Packers coach Mike McCarthy said recently that he still considers DuJuan Harris his starting running back even though the team thought so much of Harris’ work last season that they drafted two running backs in the first four rounds of the draft.
Those two draftees -- Eddie Lacy and Johnathan Franklin -- and the other backs on the Packers roster haven’t had a chance to go head-to-head with Harris this summer because Harris started camp on the PUP list because of a knee injury. But that will change now that Harris, who also had surgery this offseason to remove a cyst from his lungs, has been activated from the PUP list.
During his press conference on Monday, McCarthy reiterated his belief that Harris was the team’s starter based on the way he finished last season while adding that such a classification doesn’t mean he’ll be playing every down. It also doesn’t mean that he is going to be the team’s starter once this season gets underway. Lacy and Franklin weren’t selected to sit and watch the same guys who ran the ball last season, no matter how well they may have ended the year.
Harris will have to hold onto his job for reasons outside of past performances and that may prove to be a tall task given the upgrade in competition in Green Bay.