Sometimes an NFL team's record tells a lie in regards to how that team actually played. With so few games (even with one more now at 17 in a season), legitimate bad luck can make a good team seem mediocre, just as good luck can obscure the warts of a playoff team.
Despite similar roster, here's how Vikings can go from mediocre to the playoffs
The Vikings were exceedingly average last season and are projected to be the same this year. Whether they can rise above mediocrity largely will depend on small changes in efficiency.
May 27, 2022 at 9:58PM
The Vikings in 2021, however, were not one of those teams. They were, in pretty much every way, exactly what their record said they were: an 8-9 team good enough to hang around and win some games but not good enough to overcome their own mistakes.
Football Outsiders produces a DVOA number (Defense-adjusted Value Over Average) for every team. The Vikings in 2021 were No. 16 in the NFL. Their offensive DVOA was No. 16. So was their defensive DVOA. And their variance was No. 1 in the league, meaning they were consistent in their mediocrity from week-to-week.
Based on those metrics, they were expected to win 8.5 games.
After an offseason that brought dramatic changes in leadership but marginal changes in on-field personnel, the Vikings are projected to win between 8 and 9 games again.
It's clear that if they are going to improve enough to be a playoff team in 2022 under new coach Kevin O'Connell, it's going to be with changes in how they do things and not with whom they do them.
So I took a look at three areas the Vikings might be able to work the margins in order to improve — along with one big cause for concern.
- Second and long: Vikings fans have been screaming about the team's tendency to run the ball in this situation, and that should change under O'Connell.
Last season, the Vikings ran the ball on 2nd-and-8 or longer 37% of the time and threw 63% of the time per Sharp Football. The league average was 31% run and 69% pass in that situation; in Los Angeles, with O'Connell overseeing the Rams offense, they ran just 26% of the time.
Moreover, the Rams had a success rate of 51% on those pass plays, gaining an average of 7.7 yards per attempt. The Vikings succeeded on just 34% of their passes and just 25% of their runs on second-and-long, putting Kirk Cousins in bad third down situations where his tendency to struggle under pressure could be exploited.
If the Vikings are more aggressive and efficient on second-and-long this year, it will take pressure off Cousins and keep the offense on the field.
- Crunch time pass defense: In the fourth quarter of one-score games last season, the Vikings allowed opposing QBs to rack up a 109.1 passer rating with six TD passes and just one interception. That rating was No. 24 in the league and was part of the reason the Vikings blew some late leads.
Some of this is personnel and not philosophy, but the Rams were the NFL's best in that metric last season allowing just a 51.4 passer rating in the fourth quarter of close games. If O'Connell can import some of what made the Rams so successful in those situations — aside, you know, from having Aaron Donald and Jalen Ramsey — it could affect outcomes.
- Motion to create matchups: Per ESPN, the Vikings were a middle-of-the-pack team last year when it came to sending players in motion. But the Rams used motion a lot more, particularly during the snap, and that plays right into O'Connell's philosophy of creating favorable matchups and easy decisions for Cousins.
If the Vikings can help Cousins and get Justin Jefferson easy catches, the offense should thrive.
- Cause for concern: Turnovers. The Vikings were plus-11 in turnover differential last season, which is usually a marker for success and can be a statistic with high variance from year to year.
The fact that Minnesota went just 8-9 even with the league's fifth-best differential last season could mean that if that smooths out this year it could negate other improvements on the margins and leave the Vikings stuck in the middle once again.
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