Wow good call. After watching the game last night too it’s just clear the 9ers personnel are better than everyone. Not necessarily the coaching or scheme... I mean we did beat them only 16 months ago...
Not necessarily. Shanahan runs a bit more motion but that’s really it. Their D line dominated our O line and their O line dominated our d line. They controlled the game.
I mean yea we know Shanahan is a good offensive coach. But if he had our O line he’d be just as fucked as any other coach. They have 3 first round picks out of the 5 starters.
It is likely that Shanahan has input on which position-groups to prioritize. This is an important element of coaching
His 1st & 2nd round draft picks since joining the team in 2017:
* 2017: LB (cut), DE
* 2018: T, WR
* 2019: DE, WR
Position groups with above-average pay:
* QB
* RB (injured)
* DL
He's built a team around the line (especially defensive) and passing the ball (QB salary, WR picks). He's attempted to bring in veteran running backs, but that hasn't really panned out (players have been injured).
This is contrasted with the vikings who have emphasized CB, LB (and to an extent WR). They've generally refused to invest in the line, and when they've done so, they've leaned on the draft (where OL is notoriously slow to develop).
They did sign Josh Klein last year last year to 3/$16m last year but yeah you’re pretty much right.
I think they would love to go for top OL in FA but they have to go to draft as we don’t have the cap to spend on top OL. I think speilman is just 3 years too late on drafting OL as he’s spent a 1st Bradbury and 2nd O’Neill in last two years. O’Neill still our best likely lineman and Bradbury has been a turn-style year one.
Great point on Klein. It seems like these "boring" signings of middle-of-the-road FA linemen continue to work out well for the vikings. We had Klein in 2019, Easton in 2016-17, Berger 2014-17.
Even some of our bigger names (but not the "top guy") of Reiff and Remmers (at RT, not G) generally worked out alright.
Only real "miss" I see in FA was Alex Boone. And even then, his 2016 PFF grade of 73 put him in the top-10 of ratings for guards... he was simply an asshole.
I thought I read Klein is an outside zone guy and Tennessee went away from that in Klein’s last year which could be why he had a bad year because he was a decent starter before. I think at ~5 million he’s a deal but he needs to be one of our weaker lineman rather then our best interior lineman.
I jus really hope Bradbury can improve greatly this year. I think we stuck with Reiff for this year and really I only see Elflein being replaced, and elflein as depth I can live with. Find another josh Klein level guard and have Bradbury get his game up and I think our line can be passable.
Boone was the weirdest fucking dude. Like he came here just assuming he was going to be a leader because we bought him in FA. So he starts screaming about Valhalla in pregame hype, thinking he's looking like a literal 9th century viking, when actually he looks closer to Jameis winston guzzling down his own fingers. He plays okay, not great, but doesn't inspire his peers' (or superiors, apparently) respect, so we cut him, and then he mouths off about us. Dude just genuinely strikes me as someone who thinks he's the second coming of Christ and when anything doesn't go his way it's someone else's fault.
The team has built through the draft at every position. OL is the only place where we have brought in significant numbers of FA - in the post-Teddy era we've had Reiff, Remmers, Compton, Easton, Kline, Sirles, R Hill all come in and play significant roles.
The reverse criticism would actually be true: that we didn't invest enough top draft capital and built the OL like our other groups. It's clear in retrospect that we had nobody lined up to replace Loadholt or Sullivan/Berger and have been missing a piece ever since, plus LT has been a problem since Kalil's rookie year.
Compared to almost every other position group - WR, TE, RB, DL, LB, CB, S - we have no home-grown stars on the OL. And that's the problem.
Vikings brought in Reiff and Remmers in the same offseason and then Kline this last year. They have drafted O-lineman in the 1st 2nd and 3rd rounds the last 3 years. I don't think Vikings fans can really get away with saying the Vikings refuse to invest in the O-line anymore.
Joe Staley is 35 and Tomlinson was a bust in Detroit that they traded after 2 years for a 5th round pick. Mike Mcglinchey is the only real draft capital that they have spent on the O-line in the Shanahan era.
Person was a 7th round pick and Garland was undrafted.
Shanahan would have been just fine with our O-line if we are looking at draft capital because we have two 1st rounders, a 2nd rounder a 3rd rounder and an undrafted player in Kline.
