Vikings at Bears

[CharVike]

This will be a hard road game and 3rd straight for us which is a problem. The Bears have a defense that usually keeps them in the game. They have 2 very good pass rushers. One on the inside Dexter and one outside Sweat. Darnold was able to do a great job last week getting out of trouble in the pocket and making plays. That's not the best way to play and sooner or later something bad will happen. Either a pick or the ball on the ground. The Bears do have a problem stopping the run especially since losing Billings. I expect us to try and run the ball and we should be able to do it against this front. The Bears have the best red zone defense. On offense the Bears aren't very good. We should be able to get pressure and sacks on Caleb because their OL is a problem. That will lead to some bad throws. The Bears are on a 4 game losing streak and fired their OC a couple weeks ago. If we play clean football I think we win this 20-9.

[Cliff]

This will be a hard road game and 3rd straight for us which is a problem. The Bears have a defense that usually keeps them in the game. They have 2 very good pass rushers. One on the inside Dexter and one outside Sweat. Darnold was able to do a great job last week getting out of trouble in the pocket and making plays. That's not the best way to play and sooner or later something bad will happen. Either a pick or the ball on the ground. The Bears do have a problem stopping the run especially since losing Billings. I expect us to try and run the ball and we should be able to do it against this front. The Bears have the best red zone defense. On offense the Bears aren't very good. We should be able to get pressure and sacks on Caleb because their OL is a problem. That will lead to some bad throws. The Bears are on a 4 game losing streak and fired their OC a couple weeks ago. If we play clean football I think we win this 20-9.

They definitely need to change up their scheme a bit to get passes out more quickly. And I don't mean WR screens that seem to never work. The Bears have a weak OL but the Vikings also seem to have problems with mobile QBs. A new OC might actually represent a problem if they start using Williams more effectively. Seems like they were trying to force him to stay in the pocket.

The penalties are vital. And especially when they happen. They had 9 against the Rams and if memory serves they erased several first downs to bring up punting situations.

[CharVike]

This is a good press conf with Wes Phillips. He gives some thoughts on both our QBs. The thing I liked he is very high on Cam Akers and he said Cam loves playing football. Cam can do some good things and provides a relief for Jones. I think it's a nice 1,2 punch. You can go with the hot hand.

[VikingLord]

Vikings always seem to have a hard time at the Bears. Might be just the divisional rivalry thing or the fact its a road game, but the way I see it the Vikings haven't really fired on all cylinders the last two weeks and still managed to come out with wins in both games. Good teams find ways to win even when they're not playing their best ball, and the Vikings seem to be doing that at a critical point in the season. I expect that to continue in this game against a Bears team that is still finding its way.

Offensively, two things stand out to me for the Vikings. They simply have to get a more production out of the run game than they've gotten the last 2 weeks and we need to see the ball go downfield a couple of times and the offense at least attempt a few splash plays. I think I know what KOC is trying to do with Darnold with the way he's called the offense the last few weeks. He's trying to get him settled and keep the chains moving in the passing game, which is fine and completely understandable after a QB has had some shaky performances. Darnold seems to have responded well to that approach and hopefully has his mojo back a bit. His downfield passes are usually really good - its one of his strengths IMHO, so getting that element back will be helpful and maybe put some easy points on the board. JJ hasn't caught a TD in a bit either.

Defensively, the Vikings just need to keep doing what they've been doing the last several weeks - be disruptive and unpredictable at the LOS, get pressure on the QB, and keep the opposing run game in check. Caleb Williams has been under a lot of duress all year and the Vikings should be able to keep that pressure on him. Williams can scramble and use his legs, but he's not a running QB per se. He's far more likely to try to keep a passing option if he breaks from the pocket than try to run it. He did take off more against the Packers with some results, but I think Flores and the defense can keep him under wraps for the most part.

The game will probably be close, but I could see the Vikings run away with it too if the offense avoids mistakes and penalties.

I'm going to go with

Vikings - 21
Bears - 17

[cmoss84]

If Swift plays we lose (24-17). If he doesn't, we squeak it out (20-17).

[VikingsVictorious]

ESPN had us as 99.9% favorite to win. How do we blow that?

[CharVike]

ESPN had us as 99.9% favorite to win. How do we blow that?

It ain't over yet. Haven't seen you post lately welcome.

