Quote: @MaroonBells said:
@"Geoff Nichols" said:
@ MaroonBells said:
@"Geoff Nichols" said:
Likely means that Tomlinson is gone based on the larger dead money number. But this does not suggest P2 won't return at all. Since P2 had only a single void year the cap impact would have been the same regardless if they re-signed him before the void date or not. Tomlinson's is more impactful since an extension would have prevented the void years (3 at $2.5M) from advancing onto this years cap.
To put it in perspective, if Tomlinson was willing to take a market rate deal the Vikings could have kept him on the roster near the $7.5M cap number if not less. So in my opinion either his agent was asking for the moon or the Vikings simply didn't like him as much as they led on.
Vikings are in a weird spot. Because while you could argue a full rebuild makes sense on one side of the ball, it absolutely does not on the other. On that side it's ready to compete for a championship. Very curious to see how they manage this.
The next week at the combine will really paint the picture. Naturally you would hope they could improve defensively with guys simply knowing the system/scheme. Schemed pressure is also more predictable regardless of talent. So with Flores even if they "Gut" the defense in many ways they could statistically be better.
Flip to the other side of the coin and you could make an argument that they go all-in on offense and simply hope a top 5 offense gets them further. The question on that is how sustainable would it be with a 35 year old QB who is coming off an average season and a 27 year old RB who counts for nearly $15M on the cap? Once you talk through it you start to realize they are really between a rock and a hard place.
Part of me thinks this will end up being the year they pay and move up for a QB. It actually allows them to play this out one more time in many ways. Would it hurt to give up Hunter or a 2024 1st? Sure. But I think this FO will think about it in "resources". Is a 1st round pick valuable? Yes. But is it as valuable as $20-30M in cap space? Arguably not. They end up keeping Thielen, Cook, Harrison, etc. for one more go-around. If they backloaded a contract or two they could still add on the defensive side of the ball.
Then they would plan to transition to a rookie QB in 2024 with many of those players off the roster. Its a cleaner reset in some ways. Although they would be missing a 1st round pick they would have $30M+ in cap space to play around with and even more in 2025. So think of 2023 as a competitive year, 2024 as a reset and 2025 as the return assuming the QB works out.
I don't know what Kwesi's thinking, but I extend Cousins (short), Hock (long) and Harry (short); trade Dalvin; cut Kendricks, Thielen, Ham, Hicks and Reed; and restructure O'Neill. Just in those few moves, the Vikings could be 30-35M under the cap--enough to add a couple B-Flo picks to the defense. Then tee it up again and hope for the best.
Cousins will be better his 2nd year in the offense and I think Flores could make the defense competitive with a couple key additions.
Just think the Vikings are more likely to win a Super Bowl in our lifetimes with Cousins and Jefferson than they would by resetting, especially at QB. Because even if the Vikings were able to somehow score the #1 overall pick, that's no guarantee of anything. Far from it. We keep hearing Byrce Young is a can't miss or Caleb Williams is. Maybe. But did you know that in the last 33 drafts only ONE QB taken #1 overall has won a Super Bowl for the team who drafted him? ONE. In 33 years. 20 QBs. The key? Get lucky. Or get a vet. And we already have one.
In the meantime, let's see if we can't bring this defense up to league average. JMO.
The bolded statements above is a powerful argument. I think our current offense is more than solid, it's good. Our D can be fixed to be average in one year. It certainly won't take much to improve it from terrible. I don't see us going after the #1 overall pick, but if a QB we value is within striking range in the draft, I could see us trading up in the first. In that case, Cousins has one year left with us (2 at the most if they feel they need to extend for cap room).
Quote: @MaroonBells said:
@"Geoff Nichols" said:
@ MaroonBells said:
@"Geoff Nichols" said:
Likely means that Tomlinson is gone based on the larger dead money number. But this does not suggest P2 won't return at all. Since P2 had only a single void year the cap impact would have been the same regardless if they re-signed him before the void date or not. Tomlinson's is more impactful since an extension would have prevented the void years (3 at $2.5M) from advancing onto this years cap.
To put it in perspective, if Tomlinson was willing to take a market rate deal the Vikings could have kept him on the roster near the $7.5M cap number if not less. So in my opinion either his agent was asking for the moon or the Vikings simply didn't like him as much as they led on.
Vikings are in a weird spot. Because while you could argue a full rebuild makes sense on one side of the ball, it absolutely does not on the other. On that side it's ready to compete for a championship. Very curious to see how they manage this.
