First I think it should be said that David Johnson is better in ANY offense than Chase Edmonds.
I think it is impossible to say for sure what Kingsbury’s offense will really look like, both because he is so innovative that he probably would design something difference from his last couple of years, but also because he simply can’t run the same stuff in the NFL as in college. The field is different, the rules are different, so it’s just impossible to do the same. Another thing is that Kingsbury ran somewhat different offenses based on which players he had available.
If I am going by how Kingsbury’s offense looked the last two seasons, I would say it should fit David Johnson well. The offense includes a lot of short passes where the pass catcher needs to create something himself after the catch, and the blocking schemes should create holes for him as well.
That’s not to say that Chase Edmonds can’t have success, by the way. For instance, at Texas Tech they ran a lot of misdirection plays where Edmonds could certainly be effective.
A little (but not irrelevant) detail is how Texas Tech used the so-called “RPO-play” under Kingsbury. RPO’s has been a trend in the NFL for the last couple of years. In the play, the quarterback reads one defensive end and based on what that defender does, the quarterback either hands the ball off to his runningback or throw the ball himself. Usually (like in 8 or 9 times out of 10) the primary goal is to run the ball, but since that isn’t always a good idea, the playcaller gives the quarterback some pass options he can utilize if need be. In Kingsbury’s offense it is the reverse way in that the primary goal is to throw the ball, but since that can be troubling at times, the quarterback has some run options as well. The defenses certainly know this, and it can often create bigger running lanes because the defense is thinking “pass” first when they see the offense lining up to run an RPO.
