Week 17 of the 2011 NFL season is now upon us, and the majority of fantasy football leagues have crowned their champion for the season. We can now begin to look back on the season and determine some of the players that surprised and disappointed fantasy football owners the most this year. Disappointing performances are frequently brought on by injury, either to the specific player or to the players around him, but they are disappointing efforts nonetheless.

On that note, here are five running backs that I feel let fantasy owners down the most this season.

5. Peyton Hillis, Cleveland Browns- The Madden Curse claimed another victim this year as Hillis missed multiple games, mostly due to a lingering hamstring injury, and has just three rushing touchdowns all season. He had his first 100-yard game of the season in Week 16 against the Baltimore Ravens, which game him two straight games with over 20 carries (the only two occasions he has reached that carry total all season). There was some skepticism Hillis could again have the type of season he had in 2010, when he had 1,177 rushing yards and 11 touchdowns along with 61 receptions, but I don't think anyone expected anything quite this dismal in a contract year for him.

4. LeGarrette Blount, Tampa Bay Buccaneers- Blount led all rookie running backs with 1,007 rushing yards in 2010, despite not seeing much action in the early part of the season. That led to some high hopes for 2011 and what starting all 16 games could mean for him production-wise. But Blount, like the rest of the Buccaneers' team, has had a disappointing season as he has struggled with fumbles and lost passing down work to his backups fairly often. Blount had back-to-back 100-yard rushing games in Week 11 and Week 12, but he has just one other 100-yard game all season (Week 4) and just 11 carries over the past two weeks heading into Week 17. There was some downside coming into the season since Blount offers little to fantasy football owners as a pass catcher (17 receptions in two seasons now), but most people expected better from him and, unlike some others on this list, injuries do not appear to be a factor in his lack of productivity.

3. Jamal Charles. Kansas City Chiefs- People could have made a case for Charles to be the No. 1 pick in some fantasy leagues, particularly in PPR formats, and he was certainly an early first round pick in most leagues regardless of scoring format on the heels of his 6.4 yards per carry average in 2010 and the prospect for a bigger workload in 2011. But Charles got off to a slow start in Week 1 against the Buffalo Bills, with just 10 carries for 56 yards along with five catches for nine yards and a touchdown, then tore the ACL in his left knee in Week 2 against the Detroit Lions and his season was over. Suffering a devastating injury is certainly a good excuse to not have reached the expectations set for him, but Charles still belongs on this list even though I include him fairly tentatively.

2. Darren McFadden, Oakland Raiders- McFadden started the 2011 season strongly, with two 150-plus yard rushing games and four total touchdowns over the first three games, as he looked likely to reach the lofty expectations he came into the NFL with. He slowed down a little over the next three weeks, then went down with a foot injury in Week 7 against the Kansas City Chiefs after just two carries.  He was unable to take part in regular practice, but there was still some level of "will he or won't he?" in regard to his playing status nearly on a weekly basis. But McFadden ultimately never played another regular season game, as he has been ruled out for Week 17 as of this writing, and a frustrating experience for his fantasy owners is finally over. McFadden still has yet to play a full 16-game slate in four NFL seasons, so no one should expect him to do so in 2012 either.

1. Chris Johnson, Tennessee Titans- Despite his prolonged holdout in what was already an abnormal offseason, Johnson likely went off the board fairly early in most fantasy football drafts last summer. He ultimately got the lucrative contract he was looking for, but CJ looked like a different runner as he had just two games with 20 or more carries and just one with more than 64 rushing yards over his eight games of the season. A glimmer of hope came when he had more than 20 carries and at least 130 rushing yards in three out of four games from Week 10-13, but those came against some of the league's worst run defenses in the Carolina Panthers (Week 10), Tampa Bay Buccaneers (Week 12) and Buffalo Bills (Week 13). In three games after that he did not have more than 15 carries or 56 yards in a game, though an ankle injury that has his status up in the air for Week 17 may have been at least partially to blame. Regardless, Johnson's lack of production early in the season does not appear to be caused by any injury and any fantasy owner who took a chance on him may have been put into a whole they never got out of. 

Just Missed The List:  Rashard Mendenhall, Pittsburgh Steelers; Knowshon Moreno, Denver Broncos; Felix Jones, Dallas Cowboys; Jahvid Best, Detroit Lions; Daniel Thomas, Miami Dolphins

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