Cam Akers said he was healthy. The Rams didn’t even put him on the injury report for week 1. Yet here we are, with one half of football almost down, and he’s basically nowhere to be found. One carry, zero yards.
When asked about his health earlier this week Akers said, “I know I’m healthy. Everybody else will just get to see. I’m not trying to go show anybody that I’m healthy. I’m just going to play my game.”
Well now is his chance, and he has barely been on the field. This is a very misleading situation by the Rams. If Akers is truly healthy, he would be playing in this game.
Akers suffered a torn Achilles last year in the preseason and made a return within six months, which is incredibly quick. He didn’t look great out there, but he played and didn’t suffer a setback.
Then training camp came, and Akers was diagnosed with some sort of a soft tissue injury (aka muscular strain) to his lower body. He missed out on valuable practice time, but all reports indicated it wouldn’t linger into the season. Well, it has. There’s no other explanation other than injury that would explain why he hasn’t seen many touches.
Could Akers take over in the second half? Sure. Is it possible he’s fine by week 2? Absolutely. But this injury is clearly still an issue. And on top of that history isn’t on his side when considering his torn Achilles. We just haven’t seen a running back return to their pre-injury level after this. It impacts explosiveness and power, two key aspects needed to be successful as a running back. I hope Akers proves us wrong as he was elite before the injury and he’s very young, but we haven’t seen it done.
For now the Rams will continue to rely on Darrell Henderson, who had his own soft tissue injury to overcome. This offense could be a ticking time bomb between the health of Akers and Henderson and the elbow tendon issue Matt Stafford will have to manage. Their 3rd RB, Karen Williams, also injured his ankle in the second quarter and may not return.
