Dave Richard

Thought I'd pop open the ol' Inbox this morning and see if we had any interesting emails. Indeed we did.

From Ken Z.: Dave, In years past, several FF analysts have mentioned the sophomore slump of several RBs. Adrian Peterson is in his second year, yet I have not heard anyone mention a possible down year for him. Does everyone think AD is simply just that good and he won't have a down year? I think AD is going to be the biggest first round bust. Thoughts?

I did a lot of research this offseason, but one item I didn't get to was this one. Let's take a look at the running backs who were Rookies of the Year and how they did in their second season (keeping in mind that their first season was obviously amazing, otherwise they wouldn't have won the award):

1993 ROY: Jerome Bettis
1994 season: 1,025 on 319 carries (3.2 avg.) with 3 TDs; 293 receiving yards and a receiving TD, a slight improvement over his rookie year.
Sophomore Slump? Yes.

1994 ROY: Marshall Faulk
1995 season: 1,078 yards on 289 carries (3.7 avg.) with 11 TDs; 475 receiving yards and 3 receiving TDs much improved from rookie season
Sophomore Slump? Nope.

1995 ROY: Curtis Martin
1996 season: 1,152 yards on 316 carries (3.6 avg.) with 14 TDs; 333 receiving yards and 3 receiving TDs, also an improvement
Sophomore Slump? Nope.

1996 ROY: Eddie George
1997 season: 1,399 yards on 357 carries (3.9 avg.) with 6 TDs; only 44 receiving yards, but with a touchdown
Sophomore Slump? It's borderline, but statistically speaking, yes.

1997 ROY: Warrick Dunn
1998 season: 1,026 yards on 245 carries (4.2 avg.) with 2 TDs; 344 yards receiving but with no touchdowns
Sophomore Slump? Yes, but again that's statistically speaking.

1999 ROY: Edgerrin James
2000 season: 1,709 yards on 387 carries (4.4 avg.) with 13 TDs; 594 receiving yards and 5 TDs through the air.
Sophomore Slump? No way. In fact, James is the only RB on this list so far whose rushing average INCREASED in his second year.

2000 ROY: Mike Anderson
2001 season: 678 yards on 175 carries (3.9 avg.) with just 7 starts. Oh, he also had 4 TDs; he had 15 in his rookie year.
Sophomore Slump? Oh yeah.

2001 ROY: Anthony Thomas
2002 season: 721 yards on 214 carries (3.4 avg.) with 6 TDs and four games missed. Receiving stats were minimal.
Sophomore Slump? Yessir.

2002 ROY: Clinton Portis
2003 season: 1,591 yards on 290 carries (5.5 avg.) with 14 TDs and 314 receiving yards. Matched his average from his rookie year.
Sophomore Slump? No way.

2005 ROY: Cadillac Williams
2006 season: 798 yards on 225 carries (3.5 avg.) with 1 TD. He added 196 receiving yards.
Sophomore Slump? Yes.

2007 ROY: Adrian Peterson
2008 season: ?????

The thing to note is that other than Edgerrin James and Clinton Portis, every single ROY RB listed above had a worse yards-per-carry average in his sophomore year than his rookie year. Six of them failed to average even 4.0 yards per carry.

That said, keep in mind that Peterson averaged 5.6 yards per carry as a rookie, and that was on 238 reps. We expect him to top that 238 carry total, which will likely mean a drop in his yards per carry average anyway.

The other thing to remember is that the history of other running backs on other teams in other years has no bearing on Peterson's 2008. The Vikings' offensive line is one of the best in football, and the gameplan they run tends to focus more on rushing than passing. Even though Peterson will