Things Are HEATING UP For The Minnesota Vikings…

Things Are HEATING UP For The Minnesota Vikings…

[Music] Happy Tuesday to all you Vikings fans and welcome in the Vikings now by chat sports. My name is Patrick Seman and coming up on today’s show, we got a fun one for you guys. We’re going to start off by going over the five Vikings players and coaches who I believe are under the most pressure for the remainder of this season. And then I do want to talk about a hypothetical for this Vikings team because obviously it doesn’t look good now. You know, times are tough to being a Vikings fan, but maybe they could turn it around and be like our division rival, the 2023 Packers. I’ll explain that on the second half of today’s show. But let me ask you guys this. Who is under the most pressure for the rest of this season? You guys got to let me know your thoughts down below in the comments section. Is it the quarterback, head coach, whoever it may be? Let me know your thoughts down below. Now, I do want to give an honorable mention here first, and that’s going to be special teams coordinator Matt Daniels. And for the biggest reason why he’s under the most pressure is because if you have a lapse like you did against the Chicago Bears where they return the kick all the way to the Vikings 40 yardd line, his job is done. Um the Vikings have been a good special teams team this year but you cannot just let up a big time play like that in a big spot. So if this kind of replicates itself like maybe this weekend the Packers like you know they get a kicked house on him or a punt return to the crib you know late in the fourth quarter like I could see his job being on the line. So, honorable mention Matt Daniels. But number five on my list, I am going to go with tight end here, TJ Hawinson. Now, I almost lost my mind when Hawk dropped that one third and four out route that JJ threw to him this past Sunday against the Bears. And listen, Hawk is not the same player that he once was. And I think there’s a very good chance that TJ Hawinson is not with the Minnesota Vikings next year. He’s making way too much money. He’ll probably end up being a cap casualty and probably for the right reason. Like, he is a just a solid tight end. probably the 20th best tight end in the league, but with how much he’s getting paid, I would be shocked if the Vikings want to bring him back. Plus, the Vikings are strapped with cash next offseason. So, I think number 87, unless he completely turns it around and he starts dominating, going for 70, 80 yards a game, you know, finds endzone five times for the remainder of the season. TJ Hawkins that is probably off this team uh heading into next season. But number four on my list, I’m going to go with edge rusher here, Dallas Turner. Now, Dallas Turner has obviously been pretty underwhelming to start his NFL career. You know, the Vikings traded up for him uh to get to the 17th pick in the 2024 draft, and he hasn’t lived up to that expectation. But I thought against the Chicago Bears, he was absolutely fantastic. He ended up having five pressures on the game, had one sack against Ko Williams. His overall PFF grade was actually the highest of the entire season for Dallas Turner at 72.1. Then his coverage grade when he did drop back into coverage, he was fantastic. Had that one batted ball. Um Yiannisia has had two great batted balls over the uh past two weeks that both almost resulted in interceptions, but he also had four stops uh in the run game as well. So Dallas Turner was great and there was no doubt this was probably Dallas Turner’s best game of his career. Now with that being said, the bar was not high. Like this wasn’t a situation where it’s like Dallas Turner had, you know, three, four sack game in the past like him just getting a sack, being comfortable in coverage. When Brian Flores does drop him in the coverage, he looked a lot better. you f you kind of felt that juice that he brings because he’s a freak freak athlete. Um so just shout out to Dallas Turner. Hopefully he can build off uh this really good game he had against the Bears and especially if Jonathan Gennard can’t go this weekend against the Packers or maybe that shoulder injury keeps him out for you know a couple weeks here. This will be a big time opportunity for number 15 and this Vikings defense. But number three got to go to the head coach Kevin Okonnell. Now, Kevin Oonnell, I don’t think he has been as bad as some Vikings fans make it out to be this season. I honestly chalk up majority of the offensive struggles just to the quarterback position because it is tough to consistently move the ball when you’re getting the quarterback play the Vikings have gotten. Now, has KC done the best job of setting JJ McCarthy up for success? I don’t necessarily think so, but I do think majority of the blame falls on the quarterback. And you know, if this team does crumble and let’s just say we only end up winning five to six games and we’re picking 10th 11th here in the NFL draft with the amount of talent you have on this football team regardless of the quarterback play, I will start to have my doubts about Kevin Okonnell because I want to see number one, will this team quit? Will this team roll over or will they stay motivate uh motivated to just keep on putting good football out there on tape or will they kind of just feel sorry for themselves and say, “Hey, this season was a loss. Let’s pack it in.” So, can he keep the locker room bought in? Yeah, that is a huge question because we’ve never really been in this situation with KOC. Now, even in that 2023 year, the Vikings were actually seven and six with Nick Mullins, with Jiren Hall, and then they end up losing their last four games following the seven and 10. But now, with you being 4-6, can KOC potentially spark this team like Lafleur did with the Packers back in 2023? That’s going to be a huge uh question I’m hoping we get the answer to for the remainder of the season. You guys give Kevin Okonnell a grade so far this season as a Vikings head coach. I think it’s probably a B minus C++ year. I don’t think it’s, you know, anywhere near like C minus D plus, but he definitely hasn’t been good. So, if you guys could grade the Vikings head coach Kevin Okonnell down below in the comment section. Now, I do want to give a massive massive shout out on today’s show to our sponsor and that being Har’s. They’re shaving company and they have some sweet razors for you guys. And for a limited time, our listeners can get the Har’s Plus trial set for only $10 at harrys.com/hat. 