Travis Etienne Jr. is the most impactful free agent signing the New Orleans Saints made this offseason. The signing was received to much fanfare, and dreams of what he and Alvin Kamara could do together in the backfield immediately had fans excited. For those dreams to become reality, Etienne is going to have to prove 2024 was a fluke.
Now that Kamara has restructured his contract, we can begin to truly project what the Saints running back duo will look like in action. One of the biggest questions should be what does the rushing split look like. We know Etienne will be lead back, but what does that mean for Kamara's touches?
The @Saints RB room is looking tough 😤@swaggy_t1 | @A_kamara6 pic.twitter.com/VNrzeOOOZ9
— NFL (@NFL) July 8, 2026
Travis Etienne's history in a shared backfield is not great
Kamara is more than accustomed with shared backfields. He shared one with Mark Ingram, then Latavius Murray then Ingram again. Kamara has found success in each of those iterations of a Saints running back tandem, but that hasn't been the story for Etienne.
The Saints' new lead back was a prized addition because of what he has shown in his four-year professional career, and most of that was done while taking the vast majority of rushing attempts for the Jaguars. The one blemish on his resume was the 2024 campaign, and it was the only year where Etienne was in a true shared backfield.
Etienne has been one of the more used running backs in the league most of his career. He carried the ball 220 times in 2022, 267 in 2023 and 260 in 2025. That was good for top-10 in the latter two seasons and top-15 in his debut season.
2024 is obviously the one year missing from that list, and it's the only year Etienne didn't record 1000 years. It wasn't just the worst season of his career. It was a objectively bad year. He rushed for just 558 yards in the season on 150 carries.
The Jaguars had Etienne splitting carries with Tank Bigsby nearly evenly, with Bigsby actually having a slight edge in touches. The result was Etienne's worst yards per game, lowest yards per carry and just two touchdowns.
Maybe it was a lack of touches equating to a lack of rhythm for Etienne, or it could have just been the offense as a whole struggling. Doug Pederson did get fired after the season. There are plenty of explanations for a struggling season.
Etienne has to prove he isn't the back who needs 200 carries to establish a rhythm, because he won't see that type of workload in a shared backfield with Kamara. He's built a resume that should earn him the benefit of the doubt, but it will be interesting to see if 2024 was a fluke or a sign that Etienne is meant to be the lone back in the backfield.
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