The next week at the combine will really paint the picture. Naturally you would hope they could improve defensively with guys simply knowing the system/scheme. Schemed pressure is also more predictable regardless of talent. So with Flores even if they "Gut" the defense in many ways they could statistically be better.
Flip to the other side of the coin and you could make an argument that they go all-in on offense and simply hope a top 5 offense gets them further. The question on that is how sustainable would it be with a 35 year old QB who is coming off an average season and a 27 year old RB who counts for nearly $15M on the cap? Once you talk through it you start to realize they are really between a rock and a hard place.
Part of me thinks this will end up being the year they pay and move up for a QB. It actually allows them to play this out one more time in many ways. Would it hurt to give up Hunter or a 2024 1st? Sure. But I think this FO will think about it in "resources". Is a 1st round pick valuable? Yes. But is it as valuable as $20-30M in cap space? Arguably not. They end up keeping Thielen, Cook, Harrison, etc. for one more go-around. If they backloaded a contract or two they could still add on the defensive side of the ball.
Then they would plan to transition to a rookie QB in 2024 with many of those players off the roster. Its a cleaner reset in some ways. Although they would be missing a 1st round pick they would have $30M+ in cap space to play around with and even more in 2025. So think of 2023 as a competitive year, 2024 as a reset and 2025 as the return assuming the QB works out.
I don't know what Kwesi's thinking, but I extend Cousins (short), Hock (long) and Harry (short); trade Dalvin; cut Kendricks, Thielen, Ham, Hicks and Reed; and restructure O'Neill. Just in those few moves, the Vikings could be 30-35M under the cap--enough to add a couple B-Flo picks to the defense. Then tee it up again and hope for the best.
Cousins will be better his 2nd year in the offense and I think Flores could make the defense competitive with a couple key additions.
Just think the Vikings are more likely to win a Super Bowl in our lifetimes with Cousins and Jefferson than they would by resetting, especially at QB. Because even if the Vikings were able to somehow score the #1 overall pick, that's no guarantee of anything. Far from it. We keep hearing Byrce Young is a can't miss or Caleb Williams is. Maybe. But did you know that in the last 33 drafts only ONE QB taken #1 overall has won a Super Bowl for the team who drafted him? ONE. In 33 years. 20 QBs. The key? Get lucky. Or get a vet. And we already have one.
In the meantime, let's see if we can't bring this defense up to league average. JMO.
Well Brady skews that 33 year thing...
Quote: @MaroonBells said:
@"Geoff Nichols" said:
@ MaroonBells said:
@"Geoff Nichols" said:
Likely means that Tomlinson is gone based on the larger dead money number. But this does not suggest P2 won't return at all. Since P2 had only a single void year the cap impact would have been the same regardless if they re-signed him before the void date or not. Tomlinson's is more impactful since an extension would have prevented the void years (3 at $2.5M) from advancing onto this years cap.
To put it in perspective, if Tomlinson was willing to take a market rate deal the Vikings could have kept him on the roster near the $7.5M cap number if not less. So in my opinion either his agent was asking for the moon or the Vikings simply didn't like him as much as they led on.
Vikings are in a weird spot. Because while you could argue a full rebuild makes sense on one side of the ball, it absolutely does not on the other. On that side it's ready to compete for a championship. Very curious to see how they manage this.
The next week at the combine will really paint the picture. Naturally you would hope they could improve defensively with guys simply knowing the system/scheme. Schemed pressure is also more predictable regardless of talent. So with Flores even if they "Gut" the defense in many ways they could statistically be better.
Flip to the other side of the coin and you could make an argument that they go all-in on offense and simply hope a top 5 offense gets them further. The question on that is how sustainable would it be with a 35 year old QB who is coming off an average season and a 27 year old RB who counts for nearly $15M on the cap? Once you talk through it you start to realize they are really between a rock and a hard place.
Part of me thinks this will end up being the year they pay and move up for a QB. It actually allows them to play this out one more time in many ways. Would it hurt to give up Hunter or a 2024 1st? Sure. But I think this FO will think about it in "resources". Is a 1st round pick valuable? Yes. But is it as valuable as $20-30M in cap space? Arguably not. They end up keeping Thielen, Cook, Harrison, etc. for one more go-around. If they backloaded a contract or two they could still add on the defensive side of the ball.
