How pathetic are Vikings fans?

“As of midday Wednesday, the Vikings had 11,000 tickets to sell by 4:30 p.m. ET Friday to satisfy the league’s sellout requirements and ensure the game will be broadcast. Help from the FOX affiliate and corporate sponsors is possible.”

Mike, I agree on what an excellent job Rodgers has done and and he also not a problem for coaching/management like Favre apparently is. Glad we moved Favre and started Rodgers rather than letting him go to Free Agency next season.

Jeff, another way to look at it is if the defense would have prevented 1 more touchdown we would have won those 7 games as well. To further that we did score some touchdowns with less than 5 minutes on the clock in some of those games but the defense always broke down in the last minutes of the game and Rodgers and the offense couldn’t come back with another drive to win many times. It’s a shared effort I think Rodgers will be better next year and the offensive line will be better even if we get new tackles. I’m going to get off my soap box at this point about how the defense needs to improve, but in any case it’s the defensive line that can improve the most to take us from a terrible record back up to being a major play off contender.

It works the other way too. If O can’t move the ball, we kick from crappy field position and leave the defense a short field to work with. That happened far too often in the games we lost.

I think that’s part of the disconnect here – too many people are looking at the whole year’s stats and saying “Hey, the offense is going great!” That’s true – except for the games where we couldn’t score more than 17 points against Chicago, Tennessee, Jacksonville and Dallas.

I think you have to expect to score 21 to win today. Take a look at any given week’s scores, and you’ll see most of the winners above 17. Even a statistically good defense like Philly or Tampa Bay commonly gives up that many. Unless your team is built for absolute defensive dominance, you’d better score – only the top three defenses allowed less than 17 points a game.

Of course, the teams with the top ten defenses seem to get a lot better situated for playoff contention than us. Ach. I’m getting lost in my stats and don’t have time to dig my way out. I’m sticking with my point – Most of this year, we had a fading Clifton, Tauscher and Wells to rely on. Unless Clifton finds the fountain of youth, the only “good” O-lineman left is Wells. Some people are going to have to step up in a serious way for us to maintain the offense we had much less improve upon its consistency.

The offense did move the consistently though. They had problems punching it in, but they moved it just fine. A QB withover 4000 and a running back at what 1200? Plus you had two other running backs with 100 yd games. Now, part of the reason that they did put up those big yardage numbers was becausue they usually started so deep, but moving the ball was not the consistent problem…..neither was offensive turnovers. you could turn it the other way were that not the case, and you can always say “if they just put up one more TD”, and certainly they should have a couple times, but these collapses fall greatly on the D.

getting a pedicure

I think there is some general agreement on all here that the lines, both offensive and defensive, need real help. I don’t know what is more pressing. We know that if TT does do something in FA that it probably will be only one real impact maker. The question would be “which side do you go”? Jeff makes completely valid points on the O-line. They weren’t awful last year, and I’ve sure seen worse, but they could get real bad real quick. If Colledge graded out as the best lineman, that doesn’t bode well. It sure seems like I heard his name an awful lot on penalties and missed assignments for the top graded guy. The anchors, Clifton and Tauscher, both struggled mightily at times, especially down the stretch. The other Tt guys seem to be good fill ins who can play up and down the line, but are just not good starting caliber guys. On the other hand, the D-line was just awful, awful, awful. But I think one BIG impact guy, could completely reverse that and make them into an absolute force. If there is a Haynesworth or Peppers out there, imagine the relief of Kampman that would bring. Along with Jenkins back, the fat slobs in the middle could go back to being the Gilbert Brown types they are supposed to be. There is also a need of some depth there. Harrell either needs to get healthy or get out. I’m not even looking for him to be a first round producer anymore. I’ll take dressed on Sundays for now. that,in turn, would also free up the linebackers to work in space, which seems like that is their best setting, and an already studly D-back group would have to cover for less time, and be able to make even more impact plays than this year. You could go either way. I would prefer the D, but I won’t hold my breath either way as I think that the Stock “retirement” was the sacrificial lamb for the “big changes” we need. Think about it, it took ten weeks to cut Frost, 13 to design a blitz, 14 to run a screen, and they still haven’t learned not to sit on the ball for a field goal try. They just seem so unwilling to deviate from something that isn’t working, but we will see. Cross your fingers

upon further review….
The Packers announced Friday that Stock, 69, is retiring from professional coaching. Stock told the Green Bay Press-Gazette last week that if it were up to him, he would return for a fourth season with the Packers.

The punt and kick coverage was terrible this year and that’s on the special teams coach. too may 50 yard returns. It’s good that Stock is out.

I’m hoping they can get some good rotational players for the D-Line out of the top of the draft. Jolly and Montgomery didn’t have good guys to rotate with which just made the whole D-Line look bad. I mean really bad. Maybe those higher draft picks could then become more impact players down the road. I would agree with Pete H that if they can get at least 1 horse out of FA like Peppers or Haynesworth that would make all the differenece in the world because having an every down player really cuts down on their rotation issues.

The only thing is Peppers is probably going to get either the franchise tag or the transistion tag. I’m not sure if he has gotten either one of those tags in the past or how that effects whether or not they can put it on him again but I would bet he won’t actually become available once the FA season starts.

Dont understand the “rotational” concept of a DL. Jenkins, Kampman, Pickett, and one other; maybe a Haynesworth or from others already on team, or draft. Seems to me we need a starter not someone to rotate. Who other than the current Packers rotates? Same with OL; seems to me we need to settle on a starting unit and quit all this shuffling around. I realize the injury factor which makes for substitutions, but last year was rediculous trying to find OL and DL starters.

