Quarterly Report

We need to give them game time, Love at T but also at G and to have a look at Fusco at G in much the same way as the Bills started Wood at G for a couple of years before moving him to C.

Even if Ryan Harris is unable to play this year, I would make sure he’s signed up for the 2012 camp. He’s a very good RT and could do better than Johnson as a LT as he played here when Clady went down at the Broncos.

A 2012 line of

LT – rookie or Harris
LG – Hutchinson
C – Sullivan
RG – Love or Fusco
RT – Harris, Love or Rookie

Loadholt does not have the feet to be a LT, but is young enough to maybe get a Day3 pick if traded.

i wouldn’t say so much as he’s lost a step versus he’s been bothered a bit by the METAL ROD IN HIS LEG.

they’re working on inflammation where the rod connects to his knee, and rest is about the only thing that’s going to help. he’s already said he can see it on tape, and the coaching staff is in agreement. he’ll be fine.

Seems like a wide range of views on that question. But I wonder if maybe the Vikes might be closer than some think. I don’t know much about Fusco or Love, but if both pan out (is that a possibility?), and either herrera or DeGuerre or Taylor or Loadholt can play effectively at RG next year, well then it seems to me all the Vikes would need to shore things up and really compete for the SB next year are :

1) Ponder doing as well as Flacco, or Ryan, or even Sanchez in 1st year of playing QB as starter for season

2) Getting a solid LT from somewhere — FA or draft

3) Getting a solid deep threat at WR

4) Either Sanford developing into a solid Safety or getting one in FA

5) Cook developing into a solid CB or Griffin completely recovering from injurites and playin as a solid CB.

I don’t think those 5 things are insurmountable challenges for the Vikes.

It’s my own eyes that tell me that these Pro Football Focus numbers are meaningless. Sullivan is not better this year. If he doesn’t get help from Hutch or Herrera, he gets beaten like a drum. His inability to manage his position on his own exposes Hutch and Herrera. He also helps where he is not needed which allows delayed blitzes to be effective and also means he isn’t around when he’s needed to help on the other side. Most centers seem to have their head on a swivel when in pass protection, but that isn’t Sully’s style.

Herrera has played well for the most part. Suh beat him up a few times when they played the Lions, but seriously, he’s the best DT in the league by a wide margin. Unfortunately for Herrera he plays between Sully and Loadholt. That wouldn’t make anyone look good.

Loadholt is slow in pass defense, slow when blockingfor the run and, what this article doesn’t seem to comment on, is his impact on drives when he holds or false starts. I wish I knew how to rip video from NFL content, because Loadholt had another slow motion block against the Chiefs that turned into a 2 second stumble and fall. Why is a 6’8" RT lunging and trying to do a cut block? Because he’s too slow to get ahead of his blocking assignments. No way is Loadholt in the top 5% of run blockers. If he solidly gets his mitts on someone, he generally wins, but he really struggles to get himself into that position. McKinnie was slow too, but he cleared people out on running plays. Loadholt is bigger, younger and not nearly as effective in the run as McKinnie was.

Are there really 13 DEs I’d rather have on the field in a pass rushing situation than Jared Allen? No.

Chris Cook is 60th? Out of 95? They must be tough graders. He’s played pretty well. And seriously, the Vikings had him one-on-one with one of the top three wide receivers in the NFL (i.e. Calvin Johnson) On the other hand Griffin has been great at times but has been badly burned for touchdowns in the last two games. This is a tough call, but I suspect that you can play your guys a lot tighter if you are willing to take risks and give up a TD when you screw up on coverage. Don’t get me wrong. I like Griffin. He’s played well. However, when he messes up, the other team scores TDs. Bad luck? We’ll see. I wouldn’t put him ahead of Cook at this point though.