Then they would plan to transition to a rookie QB in 2024 with many of those players off the roster. Its a cleaner reset in some ways. Although they would be missing a 1st round pick they would have $30M+ in cap space to play around with and even more in 2025. So think of 2023 as a competitive year, 2024 as a reset and 2025 as the return assuming the QB works out.
I don't know what Kwesi's thinking, but I extend Cousins (short), Hock (long) and Harry (short); trade Dalvin; cut Kendricks, Thielen, Ham, Hicks and Reed; and restructure O'Neill. Just in those few moves, the Vikings could be 30-35M under the cap--enough to add a couple B-Flo picks to the defense. Then tee it up again and hope for the best.
Cousins will be better his 2nd year in the offense and I think Flores could make the defense competitive with a couple key additions.
Just think the Vikings are more likely to win a Super Bowl in our lifetimes with Cousins and Jefferson than they would by resetting, especially at QB. Because even if the Vikings were able to somehow score the #1 overall pick, that's no guarantee of anything. Far from it. We keep hearing Byrce Young is a can't miss or Caleb Williams is. Maybe. But did you know that in the last 33 drafts only ONE QB taken #1 overall has won a Super Bowl for the team who drafted him? ONE. In 33 years. 20 QBs. The key? Get lucky. Or get a vet. And we already have one.
In the meantime, let's see if we can't bring this defense up to league average. JMO.
Not suggesting your points are wrong, but any sacrifice to the offense at the expense of the defense is going to end poorly. So while opening up cap space is fine, they will need to replace Thielen/Cook with decently high draft assets or the cap space they are opening up. In the DVOA era (not that DVOA is Gospel) you can kind of break teams into groupings.
- The top 25% of teams have a top 10 offense & defense
- The next 25% have either a top 10 offense or defense (basically you're elite at something)
- The second to last 25% are middle of the pack at both offense & defense
- The bottom 25% is below average at both offense & defense (common sense)
So if you believe the Vikings were overachievers in year 1 it honestly may be a trap thinking they need to even out the defense.
Agree that Kirk will get better and there isn't a huge rush to move on. But the Vikings wouldn't need to move up to #1 to take a stab at a QB. Drafting a QB is a 50/50 proposition in the 1st round regardless if its pick #1 or pick #20 . Arguably you would have longer odds if you said that QB needed to outperform Kirk. But teams have had worse odds winning in the SB era with high priced veteran QBs. So that 50/50 shot is probably worth it if you really like the player you're adding. Crash or burn eventually you need to add a level of variance to the outcome.
Quote: @greediron said:
@ MaroonBells said:
@"Geoff Nichols" said:
@ MaroonBells said:
@"Geoff Nichols" said:
Likely means that Tomlinson is gone based on the larger dead money number. But this does not suggest P2 won't return at all. Since P2 had only a single void year the cap impact would have been the same regardless if they re-signed him before the void date or not. Tomlinson's is more impactful since an extension would have prevented the void years (3 at $2.5M) from advancing onto this years cap.
To put it in perspective, if Tomlinson was willing to take a market rate deal the Vikings could have kept him on the roster near the $7.5M cap number if not less. So in my opinion either his agent was asking for the moon or the Vikings simply didn't like him as much as they led on.
Vikings are in a weird spot. Because while you could argue a full rebuild makes sense on one side of the ball, it absolutely does not on the other. On that side it's ready to compete for a championship. Very curious to see how they manage this.
The next week at the combine will really paint the picture. Naturally you would hope they could improve defensively with guys simply knowing the system/scheme. Schemed pressure is also more predictable regardless of talent. So with Flores even if they "Gut" the defense in many ways they could statistically be better.
Flip to the other side of the coin and you could make an argument that they go all-in on offense and simply hope a top 5 offense gets them further. The question on that is how sustainable would it be with a 35 year old QB who is coming off an average season and a 27 year old RB who counts for nearly $15M on the cap? Once you talk through it you start to realize they are really between a rock and a hard place.
Part of me thinks this will end up being the year they pay and move up for a QB. It actually allows them to play this out one more time in many ways. Would it hurt to give up Hunter or a 2024 1st? Sure. But I think this FO will think about it in "resources". Is a 1st round pick valuable? Yes. But is it as valuable as $20-30M in cap space? Arguably not. They end up keeping Thielen, Cook, Harrison, etc. for one more go-around. If they backloaded a contract or two they could still add on the defensive side of the ball.
