ESPN Personality Predicts 2021 Vikings Bounceback
Dustin Baker
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ESPN NFL analyst Mike Clay was in a Minnesota Vikings tweeting mood for some reason Tuesday morning. Without any context – etiquette that is commonplace for Twitter – Clay posted about the Vikings defensive maladies last season.
And, he’s right.
For the most part, anyway – it would be odd for Anthony Harris to return for 2021 at the price tag he is forecasted to command. On the whole, however, Clay is absolutely correct. The Vikings experienced an unfamiliar downturn on defense while the offense thrived, scoring the league’s 11th-most points and tabulating the fourth-most yards.
Most Vikings fans believe the defense will return to form next season, or at the very least, not show the putridity of 2020 yet again. The return-to-health from Danielle Hunter, Michael Pierce (COVID precautions), Anthony Barr, Mike Hughes, and Eric Kendricks should be “enough” to shove the team back to its typical defensive prowess.
If folks are wrong and head coach Mike Zimmer has simply lost his way, then next year’s offseason will be a beacon of change from the top down.
Injuries Ravage Defense
The Vikings 7-9 record last season was disheartening because the team is in win-now mode every year with Zimmer. He started his head-coaching career with the Vikings in 2014, and the team also posted a 7-9 mark that season. The year after that, Minnesota reached the playoffs. The standard was established. And then Zimmer essentially alternates good years with mediocre ones thereafter.
The woes of 2020 can be genuinely attributed to injury. Otherwise, one examines football through a lens that champions the “next man up” philosophy in the strictest interpretation imaginable. Sure, “next man up” is a catchy phrase used to raise expectations for substitute players. But when applying the motto to multiple spots on the same side of the ball, a house of cards phenomenon sets in. A single position on defense can be masked when a starter is hurt, yet four of five players are tricky to collectively replace.
Here is a graph of the Vikings 2020 injuries. Notice the volume of defensive injuries compared to those on offense.
Injuries unfortunately matter. Hell, between Hunter, Pierce, Barr, and Hughes – 58 games by those starters alone were missed.
Pass Rush Nonexistent
When Hunter was figured to be lost for the season, all eyes shifted to Yannick Ngakoue – a defensive end acquired via trade just before the season commenced. He lasted six games. General Manager Rick Spielman traded Ngakoue to the Baltimore Ravens last October, leaving the Vikings without a battle-tested, starting defensive end.
Consequently, the Vikings finished with the fifth-fewest sacks in the NFL, and the worst quarterback pressure rate as adjudicated by Pro Football Focus.
On the Vikings pass-rushing struggles, PFF’s Ben Linsey details:
“The Vikings lost their starting edge tandem from the 2019 season of Danielle Hunter (to injury) and Everson Griffen (to free agency), and they struggled to replace that production in 2020. The only player on the team with more than 25 pressures was Ifeadi Odenigbo (42), and their team pressure rate of 21.6% ranked dead last over the course of the regular season. That was just part of the story for a Minnesota defense that parted ways with many of their starters this past offseason.”
This offseason, the Vikings will likely take measures to bolster the right defensive end spot currently inhabited by Ifeadi Odenigbo. Free agency is about one month away, and Minnesota has the 14th pick in the NFL draft – a spot in the draft prime for blending the best-player-available and team-need strategies. Men like Gregory Rousseau and Kwity Paye are on Minnesota’s shortlist at EDGE in several mock drafts.
Awful Special Teams
Clay made no mention of special teams in his tweet, but that was a segment of the team that was particularly ghastly.
Have a look at the following stats and facts from Will Ragatz of SI.com:
- The Vikings ranked dead last in punt return average at 4.3 yards per return. Their longest return of the season was 13 yards, and it happened in Week 17
- They ranked dead last in starting field position on BOTH offense and defense. That put them at a huge disadvantage on both sides of the ball.
- Punter Britton Colquitt ranked 31st in net punting average, and the Vikings allowed the third-most punt return yards in the league.
- Dan Bailey had an awful season, missing 13 kicks, ten of which came in the last five games.
- Minnesota was one of seven teams to allow a kickoff return TD, with Cordarrelle Patterson taking one to the house on MNF in Week 10.
- Rookie WR K.J. Osborn, drafted in the fifth round as a return specialist, was a major disappointment who eventually lost his role at both PR and KR.
Special teams improvement for 2021 is a shakier prognosis than that afforded to the defense. Onlookers know that Hunter, Barr, and Pierce can play with history as a precursor. The same cannot be asserted for the special teams bunch – although the team did not renew the contract of special teams coordinator Marwan Maloof. Longtime Vikings coach Ryan Ficken replaced Maloof.
The offense is fine (if it avoids widespread injury). The defense can be tweaked and reconditioned with players healthy again. Special teams is the big wait-and-see.