Bengals All-Pro wide receiver Ja'Marr Chase emerged from the locker room Thursday, but not from concussion protocol.

While running mate Tee Higgins (groin/neck) missed his second straight practice, Chase went limited while still working through concussion protocol. So the status of quarterback Joe Burrow's top playmakers remain in doubt for Sunday's game (1 p.m.-Cincinnati's FOX 19) in Miami.

So is the status of starting safety Bryan Cook (ankle), although he went limited Thursday for the first time this week. He was limited all last week before not playing against Jacksonville. Backup safety Kyle Dugger (quad) has yet to practice since getting hurt in Pittsburgh.

But Jordan Battle (hamstring), the other starting safety, went full Thursday. So did starting linebacker Barrett Carter (ankle) and rookie wide receiver Colbie Young (knee). Both were limited Wednesday, and it was Young's first practice since getting hurt in Pittsburgh Sept. 27.

Battle of Miami

Battle heads back home to Miami thinking of the great tackles made by the two all-time safeties he watched growing up in the town they share, Pro Football Hall-of-Famer Ed Reed and the late, great Sean Taylor.

"Obviously, you can't hit like they did back then, which  is kind of illegal," Battle said after Thursday's practice. "I like their approach. Like a missile. Coming downhill. Not stopping. Just running your feet on the tackle. I feel like that's something I've got to use. Running  through a guy's hip more. Running through a guy's legs and having an aggressive route, and I feel like can make a lot of plays."

Also on Battle's iPad is something as recent as last Sunday.

"I made a little cutup of guys making good tackles  around the league," Battle said.

This is what a guy who doesn't wear a C on his jersey, but knows he really is, does.

Battle stood before his locker Thursday and met the media throng in the glare of the spotlight from last Sunday's missed tackle early in the game on third-and-18 that resulted in a first down for Jaguars tight end Brenton Strange and allowed the Jags to take a 3-0 lead.

Battle also talked about defending tight ends, a position group that has accounted for most of the passing yards against the Bengals.

"Just have to have better eyes," Battle said. "I feel like a lot of time we get run-run, then play-action passes  behind it. We've got to do a better job of just radaring when we get sucked into the run. Just get back and find your coverage.  It's a hard thing, but you have to do it."

Battle didn't hide behind the injury report, which last week had him for one full practice with a hamstring issue.

"It was fine. In the second half, it was a little tight, but nothing I couldn't play through," Battle said. "It limited me a little bit, not crazy enough to where I can't be out there."

Battle, who began this week limited but went full Thursday, went around the league on tape in order to button up his tackling.

The tackles that caught his eye began with the 49ers' elite linebacker tandem of Fred Warner and Dre Greenlaw, as well as plays from Rams safety Quentin Lake and Raiders safety Jeremy Chin. Five-time Pro Bowl safety Derwin James is always on his loop.

"I like how aggressive he is, how physical he is," Battle said. "He wants to make his presence known. He wraps as well, and his target is a low-landing point."

Battle is looking to transfer the video to the field Sunday as he deconstructs the missed tackle. Battle is working on the "gather," of a tackle, where the tackler slows down his pursuit and then at the same time must begin breaking down into a stance before making the hit.

"Driving through his hip," Battle said. "Get into a gather … Under more control … I just closed before I got to a gather …  When I close, I've got to get a gather, face him up, wrap him up chest-to-chest and drive him back."

Heading home has Battle thinking about dropping some tackles that are legal, sure, and have the natives reminded of Reed and Taylor.

"In Miami," Battle said, "that would be beautiful."

The King And I

Just like 40 years ago, when Peter King told me to call him from Syracuse, N.Y. at 9:02 a.m. so he could give me the rushing stats of Giants running back Joe Morris on both Astroturf and grass (how is that for a clause filled with anachronisms and no mention of Pro Football Focus?), I called him Thursday at 11:50 a.m. so I could get the particulars of his Cincinnati book signing.

This Saturday. From 7-9 p.m. Joseph-Beth Booksellers, 2692 Madison Rd.

A book, King says, that never would have happened if he didn't cover the 1984 Bengals of Hall-of-Fame owner Paul Brown, assistant general manager Mike Brown, architect of the Bengals' first Super Bowl team, as well as rookie head coach Sam Wyche and rookie quarterback Boomer Esiason.

King was a rookie, too, on the Bengals beat for The Cincinnati Enquirer.

"Think about it," King says of the access that team offered.

