I'm having trouble wrapping my brain around the Minnesota Vikings new running back. Ever since the Vikings traded up in the second round of the 2017 NFL Draft to select Florida State's Dalvin Cook I've struggled with seeing him in the team's backfield. It's strange. I love the pick but I'm having some trouble with it. Running back was a need going into the draft so I was comfortable with them drafting one, even with an early pick. It was a draft loaded with talented runners so it was a good time to need one. I even penciled a back into the third or fourth round of every one of the hundreds of Vikings mock drafts that I crafted. Never in my wildest draft day dreams did I have Cook being available. I saw him with LSU's Leonard Fornette and Stanford's Christian McCaffrey as the best of a very talented running back draft class. There were even times during the long months leading up to the draft when I had Cook as the best. The Vikings didn't have a first round pick so Cook was never a consideration for me. Even when he slid out of the first round I never thought his landing in Minnesota was possible. At first, I thought that my struggles with it happening was due to my surprise. The draft evaluation process is a long one and it often feels longer. I follow all of it closely. By the time the draft finally starts I've imagined so many possibilities, so many combinations that I'm rarely surprised by any of it. I was surprised by this selection of Cook. But not enough to cause the struggles that I've been having in seeing him in the Vikings backfield. After a week of pondering this and other Vikings roster puzzles I've finally discovered the source of my struggles and I really should've known it all along. My issues aren't with the Vikings new running back. It's with the old one.
I thought that I was fine with it but I don't think that I'll ever really be fine with Adrian Peterson playing football for a team other than the Vikings. I didn't like seeing Alan Page playing for the Chicago Bears, Joey Browner playing for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, John Randle playing for the Seattle Seahawks, Randall McDaniel playing for the Buccaneers, Cris Carter playing for he Miami Dolphins. The list goes on. It's the business of football and I'm not a fan of it. The Vikings have 11 players honored in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Only Mick Tingelhoff played his entire career with the Vikings. That's not unusual but it's sad to see. At least it is for me. Perhaps it was because of his injury-plagued, offensive line-hampered final season in Minnesota but I just couldn't see Peterson not coming back. It just couldn't end like it did. It couldn't end with a fumble in a Week 15 fiasco against the Indianapolis Colts. Adrian Peterson is a football force and he isn't done. But he's done in Minnesota. I've been slow to accept that despite the signs that it was going to happen. I certainly didn't think it was over when the Vikings decided to opt out of the final year of his contract. That was expected due to his bloated $18 million price tag for the 2017 season. Team and player were just going to agree to a more realistic number. I didn't even think it was over when the Vikings signed Latavius Murray in free agency. They could afford both. It wasn't over, in my mind, until Peterson signed with another team. He finally did that when he signed with the New Orleans Saints the week before the draft. That signing came a few days after the NFL announced that the Saints will open the season in Minnesota on Monday Night Football. Convenient.
In my years as a Minnesota Vikings fan the team has had two truly transcendent playmakers. Football players that were simply "must-see" every time the ball was in their hands. Randy Moss and Adrian Peterson. The Vikings have had many great players but those two stand out with their jaw-dropping physical and football abilities. You couldn't look away when Peterson ran with the football. Jim Brown power, LaDanian Tomlinson cuts, Gale Sayers, vision Tony Dorsett speed. Peterson could run over a defender, make another miss, and run away from the rest. Few, if any, backs have ever combined all of those traits. He's the best runner of the football that I've ever seen. It was a blast and an absolute treat to watch every one of his games. A Minnesota treat. It's a shame that the next game I see he'll be wearing the uniform of the Saints. A damn shame.
So, my struggles with getting my head around Dalvin Cook in the backfield of the Vikings isn't about Cook at all. It's about the end of the Adrian Peterson era in Minnesota. It was a wonderful time. He deserved a Super Bowl win. 2009 should've been that win. Players like Peterson don't come around often. Fans have to appreciate them and cherish them when they do. He was in Minnesota for 10 years. A long time but it wasn't long enough. Especially when he has a lot of football left. It's Dalvin Cook's time in Minnesota now. And Latavius Murray. And Jerick McKinnon.
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