Murray and Cook Report to Training Camp…Let The Battle Begin!

Photo: Vikings.com

We finally made it! Training Camp is here for the Minnesota Vikings and football is FINALLY back!

Better yet, we’ve got a heavyweight battle this year right out of the gates and each and every one of us will be given a front row seat to watch it play out. The funny thing, I don’t know how we’re going to react to it because we’re not used to having this type of an integral position up for grabs here in Minnesota.

The Vikings and Vikings fans haven’t had much positional stability over the years at the quarterback or wide receiver positions, but running back has been a different story. In fact, the last time we had any semblance of positional battle at one of the main offensive skill positions might have been that year in 2007 when rookie running back Adrian Peterson came in and fought it out with the then incumbent Chester Taylor.

Chester was coming off of the single best season of his entire career. His first year with the Vikings he put up 1,216 yards on the ground with 6 TDs. But still, Brad Childress opted to draft Adrian Peterson who would go ahead to steal the starting job pretty quickly out of the gates and hold it down for the next ten years (with a few obvious absences sprinkled in there).

Now, ten years later we’re back for another battle at running back and early on it’s shaping up to be extremely entertaining!

Two of the three parties involved reported to training camp early on Sunday, Dalvin Cook because he’s a rookie and Latavius Murray was eligible for early arrival due to his injury status. Both did their best to downplay the positional battle as they met with the press, but nobody’s kidding themselves because we all know it’s in the back of their minds. There aren’t too many players who have experienced career success in football who are then passively okay with giving up their starting spot.

“The good thing about this backfield is that we have some workhorses,”  Dalvin Cook explained. “We have guys that are going to push each other to the next level and are going to get the best out of each other.”

As for Murray, the veteran angle he’s bringing to the table allowed him to be a little more assertive and he did just that.

“I want to be taking the snaps and be the number one back,” Murray told reporters as he checked into the dorms in Mankato. “I know each other guy wants to do that as well. I think for everyone in there it’s about themselves and getting better so they can be the guy.”

To date, the steam has solely been behind the rookie Cook who turned heads during OTAs, did so again during Mini Camp and seemingly has the support of the fanbase behind him for his dynamic play making abilities.

For Murray, he’s yet to participate in practice as a Viking due to an ankle injury and surgery.

The other variable might be the one that starts Training Camp as the “number one” back but will continuously get overlooked. Jerick McKinnon reports to camp on Wednesday with the rest of the veterans.

It’s juicy, it’s salacious and as stated it doesn’t happen every year. So sit back, soak it in and stay up to date daily as we watch these three battle it out for the starting spot in the Minnesota backfield.

So who do you got winning the starting spot for Week 1 coming out of Training Camp? Let us know in the poll below…

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