Why RBs Don't get Paid Anymore (Freakonomics)

AND the RB was worse.

No one is saying all the other things didn't matter too.

 

what part of yes did you miss for your first question. I just said it was disappointing based on expectations but I’m not blaming Barkley for all of it.

I didn’t post yards after contact because I was pointing out yards before contact. Barkley faced a lot more loaded boxes this year and like I said earlier, Hurts running 33% less for 350 less yards made it a lot easier to stop Barkley.

If you watched Philly (I doubt you did) you would’ve seen Barkley making the first man miss just like last year but he had 2 more defenders on him behind the LOS.

I asked you to check out the link where the Philly analyst breaks down the changes from last year. They went from inside zone to outside zone and it failed. This is why the OC was fired.

oh, and McCaffrey signed an extension for 2/38 in 2024. This year he had 1300 rushing yards and 10 TD’s. He also had 925 receiving yards and 7 TD’s.

 

wrong.. it’s a contract this year for Walker.

The other RB is hurt and this team is young and set to run it back again.

Why pay anyone on Seattle since they just won with a ton of talent on rookie contracts?

That’s as goofy as the guy saying we wouldn’t ever see a RB run a team to a SB win ever again.

 

I think you have to be smart when paying a RB.... There are LOTS of good RB's in the league, but very few great ones. There's like 7-8 studs and then probably about 20 dudes that are REALLY close in how good they are. Guys like CMC, Barkley, Robinson, Taylor, Gibbs, Cook, Henry... Those are the "elite" guys, and even Cook and Gibbs need a second back to pair with as they are too small to be able to take an 18+ carry a game workload.

The sweet spot for teams is having a really good tandem and having them split the carries where the lead back gets like 15-16 touches a game and the second one gets like 10-12 touches. Its all about maximizing your output for the money. Warren and Gainwell combined for 2300 yards and 16TD's for less than 8 million bucks between them... That's pretty good. When Barkley has a year like he did in 2025... the Eagles can't be thrilled paying nearly $21 million bucks for 1300 total yards and 9 TD's. Those are essentially Warren's numbers and we paid Warren less than a 1/3 of what Barkley makes. Now, Barkley had like 2300 total yards and 15 total TD's the year before... so I'm not saying he wasn't worth the money. I just think that you have to be RIGHT about paying the correct back, since there are so many good backs that will produce at a lower dollar amount.

I like Walker a good bit, but there are a lot of good FA RB's available. Is it worth investing in a guy that statistically produced at exactly the same clip as Jaylen Warren, when the price tag gets around $10 million bucks? Idk. Spending $16 million combined at RB wouldn't be terrible, but those guys would have to be driving the offense. Plus Walker will be 27 next year and Warren 28. These guys likely don't have more than 3-4 years left...

Now, if we are talking Seahawks players... there are a couple FA's in their secondary I'd love to pay to be a Steeler in Coby Bryant and Tariq Woolen. We could afford both of them with the money we get from cutting Jalen Ramsey and Jonnu Smith (according to OTC's projections). That would bolster this team immensely (and still leave us money to pay Rodgers, a decent FA WR, and maybe a G or ILB). I would sign up for Bryant and Woolen in a heartbeat.

 

This is an example of why having two good backs at low cost on rookie deals (Walker 2.7MM, Charbonnet $2.1MM) is likely better than having one RB you pay a lot to (e.g. Barkley)

How many RBs were paid more than Walker this year?

How many of them were in the SB?

How many of them were SB MVP?

Walker and Charbonnet combined for almost 1800 yards and have a cap hit of a little less than $5MM. As you point out, Walker also won SB MVP.

Barkley and Bigsby combined for 1484 yards and have a cap hit of $7.78MM.

And it's only that close because of the insane cap manipulation Philly does. Barkley currently has more than $30MM in cap hit that's been pushed past when his contract voids. And another $30MM in cap hit that's set to his in the 3 years remaining on his contract. I'm sure they'll push some of that out. But he's got a $60MM cap hit outstanding and 3 years left on his deal.

Also...I agree cheap rookie contracts are a cheat code in the NFL. Particularly when guys play expensive positions (like QB and LT and WR). That's why it really sucks that we missed badly on Kenny (worth the risk to try, was good we didn't keep throwing good money after bad), Jones has been disappointing (hope the light goes on next season, he was not terrible before he got hurt), and we felt like Pickens attitude was so bad we couldn't keep him until the end of his contract (I think this is something you and I both agree was silly).

 

sure.. we had Warren’s affordable contract and ranked 26th in rushing. We weren’t good at it last year. There is thing called team chemistry and when you think you can plug and play cheaper players you don’t always get good results.

Are the Eagles thrilled about last years production? I doubt it, but this is why the OC was fired.

 

That’s nice

Is there a point here

 

We can do this for damn near every position with a SB winning team. There are 28 teams every year who paid big money and failed.

