Cardinals coach Bruce Arians confirmed on Wednesday that the recently re-signed Andre Ellington will be used as a wide receiver this season, which means that the team is still without a clear No. 2 running back behind David Johnson.
That doesn’t seem to be much of a problem for Arians. Johnson had 293 carries and 80 catches last season, which added up to the most touches of any offensive player in the league at an average of 23.3 per game. Arians said Wednesday that he’d like to see that number go up during the 2017 season because Johnson is “too young to overuse.”
“I want to have 30 touches out of him, if possible, because that’s going to be a lot of offense,” Arians said, via ESPN.com. “When he has his hand on the ball, either as a wide receiver, coming out of the backfield, in the slot, and running, that’s a lot of potential offense for us.”
Johnson’s age doesn’t preclude the kind of injury that would knock him out of the Cardinals’ lineup completely, although there’s just as much risk of that happening in the first week of the season as any other so it probably won’t dissuade the Cardinals from building on his role as the centerpiece of the offense. If he can stay healthy and Arians is able to get him the ball that often, Johnson may realize his goal of 1,000 rushing yards and 1,000 receiving yards in the same season.