Kevin O'Connell Under HEAVY Fire From Fans...

Kevin O'Connell is under heavy fire from fans after some newly revealed stats from the Vikings Week 8 loss against the Lions has sparked many unwanted conversations, and KOC drops a Kyler Murray update that could have massive implications heading into Week 9 against the Buffalo Bills. We're going to break down all of that in this episode of Vikings Digest, but first, we are getting so close to hitting 6,000 subs, we are less than 250 away, so if you're part of the 89% of viewers who are not yet subscribed, you want to stay up to date on all things Vikings. And help us reach that goal before we kick off against the Buffalo Bills next Monday night. Make sure to hit that subscribe button and the bell icon so you don't miss any of the episodes when they drop. As Minnesota is going into a big game at home against the Bills on primetime where they are looking to stay atop the NFC North, a division in which they are currently only at a 28% chance of winning on Kalshi. 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With that, let's hop right into the first topic of the day, which is KOC's poor decision making as we know that that game against the Lions had its handful of questionable decisions by Kevin O'Connell, a lot of which coming later on in the game in when it is crunch time. First one that we're going to jump into is that fourth and five that he decided to go for about halfway through the fourth quarter, and it just blew up in his face completely. Saying that KOC went for it on 4th and 5 from the 25 when we could have kicked a field goal to go from a deficit of 5 to 2. Then he punted with 3 minutes left down 4 on 4th and 4 from his 30. Ridiculous decision making. He's a terrible play caller. His offense sucks. Flores has gave up 19 on the road to a good offense and still lost. And they are also calling to fire KOC. Which is some heavy words that a lot of people are echoing the same sentiment. I'm not necessarily there yet. But if there's a couple more weeks of this kind of football that we're seeing on the field, especially on the offensive side, I might be starting to lean a little bit more towards that side of the fence, especially when you look at how cowardly that decision was to punt. When you look at a tweet that someone put out saying that Minnesota decided to punt to Detroit from the Minnesota 33 on fourth and five with 301 remaining in the fourth while losing 15 to 19 with the surrender index of 12.58. This punt ranks at 96th percentile. of cowardly punts of the 2024 season the 94th percentile of all punts since 1999. I know a lot of people were hoping that because of the game situation regardless of where the spot on the field was that was a spot where Minnesota almost needed to go for it in that sense even though we were backed up in our own zone and it could have blew up in our face even worse however I think that that was a decision that you had to make especially when you decided to go for it in a a spot where you could have taken points. And then you didn't get it. Then you force a three and out and then you get the ball back. You go down, you score a touchdown. However, if you had scored a field goal on that drive, Minnesota would have won the game because we would have had or would have been in a better position to win the game or at least less pressure because they would have had more points on the board in their pocket and getting Will Reichert a little bit of his confidence back after a rocky start to the game. Having that missed field goal that did go a long way, but I won't put any of the blame on Will Reichert for that game. A lot of this blame goes on the offense. And the only thing on the defense was that they could. Could not tackle worth a damn as two straight weeks for an RB2 has just run all over us. However, with Kevin O'Connell and his play calling and his decision making, it has led to a lot of criticism from fans. I think it is somewhat warranted as well when you look at how Brian Flores has been executing this defense. This is a spot where Minnesota's offense, all you have to do is score 21 points a game. Three touchdowns. It's not very much. With Will Reichert kicking the way that he's been kicking aside from last game. That is something that you can easily get when you have him as your kicker, where you can count on him for probably about six points a game at worst, really, even though we didn't see him get any points on Sunday against the Lions. That was kind of a little bit of a fluke game for him in that environment and things like that. But I think that he will get right back on the right track and get back to kicking a lot of field goals for the Vikings, especially if they continue to move the ball like they have been doing. And I think this is a very concerning thing to look at. for the Minnesota Vikings because with Kevin O'Connell if he goes a couple more games where the offensive play calling is just not there or they can't