Vikings' coaches are dumb

Being a Minnesota Viking fan can drive a person crazy. Only the Chicago Cubs can be a more difficult team to root for.
 

Sunday's 27-23 loss to the Dallas Cowboys is just another excruciating loss for the Vikings. What is hard to understand, as usual, is the thinking of the coaches. Why defensive coordinators slack off at the end of games when they have a lead is beyond me. They allow the opposing team to march down the field and score seemingly at will. Why not just keep playing the same way the entire game. Rushing more guys and keeping pressure on Tony Romo would have made more sense than trying to cover all the Cowboys receivers, especially since the Vikings were missing safety Harrison Smith and cornerback Chris Cook to injuries.
 

Why would head coach Leslie Frazier opt to try the Cowboys offsides on a 4th down, instead of letting kicker Blair Walsh try a 54 yard field goal? The fact that Walsh pushed an extra point attempt wide does not matter. Walsh is recovered from his hamstring injury and has made field goals over 50 yards look routine. It would have made more sense to just let the offense go for it on that 4th down instead of trying to draw the Cowboys offsides.
 

Offensive coordinator Bill Musgrave continues his conservative play calling, making us wonder what he's thinking. Tackle Phil Loadholt is 6'8" and weighs 345 pounds, yet can't move anyone off the line.
 

Defensive coordinator Alan Williams said last week he wasn't "changing anything" despite the fact the Vikings' defense is at the bottom of the league in most statistical categories and the team is sporting a 1-7 record.
 

Rick Spielman and his scouting staff have obviously swung and missed on some players - Josh Robinson, Brandon Fusco, Charlie Johnson, John Carlson, Toby Gerhart, Erin Henderson, and Mistral Raymond to name a few - haven't amounted to much and are some reasons why the team has only won one game so far this season.

 
If Frazier and his crew don't win some games during the second half of this season, it's time they, along with Spielman, be shown the door in January, and Vikings fans will have to once again look to the future for some hope.

At least Frazier takes blame for latest Vikings debacle

Minnesota Vikings' fans ought to be used to losing games like Sunday's last second loss to the Chicago Bears. Even with a number of big plays, the Vikings still managed to lose somehow.

Jared Allen's sack and forced fumble of Bears quarterback Jay Cutler led to Brian Robison scooping up the fumble and racing down the field to score a touchdown. What a great play. Almost as good as Carl Eller and Jim Marshall of the old Purple People Eaters.

Letroy Guion's stripping the football off Bears running back Matt Forte was another awesome play. Cordarelle Patterson's 105 yard kickoff return to start the game was magnificent. Harrison Smith's interception of a Cutler pass was a thing of beauty, as he leaped into the air and snared the ball in front of the receiver. Just like Bobby Bryant and Paul Krause used to do.

Yet the Vikings still lost the game. Head coach Leslie Frazier told reporters afterwards, “That last two-minute sequence I could have done some things different. I told our players after the game, as a staff I don’t think we could have asked for any better preparation, any better fight from our team. But personally I have to do a better job in guiding our team in that last sequence and I wanted them to know that. At the end of the day, there were some things that I didn’t do in my role that could have helped our football team."

Frazier declined to get into specifics, but he said the personnel on the field for the Bears’ last meaningful drive wasn’t the problem.

“There were some things we could have done differently strategically and that’s my fault,” Frazier said.

OK.

The thing I'll never understand is, with a team like the Vikings, they have 23 assistant coaches. They practice and prepare for a week.  Then on game day the coaches don't make the right decisions?  Maybe having 23 assistant coaches is too many. What are all these guys doing?  Maybe there's so many X's and O' floating around out there that everyone is too confused to act.