Afterthoughts: Vikings vs. Bears

Well, Like I've said before, I have a keen ability to predict the exact opposite of what happens in the Vikings games on Sundays. Saying the Bear-Viking Matchup would be a defensive slugfest was just a little of the mark, wouldn't you say?

Anyway, on to highest scoring Vikings-Bear matchup in their Rivalry's history:

Vikings 41 - Bears 48

OFFENSE

First game in a while where it was not painful to watch the Vikes attempt to move up and down the field as yards came easily against an injured Bear defense. Gus Frerotte briefly had the first 300 yard passing game for the Vikings under Brad Childress' direction, before taking a sack toward the end and falling back down to his final tally of 298 yards through the air. Adrian Peterson and Chester Taylor combined for 155 yards and 3 TDs on the ground, and AP finally flashed some of his rookie season magic taking one carry 54 yards to the house that looked like an instant replay of one of his long TD runs at Soldier Field last year, turning on the jets to get the corner, running through an arm tackle, and cutting back against the grain to reach the endzone, beautiful.

The 3 TDs also bring up a point with me for this offense. On 2 of these TD runs, the Vikes were on the goal line and utilized their 2 back set of Taylor and Peterson side by side behind the QB. This is a FANTASTIC formation for the Vikes in this situation, as demonstrated by the leap over the line TD by Chester in which the Bears D followed AP and was caught unprepared. Further example as to why these two should be put on the same field at the same time FAR more often. The same logic on putting these guys together on the goal line should be applied all across the field. It will cause matchup problems and give the Vikes options to confuse a Defense with counters, reverses, and play action passes. What could possibly be wrong with having your 2 most explosive offensive players on the field at the same time? Just cause they are both RBs doesn't mean you can't use them both effectively. Anyway....

Bernard Berrian had another good day and is turning into a solid play for my Fantasy team every week. His 6 receptions for 81 yards ended his run of 100+ yard games, but he also added a nice TD catch at the sideline in the endzone which showed his ability and awareness to keep both feet in bounds and snag the ball. Bernard Berrian in my book is now officially worth the contract the Vikings gave him, he is looking like everything and more of what they expected from him.

In the end though, the offense still gets a B-/C+ rating because of turnovers and their ineptitude on 3rd downs (4-12, 33%, 32.7% on the season, 27th in the league). Gus Frerotte, in addition to his 2 TD throws, also had 4 INTs against first year or practice squad equivalent players. Each man substituting for an injured started in the Bears secondary had an INT, and without a couple of these, the Vikes very easily could have came out on the winning end.

I also am a little concerend that I am saying this, but it looks like TE Visanthe Shiancoe has also turned the corner, as he caught 4 balls for 68 yards and a TD, and finally looks like the vertical seam route runner the Vikes brought him in to be. I think all of these improvements could also be traced back to QB play, compare how they look with Frerotte running the offense to Tarvaris, just sayin...(another knock on Childress' coaching prowess...)

The Good: Adrian Peterson and the run game producting 3 TDs.
The Bad: Turnovers.
The Ugly: Brad Childress STILL has yet to coach a game that produced 300+ yards passing.

DEFENSE

I said in my preview that Kyle Orton scared me in this game, and that feeling proved to be on the mark as he lit up the Vikes for 283 yards and 2 TDs and ZERO interceptions. If Marty Booker could have found his hands sooner, Orton very likely could have had 400 yards and 4 TDs, and this game would have looked much worse, and this brings me to a new addition to 'Afterthoughts' entries:

BRAD CHILDRESS' COACHING INEPTITUDE 101:

The Vikings chose this week to try as hard as they could to keep the ball away from Devin Hester in the return game. They did this by squib kicking, pooch kicking, and anything else to keep the ball out of his hands. The results? In the first half the Bears average starting field position was their own 48 yard line, giving them a very short field to work with to score points. When the Vikes finally abandoned this tactic, Hester produced only 36 return yards on 2 tries. To be honest with you, as bad as the Vikes special teams have been so far, I'd still take my chances kicking a normal kickoff to the guy over simpling HANDING THEM great field position. At least make them WORK FOR IT. Yet another Brad Childress coaching decision that had a DIRECT result on the outcome of the game, that being a LOSS. End of this weeks lecture.

Jared Allen produced the defenses only 2 sacks, bringing his season total to 5, now only half a sack behind last years team leader from the DE spot. Newcomers to full time duty, filling in at MLB for injured E.J. Henderson, Napolean Harris and Vinny Ciurciu were extremely overmatched in this game. Though Vinny Ciurciu was flagged for a NON-pass interference penalty on a key 3rd down and goal play that gave the Bears another chance and a resulting TD. Combined they had only 6 tackles, which is about half of what could be expected from E.J. Lets hope Harris gets up to speed quickly and can prove serviceable.

The defense was handcuffed by field position and didn't seem like they came ready to play up to the level they had in previous weeks, but they did still hold the Bears and dynamic rookie RB Matt Forte to only 53 total yards on the ground. As long as the Williams are around, this dominance against opposing running games will continue.

The Good: Allen producing, Run D.
The Bad: Everything else.
The Ugly: The guys manning the MLB spot.

We'll now see how the boys fare against arguably the NFL's hottest offense and hottest QB when the Texans and Matt Schaub come to town on Sunday.

Skol Vikings! 'Til next time...