Chris Ivory injury: Jaguars RB health biggest impact to offense success

The Jacksonville Jaguars offense got off to a fast start on Sunday against the Buffalo Bills, scoring a touchdown on their first drive of the game. That was something the Jaguars hadn’t done in well over a year, dating back to Week 2 of the 2015 season. It was a mix of running the ball and passing, but a big factor was running back Chris Ivory paving the way. Ivory ran hard, picked up chunk yards both on the ground and in the air. The Jaguars nearly scored on their second drive of the game too, but a dropped pass ended up leading to a punt.

Shortly after the Jaguars offense went dormant. The reason? No Chris Ivory.

The Jaguars offense the past few weeks have had spurts off success, where they look like the offense we watched last season that put up points and kept the team in games. Those spurts of success this year all have a common denominator: Chris Ivory. It’s easy to see why the Jaguars signed Ivory in the offseason, because he makes such a difference to the balance of the Jaguars offense and changes it from being a chore to watch to actually effective.

Ivory got banged up and missed the rest of the game, so his health not only headed into this week’s game against the Denver Broncos is key, but going forward the rest of the season. If the Jaguars want to be able to build anything to carry over for next season, they’re going to need Chris Ivory out there to avoid falling back to being less entertaining than grass growing. Ivory’s injury concerns are also compounded by the fact that T.J. Yeldon is also banged up and the options behind those two are extremely limited, albeit I thought Denard Robinson did a decent job with his opportunities last week against the Bills.