Saints ‘see it’ with Peterson
Adrian Peterson METAIRIE, LA. — sounds far more concerned with his ability to pick up the Saints’ dynamic offense than whether he can still run over and through would-be tacklers.
After getting a day off from practice Saturday, Peterson dismissed the idea he would need to play in a preseason game to demonstrate he was still physically capable of running the ball as powerfully as he did with the Minnesota Vikings for most of the past decade.
Still, he wants to play in the preseason to gauge how well he understands the concepts of a dynamic Saints offense that has consistently ranked among the NFL’s best for 11 straight seasons.
“I’m healthy, without a doubt,” Peterson asserted. “When it comes to the physical part of it, I don’t think that’s going to be an issue.”
“It’s more mentally fully understanding the offense because Drew Brees, he’s a general back there and he talks so fast when he calls plays.”
With minimal tackling allowed at Saints training camp so far, the 32-year old Peterson hasn’t had many chances to demonstrate the extent to which he still possesses one of the most renowned aspects of his game — the ability to use a combination of hard cuts, leverage and strength to shake off tacklers and get extra yards.
Yet coach Sean Payton said a lack of tackling hasn’t entirely undermined his ability to evaluate what kind of production he can expect from Peterson, a seven-time 1,000-yard rusher who once rushed for more than 2,000 yards in a season. But he also missed most of last season with the Vikings because of a knee injury.
“I feel pretty comfortable with where I think he is,” Payton said, adding that evaluating Peterson is “further down on the list of my concerns.
“We tell some of these veteran players, ‘We don’t have to see it every day, but we have to see it.’ And I’ve seen it.”
The Saints don’t need Peterson to be what he was in Minnesota, which happens to be the team hosting the Saints in Week 1 of the regular season. New Orleans’ scheme is different and incumbent starter Mark Ingram is coming off one of the best seasons of his career.
Peterson said he can sense the public fascination with how he’ll fit Payton’s scheme and embraces what he calls a “two-headed monster” concept with both he and Ingram spearheading the running game.
“I’m excited about it. I definitely feel it. I feel the energy,” Peterson said. “It’s different.”
After more than a week of training camp practices, Peterson’s new teammates continue to rave about how the club’s new 6-foot-1, 220pound power runner looks.
“Even without tackling, you can tell,” veteran offensive lineman Khalif Barnes said. “You don’t want to be a safety trying to tackle that guy . ... It doesn’t look like the knee’s bothering him at all. He looks like the Adrian of old, which excites the hell out of me.”
The Saints open the preseason at Cleveland on Thursday night, and it’s unclear if or how much Peterson might play.
In the meantime, Peterson said he has been trying to take a comprehensive approach to training and his diet in order to maximize his health.
Whatever Peterson’s doing, the Saints clearly like the way he looks.
Joe Haden missed BEREA — 10 games with a concussion in 2015, but the Browns’ veteran cornerback counts last season as the most trying of his career.
He missed only three games with his two groin injuries last season but gutted it out through 13 others with those excruciatingly painful muscle tears.
But he knew he couldn’t let his team down. Antonio Brown and AJ Green were waiting, and he had to answer the bell.
“It was tough,” Haden said. “Last year was probably the toughest year I’ve ever had. But it all comes around. God works in mysterious ways.”
What made is so tough is that Haden, who had both groin muscles surgically repaired in the offseason, often took a beating on social media for being hurt and not playing up to his Pro Bowl standards.
“I love the game so much that it’s tough from the outside looking in to see [people say], ‘Man, Joe, he’s hurt. He can never stay healthy,”’ he said. “I’m not trying to be hurt. I’m not trying to not be out there helping my guys.
“It was tough for me, but just understanding you can control what you can control. I worked my tail off after my surgery [to be healthy for training camp]. So I’m just ready to go and just excited to play ball.” Browns cornerback
The criticism was more difficult to take than a brain-rattling concussion that wiped out most of his 2015 season, which followed two Pro Bowl years.
“Last year was a little harder because I was actually on the field and couldn’t do what I wanted to do, couldn’t open up, couldn’t run full speed and when you’re covering those dudes, nobody really knows that,” said Haden. “They’re like, ‘Joe’s playing. He’s ready to go.’ That just was a tough situation.”
Haden was still named a Pro Bowl alternate, but by the end of the season, he had tumbled to No. 88 on profootballfocus.com’s list of the best NFL cornerbacks. To put that in perspective, then second-year corner Briean Boddy-Calhoun was 66th, new Browns corner Jason McCourty was 57th last year with the Titans, and Browns starter Jamar Taylor was 20th.
By the time the draft rolled around in April, profootballfocus.com’s analytics team wrote a headline that read “Haden’s decline might lead Browns to lean cornerback in the draft.” It was significant, because the Browns use profootballfocus.com’s analytics as part of their evaluation process.
The article pointed out that:
Haden was tied for sixth in the NFL for most touchdowns given up (six) last season.
He allowed the 12th-most yards per coverage snap at 1.48.
His 10 missed tackles in 2016 were the highest in his career.
But the numbers never mentioned he was getting treatment during the week and dragging himself onto the field in pain.
“I’m not trying to keep making excuses, but if you can’t open up, you can’t open up,” he said. “I was just trying to do what I can to make those plays. So being out there and not being myself was tougher than not being out there at all.”
When Gregg Williams took over as defensive coordinator, he dropped a little tough love on the 2010 firstround pick.
“I went to his office and we talked for a while,” Haden said during OTAs. “He told me, ‘If you didn’t play through your injury, I would tell them to get you out of here.’”
The Browns gave up an NFL-high 36 touchdown passes last season.
“I’m selling football,” Williams explained. “If you don’t get people to listen to you, you’re not going to sell anything. I think I got (Haden’s) attention. That’s all it is. There are lots of ways to go, pat you on the back — that hasn’t worked here, so why would we be surprised that all of a sudden we have to do something different?”
But as the offseason wore on, Haden and Williams developed a mutual respect, and now Haden is clearly one of his guys.
“He believes in me,” said Haden. “He always just tells me, ‘Joe, this is going to be the best season you’ve had since you’ve been here.’ I think he sees also how much this means to me, how hard I practice, how much I’m trying to stay in the young guys’ ears, how I’m trying to just be locked in, just trying to take the approach of a vet and get everybody to a certain level ’cause I really feel like we can have a nice defense.”
In training camp, Haden looks to be back to his old Pro Bowl self. In practice, he’s been picking off passes, and during the Orange and Brown scrimmage Friday night, he broke up a TD pass in the end zone from Brock Osweiler to Ranell Hall.
With the groin injuries behind him, Haden is running full speed again and making plays.
“Man, I can just feel that gear I need to get to, changing direction, being able to move, one-on-ones not feeling like I can’t open up,” he said. “Honestly, I’m feeling good to go. I’m just excited I’m able to play the way that I’ve been wanting to play.”