Ponder this... - authentic's Blog

authentic's Blog

Ponder this...

Posted on October 30, 2011 at 11:01 PM.

(2)

Well, the Minnesota Vikings have entered the Christian Ponder era. So far, so good.

The first game was against the best team in football and against maybe the Vikings biggest rival. Ponder handeled it quite nicely I thought. He put his team in a position to win and made some nice passes.

Today he gets his first career win. As a lifelong Vikings fan I started to think. How far away is this team from being competitive again? I started to think about how to offense and defense.

Offensively this team has weapons. Peterson, Harvin, and Shiancoe are all good players. If the Vikings can get a top reciever for their first pick, they might be set in the skill player set. On the line, they have a disaster brewing. Hutch is nearing the downside of his career and Charlie Johnson has been off and on. Sullivan is a below average center and they haven't had a right guard in years. Loadholt has potential and is still young. However, the Chris Degeare fan club and rave has started and I have only heard good things about how his work ethic is and how he's improving on a weekly basis. Give this team a solid right guard and center next year and are they ok? Probably, Hutch can still hold his own for a year or two, and Charlie Johnson might be ok. Could Degeare fill in at right guard? Probably. They need to sign a center to upgrade for next year. If they get these things settled can they be competitive on the offensive side of the ball? Maybe, depends on how Ponder develops.

Defensively, they have a great up front. In honesty, I want a change. It won't ever happen because of how Frazier coaches, but imagine this. Allen, Williams, and Robison up front, with Greenway, EJ Henderson, and a free agent linebacker, paired with Everson Griffin in a 3-4 scheme. Griffin is a tremendous athete and is dropped in coverage a lot. Their secondary is a huge hole. Not only are both their safeties average, but all their corners are very slow and don't have the greatest instincts. Asher Allen in my opinion is one of the worst corners in the league. Marcus Sherels is young and probably the fastest of the bunch. Could Winfield, Cook, and Sherels make up the top 3 next year? I really doubt it. Winfield can still cover the slot and blitz, but he just is getting too old. I think Cook is going be ok. He is very young and has had some problems. Sherels played a lot this week and actually did a good job in coverage in the slot. At safety, Abdullah and Sanford are okay, but I don't see them being the starters much longer. Both need more time to get better. If the Vikings can get a secondary can this team be successful? Honestly, if they get a solid secondary, they would be a top 10 defense in the league. With their front 7, who wouldn't be?

Comments

# 1 RB10 @ Oct 31

Our defensive secondary problems lie partially in the Tampa 2 defense we play. We spread the whole field out and stick each corner, safety, and linebacker with a zone. Playing zone defense means that the offense will be able to complete 5-10 yard throws all game long, and we just tackle them after they catch it. I think we should go back to a man defense. We played man with Cook against Calvin Johnson and he didn't give up anything, but when Cedric Griffin was matched up with Calvin he got shredded. So pretty much, we need to pick and choose our matchups much better. If we played Brady right now, he would probably throw for over 600 yards. We need better safety's though, I'll agree to that. Abdullah I like, but he's still young and having trouble with the zone part of the defense.

Our offense is high powered, and when we get a complete gameplan together, (remember, only week 2 of Ponder era) we should be pretty elite offensively. We need that deep threat down field and I'm hoping Aromashodu can fill that role. We've had Sidney Rice in year's past, and if you look at Rice vs. Aromashodu, they have nearly the same speed, height, and leaping abilities. We haven't went deep to Aromashodu as much as I would like, but I think we will as the season progresses.

This zone defense is also why we get shredded to pieces on 3rd and 4th downs, (like today, 4th and 14 late in the game), and if we can adjust or fix that, we do have a chance at getting back up to the top defensively.

# 2 authentic @ Oct 31

While I think Aromashadu has potential to be very good, I don't think he's on Sidney Rice's level. Getting Ashton Jeffry (sp?) or Floyd would be huge. Aromashadu might be an answer, but only a temporary answer I have a feeling. The tampa two defense is tough to play against if you tackle well, but we don't tackle well. We need more physical corners like Winfield that are also athletic, kind of like Cook.