The Pittsburgh Steelers have made loud noises of late, particularly after pulling off a massive trade with the Seattle Seahawks that saw them land wide receiver DK Metcalf, thus addressing a need for anothe weapon downfield.

However, Pittsburgh's front office clearly hasn't forgotten about taking care of the team's backfield, with the Steelers placing a second-round tag on running back Jaylen Warren ahead of the NFL free agency, according to Tom Pelissero of the NFL Network.

“The #Steelers placed the second-round restricted tender on RB Jaylen Warren, per his agents @davidcanter and @NessMugrabi at @aurasportsgroup. It's worth $5.346 million,” Pelissero reported in a post on X (formerly Twitter) on Monday.

By using a second-round tender on Warren, the Steelers can match any offer the tailback will get from any other team in free agency. If Pittsburgh doesn't match the offer, the Steelers will lose Warren but will get a second-round draft pick as compensation.

As it stands, Warren can be expected to take over as the clear top running back role for the Steelers in the 2025 NFL season, especially since Pittsburgh had already declined its $6.79 million option on Najee Harris for the next campaign.

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It doesn't seem likely that Harris will return to Pittsburgh on a new deal, so unless the Steelers find another notable running back in free agency or via the NFL draft, it seems that the RB1 job on the team is for Warren to lose. Then again, a lot can still happen between today and the start of the 2025 NFL campaign.

In any case, Warren has seemingly impressed the Steelers enough for them to make such a move on him before free agency.

In the 2024 NFL season, Warren, who turned 26 years old in November, rushed for 511 yards and a touchdown on 120 carries.

In addition, the former Oklahoma State Cowboys star had 310 receiving yards on 38 receptions and 47 targets. As a team, the Steelers were fifth in the NFL in rushing play percentage (48.31 percent) but and 12th with 121.9 rushing yards per game. However, they were just 19th with 0.8 rushing touchdowns per game and 23rd in red zone touchdown rate (48.21 percent).