The game is now a push with a 45 point over/under. His completion percentage has dropped to 56.5% and his passer rating is a measly 83.3 over the last three games. This was Peterson’s sixth 200-yard game, tying him with O.J. Simpson for the most in National Football League history. The highlight of the game was 37-year-old cornerback Terence Newman intercepting Derek Carr two times and almost adding a third midway through the game.
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On the defensive side of the ball, it was an up and down day.
Minnesota Vikings running back Adrian Peterson likes his team’s mental toughness and sees a positive shift heading into Sunday’s game against the Green Bay Packers. A loss puts them two games back with the Vikings owning the tiebreaker.
Eddie Lacy missed the last game because of a groin injury. They also hold opponents to 336.6 yards per game.
But they aren’t yet good – they make just the wrong mistakes at just the wrong time against the teams that can take advantage of every single one, such as Cordarrelle Patterson’s 93-yard return off a Sebastian Janikowski squib kick. Teddy Bridgewater completed 14 of 22 passes for 140 yards and one touchdown. Against Oakland, Newman had four tackles, five passes broken up, and two interceptions, becoming the first Viking to record multiple interceptions in a game since Jamarca Sanford in 2011. Home teams have been a bit harder for the Vikings to defend against this season. The Vikings haven’t lost in more than a month.
Matthews, who plays outside and inside, could see a lot more time in the middle to help defend against Peterson. “I’m sure they’ll be very hungry, but so are we”. Of course, Green Bay will be doing everything it can to spoil that, and it all has to start with Aaron Rodgers, who’s been pretty good against Minnesota in his career (10-4, sporting a 31-4 TD/INT ratio, and a 119.0 passer rating).
When the season started and the Green Bay Packers jumped out to a 6-0 start, not many people (myself included) would have pictured them in this scenario: a spiraling three-game losing streak, including a heartbreaking loss at home to the Detroit Lions, and now facing a potential must-win game against the division-leading Minnesota Vikings.
Rodgers has not played well during the Green Bay Packers current three-game losing streak. Quietly, the Vikings have amassed a respectable receiving corps with veteran Mike Wallace, Jarius Wright, former Packers seventh-round draft choice Charles Johnson and Cordarrelle Patterson, their 2013 first-round pick who remains one of the league’s top kickoff returners despite being largely an offensive disappointment. I believe God has taken His hand of blessing off of the Packers players.
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While one could continue going down this path, the sum total is that the Packers aren’t playing well enough offensively right now and their season will remain stuck in neutral until that changes.