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Also gives you a chance to let players do what they do best. Pickett is never going to be much of a pass rusher, and I think trying to make KGB an every down player rather than a pass rush specialist was a mess most times. Almost everybody subs guys in situationally – goal line run stuffers, pass rush specialist and such. Guys like Jenkins and Kampman who are balanced enough to do both jobs exceptionally well just seem to be less common, and even they need to be spelled.

Thompson may be thinking salary too. If you can keep them fresh, maybe you can get the needed results from a larger number of good athletes rather than having to rely on (and pay for) a couple elite guys. I’m not sure I buy that, but it would explain the mindset. As a less insidious thought pattern, maybe he’s just trying to build the team and make the best with the guys he has rather than blow money trying to purchase a team. Again, I’m not sure I buy it, but it would explain things.

Enough amateur psychology. I’m gonna go shovel snow.

How many stud impact football players don’t have some type of issues? There is only one Reggie.
Larry, I agree that the O line needs as much cohesiveness as possible, but every team rotates D lineman. They would absolutely be worn out by the end of every game. It is by no means an even 50/50 split, but even Reggie came out sometimes. And like Mark said the league is a specialist league now. Think about Gilbert Brown. He was anabsolute liability against the pass, but a massive run stuffer. I think even the Williams boys come out on alot of pass downs. I agree on the notion that I don’t just want a bunch of average guys all on a rotation. That just means your always at best, average. I like having guys like Thompson to be able to come in and make a big play here and there, not start. The rotation fill-ins is where you can put some raw athletic ability guys out there and see what they can do on a limited basis, as well as learn from guys who “know” how to play. I think we saw that in some areas on the team this year. Tramon comes to mind. doesn’t have to play the big dogs most of the time and can the use his athleticism to make some huge impact plays. Jordy Nelson as well. KGB did it last year…..Come on TT, make me wrong about you…please.

Jenkins and Kampan are every down players but they are the only 2 every down players we have on the D-Line. When Jenkins got hurt the D-Line never bounced back as we all know, but what if Kampan gets hurt next time? Then what do you do? So a good quality D-end would be nice to bring in.

Apparently with Corey Williams leaving and Harrel not stepping up that was too much to take out of the rotation we had last year and coupled with the fact that we have not had an inside pass rusher for years would indicate we also need at least 1 quality interior D-Lineman. That’s my 2 cents on the whole rotation thing.

A good day… The Vikings get bounced and Sanders gets fired.

Ok, guys, I agree with the specialality (word?) aspect of the D given down, distance, and location. But, rotation is something totally different in my mind. To me that means lack of strength, durability, and skill. Maybe its my memory failing me but I just cant remember such wholesale substitutions. And, Mark, I may have misread your response. I took it as sarcasim, and if so I agree heartily.

Maybe, Larry. If you have studs on D-line, you want them on the field as much as possible and only take them out to spell them as needed. However, when you don’t have them and can’t immediately get them, maybe this is one way to mask that and get the most out of the guys you have.

Somewhere Chuck Bednarik is either cursing or laughing his ass off.

Isn’t Haynesworth the guy who stomped on some dude’s head and maybe even pulled his helmet off to do it? Gotta go back to Charles Martin to find that kinda thing from a Packer, and we had a pretty damn good defense once upon a time. Like I said, maybe the guy has it under control now – there’s a lot of growing up that goes on between 22 and 27. I just bring it up as a tickler. If we get a shot at the guy, I say go for it.

Well, in a perfect world, I guess. Seems to me that guys like KGB (vs Kampman) take up a lot of 53 roster space. Further, the guys this year are the same as last except for a DT and 1/2 DE (KGB). In any case rotation sure didnt keep this group fresh for the 4th QTR. Or, in this case did the pre-season conditioning program burn them out re last 1/3 of the reg. season?

Well said Jeff! With another year under their belt, who knows? There just has to be more talent in the front seven than what we’ve seen. Whats done, obviously, is done but they do have more experience. This will be the year we find out if the youth movement paid off.

“Yes Haynesworth was the guy that stomped on that other guys face. I forget who it was…”
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I believe it was Andre Gurode, Cowboys Center. I’m not certain about signing Haynesworth – when the Packers played the Titans he had the exact same statistics as Justin Harrell. To pay a DT the kind of money Haynesworth is going to command, he’d better do more than just tie up two offensive linemen!

playmakers? the way the linebackers played this year I would hope to se as few of them as possible….we should use a 1-1-9 defense..

If you want to see defense, the Baltimore Ravens have it all. I say let’s steal their defensive coaches.

No matter what scheme is brought in, we still don’t have the horses. The best guys are getting old, Barnett is going to be questionable, Kampman is still steady, Collins had a good year, but this squad has been a disaster. I have been more patient with TT than some, but I would need to see significant progress this coming year, or I’m gonna hop on the adios TT bandwagon. I get the feeling TT told MM, you can fire your defense or I can fire you. I say fire the players and start from scratch like Parsells did in Miami.

I agree Roy and unfortunately we had both a stout defense and a offense that put butts in the seats…

Can’t say as I didn’t see the defensive firing coming… I also assume, whoever they hire will have a little more say in who they draft / bring in through FA. Realistically, I think just a couple really good players on D could really shore up our Defense and elevate the play of a few others that are playing at three quarter capacity.

Reminds me of Rhodes, horrible head coach but a great Defensive Coordinator…

If I were interviewing, I’d want to know if I get to make the choice who stays or is that gonna be TTs call?