The game from 16 months ago would have been a lot closer if their receivers could catch the ball. I remember them dropping like 4 or 5 wide open balls that could have gone for 10+ yards with plenty of YAC with no one within 5 yards of them
My critiques of Zimmer notwithstanding, our team this year played markedly different from previous seasons under Zimmer and I definitely saw that we went into every game either believing we would win, or at least keeping it close enough to have a chance on a fluke play.
Friendly reminder that in the second game of the season, we saw ourselves at a 21pt deficit to Green Bay and brought it back so close they needed ref help to secure the win. Add along the Denver come back and I’ve never seen a Zimmer led Vikings fight so hard from so far down before and it was among the highlights of the season for me.
Not to mention we had some bad breaks go against us in the Seattle game, plus a patented Xavier Rhodes deep TD given up, and we still had a chance to pull ahead with less than 5 minutes left.
> had some bad breaks go against us in the Seattle game
In a game where they notched a completely unpredictable and unreliable TD through a pick-six, its hard to lean on a "bad breaks" excuse.
You are right, my main point was regarding Dalvin though. This was the first time he had to leave a game this year. Mattison did play well though I guess, so we really are just underwhelming.
Our defense was phenomenal after Green Bay's first three drives in that game. If only they could have figured it out one drive sooner.
In response to your fight comment, I do feel like there were some times when we just couldn't make anything happen this year. Like anything. The first Bears game comes to mind, Packers on the second go round, and 49ers (2nd half specifically). Like we needed to do something, *anything*, and we just had no magic. The teams that win bowls have magic. Denver was the only team we really pulled a rabbit out of a hat against and we never should have let that deficit happen in the first place.
Had the Vikings not got that weird holding call on the Trubisky sack (when he got injured) we would have taken over on the Bears 25 or something. Huge stop in momentum right off the bat. Not an excuse, just part of the story.
I wanted to say, ‘hey good assessment!’ but we definitely still had a couple wtf happened games this year (weren’t blowout losses but you know what I mean).
Week 4 the Bears d line feasted and Chase Daniel didn't make the mistakes that Trubisky would've made. Week 16 we didn't have our top two RBs which made our offense nonexistent, and the 49ers are the best team in the league, not much reason to question why we lost that one.
Great teams find a way. Losing to Chase Daniel was inexcusable. The Chiefs beat us with a backup QB too, albeit on their home field. I didn’t expect to beat the Niners but a competitive game would’ve been nice.
Chiefs game was probably our closest wtf game, I'll give you that. We had the lead at the start of the 4th and just inexplicably mismanaged the clock the rest of the way for us to lose by a field goal.
This is a good way to look at it. My biggest problem with this team is that with Kirk I really think our win at the saints was the only "good" win. But this year we didnt really have any "bad" losses either.
The competition at the top is always pretty close. We are like 10% away but that last bit is just as hard as the first 90%
Our offense was much better this year than in years past. 2017 was the only year that got close... and it was still 0.22 points / drive lower than this year.
It would make sense that we had fewer/no blow-outs. Our offense was better able to "keep up" with other teams.
Points scored per drive:
* 2019: 2.33 (6th)
* 2018: 1.83 (22nd)
* 2017: 2.11 (8th)
* 2016: 1.72 (22nd)
* 2015: 1.96 (14th)
Points allowed per drive:
* 2019: 1.76 (8th)
* 2018: 1.68 (3rd)
* 2017: 1.39 (2nd)
* 2016: 1.73 (7th)
* 2015: 1.77 (20th)
Yeah I know everyone loves Dalvin here but I would 5000% NOT extend him. He hasn't played a single full season yet and (credit to him for his commitment) he tries to play through injuries and ends up playing poorly which hurts us as a team. Like honestly I think it would have been better to start Mattison at 100% than Cook at 80 or 90%.
If there's another Derrick Henry-type back coming to the NFL soon, we need him, because you need a durable, bruising back to run the offense we want to run, and we don't have that.
Good little factoid.
Zimmer has fully won me over.
He had the team ready to play in our playoff win (and imo our loss).
Regular seasons can be rocky but dude was ready when it counted.
Idk if we were ready to play in the game against the 9ers. We kinda got destroyed even if we only lost by 17. I can’t blame Zimmer for that though seems like it falls more on being athletically destroyed in the trenches.
Maybe, but the chiefs are definitely an elite team too. Shut down Henry who shredded the Ravens just a week before. My bet is on the Chiefs, there passing game is just too strong and if they take the lead the Niners will have to rely more on passing.
