EDEN PRAIRIE, Minn. — As far as distractions go, the one surrounding Adrian Peterson seems to have died of old age for a Minnesota Vikings team that hasn’t had its best player for nine of its 10 games and realistically wasn’t expecting him to return this season anyway.

If anything, the “distraction” breathed one last gasp on Wednesday when coach Mike Zimmer and players were asked for reaction to Tuesday’s news that Peterson had been suspended by the league for the rest of the season for injuries he caused his 4-year-old son when he chose to hit him with a wooden switch as a form of discipline.

“Not really much has changed,” Zimmer said. “I still say exactly what I said before. I support him and his family. He was great with me. But other than that, our focus is on Green Bay (on Sunday) and we got to move forward. That’s just the way life is.”

The Vikings are 4-6 and likely need to win their final six games to have a chance to make the playoffs. But that, obviously, appears unlikely for a team that is 0-3 in the NFC North and preparing to face a Packers team that beat them 42-10 on Oct. 2 and has just scored 50 or more points in back-to-back games for the first time in its history.

Throw in the fact that Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers is 10-4 with 31 touchdown passes and four interceptions in 438 pass attempts against the Vikings and, well, let’s just say the Vikings’ hands and minds are full this week.

To help them move on without Peterson, the Vikings claimed former Browns running back Ben Tate off waivers on Wednesday. A 2011 second-round pick of the Texans, Tate might line up with the first unit in his first practice on Thursday. The team’s top two running backs – Matt Asiata (concussion) and Jerick McKinnon (lower back) – didn’t practice on Wednesday.

The 5-11, 214-pound Tate might add some power to a running game that disappointed Zimmer during a 21-13 loss at the Chicago Bears last Sunday. Of course, the notion that a team that employs Peterson would need more power seemed unthinkable not long ago.

Asked how difficult it was to keep his players focused on football and not Peterson’s situation, Zimmer said, “Inside the locker room, when they watch the Packers and they watch the things they do offensively and defensively and returning punts and scoring on defense and things like that, they get your attention pretty quick.

“We’ve been through a lot of things this year. I think for the most part they’ve stayed focused very well. So I think that we just keep pounding the message about what we’re trying to do here and trying to accomplish as the kind of football team and organization. The overriding message just keeps going on and on.”

Asked if he had held out hope that Peterson would return as early as the Packers game, Zimmer said, “We’ve kind of taken this one day at a time as it’s gone. So we just go with the cards we’re dealt. I know we made the statement (Tuesday), so we’ll kind of stick with that mantra.”

Although they weren’t particularly distracted, some of Peterson’s teammates were angry with the decision and the process by which NFL commissioner Roger Goodell arrived at his ruling on Tuesday.

“This whole thing has been one big mess by the league from Day 1,” fullback Jerome Felton said. “Today didn’t make it any cleaner. It made it messier. I couldn’t disagree more with the ruling. I’m disappointed all the way around. For Adrian and as a player who is concerned about the arbitrary nature of how punishments are decided. Nothing Goodell does surprises me.”

Felton accused Goodell of worrying less about justice in the Peterson case and more about public relations. He also believes the commissioner and others are misguided on Peterson because they’re lumping him with the coinciding news on former Ravens running back Ray Rice, who was suspended indefinitely after a video surfaced of him punching and knocking out his then-fiancee.

“Everybody knows that if the Ray Rice video had not come out, this would not be going on right now,” Felton said. “It’s definitely more about, `How’s this thing going to look PR-wise when he comes back?’ than what is fair and what are the guidelines to follow.

“I also put a lot of blame on the NFL Players Association and a CBA that basically gives the players no individual rights when it comes to this process.”

Felton said Peterson’s punishment is too harsh.

“I don’t care what you think of what he did, he is not a child abuser,” Felton said. “He used poor judgment with a disciplinary technique that is used in places in the country.

“That’s something that needs to be addressed going forward by everybody because it definitely is a split issue with a lot of people on both sides. Adrian will learn from this and be a leader in education in that area. But anybody who says he’s a child abuser, then I have an issue with that person.”

–Peterson’s future with the team beyond the potential end of his suspension on April 15 is very much up in the air. So rookie quarterback Teddy Bridgewater was asked if he’s up for taking on the so-called “face of the franchise” role with Peterson gone for the foreseeable future and maybe forever.

“I can tell you that I’ll embrace the role,” he said. “We have a group of guys who have established themselves in this league. I know that for me, it’s not all about me. … We have other playmakers on this team, Cordarrelle Patterson, Greg Jennings, Jerick McKinnon and then you talk about the defensive side of the ball with Harrison Smith, Xavier Rhodes, Chad Greenway and those guys. It’s an overall team effort.”