It's Week 15, 2011, and the end of the season is depressingly familiar for St. Louis Rams fans and fantasy football owners of Steven Jackson. For the seventh season in a row Jackson is closing in on a 1000 yard season, and after a brief respite in 2010 he closes the season out as the lone option on a historically brutal Rams offense. The good news for keeper leaguers is that at 28 Jackson has responded to a lighter workload with an impressive 4.4 yards per carry after a disappointing 2010 in which he averaged 3.8.
Jackson also has five touchdowns in 12 games—which wouldn't be impressive except it's an improvement over his four in 15 and six in 16 over the last two seasons. With two games left Jackson's 105 yards away from that seventh 1000 yard season. Jim Thomas writes that Jackson would join four Hall of Famers and two Hall of Fame locks among the only players ever to do it; in a season where Rams fans have had little at all to be proud of, Jackson's solid comeback certainly counts for something.
I only wish it counted for more.