Williams has company again as Panthers remake running game

By Chris Cluff  |   Sunday, May 04, 2008  |  Comments( 14 )

Carolina Panthers
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When the Carolina Panthers released running back DeShaun Foster in February, DeAngelo Williams had to be licking his chops. After two years sharing time with Foster, it looked like Williams would finally get to carry the rushing load full time.

Well, that lasted all of two months. Now Williams, the team’s first-round pick in 2006, is looking at yet another backfield timeshare system after the Panthers drafted Oregon rusher Jonathan Stewart in the first round a week ago.

For his part, Williams seems to have no problem with the arrangement.

“It didn’t bother me at all,” he told reporters over the weekend. “I still have the same mind-set whether I’m the starter or not the starter. I was thinking everybody is going to the two-back system, so whether he starts the game off or I start the game off, we’ll both get the same amount of carries, give or take a few.”

The Panthers are keeping up an NFL trend they helped start a few years ago. In 2003, Stephen Davis supplied the power and Foster provided the moves. By 2006, Williams was teaming with Foster. And now the shifty Williams (5-foot-9, 217 pounds) will share time with the more powerful Stewart (5-10, 233) once Stewart recovers from toe surgery.

Since the Panthers went to the two-back look, a growing number of teams have done so as well. In fact, two-thirds of the league now goes with the rotation system, with fewer than 10 teams still adhering to the franchise back philosophy.

“It helps to have a change-of-pace guy,” coach John Fox said, echoing the thoughts of almost every team in the league these days. “I think a lot of people are starting to do that now, and we kind of want to follow suit ourselves.”

Of course, few teams have gone to the lengths the Panthers have to establish their two-back system, using a pair of first-round picks on running backs in three years.

But Fox is determined to make the running game one of the league’s best, bumping it from its mid-pack rankings of the past two seasons and helping to take pressure off the passing game. The Panthers started the overhaul by cutting guard Mike Wahle and center Justin Hartwig, putting the franchise tag on tackle Jordan Gross and re-signing Travelle Wharton for six years and $36 million. Then they brought in a couple of big guards, Toniu Fonoti (6-4, 350) and Milford Brown (6-5, 330). Then they drafted Stewart with the 13th overall pick and traded back into the first round – giving up their first-round pick in 2009 – to draft tackle Jeff Otah (6-6, 340).

Otah probably will step in at right tackle, which will enable Gross to move back to the left and Wharton to shift inside from left tackle to left guard. Ryan Kalil, the team’s second-round pick in 2007, will start at center -- formerly occupied by Hartwig -- and the Panthers will let Fonoti and Brown battle with holdover Keydrick Vincent for the spot at right guard.

That’s a lot of changes – a new guy at every line position – but that is what Fox thinks the Panthers need to do to improve. And even though Williams will have to share the load yet again, he apparently will have no problem with it.

“It will be fun,” he said. “I’m not going to hold hard feelings toward anybody because that is not the way you play this game. It’s we, not me.”
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About Chris Cluff

Chris Cluff spent 10 years as an editor and sportswriter for The Seattle Times. He was a key figure in the newspaper's coverage of the Seahawks, particularly during their Super Bowl run in 2005. He also has written two books on the Seahawks: "The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly: Heart-Pounding, ...
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