2018 Vikings Off-Season Thread

[Mike Sixel]

 

Sure, but context is important.  Would it make any sense to rip the Twins for not having their starters average 8 innings?  Considering no one is doing that, it seems like a flawed criticism.

 

Offensive line play is a league wide epidemic of awfulness.  Spending early picks is not a guarantee.  The Pats spent one this year and their guy is hurt (injuries tend to plague lines).  The Cowboys have used three - they get one injury and they're mediiocre to bad.  It's about resource allocation and context.  Yes, I wish they were better too, but 99% of NFL fans can say the same thing.

 

Are you suggesting OL get hurt more than RBs or WRs? Or that there are more busts than QBs or WRs or DBs? I find that....unlikely.

 

The Vikings had great luck last year, they'll need it to be as good as last year. Aaron Rodgers isn't going to be watching 9-10 games this year....

 

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/nfl-2018-the-good-the-bad-and-the-browns/

 

[TheLeviathan]

 

Are you suggesting OL get hurt more than RBs or WRs? Or that there are more busts than QBs or WRs or DBs? I find that....unlikely.

 

The Vikings had great luck last year, they'll need it to be as good as last year. Aaron Rodgers isn't going to be watching 9-10 games this year....

 

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/nfl-2018-the-good-the-bad-and-the-browns/

 

The schedule is much harder, but they also added a legit QB and get their RB back.  

 

I think OL get hurt at a similar clip to RB.  It's why I'm also not going to advocate taking first round RBs.  I don't have data to support that, it's all gut feeling, so I could be wrong.  Either way, I don't agree you need to address the line early to have a good line, but we've been down that road.

 

What's important is to consider the context - virtually everyone has a bad offensive line.  It's part of what is hurting the quality of the league IMO.

[Mike Sixel]

 

The schedule is much harder, but they also added a legit QB and get their RB back.  

 

I think OL get hurt at a similar clip to RB.  It's why I'm also not going to advocate taking first round RBs.  I don't have data to support that, it's all gut feeling, so I could be wrong.  Either way, I don't agree you need to address the line early to have a good line, but we've been down that road.

 

What's important is to consider the context - virtually everyone has a bad offensive line.  It's part of what is hurting the quality of the league IMO.

 

Addressing it late hasn't worked for this team all that well either.....thank goodness for FA.

 

Top 5-10 team, unfortunately most of the good/great teams are in the NFC right now.

[TheLeviathan]

Yeah, the AFC looks like a cakewalk relative to the NFC.

[Mike Sixel]

Backup tackle Aviante Collins out for the year. Good luck RBs and Cousins if a starter gets hurt.... There is no depth.

[Vanimal46]

Backup tackle Aviante Collins out for the year. Good luck RBs and Cousins if a starter gets hurt.... There is no depth.

Ouch. I guess that makes sense why they signed a new guard today. No surprise that OL depth is paper thin.

[nicksaviking]

 

Backup tackle Aviante Collins out for the year. Good luck RBs and Cousins if a starter gets hurt.... There is no depth.

 

 

I was hoping to see Collins, but there's always depth, the team just signed Bryan Witzmann to replace him. I'm sure he's nothing special but he did make 13 starts last year which means he's probably at minimum on par with Collins.

 

The team has already made their bed going with replacement level O linmen, I don't think the depth is an issue because the guys available are likely no better or worse than the backups they already have. If Reiff goes down we probably have issues, and he's not terribly good either. However, everyone else is already so underwhelming I can't imagine we're going to notice.

[Mr. Brooks]

I was hoping to see Collins, but there's always depth, the team just signed Bryan Witzmann to replace him. I'm sure he's nothing special but he did make 13 starts last year which means he's probably at minimum on par with Collins.

 

The team has already made their bed going with replacement level O linmen, I don't think the depth is an issue because the guys available are likely no better or worse than the backups they already have. If Reiff goes down we probably have issues, and he's not terribly good either. However, everyone else is already so underwhelming I can't imagine we're going to notice.

There are always levels of bad, IMO.

A backup sitting on his couch waiting for a call seems likely to be worse than a backup already on a team.

[TheLeviathan]

An awesome article on Sheldon Richardson's dominant debut.