If our draft recruits were Superheroes, they still wouldn’t sing in public

Good morning Purple Nation, now that the dust is settling on the draft and our new recruits are fixing their contracts, it’s suddenly got a little quiet again. Save for Chester Taylor wailing like a banshee…

Really? At what point did CT think, you know what, I want to get up in front of 50,000 people and sing a song written by a 5 year old?

But I digress, because there is another Viking related video doing the rounds this morning, and it’s of our QB/WR supermegacomboplayer, Joe Webb, jumping the empire state building..

Pretty cool eh? I mean it would be better if there was one of him throwing 200 yards through a crowd of Spartans, and catching it himself to further they myth of his apparent superhuman throwing/catching/running/jumping/climbing trees/putting on makeup ability, but at least we know that if we do throw him the ball, he’ll be able to jump up to catch it, and if he’s being rushed he can play leapfrog with the corners.

I wonder what other visual treats of our new recruits are out there…

Well first up it’s the man with the heart of a lion: Toby Ger(Lion)hart who should really have schooled Chester on singing etiquette, ie. don’t f*cking sing!

Then it’s the turn of our 1st round pick, Chris Cook who I think is going to get on very well with Jared Allen:

Everson Griffen doesn’t like shirts, but enjoys matching his doo-rags with whatever is in the background, and his goal in life is to get a ton of sex:

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What’s next for the Vikings? Controversial QBs and a tougher NFC North

Good morning nation, after a lovely weekend of sunshine and football (the Olympians won 32-6!!!) it’s back to the daily grind, and the realisation that we all now have to endure an uber barren period of Viking nothingness now that the draft is over. True, we will still be making a few signings over the coming weeks as we take a look at some prospects who missed the draft, but otherwise it’s going to be slow going until the real preseason begins.

The first thing I’d like to do today is give a big shout out to all the other Viking blogs out there who covered the draft in more detail than I. It’s great to see so many fans out there sharing their knowledge and opinions, something I particularly appreciate given that draft coverage in the UK is minimal. So check out my blogroll and visit these sites!

Back to the matters of the day and more on the undrafted player we’ve taken an interest in, and one in particular who stands out from the crowd,  QB Ryan Perrilloux. On paper and in criminal record, he screams Vikings Diamond in the Rough, 2,318 yards and 19 touchdowns in his first season playing for Jacksonville State, and alleged positive testings for Mary-Jane, and numerous late and no shows to practices and a rougher-than-Jared-Allen attitude towards bar brawls. A big catch on a player with a lot of potential, but maybe the Vikings have seen something that leads them to believe they can tame him, and mould him into an acceptable person as well as an exceptional player. So watch this space and see how his trial period went.

The second order of the day is the state of the NFC North. One of the biggest talking points from the draft has been how the other teams have improved as a result of their picks. The Lions in particular are apparently starting to look like a good team, hardly surprising considering they’ve been #1 and #2 in the draft for the last 2 years and have used their picks pretty well, getting Matthew Stafford and Ndkakakahhaammaam Suh as their top picks in the past 2 years. They also picked up a good DE meaning our O-Line will need to be extra sharp when we play them, as they usually give us a fiery battle no matter how crap they are against other teams. As Rick Alonzo puts it, these are no longer win in the bag games.

Another D-Line we’re going to have to be strong against is that of the Bores. Julius “Bane of McKinnie” Peppers is likely to rip through our line 6-7 times a game so we need to address this by adding protection to whoever is QB, or we could end up with another poor result, especially when we play them in Chicago. Add to that a certain Chester Taylor who will want to prove a point and the Bores are suddenly looking more menacing, at least until Cutler gets his chubby mits on the pig-skin.

And that nicely moves us onto the arch nemesisessses, the P*ckers. Last year they started slow but finished strong despite us doing the double over them, and despite having one of the worst QB protection schemes in the game. Next year they will have more O-Line protection in OT Bryan Bulaga-Whale, and a big score to settle. I can’t see them making the same mistakes they made this season, and as much as it pains me to say it, Aaron Rodgers is a damn good Quarterback, so they will be our biggest threat.

