Adrian Peterson has done some superhuman things on the football field before, but he might actually need to become a superhuman to play at an All-Pro level for another seven or eight years, which is exactly what he thinks he’s capable of doing.
“I don’t see the end,” Peterson told Peter King of TheMMQB.com. “Straight up and honest with you, I feel like, and I don’t know if I’ll do this, because I feel like once my mind tells me, You know what—I’m not loving this game anymore, I’ll walk away whenever that time is. But I honestly feel I can play this game until I am 36 or 37 years old. And at a high level.”
Peterson turned 30 years old in March and he’s under contract with the Vikings through the 2017 season, when he’ll play at 32 years old.
But performing at a high level is extremely rare for running backs after the age of 30, and Pro Football Talk observes that the NFL has never had a running back rush for 1,000 yards after turning 36 or 37 years old. In fact, Marcus Allen is the only player in league history to rush for more than 500 yards after turning 37.
As for this season, Vikings coach Mike Zimmer told USA Today that Peterson will get a “heavy workload” and there won’t necessarily be a more balanced running game with last year’s leading rushers, Jerick McKinnon and Matt Asiata.
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