How much was Smith Njigba paid vs the top WR’s?

All these high paid WR’s were sitting at home watching Njigba and Kupp win a SB.

However, Barkley and McCaffrey made it to SB’s the previous 2 years and folks are still saying you can win with UFDA RB’s.

The truth is its hard to make a SB and there is no correct way of assembling a team.

If a player produces, he should be paid. If he is elite, he should receive more compensation.

Watt is going to make almost 200 Million and he hasn’t sniffed a playoff win yet. Miles Garrett is going to make $200 Mill for his career with 1 playoff win…against us.

There is no way you can convince me that Barkley was overpaid when he won a damn SB and could’ve smashed the single season record if he played the 17th game.

 

Yes.

RB’s deserve more money.

 

Uh

No

 

That just isn't true... Our rushing ranking had more to do with how many times we rushed the ball. We were 28th in rushing attempts but 26th in rushing. Warren was 19th in rushing yards but 21st in rushes (every RB in front of him played more games than him). He was 14th in total yards from scrimmage per start among RB's despite being 21st in total touches. He was 14th among starting RB's in YPC. Our top two rushers averaged 4.5 and 4.7 YPC respectively. I don't think the stats show that we were bad at rushing at all, and quite honestly, I think our RB results in 2025 were fantastic when you consider the facts. Our backs were highly productive, and even more so when you consider what they cost.

I'm not really sure what other results we could have expected. Warren did more with less than a bunch of guys that make a ton more than him. Our RB tandem was responsible for 2300 total yards and 16 total TD's. We had a 42 year old QB and no WR's outside of just DK Metcalf. There was a lot going against our offense, but the backs were a massive bright spot.

 

Seahawks have the 6th most cap room this season I think. They won't let many of their players walk.

 

They wont be able to afford all of them.. They have a lot of space, but they are going to have to give JSN $35 million a year plus. They also have their rookies to sign, and with only 42 players under contract, they will need to fill out their roster with back ups too. They might have 25-30 million to play with when its all said and done (if they are lucky), and they can't stack all those contracts at the same time without putting them in a bad spot financially in 2-3 years. They also have to figure that Darnold will need extended after next season and is likely to get a really big pay raise (in the range of 20 million a year or more).

Tariq Woolen, Coby Bryant, Josh Jobe, Kenneth Walker, Boye Mafe, and Rashid Shaheed are all set to hit FA... and all of them are looking to cash in. I doubt they are able to keep more than 2-3 of that list without those players taking good "hometown discounts".

 

Listened to most of it then gave it up. They're overcomplicating it way too much.

1) Due to the nature of the position, when it happend, RBs wear down fast and fall off hard.
2) RB is a position that tends to be found throughout the draft - both successes and failures - more than most positions. That makes it harder to predict.
3) A rookie is controllable for 4-5 years. Less risky to hold on and milk the RB for that time and better to sell early than get caught on a second contract.

 

There is a now-defunct website that posted a fairly detailed analysis to answer the question; Do you run to set up the pass, or pass to set up the run?

I'll skip all the maths they did and jump right to the conclusion; passing more sets up the run game.

Steelers personnel grouping frequency/rush efficiency:

• 11 personnel - 39% (31st in NFL); 23rd in rushing eff.
• 12 personnel - 25% (14th); 6th
• 13 personnel - 14% (2nd); 5th
• 21 personnel - 2% (19th); 25th
• 22 personnel - 1% (17th); 3rd

So, the personnel grouping the Steelers used most often was one of the worst for rushing efficiency... thanks Arthur Smith

 

If you can convince a group of Steelers fans that you don't need to establish the run first, second, and third priority on offense....you deserve a medal.

 

Is it worth pointing out that you were a big advocate of running it back (and giving the RB1 a raise) after a 2024 season where we ranked 25th in rushing?

 

Re: You can do this for every player.

You are the one that brought up Walker. Even though it runs counter to your argument about paying RBs (which usually means you have one good guy who gets lots of work and one not-good guy who doesn't get used). Seattle had two good RBs on rookie deals. Both were good. And the team was resilient when one of them went down.

Like we should have been when Bell got hurt against NE in the playoffs...but our good backup was on the other sideline because Tomlin was unwilling to split carries (something he thankfully started to do when we had Najee / Warren).

Re: Barkley and McCaffrey

Barkley didn't make it to the SB on his current contract.

He got a massive raise (from $12MM aav to $20MM aav to reward him for his SB season).

McCaffrey is awesome when he's healthy. And he's often not healthy. He signed a big 2 year extension before the 2024 season. Then played 4 games in 2024.

Yet, where did the 9ers rank in rushing yards (the only way you judge our run game)? 24th!!! Only 2 spots higher than our Steelers

How about the Eagles? 18th!!! Also below average despite having the highest paid RB in the league!!!

Because you want to have a good running game. Not a good running back.

So 2/3 of the RBs with the top 3 AAVs in the league finished 18tha and 24th in rushing.

