As we do every week to get you ready for our upcoming game, our X-factor of the week. Sometimes, it’s a player, unit, concept, or scheme. Here’s our Pittsburgh Steelers X-factor of the game against the Cleveland Browns.
STEELERS VS BROWNS X-FACTOR: JOEY PORTER JR.
For the second time in three weeks, the Steelers are set to take on the Browns. In Week 12, the Steelers visited Cleveland on Thursday Night Football, and they walked away with a tough 24-19 loss. This time they’ll get the Browns at home, and they’re coming off a much better performance against the Cincinnati Bengals last Sunday.
Part of the reason the Steelers lost that game to Cleveland was because of some late-game heroics from Jameis Winston. His performance against the Steelers is just one of his many strong showing over the past couple of weeks. He’s formed an excellent connection with Jerry Jeudy, who’s coming off an astonishing nine-reception, 235-yard performance against the Denver Broncos.
One Steelers defender that will be tasked with defending Jeudy is Joey Porter Jr. Porter had an excellent rookie season in 2023, and has had some good showings this season as well. However, he’s still had some issues, which came to light last week against the Bengals.
Porter was picked on throughout the game by Joe Burrow and the Bengals’ offense. He ended up being called for six penalties on the day. Only four of them were actually accepted, but that’s still a brutal number for Porter. With Porter being such a physical defender, he finds himself getting bunches of penalties at a time, as we saw on Sunday. Porter feels the officials aren’t being completely fair.
All things considered, Porter is still having a solid year. He’s got an interception, and has five passes defended through 12 games. He’s allowing a higher completion percentage at 61.7 percent than he did in his rookie season, but he’s only allowing an 81.1 passer rating when targeted.
Porter needs to be at his best on Sunday. Jeudy and the rest of the Browns offense is humming. After his rough showing last week, the Browns will try to pick on him early. If he can rebound well, it’ll be a massive help for the Steelers’ defense.
