Winning out: What does it even look like? (1 Viewer)

[LUX]

I'll give Taysom his finger problem on some of those throws, but he still needs to learn the pocket protection. He had really good pocket protection several times and just kept running out of it. Not sure if he'll figure it out, but he has a lot to learn still.

 

[porculator]

I think Payton may have to get a little more gimmicky to win 3 more games with this offense.

Between Payton's ego, Taysom's unique skillset, and our complete lack of WR/TE talent, I would have expected to see the playbook turned on its head by now. But in reality it still looks pretty similar to what we ran with Brees and then Winston, and for an offense that relies on timing and accuracy, its not a good look.

One thing is for sure, this offense isn't going to score 20+ points a game with traditional or predictable playcalling.

 

[ELLIASJWILLIAMS]

Look, I know there's a lot of you on this board who aren't interested in winning anymore games and would rather the high pick, and I get that. But if all you have to add to the discussion is a negative comment about there being no point, then just skip this thread. It's clear that Sean and this coaching staff are wanting to compete for as long as we have a chance. The point of this thread is.. What does that recipe look like?

Defensively, I feel like this is a rather easy discussion. We're far more healthy on that side of the football. Going into this season, I felt like we had a Championship level defense. While we were healthy, it sure looked that way. Now that Chauncey is back, I feel like we can get back to playing at that level defensively. We're solid at all levels, and Davenport is back. Teams can't run on us and they really know it. For as long as we're playing at a remotely competant level offensively, this defense will keep us in every single game that we play.. Which leads me to the offense.

We absolutely have to resemble an NFL offense. We have to possess the ball; limit the 3 and outs. Stay out of 3rd and 10+. Punts are okay, play the field position game. Ingram coming back should help out a lot; Tony Jones doesn't nearly have the vision or running ability that Ingram does. Him returning should allow us to lean on Kamara less in the running game, and more in the passing game. My only concern is getting it to him consistently; we threw to him twice on HB option on Sunday, but Taysom put the ball in a spot where he can run after the catch. It's no secret that I'm not a believer in Taysom as a long-term quarterback in this league, but I do think we can grind out wins with him if we play our cards right.

We have to find a way to be effective on the ground game on early downs.. which will be super tough with no real threat at receiver. But if we can limit the amount of times we're stopped for loss and no gain I think it'll go a long way. 3rd and 4-6 is super managable with our offense. Heavy dose of Kamara on outside zone, bang Ingram up inside. I'd love to run more zone/read with Taysom and Kamara. Keep running QB power and QB sweep, but at some point we need to mix up how we get Taysom out in the open on designed runs. I'd love to see us take a couple plays from the Bills playbook in how they use Josh Allen, particularly the QB draws that they run are super well designed. Continue the bootlegs, they are very effective, especially if we can keep Kamara rolling on the outside zone runs. Limit the sacks, limit the negative plays. Possess the ball, keep the ball, find ways to get points at all costs. Keep our defense fresh. Turnovers can't happen.

Obviously our toughest game of the 4 game stretch is coming up, but I strangely do think that we have a chance. Defensively we've played incredibly well in all 4 of our matchups versus the Tom Brady led Bucs, even in our playoff loss, the only reason we lost that game was giving them points off of turnovers. The defense will rise up for this game, we just have to find a way to scratch and claw our way to points because it will not be easy. We want to run the ball, and they're rather good at stopping the run. Getting 2-3 yards a pop would be a huge win versus this defense. I wouldn't even attempt running any sort of screen against this defense.. they're almost a guaranteed negative play with David and White at linebacker. If we can stay in 3rd and managable consistently, we'll have a really good shot. If we're constantly facing 3rd and long, the game will be as good as over.

TLDR: Lean on the 3 headed monster of Kamara/Ingram/Taysom in the run game, stay in 3rd and managable offensively. Get more creative with designed QB runs. Rely on the defense, as it's close to being whole again. Chauncey isn't the best player we have on defense, but he's the secret sauce that brings us to an elite level. We have 4 games left. I'd rather make the playoffs than not. As a fan, the excitement of wild card weekend is great.. just knowing that you're in the dance, even if on paper we don't belong. And for the sake of our team and it's future, I think it's important to keep the winning culture that we've established with this locker room, especially post-Brees. Even if it's not pretty.

