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The big surprise out of the voting was that Peterson, the NFL’s leading rusher, wasn’t even voted MVRB — league’s most valuable running back.
Manning won the award in a landslide on Friday with 32 votes. But Peterson managed only three, which was good for fourth behind Atlanta running back Michael Turner, who finished tied with Miami quarterback Chad Pennington for second place with four votes.
“I don’t know who the voters are for that, but I know one MVP award he is going to win and it’s here,” Vikings coach Brad Childress said.
Peterson acknowledged that winning the award was on the list of individual goals he wanted to achieve before the year began. But after rushing for 1,760 yards and scoring 10 touchdowns as the focal point of Minnesota’s offense, can he do any more to win it?
“I don’t know. Evidently you’ve got to,” Peterson said with a smile. “Just sharpen my game up. I know there’s a lot I have to work on. I’ll have the opportunity to get it one day.”
He congratulated Manning as a worthy recipient of the award and received a consolation prize later in the day when he was named winner of the Bert Bell Award, given for 50 years by the Maxwell Club to the top pro football player.
Most of Peterson’s teammates were left shaking their heads about how a player widely considered to be the best back in the league could finish behind another player at his own position in the voting.
“Minnesota’s a hard market,” left tackle Bryant McKinnie said. “I feel like this is a tougher market for certain things like that. Maybe that could have been the cause for it.
“As far as his play, he’s the leading rusher and he’s accomplished a lot. There’s really nothing else he could have done.”
GOOD SEATS AVAILABLE: The NFL has given the Vikings one last chance to sell out the Metrodome for Sunday’s playoff game against Philadelphia.
The Vikings have until 3:30 p.m. today to sell the remaining 3,100 tickets to avoid a television blackout in local markets.
It’s a unique situation in that there are plenty of quality seats available. In similar situations in the past, Vikings vice president of sales and marketing Steve LaCroix said, usually the remaining tickets are for the “worst seats in the house.”
The task isn’t as daunting as it appeared earlier in the week. The Vikings were granted their first extension on Thursday and still had a whopping 8,000 tickets to unload to avoid the first blackout since 1997.
But the team made big strides, selling nearly 5,000 tickets as of Friday afternoon. The remaining tickets are priced $80, $120 and $160 a piece. It’s the first time the Vikings have been in the playoffs since the 2004 season.
“It’s not like these are high-priced seats in bad locations,” LaCroix said. “It’s a real good value for playoff football.“
LOVE FOR LONGWELL: Ryan Longwell was named the NFC Special Teams Player of the Week after his 50-yard field goal on the game’s final play lifted the Vikings to a 20-19 victory over the Giants. He’s 6-for-6 from 50 yards or more this year, with three game-winning kicks in the final 13 seconds.
Once the regular season ends, NFL teams often sign a handful of free agents to begin filling their 80-man rosters for training camp the following summer. This week, the Vikings signed former University of Wisconsin kicker Taylor Mehlhaff for 2009. Mehlhaff was drafted this year by New Orleans, cut after camp and brought back by the Saints in October for three games while Martin Gramatica was hurt.
Because Longwell’s kickoffs are among the weakest in the league there’s certainly a possibility Mehlhaff will have a chance next season to win a job as a kickoff specialist and let Longwell focus on extra points and field goals.
But Ferraro dismissed the significance of this move, noting that assistant special teams coach Brian Murphy worked with Mehlhaff with the Badgers.
“He’s got a lot of upside,” Ferraro said. “The bottom line is we always bring two kickers into camp. I don’t think we need to read anymore into it. Ryan Longwell’s our kicker. He’s done a great job for us, and I believe in Ryan and everything he’s doing.”
IT CLICKS FOR HICKS: After generating next to nothing on the kickoff return early in the season, Maurice Hicks enjoyed his best game with the Vikings last week. He reclaimed the job after Darius Reynaud was hurt, and against the New York Giants posted returns of 37, 38 and 35 yards — all longer than his previous best of the year.
“The front did a great job of getting it set. The wedge finished it off. The thing that Maurice did that he hasn’t done as well the rest of the year is just getting the ball and hitting his landmark right now without trying to dance around, and it was the difference in a couple of missed tackles,” Ferraro said. “Just getting vertical and going where the return tells him to go.”
So what changed from before?
“We simplified something in the return to make it a little bit easier for him to read,” Ferraro said.
QUICK HITS: Adrian Peterson’s average of 103.4 yards rushing per game is the second-highest total in NFL history, behind Jim Brown’s 104.3. Peterson has passed the 100-yard mark in 16 of his 30 career games. ... Tarvaris Jackson’s fourth-quarter passer rating, 94.0, this season ranked ninth in the NFL. ... The Vikings ranked fourth in the league in sacks this year with 45, and the Eagles were third with 48. ... The dates and times won’t be set until April, but here are the 2009 opponents for the Vikings: Bears, Packers, Lions, 49ers, Seahawks, Ravens, Bengals and Giants at home, and Bears, Packers, Lions, Cardinals, Rams, Steelers, Browns and Panthers on the road.
