The Vikings are one of the most mysterious teams in history. They've never won a Super Bowl title and haven't made it to the Super Bowl in over four decades, but they have one of the highest regular season win rates since the seventies. They seldom rotted, though they also experienced glory.
Coach Mike Zimmer and general manager Rick Spearman were fired after the regular season. In the eight seasons that the two have joined forces, they have never led the team to less than 7 wins and 9 losses in the regular season, but they have only won two Northern Championships, three playoffs, and two playoff victories in this time period.
The playoffs have expanded to 14 teams in the last two years, but the Vikings have been absent twice, so it's time for a change. Since entering the National League Championship in 2017, this team has not been high or low, why is this so?
Defensive managers can keep the team high and low, but they can't guarantee the upper limit, and it is difficult to maintain long-term success
In 2013, a season before Zimmer took over the Vikings, the team averaged the worst points per game in the league (30 points per game), 11th-lowest number of yards per game, and third-worst defensive EPA.
The Vikings, who were Leslie Fraser managers, chose defenders such as Harrison Smith, Xavier Rhodes and Sharif Freud in the first round of 2012 and 2013, and their defensive talent was not bad, and when Zimmer took over, the Vikings immediately became the 11th fewest defensive group to lose points in the 2014 season.
By 2017, when they trained Denny Jet, Eric Kendricks, Anthony Barr, Linwall Joseph and others, they averaged the fewest points and yards conceded in the league, and the defensive EPA ranked fifth. Top defense put the Vikings at a 13-3 loss in the regular season and eventually reached the National League Championship, although starting quarterback Sam Bradford reported early with a knee injury.
Mike Zimmer's defensive group is so encouraging that they feel like Keith Keanem is just one win away from starting quarterback to make it to the Super Bowl, so they don't think the investment in quarterbacks matters.
Unfortunately, they didn't expect that a strong defense would be difficult to sustain. While the Vikings' fall was modest, dropping yards per game from fourth in 2018 to tenth in 2019, to 27th in 2020, and 26th yards this season, the decline itself should be predictable, given the large body of research showing that defensive groups are unstable between seasons and even weeks.
In addition, the Vikings' top defense of 2017 also has a certain element of luck, because the 11 starters in the opening game defensive group have been holding out until the National League final, and injuries will make the defensive group more vulnerable.
All in all, Mike Zimmer applied his defensive thinking to the Vikings, but Bridgewater and Big Sam's knee injuries were unpredictable. However, it is not right to focus too much on defense and reduce investment in quarterbacks.
Giving Cork Cousins a high salary was a delicious poison, and the Vikings fell into the trap twice
The second wrong variable in the equation was the acquisition of Cork Cousins, with whom the Vikings signed the first-ever fully guaranteed contract in March 2018. In order to win the bid against the Jets, the Vikings had to offer a three-year, $84 million guarantee before signing Cousins.
Cousins did not perform well in 2018, with Attack Coordinator John de Filippo scoring only 7.1 yards per pass attempt, a win contribution of only 2.68, and a PFF pass score of 79.2. In the crucial game against the Bears in Week 17, the Vikings only needed to beat the desireless Bears at home to enter the playoffs. As a result, Cousins was killed four times from 132 yards on 23 passes, and the Vikings were defeated 10-24.
When Cousins' first season didn't go well, the Vikings deployed more pavement-based tactics. While these tactics weren't efficient enough, they helped Cousins succeed in 2019, adding a full yard (8.1) to the number of yards each pass attempted to earn with 162 fewer passes than in 2018. The Vikings thus beat the Saints in the playoffs, and Cousins also received a second big contract from the Vikings, 66 million for two years, once again fully guaranteed.
Such high wages made the Vikings tied up in the free market. So far in the Cousins era, the Vikings have only signed four players in the free market who make more than $8 million a year.
Despite the inaction on the free market, the Vikings' salaries are now above the 2022 salary cap and will require a series of restructuring contracts to cut them:
In fact, Cousins has performed well in the last two years, shooting more than 66% of the pass, the total victory contribution value is more than 6.0, and only 20 of the 51 big heart passes have only 20 potential missteps. Receiver Justin Jefferson set a record for the number of yards received in the first two seasons of his league career, and veteran receiver Adam Schillen has scored 24 touchdowns in the last two seasons.
However, although Cousins has long been recognized as a top ten quarterback in the league, he has not been able to overcome the impact of the decline in the defensive group.
In one fact, Cousins averaged just 7.1 yards of passing depth in the first three quarters of the game, and the starting quarterback was sixth-to-last. Cousins also made just four potential missteps in the first three quarters, suggesting a lack of risk-taking, which makes his stats beautiful but bad for the Vikings.
