Vikings-Packers: A Homer and a Hater Debate Minnesota's Win

(Photo by Jamie Squire/Getty Images)

Four hours after watching the Vikings put away the Packers in the latest, greatest edition of the Aaron Rodgers whack-a-thon (nee: The Brett Favre Bowl), I still have no idea what I just saw.

I don’t know if I saw a juggernaut in action, or a team that can’t close to save its soul.

I don’t know if I saw three quarters of heart-stopping football, or one quarter of mind-numbing timidity.

And I don’t know if I’ll wake up tomorrow feeling like a Vikings homer or a Vikings hater.

So to sort things out, we’re going to hear a bit from both.

We teed up a handful of salient topics from the aftermath of Monday night’s game. My inner homer and inner hater lined up to take their best swings—the former waxing poetic about all that went right in Minnesota’s win, and the latter bemoaning all that went wrong.

Here’s what they had to say about:

Adrian Peterson

The Homer Says: Complain all you like about AP’s modest stat line—55 yards rushing on 25 carries—but Peterson did three things very, very right in this game:

1) He willed the Vikings down the field on their first possession. Peterson was responsible for seven of the 12 plays that made up Minnesota’s mammoth opening drive. He bullied his way to two first downs along the way, including a 4th-and-1 pickup, and set the stage for the game’s first score by hauling the rock to the Green Bay one-yard line.

2) He put the ball in the end zone. If you think that’s easy, just ask the Packers, whose inability to punch it in from a yard out in the fourth quarter wound up being mighty costly.

3) He got the Packers to commit about 14 guys to stopping the run. They stopped it all right, but effectively abandoned the pass rush in the process. Peterson may not have put up the kind of eye-popping numbers we’re used to seeing, but his loss was Brett Favre’s gain.

Peterson won’t get credit for what the offense did to the Packers, but his presence on the field was no small part of the end result.

 
The Hater Says: Somebody get the Bears on the phone—we need to find out how they managed to swap our Adrian Peterson for their own.

How else do you explain “All Day’s” all-night no-show?

The numbers were bad, especially when you figure that for a 6’1” back, 2.2 yards per carry is about as much as you’d gain if you simply ran up to the line of scrimmage, held the ball out, and fell forward.

The context was worse: In the previous two weeks, the Packers gave up 141 yards rushing to Cedric Benson, and 117 to Steven Jackson, even though Jackson was the only Ram who remotely resembled a playmaker.

This wasn’t exactly the Steel Curtain here. But Peterson got stuffed four times for negative yardage. He was stopped for no gain another four times.

And about that fumble…

As ESPN commentator Ron Jaworski asked, how does a man with such monstrously strong hands lose so many balls?

You’re better than that, AP, and you know it.


The Minnesota Defense

The Homer Says: Before the game, when Mike Tirico said the Vikings sport “the best defensive line in the NFL,” I thought he was going a little overboard.

Afterwards, I wondered why he didn’t use a few more superlatives.

Jared Allen spent most of the game doing things to Aaron Rodgers that are illegal in most states. The mulleted maniac racked up 4.5 of the team’s eight (eight!) sacks, delivered five quarterback hits, registered four tackles for loss, and nailed Rodgers in the end zone for a safety that stretched Minnesota’s lead to 30-14.

A little further back, Antoine Winfield led the Vikings with 10 tackles, including a vicious hit on Ryan Grant at the goal line to set up Allen’s safety. Winfield also snuck around Greg Jennings to pick off Rodgers and kill what would have been a go-ahead drive for the Packers in the second quarter.

And how about that goal-line stand to kill an eight-and-a-half-minute, 14-play Green Bay drive at the one?

Rodgers took the Pack 81 yards to set up 1st-and-goal from the Minnesota five-yard line. Spectacular stops from E.J. Henderson, Chad Greenway, and Ben Leber on the next three downs forced the Packers to throw on 4th-and-1, and a lucky drop by Donald Lee ended the threat.

If the Packers had any aspirations of matching Favre blow-for-blow, the Vikings snuffed them out right then and there.

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