David Johnson

By all accounts, David Johnson will be a fixture in Kliff Kingsbury’s offense this year and it won’t be a shock if he averages 30-35 touches a game.

“My role this upcoming season, from talking to the coaches, is that I’m hopefully going to get the ball a little bit more,” Johnson said. “… I’ve talked to guys (familiar with Kingsbury’s offense) like Christian Kirk and he said a lot of people have heard (Kingsbury) doesn’t run the ball, but he told me personally that that their running backs have gotten the ball a lot. I’ve heard he’s really good at putting his guys in open space, especially running backs, and giving them open space to try to get the yards catching the ball and doing things like that.”

Kingsbury hasn’t divulged any real details about the offense, but did say of Johnson, “I think he’s going to be really excited with what we do.” The story added during his six seasons as the head coach at Texas Tech, Kingsbury’s running backs ran the ball a ton, but only twice did anyone top the 1,000-yard mark. Johnson’s goal is to obliterate the 1,000-yard rushing mark in 2019 and do what he almost did three years ago, which is to also top 1,000 yards or more as a receiver.