Done, I have zero interest in following the 2017 Vikings!

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PacificNorseWest
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Re: Done, I have zero interest in following the 2017 Vikings

Post by PacificNorseWest »

I'm confident in a bounce back season next year, but at this point, I'm absolutely drained. The great start that came on top of fairly high expectations heading into the year at me ecstatic and the subsequent downward spiral all the while grasping onto some hope that there was still a chance just kicked my butt. I had no interest in watching their week 17 game, but per the usual, my excitement 2017 Vikings will be back next summer, albeit with more of a cautious type of optimism.
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Re: Done, I have zero interest in following the 2017 Vikings

Post by PacificNorseWest »

I'd like to add that there is plenty of reason for optimism if you look at a team like Atlanta. There's no reason why the 2017 Vikings can't be like this seasons Falcons.

Atlanta started off 5-0 last season and finished 8-8, missed the playoffs and now find themselves one game away from the Super Bowl. Also, their defense (1/3 of the team) is one of the lower ranked defenses in the NFL.
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Re: Done, I have zero interest in following the 2017 Vikings

Post by Mothman »

Pondering Her Percy wrote:Well if we take an OL two years ago, we don't have Tre Waynes. Or we don't have Eric Kendricks or Hunter. You can't say we could've drafted good offensive players AND still have those guys. That's literally impossible unless you have the draft of the century and hit on every pick which never happens. Give me a draft where we could've had a good balance of offense and defense with a good portion of them being good picks and to where it doesn't effect our current defense. I'd love to hear it. There were needs from top to bottom on defense when Frazier left. Not saying there wasn't on offense either but the need on defense was much bigger. Given we were the last ranked defense in the NFL the Fraziers last year. Zim wasn't going to coach a bunch of scrubs and throw the farm into his offense. I think we figured that coming in. But overall, i think we need to just sit back and let things happen instead of talking about confidence for the next month. Let's just see what they do
Then let's dispense with the criticism of people who may hold a less optimistic view of the team. If we don't know what's coming next, then we don't know that one view is inherently more accurate than the other, which is the whole point.

As for your points about the draft... that's well-trodden territory and I'm not going to revisit the "if they had taken x, they couldn't have had Y" debate again. As I said, Spielman's had 6 years, not just 3 and he's had a lot of picks at his disposal, some which were combined and traded. Here are the offensive picks over the last 3 years:

Bridgewater
McKinnon
Yankey
Clemmings
Diggs
Pruitt
Treadwell
Beavers
Boeringer
Morgan

Here are the offensive players the Vikings have picked over the previous 3 seasons:

Ponder
Rudolph
Love
Fusco
Burton
Kalil
Wright
Ellison
Childs
Patterson
Baca
Bond

I'll ask the board: when you look at that list, is it surprising at all that the Vikings offense has been among the league's weaker units for quite some time now?
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Re: Done, I have zero interest in following the 2017 Vikings

Post by PurpleKoolaid »

Pondering Her Percy wrote: Was this ever an issue before?

Agreed
Well, yeah. I never saw him on the field last year. As far as practices, I didnt hear much either I think they thought it was too early too play him. Which they have done with other players. I personally think he more on his way to bust then star.
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Re: Done, I have zero interest in following the 2017 Vikings

Post by Mothman »

PurpleKoolaid wrote:Some great posts, Jim. Finding myself agreeing with most of them.
Thanks.
I would start by looking at Rick first (who I have a feeling wont be here in 2018 if we dont WIN a playoff game), then Zimmer, coaches, assistant coaches, etc., and make sure everyone is on the same page as to our main schemes on on O and D, and practice them constantly. AD is going to be gone (or maybe not, who knows), so lets be ready for that. I dont like our RB's, so I say we get rid of then, convert Line to a FB, short yardage. And get a late TE that can block, and be a power runner/and good on screens.
(BTW, whatever happened to Pruitt? I really like that guy as a receiver and hard saw him.)
The Vikes waived him in November to make room on the roster for Heinicke. He signed with the Bears.

