Josh Burrell details transition from wide receiver to running back

The Florida State Seminoles have made an adjustment on the offensive side of the ball by moving wide receiver Joshua Burrell to running back. After practice on Friday, the Seminoles’ star athlete detailed his transition from wide receiver to running back.

“Coach Adkins and coach Norvell reached out to me over the weekend, just talking about the opportunity of doing both, utilizing my skill set of being a backfill,” said Burrell. “They feel like I can do a good job with the ball in my hands, and they opened the opportunity to me and said I could say no if I wanted to. But I was open to it. And it’s been a smooth transition so far.”

I feel like I can do a good job with the ball in my hands too. It gives me an opportunity to get on the field (more), and I’m always open to new opportunities.”

Burrell is moving from wide receiver to running back. He joins a room with players like Treshaun Ward, Trey Benson, and Lawrance Toafili already in it. This also comes as CJ Campbell suffered a season-ending injury. Burrell is ready to take on the new challenge, but it might be tricky considering that the last time he played the position was before high school.

“I’d say middle school. I did a little bit in the backfield in high school, like screens and stuff like that, but it wasn’t really like running between the tackles. So, I gotta get that used to doing that for sure. But the coaches in the running back room they’re definitely helping me out with that.”

Burrell’s transition may have just begun recently, but he is comfortable and familiar with the running backs and the coaches in the program. So the main thing he must focus on is learning to understand things from the running back perspective, like quarterback pass protection.

“The past few days, they’ve been smooth. I’ve been in the running back meetings these past couple of days. It’s been new; just getting used to the new guys… It’s been smooth just getting used to working on pass protection, stuff like that. I was running between the tackles, like I said, running outside the backfield. But I’ve definitely enjoyed it.”