"Paul Brown was at every training camp practice. I had some tense moments with Mike, but he was always there to answer questions. He would never be invisible. When I left that job, I wrote to thank him. I'm very fond of the family. Sam Wyche said to me, 'If you ever need me, just knock on my door.' I mean. Come on. This was at training camp at Wilmington College.

"Boomer Esiason, who was the most media-friendly quarterback in the league from almost the time he came into the NFL, would come into my dorm room and use my phone, and I began to meet those guys."

King signs The Game, his memoir of 40 in-your-face-not-to-mention-in-your-limousine years covering the NFL, and he'll be discussing it all with long-time Cincinnati sports columnist Paul Daugherty.

King helped me out even though we had just met the day before, when I was dispatched by the Syracuse Herald-Journal to visit the 1986 New York Football Giants late in the season.

It was a team clearly on the way to the Super Bowl with a historic defense and a running back who made history at Syracuse by scaling an all-time rushing list of Jim Brown, Ernie Davis, and Floyd Little.

Why King, the Giants beat reporter for Newsday, helped the clueless kid from Upstate writing a Joe Morris feature, is answered somewhere in his grace.

Here's a guy who would go on to become the Peter Gammons of his sport, the legendary Boston Globe baseball writer whose column became a must-read across the industry.

That's what King became for the NFL when he left Newsday shortly after the Giants won it all and went to Sports Illustrated, where his uncanny ability to get into places where no one else would be welcome, made his notes columns and newsy features must-reads.

Reggie White's limo ride that defined free agency. John Madden's bus, Steve Young's Super Bowl MVP hotel room, complete with IVs, Peyton Manning's tanning bed.

When King saw me trailing Saints head coach Sean Payton's entourage an hour after they won the Super Bowl about 15 years ago, King looked askance.

"What does Bengals.com want with this?"

Well, just one more quote nobody would have in the morning. After all, Payton had been an assistant up the road at Miami University, and the Bengals had been fans ever since their Hall-of-Fame offensive line coach, Jim McNally, raved about Payton when he worked with him at the Giants.

King didn't get mad that I was hanging around. He appreciated the grind.

Here's a guy who had Pete Rozelle in his rolodex, and he let me put Peter King in my rolodex. Like the day he answered on that first Joe Morris ring, he always took a call. From Joseph Edward Morris to Joseph Lee Burrow. Forty years. He always helped. He always counseled. He always cheered what you were doing or trying to do.

The book?

Never would have happened without the '84 Bengals.

Gary Myers, then of the Dallas Morning News, saw the stuff King was breaking in Cincy (Wyche basically gave him the '84 draft) and recommended him to Newsday.

"It's not like today," King says of his first and only Bengals draft. "It was the first time I ever met him, and as I've replayed this moment in my mind, I think he was trying to get a relationship off to a strong start with a conduit for the coach to the city.

"The draft was on a Tuesday morning, and if you put it  in the morning paper that the Bengals are going to draft Ricky Hunley, who cares?" King recalls. "Nobody would know. There was no internet, there was nothing. He knew nobody would find out."

Of course, five months later Wyche called Enquirer sports editor Greg Noble and wanted him fired for bringing what he called an enemy reporter into the locker room when all King had done was help an out-of-town writer set up an interview with wide receiver Cris Collinsworth.

"We had an up-and-down relationship. Sam taught me you had to be able to leave stuff in the past," and a month later when King asked Wyche to stop by a charity event, he did a magic act for the kids.

King regrets one moment. He was standing with Paul Brown at a camp practice that had to be vintage 90-degree Wilmington weather when he exclaimed, 'How can you guys stand out here day after day, two hours in the morning and an hour in the afternoon in the blazing sun?"

An annoyed Brown said, "Young man, this is our lifeblood."

"I should have said it better. I knew it was important," King said.

It became his lifeblood, too. But only because of the 1984 Bengals.

Pete, I'll be in Miami. But I'll call you at 9:02 to see how the signing went.​

Slants and Screens

Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow is riding a career-best 292.8 passing yards per game, fifth in the league …

He leads the NFL with 112 completions, is fifth with 157 pass attempts, and his 71.3 completion percentage trails only the 72.6 of the Jets' Geno Smith …

Burrow has never started a game without either Chase or Higgins …

He's 35-20 with both, 8-8 with one of them …

Also limited for the Bengals on Thursday was defensive tackle Dexter Lawrence (wrist), as he was Wednesday …

Same with right guard Dalton Risner (knee) …

Defensive tackle Jonathan Allen (knee) didn't practice again Thursday …

Backup linebacker Swayze Bozeman (groin) who missed last Sunday's game and Wednesday's practice, went full Thursday ..