Week 12: Back in the saddle again? Can we keep it this time?

Did someone hit the reset button or something?

I distinctly remember being disappointed at having squandered a chance to open up a lead in the division last week.  Now, as we head into a showdown with the Falcons, suddenly we’re in first again with a chance to keep it, if only for another week?

I’m not sure if I should be ecstatic the Vikings got help from the Bears this week, or even more upset that they pulled one off against the Packers when we couldn’t. 

But, that’s okay.  All will be forgiven and forgotten, much like Brett Favre’s return to Green Bay (which made it even funnier when the Packers lost on the ultimate Packers night) if the Vikings can claim first with a win against the Atlanta Falcons.

There are warts on both sides.  Atlanta’s ultimate touchdown vulture Devonta Freeman is out with an injury on their side, but the Vikings might have the worst of it because we are missing our hitman; the best safety this team has got.  Antone Exum will apparently start in his place.  I’m excited for Antone to get his opportunity, but I’m prepared for the worst.

It goes without saying that if the Vikings want to be taken seriously as a playoff contender, they need to bounce back this week and get a win.  At 7-3, the Vikings lead the division, but they would currently have a game on the rest of the wild card teams if Green Bay had won to go to 8-3.  If the Packers want to continue melting down against every team that’s not the Vikings, that’s fine by me.  But, assuming the Packers find their late-season form again, the Vikings will definitely want to own the tiebreakers over the teams chasing them if they should happen to lose a couple down the stretch like they usually do.

A win Sunday might, dare I say it, put the Vikes in the driver’s seat for a wild card berth.  The remaining schedule is tough, but if the Vikings win half of their remaining games, that’s 10.  With how weak the NFC Wild Card hunt currently looks, 10 might be the magic number.  As for which three I’d pick the Vikings to win…uh, get back to me on that one. 

After all, anything can happen in the NFL. 

Here’s to a bounce-back win this time.

Vikings vs Packers: Little Brown Jug 2.0? The slow and painful death of a once-great rivalry.

Well…that Vikings game against the Packers certainly…existed.

With the puke in my sink as my witness, I have to say that we saw one of the worst losses in all of Border Battle history on Sunday.

What made this one so bad?  Was it the fact that the Vikings were more than willing to be the slump-buster for a wounded Packers team that fell behind them in the standings after an inexplicable loss to Detroit last week, handing back the keys to the NFC North in the process? 

Was it the seemingly one-sided officiating?  Yes, the Vikings’ penalties were mostly self-inflicted, but the Packers got off scot free with quite a lot (like nearly decapitating Teddy on a facemask). 

Or was it the fact that at 7-2, the Vikings had finally begun to look like a professional football team for the first time since 2012 (possibly 2009), only to lose badly to Green Bay and make all of this progress seem like a total fluke? 

It’s likely a combination of all three.  That, and there’s the fact that with so many green and gold fans living in Minnesota, the taunting certainly won’t stop anytime soon.  “We have Super Bowls and you don’t!”  “We have Aaron Rodgers and you don’t!”  “You thought you could actually beat us?  That’s cute!”  They might even steal a great line from Dodgeball; “We’re better than you, and we know it!”

Ahem…getting back to my earlier point, I think the worst part about losing to the Packers for the 15^th time in 20 games since 2006 is that the Vikings proved once again beyond the shadow of a doubt that they are simply not ready for the spotlight (though let’s be honest, this team’s entire history is built around not being ready for prime time).

This team can win games.  They proved that by winning seven of eight after that awful MNF loss to begin the season.  You can say whatever you want about “getting fat” on mediocre/bad teams; the Vikings are finally decent at winning games again.

What we wanted to see was progress.  A win against the Packers would have sent the Vikings’ playoff stock skyrocketing.  As I said last week, even a win over a wounded Packers team would have been huge.  It would have also provided the confidence to beat just about any of the tougher teams on the back seven (Atlanta, Arizona, etc).  If the Vikings are going to become a premier team in this league, they must be able to defeat the team that has run the NFC North since its inception in 2002 when the realignment happened.

By choking away such a huge chance on Sunday with awful line play and inexcusable penalties that we weren’t taking in previous weeks, fans will surely enter this week moaning, “If we can’t beat the Packers, how can we expect to beat Atlanta or Arizona or Seattle?”

