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David Johnson, Tyrann Mathieu land on top players under 25 list

Dec 8, 2016, 10:31 AM | Updated: Dec 9, 2016, 12:04 am

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You don’t have to tell Arizona Cardinals fans how good David Johnson is.

Every week, he shows them.

Through 12 games this season, the second-year back has amassed 1,005 rushing yards and another 704 receiving yards, along with 15 total touchdowns. In 28 career NFL games, the 2015 third-round pick out of Northern Iowa has scored 28 touchdowns.

He’s good. Very good.

His coach and teammates believe he would be in the MVP conversation if the 5-6-1 Cardinals were having a better season, and they are probably right.

His 1,709 total yards from scrimmage lead the entire NFL, and with at least 100 yards from scrimmage in every game this season, and with 296 receiving yards over the final four games, he would become just the third player in NFL history to amass at least 1,000 rushing yards and 1,000 receiving yards in the same season, joining Roger Craig and Marshall Faulk.

Johnson has done all of this at age 24, which not only makes him an incredible building block for the Cardinals’ future, but one of the best young players in the NFL. According to Mel Kiper Jr. and Mike Sando in an Insider piece, he is the sixth-best player in the league who is under the age of 25.

Johnson is the first player since Edgerrin James in 2005 to produce at least 100 yards from scrimmage in each of the first 12 games to start a season. Johnson can do many of the same things we see from Le’Veon Bell, and it shows in where he lines up: outside the backfield 18.6 percent of the time. Johnson is not as proficient as Bell in pass protection, but that might be the only area where he needs work. How confident are the Cardinals in Johnson? They gave him the ball Sunday on fourth-and-1 from their own 34 with 3:47 left in a game Arizona was leading by a point. Johnson picked up 14 yards.

While that’s great, Johnson is not the only Cardinal to land on the list, as he is joined by 24-year-old Tyrann Mathieu, who came in at No. 17.

The safety, who last season tore his ACL for the second time in three seasons, has been battling a shoulder injury that has kept him out of three of the team’s last four games.

Durability seems to be Mathieu’s only shortcoming in three-plus seasons. That didn’t stop the Cardinals from signing him to a contract extension almost as soon as he became eligible. Mathieu can be an impact player from multiple positions in the secondary, but with 11 missed games in the regular season, availability is a concern.

When on the field this season, Mathieu has shown flashes of his pre-ACL tear form, but has not been quite the same player. He has 30 total tackles along with one sack, one interception, three passes defensed and one forced fumble.

Last season, though, he was in the conversation to be the NFL’s Defensive Player of the Year with 89 total tackles, one sack, five interceptions, one forced fumble and 17 passes defensed in 14 games before his injury.

The Cardinals are one of six teams to have multiple players on the ESPN list, joining the New York Giants (Odell Beckham Jr., Landon Collins), Dallas Cowboys (Ezekiel Elliot, Dak Prescott), Houston Texans (DeAndre Hopkins, Jadeveon Clowney), New Orleans Saints (Michael Thomas, Brandin Cooks) and Tampa Bay Buccaneers (Jameis Winston, Mike Evans).

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David Johnson, Tyrann Mathieu land on top players under 25 list