Najee Harris is not Spindenhall. Who was pretty damn good by the way. If they could average more than 4 yards per carry this offense is quite a bit different. Christ they had to pass on 3rd and one last year.
not because of the RB. It was because they have no blocking TE and the OL was atrocious. Derrick Henry would have struggled on the steelers last year. Unless they had a Barry Sanders or Saquon like talent that could routinely make defenders miss with poor blocking, no RB was going to do well last year.
Conner averaged 4.5 per carry his first 2 seasons, then the last 2 the OL went downhill and his average suffered. He still did average 4.3 last year.
Conner is a good but not great RB. Snell is nothing but a short yardage backup. He was a terrible draft pick. You can literally find 10 free agents to give you what Snell gives you.
My point with Mendenhall was that he was a 1st round RB, lots of talent and he didn't move the needle much on the overall effectiveness of the run game.
Harris or Etienne are better than what the steelers have. I expect than ANY RB will be better this year for the steelers because the scheme will be much better, the OL coaching will be better and i expect there will be at least 1 high draft pick on the OL.
If my choices are to draft Harris or Etienne then miss out on a TE and get a lesser OL prospect and lesser edge rusher prospect, or get a top OL prospect along with a TE and edge rusher that can play immediately and a RB in rd 4, I will take the 4th round RB, no doubt.