Tuitt says he'll be ready to play Sunday

A day after suffering an elbow injury in practice, Stephon Tuitt did not practice on Thursday.

The good news is that Tuitt said the injury was not as bad as originally feared. The better news is that he said he will play Sunday when the Steelers host the Jaguars in their AFC Divisional Round playoff game.

"I'm great," Tuitt said. "I'll be ready to go out there and practice tomorrow with the guys. I'll be fine. Just took the day off to make sure everything is good, clean.

"After a bye week, want to make sure everyone comes back healthy. We're just super excited. It's football. Sometimes contact happens, you just have to be able to play through it."

In 12 games, Tuitt had three sacks and 25 tackles (19 solo). He missed four games earlier this season with biceps and back injuries. On Thursday he reiterated there won't be a fifth this week.

"I'll be ready to go," he said. "Not as serious as I thought it was. When everything happens you take it to the extreme manner. After you get your results back it's like, 'it's not that bad.' Once we found that out, we were pretty good."

Four-plus months into the season, Tuitt said he doesn't need much practice time to be physically ready to play.

"You definitely want to make sure you're up to date with the offense," he said. "A lot of things happen from Week 1 compared to now, a lot of players have already changed different positions.

"We know the Jacksonville Jaguars. We had a chance to play them. We know what they're really good at."

While the news on Tuitt is encouraging, nose tackle Javon Hargrave's status is a little more concerning. Hargrave did not practice because of what the team is calling a back injury. This is the first time that his name has appeared on the injury report.

"Let's hope they're not injured, let's hope they're sore," defensive coordinator Keith Butler said of the injuries to his group, which includes Artie Burns, who did not practice Thursday with a knee injury.

MATT SUNDAY GALLERY