Everything about this Giants season has been a bust with one exception.
Rookie running back Saquon Barkley has turned out to be exactly the player that the team hoped he’d be when they took him with the second overall pick in this year’s draft. His 905 yards and scored seven touchdown have earned admirers who aren’t otherwise interested in seeing the Giants do well.
That group would include Washington running back Adrian Peterson, who will be facing Barkley’s team this weekend and knows a few things about succeeding as a running back in the NFL. Peterson said watching Barkley “really excites” him and he thinks the rookie is a generational talent.
“He’s the guy that stands out a little more than what I’ve seen in the past few years,” Peterson said, via ESPN.com. “Todd Gurley is a guy that has great potential as well. He falls in that same category, but they’re two different styles of players. I would say the biggest thing is one is just more elusive. Which one is that? ... You can just see with the talent. It’s obvious, him being a rookie and what he’s accomplished so far. That doesn’t happen every year or even two or three or four years [where] that type of talent comes around.”
Talent of any type is in shorter supply than the Giants would like this season, which makes slowing Barkley the key part of a winning blueprint for the rest of their opponents this season.