Of course though, all this doom and gloom doesn’t take into account our strengthening. We are an awesome team and still the best in the division when we are at our best. Favre coming back should be the icing on the cake for the team if it happens, so all the above means is that we will need to up our game if we want that bye or in the least, home field advantage in the Wildcard round.

It’s a meaner division but we’ve still got the biggest teeth. Skol!

No fireworks, but plenty to cheer about

A bit of a short one today because I’m on filming duty and it’s the opening day of the season for the London Olympians as they take on the Bedford Blue Bombers, so COME ON THE O’S!!!!

In more Purple matters we’ve completed the 2010 Draft and whilst it was a somewhat drab affair, with no big headline signing, I think we got just what we needed in order to push for a Super Bowl. True, we passed up on Jimmy Clausen and a couple of other players who could be future stars of the game, but the truth is that, short term at least, we don’t need them.

So we welcome to the Vikings the 2010 Draftees; Chris Cook, CB, Toby Gerhart, RB, Everson Griffen, DE, Chris DeGeare, OT/OG, Nathan Triplett, LB, Joe Webb, QB/WR, Mickey Shuler, TE, Ryan D’Imperio, ILB/FB and some undrafted Free Agents too. For a better run down of each of these guys I recommend taking a look at The Daily Norseman.

Now overall I’m pretty pleased with our picks, like I said, we filled in gaps that needed filling, and there’s a couple of exciting players, I’m particularly interested in the future of Joe Webb who is a QB/WR hybrid who could prove a very versatile player indeed. But despite the fact that he can play QB, the extra string to his bow does suggest he’s a jack of all trades and master of none, which begs the question, why didn’t we address our long term QB situation?

As I said after day one, I thought we’d be sure to grab Clausen, and invest in the future with a QB who could carry the franchise for a great many years. Instead we passed and strengthened the secondary which in the short term would have been equally shaky. I guess the Vikes were somewhere between a rock and a hard place when it came down to the draft. We don’t grab a premier DB and our season could spring the same leaks it did last year, ending in disappointment and a lot of flak for the management for not addressing the secondary; or we do what we did and wonder about the what-ifs of a very promising player who is likely to start for Carolina. It’s a tough call, I guess the team believe they have what it takes to win it all with a few tweaks, rather then compromising with a choice for the future.

All in all, yes I’m a bit disappointed that we passed on Clausen, but at least we’ve addressed the key areas and look stronger going into next season. All we gotta do now is wait for a certain grey haired bloke to turn up.

Minnesota welcomes Cook and Gerhart – Say Goodbye to Rnd3

Okay, so it was another interested morning of stories to wake up to, not quite what I was expecting, but relatively pleasing nonetheless.

With our 34th overall pick taken from the Lions we took Cornerback Chris Cook, a 6’2″, 210lb’er who gives us added security at a position which was not only questionable last year, but was looking very shaky going into 2010 with various injuries, especially the ACL issue with Cedric Griffin. He could also offer cover at safety, and should work well in our defensive set-up. But it wouldn’t be the Vikings unless he had some sort of “past”, and for Cook he missed large parts of his college career, through injury and also suspension for “academic reasons”.  But he showed real quality when he came back after his trouble and put up good numbers in the combine, and the Vikes staff too notice.

And then rather than waiting for our next pick at 62nd overall, the mighty Brick suddenly had a bit of a sinking feeling and felt the need to trade up at 51st to grab Toby Gerhart, a Heisman runner-up-running back. A very exciting prospect who will back up Peterson in 2010 and can also catch and block, a fullback with tailback legs, the heart of a lion, and the gills of Aquaman.

So two things can be taken from this, one that we picked up two players in positions that needed strengthening, and they seem to be good picks. The second is, however that we grabbed two players from the first 3 rounds, which is a little less positive.

The Gab sums up the understandable disappointment at this, but I’d like to add my two cents to it because I’m of the opinion that we actually did pretty well in strengthening rather than pasting over the cracks with more players of lesser quality. I’m a draft rookie so I’m not so well versed in the intricacies of trades for position, I understand wanting to move up and down, but when you are the team giving away trades you have a extra dimension to consider because you have something to lose as well as gain.

