Vikings quietly tanking

[adam]

It looks like Kwesi is quietly going into tank mode. They shed Thielen, Kendricks, Peterson, Z. Smith, and Cook, but kept Cousins.

They drafted Addison in the 1st, who will just replace Thielen's production, so there is no real gain there.  They signed Murphy at CB and Davenport at Edge, but at most those are a push, if not a downgrade from Smith (sacks leader) and Peterson.

With Cook gone, their RB room is Mattison, rookie Dwayne McBride, Ty Chandler, and Kene Nwangwu. That may be the worst RB room in the NFL. 

Jefferson is their entire offense now, their defense is worse, they still have Cousins, and they won a lot of close games last year. 

They feel like a 7-8 win team at the most.

Thoughts?

[killakrzydav]

7-8 wins isn’t tanking.

[Stinger226]

I'm not sure they are tanking though and plan on winning 7-8 games. I think they are trying to update the roster  and  focus more on a passing game. They're not winning anything soon, so might as well transform the team.

[adam]

Tank is probably the wrong word, definitely a soft reset then. That is a lot of talent to shed in one offseason to not replace.

Also, I think 7-8 wins is their ceiling, I would not be surprised if they go 6-11 or worse.

[killakrzydav]

I think you’re wrong Adam. They actually won’t have much drop off in running backs and a bad as their defense was last year nobody should be safe.

 They’re likely going to win the division with ten or eleven wins.

[Mongo3451]

From what hear, they are trying to free up space to extend Jefferson.  

[Stinger226]

1 hour ago, Mongo3451 said:

From what hear, they are trying to free up space to extend Jefferson.  

That is probably the real reason for getting rid of expensive contracts, good call.

[AZ54]

Isn't Kwesi from the Steelers organization?  They don't do teardowns and rebuild so the so-called soft reset plan makes more sense.  Unfortunately it's all about the QB and the Steelers have shown that you can be stuck in the middle ground for a long time.  I'd say that is their most likely destination along with some other vet QB down the road.  

[adam]

5 hours ago, killakrzydav said:

I think you’re wrong Adam. They actually won’t have much drop off in running backs and a bad as their defense was last year nobody should be safe.

 They’re likely going to win the division with ten or eleven wins.

Damn, you think so? Vegas says 8.5 wins. The Vikings went 11-1 in one score games last year. They easily could've when 6-6 in those games and would've been an 8 win team.

Their new leading rusher had 283 yards last year at 3.8 per carry. Thielen had a down year and still had 70 receptions for 716 yards an 6 TDs. Addison is going to have to replace those numbers.  On defense, they lost an Edge rusher with 10 sacks, their leading tackler in Kendricks, and their INT leader in Peterson.  

AND they still have Cousins as their QB. I don't think they hit the Vegas line of 8.5.

[Stinger226]

We'll find out how good their coaches are this year with losing some blue chip players. I think they could be bottom dwelling .  Hard to say what GB has but us and Detroit are going to have winning records. 

Bears- 12-5

Detroit-10-7

GB- ---7-10

Minny-6-11.

 

[adam]

12 hours ago, Stinger226 said:

We'll find out how good their coaches are this year with losing some blue chip players. I think they could be bottom dwelling .  Hard to say what GB has but us and Detroit are going to have winning records. 

Bears- 12-5

Detroit-10-7

GB- ---7-10

Minny-6-11.

 

I think it is going be really tight. 

Lions 11-6 (won 9 last year, should be better)
Bears 9-8 (won 3 last year, +6 wins is a huge jump but lost a lot of close games)
Vikings 7-10 (won 13, but 11 by one score, and they lost 6 starters)
Packers 6-11 (won 8 with Rodgers, hard to see Love matching that with basically the same team)

 

[Stinger226]

We agree on who will be the worse teams.  Lions might be better, but hard to always assume a team with an average QB takes bigger  steps. It's going to come down to the QB and I knows ours has the higher ceiling.

[adam]

2 hours ago, Stinger226 said:

We agree on who will be the worse teams.  Lions might be better, but hard to always assume a team with an average QB takes bigger  steps. It's going to come down to the QB and I knows ours has the higher ceiling.

Goff has 3x seasons with over 4400 yds passing, and 4 of his seasons would be Bears franchise records. I trust him more than Cousins, but that isn't saying much. Goff is probably a top 15 QB, so I don't think it is a stretch for them to win 1 more game than last year.