Friday Mailbag: What to expect against the 49ers

Answering fan questions about Vikings-9ers

Photo courtesy Minnesota Vikings

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By Matthew Coller

Happy Friday, everyone! It’s only Week 2, yet this game feels pretty big. So let’s dive right into it…

Justin V… Hi Matthew, how do you see the roles of the 3 safeties compared to last year, and also how they might be utilized against an offense like SF.

Through one game it looked pretty similar. Josh Metellus played about half of his snaps as a slot corner and the rest in the box. Harrison Smith played in the box quite a bit and didn’t take any snaps off. Cam Bynum was the deep guy. They blitzed a lot less than last year but that’s probably because of the way the game played out. Last year when they played against the 49ers they didn’t blitz Purdy much so I would expect that type of approach again. I’m thinking they might try to keep everything in front of them. In 2023 when Purdy threw the ball 20-plus yards in the air he had 19 big-time throws and 3 turnover-worthy plays. Intermediate passing he had a turnover-worthy play rate nearly twice that high. Easier said than done, of course, but those safeties will be enormous to slowing them down. Tackling is always big vs. SF.

DrewPearsonShovedOff1975…. Didn't get a chance to see the Giants game, just a few replays. Is our defense really that good (only 6 points allowed, 3 because of a fumble deep in our territory) OR are the Daniel Jones lead Giants Offense really that bad? How will we stack up against Shanahan's Offense?

I do think this Vikings defense is good. They aren’t going to do that every single week because otherwise they would be the greatest defense in history but the way they were able to create pressure without sending as many extra rushers and the pretty good showing from the corners against some decent receivers makes you buy into the idea that they could be the drivers of the team. Flores now has a lot more talent across the unit to work with than he did last year.

Thing is, San Francisco is unbelievably good. They smashed the Jets’ defense, which has a lot of talent. They were third in the NFL in points last year. All-Pros everywhere. Best play caller in the game. A lot of times that type of talent outweighs good defense but we’ll see if Flores can dial up something to slow them down.

Kyle S… How did Blake Brandel’s play in week one affect your expectations for him?

It definitely raises the bar. It tells us that he can definitely play and there’s a reason that they believed in him as much as they did. What really impressed me was the way that he and Christian Darrisaw worked off each other in the double teams in the run game. If they can keep doing that, we’ll see a lot of good Aaron Jones runs to that side. Pass protection was a little harder to figure. On tape I saw him helping a lot and not getting tons of pure 1-on-1 pass blocking reps. When a team is up like the Vikings were, it limits the amount of difficult situations with stunts/blitzes that the linemen end up facing.

It takes a huge sample size to know whether a lineman is ok, good or great. If he puts together good weeks over and over, then they have something here. But Ezra Cleveland had games where he graded a 90-plus too but it wasn’t consistent.

Rob P… Matthew I usually am in agreement with what you say in your game review podcasts. I do have to respectfully differ with your take that the "punting" was fine. From where I sat in the stadium it seemed definitely not fine. Based on preseason and last year I think we have a punting issue. How much does continuity of holding offset poor punting? Do you think there is a chance we make a change. FYI, it was priceless being at MetLife at the end where Vikings fans far outnumbered Giants fans.

I assumed you’re talking about the podcast right after the game. I was thinking in terms of there being nothing memorable about the punting game and the fact that three of Wright’s four punts ended up inside the 20. The net average was 12th in the league. That said, he did have a shank and it looks sometimes like he’s trying to feel it out rather than just kicking with confidence. Any golfer knows about this feeling.

My opinion is that if Will Reichard is making every kick, keep Wright. Do not upset the kicker. Not that punting doesn’t matter but they need the kicker to be in a good place.

Jeffrey U… Why is it that Kwesi and KOC are the only 2 humans on the planet who think Ed Ingram and Garrett Bradbury can be anything but horrible offensive linemen in the NFL? Do you expect Risner to start at RG when off the IR or will they continue to make a huge mistake in starting Ingram?

Let’s not lump together Bradbury and Ingram. Over the last two years, Bradbury’s numbers have been more along the lines of mid-pack than disaster. He was 10th by PFF grade in 2022 and 22nd last year. Dexter Lawrence is just a nightmare matchup for him and clearly he got banged up early in the game because he’s been limited at practice this week. The right guard situation has never been good. Nobody has allowed more pressures at guard in the last two years than Ingram and starting out with the worst day in the NFL in pass pro wasn’t inspiring. This is Dru Samia-level stuff. If it goes as badly again on Sunday as it did last week, they should consider not even waiting for Risner and see if Dan Feeney can do any better.

