SKOL!!

Great game yesterday, beating the pack by 16 in the season opener!

Some thoughts:

We still have a gaping hole at C and everyone in the organization knows it now. Its too bad they didn't know this in the off season so they could address that.

Ingram is overmatched vs good NFL starting D linemen at RG currently. I hope he improves quickly. My eye test says he was even worse than Bradbury was yesterday.

JJ looks like the best WR in the NFL right now.

Like him or not, Cousins is damn good at throwing accurate passes when he gets a little time. With all the weapons he has, this offense could be outstanding if we get some interior O line pass blocking.

The D did fantastic by only giving up 7 points to the pukers, but they were without their two starting OTs and their best WR. Also, they could have had a lot more points if not for the goal line stand and the dropped pass that would have been a long TD, so this could have easily been a close game.

On the bright side, our pass rush looked great. I think if Z Smith & Hunter can stay healthy all season, they are going to cause a lot of problems for our opponents. And neither of our top two draft picks played. We could have a deep secondary if they get healthy and are as good as advertised.

Every team in the NFL has holes. We have a lot of high end talent. If the right players stay healthy, this has a chance to be a great season for the Vikes.

Darrisaw looks like he could be a stud.

Yes. Trent Williams agrees: https://www.twincities.com/2022/08/1...myself-in-him/

lol

https://twitter.com/PFF/status/15690...rkdmEkAcNbNSGQ

Excited about our GM. However, Kirk is the highest paid little bitch i've ever seen with mine two eyes. The fact that we extended him through next year is distressing. I know OL play is partly to blame, but still it's clear we'll never have a chance at SB with him at the helm, so I'm regretfully unsubscribing from following Vikings games until he's gone. Hardly the behavior of a true fan, but I've endured 30 years of this bullshit and now know when to cut my losses.

What happened with thielen? Hardly any targets yesterday

8-1! Despite not winning easy (except for vs the pack), all this team does is win. They never think they're out of a game and they never give up. We have a chance to do some damage in the playoffs if we keep this up and stay healthy.

JJ's catch vs BUF could be the greatest catch in NFL history. What a wild game. Its amazing to come out on top of a game like that.

Yet somehow Vikes still open as dogs at home vs Cowboys. I guess a big part of that is so many Cowboys homers bet on them no matter the line.

2 Things come to mind:

1) Is Darrisaw playing? Back up tackle vs Parsons could be tough

2) Major let down spot after such an emotionally high win. Think of the Minneapolis miracle then the philly game.

I have to think that if all things were equal, the vikes would be -3 vs the cowboys at home.

538 has us favored by 1. I imagine DAL is getting a lot of $$ bet on them. I'm guessing when the smart money starts coming in, the betting odds will change.

1 - could be a big deal, especially vs a good edge rusher, although Brandle held his own ok vs BUF.

2 - maybe. I hope not. If they are going to do anything in the playoffs, they are going to have to let go of emotions from the previous week and focus on the team they're playing. Aside from the PHI game this year (and of course that came after the big win vs GB), they've done ok at that.

Football Outsiders thinks Dallas is something like 6 point favorites on a neutral field. PFF has the Cowboys as 1 point road favorites.

The season has been a blast thus far and I hope it continues to be but there is a lot of evidence to suggest that the Vikings are running very hot.

I see Kirk Cousins is rounding into mid-season form nicely.

pretty much this

The NE game was pretty good at the end. It was frustrating to watch the defense fail drive after drive prior to the 4th quarter, but at least they tightened up when they needed to. They need to blitz more imo.

Whatever we did to alleviate pressure on Cousins worked sort of ok. The RG and C still suck **** though. Hopefully Darrisaw will heal up and be 100% for the rest of the season. We need him. Brandel isn't bad for a backup, but Darrisaw is very good, possibly all-pro.

Jefferson might be the best player in the NFL. WRs never win MVP awards, but he might get some votes. Some of the catches he's making remind me of Moss.

PFF thinks the dropoff from Darrisaw to Brandel is... significant.



Here is what they think of the other three guys:

I had always thought that PFF were experts. I do not break down plays and watch every player individually on every play like they do, but I have a hard time believing Bradbury is the 10th best C in the NFL. He might be less bad than he used to be. He might make some good blocks once in a while. But when his assignment is to block a good, physically strong defensive lineman, he still gets pushed around like he's a 10 lb sack of potatoes. Is anyone else seeing what I am with regards to this guy?

We seem to have hit the jackpot with Darrisaw - we were extremely lucky that the Raiders took Leatherwood ahead of Darrisaw. I hope he recovers from the concussion symptoms 100% asap. I am a little concerned.

O'Neill & Cleveland seem to me to be pretty decent players. I remember one specific play from the Jets game when it seemed like their whole D line was on top of Cousins about 1 second after the snap. I rewound it and saw that the Jets sent 5 pass rushers. Brandel, Bradbury and Igram all blocked NO ONE AT ALL on the play - zero resistance from any of the three of them. O'Neill & Cleveland at least blocked their guys. 3 Jets smothered Cousins on the play for a sack.

On the subject of Cousins getting hammered way too often - this guy takes a serious beating basically every game and he never gets hurt. That might be his best attribute. I think the only game he missed since he's been with the team was the one he missed last season due to COVID-19.

i swore off vikings for as long as kirk was qb, but whatever, don't go 10-2 often

pretty hilarious vegas rates us as equal to the detroit lions at this point even with darrisaw coming back. i'm not saying they're wrong, just pretty funny and illustrative of how little of a superbowl chance we have for a 10-2 team. our only hope seems to be catching 49ers in divisional round with no jimmy g and having cowboys or some darker horse beat the eagles so we can host nfccg. only chance i see.

then again, i would've laid 50-1 odds against a vikings comeback in buffalo down three scores and we saw how that turned out. maybe they have heart, but i suspect kirk returns to form as a rotting pumpkin fairly soon and this season goes down as another what if (e.g. what if teddy was our qb and we had cap space to round out what could've been an elite defense)

coaching seems good, so that's encouraging. there's at least an eye toward clock management at end of halves, and we are on the other side of every one-score game this season. it's mostly variance, i'm sure, but going from 6-8 last year under zimmer to 9-0 in one score games this year has to be in some part game management.

massive bias here, probably, but jefferson is making the strongest case for a WR as MVP that i've ever seen. disappointing he's not in contention just because he's not under center.

Special Teams seem to have regressed a lot as the season goes on. They started out looking very good.

Am I the only one that isn’t convinced that this years team is better than last years?

Vikes now have a negative point differential

Vikings have the same point differential this year as last.

Good game today Vikes but you're still frauds.

Need to win out to get 2 seed, basically no chance the 9ers lose and they have the better conference record with only 2 conference losses vs our 3.

11-3 > 7-7.

I don't know about "no chance", because **** happens and upsets can happen in any game, but yeah, they probably do go 3-0.

I have no idea what our team is going to do at any time, but 11-3 is nice. What a game vs the Colts! Good thing my heart is in good shape lol.

Duke Sheely had the best PFF score on the Vikes this last game. He made a couple of great tackles and did pretty well in coverage too. He looks like he's better than any of our other CBs aside from PP. Nice pickup.