Holy Schneikes said:
ADP had 30 goal-line rushes last year, more than any back has gotten in the last 5 years in a single season. He scored FOURTEEN of his EIGHTEEN TDs with those opportunities. And while he has been reasonably effective in that role in terms of conversion rate (though not spectacular), his fumbles in that situation were absolute backbreakers for his team.
If all of the sudden another guy is getting half or more of those opportunities (which I could easily see happening), I would absolutely be concerned about the impact to his overall fantasy performance. Half of his 14 goal-line TDs (assuming the conversion rate stays the same and the team matches its ridiculous number of goal-line rushes next year which it probably won't), would be 7 TDs, and that's a lot of fantasy scratch.
So the question in my mind is "Will Gerhart be the part time or even primary goal-line back for Minnesota next year and going forward?".
Seeing how Peterson has 20 fumbles in three years (more than any back in the NFL in that span by far), and has not been significantly more effective than an average NFL starter in those situations, while Gerhart happens to be by all accounts very very good in those situations (and coincidentally had ZERO fumbles to go along with 27 TDs in 12 games last year), my answer to that question is a resounding "yes".
IMO this post is pretty far off base.1. On the first bolded point above:
Of Peterson's 20 career (regular season) fumbles, he lost 13. Of those 13 lost fumbles, 2 came in the red zone but 0 came inside the opponent's 10 yard line. So if you are discussing goal line carries, his fumbling has not been a problem.
2. On the second bolded point above:
Over the past 3 seasons, 31 RBs have had 20 or more carries at the goal line (defined as opponent's 5 yard line and closer). Of those 31 RBs, only Michael Turner and Lendale White had conversion rates better than Peterson's 50% rate. The worst rate among the group was Forte's 21.2%, so there is a decent spread. And some of those 31 players - like White, Fargas, Graham, Morris, McClain, etc. - aren't starters... meaning there are starters not even on the list.
Drop the threshold to all RBs with 10 or more carries at the goal line over the past 3 seasons, and the group expands to 64 RBs. Two more, Ricky Williams (on 16 carries) and Duckett (on 13 carries), have better conversion rates than Peterson, but the rest are lower, many by quite a bit. The lowest rate drops to 10% (Fred Jackson :X ).
IMO all of this shows that Peterson is indeed significantly more effective than an average NFL starter at the goal line. But we kind of knew that already... if he wasn't, he probably wouldn't have gotten 42 goal line carries over that span.
3. On the number of goal line carries:
While Peterson had 42 goal line carries over the past 3 seasons, note that Chester Taylor had 21, other RBs (Tahi & Richardson) had 3, and QBs (Frerotte & Jackson) had 5. Peterson only had 59% of the team's goal line carries over that span. So there would seem to be plenty of room for Gerhart and others to get some carries without taking a lot away from Peterson.
As for last season specifically, Peterson had 30 goal line carries, but others combined for 9. So Peterson had about 77% of the goal line carries. I don't see any compelling reason to believe Gerhart will get more than 25% of the goal line carries, which would basically maintain Peterson's percentage from last season.
I think a better question with regard to Peterson's fantasy performance this year is whether or not the team will get 57 goal line opportunities again (39 carries and 18 targets). That's a lot.
4. On Peterson's fumbling:
IMO the appropriate way to discuss his fumbling issue is in terms of fumbling rate, not total fumbles. For example, you note that he has more fumbles than any NFL RB over the past 3 years, but he also has many more carries than any other NFL RB other than Thomas Jones. Peterson has 916 carries over that span, and only three other RBs (Jones, Tomlinson, Jackson) have more than 790 over that period... big gap. Now, maybe his fumbling rate is also the worst, I don't know.
Plus, fumbles lost are actually more important IMO. It's harder to find that data in a format handy for comparing all RBs, but we know Peterson lost 13 of those 20 fumbles... on 999 touches. So his lost fumble rate is 1.3%. Meanwhile, he has 5313 total yards and 41 TDs on those touches. Only 4 others (LT, MJD, Deangelo, and Addai) are within 10 TDs of his total (LT actually had 42), but Peterson has at least almost 1000 yards more than all of them.
The Vikings are not going to stop giving Peterson the ball at the goal line or anywhere else.