Any running back should benefit from having Arthur Smith as his offensive coordinator, but Ray Fittipaldo of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette believes Jaylen Warren in particular will be the Steelers player who most benefits from the new coordinator’s presence.
Going into his third season, Warren is a young player on the rise. He totaled over 1,000 yards from scrimmage last year and now has opposing defenders’ attention. You probably can’t say that, at least to the same degree, about many backup running backs. Yet it’s becoming increasingly hard to even call him a backup.
Hopping on 93.7 The Fan yesterday, Andrew Fillipponi asked Fittipaldo which single player benefits most from Arthur Smith as coordinator. “I’m gonna go Jaylen Warren. They’re still gonna split the carries, but he’s gonna get more carries because it’s a run-heavy offense”, he said. “Bijan Robinson and [Tyler Allgeier] last season, [Smith] used those guys in the passing game, too. And he used them a lot”.
Smith spent the past three seasons as the head coach of the Atlanta Falcons. He had them finish with a top-10 rushing game each of the past two years. In the two preceding years as offensive coordinator of the Tennessee Titans, he oversaw two top-three running games.
Last season, the Steelers recorded the ninth-most rushing attempts, ranking 13th in rushing yards. A lot of that came after the bye week and in the second half of the season. Fittipaldo believes Smith can help the running game get going early, part of that including using Warren more.
“The Falcons, it was similar to the Steelers”, he pointed out regarding their running back usage. “[Najee] Harris and Warren accounted for 43 percent of the Steelers’ offensive yards. It’s almost the exact same percentage for the Falcons’ running backs last year. So with more volume”, he concludes, Warren stands to benefit the most.
Warren rushed for 784 yards in 2023 on just 149 carries, with 5.3 yards per attempt. On top of that, he also caught 61 passes for another 370 yards. Smith can call a more efficient passing game for his running backs, though, as he did in Atlanta.
Last year with the Falcons, Bijan Robinson caught 58 passes for 487 yards. Tyler Allgeier only caught 18 passes, but he picked up 193 yards to show for it. Warren is capable of putting up those sorts of numbers. All he needs is an offensive coordinator who can put him in situations to succeed.
Odds are he also gets more than 150 carries in 2023. Last year, Robinson recorded 214 carries to Allgeier’s 186. And the Falcons also used Cordarrelle Patterson as a third back with 50 carries. Smith has Patterson in Pittsburgh now behind Najee Harris and Warren, but he likely doesn’t see 50 carries.
It’s not unreasonable to envision both Harris and Warrene reaching at least 200 carries. It’s also not unreasonable to predict some more efficiency from the run game. Taking those factors into consideration, we could be looking at two 1,000-yard runners. Failing that, we could see Warren outproduce Harris as his workload disparity decreases.
