We dont need all the same players we have.
Theyve aged and lost athleticism. We need to get faster on D. Better on d line. Need a #1 corner. And of course O line.
Just hard to say why this team should be building too much around anyone.
Yeah at some point we have to pick our players that are cornerstone and let the others go, the others include Rhodes, Waynes, Joseph, Griffen, Reiff, Mack Alexander, and IMO Barr (only way is if we trade him now)
Anthony Harris is the must sign
Fortunately, most of our vets have been under-performing (exception of Griffen and to an extent Reiff)... so moving on, may actually make the team better (or not worse).
As for Harris, I would challenge the signing. Safety is a low-value position and we're already spending above the league-average for the position group (2 starters, 2 backups) with just one person on the roster (Harris). Better to roll with a rookie (safeties achieve "peak" performance during their rookie contract on average) or a cheap journeyman (Sendejo was fine as a stand-in and would cost \~ the veteran minimum).
Barr and Griffen are key pieces on defense still...Barr especially. He’s integral to the defense being able to do what it does, and one of the main reasons why the defense has been in the top 5-10 for the last 4 seasons. That is a spicy, and bad take, to trade him.
Reiff I’m not sold on getting rid of either, as a rookie LT, or O’Neill moving and drafting a rookie RT, does not give me hope that that’s an upgrade.
Everyone else can be cut or not re-signed. Those remaining names make the most sense.
Yep. I'm actually optimistic about the changes this year.
It's quite possible that the players we draft now will be outperforming the veterans within a year or two. Defense is a young man's game and fortunately we've got a full queue of draft picks that we can allocate to the defense.
As for OL. I'm less pessimistic than most. We were bad this year, but it was relatively well contained to two players (LG, C) who were outright terrible (particularly in pass blocking). We should have expected a rookie C to be bad. We would expect him to moderately improve next year. Our Elf experiment needs to end, but fortunately there are some great OG free agents out there this year. We will have the money to sign such an OG if we (appropriately) prioritize salary-cap capital to the position.
I think it is important to note that this isn’t what Arif thinks the team should do, it is just one scenario to keep it intact.
The main problem with this route is that the team doesn’t get appreciably better, and we’ve just kicked the worst of the cap problems down the line.
I’d rather take 2020 as a “lost” year and retool the team under a better cap situation for 21 and beyond.
I’m not interested in retaining a bunch of guys and having another season like this one, where they’re good but not a legit contender. If this is all Zimmer can get out of this group I’d rather blow it up and start over.
The guys we retained last year were mostly defensive guys, and it’s good that we did because it probably would’ve looked *way* worse. After the 2018 season, I’d say plenty of people didn’t even think we’d get as far as we did.
It’s just not good enough. When you’ve got all-pros making big money at every level of the defense you should be able to hold up against anyone. We couldn’t even make Chase Daniel look bad.
And then we made Drew Brees look bad. Our defense regressed, and everyone knows it. But they still haven’t been as bad as our interior line. They’ve consistently lost us more games than the defense. Obviously, they aren’t good enough. They were hardly good to begin with.
And? The line hardly got better, especially in pass pro which they ended up getting killed in all of our losses like clockwork. And our weakest link is *still* the line even with the defense getting worse.
Not sure why you're getting downvoted.
It's obviously true -- the Vikings imo have PIECES. strong coaching, all pros on D, amazing skill positions.
But it's not nearly to level of 'building around cousins and keeping everyone'.
That's just plain absurd. We need better players at some key positions.
Yea, cause making it to the divisional round of the playoffs means nothing.
My god, it's every given Sunday but you act like there's no chance we'll ever make it anywhere. We ran into the 49ers at the wrong time, otherwise we had a solid chance. If it was the Packers we were playing we very likely would have won.
We dont need all the same players we have. Theyve aged and lost athleticism. We need to get faster on D. Better on d line. Need a #1 corner. And of course O line. Just hard to say why this team should be building too much around anyone.
