Adversity is one of life’s greatest teachers.
Pittsburgh Steelers third-year running back Najee Harris certainly learned that lesson throughout the 2022 season.
A Lisfranc injury certainly slowed Harris down early on, eating into his reps and giving undrafted free agent running back Jaylen Warren an opportunity to work his way into the offensive scheme, raising questions about Harris in general.
But once healthy in the second half of the season, Harris figured out who he is as an NFL running back, leaning on his size and strength to become the battering ram he should be, helping the Steelers become the No. 7 rushing attack in the NFL after their bye week.
Appearing on the “Movin’ The Chains” show on SiriusXM with co-hosts Pat Kirwan and Jim Miller, Harris explained just how important the 2022 season was for him — and how he moves forward from it.
“This past season was probably like one of my most important seasons that I ever played, really. Because there was a lot that I learned. Me being a second-year guy, obviously the expectations is high, which it should be, which is fine, but I learned a lot through the start that I had and the finish that I had,” Harris told Kirwan and Miller, according to audio via SiriusXM.com. “A lot of good tape to look at. I always tell myself there’s a thousand lessons to learn during the loss. There’s one lesson to learn during the win, and there was a lot of times where we started off slow. So it was a lot of lessons that I learned.”
There were certainly a lot of lessons to learn early on in the 2022 season, not only for Harris, but the Steelers overall from an offensive standpoint.
Pittsburgh went through a transition from Mitch Trubisky as the starting quarterback in training camp, the preseason and then through the first four weeks, and the run game simply wasn’t good enough to provide balance to the offensive attack and take some responsibilities off Trubisky’s shoulders. Harris, who was dealing with the foot injury, was too often caught behind the line of scrimmage being too patient and dancing, trying to avoid contract, rather than leaning into his massive 235-pound build and punishing defenders downhill.
There were growing pains once the Steelers turned to Pickett as the starter at halftime of the New York Jets matchup in Week Four, but once Harris got healthy after the Week Nine bye, the Steelers’ rushing attack took off.
Pittsburgh went from one of the worst rushing attacks in football to the NFL’s No. 7 rushing offense in the second half of the season.
After the Week Nine bye, the Steelers averaged 141.8 rushing yards per game, a significant increase from the early-season struggles in the run game for Pittsburgh, which needed a new-look offensive line to gel under first-year position coach Pat Meyer.
In the second half of the season, Harris had five games with 4.5 or more yards per carry, including three of 5.0 or more. The rushing attack really took over in the second half of the season, and Harris looked like the first-round back he was expected to be. Pittsburgh only got better around him with the additions of Isaac Seumalo and Broderick Jones, two guys who excel as run blockers and bring a nastiness in that area.
Throughout the second half of the 2022 season, Harris was a different running back. Less dancing, more downhill, plow-ahead running taking the yards that were there, wearing down defenses in the first half before taking over in the second half when teams simply didn’t want to tackle a back his size and strength.
Coming out of Alabama the easy comparison for Harris was Tennessee Titans’ running back Derrick Henry, another former Tide star. While Harris will never be as explosive as Henry, there’s something to try and work towards with Harris. Henry doesn’t dance, puts his head down and forces guys to tackle him, knowing it’s a long game rather than searching for that explosive play to give his offense a spark on every carry, something it felt like Harris was trying to do a lot last season early on.
With those lessons learned and the upgrades on the offensive line, Harris is poised for a big season. We’ll see if he can show just how much he’s learned from a rocky 2022 season and can become the true star running back the Steelers envisioned when they selected him in the first round of the 2021 NFL Draft.
