Minnesota Vikings News and Links, 7/4

Happy Independence Day, ladies and gentlemen! I know that a lot of you are probably busy with friends and family on this holiday, but just in case you're stuck at work or you've got a little downtime at some point today, we've got our Open Thread here for you.

We haven't had a whole lot over the past 24 hours. . .just Ted's look at the position battles along the defensive line. Around the rest of the internet. . .

-Fox Sports has another story about wide receiver Cordarrelle Patterson being poised for a breakout year in 2014.

-Brian Urlacher said that the Vikings "haven't had a quarterback in four years." He said this while looking directly at Donovan McNabb. Takes guts to tell someone the truth to their face.

-Fox Sports analyst Rob Rang likes the way rookie Scott Crichton appears to fit into the Minnesota Vikings' new defensive scheme.

The rules of the Open Thread are the same as they've ever been, ladies and gentlemen. . .no politics, no religion, no feeding of the trolls, keep the language relatively clean (using spoiler tags, if necessary), and keep the GIFs relatively work-safe.

We'll conclude our week of Summer Blockbuster songs with this one.

And I'm going to cheat a little bit and give you this one as well, because America. (Naughty language warning goes here.)

With that, the beer light is on and the grill is hot for this Independence Day, ladies and gentlemen! Enjoy your holiday!