Welcome aboard Brian, one Murphy to another :). Enjoyed reading your column and laughed out loud at the reference to WKRP... Turkeys were all over the field in Cincinnati!
I'm not going to say it is all officiating but the officiating was preseason at best;
I'm not going to say it is all Kirk Cousins but 5 yards a pass and constantly throwing passes that are nearly uncatchable then being bailed out by some of the best receivers in the game making fabulous often contested catches certainly helps KC's accuracy rating... a puffed up rating in my opinion. Cousins acts like he doesn't really like the run game but his 5 yard passes are no better.
I'm not going to say it is all the O-lines fault just 40 percent of it...
I'm not going to say it is all Breelands fault... only 20 percent of it. I'm having visions of Tyrek Hill repeat itself over the next 4 games...
I'm not going to say it is Klint's fault because I don't believe it was. You can't call a wide open game constantly at 3rd and 20;
I'm not going to say its Zimmer's fault only 20 percent of it is for spending all that money on Defense knowing all the while we needed at least one more veteran on the O-line;
I'm not going to say its Spielman's fault only 20 percent for not looking to free agency for "real" O-line help, and acquiescing to Zimmer on all of the expenditures on D.
I'm not going to say its Matthew C. but if he keeps telling me that Kirk Cousins has a good game on Sunday I may have to call the authorities to do a wellness check. Cousins passes were too high or behind or in a place to get someone killed and he did not get Jefferson involved until it was nearly too late to be of any consequence... plus he would have to pass more than 5 yards.
There are a few really solid positives but the sounds of turkeys falling puts me out of the mood to share them lol SKOL
Cousins's problem is between the ears, not his feet. Yes, he lead the game trying drive, but he also inexplicably threw the ball to Cook on a check-off with two defenders between him and the sideline. Cousins doesn't make decisions or process what he's seeing quickly.
There is more to the officiating than those calls. It is ridiculous that PI wasn't called on JJ, but it was on Breeland. Still, one's right to complain is limited when there are all those pre-snap penalties. It also would have been nice if one of the two dropped INTs had been caught.
As god is my witness, I thought that turkeys could fly and that Rashod Hill was a playable OT. He sure as hell wasn't yesterday.
Brian Murphy, you do have a way with words. This was fun to read. Incidentally I didn't agree with much of it, but it was, as always, an amusing exercise in disagreement.
For example, it is odd to suggest that both of the two calls on Jefferson or Dalvin were borderline. The consensus is overwhelming that both were objectively poor calls. If you wade into Bengals land online you will find basically no one who is arguing that Jefferson clearly wasn't in, or that Dalvin clearly fumbled while still up, which you would if these were legitimately borderline calls. If you want to say that it was borderline whether or not they could have been overruled based on the stupid letter of the law for overturning a call, that would be somewhat defensible (after all, Kevin Seifert made, and was lambasted for, that take), as the "clear and obvious" standard is (for every call) a very difficult one to meet. However, the league only intermittently actually cares about those letters of that law, and given their new ability to stitch together two different feeds together based on a shared clock (and given how you could clearly see the moment at which Dalvin's butt came down in some feeds and see the moment at which the ball came out at other feeds), it frankly is utterly inexcusable that they didn't either overturn the call or confirm it - basically they were just too scared to make a stance, and decided to try to make it go away. If you want to avoid the appearance of excusing this terrible performance because of one poor call I would agree wholeheartedly given how sloppy and ugly the Vikings' performance was, but there is a mountain of evidence that the Vikings were honestly hosed by the refs on those two calls.
Also, I wasn't sure what was meant by "nary a Kirk Cousins fingerprint to be lifted." Is this suggesting that Kirk's fingerprints were not on this loss? Cuz if so, ah, nope. I mean sure, Kirk clearly played well enough to win in the 3rd/4th/OT, as he is wont to do, but he also played well enough to lose in the 1st/2nd, as he is also wont to do. He *did* hold onto the ball too long, even after it became clear that this was causing his OL to flounder. In a game in which our defense was doing very well (at that point), he was trying to be a hero rather than taking what the defense was giving him. He did not single-handedly cause us to lose, but he also contributed to many failures.
It is also a bit simplistic to just suggest that the OL was bad and move on. The OL was infuriating, no doubt, and killed many drives, but it was frankly more perplexing than just straight up bad. For example, one weird thing is that the OL had the vast majority of their problems on 1st and 2nd down. As has now been well documented, the Vikings were then forced into repeated third-and-longs. Based on articles such as this, one would expect that the Vikings didn't convert a single third down, because how could a "suspect and overmatched" OL possible hold up long enough for Kirk to convert a 3rd and 24? And yet, on those third downs, the OL performed, well, kinda good, such that Kirk legitimately had time to find open players as he was largely in clean pockets. Also, meaningfully (to me), the OL had the majority of their bad moments early in the game, which is about what I expected (my mantra throughout the preseason was that this OL would likely be rough early, but that it had the pieces and performances and pedigrees that could lead one to be optimistic about their ability to round into form late). This to me says that both sides of the argument were kind of right - those that were optimistic about the OL were correct to point to those glimmers from the preseason, as those glimmers held up in real moments throughout the game that were truly meaningful to the Vikings when in clutch moments and sufficient enough to steal a win (think about how many 4th quarter drives were previously stalled out by poor OL performances - I do not think it is trivial that our OL was basically perfect in OT and in the last drive of the 4th, when the Bengals knew what we were trying to do). But also those that were pessimistic about the OL were clearly correct to be skeptical and are now rewarded with evidence of poor OL play that one can realistically argue earned a loss.
Welcome aboard Brian, one Murphy to another :). Enjoyed reading your column and laughed out loud at the reference to WKRP... Turkeys were all over the field in Cincinnati!
