Written By Sam Ekstrom
We’re halfway through the 2014 football season, and we’ve learned a few lessons about the Vikings along the way: the team is definitely worse without Adrian Peterson, Teddy Bridgewater may not be the second coming of Joe Montana quite yet, Mike Zimmer’s defense is going to be really good once he’s done molding it, Murphy’s Law is always applicable to the Minnesota Vikings, the Brian Robison and Kyle Rudolph contracts extensions may have been pre-mature, and if Michael Oher blocked as poorly as Matt Kalil has, there would not have been a Blind Side movie.
With all that in mind, let’s take a look at the Vikings’ mid-season report card, which examines three areas: offense, defense and special teams.
OFFENSE: D
The Vikings’ 558-yard, 41-point outburst in Week 4 against Atlanta appears to have been either a fluke or an act of God. Since, the Vikings have scored 10, 3, 16 and 19 points, respectively. They’ve lost three of those four games, and rookie Teddy Bridgewater has looked uncomfortable, what with the shoddy offensive line, an apparent lack of receivers that can get open, and did I mention an atrocious offensive line?
Matt Kalil has regressed for the second consecutive year and has played a huge role in the 28 sacks allowed, the second-highest total in the league. Football Outsiders, an advanced stats website, ranks the Vikings as the second-worst team in the league at pass protection. Hence, Bridgewater has been thrust into a tough spot where he must either sit in the pocket and get slammed or flee the pocket and get slammed, which he elected to do against Atlanta and sprained his ankle.
Norv Turner has been disappointingly blasé as the offensive coordinator in his first year with the team, though most would agree his hands have been tied by the O-line’s incompetence. The Vikings are one of only two teams in the NFL not averaging at least 200 yards passing per game. Pitiful downfield passing aside, even the shortest throws haven’t yielded good results. For the most part, explosive receiver Cordarrelle Patterson has been a non-factor in the offense, which is egregious. Patterson was expected to have a break-out, Pro Bowl caliber season after finishing his rookie year with nine touchdowns, but the results haven’t come. Patterson has just two touchdowns.
“Everybody’s got to do a better job of getting open,” said Patterson. “We’d like to do everything we can to get open and just beat man coverage and beat everything the defense is throwing at us.”
The Vikings are fourth-worst in scoring offense across the NFL (17.4 ppg). They’ve lacked a downfield passing game, as evidenced by their low mark of 12 plays amassing 25 yards or more. That puts them on pace for 24 “big plays,” the same number they had last year.
Turner diagnosed the low point outputs in his Thursday press conference.
“The number one thing is, obviously, you can’t have negative plays,” said Turner. “You can’t turn the ball over, you can’t have sacks. Obviously, we did a better job of that last week … if you get to a point where you’re comfortable with not turning the ball over and doing a good job of protecting and getting the run game going, then the way you’re going to score points is make big plays. There’s four, five plays, as I said, in the [Tampa Bay] game, that we had a chance to make plays over 25, 30 yards, and we didn’t make as many of them as we could’ve. If you’re going to score more points, you’re going to make big plays at some point.”
In fairness, the offense has been marred by injury. Adrian Peterson is out for the indefinite future, tight end Kyle Rudolph is rehabbing from a hernia and out through the bye week, and right guard Brandon Fusco is out for the year with a pectoral injury. Jerick McKinnon, Chase Ford and Vladimir Ducasse have all filled in decently, but none are as good as the men they are replacing.
The first eight games have been rough. As Bridgewater gets accustomed to the NFL game, maybe things will improve. A lot rides on Bridgewater, and though it’s not his fault, fans have grown very impatient since the Christian Ponder fiasco. They want Bridgewater to be good immediately and prove his first-round worth. Tough to do that, though, with the current circumstances.
DEFENSE: B-
With the exception of a Thursday night game in Green Bay, the Vikings’ defense – which gave up the most points in the league last season – has been above average.
The defensive line has been fearsome with Everson Griffen rushing off the edge; he has eight sacks and earned NFC Defensive Player of the Month honors for October. Rookie Anthony Barr has absolutely proved his worth as the no. 9 overall pick in the draft, and he single-handedly beat the Buccaneers last Sunday with an overtime forced fumble and subsequent return for a touchdown. Most encouraging, at least to this writer, has to be the pass defense, which is fourth in the league after finishing 31st last season.
