Vikings @ Bills Game Day Discussion Thread -- Preseaon #2

[Funkytown]

Oh no. No apologies needed. I completely understand that it is WAY too much to go back to read. The only reason I was online while I was watching it is because I needed a distraction. During the regular season, I won't have time to be online while I'm watching. It's too serious then! There is no way anyone would (or should) have time to go back and read 10 pages of live game coverage from the fans. I'm more interested in the recap portion. I just commented back to you to tell you that I thought the EXACT same thing when I heard that. I was like, Frazier? You losing it?

[Purple Domination]

Right, it's ONLY about this 1 preseason game and not a trend we see spanning 2+ seasons.

We had 3 wins two years ago and 10 wins last year. I like this trend

[Reignman]

OMFG really? Is this really happening? I am trying to be positive about the PRESEASON and people are flaming me?

What happened to the real football discussions? What happened to actually analyzing things about the games? This is a football board, is it not? Is losing a preseason game so bad that we can't have a decent conversation about the game without it turning into a mass suicide ritual.

IT IS A PRESEASON GAME. IF YOU DON'T LIKE THE VIKINGS, DON'T WATCH THEM.

WOW! Calm down Sally. If being positive gets you this uptight I think I'll remain negative and keep my sense of humor, oh and I guess my sanity too.

[King James]

No surprise that some fans are content with the piss poor effort our team put on Friday.

[Just Me]

Oh no. No apologies needed. I completely understand that it is WAY too much to go back to read. The only reason I was online while I was watching it is because I needed a distraction. During the regular season, I won't have time to be online while I'm watching. It's too serious then! There is no way anyone would (or should) have time to go back and read 10 pages of live game coverage from the fans. I'm more interested in the recap portion. I just commented back to you to tell you that I thought the EXACT same thing when I heard that. I was like, Frazier? You losing it?

Someone posted something to the effect: "We did move the ball well in the other direction and scored a TD too (for the other team).

The thing that has me concerned is this:

Our first pre-season game we lost (who cares). Our first string played an offensive series and had one good throw and one poor throw (for an INT). As a whole, we played to the approximate same level of our opponents until we made substitutions. OK. Their scrubs were ostensibly better than our scrubs. (Again - Who cares?)

Now fast forward to this week. Our teams were not executing at the same level. The Bills were sloppy. The Vikings were beyond that. I get that everything is 'vanilla' in the preseason. But we can't execute vanilla plays? I don't mean we have to have a QB with a rating of 120, or rush for 175 yards but can we lose the game with 80% of the players properly performing their assignments? I didn't see that in this game. I look for each pre-season game for the players to be getting a little better. We, if anything, were worse this week than last. That is what I'm concerned about. SF is up next and we'll see then if this week was just a fluke or if it is a foreshadowing of things to come....

[Mothman]

Now fast forward to this week. Our teams were not executing at the same level. The Bills were sloppy. The Vikings were beyond that. I get that everything is 'vanilla' in the preseason. But we can't execute vanilla plays? I don't mean we have to have a QB with a rating of 120, or rush for 175 yards but can we lose the game with 80% of the players properly performing their assignments? I didn't see that in this game. I look for each pre-season game for the players to be getting a little better. We, if anything, were worse this week than last. That is what I'm concerned about. SF is up next and we'll see then if this week was just a fluke or if it is a foreshadowing of things to come....

I understand your concern about players not executing well but we won't know if anything that happens in the preseason is a foreshadowing of things to come until they actually play regular season games. The SF game isn't going to tell us that. The actual, meaningful games will tell us what kind of team the Vikes have this year and until those games played, we simply won't have answers.

[Mothman]

Judd Zulgad and Andrew Krammer discuss the game:

http://www.1500espn.com/videos/cause_fo ... nders_play

[Purple bruise]

Judd Zulgad and Andrew Krammer discuss the game:

http://www.1500espn.com/videos/cause_fo ... nders_play

Thank you for the link jim. I pretty much agreed with it and certainly I am not wetting my panties over this game like most of the doomsdayers are . Two meaningless preseason games, Ponder gets sacked three times, is under constant pressure, has the ball hiked over his head and has Rudolph drop a huge third down catch, which would have kept the drive going, Walsh misses a field goal. I am not sure that Peyton would have fared any better playing with this team obtw the Broncos (Super Bowl Favorites) had their butts handed to them by the Seahawks and looked terrible (I bet they and their fans are ready to throw in the towel because of it )
The TEAM played poorly but I did not see anything that can't be fixed. I do not think that Walsh will miss many fgs, I doubt that Rudoplh will drop many passes, AD will be in the line-up along with all of the rest of the starters and they have several weeks more to get it together.
I know that I am a Purple glasses wearing, Kool-aid drinking internal optimist but I believe that this team will be very good this year

[Mothman]

I know that I am a Purple glasses wearing, Kool-aid drinking internal optimist but I believe that this team will be very good this year

I hope so but whether they're good or not, I think the important point here is that these games aren't likely to give us a very good idea of how the 2013 Vikes will actually perform during the regular season.

