By Matthew Kaplan
With the early Eagles game and the Dallas Cowboys on their bye week, there wasn’t much going on in the NFC East on Sunday afternoon. While the Eagles go in to their bye week a game and a half off the top of the division with a .500 record, the Cowboys will be coming out of theirs to take on the Tennessee Titans with a brand-new weapon at receiver, Amari Cooper. They will be hoping Cooper will be the missing piece that puts them over as the best team in the division by the end of the season. Meanwhile, the Eagles go in to the bye week with hopes of getting healthy and correcting the issues that have haunted them through the first eight weeks of the season.
While these things are important to the overall outlook of the division, none of these were on the minds of the Redskins or Giants players as they faced off at Met Life stadium on Sunday afternoon. The game itself would feature two headline running backs, one of them being Saquon Barkley. Barkley, despite the Giants struggles this season, has shined and looks to be a big part of the future for not only the Giants, but the NFL as a whole. On the other side was Adrian Peterson, a back that is approaching the end of his, for the most part, dominant career.
This would be the first time the two have ever faced off and we would clearly see in this game, Peterson still has something left to give. Peterson would win this match-up both in overall performance and on the scoreboard as the Redskins would win this game, 20-13. Peterson would finish this game with 146 rushing yards and one touchdown on 26 attempts, highlighted by a 64-yard touchdown run late in the fourth quarter. The Redskins now find themselves with a great situation on their hands as they also got play-making running back Chris Thompson back healthy in this game. While Thompson did not do much this week, his overall impact on the team will be huge and his health will play a factor in the Redskins success moving forward. The idea that they could have Peterson and Thompson both hitting on all cylinders late in the season is a dangerous thought for the rest of the division.
Meanwhile, for the Giants, the lack of protection for Eli Manning would cause a problem again. Eli would be sacked seven times and would throw two interceptions, costing the Giants the game. The line would even struggle blocking for the run as, on 14 attempts, the backs could only find 37 yards. With that said, Barkley would still play well as he would end up with nine catches and 73 yards while trying to compensate for the lack of a run game and pass protection. Barkley would get a big assist from Odell Beckham, who ended the game with eight catches for 136 yards.
The Giants, while they are close to irrelevant at this point with only one win, will go in to their bye week at one and seven. The Redskins will take the trip home to host the Atlanta Falcons as the NFC East division leaders, boasting a five and two record.
