My long awaited return to the blogosphere has finally come. All two of my avid readers can now breathe a sigh of relief. For my first blog of 2013 (yeah, we survived Dec. 21 2012...suck it, Mayans) I will be taking a look at the two most highly debated NFL award races this season:
MVP
Let's be honest, this is a two man race between Peyton Manning and Adrian Peterson, who are also the two main candidates for Comeback Player of the Year. The thing I don't like about this kind of debate is that to make my point, I will have to downgrade what the one of these players has done. So I will preface my pick by saying that both had amazing seasons and are very deserving. That being said, I believe that Adrian Peterson is most deserving of this award. This is no disrespect to Manning, who finished second only to Aaron Rodgers with a passer rating of 105.8, and led the Broncos to a 13-3 record. I recognize that this award generally is given to quarterbacks, and understandably so, as they handle the ball on every play and the NFL has become a pass first league. The biggest argument against Manning is simply that the Broncos are a very talented team even without him, especially on defense as they finished second in total defense. The Broncos even made the playoffs last season with someone at quarterback that couldn't even supplant Mark Sanchez as the starter for the Jets this season (I will not mention his name since you all hear it enough from ESPN).
At this point I would like to reiterate that I don't want to downgrade what Manning did for his team. The reason I have chosen Peterson for this is because he was the offense for the Vikings, and frankly I think that's an understatement. Plain and simple, Peterson was the reason the Vikings made it to the playoffs. The only other offensive threat that his team had was Percy Harvin, but he has been out with an injury since Week 10. Even though the impact a running back can have on a game is usually limited compared to that of a quarterback, that was not the case for this Minnesota Vikings team. From Week 7 on Peterson tallied a total of 1,598 yards on the ground, which is 97 more yards than their quarterback Christian Ponder threw during that same span. In this pass first version of the NFL something like that is almost unheard of. Peterson was also just 9 yards short of the all time rushing record, with a total of 2,097 yards on the ground.
Even more impressive is just how he got those yards. He averaged 6 yards per carry with 3 of those yards coming after contact. Take a moment to think about how impressive that is. He fought for every inch he could get on every single run and earned each one of his yards. Arian Foster, who is considered one of the top running backs in the league, averaged 4.1 yards per run. That's only 1.1 yards more than Peterson gets after contact alone. He put his team on his back each and every week and impacted the game more than any other running back has done in a long time, making Peterson more than deserving of MVP.
Rookie of the Year
This is without a doubt the most impressive rookie quarterback class that I have ever seen. I firmly believe that these three quarterbacks above (left to right: Russell Wilson, Andrew Luck, Robert Griffin III) all have very bright futures in the NFL. Much like I said earlier when discussing the MVP, I don't like that I have to belittle the talent of any of these young players. They all had great rookie seasons, but alas, only one can win. Let me start by evaluating the first overall pick, Andrew Luck. He was asked to throw the football much more than his rookie counterparts (234 more times to be exact), resulting in him throwing for an impressive 4,374 yards while leading the Colts back to the playoffs. He also garnered a reputation for coming up big in the clutch by leading the Colts on several game winning drives.
The main knock against Luck was his turnovers, throwing 18 interceptions and adding 10 fumbles. While his increased number of pass attempts definitely contributed to his higher number of interceptions, he also had the fewest pass attempts per interception thrown (about one interception per 35 attempts; Wilson and RGIII have one interception per 39 pass attempts and 79 pass attempts respectively). Luck also only completed only about 54% of his throws. Many like to focus on Luck's late game heroics, which are certainly impressive. But people tend to ignore the multiple interceptions he threw that put them in the position of needing a comeback. Personally, I value efficiency and taking care of the ball, leading me to rank him third in this award race.
That leaves it between RGIII and Wilson. I honestly had a little bit of trouble deciding between these two guys because they both were very efficient through the air and on the ground. I also have an immense amount of respect for both of these guys. Wilson overcame all odds, being drafted in the third round because he was "too short" and going to a team that had just brought in Matt Flynn for the purpose of being their franchise quarterback. However Wilson stole the starting job during the preseason and never looked back. He also is an extremely fierce competitor, often running down the field to help block after completing a pass or handing the ball off. He made multiple key blocks just yesterday in the playoff game against the Redskins. Not to mention he must be affluent in the ways of the force, seeing as he used a Jedi mind trick to make the refs give him a touchdown when he really threw an interception.
Then there's RGIII, who also had a phenomenal season. He set a rookie quarterback rushing record by running for 815 yards. He also proved that he was more than a capable passer, completing almost 66% of his passes and throwing for 20 touchdowns and only 5 interceptions. Honestly, the only knock on him was his injury issues that caused him to miss a game, otherwise his stats would probably be even more impressive. More important than his stats though, is his ability to lead and come up big when it matters the most. When you watched the Skins this season, especially during their seven game win streak to end the season, you simply had the belief that RGIII was going to figure out a way to win the game.
When it came down to trying to pick between these two guys there was one key factor that helped my make my choice. While both these young quarterbacks led their respective teams to the playoffs, one of them had a lot more help. Wilson's Seahawks had the number one scoring defense in the league, allowing a measly 15.3 points per game. The Skins, on the other hand, were 22nd in the league in scoring defense, allowing 24.3 per game. This made RGIII's job significantly harder, knowing he had to put up major points each and every week to win. This factor caused me to give this award to Robert Griffin III, with Russell Wilson finishing second.
