In order to get to double-digit wins, what needs to happen?

Stay healthy
establish a respectable ground game
DTs and LBs play to their capabilities

Block somebody!!

@"Vanguard83" said: Stay healthy establish a respectable ground game DTs and LBs play to their capabilities

1. (Duh!) Health.  3 straight years the Vikings have lost multiple OL starters for extended periods.  2014: Fusco gone week 3, Loadholt gone week 12. 2015: Loadholt and Sullivan gone in preseason. 2016: Kalil and Smith both gone week 2.

In addition to the OL carnage, 2014 had Switchgate, lost Cassel in week 3 and Rudolph missed 7 games, 2016 Sharrif only played 1 game and AD 3.

If this season Reiff, Remmers, Cook, Murray and Bradford all stay upright this O will be better.  And the DT depth is far better in case of injury too.

2. Never mind Waldo, Where's Laquon?  For however long Michael (hic!) Floyd is gone, the Vikings need more than 1 freaking catch from Treadwell to keep defenses from doubling Diggs or Thielen.  

3. Plugged nickel?  Exit (Stage Left) Captain, enter Mack Alexander, who contributed to my week 9 trip to USBank by giving up Detroit's only regulation TD and generally looking more lost than Trump in a library.  At least Grandpa Newman is still there if Mack is still clueless. 

4. Just don't F it up.  This means you, Sendejo.  Try laying out an opponent instead of a teammate for once.  Or hopefully Kearse builds on last preseason and take the starting gig this time.

It's certainly not the be-all-end-all of stats, but it's a mantra I've been hearing since the '60's and it seems to hold true to this day, more often than not. WIN THE TURNOVER BATTLE.

If a team ends the season between + 10-15 on the turnover differential, their chances of making the playoffs skyrockets.

Again, that's not ALWAYS the case, as I believe the 2016 Vikings finished at @ +10, but historically this is one stat that seems to prove true time and again. 

The poster children for this theory are the 2006 Bears. There is NO WAY a team with Rex Grossman as a starting QB DESERVES to make a SB, but a healthy turnover differrential, coupled with a RIDICULOUS amount of defensive/special teams TD's, put them in the Championship game. 

I realize health and a few other areas mentioned in this thread are important, but if I had to choose ONE, I'm sticking with turnover differential, especially with the solid (not yet ELITE) defense that the Vikings have. 

Sendejo scares he hell outta me.  The guy looks completely lost sometimes.

Balance.

The defense is good enough to win a Super Bowl as it is. But it has to be paired with an offense that keeps it off the field. 

Win more than 9 games.

I think it's pretty straight forward.  The defense needs to stay the same, while the offense needs to get better.  If the Vikings would have scored a consistent 21 points a game, they would have went 11-5.  A middle of the road offense is 23 points per game.  More precisely, our offense can't lay as many eggs, where we are stagnant all game and just can't seem to score.  The Vikings had 2 losses where we held the opponent to 17 or less points, and another 3 where the score was 21-10 ,20-10, 22-16.

The OLine was clearly the primary limiting factor, and that should be resolved enough that we can be functional.

the defense needs to be stronger against the run and the offense needs to be able to run the ball.  we lost both abilities last year and our record showed it.

All of the above said by everyone else and one more thing....don't get full of themselves early on like they did. No more colossal collapses by a team who thinks they've punched their ticket to the SB in September.

The huge key is health and the OL. Stability on the OL impacts the rest of the offense. If that group gets it together, the likelihood of everything else falling into place is so much better.

Although you wouldn't guess it the Vikings ball possession metrics were not horrible last year. They ended up the season about 50-50 between offense & defense. But that is somewhat shortsighted since there was an overwhelming amount of pressure on the defense to win games and put points on the board. 

What really needs to improve is red zone play. Last season the Vikings were in the red zone an average of 3.1 times per game which is slightly below average. But the offense only scored points on 46% of their red zone opportunities which was third to last. A below average number of attempts and a horrible conversion rate on those attempts is a recipe for disaster. 

Offensively - average 1 score/quarter w/ 75% being TD's
Defensively - allow < 21pts/ game 
 B) 

Stupid pentalies hurt us last year on both sides of the ball...play smarter.

@"NFL Draft Guru" said: Although you wouldn't guess it the Vikings ball possession metrics were not horrible last year. They ended up the season about 50-50 between offense & defense. But that is somewhat shortsighted since there was an overwhelming amount of pressure on the defense to win games and put points on the board. 

What really needs to improve is red zone play. Last season the Vikings were in the red zone an average of 3.1 times per game which is slightly below average. But the offense only scored points on 46% of their red zone opportunities which was third to last. A below average number of attempts and a horrible conversion rate on those attempts is a recipe for disaster.