VikingLord wrote:Is Peterson under some non-disclosure clause or something? He's largely bearing the burden of public scrutiny, so why not just spill the beans? Who is he protecting and, more importantly, why would he feel the need to protect anyone who supposedly "kept him down"? He wants out? Why not poison the water then and get it over with?
Maybe he doesn't feel it's something that should be conducted publicly.
But Jim, what control did "ownership" have over this once the league got involved? Warren supposedly "worked with the league"? To do what?
I don't know. If I did, I'd post it but it's not necessarily a question of control. It may be a matter of what actions were taken. I have no idea what, if anything, went on but I assume, as the (former) General Counsel or an NFL team, that Warren has a certain degree of legal expertise. Maybe he worked with the league's people in some capacity to devise a strategy that would keep Peterson off the field for the remainder of 2014. Maybe he lobbied the league on behalf of the Wilfs to keep Peterson off the field, help the Vikes recoup some of the money they had to pay him while he was on the exempt list and enable them to avoid the PR nightmare of having him return to the field 2 months after he was charged. We don't have any substantial information beyond Schefter's report.
Goodell is the one who arbitrarily reinterpreted the rules, imposed the suspension, and whose office has fought tooth-and-nail to keep AD off the field. You talk about the Vikings and Warren as if they could really do anything about that. Maybe AD is mad because he thinks the Vikings should have lobbied the league directly on his behalf instead of the NFLPA? That would be a possible viewpoint I could understand, but even there, AD has to realize there are many other powerful interests at play. Just not cutting him and continuing to pay him speaks volumes about the level of overall support he had at the ownership level.
As I've already said, I think the Vikings were clearly acting in their own best interests. Paying him money they were obligated to pay him if they wanted to retain his rights is not an act of generosity.
But let's focus on the other questions. What level of assurance do you think the Vikings could give Peterson about anything once the league took it over?
They knew about what happened before the news broke and before the league got involved. Who knows what was said at
any point along the way, what assurances were made, etc.?
This horse has been pretty thoroughly flogged. The main point is simple:
we don't know! We don't know what conversations occurred between Peterson and the Vikings, what may have been promised, what trust may have been breached, what influence, if any, the Vikings may have had with the NFL, and so on and so on. We have very little information which is why I don't think we should be rushing to judgment about it.
Same thing could have been said about Ray Rice and the Ravens, yet the Ravens wasted no time cutting Rice.
Different player, different situation... Rice didn't have Peterson's value. In fact, he was coming off a pretty poor year.
If I wrote the article, I would have reached a slightly different conclusion based on the facts as they are known, and that is that AD has another agenda and he's using this situation as cover to implement it. Could be he wants to play for another team. Could be he doesn't like Minnesota and would rather play somewhere warmer. Could be he wants to be on a Superbowl contender. But whatever "it" is, neither he nor his agent have come out and said it because if something like that were behind his actions it would make him look like a real #### and he knows it.
In other words, we're right back to "we don't know".
I just continue to strongly believe attempts to implicate the Vikings in his madness are laughable.
What "madness" and how, exactly, has he implicated them ? He's "uneasy" with them and, according to his agent, he wants to play elsewhere. One of the things I find exasperating about all of this is all the things Peterson has been
accused of doing that he hasn't done. He hasn't implicated the Vikings of any wrongdoing. He spoke briefly about a lack of support somewhere within the organization. That's it. He's repeatedly accused of trying to shift blame for his actions onto others but that hasn't happened either. He hasn't held out. He hasn't failed to report to a mandatory team activity. He's been accused of being ungrateful but as far as I know, he's said nothing to suggest that either. He's been accused of failing to take responsibility for his actions and the consequences they set in motion. When, exactly did that happen?
Everybody seems in a rush to judge.