It looks like last night.

It starts with the continued development of Taysom at QB. Offense has to take care of the ball, limit mistakes, and find a way to sustain drives.

The defense must stop the run, win on 3rd down, and add a turnover or two per game.

Special Teams - Needs to help in the hidden yards department. K, P, and PR/KR all did their jobs well last night.

That's the recipe, oh and perhaps keep that officiating crew another week as I could be wrong but it was one of our least penalized games of the season. They let both teams duke it out and only called very obvious penalties with maybe a slip up or two.


They can't beat themselves.


Here's my flip side.

Because a lot of it depends on Taysom's development he's got to stay healthy. The plays he turns into a FB are great for the yards but one awkward hit and its Siemian. The offense has to utilize him in that way and it won't change so he needs to slide more when the opportunity is presented so he can reduce wear and tear. It looked like a light flipped on for him so it's important that he's on the field for the remainder of the stretch.

Dennis Allen and the defense come to play versus Tampa/Brady. That much is proven, but how much of their dominant effort was familiarity of opponent? Granted this is a two week stretch of only 7 points given up but there are arguably grey area things that have helped contribute to that. Miami oddly enough gives them another grey area opportunity as their QB situation falls somewhere between not nearly as good or familiar as Brady, but potentially not as bad as the Jets QB either. They are however trending up and that has to be taken into account.

Lastly, can we continue to play clean games? The margin for error is slim.

 

[Sailorsaint]

This defense has struggled mightily against mobile QBs. Two of our remaining games will be vs mobile QBs. IDK but it won't be easy and there arent any gimmes.
I could see us losing to Miami very easily. We should be able to handle a CMacless Cryolina and Atl but it wont be easy.
Positive things will be we get both division rivals after they play tough opponents. Cryolina will have Tompa Bay before us and Atl at the Bills before our games. Miami could be the biggest test.

I picked us to win 3 of our last 4 games and finish 9-8. Tampa wasn't one of the wins, so as far as I'm concerned, we are ahead of schedule.

 

[BBarnes]

Look, I know there's a lot of you on this board who aren't interested in winning anymore games and would rather the high pick, and I get that. But if all you have to add to the discussion is a negative comment about there being no point, then just skip this thread. It's clear that Sean and this coaching staff are wanting to compete for as long as we have a chance. The point of this thread is.. What does that recipe look like?

Defensively, I feel like this is a rather easy discussion. We're far more healthy on that side of the football. Going into this season, I felt like we had a Championship level defense. While we were healthy, it sure looked that way. Now that Chauncey is back, I feel like we can get back to playing at that level defensively. We're solid at all levels, and Davenport is back. Teams can't run on us and they really know it. For as long as we're playing at a remotely competant level offensively, this defense will keep us in every single game that we play.. Which leads me to the offense.

We absolutely have to resemble an NFL offense. We have to possess the ball; limit the 3 and outs. Stay out of 3rd and 10+. Punts are okay, play the field position game. Ingram coming back should help out a lot; Tony Jones doesn't nearly have the vision or running ability that Ingram does. Him returning should allow us to lean on Kamara less in the running game, and more in the passing game. My only concern is getting it to him consistently; we threw to him twice on HB option on Sunday, but Taysom put the ball in a spot where he can run after the catch. It's no secret that I'm not a believer in Taysom as a long-term quarterback in this league, but I do think we can grind out wins with him if we play our cards right.

We have to find a way to be effective on the ground game on early downs.. which will be super tough with no real threat at receiver. But if we can limit the amount of times we're stopped for loss and no gain I think it'll go a long way. 3rd and 4-6 is super managable with our offense. Heavy dose of Kamara on outside zone, bang Ingram up inside. I'd love to run more zone/read with Taysom and Kamara. Keep running QB power and QB sweep, but at some point we need to mix up how we get Taysom out in the open on designed runs. I'd love to see us take a couple plays from the Bills playbook in how they use Josh Allen, particularly the QB draws that they run are super well designed. Continue the bootlegs, they are very effective, especially if we can keep Kamara rolling on the outside zone runs. Limit the sacks, limit the negative plays. Possess the ball, keep the ball, find ways to get points at all costs. Keep our defense fresh. Turnovers can't happen.