In the case of our first three rounds, many fans feel that there is the nagging feeling we didn’t need to lose a 3rd rounder and could have ended up with our draft bag a little fuller. Let’s say that in Round 1 we didn’t give up a pick and grabbed the CB we ended up picking yesterday, okay, so we don’t have some extra picks from the Lions, but we still have our man. Then going into round 2 we have two options, we hold our horses and wait until our original pick, hoping that Gerhart is still around or just pick the “best player available” which was apparently our drafting policy, or we do what we did, and lose a 3rd rounder to trade up for Gerhart anyway, essentially what we did yesterday.

Now, and I hope I’m making sense here, if we didn’t give up a round 3, we probably wouldn’t have gotten Gerhart, so while we would have had 2 players to compliment Cook, maybe, just maybe they wouldn’t have added up to the quality of Gerhart. So was our original decision that bad given what we got? I don’t think it was, we got great players at the key positions. We are not a team in desperate need of big changes, we are Super Bowl contenders who need a little tinkering ad we still have plenty of picks going into today, including an upgraded 4th rounder and an extra in round 7, so I’m hoping that Brick knows what he’s doing, and we end up with the right personnel.

So I’m staying positive, and I also need to stress that there is no point in judging our draft until it is well and truly over. So roll on tonight, and hopefully Brick will show us that there is method to their apparent madness.

And once again, welcome to Chris Cook and Toby Gerhart, may your futures be Purple and prosperous.

Brick Keeps Us Waiting

Good morning Purple Nation. Well I didn’t see that coming I must say, I was hoping to wake up this morning to see us with a shiny new draftee, but there were a confusing few moments when I logged onto NFL.com this morning. First off, I saw that Sam Bradford went to the Rams, okay pretty standard stuff, so then I scrolled down to #30, and saw… the Lions with a new running back… Ummmmay, so did we trade up for 2nd overall, and grab Ndkdkaakahhagmmgmggmnng? No… Detroit got him too, so where the bugger were we in round one? Well it seems that Rick and Brad (Brick if they were a celebrity couple) decided to pounce on this years very deep draft and trade 30th overall for the Lions’ 2nd, 4th and 7th round picks. Score!!!

Unlike Jim Souhan at the Tribune who frets that the choice to allow our divisional rivals the chance at another solid player could result in Detroit being half decent in a year or seven’s time, I for one am excited at us making a very smart move in the draft. And, like Gonzo at the Norseman, I feel like it’s given us an opportunity to take a franchise Quarterback, in Jimmy Clausen at the top of round 2, and still have the picks to strengthen the defence, plus we didn’t really miss out on anyone we were needed from the later picks by the Colts and S*ints, so it seems to be a win/win.

From what I’ve heard Clausen is a real top prospect, and if we do take him, he is a player we can school for a year or two, and then unleash. He was meant to be first round, high-pick material and it is a bit of a mystery why gimps like Tebow were picked above him, but it is the way it is and I think we’d be mad not to take this opportunity. A good QB will last a long time, can take the team places, and we need someone like that. Favre or no Favre, T-Jack/Sage are not franchise material and I can’t see us getting another opportunity next year to take such a promising player. Plus if we take him now, he’d have the opportunity (probably) to learn from one of the greatest of all time. There have been questions over Clausen’s temperament but surely a couple of seasons under the wing of some quality players will ground the guy and ready him for the big time.

And if we did take him, the extra picks we have would let us still make quality signings to strengthen the team. We are not as desperate for a CB either, so in my opinion it makes sense.

But if yesterday taught us one thing, it’s to expect the unexpected, and this could well be a move from the Brick to make wholesale changes to key areas of the team. Regardless, if you’re a Vikings, suddenly round 2-7 are going to be a lot more interesting.

And to add some spice to the mix, and possibly influence our decision, we have the return of FAVRE WATCH!!!

NFL Network’s Steve Mariucci claims that he had a phone conversation with Brett Favre a couple of days ago, and the Silver Fox claims that he is still unsure about 2010, mainly because his poor little ankle still hasn’t recovered from the battering it took back in January. So expect the man’s agent to release more pics, we all remember the old ones of course…*cue miniature violins*

So what will this all mean? Well I won’t know till tomorrow morning, but it should be tasty whatever happens.

Play it safe, and mind the beard!