execute properly or they're just making poor decisions in crunch time where you can go out and try and take command of the game or at least get back into the game or reclaim your lead that is going to be a very big topic of conversation that is going to get very uncomfortable in the next couple of weeks if this persists and I know a lot of fans are already calling for KOC's job However, I don't think that we can go there just yet. We're still at 6-1. The sky isn't falling yet, but a lot of people are saying that, hey, this was just a microcosm of all the things that Minnesota was able to get away with for the last couple of weeks for the first six games, and now we see it all finally come crashing down, as a lot of people would say, where it could be a very rocky next couple of games for Minnesota, as we could be looking at a 6-4 team over the next couple of games, by the next three games possibly, 7-3 at best, I think, with what we're going up against. However, I hope I'm wrong and I hope that this game against the Lions are able to kind of course correct and fix what they got to do. But right now, the conversation around the Minnesota Vikings is very hot, whether it's calling for Kevin O'Connell's job, calling for them to go out and get Jonathan Taylor or another running back that could be out there and not recently in the trade rumors or just going out and getting another quarterback as well because of the way that Kyler Murray has been playing so far. And that's going to be a very interesting conversation is going to get even heavier. As the trade deadline looms even closer, the Chargers are still winless, so Justin Herbert could still be a possibility out there, Kirk Cousins or some other names out there, Joe Flacco maybe, but it's going to be very interesting to see what Nolan Teasley decides to do before the trade deadline if they want to continue rolling with the quarterback they have or move on as that is going to take us into the second topic of the day, which is the QB woes made even trickier after Kevin O'Connell dropped an injury update earlier today. Saying that Christian Darius saw came in with some shoulder soreness. Theo Jackson, he's still dealing with that quad contusion. I mentioned Kyler Murray's hamstring last night. It's sore today, so we're going through a full eval of that as we work through the day today. And I'll be able to update you guys on that as we get into the work week this week. As they took a little bit of a lighter day this today, I would imagine. Or if Kevin O'Connell's just like, no, we're just absolutely going to run them heavy and just wait until they're tired. And as far as his availability for the week, because it did lead to that question. He was also saying that I don't think we're there yet. It's still early enough that I'll kind of continue to get updates and then also get with the medical staff a little bit later today and get updates on all these guys for you as the week does roll on. And it did bring up a hilarious question as far as if Kyler Murray will be the starting quarterback if he is good to go. Kevin O'Connell gave a simple one word, three letter answer, and that was yes. Just right off the bat, he did not kind of mince his words. At all, very clearly. I mean, just very simple. And he just moved it on right from there. Kind of just trying to diffuse any conversation as far as a quarterback controversy or benching Kyler Murray for Carson Wentz, which a lot of people are calling for right now, because at least Wentz was able to move the ball and just be a game manager and not lose us games. Kyler Murray, he hasn't done any too crazy mistakes as far as turnovers, but the miscues and missing open guys, off-target throws, not being able to throw it around or over the linemen. A very constant issue so far this season, and we haven't necessarily seen a course correct with that. As far as coaching Kyler Murray, Kevin O'Connell was also asked as far as how that has been going, saying it's as much in-game, I think more so throughout the week, leading into game day. It's one thing to be totally comfortable with the game plan, but there's some nuances to it that you kind of learn sometimes on game day. Comfort level, you're trying to do those things. He's in the gun a lot, and we're trying to marry that up as creatively and effectively as we can going forward for the season. Then he closed it out as well, saying, I think it's just continuing to build that rapport of the plans, the comfort level. Continue to implore some input from him on things he likes and how we can carve it and make it even more cleaner and better for him to do that and get some of that comfort. And this has been just kind of a little bit of the same that we've been hearing and we're getting a little bit too tired of hearing it because Kevin O'Connell saying, yeah, it's just about getting him comfortable, get comfortable, get comfortable, get comfortable. Well, we're seven games into the season now. If we haven't