The second episode of the 2024 in-season Hard Knocks featuring the AFC North spent plenty of time highlighting CB Joey Porter Jr. Or more accurately, his lowlights from a six-penalty performance against the Cincinnati Bengals. Clips from Tuesday night’s episode highlighted DBs Coach Grady Brown working with Porter to clean things up.
The two are working on a drill where Brown is acting as the receiver, and Porter is playing press-man coverage. After one rep, Porter leaves his hand on Brown for a bit too long, and Brown responds.
“You see how you turned? You probably should have taken your hand off,” Brown said to Porter.
On another rep, Porter gets too handsy for Brown’s liking again. Brown responds, “Don’t hook me like that.”
Hard Knocks shows a couple of positive reps for Porter as well with Brown offering encouragement. There’s also a segment with Porter talking to Mike Tomlin where Tomlin stresses patience when it comes to greatness.
It’s clear that Porter is taking extra steps to correct some of his recent mishaps. He hasn’t had a bad season by any means, but there’s been moments of uneasiness. Porter struggled against the Cincinnati Bengals two weeks ago, with four penalties called on him. This episode was filmed after the game, so it looks like Porter put in some extra work as a result of that poor performance.
Next, there’s another segment where Brown and Porter are talking by themselves during the aforementioned drill.
“You ain’t close to how good you’re gonna be. You’re a good player,” Brown says. “Press is what you do. So don’t never let nobody or nothing take you out your instinct. We gonna adjust. We gonna work.”
Porter has remained level-headed, still feeling confident and comfortable on the field. That draws from his father, former Steelers’ coach and linebacker Joey Porter Sr., who was one of the most supremely confident players on the field.
“My dad was drafted here,” Porter Jr. said. “Once he was drafted here, they took us in as family. He coached here, he played here, he did both of those great things here. I feel like me and my dad, my whole family, we got a deep-rooted connection with the Steelers.”
Porter was penalized in the rematch win over the Browns but not for pass interference. He was tagged for unnecessary roughness, a costly penalty to take but not one related to coverage technique. For the moment, it’s a step forward.
