Rick Spielman, what should the Vikes do with him

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Pondering Her Percy
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Re: Rick Spielman, what should the Vikes do with him

Post by Pondering Her Percy »

Mothman wrote:
Yes, it is...
Mike Zimmer took this team to the playoffs in his 2nd season as head coach after taking over a team that had the LAST ranked defense and a quarterback-less offense. He goes 11-5 and wins the division last year then has the year from hell losing the 4 most important positions on offense due to injury and now all of the sudden he's being questioned. My question is, what did you guys expect? Did you expect 16-0? 12-4? 11-5 again? Heck 9-7?? Did anyone honestly expect that after these injuries happened? I sure hope not. There probably isnt a team in the NFL that could overcome that. You dont seem to take that into account. You make it sound like this is the same exact team from last year and we should be 11-5 or better and that just isnt realistic given these injuries.
Mothman wrote:
At this point, why wouldn't a Vikings fan be skeptical about Zimmer? The sun doesn't rise and set on defense. The offense has been gradually driven into the ground under this staff and only the utterly pathetic Rams offense is preventing the Vikes from finally hitting rock bottom in that department this season so no, I'm not Zimmer's biggest fan but I would like him to make me a bigger fan and I'd like him to succeed as Vikings head coach. There's plenty to like about the man. I'm not rooting against him.
Let me repeat myself again Jim. He LOST his QB, RB, LT and RT for the year practically. This offense had to be MODIFIED because our tackles couldnt hold up when our starters went down. HOW in gods name did you really expect this offense to improve when that happens?? I would say that it is next to impossible to improve when you lose those 4 positions. Do it to any team in the NFL and they will be worse. Did you really think to yourself when all this happened "Yeah our offense is definitely going to be better this season without Teddy, AP, Kalil and Smith". I sure hope not.

How can you say this "offense has been driven into the ground" when we've had the injuries we did?? Is that even a true tell of what the offense could or couldnt do?? No. It could have been an improvement from last year if the injuries happen. We dont KNOW that. But to sit here and say the offense has been driven into the ground and primarily basing that assumption on this year is extremely unfair if you ask me. If we currently had Teddy, AP, Kalil and Smith and we were a worse offense then last year then yeah, I would question that too.

But no way am I going to sit here and criticize Mike Zimmer's offense based primarily off of this year given what has happened. If he had a healthy offense or only missing a player or two, then yeah. But to miss the 4 MOST important positions on the offense, it's extremely unfair if you ask me.

You know just as well as I do that we had next to no change having a better offense this year with 4 major injuries.
Frazier made in-game adjustments too. That's such an obvious fact it's not even worth arguing about. I supported him because I think he's a good coach and because I felt the Vikings dealt him a bad hand.
Come on Jim. He HANDS DOWN had the worst two minute defense I have ever seen in my life. NEVER blitzed, sat back and let teams nickel and dime him all the way down the field and literally never did anything different. His offense wasnt much different than last years where AP practically carried the team. Even more so back then than he has since Zim has been here. If he was such a "good coach" he probably would be doing a lot more than being just a secondary coach for the Baltimore Ravens. Bottom line is, he didnt run a good defense and his offense wasnt a whole lot better than Zims (and before you try and jump all over me for that, lets not forget AP was in his prime through most of Fraziers years there. Zim has had him 1 out of 3 years). He had good players on his defenses. But was notorious for calling bad games. Frazier's and Lovie Smith's style of defense was very outdated and didnt fly in the NFL anymore. Thats why one of them is out of the NFL and the other is nearing the end. He was one of the worst in-game head coaches I've seen in a while in Minnesota.

And to say it's such an "obvious fact" really baffles me. The only obvious thing was that if we were winning at the end of the game, you knew exactly what Frazier was going to do and thats sit back, send 0 blitzers and let offenses walk their way down the field on us. It was a guarantee every time we had the lead late. And lets save our breath about the Detroit game this year. One game in 3 years from what I can remember where Zimmer did that. Frazier did it literally every time we had a lead and we lost many, many games because of it.
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Re: Rick Spielman, what should the Vikes do with him

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Pondering Her Percy wrote:Mike Zimmer took this team to the playoffs in his 2nd season as head coach after taking over a team that had the LAST ranked defense and a quarterback-less offense. He goes 11-5 and wins the division last year then has the year from hell losing the 4 most important positions on offense due to injury and now all of the sudden he's being questioned.
You keep saying "all of a sudden". It's not sudden. Some of us have been questioning him for a long time. It isn't a new development.
Let me repeat myself again Jim. He LOST his QB, RB, LT and RT for the year practically.
Losing already problematic, average-to-below average players like Kalil, Smith and Bridgewater wasn't exactly the equivalent of losing elite players at their respective positions. Losing Peterson definitely hurt but based on the way the line was playing before he went down and the way it's played since, he might not have been able to be the difference-maker he was a year ago anyway.

