pretty affordable for the Steelers to retain<\/a>. Let\u2019s look at how their numbers stack up.<\/p>\nJavonte Williams: 1,338 yards from scrimmage, 13 total TDs, 4.7 yards per touch
Kenneth Gainwell: 1,023 yards from scrimmage, eight total TDs, 5.5 yards per touch<\/p>\n
Williams has the edge in total yards and touchdowns while Gainwell was more efficient with his touches. It\u2019s hard to compare the two exactly as Gainwell is much more of a change of pace and receiving back while Williams is a bell cow that grinds out yards between the tackles.<\/p>\n
Given Williams\u2019 $8 million average per year, Gainwell\u2019s could come in around 65-70 percent of that value. That would mean an APY of just $5-$6 million for the Steelers\u2019 team MVP. In other words, roughly the same that Warren received on his extension last offseason.<\/p>\n
The Steelers could have both Warren and Gainwell together for a couple more seasons for the cost of what the Green Bay Packers are paying Josh Jacobs, for comparison. Whether the Steelers value him at that level depends on what they think of Kaleb Johnson and the progress of the offensive line. They just spent a third-round pick on Johnson last year, and committing to a Warren-Gainwell backfield would leave him as an afterthought for the foreseeable future.<\/p>\n
They will also need to factor in how much Aaron Rodgers boosted Gainwell\u2019s value with his league-low time to throw and tendency to check down at or behind the line of scrimmage. Gainwell was great in the Arthur Smith-Aaron Rodgers offense. But will it be the same with Mike McCarthy and whoever the 2026 QB is? If it\u2019s Rodgers, I imagine they will prioritize bringing Gainwell back.<\/p>\n
With his likely price tag well within budget, keeping Kenneth Gainwell comes down less to affordability and more to whether the Steelers see his production as indispensable.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Pittsburgh Steelers\u2019 team MVP is scheduled to become a free agent in just under three weeks with…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":634424,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2026],"tags":[7,1274,14451,57,691],"class_list":{"0":"post-768508","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-football","8":"tag-football","9":"tag-javonte-williams","10":"tag-kenneth-gainwell","11":"tag-pittsburgh-steelers","12":"tag-trending"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116113346721030895","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/768508","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=768508"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/768508\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/634424"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=768508"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=768508"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=768508"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}