I never said he was injured because of his fattitude, but his fatness didn't help in recovery after the big injury and his athletic shape decreased after the injuries. And second of all, the context of this conversation was comparing Adrian Peterson to other NFL players with similar knee injuries and my point on AD's athleticims is to compare him to Culpepper as far as ability to recover from a knee injury. Peterson is far and away leagues better of an athlete than Daunte. Being built like a defensive end and running at 5MPH's might make you an effective runner as a QB but I think "tremendous athlete" is a bit of a stretch, particularly in contrast to someone like Adrian. Michael Vick is a tremendous athlete. I wouldn't put Culpepper in that category.

As for bashing Culpepper as someone else posted, I was only taking a personal shot at how fat Culpepper was, I personally liked him and thought he was a good QB ever since college. I wouldn't bash him too hard as an actual QB.

Saying that Culpepper was a "fat slob" isn't a stretch, it's just pure confabulation. He was big but not a butterball, as you well know. As you also know, Culpepper was a heck of an athlete. 5 MPH? Yeah, right. Check his rushing stats before he got hurt. The guy could run.

But hey, I understand. Still smarting after that 2005 playoff game, huh? Yeah, Culpepper did spank the Pack and the Golden Boy pretty bad in that one.

We're straying pretty far from Adrian's torn ACL guys. Lets try and get this back on topic as I'm sure news will continue to flow in as the season nears.

As a fan of the game, I hope to see this guy get back to doing what he does. Best RB ever, IMO.

http://espn.go.com/blog/nfcnorth

i dont know if i am late or not, but stroll down to you get to Adrian Peterson road to recovery.

I just watched the video at the ESPN site:

http://espn.go.com/blog/nfcnorth/post/_ ... o-recovery

Seems to me that Peterson is already doing some remarkable things that one would think would cause anyone with any knee injury a lot of pain. Yet he's flying through the exercises. During the interview AD again expressed his total commitment to being ready by day 1 of the regular season.

But even so, what happens when AD takes another big hit? I honestly don't know that much about it.

I can't help but wonder what's worse for AD? A hard cut while running or a big hit that jars his knee?

If the ACL is fully healed, cutting shouldn't be an issue for him. Of course, the key word there is fully. If he does too much too soon and the area isn't fully healed, he could prevent it from ever returning to 100%.

A big hit would be a problem pre or post-ACL repair, and of course he could always re-injure it. So the real question is whether he runs in such a way that he protects it, or does he let it hang out and run like he did before the injury?

I hope AD plays for another 10 years. I really do. I just love watching how hard he works and how much conviction he has. This is a guy who has millions of dollars in the bank. His team is not likely to be all that good this year. He's coming off a major injury. He could easily sit back and look after himself and take his sweet time coming back. But he's not doing any of that. He's still pushing himself like he's trying to get drafted.

From the sounds of it AD's work ethic is contagious around Winter Park this offseason. I read that most vets and all rookies are there working hard and that has never happened in recent memory. The only vet not up there is Jared Allen, but we know he's working his tail off in Arizona.

While I still don't think the Vikes are going to be all that great this year, based on what I'm reading it does look like they're going to be very competitive.

Nice post, Edward. I couldn't agree more about AD being a hoot to watch and what a great competitor he is. He's one of my all-time favorite players. I hold my breath every time he gets the ball. But the truth is I'm a little nervous about him aggressively coming back too soon. I hope the Vikings play it safe with him, because I sure don't want to see Peterson get hurt again. And I definitely don't want him to permanently damage his knee.

I also agree that the Vikings may not be all that good this year, but they'll be far more competitive than last year. They'll need AD more and more as the year progresses, which is another reason why holding him out for the first few games might not be a bad idea.

Let's all hope for the best and see the face of the franchise return to his "old" self

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBz34VxA ... re=related

I think the Vikings will be a lot better. The team has added way too many new parts over the past few years, and that lack of a proper preseason last year started a funk that they couldn't crawl out of. A team with potential, when losing, will try too hard and make mistakes; a truly bad team will just give up. I think there was a lot more of the former than the latter with that team last year. Giving up had been a problem in the past, but after Ponder took over they kept a lot of them (except Green Bay and New Orleans...and both of those teams were Super Bowl or Super Bowl caliber teams) close. I think their receiver depth is greatly improved this year, their line is better, and they've added some depth in their secondary. They've got a starting quarterback that will have a full offseason to get in sync with his receivers and the team will probably embrace Ponder as their guy now. A lot of those games that were close might tip the other way...a lot of them were down to a touchdown or field goal.

AD should have better blocking in any case this year. They've drafted and signed enough fullbacks and tight ends over the past couple years that at least one or two of them should step up.

I hope that this has not already been posted but if so I apologise. AD talks tp ESPN reporter about his come back.
http://thevikingage.com/2012/05/21/adri ... hab-video/

Adrian Peterson - RB - Vikings

Coach Leslie Frazier confirmed that the Vikings envision limiting Adrian Peterson's early-season workload.

"He's so valuable to our organization that we have to be smart. We'll tread lightly as far as Week 1 and how much he'll contribute on the field," said Frazier. "Even when we get to training camp, he's going to be chomping at the bit but we'll have to be smart." We're tentatively expecting Peterson to get the ceremonial opening-day start even if works in as a change-of-pace to Toby Gerhart for the first quarter of the season.
Source: USA Today

Not a bad idea, the schedule starts off easy anyway. Giving him a couple weeks of rest should also give the line more time to gel (so hopefully they can block someone by the time he's ready). I'd say wait until at least Simpson is on the field before giving him any decent workload.