I've acknowledged many times that injuries hurt the offense this season but it's an offense that went from one of the league's worst to even worse, not a strong unit that fell toward the bottom due to a series of injuries.
How can you say this "offense has been driven into the ground" when we've had the injuries we did??
Because I'm talking about 3 seasons, not using injuries this year as an excuse for a steady decline. I understand the argument that, hypothetically, the decline might not have continued without the injuries but I see little reason to assume that would have been the case.
But no way am I going to sit here and criticize Mike Zimmer's offense based primarily off of this year given what has happened.
My assessments of both Spielman and Zimmer are not based primarily on this season but on the entire time they have been with the team.
Come on Jim. He HANDS DOWN had the worst two minute defense I have ever seen in my life. NEVER blitzed...
I have no interest in arguing with you about Leslie Frazier.
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Re: Rick Spielman, what should the Vikes do with him

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IrishViking wrote:To be clear, I think both Moth and I are on the same page; Zimmer is not a bad coach and he has brought some serious improvement's to this team. I would be happy with him staying on but changes are needed, I think Zimmer would be the first to admit that.

That said, Criticism is going around right now; Bradford, the run game, the Oline, Spielman, the front office. And Zimmer completely deserves a chunk of that criticism.


Zimmer is the head coach. Yes to a certain degree dysfunction in the front office does give him a fair reason. But It doesn't matter what his focus or strength is. He is in charge of the WHOLE team. If he cannot run an offense he must find someone who can, and he hasn't. If he cant coach an Oline he needs to find someone who can, and it seems like he still hasn't.

Giving Zimmer a pass because hes our defensive head coach and the Offense or special teams isn't his specialty is like being okay with a head contractor who can only build a nice finished basement but doesn't know anything else about home building.
:lol: That's a good analogy.
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Re: Rick Spielman, what should the Vikes do with him

Post by chicagopurple »

thats all in the past and meaningless.
all that matters is tomorrow.
whats the plan
why shold we expect improvement?
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Re: Rick Spielman, what should the Vikes do with him

Post by Pondering Her Percy »

IrishViking wrote: He is in charge of the WHOLE team. If he cannot run an offense he must find someone who can, and he hasn't.
How can you make an offense run without your QB of 3 years, HOF RB and both tackles?? The 4 most important positions on the offense. You could bring in any offensive guru you want and give him this offense thats minus his 4 most important players and they wouldnt be able to do anything. It was so bad that we had to MODIFY the majority of our offense into short passes because we couldnt hold up at the tackle position. Honestly what can you do to fix that other than wait for everyone to get healthy next year.

If we had our full offense from last year and it still sucked, yes 100% falls on Zim. But when you hit a string of bad luck like we did, you couldnt bring in god to fix that damage.

My thing is what did anyone expect when those 4 players went down?? I would love to know. Because if anyone thought it could somehow be better than last year or even similar to last year, I'd call you crazy. And clueless.

Take Dak, Zeke, Tyron and Free off Dallas.
Take Carr, Murray, Penn and Howard off Oakland
Take Brees, Ingram, Armstead and Streif off New Orleans
Take Ryan, Freeman, Matthews and Schraeder off Atlanta
.....just to name a few

Those teams could all have a legit shot to have a worse record than we do right now if it happened to them because none of them have the defense we do. One of the teams already has a worse record than us. Point being, it's next to impossible to overcome something like that. I mean look at New England even. They were down to their 3rd string QB and got embarrassed and SHUTOUT by the Bills. And they still had their RB, LT and RT that game. I'm not sitting here trying to make excuses for this team. It's just reality
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Re: Rick Spielman, what should the Vikes do with him

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Pondering Her Percy wrote: How can you make an offense run without your QB of 3 years, HOF RB and both tackles?? The 4 most important positions on the offense. You could bring in any offensive guru you want and give him this offense thats minus his 4 most important players and they wouldnt be able to do anything. It was so bad that we had to MODIFY the majority of our offense into short passes because we couldnt hold up at the tackle position. Honestly what can you do to fix that other than wait for everyone to get healthy next year.