Good morning to you all Purple People of the world! As the jet lag kicks in full-time to add misery to my Korean revision for an exam this weekend, I’m having trouble stringing sentences together in English let alone Hangul, but on I must plough despite the fact that the field that is Vikings news is as barren as Brad Childress’ cheeks.

As expected there is still plenty to discuss around the Draft, with the Vikings’ Official Blog running with one of the most talked about position from fans, that of Safety. Many of the Purple faithful rightfully feel that despite our heavy investment in this area of the team, it is still not quite up to the standard it should be. Last year we were very vulnerable to 20+ yard plays (8th worst in the league), and despite earning some praise from the coaches, safeties Madieu Williams and Tyrell Johnson are not in the eyes of many the right people for the job. Having witnessed throughout last season, our leaky secondary, I must agree that someone is needed who can really challenge the starters, but I’m also really hoping that the players we already have can do this, particularly Jamarca Sanford as there are other areas of the secondary which need more attention than Safety. Another opinion on this position comes from Strib, and my favourite troll, Judd Zulgad who says the current starting pair need to simply be more aggressive in their approach.

This is a point of view shared by Bleacher Report’s Michael Vichael who feels that CB is probably one of the most important areas that we need to improve along with Centre/Guard. His argument is that the Hutchmeister isn’t getting any younger and has shown a couple of weaknesses of late, and John Sullivan, whilst gallant in his efforts is is desperate need of competition in order to keep him on top his game. Add to that, the problems at Tackle, and he is very right to suggest we need someone else in there. In keeping with most of the mock drafts, CB is still the top pick as that is probably where we are going to get the best quality at 30th overall, but I’m with Vichael in his view that C or G need improving at some point in the Draft.

The recently renovated Viking Age blog takes a look at some recent comments by Brad Childress about both Brian Westbrook and Donovan McNabb and reading between the lines, it seems clear that we are thankfully not interested in either player, despite whatever guff may be vomiting out of the media machines. The most interesting point for me is whether we’d call D-Mac if Favre announced his retirement today… and to celebrate this I’m going to run a cheeky little poll to see what you lot would want us to do so check my sidebar if I can figure out how to embed a poll in there.

And that’s about it for today. I’m off to drink copious amounts of tea and enjoy the remainder of my walking dead state of exhaustion.

Fighting the Jet lag – Thursday Roundup; New OT, Plan B and More Mockies

Despite sleeping a good 4-5 hours on the flight home and having a very pleasant 10 hours kip last night, the wonder of jet lag is preventing me from focussing on my screen properly. The Monster M-80 I’m nursing doesn’t seem to be helping either, so I’m fully expecting to fall asleep on my keyboard at some point today, which is why I’m going to try and bash out a quick post while I’m still conscious.

I suppose that most of the chatter for us Vikings at the moment is the new overtime rules which were voted in at the NFL Owners meeting. I’ll let the Daily Norseman explain it because when I try to process it in my head I feel like Karl Pilkington. It’s much fairer in my opinion, both teams should get a chance unless a TD is scored in the first possession, I’m not sure that it’s perfect, but it’s better. Of course though, it is a year too latel; just imagine if we’d got the ball back after Hartley’s field goal, and then a peg-legged Favre threw for the game winning interception again… yeah I know the overtime change is long overdue but what’s the point harping on about this, we all know that somehow, someway the Vikings would have found another way to break our hearts, but that’s why we love them!

Now that I can’t focus on the keyboard, I’ll move on to why in bloody hell we voted against the change to the OT rule. To be honest I don’t know, Zygi was happy with the way the rule was, despite the fact that it contributed to our downfall last year. I must say that stubbornness like this pisses me off especially when it comes to being reluctant to change archaic rules which are favour chance rather than competition. Still he was one of only 4 who were against it so it passed. Chilly’s also grumpy because he was on the golf course, silly bearded git!