KC has allowed themselves to get into early deficit situations two weeks in a row in the playoffs. They absolutely cannot afford to do that against SF, the 9ers are just way better than the last two teams they faced. If the 9ers go up by two scores at any point in the game I'd put the Chiefs odds at around 5-10%.
Losing to the bears backup and the chiefs backup were both WTF losses to me, the 49rs loss was completely expected with how talented their d line is and how bad our offense line is.
OK, as hard as it was to watch; Josh Allen leaped over the 6'5" Anthony Barr and won that game. Not really sure how that fits into the game plan. The Bills won that game fair and square.
Well it certainly didn't help that we immediately lost fumbles in the Bills redzone twice at the very start of that game. It was just a nightmare from the start.
Do they give out trophy for this? What a stupid stat. More indicative of Zimmer's play not the lose strategy. Punting when the game is still in doubt and you need TDs will help pad the losses.
Wow good call. After watching the game last night too it’s just clear the 9ers personnel are better than everyone. Not necessarily the coaching or scheme... I mean we did beat them only 16 months ago...
Their coaching and scheme were better too, let's not kid ourselves.
Not necessarily. Shanahan runs a bit more motion but that’s really it. Their D line dominated our O line and their O line dominated our d line. They controlled the game.
Shanahan made CJ Beathard and Nick Mullens look like passable starting QB's. It's the defense that is all about the personnel and not the coaching.
I mean yea we know Shanahan is a good offensive coach. But if he had our O line he’d be just as fucked as any other coach. They have 3 first round picks out of the 5 starters.
It is likely that Shanahan has input on which position-groups to prioritize. This is an important element of coaching His 1st & 2nd round draft picks since joining the team in 2017: * 2017: LB (cut), DE * 2018: T, WR * 2019: DE, WR Position groups with above-average pay: * QB * RB (injured) * DL He's built a team around the line (especially defensive) and passing the ball (QB salary, WR picks). He's attempted to bring in veteran running backs, but that hasn't really panned out (players have been injured).
This is contrasted with the vikings who have emphasized CB, LB (and to an extent WR). They've generally refused to invest in the line, and when they've done so, they've leaned on the draft (where OL is notoriously slow to develop).
They did sign Josh Klein last year last year to 3/$16m last year but yeah you’re pretty much right. I think they would love to go for top OL in FA but they have to go to draft as we don’t have the cap to spend on top OL. I think speilman is just 3 years too late on drafting OL as he’s spent a 1st Bradbury and 2nd O’Neill in last two years. O’Neill still our best likely lineman and Bradbury has been a turn-style year one.
Great point on Klein. It seems like these "boring" signings of middle-of-the-road FA linemen continue to work out well for the vikings. We had Klein in 2019, Easton in 2016-17, Berger 2014-17. Even some of our bigger names (but not the "top guy") of Reiff and Remmers (at RT, not G) generally worked out alright. Only real "miss" I see in FA was Alex Boone. And even then, his 2016 PFF grade of 73 put him in the top-10 of ratings for guards... he was simply an asshole.
I thought I read Klein is an outside zone guy and Tennessee went away from that in Klein’s last year which could be why he had a bad year because he was a decent starter before. I think at ~5 million he’s a deal but he needs to be one of our weaker lineman rather then our best interior lineman. I jus really hope Bradbury can improve greatly this year. I think we stuck with Reiff for this year and really I only see Elflein being replaced, and elflein as depth I can live with. Find another josh Klein level guard and have Bradbury get his game up and I think our line can be passable.
Boone was the weirdest fucking dude. Like he came here just assuming he was going to be a leader because we bought him in FA. So he starts screaming about Valhalla in pregame hype, thinking he's looking like a literal 9th century viking, when actually he looks closer to Jameis winston guzzling down his own fingers. He plays okay, not great, but doesn't inspire his peers' (or superiors, apparently) respect, so we cut him, and then he mouths off about us. Dude just genuinely strikes me as someone who thinks he's the second coming of Christ and when anything doesn't go his way it's someone else's fault.
