Leading up to the 2024 season, many thought the Pittsburgh Steelers’ offense would be running through the two-headed monster of running backs Najee Harris and Jaylen Warren. Due to multiple injuries, Warren is just now starting to pick up steam. That has meant a lot of extra work for Harris, but he appears to be trending in the other direction with his production starting to dip.
“Najee Harris is maybe losing a little bit of juice because of how many touches he’s garnered to this point,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette’s Brian Batko said Friday via North Shore Drive podcast on Post-Gazette Sports’ YouTube channel. “He was running really well, really hard. Less was more for him earlier in the season when he was ripping off hundred-yard games three games in a row. But Jaylen Warren, I think for the first time this season these last couple weeks, has been the more effective back than Najee.”
Up until the last couple games, Harris was trendin towards having the best season of his career. He was on pace for almost 1,300 rushing yards and his yards per carry was up over 4.2. Both of those would have been career marks.
Over the last three games, he’s struggled to get up over the 50-yard mark on the ground and his efficiency has taken a huge dip. He has 55 attempts for 157 yards (2.9 YPC) and a touchdown since the bye week. He is now trending towards having roughly an average season compared to the first three seasons of his career so far.
Could that be because of an increased workload?
Harris is up to 411 snaps on offense with six games to go. He should pretty easily surpass his 569 snaps from 2023, but he is on pace to have quite a bit less than either of his first two NFL seasons. That being said, his share of the touches has been higher with Warren dealing with injuries. Harris is on pace for 330 touches, which would be the most since his rookie season and almost a 20-percent increase over last season.
With Warren back in the mix, that will likely trend down for the rest of the season as they split work more evenly, but Harris has put a good amount of tread on the tires this season. The same is also true for the entirety of his career. He still has yet to miss a game. Harris should finish the season around 1,300 career touches. That is not appreciably less than Le’Veon Bell’s entire tenure with the Steelers over the course of five seasons, for comparison.
Hopefully the split workload between Warren and Harris starts paying dividends and they can both start having good games at the same time. So far it has been a lot of one or the other finding success. Last season, the Steelers’ rushing attack dominated over the final stretch of the season with Harris leading the way. Recreating that success this year would go a long way toward fixing the Steelers’ recent offensive woes.
Batko doesn’t think Harris will return as a pending free agent in March. He will obviously want to finish the season on a high note to maximize his earning potential.
