Joey Porter Jr. made his Cowboys debut in Week 4, playing 25 defensive snaps. The three-year Steelers starter went from taking himself off the Pittsburgh practice field last Wednesday to starting for the Cowboys four days later.
Agreeing to play on his rookie deal in Dallas (but not with Pittsburgh), Porter had turned down an extension offer from the Steelers that arrived just before the season. Porter passed on a deal, and the Steelers — after extending 2023 draftees Keeanu Benton, Darnell Washington and Nick Herbig — moved on for a Cowboys trade package headlined by a 2028 second-round pick.
The Cowboys were the only real suitor here, according to NFL.com’s Ian Rapoport, who indicates the Lions did not join the NFC East team in making a serious offer for the disgruntled cornerback. Dan Campbell confirmed the Lions were involved in the Porter chase, but with only one legitimate offer, the Steelers fetching a second-rounder here seems like good value.
We heard recently the Steelers had offered Porter more than $27MM per year, and Rapoport adds the top Pittsburgh proposal reached $28MM AAV. That would have placed Porter as the NFL’s seventh-highest-paid corner — in terms of per-year salary.
Contract AAVs only tell part of the story in terms of value, of course, and that is especially true for three of the NFL’s franchises. The Bengals, Packers and Steelers usually design contracts that include only one season guaranteed in full; signing bonuses and first-year paragraph 5 salaries represent the upfront guarantees in these deals. That did not sit well for Porter’s camp.
As I discussed in our latest Trade Rumors Front Office piece, the Steelers ran into trouble with their long-held guarantee stance here. Porter is certainly familiar with how the Steelers do business, seeing that his father — Super Bowl-winning linebacker Joey Porter — played eight seasons for the franchise before signing with the Dolphins in 2007. The younger Porter indeed played hardball due to the organization’s long-held (save for a few impact players) guarantee precedent.
The Steelers’ offer included significant guarantees for injury beyond Year 1 of the extension, Rapoport adds, but Porter balked because of the team’s reluctance to include fully guaranteed money in the second year. The Steelers have bent their rules for select players — Ben Roethlisberger, T.J. Watt, D.K. Metcalf — and Porter presumably argued he deserved such an exception as well. It is clear the Steelers disagreed, and they took the Cowboys’ offer after a messy standoff kept the corner out of action — with a back injury (in 2019 Jalen Ramsey fashion) used as cover for the de facto hold-in.
Porter, 26, angling to be traded to a team that uses a modern NFL contract structure makes sense; it will be interesting to see if anyone follows his lead down the line in Pittsburgh, Cincinnati or Green Bay. A handful of Bengals have requested trades amid negotiations in recent years, though Mike Brown’s club is famous for not blinking in these stalemates. The Steelers opted to move on from the Porter problem, acting quickly after the situation deteriorated again last week.
Although the Steelers only held walkthroughs before their Thursday-night game last week, Porter was listed as a full participant for the first time since the team activated him from the active/PUP list in late August. Porter pulled himself off the practice field Wednesday, however, citing back pain.
This tactic appeared straight out of the Ramsey playbook, and like the All-Pro once he was traded from the Jaguars to the Rams, Porter suited up for his new team soon after a trade. The Cowboys did not list Porter on their final injury report before Week 4, all but confirming the contract-year defender had used an injury as cover to stage a hold-in.
The Steelers convinced their other extended 2023 draftees to sign contracts in line with their guarantee stance, as the Benton, Herbig and Washington contracts’ only guarantees cover the players’ 2026 salaries and signing bonuses. The Cowboys, like most teams, regularly hand out contracts with full guarantees beyond Year 1. As Porter will seek a Dallas extension — or follow two-time teammate George Pickens in being franchise-tagged after a contract-year trade — he relocated to a team likely willing to meet his demands.
The Cowboys played their Week 4 Texans matchup without the injured Cobie Durant, though 2025 draftee Shavon Revel suited up after battling an injury. Revel and Durant are positioned as backups in Dallas now, with Porter joining DaRon Bland — whose 2025 extension did include multiple years fully guaranteed — and rookie slot Caleb Downs.