Obviously our toughest game of the 4 game stretch is coming up, but I strangely do think that we have a chance. Defensively we've played incredibly well in all 4 of our matchups versus the Tom Brady led Bucs, even in our playoff loss, the only reason we lost that game was giving them points off of turnovers. The defense will rise up for this game, we just have to find a way to scratch and claw our way to points because it will not be easy. We want to run the ball, and they're rather good at stopping the run. Getting 2-3 yards a pop would be a huge win versus this defense. I wouldn't even attempt running any sort of screen against this defense.. they're almost a guaranteed negative play with David and White at linebacker. If we can stay in 3rd and managable consistently, we'll have a really good shot. If we're constantly facing 3rd and long, the game will be as good as over.

TLDR: Lean on the 3 headed monster of Kamara/Ingram/Taysom in the run game, stay in 3rd and managable offensively. Get more creative with designed QB runs. Rely on the defense, as it's close to being whole again. Chauncey isn't the best player we have on defense, but he's the secret sauce that brings us to an elite level. We have 4 games left. I'd rather make the playoffs than not. As a fan, the excitement of wild card weekend is great.. just knowing that you're in the dance, even if on paper we don't belong. And for the sake of our team and it's future, I think it's important to keep the winning culture that we've established with this locker room, especially post-Brees. Even if it's not pretty.

Thankfully it’s not a must that we win out, but we definitely need to win those last two.

We should win out if our defense plays as well as last night, but our offense needs to be much more efficient at sustaining drives

 

[LordPoopington]

Circling back on this, since we're a quarter of the way there and just beat the most challenging matchup left on our schedule. I pointed out some things that I was hoping to see, some of it was accomplished, some of it was ugly. Defensively, once again this is a short and easy discussion. The secret sauce is back (Chauncey), we have all 11 starters healthy, and we have the Bucs number. Even when Godwin/Evans/Fournette were all in, they weren't moving the ball. If we make the playoffs, it'll without a doubt be because of this unit.

Offensively, it was really bad. We did some things well early, but then it turned really really ugly. Taysom started out with some accurate balls. Kamara had a solid average in the first half considering the defense we were going up against (6 for 18 but one carry was a weird toss for -3 yards), but we moved the ball a little, only had 1 three and out, played the field position game well, and scraped together 6 points. But in the 2nd half, it was so bad to watch. 4 straight three and outs. Too much early down dropback passing. Kamara was getting solid yardage in the first half off of inside zone, yet we started trying to get him out on tosses which I even said going in would be ineffective versus this defense.

Here's what I want to see less of, and what I want to see more of going forward:

Early down dropback passing: Just why? It doesn't make sense given our roster makeup right now, even when our tackles comeback healthy. Everything we do, until we get to a 3rd and long, should be set up off of the appearance of a running play. Taysom started out relatively accurate and decisive with the ball, but even with the positive throws early, it was still an overall negative performance. He was inaccurate with the ball frequently on throws to Kamara, Marquez, and TreQuan. He had two balls that should have been intercepted if not for an insanely smart heads up play by Marquez and then a terrible drop by the Bucs safety Adams in their territory that would have kept it a 1 score game when all we needed was a FG to make it a 2 score game. The third down miss to Kamara on the option route was terrible, it's an easy throw. He didn't even give him a chance on the shot to the endzone in a 1 on 1 matchup. His pocket presence still isn't there yet, and has a hard time escaping when it breaks down. Even that being said, I still think he can be effective but we need to a better job of putting him in a position to succeed. Dropback passes without the threat of a run on early downs? Please no more. Show the threat of a run play until it's 3rd and long.

Zone read with AK?: Yes! They finally went to some more zone read plays with him and Kamara, I've been SCREAMING for that. The designed QB runs (power, sweep, etc) have been effective with him, but eventually teams will sell out to stop it. With the threat of him putting it in the halfbacks belly, they really can't do that. I'd love to see a lot more of this, and less QB power/sweep. Still run them, but not nearly as much. When we were trying to put the game away, we went with three straight QB power plays. What? Why? It netted us -1 yard in the three play sequence. At least make the defense think about what might be coming. Telegraphing what you're doing makes it really easy for them. I understand the defense that we were going against, the likelihood of us icing the game even with traditional runs was slim, but running that same play 3 times in a row was downright silly. Especially when the zone read was effective, and Taysom was getting 6-8 yards on every keep.

