For as disastrous as the Atlanta Falcons' season opener went, it's hard to ignore who the biggest bright spot was: Bijan Robinson. The only reason the 20-13 loss to the Pittsburgh Steelers didn't look a whole lot uglier is because this new Falcons' coaching staff has the best running back in the NFL at their disposal.
With Cooper Rush starting, Atlanta's offense ran through their All-Pro RB: Of the 238 yards of total offense that the Falcons accrued, Bijan accounted for 173 scrimmage yards. That's 72.6% of their offensive production--and he touched the football more than anyone else by a pretty wide margin.
Robinson carried the ball 21 times for 83 rushing yards and added another eight receptions for 90 yards and a touchdown--so clearly the different run scheme is suiting him. Meanwhile, no one else was on the Falcons was targeted more than four times, and while the best of the best deserve elite usage, we are approaching dangerous territory.
The Atlanta Falcons are going to ride Bijan Robinson until the wheels fall off (and that's not a good thing)
That's a combined 29 touches for the superstar, which would put him on pace for nearly 500 touches (493) and over 350 carries (357) across the 17-game season. That sounds like a recipe for injury, because no running back should be asked to sustain that workload--especially in the modern NFL.
The issue here is that this will be the gameplan every week until one of Michael Penix Jr. or Tua Tagovailoa is able to return to the starting lineup. With Rush starting, they'll over-rely on the run game and dump the ball off to Bijan Robinson a little extra in the passing game since attacking defenses downfield isn't an option.
And while that means the Dirty Birds are getting their money's worth on Bijan's new extension, they don't need to add any more tread on his tires than they need to. They have elite weapons like Drake London and Kyle Pitts who should take attention away from him, but they were non-factors in Pittsburgh.
If they're going to need to rely on Bijan Robinson getting 30 touches a game just for the offense to stay afloat, this could be a long season. Yes, so far in his career he has yet to miss a game, but if this trend holds up, he'll join the running back graveyard of elite talents who were hampered by injuries.
We've seen elite running backs on bad teams get too much work and get hurt, like Saquon Barkley, Christian McCaffrey (on the Panthers), and Adrian Peterson. There are two many examples of this for Kevin Stefanski and the Falcons to not be wary of how they utilize the fourth-year RB going forward.
For Bijan Robinson's sake, the Falcons can't keep trotting out Cooper Rush after what we saw on Sunday, so hopefully Michael Penix Jr. is able to return against the Panthers in Week 2.
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