Same thing every team that plays us is probably saying.

This is about more than just this season, hopefully they play it safe with him, unlike what they've done in the past with him and other players. Between the injury, and the way he plays he could use the lower workload. Try and extend his career a little.

hope they put him on the pup list. better to be safe than sorry. they better make sure he is 110% ready before seeing action.

Beast.

The websites I've checked usually have the return to competitive sports after a torn ACL is no earlier than 8 months, 9-12 are typical. Peterson had surgery just before New Years so a Tuesday return would put him at 8.5 months.


What?

It wouldn't really be what you'd call a return to the sport. It just means that he'd begin practicing with the team. My guess is that they'll keep him out of contract drills for a while, until they get a better idea of where he is. They almost have to do it that way. You can't expect him to be reinstated to the roster, go through his first practices, his first contact, and then his first game, all in a matter of days. If they were to take a month for all of it, that would bring him back to begin playing in the 2nd or 3rd game.

I assume he thinks they're binging Peterson back to practice too early but that's a call only those close to the situation can make. We just have to hope everyone involved exercises good judgment.

Adrian Peterson - RB - Vikings
Adrian Peterson (knee) has been removed from the active/PUP list.

It means he cannot start the 2012 regular season on the reserve/PUP list. Peterson is already working with the first team at Vikings practice and figures to play in a game at some point this preseason. It's clear that Peterson has not suffered a setback since his ACL surgery in December and, although he could still miss a game or two, he seems on track to return in time for the team's Week 1 game against Jacksonville.

[i]Source: Judd Zulgad on Twitter Aug 12 - 12:34 PM[/]

Which based on their history, isn't very likely. And definitely isn't helped by their jobs being on the line.

With Simpson out the first 3 games, it's basically the same offense as last year. The line and TE positions have been upgraded but not enough to stop the 8 and 9-man fronts AD commands. That's too much abuse on someone who isn't even 9 months removed from the injury. Everyone knew that someone had to reign AD in because he's a beastly competitor, I have to say at this point I don't think that's being done very well. If this really is a rebuild year, then what's the rush? We were unsure if he would start game 1 and now there's talk about playing in preseason? I sure hope all that speculation is wrong.

What do you think they haven't done very well? They've kept him away from contact and have limited his running and emphasized patience throughout his rehabilitation process. If he's coming off the PUP list now and returning to practice this week, maybe that just means he's actually ready to to return to practice. From what I've read, most orthopedic physicians recommend an athlete wait at least 6 months and preferably 7-9 months after surgery to repair a torn ACL before returning to athletic competition. Peterson is past the 7 month mark now so maybe he's ready to test his knee in practice.

At this point, we don't know if there is any rush. The target has been to get him ready to play in week 1 but Frazier has hedged his bets on that all along. They will probably see how he responds to practice reps and take it from there. If he looks ready for contact after practicing for a while, maybe they'll work in some light contact. IF he plays in a preseason game, I'm guessing it will be a brief appearance and even if he plays in week 1, that doesn't mean he'll be out there for the majority of the offensive snaps taking abuse from stacked defenses.

I just found some more info on this:

http://www.cbssports.com/general/blog/n ... o-practice





There's more at the link.

If you didn't truncate my quote, you would have seen the word speculation, which is all we're going off of right now and I'm cognizant of that. I think taking a guy off the PUP at this point of the preseason gives off the impression that he'll be playing in game 1 and maybe, as has been speculated, as early as the third preseason game. I'm aware of what Frazier has said, but these actions do speak. There was initial thought that Peterson might even enter the SEASON on the PUP, and now he's off before the second preseason game. Maybe he has freakish healing, maybe they are just bringing him in for reps, or maybe they're rushing him back, I really don't know. I'm just commenting from an outsiders perspective at this junction.

I'm sorry if not quoting your entire post created the impression that I didn't read all of it. I read every word. I simply cut it off so the question that began my response would immediately follow the sentence in your post that prompted it. I often do that to improve the flow of a reply. It doesn't seem necessary to quote a post in it's entirety when replying but I always read an entire post before responding to it.

Anyway, I didn't see your statement that "Everyone knew that someone had to reign AD in because he's a beastly competitor, I have to say at this point I don't think that's being done very well" as speculative. It seemed like an explicit statement of your point of view, so I wondered why you felt that way. I wasn't trying to start a debate. I simply didn't understand why you would feel that way given the way Peterson's rehab has been handled so far.



You have to admit, " I don't know" is a pretty different reaction than "I don't think that's being done very well".

There has been speculation that Peterson could start the season on the PUP list but his target all along has been to be ready when the season begins. I understand your concerns but I think all this particular action says is they believe they've reached the next step of the process. As Frazier put it, they've done what they can do on the side and it's time for AD to be integrated with his teammates.

The doctors' jobs aren't on the line.

Well, "I don't know" is probably the correct catchall in most circumstances since we don't know the intricacies of what goes on behind closed doors. But that doesn't lend well to messageboard discussions, so generally in these sort of cases I take what information is available and make some sort of statement. I don't see the need to sit on the fence, I don't see the fun in that .

No, that's not much fun at all.