[Just Me]

I understand your concern about players not executing well but we won't know if anything that happens in the preseason is a foreshadowing of things to come until they actually play regular season games. The SF game isn't going to tell us that. The actual, meaningful games will tell us what kind of team the Vikes have this year and until those games played, we simply won't have answers.

I agree for the most part, but when the team is apparently regressing in execution that is a cause for concern. I'm not saying that a team can't have an "off game" (or even two or three) but it that becomes the norm, rather than the exception, it makes for a loooooong season. The key word is "apparently" since for all I know this could be one of those games where nothing goes right, and they'll "blow-out" SF next week. If they struggle next week (on execution - I still don't care if we go 0-4 in the pre-season) then I'll start escalating my level of concern. If we perform sloppily in the 4th game, then I don't know why one would believe the team will suddenly execute better on Week 1 of the regular season.

Again, we are only half way through the pre-season so I'm not pronouncing the "sky is falling." I'm not that guy. But I'm also not the guy to turn and look the other way when there are shortcomings that the team needs to improve.

BTW-Foreshadowing, by it's definition, will require us to see how they play in the regular season before we can definitively say it was a forshadowing of what was to come.

[Mothman]

I agree for the most part, but when the team is apparently regressing in execution that is a cause for concern. I'm not saying that a team can't have an "off game" (or even two or three) but it that becomes the norm, rather than the exception, it makes for a loooooong season. The key word is "apparently" since for all I know this could be one of those games where nothing goes right, and they'll "blow-out" SF next week. If they struggle next week (on execution - I still don't care if we go 0-4 in the pre-season) then I'll start escalating my level of concern. If we perform sloppily in the 4th game, then I don't know why one would believe the team will suddenly execute better on Week 1 of the regular season.

Well, since the majority of the starters probably won't play much, if at all, in the 4th game I'd say you can throw that game out already.

Again, we are only half way through the pre-season so I'm not pronouncing the "sky is falling." I'm not that guy. But I'm also not the guy to turn and look the other way when there are shortcomings that the team needs to improve.

I'm not either and I know you aren't a "sky is falling" type of fan (thankfully!) but we knew in June that the team had shortcomings and needed to improve. These games are just part of the process, not a finished result.

I guess I just have a different perspective. I assume we'll see sloppy play, mistakes and uncharacteristic performances in the preseason because that's what I see from every team, every year in the preseason. I trust that players like Rudolph, Kalil and Sullivan aren't going to come out in the regular season and deliver one mistake-filled performance after another so I just don't worry about it much when they make mistakes in a preseason game, especially since they didn't play mistake-free football last season anyway.

BTW-Foreshadowing, by it's definition, will require us to see how they play in the regular season before we can definitively say it was a forshadowing of what was to come.

I understand that, wise guy. My point was that the SF game can only tell us if this week's performance was a foreshadowing of things to come in the third preseason game... which is another meaningless game.

[Funkytown]

WOW! Calm down Sally. If being positive gets you this uptight I think I'll remain negative and keep my sense of humor, oh and I guess my sanity too.

Yes! A sense of humor is a MUST if you're a Vikings fan--or a sports fan in general! You just have to learn to laugh some things off! If you don't, you might just go insane. Maybe some have already?

[Lash Man]

Fan is short for fanatic isnt it

[Eli]

Ponder is a lot faster and stronger as a runner than most defenders and observers realize. Actually, I wish the Vikings would roll him out a lot more, where he seems to be more accurate, and also give him more opportunities to make plays with his feet.

[mosscarter]

i hope musgrave and ponder are both gone after this season they are equally underachievers, and then we'll be back to square one and ap will be a year older. ponder throws 2 passes in the first game, and one is picked off. in the second game he goes 5/12. i don't care if it is preseason or not, where exactly are the signs that he is improving because i haven't seen any.