Vikings Must Feed Patterson the Ball Against Saints
It’s no secret that the Minnesota Vikings enter Sunday’s contest with the New Orleans Saints big underdogs, 10 and a half point underdogs to be more exact according to Bovada SportsBook. But that doesn’t mean the Vikings can’t surprise the NFL and come up with a victory, here is one simple thing the Vikings must do Sunday
Get Cordarrelle Patterson Maximum Touches
Patterson is the best offensive tool the Norsemen have with the indefinite absence of Adrian Peterson, and they have to get him the ball any way they can on Sunday. In the Viking’s Week 1 victory over the Rams Patterson had a 67 yard touchdown run out of the backfield, as well as 102 total rushing yards, but in the week 2 defeat to the Patriots Patterson was only used as a decoy out of the backfield.
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Either by design or production, Patterson has only had major impact in either the rushing game or passing game each week so far this season. As previously mentioned Patterson had 102 rushing yards against Saint Louis, but only 26 receiving yards. Against the Patriots, Patterson had 56 receiving yards but zero rushing yards.
Cordarrelle and the Vikings must balance his production going forward to maximize his impact, and force opposing defenses to cover all areas of the field every down.
If the Vikings want to have offensive success this season, especially against New Orleans Sunday, the offense will have to transition to running through Adrian Peterson, to running through Cordarrelle Patterson Minnesota’s best offensive threat.
Update: Cordarrelle Patterson is expected to play Sunday against the Saints despite being on the injury report. All players returned to practice in some fashion Friday for the Vikings.