Mikel Leshoure: ‘I’ll be more involved’ for Lions
By Mike Dyce
The Detroit Lions enter the 2014 season with a new offensive coordinator in Joe Lombardi, and that means new roles for players. Lombardi, who was previously the quarterbacks coach for the New Orleans Saints, said the Lions offense would resemble his former team.
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“There will be a lot of similarities (to the Saints’ playbook),” Lombardi said in February, via NFL.com. “You are going to see some difference, but the playbook that we are starting from is the Saints’ playbook, so it will certainly be very similar.”
Fourth-year running back Mikel Leshoure approves of the new offense.
“I can’t tell you (what my role will be) during OTAs, but it looks like I’ll be involved a little more than last year so far,” Leshoure told MLive this week. “As far as the role, I don’t know. That could change weekly. But I think I’ll be more involved.”
Being more involved in the offensive scheme would get rave reviews from any player, so it is easy to understand Leshoure’s excitement. Of course with two carries last season he couldn’t be less involved.
The other hurdle for Leshoure is that he is pretty far down the depth chart at running back for the Lions behind Reggie Bush and Joique Bell. The Saints used three running backs so Leshoure has a role if Lombardi brings that trend over to the Lions.