Fish Fear Me

Forget It, Adrian. It's Baltimore

Adrian Peterson will probably earn a fine from the NFL for spouting off like this after yesterday's game in Baltimore:

Peterson didn’t like much of what he saw and he took to Twitter to share his feelings after the game. Both the officials and the fans in Baltimore came up for criticism from the Vikings running back for their actions during the game.

“Wow talking about bad officiating & the worst fan base I’ve ever experience! They threw snow balls the entire 4q like lil kids. Smh,” Peterson wrote. 

Peterson expanded on those thoughts after the game. He ripped the decision to uphold a fumble by running back Toby Gerhart in the first half although it looked like Gerhart’s knee was down before the ball came out as well as a late pass interference call on linebacker Chad Greenway.

“It’s frustrating for us,” Peterson said, via KFAN. “We come in and we fight so hard, to have to beat a team and the officials, it doesn’t make any sense. … And then to top it off you have the fans who are acting like kids and just throwing snowballs the end of the third quarter and the entire fourth quarter. It’s like, it was ridiculous. It doesn’t make sense.”

The officiating was indeed terrible yesterday, but that's not really a surprise considering the referee was Pete Morelli, perhaps the dumbest member of the entire NFL officiating stable. Given the rest of his crew and whatever idiots were in the replay booth, it appears he attracts other bumblers the way a horse attracts flies.  

There's no sense getting bent out of shape about it though, since it won't do any good anyway. And maybe they did the Vikings a favor. Now they can get to the task at hand, which is losing their remaining three games so they can secure the #1 pick in the 2014 draft. Maybe Teddy Bridgewater?

As far as Baltimore fans go, well, be kind. They're in Baltimore for god's sake, which competes regularly with Paterson, NJ for the title of suckiest city on the East Coast. I'd rather go on an adventure as an urban pioneer in Detroit than move to Baltimore. 

Best just to forget about it and heal that foot, Adrian. 

The Josh Freeman Era Begins

While I wait for the kickoff of tonight's game and the debut of Josh Freeman as the leader of the Vikings offense, my best wishes to Green Bay tight end Jermichael Finley, who suffered a serious neck injury in yesterday's game against Cleveland. It sounds like he will be able to recover, but more tests and time are needed to say for sure. Good luck, Jermichael.

Huh. It looks like ESPN will go ahead and broadcast the 1-4 Vikings against the 0-6 Giants. I had put it at 50-50 that they would instead show reruns of Gilligan's Island.

The Giants are beating the Vikings defense on the line and in the secondary.  After 9:36 and 16 plays the Giants had to settle for a field goal, but if the Vikes D can't get off the field better than that it will be a long night.

Josh Freeman has taken the field. For those in neighboring states of Minnesota, that strange glow is from the lighting of hundreds of thousands of votive candles.

Nice pass for a first down under pressure.

The offensive line didn't do Freeman or AP any favors that series. Punt.

Good series from the Vikes D.

Great punt return from Marcus Sherels. Guess who thought about picking up the Vikings DST again after I had dropped them for the Ravens because of the bye week a couple of weeks ago? Shoot.

The Vikes defense hasn't been that good, but Sherels on punts and Cordarelle Patterson on kickoffs are dangerous. 

Freeman's back on for his second series.

That was over fast again. A somewhat half-assed reverse by Cordarelle Patterson, an overthrow to a WR incomplete, and a pass to the tight end that was short of the first down. 

Another three and out, including another overthrown pass and another AP run stuffed at the line.

Hahahaha...look for a clip tomorrow of Jared Allen's sack of Eli Manning in the first half. For a second there I thought Allen was giving Eli a wedgie. 

First half impressions of Freeman: He's game speed rusty and it shows with the overthrows. He doesn't panic under pressure in the pocket. He's making good reads, even if the throws aren't always that clean. One exception was a pass that put Jerome Simpson in position to have his head taken off. 

Poor series to start the second half. Freeman was lucky that he wasn't intercepted on the third down incompletion. I'm starting to wonder if Freeman has only learned 6 plays so far.

Terrible 2nd and 3 throw by Freeman that ends in an interception. Bad, that was just bad.

I'll pay $1,000 to any person who can shut up Jon Gruden for the rest of the game. 

