Week 1 Stock Market Report

Our defense deserves credit. Yeah the Saints scored on their “scripted” portion in the beginning but besides that we really seemed to have them in check.

The one thing that stands out to me is our safeties really are just “OK”. Nothing special and I think something that really needs to be looked at going into next year since we aren’t likely to sort it out much now via trades etc.

I feel like our offense is just… I don’t even really know the word. Lazy? They seemed to lack effort and minus a few great plays like Camarillo’s catch they just seemed to be going through the motions. Like how many penalties is Loadholt going to give up? Why is it Btwice can never seem to get involved in games we need him too?

Def room for improvement, not the end of the season but we better be a whole world better against the Dolphins otherwise we might be in for some trouble the first 8 games.

Brings me to my next point, How angry is everyone at Sydney Rice right now?

Some of those big plays stemmed from poor safety play over the top. Not that Allen played great but our safeties are a liability.

Considering how well the rookie saftey played for the Saints its inexcusable that there hasn’t been any real push for Chilly to improve this part of the defense.

Lets go out on a limb here for a moment to open O-line dialog.
As you pointed out Loadholt settled in nicely at left tackle and late in the game NBC showed several times the good protection for Favre.
ok here i get borderline to rediculous by asking would it not be worth trying McKinnie at
right guard?

There was one play where the receiver caught the ball right in front of him with EJ storming up the field to make a tackle and Madieu is sitting there stuttersteping. Just completely frozen. I felt like I was watching the movie “Invincible” only without the eventual payoff.

Our safeties suck pretty bad.

Kind of a boring game to watch, but for a team returning and with high hopes of playoffs, I didnt see any chemistry. The intensity should of been high but they looked slow out there. To me it was reminiscent of recent adventures of playing at the level of the opponent. Kudos to defense, for all our problems (and a good saints offense) they managed to keep it close. Offense…thanks for nothing. The fact favre wasn’t in camp (and our receiving corps changed) meant favre was rusty. IMO he is totally to blame for this loss. We didnt have time in the season to work out the kinks and the non-arrival of farve was evident.

Offense sucked but let’s not go all out for Defense just yet. 2 missed kicks and a dropped TD pass would have made it 27-9 and that my friends is what would have been called a rout. Not every team is going to be this generous.

Jared Allen was completely shut down.
Asher Allen was owned all through the game. 1 interception would have helped with morale but he cannot hold on to the ball
Abdullah – The guy is 2 yards behind receivers…every play…all night long.

I hate the guy (now) but why exactly was Sharper let go by Vikes? Seriously, I don’t know the answer. History lesson…anyone?

Sell – Berrian as a punt returner.

Buy – Reynaud as a punt returner.

but there were a few times where he had plenty of time to throw it, but no one to throw it to. Kudos to the Vikes secondary for gluing the down the Saints recievers. Not to gloat on Brees, but I think a lot of other QB’s would have been “coverage sacked” in that situation. Especially with the Vike’s d-line.

Well, it was a loss, and yet…I don’t know if I’m just feeling relieved that the anticipation is over or what, but I’m not really that upset. Sure it would have been great to start the season with a win, but the Vikings did manage to hold the Saints to a measly 14 points. 14 points. At home, filled with all the hype and adrenaline that the NFL could pump into that game, they got only 14 points. Even with the Vikings’ troubles at corner, they only got 14 points. I know that there isn’t going to be an asterisk by the Vikings loss that says “But the Saints scored only 14 points”, but it does show that fans have every reason to believe this team isn’t a dud. When, not if, Favre gets in sync with his receivers, things are going to get fun.

Nice nod to the Boss. His songs “Thunder Road” and “Born to Run” got me through my senior year of high school.

The Saints should have won the game by 13. There were a lot of dropped passes by Saints receivers, though I did like Asher Allen’s tough play on a few plays for the CB’s. I think they did pretty well for being so short handed, however.

Nobody will hold to Saints to 14 points all season. We have that to be proud of. Sidney just needs to get the hell back. Now.

I think it was pretty obvious that we were missing Sidney Rice, but I think we were also missing Chester Taylor. Our 3rd down go-to guy. Maybe some of those drives wouldn’t have ended so quickly if we still had Chester. The combo if missing Favre’s #1 guy in Sidney and the reliable check down of Taylor really killed those drives.

Ok you have a back who got 5 yards a carry in the second half. FIVE YARS PER CARRY. We had the lead, and just gassed their D before the half. Why on earth would you not run the ball more? He had a crap load of yards in the first half! Everyone could see that Favre was rusty in the first half. When the half time show started I told the people around me to get ready for the AP show. I was seriously wrong.

