Minnesota Vikings at St. Louis Rams
Vikings 38
Rams 10
For years, Vikings fans have dealt with witnessing their favorite football squad play down to the level of competition. When the Vikings appear to have a solid team that can step it up and win big, emotional games (such as the Monday nighter against the Pack), they normally follow it up with a dud to a team that's not even in the same stratosphere. Thankfully, that trend appears to have stopped as the Vikings took control early in St. Louis going up 14-0 before the first half of the first quarter was even over. The Vikings won their 400th game as a franchise, have not given up a rushing TD this year or a 100 yard rusher in 28 straight games now.
Lordy Lordy, you sure he's 40?
Brett Favre is officially an old man as he celebrated his 40th birthday on Saturday. This is the first time in his illustrious career that he's been 5-0 and he claims that this is by far the best all around team he's played on. He's taking care of himself and appears to be 100% dedicated to ending his career like John Elway, riding off into the sunset. As long as the offensive line continues to protect him as they've done the last couple of games, he should get through this season just fine. It's always a good sign to see Tarvaris Jackson come in the 4th quarter and take care of the clean up time. After five games, Favre has a passer rating of 104.1, only behind the Manning brothers and Drew Brees - and is third in completion percentage (69.1).
Good win, still room for improvement
The Vikings are 5-0 and starting to reach near the top of most Power Rankings. 5-0 is great, but there's only been one truly decent team (Packers) and another questionable one (49ers) during this stretch. In the end, the Vikings put the hammer down and took care of bad teams (Brown, Lions, Rams) like they should, but even then we've seen far to many yards amassed on this defense. After seeing the Falcons dismantle the 49ers yesterday, one has to wonder about the Vikings secondary and how they allowed Shaun Hill to look like Steve Young. This is something that will either be exposed or shored up in the next three weeks, that's for sure. Thanks to fumbles at key times and an opportunistic defense, the Vikings were able to make this game appear as a no contest affair. Truth be told though, the Rams marched up and down the field several times.
Silence of the Rams
What in the world happened to this team? How did this team become so bad, so fast? It's got to be tough going out there each week, finding another way to stall a drive, cause a penalty, or be completely unprepared and un-matched. I feel for guys like Steve Jackson, it's one heck of a tough gig right now.
What's on Tap
Time to see what this team is really made of. The easy part of the schedule is over and the Vikings find themselves at 5-0, in control of the NFC North and a front-runner in the Conference. This three game stretch followed by the bye is what I've been waiting for. It starts with a pissed off Ravens team coming to the Dome - err sorry, Mall of America Field - and does not get any easier from there (at Pittsburgh, at Green Bay). Favre must get protection and the real Adrian Peterson (the one that went for 180 yards in Cleveland) needs to lace them up and bust out some big runs again. That should come in due time now that Favre has established himself on this team and proven that he can, and will beat you with his arm still. Vikings need to come out of this stretch going 2-1 at least, if they want to be viewed as a serious Super Bowl contender.
Till next Sunday,
SKOL Vikings!
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