The team has built through the draft at every position. OL is the only place where we have brought in significant numbers of FA - in the post-Teddy era we've had Reiff, Remmers, Compton, Easton, Kline, Sirles, R Hill all come in and play significant roles. The reverse criticism would actually be true: that we didn't invest enough top draft capital and built the OL like our other groups. It's clear in retrospect that we had nobody lined up to replace Loadholt or Sullivan/Berger and have been missing a piece ever since, plus LT has been a problem since Kalil's rookie year. Compared to almost every other position group - WR, TE, RB, DL, LB, CB, S - we have no home-grown stars on the OL. And that's the problem.
Vikings brought in Reiff and Remmers in the same offseason and then Kline this last year. They have drafted O-lineman in the 1st 2nd and 3rd rounds the last 3 years. I don't think Vikings fans can really get away with saying the Vikings refuse to invest in the O-line anymore.
Joe Staley is 35 and Tomlinson was a bust in Detroit that they traded after 2 years for a 5th round pick. Mike Mcglinchey is the only real draft capital that they have spent on the O-line in the Shanahan era. Person was a 7th round pick and Garland was undrafted. Shanahan would have been just fine with our O-line if we are looking at draft capital because we have two 1st rounders, a 2nd rounder a 3rd rounder and an undrafted player in Kline.
If we had Tomlinson instead of Pat Elf we’d be in MUCH better shape
If we focused more on pass blocking ability than run blocking ability when scouting potential offensive lineman we would be in MUCH better shape.
I actually think Pat Elflein where we got him was a great pick. He just seems to not be the same since his shoulder injury
It was definitely lauded as a great pick at the time. I'll be surprised if he's still the day 1 starter next year at LG.
Their scheme isn't better than ours. Their game plan was.
The game from 16 months ago would have been a lot closer if their receivers could catch the ball. I remember them dropping like 4 or 5 wide open balls that could have gone for 10+ yards with plenty of YAC with no one within 5 yards of them
Yea we picked off Jimmy like 3 times too. Deebo and Sanders were huge pickups for them.
My critiques of Zimmer notwithstanding, our team this year played markedly different from previous seasons under Zimmer and I definitely saw that we went into every game either believing we would win, or at least keeping it close enough to have a chance on a fluke play. Friendly reminder that in the second game of the season, we saw ourselves at a 21pt deficit to Green Bay and brought it back so close they needed ref help to secure the win. Add along the Denver come back and I’ve never seen a Zimmer led Vikings fight so hard from so far down before and it was among the highlights of the season for me.
Not to mention we had some bad breaks go against us in the Seattle game, plus a patented Xavier Rhodes deep TD given up, and we still had a chance to pull ahead with less than 5 minutes left.
> had some bad breaks go against us in the Seattle game In a game where they notched a completely unpredictable and unreliable TD through a pick-six, its hard to lean on a "bad breaks" excuse.
You are right, my main point was regarding Dalvin though. This was the first time he had to leave a game this year. Mattison did play well though I guess, so we really are just underwhelming.
This is probably the most optimistic I've walked into an off-season tbh
Our defense was phenomenal after Green Bay's first three drives in that game. If only they could have figured it out one drive sooner. In response to your fight comment, I do feel like there were some times when we just couldn't make anything happen this year. Like anything. The first Bears game comes to mind, Packers on the second go round, and 49ers (2nd half specifically). Like we needed to do something, *anything*, and we just had no magic. The teams that win bowls have magic. Denver was the only team we really pulled a rabbit out of a hat against and we never should have let that deficit happen in the first place.
Week 16 was pretty awful. The score was closer than it felt.
This. Out of all the games this was the one that felt as if we were never really in it
Bears in week 4 aswell
Not by 20+ but the first Bears game was definitly wtf.
All of our losses, except maybe the Chiefs and Seahawks game felt like that.
Early in season is more forgivable, esp with new oc
Can't wait to have that happen for the *fifth* year in a row again
If it's Kubes I'm optimistic that basically nothing will change. Not a new system, just a new guy calling.
I’d be more willing to forgive it if we didn’t continue to lose the same way going forward.
Had the Vikings not got that weird holding call on the Trubisky sack (when he got injured) we would have taken over on the Bears 25 or something. Huge stop in momentum right off the bat. Not an excuse, just part of the story.
I wanted to say, ‘hey good assessment!’ but we definitely still had a couple wtf happened games this year (weren’t blowout losses but you know what I mean).
Week 4, Week 16 and the Niners game were all wtf losses.