seen him get even some semblance of more comfortable with the offense. That is going to be a very big problem. I know the concussion kind of set him back and things like that. Maybe this hamstring will set him back as well. But if he's not ready to go, obviously Carson Wentz will go in there. But it's going to lead to a lot of conversations, even if he goes out there against the Bills and performs like he did against the Lions, where he's kind of game managing, but not entirely losing us the game, but not entirely winning us the game. And I think Carson Wentz would be able to do that a little bit better if that's what they're looking for. But if they're looking for Kyler Murray to be a game changer, And actually be using his legs and being impactful and looking like a prime Kyler Murray, like we saw a long time ago, I know. But there is still that shade of Kyler in there, as we have seen a little bit of hints of it here and there, just not on a consistent level. So at some point, we got to stop hearing this kind of broken record of getting him comfortable, getting him comfortable and start seeing those results. Or you just move off from this experiment while you still have a season that you can salvage and make a playoff run. While you have this defense that's absolutely motoring, you know this defense can keep you in games and more than likely win you games. So if you want to move on from Kyler Murray, you take that $1 million loss on the investment where, hey, you brought him in on a veteran minimum deal just for this exact reason. For a potentially low risk as long as the season isn't a wash as a result of it. But right now that risk is starting to get a little bit higher. The financial risk is very low where Minnesota can cut their losses at any time with Kyler Murray. and not have to worry about taking too big of a loss. They're not necessarily hitched to Kyler Murray in this scenario. As much as Adam Thielen would like to say where he was saying on KFAN 100.3, at this point, you're kind of in there. I say you stick with Kyler. But with where the Vikings are at at quarterback right now, and with the Kyler Murray contract, and what that salary is looking like, Minnesota is in a spot right now where they can move off Kyler Murray in a position where a lot of teams can't if they have a struggling starting quarterback who's getting paid a lot of money. Kyler Murray? He's getting paid from the Cardinals right now. So right now, it's not on our dime, aside from that million that they gave him as a vet minimum. So right now, Minnesota could be in a spot where they can move off of this experiment while they have a chance to salvage what's left of this season to really kind of turn it around and to shut up a lot of the naysayers and really get this offense looking to how it was looking a couple years ago or in the prime years of Kirk Cousins. But let us know your guys' thoughts on all of this down in the comments below. As far as all the stuff on the Kyler Murray front, the Kevin O'Connell front, How many weeks do you think it is before the conversation around Kevin O'Connell being on the hot seat starts to get very, very real and a little bit too uncomfortable as with Vikings season this year? You don't want to have to go through it as far as having a Super Bowl level defense and one of the worst offenses in the league, having that all go to waste and having to start over next year with a new head coach, maybe Brian Flores. I don't know if it is a new head coach. I hope it's Brian Flores, just so it's someone who's familiar with this team and this system as well. But again, it's going to be very interesting to see how it kind of all boils down. As like Jordan Addison was saying, there is a lot of factors that play into it, but he kept it simple saying it's not really about finding yourself, just making the routine plays When you turn on the tape. We got guys open running the ball. We got gaps that's open. We just got to execute honestly. And that is the biggest thing here is that the Vikings really got to just lick their wounds, move on. It's a new week. Just try and go 1-0 this week against the Bills and not worry about what happened last week against the Lions and go out and try and execute on prime time on Monday night. Let us know down in the comments below what you guys think about all that we covered in this episode from the KOC stuff to the Kyler Murray stuff. Do you think that it's wise that if Kyler Murray is not 100% this week? to sit him out even if he's at 90% do you think you'd go with Wentz? I think a lot of people would say even if Kyler Murray's at 110% they'll go with Carson Wentz but let us know down in the comments below as that's going to do it for this episode of Vikings Digest. Again thank you guys so much for liking, subscribing, hitting that bell icon so you don't miss the episodes when they drop and thank you to CallSheet for sponsoring this video but for now I've been your host Griffin take care.