No need to get into a debate over child abuse again. Either you think Peterson was justified or not, that is a matter of opinion.
I think one thing is clear, Peterson and his people don’t think he did anything wrong and because he is an exceptional running back as long he plays well all will be forgiven.
He is a peculiar guy and I think this ESPN story about his birthday party really illustrates that. It is like he needs a lot of reaffirmation and assurances from yes men and women and this was one way to get it.
Peterson made a list of about 320 friends and family members. He sent out invitations with an embossed signature logo. He bought his guests first-class plane tickets to Houston and booked them first-class hotel rooms.
“I want people to come and forget about everything else,” he said. “I want us to create a separate little world.”
They found a lemur available for rent and a python that would drape like a scarf over Peterson’s shoulders. They imported a troupe of snake charmers out of Dallas and world-renowned belly dancers from New York. There was an elaborate tent city in Peterson’s backyard: Moroccan couches, velvet drapes, ice sculptures bearing Peterson’s initials, imported trees and a throne on which Peterson alone would be allowed to sit. The cake designer baked a royal palace flanked by a fondant camel and elephant. Wale agreed to perform. Jamie Foxx offered his services as a DJ. In the final hours before the party, more than 100 workers rushed to set up stripper poles, a hookah bar and a cigar humidor in a tent called the Man Cave.
“Even the port-a-potties were over the top, with silver sinks and shiny floors,” says Bobby Maze, one of Peterson’s closest friends. “You would have thought you were going to the bathroom at Ruth’s Chris.”
The guests arrived in elaborate Arabian costumes, handed off their rides to valets and walked down a red carpet into a room where waitresses passed out champagne. Then the crowd waited for the man of honor to arrive.
Peterson entered by a path from the front door of his house toward the main tent. Another parade formed in front of him to lead the way: first the fire-breathers, then the sword swallowers, then the snake charmers and the belly dancers and then finally a camel, rented for the night from an Austin zoo. By the camel’s side were three men dressed as humble peasants, their eyes glued to the floor, and atop the camel was one man, Peterson, wearing a bejeweled Arabian headdress and a gold sequined jacket.
THE PARTY BEGAN with an hour of performances on a red-carpeted stage. Peterson sat in the front row as the fire-breathers and snake charmers danced around him. Caterers circled with fried chicken and pulled pork. Jamie Foxx challenged Peterson to a dance-off.
The children stayed inside his mansion under the care of a nanny as the party continued to build momentum past 10 p.m., then midnight, then 1 a.m. The Man Cave finally opened at a little past 2:30 a.m., and men played video games on a PS4 while a group of women who referred to themselves as “pole magicians” danced in lingerie at the center of the tent. The caterers brought out milk, cookies and then cereal. Sometime during the night, before the first guests began to trickle out at sunrise, before Peterson left with a handful of friends to continue their party elsewhere.
At the conclusion Peterson announced he and his wife were having his 8th child (6 different baby mothers).
You wonder how Peterson will react once there is no longer football to hang his hat on and a lot of the hanger-ons fade to black.