If we had our full offense from last year and it still sucked, yes 100% falls on Zim.
Then throw this year out. Now we still have two years of lousy offense without the long list of key injuries. That falls on Zimmer too.

Zimmer and Spielman have been too busy collecting defensive players to take care of the offense and the lack of sufficient quality and depth on that unit caught up to them with a vengeance this season.

Why do you seem to think Zimmer is above criticism? Honestly, I don't mean that to sound as challenging as it probably does. It just seems as if you can't brook any criticism of the man and it seems to many (most?) of us that he deserves some.
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Re: Rick Spielman, what should the Vikes do with him

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Pondering Her Percy wrote: How can you make an offense run without your QB of 3 years, HOF RB and both tackles?? The 4 most important positions on the offense. You could bring in any offensive guru you want and give him this offense thats minus his 4 most important players and they wouldnt be able to do anything. It was so bad that we had to MODIFY the majority of our offense into short passes because we couldnt hold up at the tackle position. Honestly what can you do to fix that other than wait for everyone to get healthy next year.

If we had our full offense from last year and it still sucked, yes 100% falls on Zim. But when you hit a string of bad luck like we did, you couldnt bring in god to fix that damage.

My thing is what did anyone expect when those 4 players went down?? I would love to know. Because if anyone thought it could somehow be better than last year or even similar to last year, I'd call you crazy. And clueless.

Take Dak, Zeke, Tyron and Free off Dallas.
Take Carr, Murray, Penn and Howard off Oakland
Take Brees, Ingram, Armstead and Streif off New Orleans
Take Ryan, Freeman, Matthews and Schraeder off Atlanta
.....just to name a few

Those teams could all have a legit shot to have a worse record than we do right now if it happened to them because none of them have the defense we do. One of the teams already has a worse record than us. Point being, it's next to impossible to overcome something like that. I mean look at New England even. They were down to their 3rd string QB and got embarrassed and SHUTOUT by the Bills. And they still had their RB, LT and RT that game
I get your point and don't disagree, my point is that if we are going to consider holding the GM responsible for decision he probably made 6 years ago it would be the height of folly to ignore clear issues in the coaching and just chalk it up to "temporary issues" and figure they will work themselves out with a run of good luck.

The defense is spotty period. You do NOT give up 37 points to a 6-7 colts team and get to say you are an elite defense, or even a great defense. They are a decent defense that, with growing frequency, seem to forget which days are game days.

So if our HC, ISN'T running the offense or fixing the issues there (someone HAS to, it wont fix itself) and he isn't running special teams, and his defense is under performing based on the investment in it... What exactly is he doing? He's a first time head coach barely above .500 without a playoff win. I simply do not understand the massive benefit of the doubt he gets. There is a very real possibility that last year was his peak with added luck. Zimmer might just be an average coach who had a good year.

Again, I get your point and agree with it but its mind numbing to me that we sit here and say "At 6:02 pm on March 22nd 2011 Spielman ate a steak with the 5th cousin of Kyle Rudolph, see attached satellite pictures, thus proving he reached for Ponder" but our 25-21 head coach who has had a terrible offense for 3 years gets a "well, its been hard for him, can't blame him. Lets talk about all the massive failures of leadership on the team that are completely unrelated to our HC"
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Re: Rick Spielman, what should the Vikes do with him

Post by Pondering Her Percy »

Mothman wrote:
You keep saying "all of a sudden". It's not sudden. Some of us have been questioning him for a long time. It isn't a new development.
Funny how I never saw any of that last year. Hmm
Losing already problematic, average-to-below average players like Kalil, Smith and Bridgewater wasn't exactly the equivalent of losing elite players at their respective positions. Losing Peterson definitely hurt but based on the way the line was playing before he went down and the way it's played since, he might not have been able to be the difference-maker he was a year ago anyway.

I've acknowledged many times that injuries hurt the offense this season but it's an offense that went from one of the league's worst to even worse, not a strong unit that fell toward the bottom due to a series of injuries.
It doesnt matter what kind of players they are. Bottom line is, they are the 4 most important positions on the offense. And tackles are extremely limited in this league as you can see. These guys are backups for a reason. We lose "average to below average" players and had to sub in extremely bad players for them. Outside of Teddy/Bradford. So yeah, it makes a huge impact regardless.
Because I'm talking about 3 seasons, not using injuries this year as an excuse for a steady decline. I understand the argument that, hypothetically, the decline might not have continued without the injuries but I see little reason to assume that would have been the case.


