STEELERS Joey Porter's night life now confined to hotel

Pittsburgh is traveling to Denver looking to rebound from two home losses.
PITTSBURGH (AP) -- Pittsburgh Steelers linebacker Joey Porter returns to Denver this weekend for the first time since being shot there six weeks ago. Don't look for him to drop by any sports bars.
"I'm going to be where I'm supposed to be," Porter said. "This is a business trip. It's not like on Saturday nights we go out anyway. I'll get some dinner, probably in the hotel, and get ready for the game."
Pittsburgh (2-3), coming off consecutive one-sided losses at home, plays Sunday at Denver (4-1) in what several Steelers say is a pivotal game in their season. If only for that reason, Porter will be much too busy to spend much time thinking about his last trip to Denver.
Gunshot victim
Porter was shot outside a sports bar several hours after the Colorado State-Colorado game on Aug. 30. A former Colorado State player, Porter went to the sports bar with some former college friends and was standing in a parking lot with about 150 others when the shooting took place.
The 9-millimeter bullet struck Porter in the buttocks and lodged in his right thigh before being removed by the Steelers' team doctor two days later. The Steelers initially feared Porter might miss half the season, but his wounds healed so quickly he missed only two games.
The shooting left one dead and wounded five others, including Porter, who was described by police as an innocent bystander. Porter has not talked to police since that weekend.
"I didn't see nothing, so there's nothing I can tell them," Porter said. "I told them I was hit. There was nothing else I saw. I gave them my statement that day. That's all I remember."
So far
Despite his quick return to the lineup, Porter has yet to start playing like he did last season, when he became the first NFL player to have nine sacks and four interceptions in a season. He has one sack and nine tackles in three games, and has yet to make more than four tackles in a game.
But Porter is hardly to blame for the Steelers' ongoing problems with controlling offenses that use four-receiver sets, which often force Porter and linebacker Kendrell Bell to drop into pass coverage.
Here's the anomaly: the Steelers' defense is top-ranked in the league, mostly because teams are scoring so fast, they're not piling up lots of yards. Also, the Steelers have allowed four touchdowns on returns, three on interceptions, and another interception was returned to their 1 and was quickly converted into a touchdown.
The Steelers are allowing 25.8 points per game, the ninth worst average in the league.