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The Minnesota Vikings pulled off the biggest comeback in NFL history. Down 36-3, the Vikings ripped off five straight touchdowns thanks to Kirk Cousins, Justin Jefferson, and some timely takeaways. It was a historic day for the franchise, and a huge win for the Vikings as they clinched the NFC North. But my biggest takeaway from Saturday’s shootout? The Vikings stink.
We Are Going to Start A Dialogue
You’ve heard it all season. Their competition is bad, the defense isn’t as good as it seems, Kirk Cousins still doesn’t consistently show up when it matters, and it’s all true. This is not a good 11-3 football team.
Now this was obviously before the comeback, but the Vikings now sit at 11-3 with a point differential of +2. Plus. Two. That is HORRENDOUS for an 11-3 team. The three games they’ve lost, against playoff teams that they might run into, by the way, were ugly. Their quality wins have been by the skin of their teeth. Even their ‘regular’ wins look ugly. 27-22 over Mike White’s Jets, 20-17 over the Commanders, 28-25 over the Saints, and so on. Yes, they beat the Bills. Great job! The point is, they do not have enough quality wins for me to trust them in the playoffs. This isn’t the CFP and I’m by no means the NFL committee, but when our playoff brackets go live and I see the Vikings first matchup, I am absolutely fading them. Unless Kirk plays at 1 PM, of course.
Afternoon Kirk
If there’s one thing that you can’t knock the Vikings for, it’s their resilience. Specifically, the resilience of Kirk Cousins.
Kirk loves to do this thing where he plays like it’s the first time touching a football for the first two or three quarters, then some imaginary switch is flipped and all of a sudden he’s Dan Marino. It’s impressive how many times he’s led the Vikings back from improbable deficits, but playoff football is different. I’ll let Kirk and the Vikings enjoy their victory, but when playoff football comes and leads are harder to blow, best believe I’ll be fading the Vikings.
Interim Hot Seat?
Leaving the Vikings alone for a second, is it possible to fire an interim coach? The Colts made heads turn when they hired Jeff Saturday to be their interim coach in the first place, and it’s abundantly clear that the experiment is failing. There is no excuse to blow a 33-point lead as a coach. He ‘shocked’ the world with a victory over the Raiders in his first game, but the honeymoon has officially ended. They got embarrassed by the Cowboys, lost to a middling Steelers team, to his credit played the Eagles tough but eventually lost, and now Jeff Saturday is responsible for giving up the biggest comeback in NFL history. I don’t run a professional football team, but that’s not going to look great on his head coaching resume if he goes searching for jobs this offseason.
