O'Connell sticks up for Darnold, cites 'body of work'
O'Connell sticks up for Darnold, cites 'body of work'
As Vikings QB Sam Darnold's dream season sputtered to a close Monday night in a playoff loss to the Rams, he now heads toward free agency with his future as unsettled as ever.
As Vikings QB Sam Darnold's dream season sputtered to a close Monday night in a playoff loss to the Rams, he now heads toward free agency with his future as unsettled as ever.
The Darnold experiment has concluded. Unless you're willing to spend on an elite O-Line, it's best to use a quarterback who doesn't take four seconds to decide what to do or not do.
The Vikings should move on from Darnold and go with their rookie who can run and handle pressures. JJ McCarthy might not be their guy either, but I'd hate for the Vikings to trade him away and he then becomes a star somewhere else.
The Vikings should move on from Minnesota if they ever want to win a Super Bowl, and I say this as a Vikings fan and fan of Minnesota sports in general since the '90s. Minnesota has, and fosters, a losing sports culture. Teams that leave our state instantly find success. The fans here are either satisfied with being mediocre at best and "aww shucks, just happy to be here" or are just too cynical and jaded to care anymore because they've seen the same rerun too many times. The players feel the fans give up and give up themselves in return. I've seen Twins, Vikings and Wild teams blatantly just give up in the playoffs at the slightest moment of adversity in the last five years. The only MN team I can respect anymore in that regard is the Timberwolves, who in their two playoff runs in the past few years, even though they didn't go all the way, they played their hearts out and left it all on the court, and didn't just lie down when things got tough. I wish I could say that for the other teams. But because we have teams that just give up, and our fans just accept it as inevitable (toxic negativity) or even a wondrous accomplishment to get that far (toxic positivity), Minnesota as a state will never see a championship again.
Sorry, just had to rant.
They almost had a shot to move to L.A. with someone even making a plan for a stadium. That said, Vikings have had some memorable games throughout the years, some games more exciting than some Super Bowl games. Teams/cities can go through a drought, but I think we're getting closer.