Weakness to strength in record time?

[Guest]

@AGRforever said:

@pattersaur said:

"This offseason is the year we're finally gonna fix the O-line baby!"- Vikings fans for the past 5 years.
I'm only half-joking and I do agree we might finally--maybe-- actually be close to doing it. Charlie Brown is gonna connect with that football one of these years, right? It will be painfully ironic if the O-line gets good right as Kirk is exiting stage left. I'm not the biggest Kirk fan in the world but even I would like to see what he can do with a solid OL. Hopefully it comes together for him and for us THIS year versus waiting until 2023.

I find it funny that you think Kirk is exiting. I think he retires a Viking. 

Me too 

[Guest]

Nobody even mentions, when is the last time we had a really good oline coach who made a difference?  Do I have to go back 25 years to Mike freakin' Tice?   At least this year we have one thing going for us - no more Rico!   A traffic cone would be an upgrade over Rico.

And yeah the talent is better than back when Ricky kept trying to find guys in the 6th round, which, he basically never did despite giving public interviews claiming it was his secret draft sauce.   But regardless, the main/current issue is the black hole that is Garrett Bradbury.  KOC went from "there's no competition, he's the man" last spring to "there's competition" today--competition being Reed and Schlottman which isn't exactly inspirational.   There's competition because the reality is ugly no matter how much happy August camp spin anyone tries to put on it.

[Guest]

@comet52 said:
Nobody even mentions, when is the last time we had a really good oline coach who made a difference?  Do I have to go back 25 years to Mike freakin' Tice?   At least this year we have one thing going for us - no more Rico!   A traffic cone would be an upgrade over Rico.

And yeah the talent is better than back when Ricky kept trying to find guys in the 6th round, which, he basically never did despite giving public interviews claiming it was his secret draft sauce.   But regardless, the main/current issue is the black hole that is Garrett Bradbury.  KOC went from "there's no competition, he's the man" last spring to "there's competition" today--competition being Reed and Schlottman which isn't exactly inspirational.   There's competition because the reality is ugly no matter how much happy August camp spin anyone tries to put on it.

In recent years, the OL played at it's best when Tony Sparano was the coach.

[Guest]

@medaille said:
I don’t know if I’d call it “record time”, we’ve been
investing day 1 and 2 picks into it for several years.  Most teams are getting better OLine production
with less draft capital.  It’s really
hard to ignore the Spielman/Zimmer issue of always having a couple of
catastrophic weaknesses on the OLine, and the Spielman issue of replacing his better
linemen, while ignoring his horrible ones. 
That said the offense has been producing, so I can’t be too critical.

Agreed. But having said that, I'll take the improvement regardless of what kind of draft capital put behind it. We've missed on guys like Matt Kalil and Bradbury, but generally do better when the team actually decides to draft someone for the O-line in the top 2 rounds. Recent misses: 3rd round, Wyatt Davis. 3rd round, Pat Elflein. 4th round, Willie Beavers. 4th round, TJ Clemmings. The issue is Minnesota generally just doesn't draft enough guys in the top 4 rounds for the O-line historically the last 12 years.