What a difference a year makes.

Last season Oregon running back LaMichael James dipped, darted and sped his way to a third-place finish in the Heisman Trophy balloting by rushing for 1,731 yards and 21 touchdowns.

This season, after four games, he's not even ranked among the top Heisman contenders on some websites that track such things (at least those I checked) or is only listed way down a long list of long-shots.

ESPN.com

CBSSports.com

Bleacher report

This despite

and ranking second in rushing yards per game, 153.3 yards per game with seven touchdowns. He gained a school record 288 during a 56-31 win at Arizona on Saturday.

Granted, James got off to a slow start with 54 yards on 18 carries in a loss to No. 1 LSU. But let's not pretend former Heisman winners, let alone candidates, haven't stumbled here and there during their Heisman quests.

The most recent running back to receive the honor was Alabama's Mark Ingram, now with the New Orleans Saints. Ingram in 2009 rushed for 1,658 yards and scored 17 touchdowns. Along the way he gained all of 30 yards on 16 carries during a 26-21 win at Auburn and had four other games of under 100 yards rushing. James has just nine for his career.

Ingram's Heisman run came after a year in which he rushed for 728 yards and 12 touchdowns.

So, James has a better body of work than Ingram did, including his Heisman season, and is on pace to shatter his own records while coming off a third-place finish yet is not even considered to be a legitimate candidate?

James is on pace for 1,839 yards in 12 regular season games. Give him the Pac-12 title game and a bowl game and he could rip past 2,000 with ease.

But it doesn't stop there.

James is returning punts and ranks third in the nation with an average of 22.3 yards per return. He's also catching more passes than ever before with 11 for 159 yards so far this season. Last year he caught 17 for 208.

James' versatility shined in Oregon's 69-20 win over Nevada. Although he rushed for a mere 67 yards on 12 carries, James also contributed two receptions for 56 yards and a touchdown, and a 58-yard punt return.

The trick for James will be winning at Stanford. Cardinal's quarterback Andrew Luck is a serious Heisman candidate who will put up amazing numbers. James' only real chance to win will require the Ducks to win at Stanford and then win the Pac-12 title to qualify for a BCS bowl game.

Should that happen, and James reach 2,000 yards of total offense with 20 total touchdowns, he should once again finish at least in the top three in voting.

What's curious now is that he's pretty much disappeared from the Heisman landscape just four games into the season. The leading running back candidate right now is South Carolina's Marcus Lattimore. He has rushed for 611 yards and eight touchdowns on 42 more carries (107 to 65) than James. That includes a modest 77 yards on 20 carries against Vanderbilt.

If Oregon's lone loss is a key component. Then why is Baylor quarterback Robert Griffin III a candidate? Is Baylor going undefeated?

If I were running marketing at Oregon, I'd take advantage of the off week and send out a short, four-game highlight video of James set to Patrice Rushen's 1982 hit "Forget me nots" (see video below).

Anyone over 40, who got their groove on in their younger days, should remember the tune. The younger set will know the beat from Will Smith's hit 1997-hit, Men in Black.

Either way, the sentiment of the original song seems appropriate. James has been forgotten. And not rightfully so.

Okay, Fentress rant over. Onto some links (what few there are during an off week):

From The Oregonian...

- Willie Lyles says Tennessee broke rules in

.

- Oregon is surrendering yards but it's

to do with that.

- Featured

.

- James named Pac-12

.

- Oregon

.

From the Eugene Register-Guard...

- Willie Lyles reveals

recruiting visit.

- Fast, focused Ducks

.

- Around the Pac-12

.

--Aaron Fentress

Follow @AaronJFentress