The biggest question the Vikings need to answer beginning next Sunday at Atlanta is this; are the Packers just an Achilles heel like the Yankees to the Twins or the BlackHawks to the Wild? Or is this team lacking the ability to beat the elite? 

If the answer to the first question is yes, the Vikes might be able to do just enough to avoid a season’s on the line situation at Lambeau Field in Week 17.  After Week 11’s pathetic showing, it's clear we want no part of that.

Rising Vikes vs Slumping Pack: Who takes first place?

And so it begins…the tough part of the schedule.  Green Bay twice, Arizona, Seattle, Chicago (which might get very interesting the second time around if the Bears keep winning games), Atlanta and the New York Giants.

After a 7-2 start, that schedule does not look as brutal as it once did.  However, those other games will have to wait.  After all, it’s Packer week.

Things have been going well for the Vikings lately.  Players seem to get nominated as “player of the week” after every game, and winning that honor quite a bit.  Terrence Newman is the most recent recipient on the defensive side after scoring two huge interceptions.  His second one came at a critical time, as a third Derek Carr touchdown might have given Oakland a late chance to come from behind and beat the Vikings.  Of course, All Day sealed the deal with another “HE’S LOOSE!” run for a touchdown.

The Vikings are on a five game winning streak.  The defense is becoming more legitimate with each passing week.  You can say what you want about “feasting on bad teams,” but I’ll take it because the Vikes used to lose to some of those teams (like in the opener this year).  The team is 5-0 since a game in which it had a legitimate shot to beat Denver way before Andrew Luck did.

Historically, this is the point where it all comes crashing down.  But, the Vikings seem to be adopting a Marty McFly attitude (“Yeah, well, history is gonna change”). 

One thing I doubt many people saw coming in the March to the Border Battle was what happened to the Packers the past few weeks.  As the Vikings beat Kansas City and Detroit, the Packers kept a steady hold on the division lead at 6-0 while the Vikings sat at 4-2.  The next week, the Vikings finally won at Soldier Field for the first time since 2007 while the Packers got stomped by Denver.  Minnesota won again in overtime against the Rams the next week to go to 6-2.  The Packers lost to Carolina 37-29, and suddenly Green Bay stared the “inferior” Vikings straight in the face.

Typically, Aaron Rodgers bounces back from one loss.  He usually doesn’t lose two in a row.  He most certainly doesn’t lose three in a row…right?  Wrong.  In a game that apparently wasn’t televised outside the Wisconsin and Michigan markets (Vikings fans see the Packers almost as often as their own team most seasons), the Packers lost at home against the previously 1-7 Lions for the first time since the first Bush administration.  The Vikings took care of Oakland, as previously mentioned, to claim sole possession of first place.

The Vikings come into the first Packers game in a rare position.  Green Bay is in a slump the likes of which Aaron Rodgers has avoided since his rookie year, when he suffered a five-game losing streak that took the Packers out of any possible playoff contention.  Yeah, as Vikings fans, we are used to losing to them and they are not used to losing period.

The rest, as they say, is history.  But, as we all know, you can throw silly things like records and history out the window whenever rivals play.  One thing is for sure, the Vikings need to smell blood and get after a limping rival.  The Packers are still the Packers, and they will be enraged after losing to the Lions last week.

Mike Zimmer has had his team fight and claw its way to increasing levels of respect.  The Vikings might very well be favored against Green Bay at TCF this weekend.  He sounds like he’s doing everything he can to keep his players’ heads on straight and not fall victim to believing their own hype.  That’s probably what happened against San Francisco, right?

This begins a test to see if the Vikings can stand up with the elite teams in the league.  7-2 is still 7-2 no matter how you got there, but that’s not enough for some people, including Coach Z.  A win over Green Bay, even a wounded Green Bay, would keep the respect coming and the Vikings hype train would keep rolling. 

Best of all, the Vikings would open up a two-game lead in the division.  It would also guarantee a winning record in the divison one year after losing all but one game within the North.  The Vikings are playing football as a fairly complete team right now.  Sure, Teddy Bridgewater could be throwing for more yards, but Minnesota is playing to all of its strengths, which has proven to be a winning formula.

If they can do the same against the Packers and get a win, watch out. 

On the flip side, a loss would prove that the Vikings are still a fringe team; good at beating the Detroits and St. Louis’s of the world, but not quite ready for the next level; something which has really defined the Vikings throughout their history. 

