The Lions haven't played yet, but I don't care. This is the first Monday morning in ages where I can say the Vikings are alone atop their division.
They did as expected yesterday. They took a team hobbled by the loss of a starting quarterback and destroyed his two backups. And they added some big plays of their own on both defense and offense.
Let's not get too excited though. Peterson was carrying the ball way too much for way too little results. The passing game, though efficient, was short passes all afternoon. Coach Zimmer was aware of the Ram's heavy quarterback rush reputation and went with the conservative offense approach.
If anything THIS Vikings offense looked a lot like Childress's and Frazier's. They didn't have a lot of long sustained drives but instead relied on the big plays of individuals to win. That's not a sustainable formula for success in the NFL. We had those types of plays the last couple of seasons as well and look where it got us in the long run.
The Rams weren't a test for our new system. I'll take the huge win either way, but I think New England will give us more of an idea how good our offense and defense really is this season. And since New England lost to Miami yesterday, they'll be all the more hungry to prove it to us.
And we still don't know how well this team will play outdoors at The Bank. Next week, we'll have a better idea of who the Vikings are this year.
Let's hope Patterson continues to look like the new Harvin as well...
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