Then they would plan to transition to a rookie QB in 2024 with many of those players off the roster. Its a cleaner reset in some ways. Although they would be missing a 1st round pick they would have $30M+ in cap space to play around with and even more in 2025. So think of 2023 as a competitive year, 2024 as a reset and 2025 as the return assuming the QB works out.
I don't know what Kwesi's thinking, but I extend Cousins (short), Hock (long) and Harry (short); trade Dalvin; cut Kendricks, Thielen, Ham, Hicks and Reed; and restructure O'Neill. Just in those few moves, the Vikings could be 30-35M under the cap--enough to add a couple B-Flo picks to the defense. Then tee it up again and hope for the best.
Cousins will be better his 2nd year in the offense and I think Flores could make the defense competitive with a couple key additions.
Just think the Vikings are more likely to win a Super Bowl in our lifetimes with Cousins and Jefferson than they would by resetting, especially at QB. Because even if the Vikings were able to somehow score the #1 overall pick, that's no guarantee of anything. Far from it. We keep hearing Byrce Young is a can't miss or Caleb Williams is. Maybe. But did you know that in the last 33 drafts only ONE QB taken #1 overall has won a Super Bowl for the team who drafted him? ONE. In 33 years. 20 QBs. The key? Get lucky. Or get a vet. And we already have one.
In the meantime, let's see if we can't bring this defense up to league average. JMO.
Well Brady skews that 33 year thing...
Actually that reminds me, Drew Bledsoe won a Super Bowl, so...TWO. But yeah, there are a lot of yabbuts in this. But that's my whole point. A top pick, or even a top 10 pick spent on a QB is not the panacea so many think it is. Folks will look at who won the Super Bowl each season and say THAT is the key. Manning wins and it's the top pick in the draft. Wilson wins and it's a QB on a rookie contract. Brady and Stafford win and it's an acquired vet whose cap percentage is under 12%. Mahomes wins at 17% and its....I don't know but go get yer Mahomes! B)
Vikings and Tomlinson mutually agreed to extend the VOID date to 3/15.
I’m waffling on whether I have faith that we can reasonably
expect an elite offense. I’d like to be
surprised. I just don’t think we’re
going to draft an upgrade over Thielen and it’s going to magically unlock our
offense. I kind of think our best option
is to resign Thielen at a lower cost. I
think most of the upgrades are going to come from being better at blocking, at
running the ball, having more balanced playcalling, and Cousins seeing his 3rd
and 4th options better. Despite
what we’ve seen the last couple years, there’s a part of me that doesn’t believe
that Cousins is going to become a shootout QB, where we are always scoring 30+
points and consistently outscoring other teams.
There’s also a part of me, that doesn’t want to have to experience the
roller coaster all the time, and wants a defense that can keep the other teams
offense at bay so that we can reliably win, and I think getting our offense to
elite will keep our defense in the cellar.
If I thought we were 1 WR away, I’d probably be on board
though.
Quote: @medaille said:
I’m waffling on whether I have faith that we can reasonably
expect an elite offense. I’d like to be
surprised. I just don’t think we’re
going to draft an upgrade over Thielen and it’s going to magically unlock our
offense. I kind of think our best option
is to resign Thielen at a lower cost. I
think most of the upgrades are going to come from being better at blocking, at
running the ball, having more balanced playcalling, and Cousins seeing his 3rd
and 4th options better. Despite
what we’ve seen the last couple years, there’s a part of me that doesn’t believe
that Cousins is going to become a shootout QB, where we are always scoring 30+
points and consistently outscoring other teams.
There’s also a part of me, that doesn’t want to have to experience the
roller coaster all the time, and wants a defense that can keep the other teams
offense at bay so that we can reliably win, and I think getting our offense to
elite will keep our defense in the cellar.
If I thought we were 1 WR away, I’d probably be on board
though.
everything you said there, but I dont think Cousins is going to get us to elite without some other aspect of the team struggling, he gets paid to much for the supporting cast he needs IMO ( in case you havent been paying attention :p )
and unless he is willing to take less, there just isnt enough cash left over to build a defense and get him a better line that will keep him clean enough to get comfortable enough, to get past these long stretches of the game where his play just seems to suffer, or to where he is able to make his plays against top tier defenses.
I think a rebuild is in order, the longer we wait, IMO the more years of JJ and now Hock we are going to be wasting.
If we fix the Oline the team gets automatically better---too much poor Qb decisions because of D running free
They need to do something with D.Hunter this off-season too.
GL KAM, no pressure.
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