NFL player prop bet picks: Harris can bring back Steeler football in style

Free NFL player prop bets, betting tips and analysis ahead of the 2021 season.

Best bets

Najee Harris over 975.5 rushing yards
2pt 10-11 Hills

Christian McCaffrey over 11.5 rushing touchdowns
1pt 10-11 Hills

Josh Allen most regular season passing yards
1pt each-way 10-1 Betfred

Preview

There are two vital ingredients that make up what they lovingly refer to as 'Steelers football' in Pittsburgh. The first is a fearsome defence and the second is a running-back who is more likely to run through a defender than around one.

In Najee Harris, who shares a surname with the franchise’s all-time leading rusher Franco, the Steelers have found a modern-day equivalent to fill the second of those requirements.

Taken with Pittsburgh’s first pick in this year’s draft, Harris arrives in the NFL having put up a combined 2,690 rushing yards in his final two years at Alabama. Averaging six yards per carry, the 6ft 2in back proved tough to stop and those skills will translate well to the NFL.

Unlike many other franchises who operate running back by committee, Harris has the Pittsburgh backfield all to himself and should thrive playing with one of the best offensive lines in football. Last year, James Connor put up over 721 yards running the ball for the Steelers, despite missing quite a bit of time and there’s every reason to believe that Harris will eclipse that total by a wide margin.

Also looking to dominate on the ground this year are the Carolina Panthers, who were without their top offensive talent Christian McCaffrey for most of 2020.

Ankle and shoulder problems combined to keep McCaffrey out for 13 games after he had never previously missed an NFL match in his professional career. The 25-year-old has been quick to brush off questions over his durability in light of those issues and has looked sharp in pre-season.

In 2019, McCaffrey became only the third man in league history to register over 1,000 rushing and 1,000 receiving yards in the same season. He ran for 15 touchdowns that year, while he managed five scores last year in three games.

Sam Darnold is not the type of quarterback to take touchdowns away from his running back in the redzone, so McCaffrey is poised for a bounce-back season

Likely to join McCaffrey and Harris as one of the top offensive talents to watch this year will be Buffalo Bills quarterback Josh Allen.

Allen accumulated an impressive 4,544 passing yards with 37 passing touchdowns in 2020, thanks in large part to a fine year from wide receiver Steffon Diggs as the duo combined to help the Bills go 13-3.

Allen racked up the fifth-most passing yards last year but could climb that ladder this season and is worth a wager to finish top of the pile.

Deshaun Watson, the 2020 passing leader, won’t play this year, while the Kansas City Chiefs seem intent on running the ball more, potentially bringing down Patrick Mahomes’ insane numbers.

Bills offensive coordinator Brian Daboll seems hell-bent on letting Allen throw the ball as much, if not more than he did in 2020 and it would be a surprise if he didn’t put up the air yards required to challenge for the individual gong.

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