Steelers' Najee Harris - RBs devalued only when it comes to pay - ESPN

LATROBE, Pa. — A day after New York Giants running back Saquon Barkley agreed to sign an adjusted franchise tender to end a stalemate with the team, Pittsburgh Steelers back Najee Harris expressed frustration with the current valuation of the position in the NFL.

«They ask me alone — 'The game's going to rely on you, you need to do this for the team, you got to do this right here. Hey, it's time to close out the game. Hey, we need to lean on you right now,'» Harris said Wednesday. «And it happens a lot of places like Cleveland, Tennessee, even with the Niners; there's numerous teams where this happens at.

»… Only time when they choose to say that [the position] is devalued is when it's time to pay the running back.… It's not devalued at all. They just don't want to pay a running back."

With incentives, Barkley's deal can have a total valuation of $11.1 million — about a million more than the position's 2023 franchise tag value of $10.091 million.

«Saquon accumulated for almost 30% of the offense,» said Harris, who emphasized repeatedly he was speaking on behalf of all NFL running backs and not voicing gripes with the Steelers' organization. «Why can't you look at that and say, 'OK, well he said he's not trying to break the market or set the market, but he's trying to get compensated of what he thinks is fair… I know that they know themselves, that ain't fair what he's getting. He wanted a long contract to know his security there. Right now, he doesn't have no security. They're just going to probably utilize him the same way. And if something happens to him again, they're going to probably look somewhere else.

»It's like, man, what is the security that we have? We don't have no security right now. You guys are using us to