Despite being the Pittsburgh Steelers’ technical backup, one analyst is picking Jaylen Warren over Najee Harris on his last of the top runners in football. CBS Sports’ Garrett Podell listed the best 20 running backs in football, placing Warren at the No. 20 spot. Harris didn’t appear on the list.
“Jaylen Warren ranked as the NFL’s most elusive running back last season with a 35.6% tackles avoided rate, the best among 49 running backs with at least 100 carries in 2023,” Podell wrote. “Warren’s 76 tackles avoided ranked as tied for the third most in the NFL last season with Kenneth Walker III.”
Warren is a bowling ball of a runner and difficult to tackle. Using separate but similar data from Pro Football Reference, he ranked tied for third with 27 total broken tackles last season. But considering he wasn’t the team’s bell-cow runner makes the number all the more impressive. On a relative basis, Warren broke a tackle once every 5.5 carries, easily the best mark in football. Here’s the top five.
Best Broken Tackle Rates (2023)
1. Jaylen Warren – 5.5 attempts
2. James Conner – 7.7 attempts
3. Jerome Ford – 7.8 attempts
4. Najee Harris – 8.5 attempts
5. Travis Etienne – 8.6 attempts
Certainly a heavy theme of current or former Steelers backs on that list with James Conner and Harris joining Warren in the top five.
Warren broke out as a sophomore, establishing regular playing time after working his way onto the field as a rookie. He carried the ball 149 times for nearly 800 yards and a healthy 5.3 yards per carry mark that led the league until late in the season. A meaningful contributor in the passing game, Warren finished second on the Steelers with 61 receptions, turning 19 of them into first downs.
Warren should retain a similar role in 2024, working behind but splitting time with Harris as the Steelers enjoy one of the best one-two combos in the NFL.
Harris didn’t make the top 20 despite another 1,000-yard season. He also set career-bests in yards per carry (4.1), run success rate (48.2 percent), and rushing touchdowns (eight) with a pair of 100-yard performances to finish the year. But his role as a receiver has been reduced since Warren arrived and Harris lacks the juice to be a big-play runner.
The top running back spot unsurprisingly went to the San Francisco 49ers’ Christian McCaffrey. Derrick Henry and his new Baltimore Ravens squad took home second place, still running strong at age 30. And Nick Chubb, despite the second devastating knee injury of his football career, rounded out the top five.
