Everson Griffen and Adam Thielen on Track for Record Breaking Seasons
Joe Johnson
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I said multiple times before the season started that this Minnesota Vikings team, on paper, was one of the most stacked teams in the NFL. Not to toot my own horn (but beep! (click clack go to sleep?)), but I was relatively confused back then as to why next to no one outside of myself was giving this Vikings team a chance to even make the playoffs (let alone win a championship like I thought they might be able to (with Bradford at the helm, of course)) as they were returning all 11 starters on a defense that before the Bye last season was being compared to some of the greatest defenses in NFL history. On the offensive side of the ball, they had a quarterback who was coming off of the most accurate season of all time, a rookie running back who looked amazing and the league’s best wide receiver duo in Stefon Diggs and Adam Thielen. With the Vikings at 6-2, it appears like my strange brand of negative optimism was right!
A lot of that has to do with the play of the defense and there is no one on that side of the ball that is playing better than Vikings defensive end Everson Griffen. After eight games he’s already in double digits for sacks, with ten, which makes him 12 away from tying the team record that is owned by his predecessor/teacher Jared Allen and 12.5 away from tying the all-time NFL record which is held by Michael Strahan (who was given that record by former Viking Brett Favre (and I mean “Given” as literally as possible)). Griffen has a sack in every game this season and should be able to keep that streak alive this weekend when facing the Washington Redskins’ beat up offensive line. He also had a sack in the last game of the 2016 season, which means that Griffen has a sack in nine consecutive games which means that he’s tied for the second-longest streak in NFL history (with Bruce Smith and Kevin Greene!). That’s pretty damn amazing for a player that fell all the way to the fourth round of the 2010 NFL Draft, or really any player from any round from any draft from any year from any from from. Also, from.
The Vikings have another draft-related record on the other side of the ball, as well, in receiver Adam Thielen’s amazing year. While he’s not on track to break any NFL records for receiving yards or catches, but as the Star Tribune explains:
If Thielen remains on those paces, he could become just the 10th undrafted player since the 1970 AFL-NFL merger to surpass 90 catches in a season, and only the sixth to eclipse 1,200 yards
The paces they reference are the fact that Thielen is 10th in the NFL with 48 receptions, and is sixth in the league with 627 receiving yards. Considering he’s been playing without Diggs at his side (to draw coverage) and also with a backup quarterback who struggles with accuracy and the deep ball, it’s a pretty amazing feat in and of itself. Thielen has been praised by basically everyone, and should be, as he is an incredibly hard worker who has become just like the man he idolized as a child… Cris Carter. Thielen has amazing hands (like Carter) and has an even better catch radius than Carter had. Throw the ball within 8-10 yards of Thielen and he’ll come up with the catch nearly everytime. Considering he’s an undrafted player who joined the Vikings after a rookie tryout (after not being invited to the combine, as well), his ascension and success have both been equally amazing. He’s just a great story and the fact that he’s showing what undrafted guys can do should (and most likely does) mean a lot to the kid from Detroit Lakes who used to dive into his bean bag chair while catching the ball and pretending to be Carter.