Moving on though, because any more of that is likely to induce narcolepsy in anyone, let alone someone who should really be in bed, in California, rather than gloomy London, and we got a compensatory draft pick. Okay, that didn’t help my cause…. Okay let’s try another opinion on Tim Tebow….  *starting to nod off*… How about Judd Zulgad pulling a Wayne’s World by broadcasting from his basement hideout in Florida to talk about the owners meeting and an “update” on Favre (oh sweet mercy 5 pound 3 ounce baby Jesus give me strength) …

Something that i found more interesting is the proposal that the tail-end games of the season include more divisional matchups. I for one am happy with this idea, don’t get me wrong, I love spanking the Giants every year to finish off the season, but it’s getting a bit old and this would certainly make the end of the season more exciting. Just imagine going into Week 17 needing to beat the P*ckers at Lambeau to get into the playoffs on the final day of the season, and the looks on their faces when we do!

Okay, now I’m really tempting fate with my state of consciousness, but there’s another Mock Draft on Bleacher report, but at least it’s in the form of a slide show… and there’s someone called Scott Sicko!

There’s no FAVRE WATCH today, I’m sure you can understand why. I’m going to pass out now. Have a good one, hopefully I’ll be more alive tomorrow.

Welcome to The Fransition Zone – Vikes tried to sign Dorsey, much ado about Chester and more mock drafts

Blimey, it’s a chilly one in London this morning, and I had the pleasure of sitting across from someone on the train who obviously didn’t realise that they could turn off the ‘tock-tock’ keypad sound from their phone! Consequently I feel like I’ve shared my commute with Woody Woodpecker.

There doesn’t seem to be much in the shape of headlines this morning, the main thing is that it’s the beginning of the period when teams can apply franchise or transition tags to free agent players. I don’t know if this period really has an official title which is why from now on, it will be referred to as The Fransition Zone.

Our main concern in The Fransition Zone should be securing the services of DE Ray Edwards who pwnd Tony Romo last month, and is a Restricted Free Agent. However it is unlikely that we will tag Chester Taylor in any way as he is an Unrestricted Free Agent and is probably going to check out his worth through other team’s offers for his services. Keeping Chester should be another priority for us, but could prove tricky, which is probably why we tried to sign Dede Dorsey . His numbers don’t tell the tale of just how valuable he is, but he can make more money at another team, and be a starting RB, so where his future lies is more up to him than to us, but I do hope he stays (for one I’ll have to replace my home jersey which bears his name). There is a more complete roundup of our Unrestricted Free Agents on The Daily Norseman if you want a more complete overview.

Another player who will be hitting Free Agency is Tavaris “T-Jack” Jackson. Jacko’s performances in Purple haven’t set the Vikings’ world alight thus far in his career, and he didn’t really have the chance last season thanks to Favre. It’s hardly surprising then, that he doesn’t really know where he’s going to be in 7 months time, but thanks to free agency looming, he doesn’t really need to worry about it. Personally I think we need to lose either Tavaris or Sage to make way for a rookie in the draft, so if a bid comes in for Jackson, we should probably let him go. If we don’t however, it won’t be the end of the world. Hopefully he’s learnt a lot from spending a season with Favre, and with little pressure on him at the moment, it could put him in a good frame of mind if/when he is called on to step up and play.

One person T-Jack could draw inspiration from is the Vikings’ new Hall of Famer, John Randle. There’s a great article from Sid Hartman on the Star Tribune today charting Randle’s rocky road to becoming a starter for the Vikes, and how he never stopped trying to make it in the NFL. I particularly love the bit about how we used to practice with a #4 dummy, thanks to our animosity towards our “current” quarterback.

There’s more mock draft goodness out there on the interweb, this time from our friends at Bleacher Report. In their opinion a new centre/guard is at the top of our list, with Colt McCoy (most American name ever?) being picked up in round 2 at Quarterback. It’s hard to get too excited about any of this though, at least until after the Combine when the team should start to make a few signals about who they might be interested in, but it’s still fun to look at who we might, but probably won’t pick.

Okay, that wraps up a quiet day in The Fransition Zone, but expect things to pick up a bit in the coming days. And now, it’s time for FAVRE WATCH, which today is brought to you by Molton Boron.

Recently The Viking Ship invited readers to write their own articles for the site, and today features Yvonne, who explains how she became a born again Favre Fan. It’s a fun read, charting how her hatred for a Green #4 eventually transformed into love for our Purple Silver Fox. And she’s right when she says “Brett made it fun to watch football again.”

And that’s it for the Watch today, but thanks again to Molton Boron for making today’s lack of news on the Old Man possible.