It's not an excuse. It's reality. Whether you agree or not there was zero shot for this offense to improve with the injuries.
My assessments of both Spielman and Zimmer are not based primarily on this season but on the entire time they have been with the team.
Ok? And Zim improved their record in 2014 and again in 2015 that led to a division title. Are we forgetting about that. Was I watching the wrong team all these years? Same goes for Spielman in that regard. This team would of had a legitimate shot to be anywhere from 10-6 and 12-4 this year if it werent for those players going down. If you dont see that then I'm not sure what to tell you.

I have no interest in arguing with you about Leslie Frazier.
:lol: I wouldnt either because there isnt much to argue
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Re: Rick Spielman, what should the Vikes do with him

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IrishViking wrote:Again, I get your point and agree with it but its mind numbing to me that we sit here and say "At 6:02 pm on March 22nd 2011 Spielman ate a steak with the 5th cousin of Kyle Rudolph, see attached satellite pictures, thus proving he reached for Ponder" but our 25-21 head coach who has had a terrible offense for 3 years gets a "well, its been hard for him, can't blame him. Lets talk about all the massive failures of leadership on the team that are completely unrelated to our HC"
:rofl:

Thanks. That comment made my day!
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Re: Rick Spielman, what should the Vikes do with him

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IrishViking wrote:The defense is spotty period. You do NOT give up 37 points to a 6-7 colts team and get to say you are an elite defense, or even a great defense. They are a decent defense that, with growing frequency, seem to forget which days are game days.

So if our HC, ISN'T running the offense or fixing the issues there (someone HAS to, it wont fix itself) and he isn't running special teams, and his defense is under performing based on the investment in it... What exactly is he doing? He's a first time head coach barely above .500 without a playoff win. I simply do not understand the massive benefit of the doubt he gets. There is a very real possibility that last year was his peak with added luck. Zimmer might just be an average coach who had a good year.

Again, I get your point and agree with it but its mind numbing to me that we sit here and say "At 6:02 pm on March 22nd 2011 Spielman ate a steak with the 5th cousin of Kyle Rudolph, see attached satellite pictures, thus proving he reached for Ponder" but our 25-21 head coach who has had a terrible offense for 3 years gets a "well, its been hard for him, can't blame him. Lets talk about all the massive failures of leadership on the team that are completely unrelated to our HC"
Right you are. Quite honestly, it's time to admit this current Vikings team isn't very good. This is particularly true about the offense, which has been wallowing in mediocrity on its best days. The kind of slide this team has taken this season alone is mind-boggling but maybe predictable. Because of injuries? No, because as Jim pointed out, there possibly has been an overwhelming desire to build up the defense at the expense of everything else required on the roster. I don't see that as good coaching or general management.

You can't get out of a rut by digging deeper. That makes things worse. The Vikings need make better decisions and deal with whatever needs to be changed. No, I'm not saying, "Fire Zimmer!" I'm saying the offensive philosophy and its application has to go. By now the head coach should know that. Same with the general manager.
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Re: Rick Spielman, what should the Vikes do with him

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Simply put...
Vikings are a BAD team right now!
Vikings offense is probably the worst that I have seen out of a Viking team. Yes, injuries contribute, but these are PROFESSIONAL ATHLETES !!! The depth in our OL is horrendous. Who's to blame for this? Whoever pays them to be the backups and does not provide competition.
Injuries are a part of sports and the best teams continue with a "Next man up" philosophy and continue to win. Unfortunately, in Minnesota we encountered injury and instead of Next Man Up, we get "Ohhh crap, now what"? This team has been unable to overcome the destruction of our OL, but we didn't have quality pieces ready to back them up anyways.

Directly across the LOS, we have quite the opposite. A fairly deep defense with interchangeable pieces.

So in determining whether Spielman should be our GM and Zimmer our HC, I want answers to the following question..... What's our teams vision ?