Now for Winfield. The idea that Winfield is the best corner in the NFL is nutty. He might be one of the most fun to watch, but his coverage is not good. I have watched him closely for years. He is the best tackler on the field. His tackles fire up his team. When he blitzes, he makes good things happen. However, what I want from a corner first and foremost is the ability to take their guy out of the play before he gets the ball. The Vikings are getting carved up on the underneath routes. Unlike Cook and Griffin on the edges, the team seems to use Winfield in a zone formation a lot. Is that because he’s a good cover CB? Not likely. Even when he stays with his guy one-on-one, he is the most vulnerable CB out of Griffin, Cook and Winfield. Here’s a hint for those of you who play fantasy football in a league that counts individual defensive tackles as a stat. Pick Winfield. He makes a lot of tackles in part because he tackles a lot of people AFTER they catch the ball. I really enjoy watching Winfield on the field. He makes amazing plays at the line of scrimmage, but once he’s 5 to 10 yards off the line of scrimmage its a totally different thing.

I have enough experience with the challenges of quantifying activities that require significant human judgment in the scoring process to know that it is important to the scoring criteria used and see examples of how it is applied. Without that sort of access, I just can’t argue with my own observations of these players. Pro Football Focus player scoring reminds of the famous quote: “There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.”

Can’t even seem to get out of the way of Peterson let alone block and open up a hole. Even though the box is stacked half the time he can’t even get up to the line any more because they all just get shoved in his face, including Loadholt and Johnson.

Has Phil Loadholt ever played inside?

With all do respect, at most we bench McNabb, we don’t cut him. It’s interesting that you justify such a move by saying:

at the end of the day, football is a business, and I get that we’re dealing with human beings. But McNabb expects to be the starter, and if he isn’t, he has a reputation, unfounded or not, that his attitude is less than professional when he’s not the starter.

You don’t fire people for how you think they will react to something. That isn’t how you run a “business,” even though that is the mantle you drape this statement in (and you yourself admit the rep may be “unfounded”!). So wait and see how he reacts, and if it as you fear, then (and only then) do you consider such a dramatic action.

If they actually did what you suggest it would be a far, far bigger fiasco than the Randy Moss thing was last year (which I recall you were pretty critical of Chilly for, ironically). At least Chilly was directly responding to some way-out-there, extremely unprofessional conduct off the field (with the caterers, Patriot PC comments, etc) as well as lack of performance on the field.

Plus how dumb a business move would it be to cut a guy who you would have to pay the rest of the season anyway, then turn to mostly unproven quantities that could get injured or you might find you have pushed too far too fast & might want to give Ponder/Webb a break because it was too much too fast. Boy would we look dumb spending money on a stopgap to play the position in a lost season, because we irrationally cut McNabb for no good reason out of frustration. More dumb than how we looked continuing to pay Randy and Donovan after they were gone.

Finally, I know if I were a future vet FA looking at the Vikings this offseason, I would definitely take pause before signing with the team if they had needlessly, irrationally humiliated McNabb as you propose. “Treating employees with respect” and running a business for the long term actually go hand in hand you know, they are not contradictory things as you suggest!

This “Antoine WInfield is the best CB in the NFL” stuff is getting tired. He may have been the best, and he still may be very good, and he still may be one of the bigger strengths of the team, but it’s really kind of “out there, bordering on sounding like an ignorant homer” to keep insisting he is clearly, indisputably “the best.”

That seems to be the pattern of this article from top to bottom, from extremist reaction to the biggest problems on the team (e.g. McNabb) to extremist over-the-top praise of the bigger strengths (e.g. Antoine). It reads more like emotional venting than sober rational reasoning — what one needs to bring to the table when looking at “the Stock Market.”

I would take those numbers with a grain of salt – he’s been awful and totally unimpressive this year so far. Cut him quick. Other than that, I agreed with EVERYTHING you’ve written in this post.

I dont care what the stats say, Sully is terrible. Keep Hutch around till he retires to anchor the line, trade back in the draft to pick up some more 2nd and 3rd rounders and draft a metric ton of Olineman.

We’re almost guaranteed to miss the playoffs (yeah, yeah, Chargers went 11-5) and we’re in an excellent spot to gun for a top 5 pick. We need to embrace this year as a rebuild and get Ponder some playing time so we know what we have before we need to make a decision re: Andrew Luck.

I really don’t think they are right on him, at least from what I have seen the guy is not very good.