I’m not sure what the hell Bevell is smoking but it was a terrible idea to put the game in the hands of Favre when he was obviously uncomfortable with it.

Here’s another SELL BERRIAN. Was the man ever open? He has three yards. Hell put Joe Webb in there. You don’t even have to train him. Just have him run as fast as he can down the field to the endzone. People will have to follow him, hell you might get lucky and he catches a ball. Right now he can do no worse… Unlike most of the recievers he was actually with Favre the entire time!

We did alright we played a tough team and Favre showed that he should have been at camp. We’ll do better every game from now on. I just don’t want to lose to many because the Pack aren’t going to allow us to make to many mistakes.

The corners were up and down. They started off absolutely horrible, but I thought Lito Sheppard played pretty dang good. But then, I’m pretty sure they started throwing away from him and Winfield, and they targeted Asher.

The problem with Asher (besides letting guys get some good separation on him) is that he’s 5’9"……for crying out loud. Do we even have anyone taller than 5’10" at corner besides Chris Cook ‘n’ Ced, or that can actually jump high enough to hit the ball? One of the plays last night, Asher got absolutely owned by a pass that sailed way too high above him to hit it. He had his hand up to bat it down and everything but…..the guy is too short! I understand we got these guys cuz they hit hard, but the ball WILL need to be swatted away once in a while! (ie….in the endzone). I suppose that’s where some safety help would be nice.

Winfield played okay. One minute, he seemed like he knew exactly what was coming, but, then, the next minute he was charging after the running back during a play action and getting schooled.

Our secondary gave me a mild to serious headache last night.

of going undefeated.

I am just looking at it as we started pretty much the same way last year, except we had the luxury of playing Cleveland the first game.
Even if Favre had been in camp, most of his receivers from last night would not have been there with him. They need to do some extra practice to get their timing down.
I also think they were out gameplanned last night. We were prepared for what we got in January, and didn’t get it, and it kind of threw us off.
We will get it together and go on a winning streak. Not worried at all.

Reading up through the comments, most of them cover the same stuff I saw. I had to step out for most of the second half and watched it on the DVR later. I wanted to wait to think about this for a little bit, before commenting.

This game was a lot like last year, Favre looks like he’s out of sync and needs time to catch up. The price paid for not attending training camps or getting enough play time in during the pre-season, he’ll pick it up in another game or two. Just like last year. The difference is that last year, we played a pair of easy games right off the bat, which Favre managed to make look like real battles because he was playing catch up. This year we paid the price for giving the Old Man his time off.

Takeaway – If the Old Man wants to come back next year, he needs to at least play more through the pre-season.

Berrian, Berrian, Berrian…. if we had a faster alternative in the wings or obtainable, I’d advocate hitting the jettison switch on him. But reality bites, we’re already short at the spot and he’s the closest thing we have to a #1 WR.

Takeaway – Look for a true #1 WR and send Berrian packing. Sidney Rice can’t get well fast enough, and it’d be awfully nice if Jaymar Johnson healed up and stepped up too.

Albert Young…. really, really, really, made me miss Chester Taylor, and made me wonder, if the FO is really fighting for the big win, NOW, why they didn’t just pay Taylor and keep him for this Super Bowl run? Maybe Young is earning his paycheck as a blocker and that’s enough, although I would think that Jimmy Kleinsasser could do that just fine.

Takeaway – Toby Gerhart can’t get well fast enough.

Offensive Line – A lot of folks liked what they saw. I didn’t. I saw an O-line that did marginally better in run-blocking, enough to open some holes but not enough to open true lanes. If they were better, Peterson would have run amok last night instead of having to carry the burden mostly on his own formidable shoulders. Oh, and McKinnie…. let’s get us a replacement LT. Watching McKinnie literally stop blocking and turn to stand there, watching, while the guy he let go moved on to jump onto the Peterson Pileup and help pull Adrian backwards, was absolutely infuriating.

Takeaway – Load is growing into the big-boy cleats, the Vikings would be well served to pay the bucks for a high-end LT and trade McKinnie for whatever they can get for him.

Secondary – I didn’t realize how badly they were going to get owned, but this was painful to watch. They’ve gotten away with being mediocre for a long time because the D-Line is so magnificent and the LB corps boys know how to help out with pass coverage, but tonight they were revealed in all their issues.

