Washington Redskins: Re-signing Adrian Peterson is the right move

The Washington Redskins have Derrius Guice as their running back of the future, but Adrian Peterson can still bring a lot to the table and they should bring him back.

The Washington Redskins headed into 2018 with a shiny new toy at running back in Derrius Guice. However, that ended quickly as the rookie tore his ACL in the preseason. Due to that, they turned to veteran free agent Adrian Peterson. This turned out to be a fantastic move as Peterson had a career resurgence in Washington. The 33-year old ran for 1,042 yards and seven touchdowns on the season. Both his best outputs in those respective categories since 2015.

Now that Guice is expected to be healthy for 2019, it might seem like bringing Peterson back is unnecessary. That’s not the case, however.

The Redskins bringing Peterson back would make sense for a few reasons. First of all, he’s a fantastic insurance plan should something happen to Guice. Not only were those numbers last season impressive, but he accomplished that despite there being very little going on in the passing game.

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Then, of course, there’s the leadership. Giving Guice a chance to learn from and play with Peterson for another year will be extremely valuable to his development. There are very few running backs in NFL history you could consider to be better than Peterson. It can’t hurt to have him teach Guice a thing or two.

There’s also the workload to consider. Guice has a total of regular season zero carries in the NFL. Coming off a torn ACL, it would be smart not to overwork him. He’s expected to be the running back of the future for the Redskins, no need to run him in the ground immediately.

Washington has another solid back in Chris Thompson, but he’s very much a change-of-pace back. They use him primarily as a receiving back with Thompson getting very few carries a game. Bringing Peterson back would give the Redskins a legitimate back to give real carries to. This way (especially early on), they can ease Guice into everything. Limiting his carries will keep him fresh all season long and reduce the risk of anything else happening to him this early in his career.

Finally, having a two-headed monster at running back is never a bad thing. Guice is very much like Peterson in the fact that he’s got the potential to be above-average at everything. He’s a strong running who keeps his legs moving, but has no limit of moves in his repertoire. The 21-year old is also faster than you’d guess when you see his 5-11, 225-pound frame.

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In short, there’s not much Guice can’t do. Having a young star like that and a veteran with the unparalleled vision of Peterson could give the Redskins one of the deadliest rushing attacks in the NFL. That’s something that could help the passing game exponentially.

Last season, Adrian Peterson showed that there’s still plenty left in the tank. Now it’s time for the Washington Redskins to bring him back.

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