Jerome Simpson just dropped a TD ball. I don't care who is tossing the rock, the Viking receivers definitely have to step up.

Well, nothing good out of this game. Would have been better if we had gone with the Gilligan's Island reruns. I'll recall what I said last week:

"There will be a lot pressure now to start Josh Freeman next week against the NY Giants and I think that would be a mistake. There are too many other things wrong with this team and throwing Freeman in there before a few of them are fixed will just poison the well for him too. I would give Cassel another chance while continuing to bring Freeman up to speed. Then I would hand the offense over to Freeman week 8 at home against Green Bay."

Now what does head coach Leslie Frazier do? I think he has to stick with Freeman for now and keep working on the other issues. And the rest of us might as well write off the rest of the season now. Frazier can still salvage his job if the team at least makes incremental improvements each week, but this game was just a disaster.

On A Lighter Note

It was a big win for my fantasy football team this past weekend. I took on my previously unbeaten division rival and won by a score of 72-52. That leaves us tied at 5-1, but now I have the head-to-head advantage plus 20 points in the first second tiebreaker if it comes to that. 

I benched Matthew Stafford because I didn't like his matchup and I lost 6 pts with that mistake. Cecil Shorts turned out to be a bust for the week because he got hurt in the first quarter of his game, but looking at his teammate Justin Blackmon's 190 yards you know he would have lit up Denver too.

Other than that, I got good scoring from all the big hitters. Seeing Vincent Jackson finally break out was particularly gratifying since I picked him to start over Anquan Boldin and Jordan Cameron. I think he's going to get a lot more action with Mike Glennon as QB in Tampa Bay. 

Speaking of Boldin, I haven't given up on him. He can still be a decent matchup play, and if Mario Manningham comes back in the next week or two he could catch fire. Right now he's getting an awful lot of double coverage because the rest of the receiving corps in San Francisco is so weak, Vernon Davis excepted. That won't be so easy for opposing defenses when Manningham gets back.

In the real football world, the Vikings got creamed at home 35-10 by Carolina on Sunday. They were once again outplayed and outcoached. Matt Cassel threw two horrible interceptions, but it really was a dismal team effort on both sides of the line. There will be a lot pressure now to start Josh Freeman next week against the NY Giants and I think that would be a mistake. There are too many other things wrong with this team and throwing Freeman in there before a few of them are fixed will just poison the well for him too. I would give Cassel another chance while continuing to bring Freeman up to speed. Then I would hand the offense over to Freeman week 8 at home against Green Bay. 

On the death of Adrian Peterson's son: I don't think we know the whole story, so caution is in order when it comes to what Peterson did or didn't do regarding his son. That said, I didn't care for his demeanor in front of the media on Friday before his son died. I don't like that he heard that boy was his son three months ago and yet he hadn't met him until the child was on life support last Thursday. I don't like that he's had three kids with three different women. I guess that's all I have to say at the moment. 

W00T

A solid 50-28 win this past weekend leaves me 3-0 in FFL, my best start in some time. Unfortunately, another team in my division looks likely to go to 3-0 also, so I have to share the division lead. We're the last two undefeated at this point and will meet up in three weeks.

It was another solid week for my RBs. Jamaal Charles got me 12 points last Thursday and Joique Bell, in place of Reggie Bush yesterday, got me 10 more. A respectable 9 points from Stafford and an excellent 14 point performance from Justin Tucker took care of the bulk of the scoring.

I'm unhappy that Anquan Boldin, Vincent Jackson, and Brandon Marshall combined for only 5 points. Jackson left the game early with a rib injury and we'll have to see how serious that is. It looks like Marshall had a down game simply because Chicago jumped to an early lead and didn't do a lot of passing. Anquan Boldin worries me the most right now, as I watched most of the 49ers game and his quarterback, Kaepernick, looked awful. What made it even worse was it looked like they had established the running game with Frank Gore, so it should have been even easier for Kaepernick to both run and open up the passing game. Clearly teams have adjusted to his style and he and his coaches are going to have to do some adjusting of their own. 

