Thread: What we need to improve on, and what went wrong.

Ok, lets start this:

1. Where was our offense you might ask. It was out with injury. Can we count how many of those false start penalties were committed by replacement linemen or the guy replacing Jimmy K? Lets just say a good share of them, because I do not know the exact amount. In my mind the offensive line was what lost us the game. How many times did we get to the red zone? How many times was there a holding or false start call within 30 yards? What pulled back the Culpepper TD?

2. The D needs to be agressive, we are giving up too much underneath. Send the safties back in a zone if they want to defend the deep ball, but keep windfield and williams up close. We are giving up way too much underneath.

3. Let the offense get agressive. Yes, the short game was working to work us up the field, but we are not a team that does that. We are an explosive team. We knew that they would be ready for Moss, so we changed our plan, big mistake. Make them adjust to us, don't adjust to them. The offense was not managed well this game.

4. Coaching staff. Two calls, the fumble on the line, and the TO TD pass. Both of them could have been challenged, and could have been turned around. Those alone would have won us the game.

5. MICHAEL BENNETT WE NEED YOU!!!!!!!!!!!

6. Refs, I know that bad calls happen all the time, and this is in no way an excuse. Many of the holding calls were marginal, many other calls during the game were questionable too. But I say again, the main reasons we lost are stated from 1-5 above.

Places I DO NOT place the blame:

1. Daunte, look at his numbers, he did a hell of a job. The fumble was no good, but sh*t happens, I still think he was in anyway. And his arm was whacked on the INT. He did a damn good job though, very accurate, great completion percentage, keep it up. Same with Moss, he did all he could too. He was even trying to pump up the team with little time left in the 4th quarter, very mature showing.

2. Defense as a whole. The players did well, the coaches were the ones that messed that up. The defense did plenty to give the offense chances to take a lead, the offense just didn't follow up because of them going offsides and not playing like they are used to.

Things that need to improve:

Offensive Line - I can't remember the last time I saw the Vikes line play that bad. Onterrio didn't have much to work with, and the pass protection was horrible.

Stupid Penalties - Alot of dumb penalties called by the refs didn't happen. but the Vikes earned at least 3 for every one bad call.

Defense(3rd downs) - I thought the D played well but it seemes like as soon as they got them on 3rd down, they quit.

Things I thought were good:

Daunte - I thought played really well considering how badly the line played. Out of all the players on the team I think he had the best game(which, too be fair, isn't saying much).

Receivers - The receivers did a decent job of getting open with the short time that Daunte had. Wiggins made some big 3rd down catches, Burleson made some good plays, and Campbell made a nice play to get open when Daunte was scrambling. I, also thought Moss didn't have a bad game, but I gotta expect more out of the best receiver ( and arguably the best player) in the NFL.

One more thing, special teams were god awful. From punts to kickoffs to coverage. The only bright spot I saw was Mewelde Moore on returns. he did a good, not great, job.

I agree with Claiborne that the third down performance of the Vikes D left much to be desired. My own philosophy is that stopping a team on first and second down doesn't mean sh*t if you can't stop them from converting on third down. The D might as well conserve energy wasted on the first two downs if they aren't going to get the ball back for the offense. That said, the Vikes D did do enough for the offense to win the game...but we all know what happened there.

Coaching & red-zone execution:

After having had time to reflect a bit, not getting the ball in the end zone early when they had first and goal from the 2 yard line is pathetic. Not going for it from the 1 on 4th down was also surprising given Tice's former philosophy on this. Against a team like the Eagles and given our suspect defense, that decision and lack of execution early I believe was telling. If you're at the 1 yard line, why not sneak Culpepper driving straight up the middle?
Not challenging the T.Owens TD was unforgiveable.


The defense:

How about some linebacker coverage on the screens?!
Very soft over the shallow middle as evidenced in the Dallas game and tonight here again.
And the line .. pressure on the QB? Again, pretty much non existent. Stopping the run .. not very good here either.

Kicking game:
One thing is for certain though, Elling must go!
Kickoff coverage also seems to be a glaring problem
Andersen seems solid from 40 and in.

Kudos to Wiggins who played very well. The secondary also played better than expected. Culpepper I think did a nice job given what he had to work with tonight.

Wiggins kicked ass

"Kleinsasser40" wrote:

Ok, lets start this:

1. Where was our offense you might ask. It was out with injury. Can we count how many of those false start penalties were committed by replacement linemen or the guy replacing Jimmy K? Lets just say a good share of them, because I do not know the exact amount. In my mind the offensive line was what lost us the game. How many times did we get to the red zone? How many times was there a holding or false start call within 30 yards? What pulled back the Culpepper TD?

2. The D needs to be agressive, we are giving up too much underneath. Send the safties back in a zone if they want to defend the deep ball, but keep windfield and williams up close. We are giving up way too much underneath.