Allocating resources to non-core locations leads to roster problems
The Vikings' total of 75 draft picks and 21 down trades since 2015 are the league's most numerous, but the lineup talent is hard to say successful. The Vikings team victory contribution value this season is 5.6, just the middle of the league, how can this be?
First, Viking management doesn't seem to particularly value the importance of position. With the exception of hastily exchanging second-round picks from Jaguars for passer Yannick Ngacue before the 2020 season kick-off, the Zimmer-era Vikings have never invested in the first three draws to rush passes from the outside, even though it's one of the most important positions in rugby.
Part of the reason is that the Vikings have never exceeded the No. 9 pick in the Zimmer era, nor have they exceeded the No. 14 pick since 2016, plus the LSU rusher Daniel Hunte picked up the LSU rush passer with a three-round pick in 2015, which further strengthened their confidence in the low-pick Taobao rush passer, preferring to invest in the high pick in other positions.
Since then, however, their victory contribution on the defensive front has been negative. BJ Dubos, Stephen Witherly, Jalil Johnson, Iphid Aldenbo, Ade Aruna, Jering Holmes, Amon Watts, Kenny Wilkes, James Lynch and DJ Warnham have all failed to invest in many low-pick Taobaos, or they will not get playing time, and those who can play are hurting the team.
In addition to not properly assessing the outfield passers, the first four picks for 2017 were used at running backs, centre-forwards, defensive interceptors and linebackers. Only Darwin Cook is still in the squad today, and since signing a big contract in 2020, his performance can only be said to be mixed. By 2019, the Vikings' top four signings were center, mid-range, running back and linebacker, and of the 15 players in the last two drafts, only outside receivers Justin Jefferson and KJ Osborne provided positive victory contributions, although the value of the outside receiver itself was high.
In addition to the draft, the top two free agents signed by cousins are defensively focused on michael Pierce and Darwin Tomlinson. Although both of them can complete the rushing work relatively well in the Vikings, they are not passing the job of preventing running. The Vikings have averaged 4.7 yards this season, the third-to-last in the league.
Where is viking road?
While the long road ahead is daunting, the Lions and Bears are rebuilding, and it's unclear whether the Packers' future Hall of Fame quarterbacks will stay on. So Kevin O'Connell, who just took over the Vikings, was lucky. But they have to do two things:
1. The Vikings need to look at everything in the long run, especially the lineup and game plan.
Since signing Cousins, the Vikings' every move has been desperate. They changed their offensive plans, trying to rely on Cousins' connection with the outside receiver in 2018, but then began to protect him tactically, as if he were a rookie quarterback. That limits their offensive advantage and puts them in too many evenly matched games – games like Cousins are often difficult to win. This also led to the departure of the disgruntled star receiver Steven Diggers, and as a result, the family went to Beal to become the league's catch king, and Bill finally turned over the Patriots twice.
The Vikings also didn't use a lot of resources to prop up the offensive front, which often left the team with an extremely low fault tolerance. They didn't make appointments with veteran Riley Leif and relied too heavily on first-round shows like Garrett Bradbury and Christian Dariso, pushing them into battle early, while Dakota Dozil and Ollie Udo were completely untouchable but reused.
Defensively, their operations were celebrated last offseason, signing Patrick Peterson, Xavier Woods, Super Bowl champion cornerback Bathhold Brilan and lineback Nick Virgil. Even signed back veterans Sheldon Richardson and Everson Griffin.
Of course, these initiatives have not worked well. These measures have indirectly led to a shortage of salary space for Vikings this year, and it is not a bad thing to restrict their careless investment.
2. The Vikings needed to decide the best way to get rid of Cousins.
Cousins' personal performances and stats have been good enough in the last two seasons – in many ways since joining the team, they have exceeded expectations – so it seems difficult to give him another contract extension.
Cousins' salary accounted for 45 million this year, which is the main reason why the Vikings' salary is overpaid. If you renew the contract on this basis, it is equivalent to buying high on the stock market again, which is definitely not a wise move, especially for the investment in quarterbacks.
The best way to get rid of Cousins is to trade him, which will free up 35 million of space. Given the large number of teams looking to get a good quarterback in the offseason, they're likely to find receivers to help clear space, and maybe even get another starting quarterback directly from a counterparty, such as the Cleveland Browns.
If the Vikings can't find Cousins' next home, then the Vikings will have to eat up 45 million space, continue playing the 2022 season, and then release him to the free market next spring to get a compensatory draft pick. Cousins' performance in recent years has accumulated relatively good deal value, but for the Vikings to begin a real rebuilding period, dealing with Cousins will be of great benefit to the reconstruction of the vikings' overall lineup.