Steelers Have Dynamic Path To Get Next Extension Completed

The Pittsburgh Steelers kicked off the preseason on Thursday night with a 28-9 victory over the visiting Green Bay Packers as head coach Mike McCarthy went up against one of his former NFL teams. In the contest, all quarterbacks shined for the Black and Gold, but rookie Drew Allar really stood out after a lot of questions surrounding him entering his rookie season. Albeit just the preseason, his performance came without veteran wide receivers Michael Pittman Jr. and DK Metcalf on the field. The injuries to the top two pass=-catchers will hopefully not linger for much longer.

Among the other players who did not play was cornerback Joey Porter Jr. as the anticipation of him receiving a possible extension from the franchise continues to ramp up. On Friday night, the news broke that the team reached an agreement on an extension with defensive tackle Keeanu Benton. However, the franchise still sits in a lull with its former second-round pick as watches from the sideline due to an injury.

On Saturday, team insider Nick Farabaugh joined 93.7 The Fan and was asked about some topics surrounding the team following its practice. The extension for the cornerback was brought up during the segment. Farabaugh offered up his thoughts on a dynamic way the front office can push the deal across the goal line.

“I think this gets done,” Farabaugh said. “He either gets higher annual value per year with lower guarantees or he’ll take a little bit of a discount in the average annual value and get higher guarantees. Corner is not a high guarantee position. I think a realistic kind of contract is four years $120 million and then if you get the high guarantees, it is somewhere around $80 million guaranteed. That probably gets that across the finish line.”

For Porter, who finished fifth in AP Defensive Rookie of the Year voting in 2023, had a breakout season in 2025. Throughout his career, the big knock on him has been that he is prone to commit penalties. However, he reduced those a year ago while also producing a career-high in passes defended with 14. He also added an interception in his 14 games started, as well as one sack.

Steelers Signing Porter To An Extension Will Solidify Secondary

On Saturday, Seattle Seahawks cornerback Devon Witherspoon reached an agreement with the franchise on a four-year, $132 million extension. The deal given out now makes him the highest-paid cornerback in the NFL. While the market keeps going up, especially after this most recent deal given out by Seattle, Farabaugh also mentioned that he does not think a Porter extension would command a similar amount of money should it finally get pushed across the finish line.

One thing that has plagued the Pittsburgh defense in recent years is lapses in coverage in the secondary. As defensive coordinator Patrick Graham gets ready to coach his first NFL regular season in the Steel City, he has a lot of work in front of him to reinvigorate a defense that historically has been known to be dominant.

The front office did a great job of bringing in more pieces for the secondary with veteran safety Jaquan Brisker, who was teammates in college with Porter, as well as cornerback Jamel Dean. If 2025 was any indication of what is to come in Porter's career, getting an extension completed would help to solidify the secondary for Graham.

With the offseason extension for Nick Herbig, as well as the recent contract given to Benton, one can only imagine what Porter might be thinking. However, with his father being a former player for the Black and Gold, he has a chance to keep that legacy going. If he does choose to work with the team on getting a deal done, he will get paid well while having the chance to have a tremendous impact on one of the NFL's most storied franchises.