Once answered, I would determine if we have the right guys. From what I see right now, nope and nope. I think we have a reactive GM instead of a proactive one. Look no further than the panic signings of Bradford and Jake Long. Why was there never a contingency plan in place for a brittle QB and a LT with chronic knee issues ? Why weren't our backups good enough? Why do we pay them then ?
I believe Zimmer is a very good DC and very good evaluator of defensive talent. I just don't think that he's a great HC.
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Re: Rick Spielman, what should the Vikes do with him

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exactly! :thumbsup:
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Re: Rick Spielman, what should the Vikes do with him

Post by Pondering Her Percy »

IIsweet wrote:Simply put...
Vikings are a BAD team right now!
Vikings offense is probably the worst that I have seen out of a Viking team. Yes, injuries contribute, but these are PROFESSIONAL ATHLETES !!! The depth in our OL is horrendous. Who's to blame for this? Whoever pays them to be the backups and does not provide competition.
Injuries are a part of sports and the best teams continue with a "Next man up" philosophy and continue to win. Unfortunately, in Minnesota we encountered injury and instead of Next Man Up, we get "Ohhh crap, now what"? This team has been unable to overcome the destruction of our OL, but we didn't have quality pieces ready to back them up anyways.

Directly across the LOS, we have quite the opposite. A fairly deep defense with interchangeable pieces.

So in determining whether Spielman should be our GM and Zimmer our HC, I want answers to the following question..... What's our teams vision ?

Once answered, I would determine if we have the right guys. From what I see right now, nope and nope. I think we have a reactive GM instead of a proactive one. Look no further than the panic signings of Bradford and Jake Long. Why was there never a contingency plan in place for a brittle QB and a LT with chronic knee issues ? Why weren't our backups good enough? Why do we pay them then ?
I believe Zimmer is a very good DC and very good evaluator of defensive talent. I just don't think that he's a great HC.
We had Phil Loadholt, John Sullivan and Mike Harris at the beginning of the offseason. If that's not competition then I don't know what is. One retired, one was cut and one has a mysterious illness. It's not just about Kalil and Smith getting hurt. It's also about what happened with those guys too.

All in all, we lost Matt Kalil, Andre Smith, Mike Harris, John Sullivan and Phil Loadholt. There goes any kind of depth and starter we had. You act like we went in without any viable tackles, guards or centers going into training camp and that's completely false. It's not like we went into the offseason with Clemmings, Sirles, Easton and Kerin as immediate backups. That wasn't the case at all and you know it.
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Re: Rick Spielman, what should the Vikes do with him

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Pondering Her Percy wrote: We had Phil Loadholt, John Sullivan and Mike Harris at the beginning of the offseason. If that's not competition then I don't know what is. One retired, one was cut and one has a mysterious illness. It's not just about Kalil and Smith getting hurt. It's also about what happened with those guys too.

All in all, we lost Matt Kalil, Andre Smith, Mike Harris, John Sullivan and Phil Loadholt. There goes any kind of depth and starter we had. You act like we went in without any viable tackles, guards or centers going into training camp and that's completely false. It's not like we went into the offseason with Clemmings, Sirles, Easton and Kerin as immediate backups. That wasn't the case at all and you know it.
You just proved what I have been preaching. We went in with a LT who has chronic knee issues, backup LT is a guy we signed off the streets, who again has been injury plagued his entire career. 3rd string is a project OT who played it for 1 year in college and shows very little feel for the position. You're right, we had Sullivan, but we're counting on a guy coming back from BACK SURGERIES to compete in the NFL on the interior of the OL and is supposed to handle 325 pound gargantuan's ??? C'mon Man!! Next, no idea about Harris who should have been a starter.
At RT you cannot think that a 6'8" 350 pound OL coming off an Achilles TEAR is going to be able to battle in the trenches a year after ripping apart his leg ???

So again I say, I see that Spielman is reactive. There was no proactive approach to providing a strong OL when we were only a rare missed 27 yard FG from a potential run to the NFCCG. If I was that close, I would have made sure that we improved our depth. We added Boone. Great job. Drafted Beavers, whose only significance is that it's fun saying his name in jokes. Hoped Fusco would return to form of years ago, but nope. Then, boom.... Injuries and this team cannot overcome them. Those backups with question marks then also had injuries.
I look forward to your response
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Re: Rick Spielman, what should the Vikes do with him

Post by S197 »

IrishViking wrote:
That's not evidence; that's conjecture and supposition based on the theory he panick.
It also lacks the context of an extraordinary offseason. In 2011 there was no free agency. We didn't even know if there would be a season! No training camp, no working out in the facilities, no talking to coaches.
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