So many questions following the Vikings blowout loss to Chargers
Getting back on track with JJ McCarthy now appears to be a huge challenge
LOS ANGELES — There isn’t a lot of mystery about what happened to the Minnesota Vikings on Thursday night against the Los Angeles Chargers. They got destroyed in every facet of the game.
The box score tells the right story. The Chargers outgained them 419 to 164 in yards. They Chargers got a brilliant performance out of quarterback Justin Herbert, who threw for 227 yards and three touchdowns and added 62 yards rushing. The Chargers got 117 yards on 23 carries from their third-string running back Kamani Vidal.
On the other side, the Vikings offense averaged 3.5 yards per play.
The overall impact of the loss is the Vikings dropping to 3-4 in an NFC that is completely stacked. They are in 12th place in the conference.
Those are the facts. There’s no disputing how bad Thursday night was for the franchise.
But walking out of SoFi Stadium, there are a lot of questions about the loss to the Chargers and the bigger picture that are going to gnaw at Vikings fans. Let’s have a look at them…
Why did Wentz stay in the game?
It was clear from the outset that Carson Wentz was in for a beating. There were multiple times within the first half where he walked off slowly, including one play where he knocked a ball down that popped up in the air and was grabbing his left elbow. Wentz got hurt against the Browns when he tried to scramble through two defenders and hasn’t been healthy since then. He was wearing a contraption on his left shoulder that he said he hadn’t really practiced with outside of a walk-through where he wore pads.
An image tells the story. The lasting memory from the 37-10 destruction by the Chargers will be Wentz writhing in pain, then throwing his helmet and then sitting on the bench completely defeated. He was sacked five times. It felt like 25.
Shouldn’t the Vikings have gone to backup Max Brosmer?
“He was sore going into it and took quite a few hits…I asked him multiple times where he was at, and he said he was good and wanted to keep going,” head coach Kevin O’Connell said.
He added that he did not think it was a good idea to play the rookie QB from Minnesota while the team was getting rocked by the Chargers’ pass rush.
“Carson’s a veteran player,” O’Connell said. “He understands some of our circumstances tonight. I think it’s very difficult to ask a rookie to go in there for his first performance.”
Analysis: At some point, there was no way Wentz could give them a chance to remain competitive while playing in that much pain. But it’s understandable that they wouldn’t want to subject Brosmer to that.
What happened to the offensive tackles?
Last week against the Philadelphia Eagles, Christian Darrisaw and Brian O’Neill played the entire game and were both terrific. By the end of the first quarter, neither was in the game against the Chargers. Darrisaw played nine snaps and then did not return and O’Neill was ruled out before the game.
“We have Christian on a plan of attack every week based upon the idea of the type of injury he’s coming back from,” O’Connell said. “I’m not going to go into detail with what that injury was, but I would just say there’s a layer to Christian doing everything he can.”
“Brian worked his absolute tail off to get back with his right MCL and just came out of the [Eagles] game with some left knee kind of swelling, maybe overcompensating, but just couldn’t quite get that out of there.”
As crushing as it is for the offense to miss its starting tackles and starting center, why couldn’t the Vikings get anything going against a defense that came into the game ranking 19th in points per game allowed.
“I would have liked to get more runs off, but it’s a circumstance where you’re also trying to make sure you’re not walking yourself right into third and very, very long with the need to try to get eligibles out and also protect on both edges,” O’Connell said. “So it’s trying to figure out the best way to activate the healthy players we do have…but I got to do a better job mitigating the challenges that we face in a game like we did tonight and wasn’t good enough.”
Analysis: Is it possible for the Vikings to mitigate challenges on offense? It’s really hard to criticize a bad performance when they are playing a backup quarterback who is injured and he’s trying to play with three backup linemen but 164 yards and 10 points (that was handed to them) is nowhere near an average expectation for a team with an elite WR duo and two good RBs. That isn’t even remotely competitive, even if the defense had been good.
O’Connell has said that he needs to look himself in the mirror but the offense seems to run into the same problems over and over when they aren’t at full strength. They can’t run and take endless sacks and pressures. It happened against Pittsburgh. It happened last year against the Rams in the playoffs. With the weapons they have, there should be more answers.
What happened to the defense?
Following a loss to the Eagles where the Vikings allowed a perfect QB rating to Jalen Hurts, they allowed a 122.8 rating to Justin Herbert. About 90% of his successful plays looked exactly the same. He managed the pass rush and then fired the ball to wide open receivers in the middle of the field. Tight end Oronde Gadsden II caught five passes on five targets for 77 yards and a touchdown.
Last week the Eagles hit numerous explosive pass plays. Herbert threw to Ladd McConkey for a 27-yard touchdown that put the dagger in the Vikings.
Asked why the defense had allowed so many big plays in the last two games, O’Connell said:
“It just felt like it wasn’t our best performance or even an adequate performance in any phase. So I don’t necessarily want to get into the details of individual sides of the ball. But I will tell you, Matt, that we’ve got to improve. And we’ve got to understand that what we’re going to do moving forward.”
Linebacker Blake Cashman talked after the game about the sorry performance.
“Sloppy,” he said. “We have to be better in a lot of areas. That wasn’t our brand of football…we have a decision to make.”
What decision?
“Doing the simple things better, and for lack of a better term, nut up,” Cashman said. “It’s easy when things get challenging like this to get frustrated and let your emotions get the best of you and let those circumstances dictate your behavior.”
Analysis: Platitudes, platitudes, platitudes. How are they going to stop every good quarterback for the last three years from having a good game against them? Jared Goff has done well, Matthew Stafford has done well, Justin Herbert has crushed them, Jalen Hurts has beaten them, Aaron Rodgers had a really good game.
You have to start to ask if the scheme is having any effect on these good QBs or if it has been figured out by opponents using Ben Johnson and Sean McVay’s blueprints. Or if it’s just players under performing.
How would so many players under perform at the same time though? Did they make so many miscalculations as a front office and coaching staff that they don’t have the horses to face off with quality offenses?
That might seem hard to fathom but they they did completely overhaul the D-line with two older players. They did spend huge draft capital on Dallas Turner. They did let Cam Bynum walk. They did rely on unproven (as a starter) Isaiah Rodgers and unproven Jeff Okudah and unproven Theo Jackson. There were a lot of changes on defense for a team that won 14 games. They have not worked.
Can JJ McCarthy get this thing back on track?
Will McCarthy be back?
“If JJ’s healthy, JJ will play.”
Analysis:
The whole idea of this season was that the Vikings would surround their 2024 10th overall pick with a great supporting cast on both sides of the ball and allow him to just keep the train on the tracks. Now he’s supposed to save the season?
Here’s the reality: Until proven otherwise, this is an evaluation season for JJ McCarthy and everyone else. How good is he? Who’s going to be here?
The playoffs aren’t worth talking about. The division? Not even close to Green Bay or Detroit — and maybe even Chicago.
They have the next few weeks to prove that they belong in the conversation because right now they seem much closer to the conversation for a top-10 draft pick.
I think now we are realizing just how truly brutal this schedule has been so far. I'm not sure an easier schedule would not have changed what has been happening to us but I think it has absolutely been the nail in the coffin.
Maybe sell off some of the high priced vets (Allen, Hargraves) that are not key to the future. etc... Maybe try to pick up Assanti Jr (If healthy) for evaluation purposes.
The defense sucking and the ST managing to get a penalty literally every time Price had a good return was just a never ending river of manure... Just so, so ugly