3. Let the offense get agressive. Yes, the short game was working to work us up the field, but we are not a team that does that. We are an explosive team. We knew that they would be ready for Moss, so we changed our plan, big mistake. Make them adjust to us, don't adjust to them. The offense was not managed well this game.

4. Coaching staff. Two calls, the fumble on the line, and the TO TD pass. Both of them could have been challenged, and could have been turned around. Those alone would have won us the game.

5. MICHAEL BENNETT WE NEED YOU!!!!!!!!!!!

6. Refs, I know that bad calls happen all the time, and this is in no way an excuse. Many of the holding calls were marginal, many other calls during the game were questionable too. But I say again, the main reasons we lost are stated from 1-5 above.

Places I DO NOT place the blame:

1. Daunte, look at his numbers, he did a hell of a job. The fumble was no good, but sh*t happens, I still think he was in anyway. And his arm was whacked on the INT. He did a damn good job though, very accurate, great completion percentage, keep it up. Same with Moss, he did all he could too. He was even trying to pump up the team with little time left in the 4th quarter, very mature showing.

2. Defense as a whole. The players did well, the coaches were the ones that messed that up. The defense did plenty to give the offense chances to take a lead, the offense just didn't follow up because of them going offsides and not playing like they are used to.

I agree 100% about penalties, they killed us especially the o-line. The Vikings need to stop making stupid mistakes like that on the road. This seems to happen whenever they get behind in road games.

I missed Bennett too, but Onterrio Smith actually did a very good job. He made some awesome runs, it's a shame he wasn't used more often. Only 10 carries...that really surprises me. The Vikings attempted 47 passes but only 11 runs if you don't count all the times Daunte scrambled. He had 8 runs. I think failing to establish the run kind of screwed us too, although the Eagles didn't run the ball that much either. It was really a passing contest.

Our front 7 have speed, this we know. But underneath coverage by the LBs will come with time. Two of those guys are still pretty inexperienced, and I think we will see that improve as the season goes by. I fully expected us to be weak underneath, playing an efficient WCO like Philly with our young LBs. But there is no reason why we should not get more pressure on the QB with our front 4. If Hovan wants a future in Minnesota he needs to step up. Williams and Udeze still look good. Getting back Mixon will help too.

One bright spot on D...Antoine Winfield did his job. TO was limited to 4 catches for 79 yards, with 45 of those yards coming on that TD catch that the entire country except the Philly refs know was bogus. Take that crap away, and it's TO with 3 catches for 34 yards. Not too bad since he was expected to torch our secondary.

And you're right about Daunte. Actually I consider Daunte to be the one thing going right for our offense. Did you see how many times he escaped a sack? THere were several times I thought for sure they would take him down but he stayed on his feet. Philly really brought the pressure, so that's what hurt our deep pass attack. Bad thing is, other teams know this and will probably be more aggressive with us now.

"Kleinsasser40" wrote:

Ok, lets start this:

1. Where was our offense you might ask. It was out with injury. Can we count how many of those false start penalties were committed by replacement linemen or the guy replacing Jimmy K? Lets just say a good share of them, because I do not know the exact amount. In my mind the offensive line was what lost us the game. How many times did we get to the red zone? How many times was there a holding or false start call within 30 yards? What pulled back the Culpepper TD?

Ummmm...didn't I get ripped on for suggesting injuries played a part in the Packer loss?

i dont use it as exxcuse they stuggle on the road and philly is a tough spot to try to break there stuggles

Man the Offense looked great. We had the ball more we were getting first downs and considering the monster pass rush we did a great job. We shouldn't have abandoned the run so early. It was effective and would have continued to be when they were running blitz packages.

The D did ok. I think Cotrell isn't letting them play. He has harnesses on them. Better pass rush this week. They moved the O-line backwards and even got a couple sacks on a very elusive Qb.

Special teams ukeright:

Just a lot of mistakes, a lot of new people that had limited Play time. And one great Dfensive performance for the Eagles.

Things to realize are:
We held them to a fairly decent score.
Pepper can't hit Moss deep when he is running for his life. The pass rush was insane and that is why the deep ball didn't fly.

"LosAngelis" wrote:

"Kleinsasser40" wrote:

Ok, lets start this:

1. Where was our offense you might ask. It was out with injury. Can we count how many of those false start penalties were committed by replacement linemen or the guy replacing Jimmy K? Lets just say a good share of them, because I do not know the exact amount. In my mind the offensive line was what lost us the game. How many times did we get to the red zone? How many times was there a holding or false start call within 30 yards? What pulled back the Culpepper TD?

Ummmm...didn't I get ripped on for suggesting injuries played a part in the Packer loss?

Yeah, you did. I'm not blaming the loss on injury though. I am saying that the people subing for the usual starters (subing for Rosenthal and Kleiny) made a pretty bad showing. Injurys happen, we did not lose because of them, we lost because of the bad playing of the people who were supposed to fill those spots in the case of injury.