They’ve had stretches, however, where things didn’t look so keen. The third-down defense has been shoddy at times, particularly in big spots (New Orleans and Buffalo games). Opposing offenses have imposed their will early in several games to create deficits (Green Bay and Detroit). The defense also collapsed down the stretch against the Bills to lose in the final seconds, then did their best to lose in Tampa last week before the offense executed a two-minute drill to avert the crisis.
While each level of the defense is anchored by a quality star – Griffen on the D-line, Chad Greenway at linebacker and Harrison Smith at free safety – there are still weak links at several positions. Second-year defensive tackle Sharrif Floyd doesn’t seem to be that much better than journeyman Tom Johnson, who has five sacks in a rotational role. Middle linebacker Jasper Brinkley earned the starting spot out of training camp but is certainly not a part of the long-term vision. And strong safety Robert Blanton, who beat out the likes of Jamarca Sanford, Chris Crocker and Mistral Raymond to win the job, often appears to be late on the scene, which might explain how he leads the team in tackles.
Zimmer, however, explains that he likes the process of molding young, raw players because they are so malleable.
“One of the reasons I like young guys is because I like to be able to teach them what I want them to know, and not what they’ve known in the past,” said Zimmer. “I’m not saying what I’m teaching is right or wrong, it’s just the way we do it, and we’re able to get them to think the way we think.
“Sometimes the maturation process of young players takes a little bit longer.”
What’s encouraging is that Zimmer has insatiably high expectations for the defense. If they shut out an opponent, Zimmer would say they gave up too many points. That’s how nit-picky he is. He’s a quiet man who usually exercises word economy unless he gets talking about his team-defense gospel, which you can read about in depth here.
There are some unbelievable pieces to build around with Barr, Griffen and Smith. This defense could be a top-10 product by the time the season is over, or at the latest, next season.
SPECIAL TEAMS: C-
This low grade is mainly because of regression. Cordarrelle Patterson had the best kick return average in the NFL last year, and Marcus Sherels had the second-best punt return average. This year, Patterson has dropped to 10th and Sherels is down to 14th with no return touchdowns between the two of them.
Punter Jeff Locke has subtly had a bad first half of the season, too. He is 26th in net punt yardage, which subtracts return yardage from punt distance. His punts don’t seem to have the hangtime they should, and he struggles with judging distance on precision punts. Remember, punters don’t want touchbacks – they’d rather pin a team inside the 20-yard line. Locke has four touchbacks, including one at the end of the Buffalo game that gave the Bills life for their game-winning drive.
The special teams units have also had their fair share of penalties, which forced Vikings coaches to address the team after the Tampa Bay game.
“The frustrating thing for me is the penalties this year,” said special teams coordinator Mike Priefer. “We were not penalized very often last year, and this year we have been, and that’s been tough. We’ve lost a lot of hidden yardage … When you’re an error-repeater, you’re going to run out of chances at some point.”
It probably hurts that Priefer missed practice time and two regular season games due to a suspension in September, but field position is critical in this league, especially on a team that’s defensively oriented. Things have to improve in that area. The young special teams unit has to improve eventually.
————
In order to make the playoffs, the Vikings would likely have to finish the season 7-1, which is probably a wild fantasy. The second half of the season is all about progress. Can Bridgewater look like a quality quarterback week in and week out? Can the offensive line reduce the amount of sacks? Can the defense play at the same level for all four quarters?
The first half of the season was crazy from an off-the-field standpoint: multiple nightclub altercations, indictments, arrests, trials, suspensions, even kidney stones for the head coach. Point being: It probably can’t get more hectic, more patchwork or more uncertain than this for Coach Zimmer.
The Vikings have to hope they’ve used up their quota for drama. Not just for this year but for the next decade.
Sam Ekstrom is a staff writer for Cold Omaha at 105 The Ticket. He has previously served as a play-by-play broadcaster in Iowa and South Dakota and has covered Minnesota sports since 2012. Follow him on Twitter @SamEkstrom for further insights.