If you looked at Monday night’s matchup on paper, the Vikings looked poised to blow out the over-matched Bears squad sitting at 1-6. Unfortunately, things didn’t exactly go according to plan as the Vikings laid an egg, falling 20-10 at Soldier Field. Their second consecutive loss after rattling off five straight victories to start the season.
The panic button has officially been mashed as the bandwagon purple fans are abandoning ship, and for good reason. A defense that appeared to be on the verge of an historic run played its absolute worst game of the season against a mediocre offense at best. Amazingly, things were even worse on offense as the line continued struggling to keep Bradford upright for the entirety of the game. In a game with very few positives to glean if you’re a fan of the Vikings, here’s a recap of Monday night’s debacle in Chicago.
Jayron Kearse blows his chance
Many Vikings fans, myself included, saw Kearse as the inevitable heir to the strong safety position if he were to perform well in Monday night’s contest. Unfortunately, Kearse was in the dog-house almost immediately after taking a horrible angle to tackle Jordan Howard that ended up going for a huge gain. Having seen enough, Zimmer pulled Kearse and put in Anthony Harris for the remainder of the drive.
Kearse can still become the player that the coaching staff believes he can be, but it will take a lot of hard work and determination on the practice field to earn back Zimmer’s trust and get another shot.
Sam Bradford is seeing ghosts
In his first four starts with the Vikings, Bradford looked to be as poised of a quarterback as there is in the NFL. Unfortunately the last two games have seen that poise all but evaporate as Bradford appears gun-shy and skiddish in the pocket with the offensive line failing to give him any sort of protection.
Unless the offensive line can find a way to improve on protecting Bradford, this problem will snowball into a disaster that may prevent us from even making the playoffs.
Big plays given up by generally stingy Vikings defense
If you had watched the Vikings defense through the first six games, you noticed how infrequently they give up any explosive plays on the ground or through the air. That all changed on Monday as rookie running back Jordan Howard had a hand-full of explosive plays that culminated in over 200 yards from scrimmage when it was all said and done.
Did Howard’s performance expose this defense as one that isn’t nearly as good as we initially believed it to be? For what it’s worth, I don’t believe so as this defense has too great of a personnel and coaching staff to let the whole unit collapse after just one stinker of a game. Look for a big bounce-back week against the Lions when we return home to U.S. Bank Stadium this Sunday.
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