Bob Cook

Even if Adrian Peterson’s injured knee heals quickly enough so he misses only Sunday’s game against Oakland, the Minnesota Vikings had better think twice about playing their star rookie running back again this season.

In a best-case scenario, playing Peterson means the Vikings might get two or three more wins as he continues to carry the offense, perhaps breaking Eric Dickerson’s rookie rushing record of 1,808 yards in the process.

The worst-case scenario is that Peterson comes back too soon and reinjures his knee, thus resulting in the ruination of his career and the Minnesota Vikings franchise as a whole. Given the Vikings’ on-field record and off-the-field public relations blunders the last few years, the worst-case scenario is far more plausible.

The issue is not that Peterson is fragile, though he came into the NFL with that reputation after missing nine of his 31 college games because of shoulder and ankle injuries. The issue is that Minnesota owner Zygi Wilf, who has called Peterson “a very important point in our franchise,” is going to have to step in so his investment in Peterson and the Vikings doesn’t go down the drain.

If Wilf leaves the decision up to Peterson and coach Brad Childress, he’s crazy. Peterson will play if he’s given the go-ahead, like any player would. Childress, of course, would want Peterson to play because he needs to pad his lousy 9-16 record in one-plus seasons, which has Vikings fans pining for the coaching genius that was Mike Tice.

If the Vikings were 6-3 and in the thick of the playoff race, then by all means rush Peterson back. Peterson has had a glorious first nine games, at least until tearing a lateral collateral knee ligament in the third quarter during a 34-0 loss at Green Bay last Sunday. He has rushed for an NFL-leading 1,081 yards, more than 200 yards better than the No. 2, Pittsburgh’s Willie Parker. Even while splitting time with Chester Taylor — no slouch himself, running for 1,216 yards last year — Peterson has accounted for 44.5 percent of the Vikings’ offense. He has rushed for more than 100 yards three times, and more than 200 yards twice, including a record 296 against San Diego.

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But the Vikings are 3-6 and in the thick of getting a high enough draft pick to land a quarterback who would seem eminently capable of replacing the three-headed monstrosity of Tarvaris Jackson, Kelly Holcomb and Brooks Bollinger. They have completed a lowly 51 percent of their passes, with five touchdowns and seven interceptions, to give Minnesota the next-to-worst passing attack in the NFL at 152.6 yards per game. (I say seemingly capable because the worst NFL passing offense belongs to San Francisco and Alex Smith, the No. 1 pick in 2005.)

The Vikings’ quarterbacking is so bad — and their wide receivers aren’t much better, with only Bobby Wade recording more than Peterson’s 220 receiving yards — that Peterson is going to face nothing but the eight-man fronts that Green Bay threw at him. Nobody is going to be dumb enough to, like San Diego, stay back in a zone defense all game. (Then again, no one else has Norv Turner as their head coach.)

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