Kickers have been … a problem … for Minnesota Vikings head coach Mike Zimmer over the last few seasons. The latest kicking headache popped up in Sunday’s game against the division rival Packers on a road trip to Green Bay. Daniel Carlson was selected in the 2018 draft and was the team’s highest-ever drafted kicker and was deemed to have won the competition against last season’s kicker Kai Forbath (who was released before the final preseason game). From that moment onwards, he’s worked very hard to get into coach Zimmer’s doghouse, and three missed field goals in his latest outing may have him packing his bags soon. Judd Zulgad thinks the time to part company with Carlson is now (updated below):
The warning signs about employing a rookie kicker where everywhere and yet the Vikings ignored them.
There was the failure of Blair Walsh, the kicker they drafted out of Georgia in 2012, whose brutal miss cost them a playoff win; there were Carlson’s two 42-yard misses against Seattle in the Vikings’ third preseason game; and there was the knowledge that throwing a young kicker into the pressure cooker of being on a team with Super Bowl aspirations might not be wise.
Yet, the Vikings felt they knew better than everyone else and general manager Rick Spielman traded back into the fifth round last April to select Daniel Carlson out of Auburn. Veteran Kai Forbath was kept around into training camp but that was simply for show and the veteran eventually was jettisoned. All because the Vikings knew better than anyone.
On Sunday that hubris bit them right in the behind.
Carlson’s miss on a 35-yard attempt as time expired in overtime cost the Vikings a chance to complete an improbable comeback against Green Bay and instead left Minnesota with a 29-29 tie at Lambeau Field. Instead of being atop the NFC North with a 2-0 record, the Vikings and Packers are both 1-0-1.
Carlson’s failure to hit that field goal completed a game in which he missed three attempts all wide right. He also missed from 48 yards in the second quarter — that ball was so far right it looked like it might be headed to Madison — and from 49 yards at the conclusion of the Vikings’ first drive in overtime.
Another Viking player whose job is at risk is wide receiver Laquon Treadwell, who scored his first NFL touchdown today but also committed enough errors — including tipping a pass that was intercepted by the Packers —that it was surprising to see him on the field during the final quarter of regulation time. Sam Ekstrom:
Sunday’s 29-29 tie with the Green Bay Packers, more than anything, strengthened a pair of narratives that have long been festering with the Minnesota Vikings fan base.
One, that Laquon Treadwell has failed to live up to his first-round draft status. Two, that kickers only exist to doom them in clutch situations.
Both were at the forefront of a bizarre stalemate in which kicker Daniel Carlson missed all three field goal attempts — including two in overtime — and Laquon Treadwell dropped two (arguably three) passes, one of which was intercepted late in the fourth quarter.
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Overshadowed a bit by Carlson’s misses is Treadwell, who caught his first NFL touchdown in the first quarter but was nearly the game’s primary goat when Cousins’ pass was intercepted by Ha Ha Clinton-Dix after hitting Treadwell’s hands with the score 26-21 and just over two minutes remaining. Thanks to Cousins’ heroics on the ensuing drive, Treadwell’s drop took a back seat, but he later missed a ball on 3rd and 9 in overtime that forced Carlson to attempt a lengthy 49-yard field goal. It was thrown slightly behind him but could have been caught.
“You’ve got to catch the ball,” Zimmer said of Treadwell. “That’s the number one thing that receivers do, catch the ball.”
Treadwell also dropped another third down pass on a broken play in the third quarter that would have been a first down.
Cousins took some blame, though, for his interception-causing drop in overtime.
“[He’s] fine. This is a tough game,” said Cousins. “Stuff happens. I threw that ball pretty hard. That was probably my hardest pass of the day. We just gotta get him in the fire where he can be, ‘OK, been there, done that.’”
Treadwell watched from the sidelines on several plays late in the contest as Stacy Coley and Brandon Zylstra took his place in the wide receiver rotation. Coley, though, also dropped a pass and was targeted by Cousins on a nullified interception that could have iced the game.
Update: The Vikings just announced that they are waiving kicker Daniel Carlson and are rumoured to be pursuing veteran kicker Dan Bailey. Sad to see the kid whacked, but as Judd Zulgad pointed out above, it was probably needed to keep the team in contention.
At the Daily Norseman, Ted Glover provides his usual post-game Stock Market Report on the Packers game.
Well, the Vikings didn’t lose. They didn’t win either. They should have done both. Weird.
I honestly don’t know what to make of what happened. It was mostly terrible Vikings football, followed by a glimmer of hope, followed by no hope, followed by an amazing drive, followed by a ‘lol are you kidding me’ drive that ended with Mike Zimmer actually icing a kicker, followed by a got dang miracle miss from a kicker that never misses, culminating in Blair Walsh II: Wide Right This Time. It was a game where the Vikings should have lost, should have won, and at times were their own worst enemy.
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Blue Chip Stocks:
Kirk Cousins, QB: I’ve been a Vikings fan a long time, and I gotta say kids … that was the most Tommy Kramer-esque game I’ve seen a Vikings QB play since, well, Tommy Kramer. From the slow start, to the crippling interception (that wasn’t his fault, but JUST HEAR ME OUT), to the frenetic comeback, it was all there. For three and a half quarters I was thinking that the ‘Kirk Cousins shrinks from the moment’ criticism was alive and well … and then Cousins did everything except kick the game winning field goal…and at this point I’d trot him out there before I’d trot out Daniel Carlson. His 424 yards passing was the first 400-plus passing yards by a Vikings QB since 2010, and from the moment he hit Diggs on that 75 yard bomb, he was on fire. He couldn’t miss, and it was amazing. For those of you who never got to see Kramer play and have wondered what it was like…today looked and felt like a classic Two Minute Tommy moment. God, I loved it.
Also, Green Bay fans who were incensed that the game ending interception Cousins threw was nullified by a ‘bullsh[rhymes with wool split]’ roughing the passer call on Clay Matthews, shut up. If your brittle-ass QB didn’t incessantly whine for six months after the legal hit Barr put on him last October, there would be no Aaron Rodgers rule today. Live by the whiny ass QB, tie by the whiny ass QB.
Stefon Diggs, WR: It wasn’t on par with the Minneapolis Miracle, but when the Vikings needed a heroin fix in the arm, Diggs was Hamsterdam. He had a quiet day until that point, but he did have a TD prior to that and then he also had a two point conversion catch, and was well on his way to becoming a hero of the game until things kind of went sideways. He’s had a knack for making a big play when the Vikings need it, and he came through again today. He finished with nine catches for 128 yards and two touchdown.
Adam Thielen, WR: Until the offense went and did three lines of cocaine off of a hooker’s belly to get a jumpstart and spur a 22 point fourth quarter, the only guy that really seemed to stand out the whole game was Adam Thielen. He was the steady, reliable guy all afternoon, the designated driver at this wild ass fourth quarter, 22 point bachelor party. His falling backwards TD catch in the closing seconds of regulation was his version of pulling into the driveway after he got everyone home safely, turning off the keys to the ignition, and going ‘damn man…I love those guys but what the hell?’ As good as Diggs was Thielen went one better, catching 12 passes for 131 yards and a ‘go home Vikings you’re drunk’ touchdown with 36 seconds left that gave Minnesota an improbable opportunity to tie the game up and go to OT. Also…did you guys know Thielen is a Minnesota native?