[CharVike]

Won 3 straight road games. We played some sloppy ball but a win is a win. Darnold made some clutch plays. I give the guy a ton of credit. Mullens comes in and 1st down toss. Seems like he has done that before. I thought for sure we blew that one. Our D was shredded at the end but made the stop in OT to give us a chance and Sammy delivered. Good win.

[VikingLord]

Some questionable decisions by KOC in that game starting with the decision to go for it on 4th-and-1 at the Bears 31 (?) yard line in the 2nd half. I thought if he was going to go for it the sneak would be the best playcall. But the best call would have been to take the 3 points on the road. I know he was trying to stay aggressive and maybe catch the Bears off guard, but that single decision (and resulting failure to convert) nearly cost his team the game. I hope he learns from that.

Likewise, the decision to kick it short late in the 4th also proved foolish. Again, KOC is trying to be strategic and run clock, which I get, but there is a risk of a big return that nearly went for a TD. Not sure what is more significant - burning a few extra seconds of clock versus a dagger on the return, but man, he ended up setting the Bears up for success late. IMHO, risk with little reward late is a recipe for disaster.

Lastly, on the onside, I mean the guys up front have to be aware of what the ball is doing. I understand the desire to be aggressive there, but that ball might very well never have gone 10 yards and the Bears cannot touch it before it goes 10 yards. Just blindly going forward and trying to block Bears players without any apparent awareness of what the ball is actually doing is something they clearly need to work on. Little mistake again with huge implications at the end of a game the Vikings should have won comfortably.

This is another game where I really wondered what Darnold was doing for most of the game. He has time on most dropbacks, but he just won't release the ball and it costs the offense. Later in the game and into OT he started to be more decisive and had better timing and it made all the difference. Just do not understand if he's being coached to be uber conservative or he's not trusting what he's seeing but he made the Bears defense look much better than it actually is IMHO.

Refs continue to amaze me with what they call against us versus what they miss against us. Two missed calls stood out today - the hit out of bounds on Powell's return and the no-call on pass interference against Addison on the deep ball he still managed to catch in the deep middle that put them at the Bear 2 yard line. Both clear fouls and no call on either play. Addison managed to catch the ball in his case but that was just a great play on his part despite the clear foul. Do not understand why the refs keep missing this stuff.

Last comment is about the announcers. I understand they are impressed with the Bears and that the Bears have some cause for optimism, but my God, it seems like all they could do was wax the Bears all day. Barely credited the Vikings for anything if they even talked about them. I get it if we're listening to home announcers, but this was Daryl Johnston and another national announcer. Yuck. Almost hit mute except I liked hearing the crowd react to good Vikings plays. Lots of Vikings fans there.

Vikings continue to squeak out games against subpar competition. They are wins and for the most part I feel like the Vikings have been the better team in these wins, but they are still not putting complete games together. They are 9-2 and in great position, but are clearly going to have to play better if they want to finish the season strong.

[SunyP]

ESPN had us as 99.9% favorite to win. How do we blow that?

ST!

[Cliff]

Some questionable decisions by KOC in that game starting with the decision to go for it on 4th-and-1 at the Bears 31 (?) yard line in the 2nd half. I thought if he was going to go for it the sneak would be the best playcall. But the best call would have been to take the 3 points on the road. I know he was trying to stay aggressive and maybe catch the Bears off guard, but that single decision (and resulting failure to convert) nearly cost his team the game. I hope he learns from that.

With the way things went obviously you're right, but I didn't have any problem with it at the time. I'm not sure I agree with him needing to learn a lesson from it, the Vikings have gone for it on 4th down only 7 times this season which is tied for 2nd least. So it's not like he's doing it all the time or anything. Taking a gamble every now and again to try to put the game away is ok by me.

Likewise, the decision to kick it short late in the 4th also proved foolish. Again, KOC is trying to be strategic and run clock, which I get, but there is a risk of a big return that nearly went for a TD. Not sure what is more significant - burning a few extra seconds of clock versus a dagger on the return, but man, he ended up setting the Bears up for success late. IMHO, risk with little reward late is a recipe for disaster.

