Steelers Four Downs: Najee Harris under siege by defenders quickly

1. Happy with Harris

In today’s NFL world, it’s become controversial to invest too many resources in running backs. That made the Pittsburgh Steelers’ first-round draft choice of Najee Harris one to keep an eye on. So far, the traditional measures of results have been mixed. But what about a deeper dive?

The limitations Harris is subjected to are exhibited by the fact that, according to pro-football-reference.com, Harris has the fewest average yards before contact (1.8) of any of the NFL’s top 17 rushers by yardage. Among the league’s top 80 in rushing yards, Harris is among only 22.5% who have gotten more of their yards (1.9, on average) after contact than before.

The traditional stats list Harris as sixth in the NFL in rushing yards (873), fourth in yards from scrimmage (1,270), second among running backs in receptions (60) and first in touches (297). But among 26 running backs with at least 130 carries (an average of 10 per team game played), Harris is 24th in yards per carry (3.7).

Per pro-football-reference.com, Harris breaks a tackle on an average of once every 13.2 carries, right in the middle of the pack of the 26 NFL running backs with the most carries.

Pro Football Focus, though, reports that Harris leads all NFL running backs in missed tackles forced (70) — albeit, with a whopping 28 coming on receptions. That leads all running backs by a wide margin; the 42 missed tackles Harris has been judged by PFF to have forced on rushing attempts is tied for fourth-most in the NFL.

PFF’s signature metric for evaluating running backs is “elusive rating.” It has Harris fifth in the NFL that category.

2. No-contact

Speaking of yards before/after contact, the Steelers rushing defense was so bad against the Minnesota Vikings last week that Dalvin Cook had 110 of his 205 rushing yards before he was touched by a defender. That 4.1 per-carry average of yards before contact, over the full season, by far would lead the NFL among running backs who average 10 carries per team game. The Jacksonville Jaguars’ James Robinson averages 2.8 yards per carry before contact, according to pro-football-reference.com, most in the league.

3. Deeper Ben

Ben Roethlisberger still throws deep with a frequency that’s well below the NFL average, and his average pass length down the field ranks near the bottom of the league. But one of the bright spots of the Steelers’ most recent game is that Big Ben was throwing long.

According to Next Gen Stats, Roethlisberger went 4 for 5 on passes more than 20 yards downfield. The four completions that far downfield were his most in a game since Week 15 of 2016. The throws in Minnesota gained 134 yards and accounted for a touchdown.

With the Steelers facing a big deficit in that game, Roethlisberger averaged 9.0 air yards per attempt in the second half. For the season, 9.0 would rank among the top five in the NFL; Roethlisberger entered the game among the bottom five in that category.

4. First/second/third priority

Footballoutsiders.com has a statistic that isn’t simple to explain but serves as perhaps the best, all-encompassing comprehensive metric to judge value: Defense-adjusted Value Over Average (DVOA). What might be of interest to Steelers fans is that their offense, as judged by DVOA, gets better as a series of downs progresses.

The Steelers are the third-worst team in the NFL in DVOA on first downs. They improve to, roughly, average (15th in the 32-team league) on second downs and move into the top 10 (ninth) on third/fourth downs.

The first down numbers don’t discriminate: The Steelers are second-worst in the NFL when passing on first downs and fourth-worst when using rushing plays.

Hey, Steeler Nation, get the latest news about the Pittsburgh Steelers here.