Could the Vikings make the playoffs without beating the Packers?  It’s possible.  Seattle’s looking decidedly less invincible than in previous years, and I’m pretty sure Eli Manning hates us by now.  If 7-2 was to drop to 7-3, that’s still a pretty record through the first ten games.  It’s likely the Vikings could still control their own destiny regardless of this game.

But, count on Vikings territory to be disappointed if it happens.  We’re sick of being pushed around.  If change is coming as soon as this season, a win against the Packers needs to become a reality.  Expectations have changed in a hurry for the purple and gold, and the biggest rivalry we have needs to turn the corner at some point, so why not now?    

Sunday, we find out if this team is ready to step up to the big stage.   

End of the ("Cupcake") Line: The Quest for 5-0

It’s finally here…the end of the five game “cupcake” portion of the schedule.

Though, let’s be honest here…none of these four prior games felt like cupcakes.  A six point win over the Chiefs the week after their best player went down with an ACL injury.  A nine-point win over the Lions where the Vikings couldn’t score much in the red zone and had to overcome an early 14-3 deficit.  The other two games left us to rely on formerly-much-maligned kicker Blair Walsh to claim victory. 

Yes, in theory, the Vikings needed to win at least four of these five to show improvement and stand any kind of chance against Green Bay in the division race.  As it stands, that’s exactly what this team has done.  

As of this writing (somewhere between the Packers game and the Vikings game), the Vikings and Packers are tied for the NFC North’s best record.  The Vikings actually have fewer points against, if that’s important to you.

Which is why, with “America’s Game of the Week” showdown with the Packers approaching, it goes without saying that it is in the best interests of the Vikings and their fans to go into next week tied atop the division as well.  The Packers get the easy route, as they take on the Lions at home, where they haven’t lost to Detroit in four straight presidential administrations.  For those keeping score, that’s before Brett Favre fell into their lap and made them good again.  So they’ll be 7-2.

The Vikings have a tougher road.  Ever since a few weeks ago, I have gotten more nervous about this game.  Carr is no slouch; he appears to be the real deal.  Some are discussing him as a sneaky MVP candidate.  The Raiders might be only 4-4, but they look like a much better 4-4 team then the Rams were.

The Vikings need to make the Raiders a one-dimensional offense like they’ve done with most of their opponents this season.  The defense will really have to get after Carr or he will carve them up.  They have done just fine over the past four weeks.  The question mark, once again, is the offense.  Adrian should get his yards, but can Teddy deliver in a game where he’ll certainly need to do so?

Oakland’s defense is not a strength like the Minnesota D.  They just got shredded by Pittsburgh last week.  If Teddy can have a big game and take care of the football, the Vikings should be able to go 5-0 to finish off the “easy” part of the schedule.  They need it, because everything ramps up after this week.

Week 9: Gurley vs Peterson; a tough one to call

I’ve been forced to re-think some things.

The Vikings are 5-2, on a three-game win streak, and conclude a favorable schedule run against the Rams and the Raiders; two teams that have had a recent history of being terrible (as have the Vikings).

The catch here is that these two teams seem to be coming out of that period along with the Vikes.  The Raiders will be a featured subject next week, but I’ve got plenty to talk about regarding this week’s opponent.

The Vikings have a long history with the Rams.  It’s been a fairly successful run, but they threw the biggest haymaker when they beat us in the 1999/2000 playoffs on the way to a very memorable Super Bowl win against the Titans. 

Lately, the series has been all Vikings. Brett Favre rolled to a 5-0 start in his good year with the team, a 38-10 blowout in 2009. Three years ago, Adrian Peterson ran for 212 yards near the tail end of his MVP season while Christian Ponder rode along just trying not to screw up anything. The Vikings held on for a 36-22 win.

Last year, the Vikings crushed the Rams 34-6; a victory that should have been a sign of great things to come for the purple and gold.  Instead, it wound up being one of just a handful of highlights from what we can really call a lost year.  Last season, Matt Cassel led the Vikings.  Some people thought Teddy Bridgewater should have started from the word “go” in 2014.

This year, Teddy gets his chance.  He has Adrian Peterson.  He has Charles Johnson back, which is good with Stefon Diggs limping along a bit.  But, this game will be no walk in the park.  The Vikings offense has struggled to close victories over lesser teams than St. Louis.  When I thought the Vikings might roll to non-nail-biting wins against the hapless Chiefs and Lions, they ended up having to grind and made all of Vikings territory (see what I did there?) squirm.

