Good post, Gonzo, as always. It’s all kind of laughable, this predictive bit, isn’t it? I’ve been a fan of the Vikings since forever (1966), and I’ve come to this position: it’s impossible to predict wins and losses for the purple. I just wait and watch and hope. However, this season I have to say that my hope tends to be more and more as we approach games. It’s the first time in years that we’ve played bad teams and actually whupped them – your stats on “garbage time” are part of the proof of that. There’s nothing more encouraging than that for this season. We’ve always played up to the good teams (OK, not 41-0, but almost always). It’s the 3-12 Cardinals-type games that used to kill us. In my mind, the Favre acquisition has paid for itself just in imbuing that kind of “put them away” mentality.

Hey this is what we are looking for. Ravens & Steelers back to back. You would have to have beaten both these teams to get to the Superbowl last year. Consider it a challenge. Are we an Elite team or not? We aren’t getting any love beating the Lions & Browns & Rams Oh my. Lets rattle their young QB’s cage. Lets give him a nice Thunder Dome welcome.

If you shut down Derrick Mason, they really don’t have much of a passing game. Now call me crazy, but we’ve done a pretty good job of shutting down #1 Wideouts so far this season. Edwards didn’t do much against us, neither did Jennings or Calvin Johnson. I’d say those guys are about the same level if not a bit better than Mason.

But I’m still mildly afraid of this team. Not because of the defense, I feel we can pass at will against these guys, but because of the, yes I’m going to say it, running game. They’re not going to run it up the middle, obviously, but for some reason we are just getting gashed on outside runs so far this year. I don’t know what it is. Hopefully Frazier has the defense prepped and ready to fire on all cylinders.

Also, I’m expecting this game to be a bit of a shoot out. That’s how it always seems to go when we think it’s going to be a defensive battle. See the Bears-Vikes games the last couple years for examples.

…. the biggest liar in the world is statistics.

Great post, Gonzo, pointing out the ‘garbage time’ points/yards given up against our 2nd string.

It won’t be an easy game, but it should be a battle.

GO VIKES!!!!

who will dominate the trenches will win the game plain and simple.and if we want to be taken serious as a superbowl contender win bit if we lose great thing there is always next week to redeem yourself.

schmuck chose to point out Ravens are ranked higher in D. Okay, in what category? Yards allowed is what he chose. Cover 2 is a bend but don’t break scheme that gets extremely tough in the red zone. Who cares about yards. What schmuckly failed to point out was the only D stat that really matters, points allowed. Guess who’s better? Yep, the Vikings. They rank just ahead of Patriots and Bengals. HEY, wait a second. Aren’t those the two teams that just beat the Ravens. Forgot to mention that didn’t you schmuckly?

Same goes for offense. So Ravens rank ahead of Vikings O in total yards. WOOHOO< crown them champs right not. Actually , again, the Vikings are ahead in the only O category that really matters, points per game.

Finally he had an outright lie in saying Vikings haven’t played a top D. In that all important point allowed category, SF is at 19.6 points just behind Ravens 19.4 points. At the time Vikings played SF thet had a 13 pts/game avg. If SF is not top D then neither is the Ravens. LMFAO

The Vikings haven’t played enough quality teams for stats to matter. Our offensive yards are low because these crap teams give us short fields and fall behind so early we quit taking any risks in the 4th quarter. Defensive yards given up are equally meaningless because most of the second half of Vikings games have come down to just keeping them out of the end zone and protecting against the big play.

Points per game are just as important as yards per game. I’d even argue that they are more important. In those catergories the Vikes rank ahead of the Ravens. Again though they’ve played in so many lopsided second half scores that the stats stop meaning anything.

Chew on this. The Vikings defense has given up under 11 points per game during the competitve portions of the 5 games. Don’t count special teams are opposing defensive TDs or “garbage time” and our defense has been plenty stingy.

We’ll see what both teams are made of on Sunday. If the Bengals can beat them there then I don’t see any reason we can’t beat them here.

I would like anyone to debate me on this analogy. The Vikings defense with the roster line up and scheme they present are one of the better defenses in the league. Regardless who we have played and statistics, the Vikings have one of the top rated defenses. With that said and the “gelling” of our new (yet older) quarterback and his weapons, please correct me if I am wrong, but the Minnesota Vikings could legitimately beat any team in the NFL. The defense is not going to have some sort of complete melt down that has the opposing teams running up some astronomical score which will force them to turn into a one dimensional throwing machine. So with that said, they can, for the most part, stick to the game plan they were planning all week long. Watching film and playing on the weakness of the opposing team. They have been able to do this in the first 5 weeks and have won when they should because of their “plan” and the defense allowing them to stay within their game. I think that is the most important thing that is different from this year to past years. Good defense and complete balance on offense. Please post any comments even if some may find my thoughts way out there.

From what I’ve read, since the inception of the Ravens in 1996, the game against the Vikings will be only their 11th indoor game. And the Ravens are 2-8 indoors. Could the noise factor play any significance?

I’ve been posting all week that I think the Ravens are better than a lot of people rank them right now, and that, in the next 3 game stetch, while I’m hoping to win two, I would not be suprised to win only one (and it could be any of them that are won or lost, none of them will have us as clear favorites IMO). So yes, I think the matchup is a lot more even than the 2-3 vs 5-0 record implies. The main reason I think we may have any edge is because it’s a home game, not becuase we’re the clearly better team.

I have to admit, when the schedules came out I wasn’t too worried about the NFC north teams the Ravens had to face this season. We all knew that the Vikings had a really good defense, and Adrian Peterson and Chester Taylor in the backfield on the other side of the ball. With the Ravens having one of the best run stuffing defenses in the NFL — no worries, right? But now? Sheesh.. Berian, Harvin, Rice, Favre. Do they stuff 7 or 8 in the box, or keep the DBs back and defend the pass? A little nervous going into this one.. The Ravens have the toughest part of an overall difficult schedule coming up, and they need a big win today. It’s going to be a great game!