Minnesota Vikings Look To Avoid The Post-Bye Blues

For many teams, the bye week in the National Football League is an opportunity to get healthy, relax a little bit, and attempt to get some momentum going for the remainder of their season. However, for the Minnesota Vikings over the past few years, it has been anything but.

The Vikings haven't won a game coming out of the bye week since 2009, when they posted a 27-10 victory over the Detroit Lions. And, for the most part, they haven't just been losing. . .they've been getting their teeth kicked in.

Here's how the Vikings' last five games coming out of the bye have gone.

Yes, two of those games have come at the Vikings' personal house of horrors, Soldier Field, and four of those five games were on the road (though the one that was in Minnesota wasn't exactly anything to write home about). But it's a little strange to see a team have such a down streak in games where they should, theoretically, have a little bit of an advantage. Under Dennis Green, the Vikings were seemingly automatic coming out of the bye. In 11 post-bye games under Green before the Vikings crowned his. . .well, you know. . .the Vikings lost only twice.

As Ted has pointed out, the Vikings are entering a stretch of their schedule against teams that have sub-par records on paper before lining up a very tough final stretch to their season. If the Vikings are going to contend for a playoff spot and/or a division title in 2015, they need to take advantage of that, starting by snapping their post-bye week funk that has seen them not win coming out of the bye in this decade.