Thread: Where Does the Vikings' Center Rank Among the NFL's Best? (Bleacher Report)

5. John Sullivan, Minnesota Vikings

Perhaps a surprise as a top-five center, but John Sullivan was incredible in 2011. He rarely missed assignments and was dominant in run blocking. He's a legitimate up-and-comer after four seasons.

B/R NFL 1,000: Top 32 Centers | Bleacher Report

Sure have seen alot of good stuff about Sully of late (and not all in Caine's beloved Bleacher Report).

This is Bleacher Report... but I've been seeing people talking up Sully this offseason. I'm gonna have to rewatch a few games and pay close attention. I don't remember being blown away by the guy this season.

Originally Posted by Mr Anderson

This is Bleacher Report... but I've been seeing people talking up Sully this offseason. I'm gonna have to rewatch a few games and pay close attention. I don't remember being blown away by the guy this season.

I actually graded him out pretty well this year and I watched him with a pretty critical eye especially considering the initial comments from the new OL Coach/O-coord with respect to what blocking scheme they were going to run.

I was 100% convinced we were going to see him struggle, but truth be told, they ran alot of zone blocking last year, which I didn't think they were going to do.

Remember, at first they kept talking about how they were going to move away from the ZB'ng scheme, which Sully fits pretty well, to a more traditional, hat on hat/man up scheme, which he doesn't.

Sully definitely is getting much better. I think a least with him in the top 5 in the league might be a stretch ... but I think feeling comfortable with him going forward is fine.

He DEFINITELY was better in 2011 than he was in 2010. Lets hope that improvement continues.

To be fair to him trying to follow someone like Birk was a hard job and some do expect no drop off when you replace a pro-bowler. Actually on reflection we've been lucky in years prior to Sully with both Birk and Christie ( who many thought that Birk couldn't replace ).
So to have a center who is not, at the moment, Pro-Bowl material is something we're not used to but doesn't mean that he can't still be a solid player.

Where does our receiving corps rank in the NFL? Sorry, I had to....

He'll be even better when he has Matt Kalil lined up next to him.
Matt's brother, Ryan Kalil, is probably the best center in the NFL right now.

I hope he got better because in the past he was suspect at best in almost every phase of the position. That being said we have has terrible line play for a long time and drafting Kalil IMHO is not going to change much because I don't feel we have an OC or OL coach that are up to NFL standards.

We had a LT that was good enough to get in the pro bowl and a HOF LG that chewed up too much cap space and that left the rest of the line with too little depth and it showed up in the way our QB's got beat up and it was really evident in the dropoff in play when a starter went down.

If they want to fix the play of the OL they don't need to draft a LT at 3 and they don't need to draft high dollar FA's. They just need to find the right mix of role players and get coaches that can install the right scheme and be able to teach it proficiently.

If Bleacher Report ranks him that high, it must be true.

Originally Posted by jmcdon00

He'll be even better when he has Matt Kalil lined up next to him.
Matt's brother, Ryan Kalil, is probably the best center in the NFL right now.

Not according to Marty's Article

Btw, look at some of this guys other articles, like his QB rankings. Completely idiotic.