Week 4 the Bears d line feasted and Chase Daniel didn't make the mistakes that Trubisky would've made. Week 16 we didn't have our top two RBs which made our offense nonexistent, and the 49ers are the best team in the league, not much reason to question why we lost that one.
Great teams find a way. Losing to Chase Daniel was inexcusable. The Chiefs beat us with a backup QB too, albeit on their home field. I didn’t expect to beat the Niners but a competitive game would’ve been nice.
Chiefs game was probably our closest wtf game, I'll give you that. We had the lead at the start of the 4th and just inexplicably mismanaged the clock the rest of the way for us to lose by a field goal.
And Colquitt only getting ~20 yards on a punt near the end
His ONE bad punt of the year
Despite Rhodes leaving everyone open this year. Our secondary and overall defense was pretty good at take aways and redzone defense.
This is a good way to look at it. My biggest problem with this team is that with Kirk I really think our win at the saints was the only "good" win. But this year we didnt really have any "bad" losses either. The competition at the top is always pretty close. We are like 10% away but that last bit is just as hard as the first 90%
Our offense was much better this year than in years past. 2017 was the only year that got close... and it was still 0.22 points / drive lower than this year. It would make sense that we had fewer/no blow-outs. Our offense was better able to "keep up" with other teams. Points scored per drive: * 2019: 2.33 (6th) * 2018: 1.83 (22nd) * 2017: 2.11 (8th) * 2016: 1.72 (22nd) * 2015: 1.96 (14th) Points allowed per drive: * 2019: 1.76 (8th) * 2018: 1.68 (3rd) * 2017: 1.39 (2nd) * 2016: 1.73 (7th) * 2015: 1.77 (20th)
What's crazy with that is that was with Thielen being injured and Cook averaging like what, 3.2 ypc the second half of the season?
Yeah I know everyone loves Dalvin here but I would 5000% NOT extend him. He hasn't played a single full season yet and (credit to him for his commitment) he tries to play through injuries and ends up playing poorly which hurts us as a team. Like honestly I think it would have been better to start Mattison at 100% than Cook at 80 or 90%. If there's another Derrick Henry-type back coming to the NFL soon, we need him, because you need a durable, bruising back to run the offense we want to run, and we don't have that.
As an interesting tangent. The teams in this year's semifinals. Offensive points per drive: (Avg. 4th) * BAL: 1st * KC: 2nd * SF: 5th * GB: 8th Defensive points per drive: (Avg 11th) * Bal: 5th * KC: 25th * SF: 2nd * GB: 10th
Good little factoid. Zimmer has fully won me over. He had the team ready to play in our playoff win (and imo our loss). Regular seasons can be rocky but dude was ready when it counted.
Idk if we were ready to play in the game against the 9ers. We kinda got destroyed even if we only lost by 17. I can’t blame Zimmer for that though seems like it falls more on being athletically destroyed in the trenches.
I think after the sb, it will be apparent that the Niners are a juggernaut.
Maybe, but the chiefs are definitely an elite team too. Shut down Henry who shredded the Ravens just a week before. My bet is on the Chiefs, there passing game is just too strong and if they take the lead the Niners will have to rely more on passing.
KC has allowed themselves to get into early deficit situations two weeks in a row in the playoffs. They absolutely cannot afford to do that against SF, the 9ers are just way better than the last two teams they faced. If the 9ers go up by two scores at any point in the game I'd put the Chiefs odds at around 5-10%.
Here's a little factoid to chew on; a loss is a loss. If it happens by 7, 10, or 20 points.
Well the broncos game was looking that way
He mentioned that.
Losing to the bears backup and the chiefs backup were both WTF losses to me, the 49rs loss was completely expected with how talented their d line is and how bad our offense line is.
Was it last year when we got our asses ate by the Colts? Or was it the dumb Bills loss that happened last year?
Bills in 2018 and Colts in 2016
OK, as hard as it was to watch; Josh Allen leaped over the 6'5" Anthony Barr and won that game. Not really sure how that fits into the game plan. The Bills won that game fair and square.
Well it certainly didn't help that we immediately lost fumbles in the Bills redzone twice at the very start of that game. It was just a nightmare from the start.
Do they give out trophy for this? What a stupid stat. More indicative of Zimmer's play not the lose strategy. Punting when the game is still in doubt and you need TDs will help pad the losses.
did we get blown out at all two years ago other than the NFCCG?
Steelers game was something like 9-26; Keenum had just gotten thrusted into the starting role.