Today's underdog: Adrian Peterson
As a proud Minnesota Vikings fan, I have followed the comeback of one of the NFL's greatest current players religiously. Like many though, I expected the comeback to be far less incredible than it turned out to be. The running back, Adrian Peterson, or All Day, as he has been referred to (because he goes all day), surprised the world, or at least the NFL, with a comeback year for the ages. Let's break it down.
Adrian Peterson tore both his ACL and MCL on December 24, 2011, and as Bleacher Report informs us, this is a potential career-ending injury. The recovery time is around 7-9 months, assuming one returns to normal activity. Given Adrian Peterson was hoping to return to the football field, 7-9 months was incredibly optimistic. Even if he could return in that amount of time, to expect him to have a good year would put you in the minority. In fact, in this article, the author argues you shouldn't expect a running back to have a good season until two years after a major injury. Of the 17 running backs listed, every single one had a worse season the year after a major injury than the year before the injury. Every single one. And not only worse, but in most cases significantly so.
But Adrian Peterson didn't mind being the underdog. Adrian Peterson did come back in 9 months, returning for week one of this 2012-2013 season. In his first month back (September), Peterson had 332 yards, for an average of 4.2 yards per carry (see source for stats). That average over the course of the season would've left Adrian with 1,328 yards (assuming the same amount of carries). That average would have beat his solid 2010 season (1,298 yards). But Adrian Peterson wasn't done. In October, he increased his yardage to 443 yards for the month, an average of 6.2 yards per carry. He followed up in November with 461 yards, and closed the regular season with a whopping 861 yards in December. This image shows the profound improvement over the course of the season. His season total of 2,097 yards left Adrian Peterson 8 yards short of tying Eric Dickerson for the single season rushing record. Read that again. Returning from an ACL and MCL tear, a major injury that some wouldn't ever have come back from, Peterson fell 8 yards short of becoming the league's single season record holder. But it gets more incredible. Peterson had over 1,000 yards after contact, almost as much as his total yards in 2010.
If Adrian Peterson had had an average season, it would have been incredible. Or look at it another way. If Adrian Peterson had not been injured, and had the season he did this year, falling 8 yards short of tying Dickerson, it would have been incredible. But he did that all with an ACL and MCL tear in the back of his mind. The hard work Peterson, or All Day, put in, ensured his underdog success. By not allowing history and trends to dictate his comeback, Peterson ensured his underdog success. Peterson provides an example for other underdogs. Perhaps an underdog can simply rely on hard work to overcome odds. This is rather comforting, since hard work is mostly in our control. But perhaps Adrian Peterson's comeback also depended on his natural ability, his body's injury response, or some other factor out of our control. Either way, hard work certainly had an impact. A workhorse mentality can overcome any dark horse position.
