PITTSBURGH (93.7 The Fan) – There is a harsh reality will come for some late Saturday night or whenever this season ends—they will never be a part of this team or organization again. Among them is a Steelers number one pick.
What the team declined the fifth-year option on running back Najee Harris it pretty much sealed the end of his Steelers career following this season. There is always the possibility to re-sign Harris to a longer contract, but it’s not likely. Heading into the playoff game on Saturday, Harris seemed matter-of-fact about it.
“Shoot man, this is a business,” Harris said Thursday. “This is a production business.”
He’s produced in terms of 1,000-yard seasons. He’s eclipsed that number each of his four years, which no other Steeler has ever done. His yards per carry are second-highest in his career at 4.0 and his yards per reception are best at 7.9. Over the span of his four seasons he’s also played for two different offensive coordinators and with six different starting quarterbacks.
“I’ve been put in situations where you have to make the best of your opportunity,” Harris said. “Whatever that is, it is. If you said you did the best you can, that’s all you can do.”
“Would you want to change stuff? Yeah. Would you want to do better at things? Yeah. Sometimes people are faced with certain situations and you got to make the best of it.”
Harris didn’t want to get into what those situations are or were. He said those things are personal and he’s not going to spill them to public consumption.
“Putting it out there on social media isn’t going to do no good,” Harris said. “Everyone has their own stories and write what they want.”
He added it’s part of the sport and for anyone/everyone to speculate, he’s not upset or concerned about that. What he said his focus is right now is to do something he’s never done, win a playoff game. Not about trying to prove his value to the Steelers or any of the 31 other teams who might have interest in him when free agency begins in March.
“We are just trying to win,” Harris said. “You can’t lose the fact that that’s the main goal at the end of the day. Yeah, you want to have a big game, but at the end of the day it’s more of a team thing. If the team wins, then everybody eats.”
“You do the best that you can. At the end of the day, if the team doesn’t win, it really doesn’t matter.”