Adrian Peterson: Perhaps you’ve heard of him

You’d think that after throwing for 50 touchdown passes in 2007, and turning in one of the more dominant single-season fantasy performances ever, that Tom Brady would be able to land a  couple of fantasy football magazine covers here and there.

Sorry Tom, apparently this is Adrian Peterson’s world.

Riding a wave of hype that has reached “Indiana Jones IV” levels, Purple Jesus graced the cover of six of seven fantasy football magazines on the rack at a Borders store I visited earlier this week.

The other cover? That was filled by Tony Romo.

Peterson has become the poster boy for fantasy football heading into 2008. But Matthew Berry, ESPN’s senior director of fantasy coverage, rains on the AP parade in his first “Love/Hate” column of the season, putting the Minnesota back in the No. 4 fantasy slot, behind Tomlinson, Westbrook, and Addai.

Berry points out that putting Peterson at No. 4 overall on your list is essentially the same thing as putting him dead last, as there’s no way he’s falling that far in any draft.

I’m not a fan of Berry’s off-the-wall (an understatement) writing style, but if you can get past the occasional self-congratulatory line, and digressions into 80s hair bands and whatever VH1 reality show he feels the need to talk about, there’s some really interesting info in his articles. He makes bold predictions, and he backs them up with solid reasoning. Plus the ESPN fantasy Web site got a face lift and is really easy to navigate — it’s worth checking out.

Berry’s reasoning for bumping Peterson down from a top-two pick? It’s about value. He says it’s hard to justify spending a top-two pick on a player who could still be sharing carries with Chester Taylor, and someone who plays for a team without a decent quarterback.

Value. I should have thought about before shelling out $20 on two tickets for a sub-par “Indiana Jones” flick.