I'm not going to say it is all officiating but the officiating was preseason at best;
I'm not going to say it is all Kirk Cousins but 5 yards a pass and constantly throwing passes that are nearly uncatchable then being bailed out by some of the best receivers in the game making fabulous often contested catches certainly helps KC's accuracy rating... a puffed up rating in my opinion. Cousins acts like he doesn't really like the run game but his 5 yard passes are no better.
I'm not going to say it is all the O-lines fault just 40 percent of it...
I'm not going to say it is all Breelands fault... only 20 percent of it. I'm having visions of Tyrek Hill repeat itself over the next 4 games...
I'm not going to say it is Klint's fault because I don't believe it was. You can't call a wide open game constantly at 3rd and 20;
I'm not going to say its Zimmer's fault only 20 percent of it is for spending all that money on Defense knowing all the while we needed at least one more veteran on the O-line;
I'm not going to say its Spielman's fault only 20 percent for not looking to free agency for "real" O-line help, and acquiescing to Zimmer on all of the expenditures on D.
I'm not going to say its Matthew C. but if he keeps telling me that Kirk Cousins has a good game on Sunday I may have to call the authorities to do a wellness check. Cousins passes were too high or behind or in a place to get someone killed and he did not get Jefferson involved until it was nearly too late to be of any consequence... plus he would have to pass more than 5 yards.
There are a few really solid positives but the sounds of turkeys falling puts me out of the mood to share them lol SKOL
“No quarterback is better at scrambling into a sack.” My favorite part of the article.
Cousins's problem is between the ears, not his feet. Yes, he lead the game trying drive, but he also inexplicably threw the ball to Cook on a check-off with two defenders between him and the sideline. Cousins doesn't make decisions or process what he's seeing quickly.
There is more to the officiating than those calls. It is ridiculous that PI wasn't called on JJ, but it was on Breeland. Still, one's right to complain is limited when there are all those pre-snap penalties. It also would have been nice if one of the two dropped INTs had been caught.
As god is my witness, I thought that turkeys could fly and that Rashod Hill was a playable OT. He sure as hell wasn't yesterday.
Brian Murphy, you do have a way with words. This was fun to read. Incidentally I didn't agree with much of it, but it was, as always, an amusing exercise in disagreement.
For example, it is odd to suggest that both of the two calls on Jefferson or Dalvin were borderline. The consensus is overwhelming that both were objectively poor calls. If you wade into Bengals land online you will find basically no one who is arguing that Jefferson clearly wasn't in, or that Dalvin clearly fumbled while still up, which you would if these were legitimately borderline calls. If you want to say that it was borderline whether or not they could have been overruled based on the stupid letter of the law for overturning a call, that would be somewhat defensible (after all, Kevin Seifert made, and was lambasted for, that take), as the "clear and obvious" standard is (for every call) a very difficult one to meet. However, the league only intermittently actually cares about those letters of that law, and given their new ability to stitch together two different feeds together based on a shared clock (and given how you could clearly see the moment at which Dalvin's butt came down in some feeds and see the moment at which the ball came out at other feeds), it frankly is utterly inexcusable that they didn't either overturn the call or confirm it - basically they were just too scared to make a stance, and decided to try to make it go away. If you want to avoid the appearance of excusing this terrible performance because of one poor call I would agree wholeheartedly given how sloppy and ugly the Vikings' performance was, but there is a mountain of evidence that the Vikings were honestly hosed by the refs on those two calls.
Also, I wasn't sure what was meant by "nary a Kirk Cousins fingerprint to be lifted." Is this suggesting that Kirk's fingerprints were not on this loss? Cuz if so, ah, nope. I mean sure, Kirk clearly played well enough to win in the 3rd/4th/OT, as he is wont to do, but he also played well enough to lose in the 1st/2nd, as he is also wont to do. He *did* hold onto the ball too long, even after it became clear that this was causing his OL to flounder. In a game in which our defense was doing very well (at that point), he was trying to be a hero rather than taking what the defense was giving him. He did not single-handedly cause us to lose, but he also contributed to many failures.
It is also a bit simplistic to just suggest that the OL was bad and move on. The OL was infuriating, no doubt, and killed many drives, but it was frankly more perplexing than just straight up bad. For example, one weird thing is that the OL had the vast majority of their problems on 1st and 2nd down. As has now been well documented, the Vikings were then forced into repeated third-and-longs. Based on articles such as this, one would expect that the Vikings didn't convert a single third down, because how could a "suspect and overmatched" OL possible hold up long enough for Kirk to convert a 3rd and 24? And yet, on those third downs, the OL performed, well, kinda good, such that Kirk legitimately had time to find open players as he was largely in clean pockets. Also, meaningfully (to me), the OL had the majority of their bad moments early in the game, which is about what I expected (my mantra throughout the preseason was that this OL would likely be rough early, but that it had the pieces and performances and pedigrees that could lead one to be optimistic about their ability to round into form late). This to me says that both sides of the argument were kind of right - those that were optimistic about the OL were correct to point to those glimmers from the preseason, as those glimmers held up in real moments throughout the game that were truly meaningful to the Vikings when in clutch moments and sufficient enough to steal a win (think about how many 4th quarter drives were previously stalled out by poor OL performances - I do not think it is trivial that our OL was basically perfect in OT and in the last drive of the 4th, when the Bengals knew what we were trying to do). But also those that were pessimistic about the OL were clearly correct to be skeptical and are now rewarded with evidence of poor OL play that one can realistically argue earned a loss.
Great stuff, Brian! Awesome read. Frankly, they are staring at an 0-4 start. Not looking good, but hey at least the rest of the North lost too!