MVN - Most Valuable Network

Props for the Vikings Offensive Line

The praise from the national media just keeps rolling in. Yesterday, we linked to an article from the Sporting News that stated the Vikings have the best safeties in the NFL — and today, we tracked down offensive line rankings from NFL.com that list the Vikes as having the eighth-best blockers in the league:

Based on the success of Adrian Peterson and Chester Taylor, it’s no shock that the Vikes had the best run line in the NFL in 2007. No team averaged more touchdowns per carry (22.4) or yards per carry (5.3), as C Matt Birk, G Steve Hutchinson and T Bryant “Mount” McKinnie opened huge holes for A.P. and Taylor to dash through all season. Their pass line wasn’t nearly as effective, but Tarvaris Jackson doesn’t hold much value.

Now, these rankings were compiled from a fantasy football perspective, but they’re worth mentioning because some fans (myself included) have been pretty harsh on the Vikings offensive line. So, either the national media is overrating the offensive line, or we simply have a tendency of being too critical towards Hutch, McKinnie, Birk, Cook and Herrera. In all honesty, I think the latter might be the case.

I’ll admit to being too harsh on Cook — while his performance in the earlier parts of last season was cringe-inducing, he made significant strides during the second half of the year. The acquisition of Hutch transformed this offensive line (obviously), and although McKinnie’s pass blocking was often porous last season, he still belongs in the upper echelon of left tackles — the guy is completely devoid of maturity or good judgment, but he was often a dominating force on the field last season.

Birk’s window in this league is quickly closing, but I’m thankful he’ll spend at least one more season in a purple uniform. Herrera compensates for questionable ability by playing with a great mean streak. Ultimately, it’s refreshing to see these guys receive some positive national attention.

It’s rankings like these that make me itch for training camp/preseason/the regular season to get underway. By now, we’ve concluded that this team looks pretty damn good on paper — but we’ve seen time and time again in professional sports that things don’t always happen according to plan. Unfortunately, we’re about three and a half months away from the beginning of the regular season, so there’s still a ton of time remaining before we find out how good, exactly, this team is.

*If you’re really, really bored on Monday night, I’d recommend tuning into The Bachelorette on ABC. Former Viking and Gustavus grad Ryan Hoag will be one of 25 men vying for DeAnna Pappas. I’ve got my DVR set to record it, because there’s nothing wrong with a guy watching The Bachelorette, right? Uh, right?

This entry was posted on Sunday, May 18th, 2008 at 6:40 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.