Takeaway – Let’s get some taller guys, let’s get some guys who’s strength is man-coverage and let them play zone, so that when they do find themselves going mano-a-mano, they can bring a more dangerous game. I hope like hell that Cook is the first move in that direction, because WRs are just getting bigger and faster. And while we’re at it, how about getting our secondary some more ball-catching practice. Seriously.

Peterson is money. Anyone who thinks otherwise, don’t know football. Once we can get Gerhart in there to give him a breather that’s still a credible pounder, the Vikings offense is going to beat the hell out of the opposition for 4 quarters. That’s going to be important for the D, also, because the D is getting gassed by the 4th if the offense doesn’t have enough time on the field.

Jared Allen. Remember him? Is it my imagination or is his production starting to fall off? Yes, I know he was double-teamed and chipped all night, what else is new? That never stopped him for very long before, and the doing of it should make it easier on the other side. Not seeing much sign of that. I hope this isn’t a trend.

Seeing Longwell’s point-after get tipped was NOT my favorite moment of the game. Used to be that the Vikings were the best in the game at blocking kicks and punts, would love to see that come back. Let’s not let it happen to us again.

Bottom line – The Vikings are going to kick ass this year. Sure, we lost the hardest game we’ll face all year long, but we lost it with a QB who wasn’t in sync with his decimated receiver corps, a slew of injuries amongst our top players on offense and defense, in the enemy’s home stadium where the noise level is so loud that it’s considered a hearing danger to anyone in the dome, and we only lost by 5 points. Yes, it could have been worse… it could have been better, too.

And that’s not just us being homers, even the New Orleans Saints knew that; they were on the 50 yard line with 2 minutes to go, and one of the most prolific offenses in the NFL and instead of trying to advance 20 more yards to seal the deal with a field goal, they took the knee 4 times. They decided to take that 5 point lead and get the hell out of the game while the getting was good, and not do ANYTHING to risk giving the Vikings the ball back, not even for 10 seconds. That, my friends, is fear… and respect. And I’ll take it.

We got nothing to be ashamed of in this loss, and once the problems get fixed over the next few weeks, the Vikings are going to be the brutal Monster of the Midway that we’ve come to love.

I guess holding the Saints to 14 points is something to be proud of theoretically, but since we scored less than 14, it’s not so useful.

I didn’t see a lot that impressed me last night. Pretty flat performance from the offense as a whole. Peterson did okay I guess but you can get okay from a lot cheaper RBs than him. He needs the ball 25 times to do much damage, but for some reason we wanted to pass more even though Favre was likely to start slow like last season.

Eh, it’s only one game and I would much rather we beat the Packers than the Saints at this point. But we’ve got a lot of work to do if we want to make it back to the playoffs.

on no play action. The way the Saints LB’s were rushing the line, even in their fake zone blitz packages where they would fall back, should have burned over and over and over again. Watch the tape, there were open receivers all night. Favre just locked on to one read on every single play and then checked down to TE or RB all night.

And we still had a chance to win.

Play action would have been a killer, and they didn’t use it. I can only hope they are feigning ignorance and using tape to open up plays later in the season.

Where was Toby? Albert showed nothing, over and over. and over again.

When we get healthy, we are a force. When the braintrust realizes what a great pickup Camarillo was as an outlet, we are a force. When they stick with the running game instead of abandoning it, we are a force.

I blame this loss on poor talent evaluation, play calling, and straight up old fashiond RUST from not being in training camp to develop a repertoire with our healthy WR’s.

I have no excuse for the lack of Percy.

This game should’ve taken place mid-season at Minnesota. The first one was played in New Orleans. Are the Taints afraid to travel up north?

Anyhow, Favre looked very rusty and out of sync with his receivers, as was exactly the case last year’s pre-season when he first got there. He didn’t know Sidney Rice, Shancoe, or Harvin well till a couple games in. With Rice out, Harvin shaking off the rust, and Camarillo fitting in — it’s going to take a little while for them all to get on the same page. But, I saw nothing out of Favre that suggests he’s done or washed up. He looked a little unsure of himself on the ankle at times, but that was it.

The schedule has potential to take the air out of their tires if they don’t pull it together soon. But, barring any further injuries I believe they’ll be fine.

Go Brett! Go Vikes!

Buy: Ben Leber. The guy is one hell of a linebacker. He is ALWAYS in the right spot. I seriously think he’s one of the better outside linebackers in the league. He holds his own against the run, and is tremendous in coverage. I wish the Packers had him.