Steelers' Jaylen Warren, Alex Highsmith downplay injuries, would play if it was regular season

Now a three-year NFL veteran, it was posited to Jaylen Warren that he might not necessarily need snaps in preseason games or training-camp practice reps to prep himself for the regular season.

The Pittsburgh Steelers’ running back, though, doesn’t care if that’s true or not.

“I try not to look at it like that,” Warren said Wednesday, four days after suffering a hamstring injury during a preseason game. “I’d rather just take the same approach to everything. I still would rather be out there still doing everything I can to help win a Super Bowl.”

The “1-A” to “1” Najee Harris in the two-man running back committee the Steelers deploy, Warren did not play after early in the second quarter of Saturday’s preseason loss to the Buffalo Bills. He is expected to sit out Saturday’s preseason finale at the Detroit Lions.

Warren, though, indicated that if it was the regular season, he would be playing.

“It’s nothing major,” Warren said of his injury. “I would play, but you have to be smart.

“I am fine. We are just looking at this point to the regular season.”

Asked flatly if there was any worry he would not be ready for the Sept. 8 opener at the Atlanta Falcons, Warren said, “No.”

Highsmith not ruled out

Outside linebacker Alex Highsmith termed it “status undetermined” for the game in Detroit. Highsmith suffered a groin injury during a training-camp practice two weeks ago and has yet to make his preseason debut.

“I know now by Year 5 (in the NFL) what I’ve got to do,” Highsmith said after Wednesday’s practice. “The way I am wired, though, I hate missing stuff. But I know with this injury that I have I have got to be smart with it. I don’t want any setbacks going into the regular season.

“But, there is just something about me that I have an itch. I want to be out there, so it is all about knowing my body and just being as healthy as I can.”

Since he entered the league in 2020, Highsmith has missed just one of the Steelers’ 70 games (including playoffs). That, coincidentally, was because of a groin injury – sitting out a Sept. 26, 2021, game against the Cincinnati Bengals.

“We will see,” Highsmith said about playing Saturday against the Lions. “But if I get out there, I will just do what I always do, try to do whatever I can, ball out to help this team. But also looking forward to being as healthy as I can for Week 1.”