CJ Anderson is on the cusp of his first 1,000 yard season

Les Shapiro of the Afternoon drive caught up with CJ Anderson after practice today to talk about his goals for the end of the season. Other than the obvious answers: play hard and helping the team win, Anderson admitted that he has some personal milestones he would love to reach.

“Want to definitely hit some milestones that I’ve been having on the wall since I first joined the league and I’m this close. I think it would be rewarding for myself and the fellas up front who are putting it together.”

Anderson also mentioned that he’ll have to do something special for the offensive line if he reaches his milestone. Shapiro asked if he’d be willing to share his goal and CJ said he would like to end the year “well over 1,000” yards. His initial goal at the beginning of the season was 1500 yards.

CJ is currently sitting at 848 yards on the season, putting the 1,000 yard mark clearly within reach. With 142 yards to go over two games, CJ would need to average 71 yards in those two games, which seems very doable. If he continues the pace he was on Thursday evening, 1100 yards may not be out of the question.

Shapiro and Goodman made a good point after the interview that if CJ had received a decent number of carries throughout the season, there’s a good chance he could have made a run at that mark.

Anderson has only five games this year with 20+ carries. Additionally, there were six games where he received 10 carries or less. On a semi-related note, Denver is 5-0 in those games where CJ received 20 or more carries.

Thursday against the Colts, when given 30 carries, he put up 158 rushing yards. While that was clearly not a standard performance, it speaks to what can happen when the offense is in a position to run the ball consistently (e.g. not turning it over or getting down quickly).

Lastly, Anderson also admitted that finishing a full 16-game season (something he has never done in his career) was important to him.

Here’s to hoping CJ can get both of those goals over the next two games as he looks to build on his massive outing on Thursday night.

Check out the full conversation with CJ starting at the 22:30 mark.