Jaylen Warren vs Tony Pollard: Who's The Better 2026 Fantasy Football Pick?

If you are drafting a running back in Round 7, you’re most likely drafting your RB2 or are in the middle of a Zero/Hero RB approach.

Either way, you know you’re not incredibly excited.

Both Jaylen Warren and Tony Pollard are coming off draft boards in that range, and both present intriguing potential as relatively high-floor pieces to add to a loaded WR room. Let’s take a closer look at which player projects best for 2026.

Jaylen Warren vs Tony Pollard For 2026 Fantasy Football

The Case for Jaylen Warren

Aaron Rodgers can’t move.

At 42 years old, Rodgers has elite sack avoidance. And by that, I don’t mean he’s elusive, slippery and difficult to bring down. No, no. I mean he quite literally avoids taking sacks by getting rid of the football as quickly as humanly possible.

Advantage Warren.

This past season, a whopping 31.7% of Rodgers’ pass attempts were at or behind the line of scrimmage, the highest rate among qualified signal callers. He also led the NFL in pass attempts within one to two seconds from the snap (193), making up a healthy 39% of his total pass attempts. 24% of his passes went to the running back position, one of the highest rates in football, which explains Kenneth Gainwell’s absurd 73-catch season. Warren, meanwhile, hauled in a respectable 40 balls, but Gainwell’s emergence did limit his overall involvement in the passing game.

In 2024, Warren logged 79% of Pittsburgh’s long-down-and-distance snaps, as well as 78% of the two-minute work. But this past season, those rates dropped to 25% and 16%, respectively. With the Steelers replacing Gainwell with Rico Dowdle this offseason, we could easily see a return to 50-60 catches from Warren, especially with Mike McCarthy coming in to run the offense.

Let’s also not overlook that Warren is simply good at the game. And even while seeing a career-high in carries (211), Warren remained pretty efficient, averaging 4.5 YPC. His ability to slip tackles didn’t disappear either, ranking sixth among running backs with at least 100 rushes in avoided tackle rate (25.1%). And this isn’t a new trend for Warren. In fact, among running backs with at least 250 totes since 2023, Warren trails only Kenneth Walker in avoided tackle rate (28.3%), while ranking seventh in YAC/ATT (3.29).

Pretty, pretty good company for Warren, who also broke a tackle every 9.2 carries a season ago, the fifth-best mark in the league. With Dowdle reuniting with McCarthy, expect Warren to dip back below the 200-carry mark, though, per usual, he’ll make the most of his workload. Especially considering how strong Pittsburgh’s run-blocking unit was a season ago. The Steelers ranked ninth in ESPN’s run block win rate at 72% (shoutout Darnell Washington).

The Case for Tony Pollard

Pollard very well might be the latest running back you can select in fantasy drafts that should see legitimate volume. Last year he handled 70% of Tennessee’s designed rush attempts (fifth among RBs), while logging 62% of the snaps and just over 16 touches per game. And even if you only look at the games Pollard played alongside Tyjae Spears, he still averaged 15.5 touches per game.

Of course, playing on one of the worst teams in the NFL limited his fantasy upside, as Pollard averaged just 10.9 PPR PPG, which ranked 29th at the position. We did see him improve to 12 points per game (RB24) following Tennessee’s bye week, which coincided with Cam Ward and the offense taking major strides. During that span, the Titans improved to 22nd in TDs (19%), 19th in plays (5.81) and second in red zone touchdown rate (70.6%), a huge step forward from earlier on in the year.

Weeks 1-10:

TDs/drive: 9.3% (32nd)
5.32 plays/drive (28th)
43.8% RZ TD rate (31st)

Pollard finished last season with 242 carries, despite the Titans ranking fourth in dropback rate (65%) and third in plays when trailing by 8+ points (444). And down the stretch last season, Pollard showed he still has plenty left in the tank.

Weeks 13-18:

17.0 carries
93.3 rushing yards
14.1 PPR PPG
Three 100-yard games

Improvements to Tennessee's supporting cast around Cam Ward could help Pollard post top-24 fantasy production. Ward, himself, looked a lot better during the second half of his rookie year, and the Titans have since added OC Brian Daboll and WRs Carnell Tate and Wan’Dale Robinson to help him make a second-year jump. Great for the Titans, therefore, great for Pollard.

Should You Draft Jaylen Warren or Tony Pollard in 2026?

It’s pretty funny, actually.

Warren is expected to be in a souped-up version of the Tyjae Spears role, while Pollard likely plays a boosted version of Rico Dowdle’s role. Am I making any sense? Alright. So, both players are on the board, and you need a running back. Who should you choose?

Well, it depends.

For starters, both Warren and Pollard, at least to me, are mainly targets on teams where I’m deploying a Zero or Hero RB approach. Both being drafted in Round 7 lands them in the vaunted dead zone, often a trap area for running backs. In full-PPR formats, I tend to lean towards Warren, but there are contributing factors that could impact both players’ pass-game usage.

Warren: The addition of Michael Pittman could lead to Rodgers relying less on the running backs. Last year, Pittsburgh’s WR1 DK Metcalf ran go routes 24% of the time, but Rodgers ranked 23rd in football in pass attempts of 10-20 air yards (81), while Metcalf caught just 15 of 38 targets of 11-30 air yards. Enter Pittman, who meshes much better with Rodgers' current skill set.

As his career has progressed, Rodgers has become a lot more reliant on quick-hitting slant routes and timing concepts. Over the last two seasons, no quarterback has targeted slant routes more than Rodgers (96). Pittman, meanwhile, was often used on such concepts, especially on RPO plays, during his time in Indianapolis. This past season, his 15 targets off slant routes were good for the eighth-most in football. A safety valve at wide receiver should lead to less pressure on Rodgers to check the ball down.

Pollard: He only caught 33 passes to begin with, six of which came with Spears sidelined. During those weeks, Pollard logged 88% of the long down and distance snaps, as well as 92% in the two-minute drill. But from Week 5 on, those rates fell to 19% and 30%. Spears has certainly had trouble staying healthy, but as long as he’s out there, he’s going to handle the majority of the passing down work.

This is very, very close, but I’m giving the slight edge to Warren. Don’t get me wrong. You have to project Pollard for more touches. But I project Warren to be more efficient with his touches, while seeing much more work in the passing game.

Players Mentioned in this Article

JaylenWarren
RBPIT
PPG
11.8
Proj
152.6
TonyPollard
RBTEN
PPG
9.8
Proj
153.9
RicoDowdle
RBPIT
PPG
10.9
Proj
151.2
TyjaeSpears
RBTEN
PPG
6.9
Proj
98.5

Published Jul 22, 2026, 4:00 AM ETUpdated Jul 22, 2026, 9:11 AM ET