Ben… Do you think Sunday is kind of a no lose situation?? If the Vikings win you feel like they can compete with the best in the NFC. If they lose 1-1 isn’t the worst start right??

No such thing as a no-lose in Roger Goodell’s National Football League, my friend. I’m in agreement with your general premise that 1-1 is about what everyone would have expected and it opens the door to reach 3-2 by the time they hit the bye week. How they lose would matter a lot in the equation. A blowout would definitely deflate all the good feelings that came from Week 1. A tight loss would be the rare moral victory in this case, considering how good the 49ers are. Not that anyone would overreact to football results but a win would mean PLAYOFFS 2024 OR BUST reaction.

Jon D… Has the Giants game changed your view of the floor or ceiling of this team?

It really hasn’t. I picked them to win nine games because I thought that Jefferson, the defense and coaching would put them in position to have a chance every week but Darnold would be volatile enough that they wouldn’t be at the top of the NFC. I still think that. If they beat the 49ers, ask me again. At that point I might say that that the ceiling is higher.

Jason…. So what’s the result you expect to see if the Vikings are a good not great team this weekend? What does disaster mode look like?

If they play hard, battle the heck out of the 49ers and lose 24-17 then I would be saying on the postgame podcast that they gave them a good battle and in 2025 they might win that game but right now it’s not enough. Disaster mode would mean that Darnold is jittery and turns the ball over and the cornerbacks struggle really badly against the 49ers’ offense and San Fran runs up the score on them. I would lean more toward it being a battle.

Dennis T… Hey guys , I was at Sundays game , what I saw was a confident Sam Darnold ,going through his progressions and not locking in one target…now that he’s the QB for us without looking over his shoulder definitely is a factor for him going forward week to week and taking command of the most talented offense he’s had a chance to play with as a starter in his career

No question he looked confident. One thing that I did notice was that he had the second lowest number of passes quicker than 2.5 seconds in the league only behind Justin Fields. That tells me that he was hanging onto it a little longer than they would like. He was at 30%. Kirk was 41% last year and 40% in 2022. Even when Darnold was good in 2022, he was the lowest in the league. That’s something I’ll be keeping an eye on.

I really enjoyed JT O’Sullivan’s breakdown of Darnold playing on time with KOC’s offense.

Thomas S… Matthew: Between EPA and DVOA, which one do you prefer in analyzing the Vikes?

As much as I love analytics, in this instance the eye test is going to work better than any metric. If you watch every play of every game, you know better than any catch-all statistic how good the team is.

But for points of reference to compare them to other teams that might have similar records, I would use both of those for different things. DVOA is supposed to be predictive of where teams are headed. So if you are winning games with a low DVOA, we can expect regression (see: 2022 Vikings). Or if you are not winning with a high DVOA, you’re more likely to get going eventually. EPA can be very noisy if you’re using it in small samples. I tend to look at that more toward the end of the season to see which teams have been the strongest over the entire season.

Offensive EPA has been pretty good at predicting who goes deep in the postseason so when we get to the point where we’re asking whether the Vikings are really a Super Bowl contender (someday?) I’ll be looking at whether they clear EPA thresholds as we get to the end of the season.

Thomas H… Is Van Ginkel’s foot injury related to the surgery that kept him out of OTA’s, etc.?

I got that impression about Van Ginkel but I can’t say that for sure.

Robert S… Even after listening to you and Kyle Madson, I still get the feeling that SF is kind of invulnerable...so my question is, if I told you the Vikings won this game (and they will!), how would you say it must have happened?

I feel the same way. If you cover a team like that you have to look for everything that might be wrong because everything is viewed through a Super Bowl lens. And if you spend 17 weeks saying “wow this team is good,” then it gets tiring.

If the Vikings win this game then it will have happened because they forced a couple turnovers and ran the ball very well and built everything off that.

I know that these statistics are flawed but I’ll throw it out there anyway to make the point: When the 49ers turned the ball over even once in 2023 they were 4-5. When 2023 49ers opponents went over 100 yards rushing they were 2-4. In the playoffs, all three teams ran for 100 yards or more and they allowed 21, 31 and 25 points.