Sitting on the bench is Cecil Shorts for Jacksonville, who didn't get in the end zone yesterday but had a very respectable 143 yards against a tough Seahawks defense. Then there's Tavon Austin, who I picked up after I dropped Sidney Rice yesterday. Naturally, Rice had a huge game with two TDs yesterday. I'll have to see who makes it through the waiver wire Wednesday night.

In the real world, the Vikes went to 0-3 after losing at home to, gulp, the Cleveland Browns. They simply got outplayed and outcoached. The offensive line that cleared the way for Adrian Peterson last year and did a decent job of protecting Christian Ponder is in complete disarray. Ponder was sacked six times yesterday and Peterson had to work awfully hard to get to 88 yards. Ponder looked decisive on short passes and had some zip on the ball, but he was terrible passing downfield.

Unlike my FFL team, it may be time to write this season off.

NFL History

Watching history this afternoon. Adrian Peterson has become the seventh NFL running back to rush for 2,000 yards in a season(right now he's #4 on the list). He has just busted out another long gain in this game against the Packers and now he is just 61 yards away from taking the all-time season rushing record from Eric Dickerson.

Wow. 

Updates:

He just passed Barry Sanders to become #3 all-time at 2,057.

To be clear, I really don't care all that much if the Vikes get into the playoffs. They are a pretty good team and AP is amazing, of course, but I have little confidence that Christian Ponder will step up enough to get them past the first round. I want AP to get the record.

The way the Vikings have played the last part of the fourth quarter, I now don't think he is going to get it.

AP has now passed Jamal Lewis for #2. I cannot believe how stupidly the Vikes have managed this game with history on the line. 

They let the clock run down. Assholes. I know, the game isn't about personal records, but this is an exception. Leslie Frazier is a douchebag. 

Nine yards shy. Leslie Frazier is a fucking asshole.

My final words on this: I will never respect Leslie Frazier because of the way this game was called when Adrian Peterson was so close to making history. Never. 

Vikings-Titans

A 30-7 win makes a whole bunch of complaints go away, but I have a couple of things to note about the Vikings-Titans game yesterday.

The CBS coverage of the game was awful. Poor camera work, poor commentary, and absolutely horrible replays, or lack thereof. I lost count of how many times they gave us a glimpse of a definitive replay angle and then repeatedly showed us angles that were inconclusive. Maybe, maybe they would get back to the definitive angle again. Maybe not. That was if they showed us a replay at all. I also lost count of how many times I wanted to see a replay of an important play or penalty and instead got a bunch of witless banter and banal views of the crowd or sidelines. The Vikes are usually on Fox, so I'm wondering if that was just one of their "B" crews or if CBS NFL coverage is always that bad.

Speaking of "B" crews, I was not exactly impressed with referee Jeff Triplette and his crew yesterday either, particularly back judge Steven Freeman. A moment where Freeman displayed unprofessional conduct ended with Vikings safety Harrison Smith being ejected for "excessive contact" against Freeman in the second quarter and that could have had a game-changing impact. The NFL has a crappy video clip of CBS' crappy coverage that sort of shows what happened.

After one play where the Vikings picked off Tennessee QB Matt Hasselbeck, some Vikings and Titans players were jawing with each other on the field. Smith came to teammate Chris Cook's aid after he was shoved a little and the jawing continued. Enter Freeman who decided to keep the words from escalating by pushing Smith away from his opponents. I don't have a problem with some intervention, but it looks like Freeman shoved Smith about 5 yards down field and that was totally unnecessary. The players were separated after just a couple of yards and Freeman had no valid reason for continuing to shove Smith. Well, I guess Smith pushed off from Freeman at that point and that was that.

Not that I justify pushing an official. You put your hand on an official and you are immediately at their mercy. Smith should have turned his back and walked away, no doubt. On the other hand, it's not clear from that crappy video that Smith's offense warranted ejection by Triplette. Perhaps it did, but it's interesting that the NFL decided today to not only pass on suspending Smith, they aren't even going to fine him.

Hmmm...sounds to me like everybody just wants this one to go away. Smith has properly groveled and I'll bet Steven Freeman has been counselled behind the scenes to not get so aggressive with the players. 

All's well that ends well, I guess.

Victory!

My FFL opponent's last chance to beat me earned him a big fat zero last night and the Dallas Cowboys were utterly humiliated by the Bears. Monday Night Football doesn't get much better than that.

