The 2020 Vikings offense is good — until it has to beTake away the element of unpredictability, and the Vikings' offense falls apart.The Vikings scored 27 points Sunday and gained more than 400 yards on an average of 6.2 yards per play. That they still lost 33-27 to the Bears should feel far more like a function of a leaky, injury-ravaged defense than anything the offense did or didn't do.
And yet the story of the game — and really, the story of the season — was told in a small sample size on offense, not defense. Defense and special teams sabotaged plenty of plans this year on the way to a 6-8 record and all but mathematical playoff elimination. But the offense, with relatively good health, abundant star power and even more resources poured into it than the defense, undercut the Vikings when it mattered most.
Time after time.
The Vikings are fifth in the NFL in yards per game (387.1), yet they can't get one when it matters most.
They couldn't do it on an Alexander Mattison 4th-and-1 run that would have sealed a win in Seattle earlier this season in a game that instead pivoted to an excruciating loss.
They couldn't get one Sunday against the Bears — neither on a momentum-turning second-quarter run by Dalvin Cook that gave the Bears free points the Vikings chased all day, nor on their last realistic chance to change the outcome while trailing by 3 and facing a 4th-and-1 at the outset of their late drive.
The first 4th-and-1 whiff was defined by stubborn predictability:
running Dalvin Cook into the teeth of the Bears' defense, where he found no cutback lanes and was stuffed. The second was likely informed by the first: The Bears were all over a 4th-and-1 pass, forcing Kirk Cousins to scramble backwards before lofting a desperation floater that fell harmlessly to the ground.
The failed two-minute drill called to mind similar misses in close losses to Tennessee and Dallas. There were successes, too, but like the rest of the 2020 Vikings they were overshadowed by the failures.
When you have a quarterback who holds the ball too long and an offensive line that can still be overpowered, it makes you vulnerable when the game matters most.
The Vikings learned that the hard way over and over again, and now they won't have the chance to learn it again in a meaningful way until 2021.
https://www.startribune.com/the-2020-vik...600003268/