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Welcome to The Terrible Take, a daily segment telling Steelers Nation what's on our mind.

I'm Ross McCorkel. After a career high, 1,291 yards from scrimmage, last year Steelers running back

Jailam Warren is once again going to be in a committee backfield. It used to be with Najee Harris

and then last year with

Kenneth Gainwell. In 26, it will be with Rico Dowdle. And that is a trouble for Warren for

multiple reasons. Perhaps most of all is the fact that Dowell has familiarity with head coach

and offensive play caller Mike McCarthy. And Dowdell himself is coming

off of two straight 1,300-plus yard from scrimmage seasons, one with the Dallas Cowboys and

one with the Carolina Panthers. The first one was under Mike McCarthy. Why is this potentially

an issue for Warren? Well, if you look at Mike McCarthy's

history of how he uses multiple running backs, he had two good running backs all five years that

he was in Dallas between Dowdle, Ezekiel Elliott, and Tony Pollard. The split between the top

two running backs in all five of those years, on average, was a two-thirds to one-third split of total touches. That's not just carries, but touches, including receptions through the air. There was one season where it was an even split, Zecchio Elliott, 51.7% to Tony Pollard, 48.3%.

And that is the ideal split between Dowdell and Warrant, but history says it may not be that clean.

If one has the hot hand and that warrants a larger split of the carries and touches, then so be it.

But they really should try to maximize both skill

sets, Rico Dowdle a little bigger, Jalem Warren, maybe a little better on third downs, receiving,

and blocking in the backfield. But both can do just about everything. There's no need to get

into a traditional first and second down running back roll for Dowdell and a third down receiving back role for Warren.

...