This season has been underwhelming for the Vikings and fans are searching for answers and someone or something to blame. Most of our society needs to have things a simple one answer, black and white conclusion when in reality most things in life are complicated and grey.
Here are the multiple reasons the Vikings are 4-6:
1) J.J. McCarthy is too amped up early in games, but especially in front of 66,000 people at home playing at US Bank Stadium. He’s throwing fast balls on most of his passes, equivalent to a young baseball pitcher that can throw 100mph but doesn’t have control. As we have seen in the game at Detroit, McCarthy has the stuff to get it done, but he needs to harness his energy to play with calm. Fans should be patient with him, which is hard for long suffering Vikings fans.
I was in the locker room after the 19-17 loss to Chicago. I was trying to get in position to interview Jordan Mason, but McCarthy came up to Mason, Aaron Jones and C.J. Hamm and said, “Way to ball out guys, you were awesome today.”
The response from the main guys in the backfield was, “All we want is for you to play well enough to give us a chance and you did, keep doing what you are doing, we got your back.” It was good to hear McCarthy’s teammates give him those word of encouragement.
2) Kevin O’Connell and his staff are having a tough year. KOC hasn’t been calling plays to put his young quarterback in a better position to win. He needs to stay with the running game more and have more short rhythm passing routes, especially to great outlet route running guys like T.J. Hockenson and Adam Theilen. I’m not sure why they traded for Theilen if they aren’t going to use him in the “Red Zone” or in short yardage situations. Those situations have always been Theilen’s strength and the Vikings weakness under O’Connell. That should be able to be a perfect marriage.
3) The kickoff and kick return game is inconsistent. Myles Pryce has been a nice surprise as a returner but fumbled against the Ravens to hurt the team in that loss last week at home. Against the Bears the kickoff team gave up a big return to set Chicago up the game winning field goal.
4) The defense can’t stop the run. The difference between Brian Flores defense this year and last year is they were stout stuffing running backs, forcing the opponent to throw the ball, leading to more turnovers. This year the are getting gashed and losing time of possession battles week after week because of it. That also is why the Vikings are not getting interceptions and forcing fumbles. I thought the Vikings could be successful with a young quarterback because this would be a championship defense. Well you can’t be a championship defense if you can’t stop the run.
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