As you can probably tell from a lot of my comments, I agree with you about looking at Rick Spielman first. :)
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Re: Done, I have zero interest in following the 2017 Vikings

Post by 808vikingsfan »

Mothman wrote: So do you think commitment to a coach is an inherently good idea regardless of results? At some point, I think they have to be taken into consideration. Take Zimmer out of the equation for the moment: suppose a team hires a head coach and that coach has 4 straight losing seasons. Should the team stick with the coach longer and if so, how long should they remain committed to him before they move on?
4 losing seasons? I think it depends. Take Cleveland. I think even the best coaches would have a hard time turning that team around in 4 years. What that team needs is a foundation and stability. If the Browns keep changing coaches, it'll be a while before they see a winning season. In fact, a philosophy like Zimmers could work well for the Browns. Focus and make one part of the team great and go from there.


Back to Zimmer:
That makes sense to me but I think overall results need to be considered, not just defensive results. So far, Zimmer has built a good defense and arguably, a good enough defense to win a Super Bowl. It clearly takes more and we've seen little to no improvement in other areas of the team over the past 3 years (or even in the run defense). That has to change and if it doesn't, I think the Vikings have to seriously question how long they should stay committed to this head coach/GM combination. Otherwise, they could end up with a Marvin Lewis/Cincinnati Bengals-like situation. The Bengals committed to Lewis and have stuck with him for 14 seasons now. They have 7 winning seasons, three .500 seasons and zero playoff wins to show for that commitment.
Does it really matter where the run or pass defense is ranked if they're ranked 5th best in scoring defense? As far as the offense this year, choose any team and take away their 2 best players on offense and dismantle their OL. Would it be fair to blame the drop in production on the coaches?


Maybe 4 years isn't enough but 14 years certainly seems too long in Cincy's case so how and when do you make the determination to move on?
I think that's all I'm saying. If the GM and HC are on the same page, I'd certainly give them more than 4 years. With all that Zimmer has been through (Peterson fiasco in 2014, the injuries this year), I'm a bit surprised he's getting so much flak.
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Re: Done, I have zero interest in following the 2017 Vikings

Post by Mothman »

808vikingsfan wrote: 4 losing seasons? I think it depends. Take Cleveland. I think even the best coaches would have a hard time turning that team around in 4 years. What that team needs is a foundation and stability. If the Browns keep changing coaches, it'll be a while before they see a winning season. In fact, a philosophy like Zimmers could work well for the Browns. Focus and make one part of the team great and go from there.
That's a fair answer. Certain situations require more time and not every rebuilding job is the same.


Does it really matter where the run or pass defense is ranked if they're ranked 5th best in scoring defense? As far as the offense this year, choose any team and take away their 2 best players on offense and dismantle their OL. Would it be fair to blame the drop in production on the coaches?
The rankings matter less than the overall effectiveness of the defense. A 5th-ranked scoring defense that's too vulnerable to the run is ripe for defeat against a team that can exploit that weakness. It's been an area in need of improvement since 2014 and we haven't seen that improvement.

As for the offense: every time this subject comes up, people ask questions like the one above as if this season occurred in a bubble. We've seen 3 straight seasons of bad offense under this coaching staff, not one. The offense has regressed and stagnated under their leadership.
I think that's all I'm saying. If the GM and HC are on the same page, I'd certainly give them more than 4 years. With all that Zimmer has been through (Peterson fiasco in 2014, the injuries this year), I'm a bit surprised he's getting so much flak.
Having a GM and coach on the same page is a starting point. Their overall job performance after getting on the same page is far more significant.
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Re: Done, I have zero interest in following the 2017 Vikings

Post by S197 »

I read an article a long time ago and they pointed out that the difference between a great LT and a bad LT is a few pressures/poor blocks per game. I think this is similarly true when it comes to the NFL as a whole. The difference between a good team and a bad one isn't all that big, largely due to the salary cap but also because there's 32 teams picking the elite from a hundred NCAA schools.

We can see many examples of this. The Falcons were pointed out as a good example, 8-8 to now in the NFCCG. In the opposite direction, you have teams who were at the top of their game fall off considerably, the Panthers and Cardinals for example. There's very few teams like the Patriots that can be consistently good. To be consistently good I think you need a hall of fame QB and an equally good HC.

