The Riders have had to rely on a rotation of returners

For a while there, it looked like the Saskatchewan Roughriders were approaching the point of no returners.

Six players have returned punts for Saskatchewan this season and five of them have been injured, either while handling a return or while performing their normal duties for the CFL team.

Throw in Chad Owens — who was signed in the off-season to be Saskatchewan’s primary returner but who has yet to play due to injury — and the Roughriders have been unlucky at that position.

“We’ve been a little snakebit back there,” admitted special-teams co-ordinator Craig Dickenson. “I haven’t seen as many guys get hurt as we’ve had this year, but fortunately, with the exception of Chad, most of the others aren’t long-term injuries so we should be able to get them back.”

Owens didn’t make it out of training camp before being sidelined.

Ricky Collins Jr., was the Roughriders’ returner for their game against the Montreal Alouettes on June 22, but he got hurt on his first — and, ultimately, only — return of that contest.

Nic Demski replaced Collins and fared well before he was injured Sept. 3 against the Winnipeg Blue Bombers. Fellow receiver Duron Carter did some returning, but he suffered an injury versus the Hamilton Tiger-Cats on Sept. 15.

Christion Jones provided a spark during his three games as the returner, but he got hurt Aug. 25 against the Edmonton Eskimos. Marcus Thigpen was signed to handle the duties, but he lasted just three returns before leaving the game in Hamilton.

Only Ed Gainey, who had two returns against the Tiger-Cats as an emergency fill-in, has yet to sustain an injury this season.

“It’s not ideal,” Dickenson said of rotating returners. “Every time you get a guy in, you want to find something he does well and play to his strengths. When you’re not sure who it’s going to be, it forces you to be a little bit more generic than you might want to be.

“We’ve had a little bit of bad luck at returner, but the guys who have been out there have done a good job. We’re just hoping they get healthy as soon as possible.”

Enter Jones.

The former University of Alabama Crimson Tide star is being activated off the six-game injured list after just three games and will handle the Roughriders’ returns in Sunday’s game against the visiting Calgary Stampeders.

“It was sort of a cumulative thing,” Jones said of the decision to activate him early. “It was on both of our minds to see where we are — where we were — with the injury.

“Coach (Chris) Jones and I talked and we came up with a plan. The plan was successful and I went through a couple of workouts to make sure everything was right. We felt everything was where it needed to be to play.”

Jones made his debut with Saskatchewan on Aug. 5, when he returned one punt for 26 yards against the host B.C. Lions.

One week later, he had seven punt returns for 133 yards against the visiting Lions — the highest yardage total for a Roughrider in a regular-season game since Corey Holmes had 181 yards against the Toronto Argonauts on Sept. 15, 2002.

Jones added 33 yards on three returns against the hometown Edmonton Eskimos on Aug. 25 before suffering a shoulder injury.

Now he’s back — and he hopes he’s better than he was when he left.

“From the outside looking in, I taught myself some things I could have worked on for my short time being here,” Jones said. “Hopefully we can attack those deficiencies that I had before I got hurt, come in and be effective in the game Sunday.”

The thing is, the rest of the punt-return team has been forced to adjust as the returners have changed.

Dickenson noted that the Roughriders employ a man-to-man blocking scheme, so having a different returner hasn’t affected the blockers’ game plan. But the timing of the return can be thrown off if the ball-carrier’s traits change from game to game — or even return to return.

“Much like a running back with a good O-line, they need some reps and they need some time together to get a feel for what each of them likes and for what they’re doing,” Dickenson said. “As a result, we’ve missed out on a little bit of chemistry that comes with having the same guy back there.

“We’ve just got to keep plugging away and do the best we can.”

Jones only returned to practice Friday — he took the field after the workout had started — so the Roughriders looked this week at Jacoby Ford after signing him to their practice roster.

The Clemson University product was a fourth-round pick (108^th overall) by the Oakland Raiders in the 2010 NFL draft and played 38 games with them between 2010 and ’13.

But he hasn’t played since. Stints in the NFL with the New York Jets and Tennessee Titans and in the CFL with the Eskimos and Alouettes didn’t produce game action.

“That was the frustrating part, not sticking and not really knowing your role, especially when you know you can play,” said Ford, a 30-year-old from West Palm Beach, Fla., who had been working in medical sales before getting the urge to play again.

“God has a way of bringing it back and humbling you again. He has a way of opening doors as well. He can open them and close them just as easy. He’s giving me another opportunity and I’ve just got to seize it this time.”