Last week, it looked like another loss to Chicago before Teddy turned back into Teddy after spending the game looking like someone else.  Resiliency has been a theme for this team all season.  They’ll need it against Todd Gurley, who has been a stud this season since being cleared for NFL action.

In fact, this Vikings-Rams game resembles the famous Chargers-Vikings game from 2007.  A comparison Branden and I have thrown around quite a bit this season is that the Rams heavily resemble the 2007 Vikings. Solid defense, stud halfback, but Nick Foles is a better quarterback than Tavaris Jackson was.

Overall, the Vikings look better on paper, but this team has been unable to score touchdowns in the red zone.  They’ve struggled to beat teams whose seasons are turning pear-shaped.  St. Louis is proving that solid defense + running game = better chance at victory.  The Vikings should win, but the cupcake portion of the schedule has ended prematurely.  

Oakland will be no picnic either.  Derek Carr is blossoming into a star quarterback before our eyes.

Mid-season bonus post: Flexing our muscles? How two "flex" games cost the Vikings everything.

Stop me if you’ve heard this one before.

The Vikings are off to a fast start, or they have successfully rebounded from a slow start to put themselves in the playoff hunt.  A seemingly ordinary game awaits them at noon against an opponent they should beat if they can just take care of business the way they have during this recent run of success.

That is, until the NFL, though no fault of its own, decides that a game between teams that seem evenly matched on paper and have similar, relevant records is the game that everyone wants to see.  The Vikings go into the game and are blinded by the lights, and get trounced in front of the entire nation; an outcome that might not have occurred had the game stayed at its original time.

As much fun as it is to see the Vikings getting on the right track and maybe even getting taken seriously again, the recent trend of “flexing” games into primetime (that have gained importance based on the week-to-week happenings of the NFL season) has not been tremendously kind to our favorite team.  For the sake of this post, I’m only considering games that got flexed to Sunday night.  I don’t really consider moving a noon game to 3:25 to be a “flex.”  (The Giants-Vikings MNF game in Detroit was not really a “flex,” either, but more of a necessity move, so it won’t be detailed here).

In 2007, the Vikings had an 8-6 record and suddenly saw a meaningful game against the Washington Redskins get thrust under the bright lights of Sunday Night Football on NBC (in just the second year of SNF on NBC).  The result: 22-0 Redskins at halftime and a 32-21 victory for Washington, whose players and coaches (and fans) were mourning the murder of Sean Taylor at the time.  This game cost the Vikings a playoff berth because all the Skins had to do was win in Week 17 to get in thanks to the tiebreaker over Minnesota.

The 2009 season, for all the good it brought Vikings fans, featured one of these as well.  The Vikes faced Arizona, a team that had blossomed under veteran QB Kurt Warner (nearly winning Super Bowl 43, the most recent at the time).  The Cardinals steadily built a 30-10 lead and won 30-17.  It was just the second loss of the season (10-2), but the Vikings won just two more games in the regular season to get the #2 seed. 

And we all know how that turned out.

The most recent Vikings game to get this treatment was the Philadelphia game in 2010.  There was nothing remotely compelling about this game; The Eagles were good and we were trash.  Brett Favre had been injured against the Bears, a Monday Night game, and this game has the distinction of marking the end of his legendary games-started streak.  Apparently the game was flexed to Sunday night, but moved to Tuesday night because of a major snowstorm on the east coast.  It remains one of the few Tuesday night football games in NFL history.  

Fondly remembered as the Joe Webb game, a fun bright spot in an otherwise dismal season, the Vikings managed to get a late-season win over an Eagles team that would qualify for the playoffs the following week. 

I guess in the long run, 1-2 in “flex” games isn’t so bad…but the fact remains that national television stumbles are a big part of Vikings lore.  The diehard fans behind Vikings Cavalcade hope that the Zimmer era can change that.

Although I personally don’t consider it a “flex,” earlier this week it was announced that the Vikings-Packers game in Week 11 is now “America’s Game of the Week” on Fox.  If the Vikings play their cards right, they’ll be 7-2 (best case scenario).  The Packers could be 8-1 (also best case scenario).  

This will be, without a doubt, the most meaningful Vikings-Packers clash since Week 17 of 2012, regardless of record.

But I’ll save any more words about that game for Week 11.  The big question I have is this; can the Vikings shed this label of “eternal national stage fright?”