Najee Harris enters his 71st game with the Pittsburgh Steelers on Saturday in a wild-card game with the Baltimore Ravens. The former first-round back knows it could be his final wearing the black and gold.
"Compartmentalizing (those feelings) is not hard," Harris said Thursday, via . "But (I am) realizing the situation, what it is. You realize what it is. And (come) the offseason, whenever it is, whatever happens after this season … all you can do is see what happens next."
In four seasons with the Steelers, Harris hasn't missed a contest, playing in all 68 regular season tilts, and two playoff games. He's the only running back in the ¹ú²úÍâÁ÷Íøwith 1,000-plus rush yards in each of the last four seasons.
With the Steelers declining his fifth-year option, the running back is headed toward free agency in 2025, but he's not getting sentimental heading to Baltimore for a postseason tilt.
"Soak it in? Shoot, man, this is a business," Harris said. "This is a production business, obviously. All you can do is … I've been put in situations where I've got to make the best of my opportunities. Whatever that is, it is, and if you can say you've done the best you can, that's all you can do.
"Would you want to change stuff? Yeah. Would you want to have done better at some things? Yeah. But sometimes people are put in certain situations, and you have to make the best of it. That's the reality of it."
Harris' 1,043 yards in 2024 gave him four consecutive seasons over the 1,000-yard plateau. He is the third player in the last 20 seasons to have 1,000-plus rush yards in each of his first four ¹ú²úÍâÁ÷Íøcampaigns (others: Adrian Peterson and Chris Johnson).
Yet, those numbers have primarily been gained by the Steelers buying in bulk. Harris has a pedestrian career 3.9 yards per carry average and has never generated a run of 40-plus yards in his career. Harris has never been a big-tackle breaker, generating a career 2.91 yards after contact per carry, according to Pro Football Focus.
The Steelers' decision to decline a not-outlandish $6.97 million fifth-year option signaled they'd be comfortable moving on from the running back after the season.
Jaylen Warren has sliced into Harris' carries and been more explosive than the former first-rounder -- 3.39 yards after contact over three seasons. Harris has 103 runs of 10-plus yards on 1,121 career carries (one every 10.88 totes), per PFF. Warren has 51 10-plus yard runs on 354 carries (one every 6.94 carries).
In two games versus Baltimore this season, Harris has earned 105 yards on 27 carries (3.89 YPC) with no touchdowns.
Harris has never won a playoff game in a Steelers uniform, going 0-2 in his first three seasons. If this is his last playoff ride in Pittsburgh, Harris wants to go out with a bang and give himself at least one more game wearing black and gold.
"You can't lose sight of the fact that that's the main goal at the end of the day," Harris said of winning in the postseason. "Yeah, you want to have good (individual stats) and everything, but, at the end of the day, it's about the team win. If the team wins, everybody eats. If the team doesn't win, it really doesn't matter."
Last offseason, headline-making running backs changed squads and smashed, from Saquon Barkley to Derrick Henry to Josh Jacobs. The 2025 crop isn't as star-studded, with Aaron Jones, Harris, J.K. Dobbins, Javonte Williams, Rico Dowdle and a post-injury Nick Chubb the top options set to be free agency in March.