Unless there are pictures of Jerry Jones crying. Are there pictures of Jerry Jones crying?

The Bears win leaves them tied with the Vikings for the lead in the NFC North. Green Bay is one game back and Detroit is the surprising laggard at 1-3. The latter was supposed to be occupied by the Vikings at this point.

The good start is welcome to Vikings fans, of course, but I think ESPN's Kevin Seifert expresses the right amount of skepticism here:

The Vikings are the darlings of the NFL after a wholly unexpected 3-1 start, including two victories against 2011 playoff teams. But with that success brings added scrutiny, and it's fair to question whether the Vikings can sustain on the low-octane offensive model displayed at various points during this start. Let's be clear on how rare it is to win a game without an offensive touchdown, as the Vikings did Sunday.

Last year the team was a mess from top to bottom, for all sorts of reasons. This year's team is a vast improvement over that one and shows solid improvement in just about every area. That doesn't make them great though, and I suspect some tough losses are ahead if the offense doesn't step it up a notch.

Still, an impressive win against the 49ers and going into Detroit and coming away with the victory are nothing to sneeze at. If nothing else, they aren't the patsies that pretty much everybody figured them to be. That's a big improvement over last year by itself.

NFL/FFL Start

Not a bad start to the 2012 NFL season. I wish I could say the same for the start of the 2012 FFL season. I still have AJ Green going tonight for the Bengals, but it's not realistic to expect him to single-handedly overcome the lead my opponent built over my other starters yesterday. So it goes.

Any disappointment over FFL though, has been mostly relieved by seeing Adrian Peterson make a fantastic return after major knee reconstruction and rehabilitation. Two touchdowns and 84 yards rushing and he might not have been back to 100% yet, but he really looked good. 

On top of that, the Vikes pulled out a great win over Jacksonville yesterday at the Metrodome.

The defense couldn't hold the Jaguars at the end of regulation and they took a three point lead with only 20 seconds left. Like most Vikings fans I bet, the gaping maw of another dismal season had opened before my eyes. Christian Ponder would come out and flounder for a couple of plays and the first loss would be in the books.

Or not.

After a decent return to the 31, Ponder came out and threw two quick passes to get the Vikings to the point where a 55-yard field goal would put the game into overtime. In a way it was just uplifting to see Ponder prove me wrong. Expecting rookie kicker Blair Walsh to make such a long kick under that kind of pressure though, that would be ridiculous.

Or not.

Walsh made that one and another in overtime and the Vikes walked off with the victory this time. They need to repeat that kind of resolve a few more times before anyone gains confidence in them, but you have to start somewhere.

Good on Christian Ponder for hanging in there, Blair Walsh for cool under pressure, and Adrian Peterson for all of the hard work in coming back and the courage to put it all to the test yesterday.

As The Vikings Stadium Turns

It's 11:00 PM here as the Minnesota Legislature works to reconcile the House stadium bill passed on Monday with the Senate stadium bill passed yesterday. It appears that a lot of the action has been done piecemeal throughout the day to avoid a quorum of the conference committee and allow legislators to work things out privately. I can't say I'm a big fan of that.

It appears that the final bill will be voted on quickly after it is crafted, so the public will probably have no time to weigh in on it until after the fact. I can't say I'm a big fan of that either.

Here are some of the changes that the St. Paul Pioneer Press thinks will be in the final bill:

-- The Vikings share will rise to $477 million, the state's will drop to $348 million.

-- Team retains naming rights to new stadium.

-- St. Paul will get $2.7 million, city has suggested it could be used to pay for new St. Paul Saints stadium in Lowertown.

-- Minneapolis will be allowed to use some of its tax money used as part of the deal to upgrade the Target Center.

-- Construction cost overruns to be picked up by the builder.

I won't be waiting up tonight.

Did Not Pass Go

The Vikes lost their first game of the season yesterday to the San Diego Chargers by a score of 24-17. The Vikings actually led at halfrtime 17-7, but then had an absolutely dreadful second half on offense. Adrian Peterson and the rest of the running game did their job, but Donovan McNabb passed for an appalling 7/15 for only 39 yards. You aren't going to win many games against playoff caliber teams with that kind of passing. 

It's pretty much as simple as that.