Then Colts with Taylor (17th), Saints with Kamara (28th worse than us LOL), Packers with Jacobs (15th). So for the top 6 highest paid RBs by AAV 5 of them are average or below average.

Note: the next couple guys start to have good running games with Cook and Williams. They are making right around half the AAV - $10-11MM - of the top two guys - ~ $20MM. Maybe this suggests that you only want to be in about the 3rd tier of RB salaries by AAV?

Before you asked why I kept bringing up Henry. It's because he's the outlier where the idea of paying RBs works. Because he's a super-human among super-humans. The Rats were 2nd in the league in rushing.

 

So our running game was fantastic but we didn’t use it because… we had 1 WR and 8 TE’s and scored 6 points in a playoff game at home?

The problem with stats is its easy to use them without context.

Why would we abandon an awesome rushing attack when we had 1.5 WRs?

 

Where are you getting your stats?

We ranked 11th in team rushing in 2024.

We ranked 26th in team rushing in 2025.

https://www.nfl.com/stats/team-stats/offense/rushing/2024/reg/all

 

Thanks Felt.

I think it was sorted wrong when I looked at it for 2024...oops.

I do think I got the rankings by yards correct for the 2025 numbers for high paid RBs though.

• Eagles with Barkley (18th)
• 49ers (24th)
• Colts with Taylor (17th)
• Saints with Kamara (28th worse than us LOL)
• Packers with Jacobs (15th).

So for the top 6 highest paid RBs by AAV 5 of them are average or below average.

Again, Henry is the outlier.

Is it better to have better team rush yards (for less $$) or lower team rush yards (for more $$)?

 

We didn't use it as much as last year because our defense sucked at getting off the field.

It's not the only metric, but our D ranked 26th in opposition 3rd down success rate (43.03%).

In 2024, we were 11th (37.44%).
https://www.teamrankings.com/nfl/stat/opponent-third-down-conversion-pct

We see this in TOP too, but it's less clear who's fault it is there.

TOP in 2025 = 28:22 (29th). 2024 = 30:13 (15th)
https://www.teamrankings.com/nfl/stat/average-time-of-possession-net-of-ot?date=2025-02-10

And in offensive team plays per game: 2025 = 58.0 (28th) 2024 = 62.6 (14th)
https://www.teamrankings.com/nfl/stat/plays-per-game

Here's how it goes:

1. Defense significantly worse at getting off the field.
2. Offense on the field for fewer plays.
3. Offense gets fewer running plays.
4. Offense does better in every rate (or per play) metric.
5. Despite the running game being better on a per play basis, it has fewer total yards because there was a big difference in total plays.
6. Even though the running game had fewer plays, it provided more points (TDs) by the top two RBs than last year (the point of offense). 2024 = 7: Najee 6(+0 rec), Warren 1(+0 rec). 2025 = 11: Warren 6 (+2 rec), Gainwell 5 (+3 rec)
7. Also despite having fewer plays more yards from scrimmage: 2024 = 2147 yards: Najee 1326, Warren 821. 2025 = 2314 yards: Warren 1291, Gainwell 1023

It's only more rushing yards (because of more attempts) that was better last year. In classic Najee fashion, it only looks good because of more touches.

 

and I think more attempts with a healthy Najee and Warren with a much better passing QB in AR would have faired better.

We were pretty bad between the tackles and I think folks aren’t taking into account how a big back like Najee wears down a defense by the 4th quarter.

Let’s hope KJ can be our next big back. I just don’t believe our running game will be much better next year with Gainwell and Warren as our primary backs. They are good in the passing game but on the ground, I need more.

 

Belichek did the same in NE. Every starting RB lit it up there.
I think it shows with the right system, a mediocre RB can be productive. There's still a difference between a Barry Sanders and an average RB, but is the production difference worth the extra salary cap dollars? Maybe not

 

Sure...more attempts with a healthy Warren and Gainwell + Rodgers would have been better too.

But would a Najee-led backfield have been better than what we got this year with 50-60 fewer carries than last year? It's possible to say yes, but that's just about faith.

Per Ramon Foster (when he had a podcast), part of the reason we weren't good between the tackles was that the RB was running into the backs of the OL. He said this was probably because he was running "to where the hole was supposed to be" instead of "where it was". Which I think is about vision and decision making. I think it was probably easier at Bama behind a line that all went to the NFL (I think 3 in the 1st?). My guess is that on that team where the hole was supposed to be == where the hole was.

Najee got to the 1000 yards seasons because he could take the punishment of having so many carries. Taking the punishment was his superpower. But if the carries aren't there to be had, he isn't going to magically get better on a per carry basis. Or at least it's really hard to make that assumption because there's no support for it in the data.

Maybe we'll see more support for this idea next season because he'll probably be the RB2 in come back by committee approach somewhere (I don't think he's still under contract for the Chargers).