If it was on purpose I agree. Though it's hard to know if the short punt was on purpose. Sometimes kickers just mess up. The theory is sound at least, the ball having high hangtime should result in the kicking team getting down the field by the time the ball lands and stopping the return. I also am not a fan of the "run the clock out" mentality towards the end of games in general. At least not to the extent that KOC does it. Even if it has actually mostly worked

This is another game where I really wondered what Darnold was doing for most of the game. He has time on most dropbacks, but he just won't release the ball and it costs the offense. Later in the game and into OT he started to be more decisive and had better timing and it made all the difference. Just do not understand if he's being coached to be uber conservative or he's not trusting what he's seeing but he made the Bears defense look much better than it actually is IMHO.

I think the team just runs a lot of plays that take a while to develop. I do agree that he does that sometimes. He takes a while to decide if he's going to check down or not specifically but I like the way he at least looks for the longer throw first. He's kind of like Kirk Cousins with balls. Kirk is very quick to check down and I don't want that either.

Refs continue to amaze me with what they call against us versus what they miss against us. Two missed calls stood out today - the hit out of bounds on Powell's return and the no-call on pass interference against Addison on the deep ball he still managed to catch in the deep middle that put them at the Bear 2 yard line. Both clear fouls and no call on either play. Addison managed to catch the ball in his case but that was just a great play on his part despite the clear foul. Do not understand why the refs keep missing this stuff.

Yes! The guy was literally riding Addison's back before the ball got there. The holds the Bears got away with were crazy too. Guys literally holding onto defender's arms. I did feel like they missed some calls in the Vikings favor too though, so it kind of balanced out.

Last comment is about the announcers. I understand they are impressed with the Bears and that the Bears have some cause for optimism, but my God, it seems like all they could do was wax the Bears all day. Barely credited the Vikings for anything if they even talked about them. I get it if we're listening to home announcers, but this was Daryl Johnston and another national announcer. Yuck. Almost hit mute except I liked hearing the crowd react to good Vikings plays. Lots of Vikings fans there.

My god yes. They were all over the Bears' junk. I watch on Sunday Ticket and it'd be nice to be able to choose which announcers you listen to.

Vikings continue to squeak out games against subpar competition. They are wins and for the most part I feel like the Vikings have been the better team in these wins, but they are still not putting complete games together. They are 9-2 and in great position, but are clearly going to have to play better if they want to finish the season strong.

I think we get caught up in what the Lions are doing to some teams and it skews perspective. Or at least I've fallen into that category a time or two. But the Vikings are 4th in point differential and it's not like they've blown out any teams 50-0 to skew that stat. They're 6th in points per game and 5th in opponents points per game. They're not really squeaking by in the context of the entire league over the course of the season.

Some of the games have definitely been closer than they should have been, but there's also been some fluky plays that have caused that. The only onside kick to be recovered all season. Aaron Jones fumbling at the goal line; Jones has fumbled the same amount that the Bears have had FG's blocked. So many of the turnovers happening in the red zone has to be a record. Even Darnold throwing 3 INTs in one game, that's not something that happens all the time or anything.

At any rate, they came off a 3 game stretch on the road where most expected them to drop at least one game. Just like at the beginning of the year where they were supposed to start 0-5 or 1-4. They keep exceeding expectations and the wins somehow still aren't good enough. Not that you're saying they're not, just in general it seems to be the consensus. They aren't stomping teams into the ground so they're "pretenders".

[VikingLord]

With the way things went obviously you're right, but I didn't have any problem with it at the time.

It was the playcall more than the fact he went for it on 4th down. Could have (and should have) just run the QB sneak. No need to do a drop back pass there.

At any rate, they came off a 3 game stretch on the road where most expected them to drop at least one game. Just like at the beginning of the year where they were supposed to start 0-5 or 1-4. They keep exceeding expectations and the wins somehow still aren't good enough. Not that you're saying they're not, just in general it seems to be the consensus. They aren't stomping teams into the ground so they're "pretenders".

I think what bothers me about the Vikings is they should be so much better and winning by wider margins. I mean, this is a talented team. The offense has a lot of great players and yet somehow they're like 15th on offense. The defense makes up for it which is shocking as I expected it would the the offense carrying the team's water this year while the defense tried to hold it's own. In fact, it is the reverse of that so far this year apart from the first 2-3 games of the season where the offense actually looked the part.

Of course, there are times when the offense moves it like they're capable of and I think "OK, they've finally gotten it figured out", only to then watch them come out and string several fruitless drives together.

Not sure who or what is to blame for those stretches, but this is a 9-2 team that I think is very fortunate to have that record.