I'm super pumped about the W, an amazing performance all around. Not trying to poopoo on our offense, just highlighting what worked and what didn't.

Going forward?
-Less dropback passing on early downs.
-Everything should appear like a run until we get to 3rd and long.
-Stop telegraphing QB runs.
-MORE zone read with AK. It's insanely effective. 11 on 10 football when the QB makes the right read.

We control our own destiny, let's do this thing.

Yeah, the early down dropback passes drove me nuts. I'm in your camp that Taysom is no long-term solution as a starting QB, but....if you're starting him, you have to put him in positions where he's most likely to succeed and not have him drop back on 1st down so often. I thought we did a better job of adjusting to Taysom's strengths and limitations vs. NYJ (granted, a much weaker defense).

It's stating the obvious, but we really, really need our OTs healthy. We can't expect to win our remaining games if we have 3 more rushing performances like last night even though I know part of it is TB's run defense is good.

Last night was the toughest game on our remaining schedule, but MIA is coming off a 6-game winning streak. They're not a terrifying team, but they're better than CAR and probably better than ATL, too.

 

[LordPoopington]

Thankfully it’s not a must that we win out, but we definitely need to win those last two.

We should win out if our defense plays as well as last night, but our offense needs to be much more efficient at sustaining drives

Wouldn't us getting in the playoffs at 9-8 involve a fair amount of help from other teams though? I think even if we win out, we could still miss the playoffs (I think MIN currently has a tiebreaker on us and if they beat CHI tonight we would be out of the playoffs if the season ended tonight)?

 

[BBarnes]

Wouldn't us getting in the playoffs at 9-8 involve a fair amount of help from other teams though? I think even if we win out, we could still miss the playoffs (I think MIN currently has a tiebreaker on us and if they beat CHI tonight we would be out of the playoffs if the season ended tonight)?

We win out we are 100% in. We win the two NFC games it’s about a 98% chance or around there that we are in. You can go do the nfl playoff predictor and play with any scenario. I’ve done a ton of them. It’s very very likely that we make the playoffs and we control our own destiny at this point

With our win last night we went from 25% to 45%. Minnesota currently has a 24% chance to make it

2022 N.F.L. Playoff Picture: Each Team’s Path to the Postseason (Published 2023)

An interactive calculator that lets you explore every team’s path to the N.F.L. playoffs.

www.nytimes.com

 

[porculator]

Wouldn't us getting in the playoffs at 9-8 involve a fair amount of help from other teams though? I think even if we win out, we could still miss the playoffs (I think MIN currently has a tiebreaker on us and if they beat CHI tonight we would be out of the playoffs if the season ended tonight)?

We're still at the point that it's not even worth speculating. I checked out the NFL playoff predictor tool and was appalled at the amount of scenarios. The division winners seem pretty certain as long as none of them lose out, but there's 6 legit wildcard hopefuls. The good thing is that all of them play each other except for us.

ESPN.com's 2023 NFL Playoff Machine - Playoff Matchup Predictor

Use the NFL Playoff Machine from ESPN to predict the NFL Playoff matchups by generating the various matchup scenarios based on your selections.

www.espn.com

 

[mc4saints]

The only great pass Taysom threw last night was the rainbow that he dropped in a bucket over Callaway's shoulder. Besides that one it took some adjustments for our receivers to have a shot at making the catches. It may be a while before we see our QBs pinpointing passes like Drew used to do.

Actually, this was his greatest throw ever and it isn't close.

 

[VPCajun]

We win out we are 100% in. We win the two NFC games it’s about a 98% chance or around there that we are in. You can go do the nfl playoff predictor and play with any scenario. I’ve done a ton of them. It’s very very likely that we make the playoffs and we control our own destiny at this point

With our win last night we went from 25% to 45%. Minnesota currently has a 24% chance to make it

2022 N.F.L. Playoff Picture: Each Team’s Path to the Postseason (Published 2023)

An interactive calculator that lets you explore every team’s path to the N.F.L. playoffs.

www.nytimes.com

FWIW, Vikes remaining schedule:

@Bears
Rams
@Packers
Bears