The Pittsburgh Steelers are mainly dealing with injuries on the defensive side of the ball as training camp and the 2022 preseason come to a close. That doesn't change the fact that second-year Pro Bowl running back, Najee Harris has missed the majority of practice with a nagging injury. He spoke to the media after his first action of the season on Sunday and talked a little bit about the injury and what it felt like to get back on the field against the Detroit Lions. The ball carrier suffered a sprained Lisfranc which is an extremely scary injury for a running back.
Credit: Jordan Schofield / SteelerNation (Twitter: @JSKO_PHOTO)
Steelers' Najee Harris Believes He Wasn't At His Best Versus Lions
Harris is on a mission to become one of, if not, the best running back in the NFL this season. He admitted that it was good to be on the field competing again, but he isn't where he'd like to be.
"It was good to get back out there. Kind of rusty a little bit I would say. I've been down for about four weeks," Harris said.
He went into detail about how what once was thought as a minor injury was a little more serious than the Steelers and him led on.
"To give everyone the update, I never did just get my foot stepped on. I had a sprained Lisfranc. That's why I was out for the majority of the camp, so to get back in the motions of stuff like that, I felt really rusty. I wasn't too happy about my performance. I had a bad read on one run and the false start I would say."
The franchise running back is happy that the game on Sunday didn't mean anything in terms of the Steelers' record.
"It's good that it's preseason right now, but got to watch the film and get better at it," Harris said.
It definitely is a good sign that Harris was out there versus Detroit, but many Lisfranc injuries tend to be nagging and season-ending. Baltimore Ravens' rookie center, Tyler Linderbaum suffered a similar injury to Harris and is only expected to miss a couple weeks as the running back did. Harris and the Steeles are certainly lucky that it was just a sprain and he was good to go on Sunday.
Pittsburgh Steelers running back, Najee Harris (#22) warms up at Acrisure Stadium in a preseason game against the Seattle Seahawks on August 13, 2022 in Pittsburgh, PA. | Jordan Schofield / SteelerNation (Twitter: @JSKO_PHOTO)
The National Library of medicine published a study stating that 92.9% of NFL players who suffered the injury returned to play in the league, but missed a median of about 11 months of action. It is not common that the Lisfranc injury results in a sprain, but it was the case for Harris and given the state of the running back room, the Steelers offense should be extremely thankful that Harris is almost back to full health.
Did Harris play too much on Sunday in his first action since the foot injury? Let us know in the comments below!
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