Jeremiah Johnson believes he has an idea to cure Oregon’s quarterback woes.
Give him the ball.
“I don’t want to put a set number on yards,” the typically unabashed senior running back said, “but hopefully with God’s graces it’ll be in the thousands or even higher.”
Johnson will be on the sideline in full uniform for the first time since tearing the anterior cruciate ligament in his right knee against Washington State on Oct. 10 last season, barely six games into the season and what looked like a breakout year ahead of him. All told, he still ranked fourth on the team with 360 yards rushing on 54 attempts, with a higher yards-per-carry average than that of Jonathan Stewart, Dennis Dixon and Andre Crenshaw.
Rested and ready, he hopes this season will be his not-so-coming-out-party. His coach agrees.
“I don’t think Jeremiah is going to sneak up on anybody,” Oregon head coach Mike Bellotti said. “In some regards, Jeremiah was the dominant back in several of the games he played in with Jonathan last year.”
But for all the promise he showed last year before the injury, this season is the first time Johnson is the featured back in his own backfield since his junior year of high school. At Los Angeles’ Dorsey High, Johnson split time at halfback during his senior year, yet still managed to rush for 1,615 yards and 18 touchdowns. Sharing time with good friend and classmate Jonathan Stewart at Oregon has left Johnson with one career start before today, yet his ability to capitalize on his playing time gave the Ducks a consistently healthy second option.
Until Washington State that is, when he crumbled to the turf with a season-ending ACL tear after scoring two touchdowns the first two times he touched the ball. When Stewart jumped to the NFL in January, the path to the starting job seemed reserved for Johnson through his rehabilitation – but even that wasn’t a shoe-in after a strong spring by junior college transfer LaGarrette Blount.
However, even Blount, a 6-foot-2, 240 pound running back composed of sheer toughness, knows it’s Johnson’s time to be on top of the depth chart.
“Without a doubt he’ll be the premier back here, and I think he deserves it,” said Blount, who came to Eugene from East Mississippi Community College. “I think if he wouldn’t have been hurt, this past season he probably would have been leaving along with Stew.”
Not yet. Johnson still has some unfinished business as a Duck, including needing only 971 yards to unseat Reuben Droughns for tenth on Oregon’s all-time rushing list. If he maintains his yards-per-carry average of 6.3 this season, he’ll break John McKay’s 60-year-old Oregon record. He also was voted by his teammates at the end of fall camp as one of four captains for the year.
Any rush toward the record book will begin by staying healthy, however, something Johnson is eager to test in a full-contact situation against the Huskies.
“That’ll really set the pros away from the heroes,” Johnson said. “I’m just ready to see how my knee will hold up against them when I get hit or when people try to hit me low. I’m just really excited for Aug. 30.”
As a career understudy, he’s thankful for Blount and Crenshaw’s support in the running game now that he’s the lead dog. Bellotti said Tuesday that Johnson and Blount will alternate series on offense.
“Like I was saying with Jonathan, two heads are better than one, and even with Andre Crenshaw, three heads are better than two,” Johnson said.
Running backs coach Gary Campbell pinpointed spring workouts as the time he knew Johnson would be back in time for kickoff.
Campbell never had to worry about his attitude. Gregarious and outgoing and having never met a mic he disliked, Johnson pulled aside two young fans after a mid-August practice for a quick lesson on his major-league stiff arm.
“I’m not really worried at all,” Campbell said. “He’s making full-speed cuts and he doesn’t seem to be favoring it at all and I’m confident that he’ll be ready to go.”
Told of Johnson’s prediction that he’d be close to Stewart’s Oregon record of 1,798 yards rushing, Campbell just smiled as if to say, that’s the Jeremiah I know.
“I’d love to see him do that.”
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