It's tough being a Vikings fan, they're fairly consistently middle of the pack. They have near great seasons and some poor ones, but overall they do "ok." And I get that the fan base is tired of "ok." But I think what we've seen in the past few years is that the NFL is vastly different than it was a decade or two ago. Especially on the NFC side, the volatility of who is a "contender" fluctuates enormously.

So absent being a team like New England, I think the perspective needs to be, are there enough pieces in place to potentially get through that small window and win the big one? I don't think we're going to agree on the answer to that but here's how I look at it.

If you look over the last, say 5 years, what were the major issues? (1) We didn't have stability at QB. And we still don't but we have the best depth (assuming TB can come back next year) we've had in a long time. (2) The team couldn't win on the road. I think the team has made great strides in this respect, including a win at Lambeau last year to take the NFCN. (3) The team was notorious for falling apart in the 2nd half. I think if anything, the Vikings look better coming out of the locker room at the half. I see a lot of good adjustments. (4) The secondary was awful, like setting NFL records that stood for 50+ years awful. Clearly a major turnaround since then. (5) Poor run defense. There's work to be done here but the run defense isn't that[/] bad. It's middle of the pack, which I think is okay when combined with a top rushing front and a good secondary. (6) Lack of skill players. For a while we had AD and that was it. Troy Williamson, Bernard Berrian, Greg Jennings, Shiancoe, it was a ####. While I think we still need one more "weapon" having Diggs, Rudolph, and Thielen is a better base than we've had in a while.

That's some of the reasons why I'm still optimistic. YMMV. That's not to say I'm ignoring the problems, the o-line is a mess and the offense needs to put up more points. Fans on both sides have valid points, I'm not really here to convince someone one way or another. I guess my long winded post if I were to distill it down is basically, "any given Sunday." Every time the Vikings step on the field on Sunday, I think they have a shot for the above reasons. I hope like Cubs fans, we're all rewarded for our patience. Hopefully many times over!
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Re: Done, I have zero interest in following the 2017 Vikings

Post by Pondering Her Percy »

PurpleKoolaid wrote: Well, yeah. I never saw him on the field last year. As far as practices, I didnt hear much either I think they thought it was too early too play him. Which they have done with other players. I personally think he more on his way to bust then star.
He was on the jugs machine after every practice
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Re: Done, I have zero interest in following the 2017 Vikings

Post by CbusVikesFan »

Mothman wrote: Then let's dispense with the criticism of people who may hold a less optimistic view of the team. If we don't know what's coming next, then we don't know that one view is inherently more accurate than the other, which is the whole point.

As for your points about the draft... that's well-trodden territory and I'm not going to revisit the "if they had taken x, they couldn't have had Y" debate again. As I said, Spielman's had 6 years, not just 3 and he's had a lot of picks at his disposal, some which were combined and traded. Here are the offensive picks over the last 3 years:

Bridgewater
McKinnon
Yankey
Clemmings
Diggs
Pruitt
Treadwell
Beavers
Boeringer
Morgan

Here are the offensive players the Vikings have picked over the previous 3 seasons:

Ponder
Rudolph
Love
Fusco
Burton
Kalil
Wright
Ellison
Childs
Patterson
Baca
Bond

I'll ask the board: when you look at that list, is it surprising at all that the Vikings offense has been among the league's weaker units for quite some time now?
I hope that nobody is surprised. Those lists are atrocious. I'm telling you, I know that I could do better at analyzing talent and building the team in the manner in which it should be. Balance has not been a part of the lexicon of the Vikings since Denny was coach.
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Re: Done, I have zero interest in following the 2017 Vikings

Post by HardcoreVikesFan »

Mothman wrote: Having a GM and coach on the same page is a starting point. Their overall job performance after getting on the same page is far more significant.
Jim,

I was looking for the offensive line concerns we shared last offseason. I found them. It is pretty ominous how correct our line of thinking was (along with a couple other posters).

