In the wake of the Adrian Peterson fallout, the Minnesota Vikings have decided to call up running back Joe Banyard from the practice squad in order to deal with Adrian Peterson’s deactivation against the Patriots, per the Pioneer Press. The presence of a third running back is evidently very important for them. No word on who will be cut (Peterson still counts against the roster) in order to make room.

This should not have a significant impact on the game.

Scouting report from before the season on Joe Banyard below:

Joe Banyard (Class of 2012)

Banyard has had some staying power with Minnesota, having twice earned a practice squad spot and even earning a promotion from the practice squad to cover for running back injuries. There isn’t a lot of information about Banyard out there (aside from the fact that he is a proficient rattlesnake catcher) but he has participated in camp before and so is a known quantity to the Vikings if not the fans.

Strengths: Banyard may not be nearly the athletic talent that McKinnon or Peterson are, but he certainly has much more speed and strength (for his size) than either Dominique Williams or Matt Asiata. Aside from just combine numbers (where he beats out Asiata and Williams in raw and weight-adjusted explosion, strength and speed scores), Banyard has shown elusiveness in his limited time in preseason and camp that Asiata has not. Banyard has good balance and speed, which is where his elusiveness comes from—adapting to defenders instead of juking to create space.

Weaknesses: Despite that balance and speed, Banyard did not show the agility to make jump cuts or prevent tackles with deception and doesn’t plant well enough to be particularly effective in zone schemes despite the fact that he prefers to run outside than between the tackles. In 2013 camp, he had a lot of problems holding on to the ball, dropping passes multiple times in practices (three times alone in one practice) and fumbling more than once in limited reps as well. He dropped from the third string to the fourth string over the course of camp somewhat quickly.