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After the lackluster preseason and last year's struggles, I expected a tough game. Hell, I wouldn't have been surprised had we lost. But hot damn that was fun to watch. If the Line plays this way for a majority of the year and Cook plays like he did tonight....well, let me not get ahead of myself. But if they can keep this up or at least close to this type of performance, we'll be in every game this year and be in it to win it at the end.
Good night folks...and SKOL!!!
That is the way this team SHOULD be playing. Just look at the roster and compare it to others in the NFL. As I've said all summer, this team needed a shrink more than added talent. So I, like most I suspect, will remain cautiously optimistic. Because that underachieving bugaboo (or injuries) could creep up at any time. If this team doesn't make the playoffs it won't be for lack of talent.
They sure as heck surprised me. It was something we all hoped for, but few would predict. Great way to start the season!
Here's the deal: you guys may notice I predict the team to go 19-0 every year. This year, at the end of preseason, I really didn't know how they were going to do it. I almost gave up my optimism. However, when they cut Boone, it immediately restored my confidence in the team.
Viewing it through that lens (that Boone was NOT part of their plan, and they were just apparently using preseason not to choose their starters, but to weed through the bubble players), I was excited. For years the Vikings were the team that TRIED to win preseason games. We'd keep our first stringers in the game much longer than almost any team in the league, because we HAD to. The Vikings would walk into game one still unsure of who their best 53 were. This year, apparently, that wasn't the case. I'd guess they had 48-ish slots filled by the time they took the first snap of preseason. If you look at who was cut, those guys played a LOT in preseason. It's clear to me that if someone was going to be cut, the Vikings had two plans for preseason:
1. Make the scrubs prove they are scrubs (Boone). And...
2. Give the starters an actual challenge in vanilla settings by intentionally replacing key players with scrubs/borderline players. That's why you never really saw our true "starting lineup" on either side of the ball. There would always be one or two players out with the starters who'd make you think "... he's gonna start?". Similarly, I noticed a number of formation issues... where it seemed the coaches were intentionally setting the defense up to fail in preseason, to help them practice broken formations or defensive mismatches.
Interesting take Max, and I do think you may have hit on something here because this was a different preseason feel than what we were used to.
Quote: @MaroonBells said:
That is the way this team SHOULD be playing. Just look at the roster and compare it to others in the NFL. As I've said all summer, this team needed a shrink more than added talent. So I, like most I suspect, will remain cautiously optimistic. Because that underachieving bugaboo (or injuries) could creep up at any time. If this team doesn't make the playoffs it won't be for lack of talent.
You could say us as fans needed a shrink just as much.
Max you may be right with that, I did not get to see much in the way of preseason games. However, what I did see then and what I saw tonight were polar opposites and maybe that is what the Vikings were looking at in the preseason and not worried about the W or the L.
Quote: @MaroonBells said:
That is the way this team SHOULD be playing. Just look at the roster and compare it to others in the NFL. As I've said all summer, this team needed a shrink more than added talent. So I, like most I suspect, will remain cautiously optimistic. Because that underachieving bugaboo (or injuries) could creep up at any time. If this team doesn't make the playoffs it won't be for lack of talent.
I think after the TB injury, they did need a shrink. The issues were masked as we went 5-0, but everyone was waiting for the roof to fall in.
As to Max's take, definitely a possibility. Kinda wondered along those lines as well. Especially the game that Edwards called. We seemed to be out of place a lot.
One difference, Mac didn't play much last night did he. Watched much of it on my phone so couldn't really tell who the slot db was, but I read Newman played most of it? So the preseason was about getting Mac some game experience there to build from?
Quote: @PurpleCrush said:
@ MaroonBells said:
That is the way this team SHOULD be playing. Just look at the roster and compare it to others in the NFL. As I've said all summer, this team needed a shrink more than added talent. So I, like most I suspect, will remain cautiously optimistic. Because that underachieving bugaboo (or injuries) could creep up at any time. If this team doesn't make the playoffs it won't be for lack of talent.
You could say us as fans needed a shrink just as much.
A shrink? After 25 yrs of rooting for the home team I need a hell of alot more then that. I know some of yall have been around much longer then I have but damn its tough being a Viking fan.
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