury now, that’s not a bit surprising with him taking so many hits on Sunday in the teams loss to the Las Vegas Raiders. Tomin was asked on Tuesday if he thought Roethlisberger took too many hits in that game.
“He did. He took too many hits,” Tomlin said.
Steelers second year defensive tackle Carlos Davis also missed the Week 2 game with a knee injury and Tomlin was asked about his status for Week 3 on Tuesday.
“We’ll see,” Tomlin said. “He hadn’t practiced yet this week. We’ll let his participation be our guide in terms of where he is.”
So, there you go. The first official injury report of Week 3 will be released after Wednesday practice so we can probably expect that to show that several players failed to work earlier in the day.
