After having a largely injury-free first three quarters of the NFL season, injuries are quickly catching up with the Cincinnati Bengals. A scary number of defensive backs are banged up heading into the Bengals' Week 14 matchup with the Pittsburgh Steelers.
Adam Jones has claimed he's not playing this Sunday while dealing with a foot injury. George Iloka and Leon Hall both missed Sunday's game against the Browns and continued to sit out with injuries for the team's first practice of the week on Wednesday. Dre Kirkpatrick appeared on the team's Friday injury report last week with an ankle injury and now he's back again with a knee injury. That's pretty worrisome as he's likely to be the team's No. 1 quarterback come Sunday if Jones is in fact out.
Other new and unexpected names on the injury report are Ryan Hewitt and Clint Boling who were both limited with knee and neck injuries respectively. It's unknown when those injuries occurred as neither left Sunday's Browns game due to injury. Mario Alford also missed practice, but, it was due to non-injury reasons.
The best news of the day was tight end Tyler Eifert participating on Wednesday and though he was limited, barring setbacks, he should play on Sunday, according to Bob Holtzman of ESPN.
Eifert told me he is on track to play Sunday if all goes well this week. https://t.co/Z7ggGjVyxm
— bob holtzman (@BobHoltzmanESPN) December 9, 2015
As for the Steelers, cornerback William Gay was held out with a concussion but per the injury report that was a "coach's decision", meaning he may have cleared the NFL's concussion protocol and could be back for Sunday. Tight ends Matt Spaeth and Heath Miller both didn't practice and linebacker Sean Spence was limited with a hamstring issue. As is also the case for the Bengals, Thursday and Friday's reports will be more indicative of the actual status of each player for Sunday.
BENGALS | INJURY | WED | THURS | FRI | STATUS |
OT Andrew Whitworth | Non-Injury Related | DNP | |||
CB Leon Hall | Back | DNP | |||
CB Adam Jones | Foot | DNP | |||
WR Mario Alford | Non-Injury Related | DNP | |||
CB Dre Kirkpatrick | Knee | LP | |||
S George Iloka | Groin | DNP | |||
CB Josh Shaw | Back | FP | |||
G Clint Boling | Neck | LP | |||
TE Tyler Eifert | Neck | LP | |||
HB Ryan Hewitt | Knee | LP | |||
STEELERS | INJURY | WED | THURS | FRI | STATUS |
WR Sammie Coates | Illness | DNP | |||
CB William Gay | Concussion - Coach's Decision | DNP | |||
LB James Harrison | Not Injury Related | DNP | |||
TE Heath Miller | Rib | DNP | |||
TE Matt Spaeth | Knee | DNP | |||
LB Sean Spence | Hamstring | LP | |||
LS Greg Warren | Not Injury Related | DNP |
DNP - Did Not Participate
LP - Limited Participation
FP - Full Participation
Game Status
Out = Player will not play
Doubtful = 25% chance a player will play
Questionable = 50% chance a player will play
Probable = 75% chance a player will play
(-) = Not Listed - No game status available