fiestavike wrote:That may be, but you need to be cautious that you aren't cherry-picking those criteria as the cause for his poor production.
That's not what I'm doing. The factors I mentioned were evident on film during most of that stretch, along with a few others which are also utterly ignored when we focus on a simplistic, cherry-picked 9 game stat (like injuries and the quality of some of those opposing run defenses).
Afterall, other than 2009 Peterson spent nearly his whole career behind bad OL play and accompanied by poor QB production. It undoubtedly hindered his production, but it didn't prevent him from having some fantastic performances even given those conditions. I don't think you are pointing to the correct factors to explain his declining production.
I'm not only pointing to two correct factors, I'm pointing to two
obviously correct factors and I'm not going to waste my time arguing about them when they're so self-evident. I'm not saying they are the only factors but their impact has been obvious.
The 9 game sample size is clearly cherry-picked for effect. Why not go back 10? Because then the 2.9 yards per carry gets boosted up to a less damning 3.3 and you hit the end of a stretch in which Peterson rushed for over 100 yards in 4 of 5 games (and over 200 in one of them). That ruins all the fun.