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After you purchase, they’ll ask where you heard about them. Please support our show, Vikings, down by Chat Sports, and tell them we sent you. But this link for you guys is in the comment section and description of today’s show. All right, number two on my pressure rankings list, you got to go with the GM here, and that’s Qua Doofmensa. Um, and for the biggest reason is you got to start to see something from these younger guys or these free agent additions because, you know, let’s just say the Vikings, you know, hey, they go 6 and 11 to finish out the year and guys like Jonathan Allen, Javon Hargrave, Will Fry, Ryan Kelly don’t show you anything. Well, that’s your main free agents that you picked up this past offseason and that would look like a terrible free agency class. And we obviously know his struggles drafting um throughout his tenure as a Viking GM. like we don’t see a whole lot from this roster. We’re doubting the talent on this team. Even a contract like the Byron Murphy extension this off seasonason. He hasn’t lived up to that. So, I think a lot of pressure is on Quy to see a lot out of his guys that he brought in that he drafted that really haven’t been living up to expectations. But no shocker here on number one. It’s obviously the quarterback and it’s JJ McCarthy. Now, I think JJ has a lot to prove. Mainly, you know, within the own building, and I think obviously fans, they’re going to feel a certain type about type of way about JJ no matter what happens. But the big question with JJ is like, can he get Kevin Okonnell to believe in him and believe in his development moving forward? Can he get this whole Vikings front office or even his teammates to believe in him to maybe be uh get the Vikings back to playoffs the following year if they can’t get back there this season? So, obviously a lot of pressure on number nine and I’ll kind of explain why if he turns it around, Vikings could still go on a run, but we’ll talk about that here in a second. But, are you guys waving the white flag? Is the Vikings season over? Give me a Y for yes, give me an N for no. You guys let me know your thoughts down below in the comments section. I don’t think it is. Um it’s got to take a week by week. start in Green Bay and potentially get a win over the Packers even though it is Toyota thon starting on Wednesday. So that’s not good news uh for Jordan Love playing against this Vikings defense. So we’ll talk about it here. Uh or never mind brain fart right there. Is the Viking season over? Why for yes and for no? All right, let’s talk about this. So I saw this floated out there on social media. I wanted to dive into it a little bit. Pretty much the question, can the Vikings be the 2023 Packers? So this Packers season, this was when Jordan Love first year starting, they went into Dallas and won a big-time playoff game against a 12- win Dallas Cowboys team, which was the two seed in the entire conference. But very similar to the Vikings starting off this year, the Packers are actually worse. The Packers started off this season with a 3-6 record. And the Vikings obviously right now 4-6. But the Packers, they want him went on a massive run, winning six of their last eight games. They finished up with a record of 9 and eight, including one playoff win over the Dallas Cowboys. Now, TBD, where the Vikings end up finishing. But a big reason for why the Packers went on this run and why they be so successful. Is because in the first half of the season, Jordan Love was not playing good football. He was struggling. Packers fans were saying, “God, we waited all this time. We waited three years for this guy and he looks terrible.” But then at the second half the year, Jordan Love took his play to the next level and he was absolutely fantastic. So a big difference between the Packers in the first half of the year and the second half of the year was Jordan Love. So you know obviously now with the Vikings situation like you have a young quarterback first year starting and JJ McCarthy like can he do the same thing? Like can JJ turn this around start playing some good football? Because there’s no doubt like with the 2023 Packers and the 2025 Vikings there’s talent on the roster. you got a good coaching staff, but the quarterback play has been so bad with the Vikings so far this season and with the Packers back in 2023 just takes a, you know, flip of the switch there and uh hopefully the Vikings, you know, can go on a run. So, some more similarities here. Like I was saying, first year starting QBs, obviously Jordan loves out his first three years. JJ had to miss his first year with that torn meniscus, but you got two offensive-minded head coaches, top of the league. Um Kevin Okonnell and Matt Laflur, both teams did have some great weapons. Um, and even the Packers defense back in 2023 was really solid. So, you got two good defenses, you got weapons, you got offensiveminded head coaches. And then also at the bottom, the NFC North that year, it was wide open because that was when the Vikings were with Nick Mullins, Josh Dobs, they were having an off year. The Lions ended up winning the division this year with 12 wins. Um, but again, there was no true dominant team that year. Lions ended up pulling away, but now with this year, I mean, the division it is tight. Like, I understand the Bears are seven and three. Do I think the Bears are going to be a 12 13 win team? Absolutely not. Um I think they’ll probably be around eight, nine to 10 wins as their schedule gets a lot tougher, but the Lions got their problems, the Packers got their problems. So there are some similarities, but again, comes down to this top one. Can JJ McCarthy do what Jordan Love did for the second half of the year. So we appreciate all you guys tuning in. Um tough times here, but we’ll be all right. So uh if you guys could give me those skulls down below in the comments section, we’ll get on out of here. Let’s go bikes. [Music]

Minnesota Vikings news and rumors discussed on today’s show:
– We start off by diving into which players on the Vikings roster and coaching staff are under the most pressure heading into the rest of the 2025-26 NFL season.
– We also discuss if the Vikings can replicate the Packers 2023 season with J.J. McCarthy having a potential similar end to the season Jordan Love did that season.
– Chat Sports host Patrick Siepman breaks down the latest Vikings news and rumors discussed on today’s Minnesota Vikings YouTube video!

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Here’s even more Minnesota Vikings YouTube videos to watch:
– 🚨Cris Carter Puts J.J. McCarthy On BLAST!: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AsTTjWM5aCc
– The Vikings DODGED A MAJOR BULLET!: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ujkhMOCntk8
– The Vikings Loss To The Bears Just Got 100x Worse After Seeing This…: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S8EP8AMDqPE

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– Is the Vikings season over? Type ‘Y’ for Yes or ‘N’ for No

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