Fans of Vikings opponents — the Lions and Bears — are steeped in anger over lousy performances

Remember how angry Vikings fans were after that 1-5 start?

The anger index in the NFC North has shifted dramatically in the last couple of weeks.

After the Vikings upset Green Bay, we shared the distress on Green Bay fans despite their team's first- place standing. And it has presumably cooled somewhat after Thursday night's victory over San Francisco.

In Detroit and Chicago, the frustration and losses are piling up. Here's some of what was written after the Vikings dominated Detroit on Sunday and after the Bears, who play the Vikings next Monday night, lost their third straight game at Tennessee.

Guess who isn't popular in Detroit? It's head coach Matt Patricia, the former Bill Belichick assistant in his third year of running the Lions. More than a few people are thinking he should be run out of town.

On the Detroit Jock City blog, writer Bob Heyrman wants Patricia gone now:

"It's time for Detroit Lions general manager Bob Quinn to fire head coach Matt Patricia. Forget this 'attached at the hip' stuff. I don't care how close the two are; business is business. It's time Quinn puts his friendship aside and do what is best for the organization. Isn't that what a general manager is supposed to do? Patricia should have been flying economy back to Detroit and locked off of the team's charter plane. It's not working in Detroit. In fact, nothing has worked in Detroit since Patricia arrived. Patricia inherited a 9-7 football team and molded that unit with help from his good pal Quinn into a consistent three-win club."

"If it wasn't clear before, it's crystal clear now: Matt Patricia should have just kept that engineering job. There may be such a thing as a defensive genius, but that dude doesn't work in Detroit. This regime has systematically broken the Lions apart and brought them back to the dark ages. Seriously, this team is like 2006 levels of bad at this point. Once Quinn leaves his parting gift of not getting Golladay a new contract, they'll be knocking on the 2009 door again. The drafting has been bad, the trading has been bad, the allowing of great players to leave has been bad, and most of all, the on-field product has been bad. There is absolutely nothing redeeming about the last three years."

Also on the Pride of Detroit, the question has been raised about when (not if) Patricia should be fired. You can check out a thread that was started Monday morning:

"The firing of Matt Patricia is not a question of if, but when. It would be irresponsible of the organization to think otherwise when the product that has been delivered has been as pitiful as we have seen. Sunday's loss to the Minnesota Vikings was among the lowest of lows for the Detroit Lions under Patricia."

In his 10 observations about the Lions on the SideLion blog, Payne Schanski made this observation about Adrian Peterson:

"Watching Adrian Peterson's facial expressions on the sideline was interesting and revealing. As Dalvin Cook ran wild for his former team in the second half, it was like the Hall of Famer had that changing of the guard moment, that final undeniable snapshot coming into focus and showing that his time is up. Peterson ran the ball about as well as he has for at least a month, and still ended up with under 30 yards rushing and less than four yards a carry."

The Bears Goggles On blog laid out four changes the team needs to consider if it finishes the season with a .500 record or worse. Joseph Herff set up his critique this way:

"After starting the season 5-1, the Chicago Bears have now lost three straight to fall to 5-4. The last few games though have been arguably one of the most embarrassing offensive stretches in recent years. The Bears are averaging less than 17 points per game during this stretch against three defenses that are all below average. Fingers can be pointed at almost everybody from the offensive line, to Nick Foles, to the weapons Foles has to work with, or to Matt Nagy. Regardless, the offense is a major dumpster fire that needs to be retooled from top to bottom after this season."

Remember when the Bears thought they improved by benching Mitchell Trubisky in favor of Nick Foles? In laying out the case for switching back, Ryan Fedrau writes this on the Bears wire blog:

"The Bears need to turn back to Mitchell Trubisky as soon as possible. Right now, Trubisky is out with a right shoulder injury, but he is week-to-week. If he can be ready for next week's game against the Vikings, there's no excuse not to start him over Foles."

And, finally, Jeff Hughes on Da Bears blog has simply had enough. If you looked for his critique of the loss to the Titans, what you got started this way:

His ending? Here it is, minus one word we're not going to print for reasons of taste.