Will Minnesota Vikings Finally Emphasize Adrian Peterson Again?

In this author's opinion, there was not a more wasted player of talent in the NFL than Adrian Peterson.

In the past two years, the Minnesota Vikings have been trying to get Brett Favre to lead their potent offense. While it certainly worked out in 2009, it should have been clear that it wasn't going to work in 2010.

After starting the season 0-2, and nobody able to fill the void of Sidney Rice and Chester Taylor, Brad Childress should have made the decision to switch all gears to his running back. Instead, he just couldn't let the 2009 season go.

That was unacceptable considering what Adrian Peterson was able to accomplish in 2008.

In 2008, the Minnesota Vikings had trouble with the quarterback situation and there was no No. 1 receiver on the team. In fact, they didn't have an amazing kick returner (Percy Harvin), their running back made costly fumbles and their offensive line gave up 43 sacks.

With that said, the 2010 Minnesota Vikings started out looking just as good if not better than the 2008 team on paper. The strange difference, however, is that they went 10-6, won the division and made the playoffs in 2008, but went 6-10 and landed on the bottom of the division in 2010.

The only explanation for such is that Adrian Peterson was not emphasized in their offense enough.

In 2008, Adrian Peterson lead the league with 1,760 yards running, on over 363 attempts. In 2010, he was the sixth best rusher, and had the ninth most attempts with 283. I would think the league's best back would have bigger numbers than that. He may have missed some time due to injury last season, but that's still a difference of over 80 attempts!

Many things came into play for the disastrous season the Minnesota Vikings had last year, and I'm not trying to completely blame it all on the lack of using Adrian Peterson, although I fully believe it is the main component to what happened to them in 2010.

All I'm trying to say is that when you have the best running back in the NFL, he should be treated like he's the best running back in the NFL. As a Green Bay Packers fan, that's saying a lot.

I may not have any love for the purple and gold, but I know there's one thing in the NFL that I hate more. And that's simply seeing talented players being wasted (the Kevin Kolb scenario comes to mind).

When the 2011 season starts (thank you God! The lockout is over!), I fully expect Leslie Frazier to groom up his quarterback, but also understand that he has Adrian Peterson, which is truly relieving to know. I won't be surprised if Minnesota has one of the top running offenses in the NFL.

With Toby Gerhart another year under his belt, and Adrian Peterson getting the majority of the snaps, it's easy to see these two running for more than 2,000 yards next year.

Running backs like Adrian Peterson don't come often enough, and in this author's opinion, he will one day be compared to the likes of LaDainian Tomlinson and Jim Brown. Or in other words, an all-time great.

I'm looking forward to seeing him tear it up next year, and hopefully he'll be able to make up for the rather low year he had in 2010.