[chicagopurple]

I find Darnold looking unflappable lately. He has been getting pressured, knocked around, etc and he remains calm and doesnt do anything to excessive or stupid. He does not just settle for meaningless short check down passes like Cousins. I really didnt expect much out of him given his past and I have been really pleased with what the team has gotten out of him.
Anyone have a clue about why JJ was missing in action all day?
Our TEs continue to get the job done on passing routes.
Running by committee also seems to e working. The Bears traditionally have a pretty tight run defense but we ground out some good yardage.
SO, overall, we squeaked out 3 road victories....against middling/bottom teams. Dont look a gift horse in the mouth. Now we are Home and the Vikes need to prove that they are the real deal against some decent teams.

[CharVike]

I find Ponder looking unflappable lately. He has been getting pressured, knocked around, etc and he remains calm and doesnt do anything to excessive or stupid. He does not just settle for meaningless short check down passes like Cousins. I really didnt expect much out of him given his past and I have been really pleased with what the team has gotten out of him.
Anyone have a clue about why JJ was missing in action all day?
Our TEs continue to get the job done on passing routes.
Running by committee also seems to e working. The Bears traditionally have a pretty tight run defense but we ground out some good yardage.
SO, overall, we squeaked out 3 road victories....against middling/bottom teams. Dont look a gift horse in the mouth. Now we are Home and the Vikes need to prove that they are the real deal against some decent teams.

JJ was being covered by one of the top cover CB's in the NFL. He got a few PI calls but I imagine the game plan was whoever that CB was covering better look some place else. I wouldn't call the Bears bottom feeders. They have a dam good defense and since they lost their run stuffing DT they have been giving up more rushing yards. I'd take their CBs over ours. I wouldn't call AZ a decent team because their OL is bad. You won't beat a team with a top defensive front with that piece of crap OL they put out there. Darnold has every physical skill. Our OL has been slacking again so he will take a pounding and might get knocked out before the season is over. I've seen us many times over the past 5 decades loose to teams we should have beat. We all would like a 45-0 game but they don't come around very often. Packers beat them by 1 point. The Commanders beat them on a hail Mary. They can play with any team because that D is tough. We shot ourselves in the foot again. Like fumbling a TD away on the opening drive. That had nothing to do with Sammy. Our OL got whipped and Jones tried to break through. That goes on our OL. They need to start trying more.

[VikingLord]

I find Ponder looking unflappable lately. He has been getting pressured, knocked around, etc and he remains calm and doesnt do anything to excessive or stupid. He does not just settle for meaningless short check down passes like Cousins. I really didnt expect much out of him given his past and I have been really pleased with what the team has gotten out of him.
Anyone have a clue about why JJ was missing in action all day?
Our TEs continue to get the job done on passing routes.
Running by committee also seems to e working. The Bears traditionally have a pretty tight run defense but we ground out some good yardage.
SO, overall, we squeaked out 3 road victories....against middling/bottom teams. Dont look a gift horse in the mouth. Now we are Home and the Vikes need to prove that they are the real deal against some decent teams.

I had to do a doubletake when I first read your post Chicago. I was thinking "Did I miss an announcement that Ponder came out of retirement and maybe the Vikings signed him?!?!?" I was having some disturbing flashbacks for a second there...

Yeah, Darnold is interesting. There are like two versions of him - the safer version who seems reluctant to release the ball and struggles to get into a passing rhythm, and the more aggressive version who has good pace and timing and isn't afraid to let it fly. The safer version coincides with the Vikings offense struggling mightily to move the chains and sustain drives and is generally when Darnold is taking sacks and forced to scramble, while the aggressive version is when the Vikings seem to move it quite easily and rip off big chunk passing plays.

Whatever it is, Darnold is clearly capable of playing at a high level and being very effective. KOC just has to figure out how to get and keep him there for a whole game.

As for JJ, it's hard to tell how the Bears defended him, but it's likely Addison benefited from whatever they were doing to JJ, and that is honestly a great sign when a team has other receivers who can step up in those situations and make the defense pay. Addison has looked like a first round pick these last two games. I think after this last game it's more likely the Cardinals will have to pay more attention to him, which should free JJ up more. Also, the arrival of TJ Hockenson cannot be understated. He's been huge too. The Bears struggled to defend him as well.