The following quotes are from March 5th, 2016 in the 2016 Free Agency thread:
dead_poet wrote:Kalil, Fusco, Sullivan, Berger, Boone, Harris, Loadholt, Bykowski, Sirles, Shepherd, clemmings, kerin, easton.....#Vikings suddenly have competition, depth at O-line.
Mothman wrote: :wallbang:

Just add Boone and a line that's given up 140 sacks in 3 seasons is now deep, eh? I'm not buying it... and yes, I know Sullivan and Loadholt are coming back,. Berger has been part of that depth all along and he's solid but I sure hope they're going to make OL a priority in this draft.

FiestaVike may be the only one who will agree with me on this though... if I'm lucky. :lol:
HardcoreVikesFan wrote:
I agree with you Jim.

I don't believe that anyone outside of Berger (if he comes back) and possibly Clemmings are the answers at the backup positions. Heck, I don't believe that Mike Harris nor Brandon Fusco are the answers at guard.

If this team doesn't spend a high round pick on an offensive lineman, I will be absolutely livid.
allday wrote:
I also agree. I'll be livid if Kalil starts at LT without an attempt to replace him. It's nice to see improves elsewhere in the Oline however the LT usually gets the best rusher on the team, and Kalil is arguebly the worst on the line, not a good match up.

Clearly even when the two were on the same page, the results were still extremely underwhelming and foolish. They cannot afford to sit passively again this offseason.
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Re: Done, I have zero interest in following the 2017 Vikings

Post by Mothman »

HardcoreVikesFan wrote: Jim,

I was looking for the offensive line concerns we shared last offseason. I found them. It is pretty ominous how correct our line of thinking was (along with a couple other posters).

The following quotes are from March 5th, 2016 in the 2016 Free Agency thread:

Clearly even when the two were on the same page, the results were still extremely underwhelming and foolish. They cannot afford to sit passively again this offseason.
Thanks for digging that up. They definitely can't afford to be take a similar approach this offseason but unfortunately, they've painted themselves into another corner. Their options and avenues to improve are more limited and their needs even greater.

It amazes me that Spielman still has a job after this mess. It really does. As bad as the line was in 2015, it was worse in 2016 and there's not even a starting-caliber offensive tackle on the roster as we head into 2017. I don;t think they have two legitimate starters at guard either. You could see this problem coming from a mile away and yet here we are...
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Re: Done, I have zero interest in following the 2017 Vikings

Post by fiestavike »

Mothman wrote:
It amazes me that Spielman still has a job after this mess. It really does. As bad as the line was in 2015, it was worse in 2016 and there's not even a starting-caliber offensive tackle on the roster as we head into 2017. I don;t think they have two legitimate starters at guard either. You could see this problem coming from a mile away and yet here we are...
I don't think they have a choice but to use free agency to at least lift the floor a bit for this unit. Boone and Berger are (maybe) passable but they need comparable (barely) adequate players at LT, RG, and RT. Then draft for upside.

I do wonder what it would take to acquire some slightly higher quality players from other teams via trade. I wouldn't object to using the 2nd and 3rd round choices for that purpose, especially if they can get 6th and 7th round choices back in the deal, to at least give them the chance to draft upside players like Kearse.
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Re: Done, I have zero interest in following the 2017 Vikings

Post by Mothman »

fiestavike wrote:I don't think they have a choice but to use free agency to at least lift the floor a bit for this unit. Boone and Berger are (maybe) passable but they need comparable (barely) adequate players at LT, RG, and RT. Then draft for upside.

I do wonder what it would take to acquire some slightly higher quality players from other teams via trade. I wouldn't object to using the 2nd and 3rd round choices for that purpose, especially if they can get 6th and 7th round choices back in the deal, to at least give them the chance to draft upside players like Kearse.

They'd be wise to explore every avenue, including trades.
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Re: Done, I have zero interest in following the 2017 Vikings

Post by PurpleMustReign »

Would they get anything for Teddy? It is a serious question... Even a 6th would help. And what about Wright? I am asking because i think they need to make a trade for an established lineman.

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