Alabama Football: Will Trent Richardson Put Up Mark Ingram-Type Numbers?

Larry Burton (Syndicated Writer)

Mark Ingram was a Heisman Trophy winner and a team leader at running back for two years before leaving early for the NFL as a first-round pick.

His shoes are going to be hard to fill, right?

Perhaps not, especially if you have Trent Richardson, his running mate for the last two years, waiting in the wings to become the leading running back.

It's going to be easy for Richardson to surpass Ingram's 2010 rushing numbers, as Ingram missed some early games with a recovering knee and only rushed for 875 total yards.

Richardson will pass that by midseason.

But what about Ingram's Heisman year when he rushed for 1,658 total yards? Can Richardson match that?

Let's take a look at the per carry numbers to determine a likely outcome.

In Ingram's best year, his Heisman year, he averaged 6.1 yards a carry. Last year he averaged just 5.5 yards per carry.

Last season in limited play, Richardson only ran for 700 total yards, but averaged 6.3 yards per carry. Therefore, common sense would tell you that if given the same number of opportunities to tote the rock that Ingram had in 2009, 271 carries, Richardson would pass Ingram's numbers by just over 50 yards.

This is if Richardson can maintain that 6.3 yard per carry average.

So the only real question is, will Richardson get 271 attempts? Much depends on how well Eddie Lacy fills Trent's own shoes as the No. 2 runner.

Should Lacy struggle, Richardson would get more of just the lions share of the rushing attempts. Should Lacy turn out to be a bull and mow through defenders, Saban might opt to have the rushes more evenly split.

There are many factors that will determine if Richardson outdoes Ingram in yardage, but for Bama fans, this is a pleasant debate to wage.

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