{"id":23783,"date":"2014-01-15T11:12:40","date_gmt":"2014-01-15T16:12:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/?p=23783"},"modified":"2014-05-09T14:08:22","modified_gmt":"2014-05-09T19:08:22","slug":"minnesota-hires-mike-zimmer-as-their-new-head-coach","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/2014\/01\/15\/minnesota-hires-mike-zimmer-as-their-new-head-coach\/","title":{"rendered":"Minnesota hires Mike Zimmer as their new head coach"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"It’s being widely reported (at least on Twitter<\/em>) that the Minnesota Vikings have offered the head coaching position to Cincinnati Bengals defensive co-ordinator Mike Zimmer. Zimmer arrived in Minnesota yesterday for a second interview with Vikings executives and remained in town overnight. At the Daily Norseman<\/em>, Arif Hasan put together a voluminous compendium of information on the head coaching candidates. Here’s part of the section on Mike Zimmer<\/a>:<\/p>\n

The former linebacker is also well-known for specific gameplanning, and pre-game adjustments to the scheme to match the weaknesses of the opponent, rather than relying on a base scheme. There are significant drawbacks to this approach (which is why the league-leading Seahawks defense prefers to stick with the scheme instead of changing much for specific game plans), but it has its adherents (Bill Belichick being the most famous \u2014 though defensive mavens like Rex Ryan do this as well. It is also the approach of Todd Bowles, the DC of the second-best defense in the league in Arizona).<\/p>\n

The position that Zimmer prefers to be deepest seems to be cornerback, although he’s made sure the roster has had competition at a number of levels. Also interestingly, he has a tendency both to stick with and quickly move on from players. The best example of this odd paradox is Rey Maualuga, second-round pick for the Bengals in 2009. Rey was a solid-to-good strongside linebacker that did well for two years before switching to the middle.<\/p>\n

[…]<\/p>\n

Zimmer is probably best known for his hardnose, “no-nonsense” style of coaching that has endeared him to Bengals fans and seems to follow the tradition of Bill Parcells, berating players blue in order to get them fired up. Applied with intelligence, it also seems to have gotten the players’ loyalty. He’s even used it as an asset in his free agency recruiting, arguing that his ability to get results is better for players than what others can offer. It also means that players know where they stand with him, which can be invaluable.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Update<\/strong>: The Star Tribune<\/em> confirms the news with this report by Mark Craig<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Mike Zimmer, a 20-year veteran NFL assistant coach who worked with Hall of Famer Bill Parcells in Dallas before turning the Cincinnati Bengals\u2019 defense around as their defensive coordinator the past six seasons, has been hired as the ninth head coach in the Vikings\u2019 54-year history, NFL sources confirmed.<\/p>\n

Zimmer, who has never been a head coach at any level, replaces Leslie Frazier, who was fired on Dec. 30, and becomes the third head coach hired since current owners Zygi and Mark Wilf bought the team in 2005.<\/p>\n

Zimmer, 57, played quarterback and linebacker at Illinois State. He then coached on the defensive side at the collegiate level for 15 years at Missouri, Weber State and Washington State before joining the Dallas Cowboys as secondary coach.<\/p>\n

He won a Super Bowl ring when the Cowboys beat the Steelers in Super Bowl XXX. One of Zimmer\u2019s players, unheralded cornerback Larry Brown, became the game\u2019s MVP.<\/p>\n

[…]<\/p>\n

Zimmer was praised by Parcells recently in a Star Tribune article.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s very competitive, he\u2019s intense,\u201d Parcells said. \u201cI think he\u2019s a smart guy. \u2026 Every place that I\u2019ve ever heard that he\u2019s been, the players really liked him. And yet he doesn\u2019t coddle the players at all. He\u2019s got a good balance with that tough love.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think now he\u2019s got enough experience to handle the players and the big picture and the scouting and the constraints and the things that the league mandates now. He\u2019s got enough experience to where he\u2019d do a good job.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bengals coach Marvin Lewis also has said Zimmer has what it takes to be a head coach.<\/p>\n

\u201cZim does a great job of identifying who to push and when,\u201d Lewis was quoted as saying on the Bengals website. \u201cHe helps me by being the guy who puts his foot up their butt, getting them moving in the right direction so I don\u2019t have to be the one to do it all the time.\u201d<\/p>\n

Zimmer\u2019s son, Adam, is a Bengals assistant coach. He also has two daughters Corri and Marki. Zimmer\u2019s wife, Vicki, passed away suddenly of natural causes at age 50 in 2009. That same year, he was named NFL assistant coach of the year by cbssports.com<\/em> and the Pro Football Writers Association.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It’s being widely reported (at least on Twitter) that the Minnesota Vikings have offered the head coaching position to Cincinnati Bengals defensive co-ordinator Mike Zimmer. Zimmer arrived in Minnesota yesterday for a second interview with Vikings executives and remained in town overnight. At the Daily Norseman, Arif Hasan put together a voluminous compendium of information […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[944,126,179],"class_list":["post-23783","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-football","tag-mikezimmer","tag-minnesotavikings","tag-nfl"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2hpV6-6bB","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23783","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23783"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23783\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23787,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23783\/revisions\/23787"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23783"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23783"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23783"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}