Vikes Views: Nincompoop of the Week – Vikings at Rams

The Minnesota Vikings season is over. They were defeated in the 1st round of the playoffs by the Los Angeles Rams by a score of 27 – 9. It was a disappointing end to a surprisingly good season.

Sam Darnold

I don’t want to kill Sam Darnold. He played better than he ever has in his career. It’s most likely Darnold doesn’t paly another snap for the Vikings. I’ll thank him for the good memories. It was a lot of fun, until it wasn’t. This team and the fanbase will move on to JJ McCarthy (most of the fans already have). I wish him the best. He’s not good enough to overcome interior pressure like that. For Sam, the difference between doing that and not, is likely $25-30M a year.

Kevin O’Connell

KOC might be the coach of the year. It’s a regular season award that has been voted on already. However, there were a few big spots where he got a little outcoached. I don’t blame KOC as much as some. There were open players last night a few times. Hockenson stood alone with no one within 20 years on one of the many sacks. He wasn’t able to coach Darnold through handling the pressure. That was KOC’s biggest failure. Maybe he deserves credit for even Darnold as far as he did? It’s always a fine line between coaching and players.

Interior OL

This has been a problem for the better part of 10 years. The Vikings have two of the best OTs in the league coming back with Christian Darrisaw and Brian O’Neil. None of the three spots at Interior OL are starting caliber right now. This has to be the top priority for Kwesi heading into the offseason. JJ McCarthy stands no chance if they play like they did last night. Pressure up the middle almost immediately on half the drop backs. Darnold tends to hold onto the ball, but the interior OL deserves plenty of the blame too. Bradbury is undersized and the other 3 they started at OG aren’t starting caliber players.

Dishonorable Mention

The NFL refs. This year they have been horrible. The Vikings certainly benefitted at times this year and often did not. The Matt Stafford “forward pass” to avoid a sack was a ridiculous call. The way the Vikings played, it didn’t matter. However, it was a game changing play and you never know how that changes the game. Hoping the NFL spends some time revamping the review process. The automated quick reviews work seamlessly. More of that and less of the formality around reviews. Just get it right.

On to the draft.

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