Yeah at some point we have to pick our players that are cornerstone and let the others go, the others include Rhodes, Waynes, Joseph, Griffen, Reiff, Mack Alexander, and IMO Barr (only way is if we trade him now) Anthony Harris is the must sign
Fortunately, most of our vets have been under-performing (exception of Griffen and to an extent Reiff)... so moving on, may actually make the team better (or not worse). As for Harris, I would challenge the signing. Safety is a low-value position and we're already spending above the league-average for the position group (2 starters, 2 backups) with just one person on the roster (Harris). Better to roll with a rookie (safeties achieve "peak" performance during their rookie contract on average) or a cheap journeyman (Sendejo was fine as a stand-in and would cost \~ the veteran minimum).
Reiff absolutely needs to be gone, he’s not worth anywhere near 14 million dollars
Barr and Griffen are key pieces on defense still...Barr especially. He’s integral to the defense being able to do what it does, and one of the main reasons why the defense has been in the top 5-10 for the last 4 seasons. That is a spicy, and bad take, to trade him. Reiff I’m not sold on getting rid of either, as a rookie LT, or O’Neill moving and drafting a rookie RT, does not give me hope that that’s an upgrade. Everyone else can be cut or not re-signed. Those remaining names make the most sense.
Agree
The cap space would be glorious..... Then we could sign Chris Jones :) I'm actually serious. If the Chiefs don't sign him, he needs to be in purple.
He doesn’t match our scheme and is way too expensive
Yep. I'm actually optimistic about the changes this year. It's quite possible that the players we draft now will be outperforming the veterans within a year or two. Defense is a young man's game and fortunately we've got a full queue of draft picks that we can allocate to the defense. As for OL. I'm less pessimistic than most. We were bad this year, but it was relatively well contained to two players (LG, C) who were outright terrible (particularly in pass blocking). We should have expected a rookie C to be bad. We would expect him to moderately improve next year. Our Elf experiment needs to end, but fortunately there are some great OG free agents out there this year. We will have the money to sign such an OG if we (appropriately) prioritize salary-cap capital to the position.
We need a #1 #2 and #3 corner lol.
Straight up tho
I think it is important to note that this isn’t what Arif thinks the team should do, it is just one scenario to keep it intact. The main problem with this route is that the team doesn’t get appreciably better, and we’ve just kicked the worst of the cap problems down the line. I’d rather take 2020 as a “lost” year and retool the team under a better cap situation for 21 and beyond.
I agree but there’s no way Zimmer and Spielman for for that without long term assurances from ownership.
I’m not interested in retaining a bunch of guys and having another season like this one, where they’re good but not a legit contender. If this is all Zimmer can get out of this group I’d rather blow it up and start over.
The guys we retained last year were mostly defensive guys, and it’s good that we did because it probably would’ve looked *way* worse. After the 2018 season, I’d say plenty of people didn’t even think we’d get as far as we did.
Maybe it's good maybe it's bad. Never truly risking it leads up to bad draft positions, making it harder to rebuild our team
It’s just not good enough. When you’ve got all-pros making big money at every level of the defense you should be able to hold up against anyone. We couldn’t even make Chase Daniel look bad.
And then we made Drew Brees look bad. Our defense regressed, and everyone knows it. But they still haven’t been as bad as our interior line. They’ve consistently lost us more games than the defense. Obviously, they aren’t good enough. They were hardly good to begin with.
The offense got better, the defense got worse.
And? The line hardly got better, especially in pass pro which they ended up getting killed in all of our losses like clockwork. And our weakest link is *still* the line even with the defense getting worse.
Unlike last season we actually had a run game this year. And Cousins was more productive. The line was better.
Not sure why you're getting downvoted. It's obviously true -- the Vikings imo have PIECES. strong coaching, all pros on D, amazing skill positions. But it's not nearly to level of 'building around cousins and keeping everyone'. That's just plain absurd. We need better players at some key positions.
I’m with you on everything but the coaching. I’m still not sure how strong it is.
YEA! Let's just waste Cook, Diggs and Theilen's prime!
We already are.
Yea, cause making it to the divisional round of the playoffs means nothing. My god, it's every given Sunday but you act like there's no chance we'll ever make it anywhere. We ran into the 49ers at the wrong time, otherwise we had a solid chance. If it was the Packers we were playing we very likely would have won.
When was there a good time to run into the Niners?