NFL Hall of Famer Gale Sayers thinks the reason for Devin Hester’s disappointing season so far is because Hester looks scared during kick returns.

“It looks like he’s afraid to run back kickoffs,” Sayers said.

“He’s running straight up the field and everybody is tackling him. He looks like he’s afraid to go out on his own. A couple of times the other team would kick to the right and he would run to the right and run out of bounds. It’s like he doesn’t want to run the kickoffs back. Run to the left … you have the whole field!”

Sayers critique of Hester is somewhat unfair considering Hester has been dealing with some injuries this season. Once Hester gets healthy I think he’ll be just fine.

If these comments by Sayers don’t fire him up to return a couple kicks before the end of the season, I don’t think anything will.