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Vikings cornerback Cameron Dantzler slipped to the ground after a stiff-arm from Smith-Marsette and recovered his balance as the receiver cut back inside and tried to juke Harrison Smith for additional yardage. Dantzler ripped the ball out of Smith-Marsette's hands, turning back toward the Bears' end zone as U.S. Bank Stadium erupted, and slid to the ground at the Chicago 45, ensuring the Bears would not get the ball back and sewing up a 29-22 victory.
For Ryan Cordell, sitting two levels above the field in a coaches' booth, the proudest moment came when he watched the Vikings sideline and saw players and coaches motioning for Dantzler to get down.
"The part that's underrated, to me, is the entire sideline is jumping up and down, helping him out," Cordell said. "It isn't just one guy. Cam knows it, but so does everybody on the sideline, so does everybody on the field. He makes a great play; let's capitalize on this great play and close out this game."
None of the 28 assistant coaches on Kevin O'Connell's staff has as unique a role as Cordell, the Vikings game management coordinator whose job is to prepare players and coaches for the split-second decisions that can mean the difference between a win and a loss in the NFL.
A year after going 5-8 in one-score games and finishing a game out of the playoffs, the 4-1 Vikings have won three consecutive games by seven points or less, getting the go-ahead score late in the fourth quarter each time. They picked up a key first down with Ryan Wright's completion to Jalen Nailor off a fake punt against the Saints on Oct. 2, and iced the game with Dantzler's turnover after a seven-minute touchdown drive against the Bears last Sunday.
https://www.startribune.com/vikings-situational-masters-game-management-coordinator-ryan-cordell-kevin-oconnell/600216057/
Cordell's weekly "situational masters" meetings, where he holds lively film reviews of how teams handle different in-game scenarios, have become a big hit with players. On Saturdays, he meets with O'Connell and the Vikings coordinators to talk through how they plan to handle certain situations. On gamedays, he sits in the coaches' booth, thinking ahead about O'Connell's upcoming decisions and ready to chime in about whether the Vikings should go for it on fourth down, challenge an official's call or manage the clock a certain way.
"When I flip over to defense, or it could be a situational thing on special teams, field position-wise, how aggressive I want to be on some of these fourth downs, he's involved in a lot of that dialogue," said O'Connell, who is 3-for-4 on fourth-down attempts. "He's so intelligent, so bright, but also has a great way about him."
Most NFL teams spend time talking through situational football, and the Vikings emphasized it with meetings and situational drills during practices under Mike Zimmer. Under O'Connell, the Vikings are one of a handful of teams that have game management coaches on staff.
"I don't think you can overemphasize it," linebacker Jordan Hicks said. "Kirk [Cousins] may know the situation, but we've got to get every single offensive lineman, every person on the field understanding what we have to get done. Winning NFL football teams are good situational football teams."
The term "situational masters" was popularized by Sean McVay with the Rams, and O'Connell brought it with him to Minnesota; to prepare for his meetings each week, Cordell continues the process that first caught O'Connell's eye in San Francisco.
He reviews different situations from each NFL game every week, scouring film for either examples worth emulating or cautionary tales to avoid. From one presentation, Hicks said, he learned the NFL's obscure rule permitting a free kick after a fair catch; another presentation, right tackle Brian O'Neill said, highlighted the proper and improper ways to defend a teammate during an on-field scuffle.
"He's charismatic," Hicks said. "He brings some humor into it — cutting in and out of different funny clips. He's always trying to keep guys engaged and be creative. He does a great job."
The meetings have taken off to the point, wide receiver Adam Thielen said, where players bring in their own examples of situations they saw in a college game on a Saturday afternoon.
"Guys are coming in and saying, 'Man, did you see that game and what they did? That's a perfect clip for situational masters,'" Thielen said. "You see guys actually watching other games and learning from them before we even talk about it."
On gamedays, Cordell's most important role might be to stay a step ahead of O'Connell.
He travels with O'Connell to different channels on the coaches' headsets, providing an eye-in-the-sky perspective about whether to challenge a call or and picking his spots to cut through the conversation with short bursts of information about an upcoming decision the head coach might face.
"[He'll say], 'Hey, if you're third-and-11 and you get 6 yards, your line where the percentages tell you you can be green-lit to go for it is here,'" O'Connell said. "And then I just have to make the decision. Are we close to that line where I'm willing to risk it?
"He does a great job laying out the circumstances based on his recommendation. I know what the analytics would say, and then I can think about the game, how the team's playing on the other side, how we're playing in all three phases, and then, is it a moment where we can possibly grab the momentum?"
Cordell said he has used different analytical methods with different teams when advising on fourth-down decisions or kick-or-punt choices. He's spent enough time as both a coach and a data analyst to know those choices aren't always cut-and-dried.
"You want to go, 'Hey, A led to B led to C.' Well, if we'd changed A, then C would have been way different,'" Cordell said. "Seeing how the game shifts and grows and moves as it goes along is important in how you make your decisions. I'd love for it to be a little more linear, but it's not. At the end of the day, it's an oddly shaped football, and it does some weird things from time to time."
"We're just really lucky to have him," O'Connell said. "He's a real bright spot for me on our staff."
I think this type of coaching is a real thing. This isn't just some fluff piece with hyperbole on something that is exaggerated. 'Situational masters' are the teams that win more games than they lose in close, 4th quarter contests. If anyone watches the NFL Redzone, you see this stuff all the time, especially in the Witching Hour.
Too early to say 100% that Minnesota may be past most of the gross losses we've seen in crunch time for various reasons, but you have to love how things have started for the Vikings in that category.
Good read. Employing a "game management coordinator" is a damn good idea.
I might have been dismissive if I had just heard the title “game management coordinator.” But hearing it explained, it seems like such a logical idea. And the way it has caught on with the players is incredible, especially the way Thielen describes it. This is a great read.
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