According to the folks at Larry Brown Sports (who picked this up from a couple of Titans' beat writers on Twitter), Minnesota Vikings' running back Adrian Peterson placed a phone call to Tennessee Titans' running back Chris Johnson this afternoon, offering him some encouragement after Johnson has gotten off to a bit of a rough start to the season.
Peterson may have been better off calling him a few months ago and saying something along the lines of, "Dude, that whole holding out for a new contract thing? Dumb idea. Don't do it."
Do you remember those old Goofus and Gallant cartoons from Highlights magazine back in the day? Well, if they were to do one for this situation, it would probably look something like this.
"Goofus complains about his contract and stays at home until he gets a new deal."
"Gallant continues working hard and fulfilling his obligations to the team, despite his contract status."
"Goofus finally gets his new contract."
"Gallant finally gets his new contract, which pays him more than Goofus'."
"Goofus morphs into Shaun Alexander."
"Gallant continues to be the best at what he does."
Seriously. . .there was a point in the not-so-distant past when people actually debated which of these two was the better back. As it stands today, Peterson leads the NFL in rushing with 712 yards. . .Johnson is on pace to rush for 715 yards for the season. Peterson has also found the end zone seven times this year. . .Johnson has touched the ball 117 times between carries and receptions, and has the same number of touchdowns as one more touchdown than you, me, and Bernard Berrian. (Thanks to Luft Krigare for the correction.)
It just goes to show. . .holding out is rarely a good idea. Chris Johnson and Adrian Peterson both got paid this pre-season. . .but it appears that only one of them is earning it.