Minnesota Vikings Fans Need to Place Blame Where It Really Belongs

Minnesota Viking fans aren't happy. That has been true most of this season.

With a 3-6 record, things are not nearly as rosy as most anticipated during the preseason.

Perhaps not surprisingly, Brad Childress is getting heat from the fans.

But is Childress really the one deserving the blame? Let's look at Minnesota's three biggest stars and see how they've been performing.

First of all, let's review Brett Favre's season so far. 

It's not a shock that the preseason began with Favre still undecided about playing. The Favre retirement watch has worn so thin that even his most ardent supporters have lost patience with his "drama queen" attitude. 

Nevertheless, Favre suited up for his 20th season and took the field with his team. Coming off a close loss to the Saints in the NFC Championship Game last year, the Vikings, and their fans, were optimistic about taking the next step to the big dance this year. Maybe the biggest reason for that optimism was the fact that Favre had perhaps the best season of his entire career.

Last season Favre was sharp. He threw a whopping 33 touchdowns to go along with only seven interceptions—spectacular numbers by any standard. It's no wonder the Vikings organization and their fans all had great hopes for Brett coming back again this year.

Favre's been called a "gunslinger," which has often been just a nice way of saying that he's had a propensity to shoot himself in the foot. This year, it looks like the "gunslinger" has returned.

So far Favre has thrown 10 touchdowns and 16 interceptions. His QB rating is just 72.2, and worst of all for the Vikes, their record is just 3-6. To top it off, there is talk of tension between Favre and Childress.

In truth, there has been talk of tension going back to before the season even began. But I would suggest that Favre would be wise to recognize that, under Brad Childress, he did indeed have a season for the ages last year. In Childress' system Brett Favre thrived. But it appears to me that Favre has decided to adopt a bit of a prima donna attitude this season, which has been exactly the wrong thing to do.

Now on to Jared Allen and his season thus far.

Allen was brought over from Kansas City for one main purpose: The Vikes wanted a more explosive pass rush. They felt that Allen could supply that. In his first season he had pretty good numbers with 14.5 sacks and five forced fumbles.

It's true that he has the most annoying sack dance in recent memory, but that's a topic for another time.

This season sacks have been few and far between for Allen. In fact, if you were to take away his one big game against Arizona in which he had 2.5 sacks, Allen would only have three sacks to this point. Even when you include the Arizona game, 5.5 sacks is far fewer than should be expected from a guy who is being paid big bucks for the express purpose of getting after opponents' quarterbacks.

It's hard to win games when your opponent's QB has all the time he needs to throw. So much of pass rushing is about having the qualities of relentless energy and determination. As these qualities are dependent on the player himself and not what the other team is doing, there's really no excuse for such poor early season performance by Jared Allen.

Finally, let's move on to Adrian Peterson.

Peterson is perhaps the one big bright spot for Minnesota this year. He has had some fumble issues in the past, but this year he hasn't fumbled once. He is doing his part to try to help the team reach its Super Bowl goals. It should also be said that often such big improvement in a player's former area of weakness can be attributed, at least partly, to good coaching.

While it is an easy reaction to blame the coach when things aren't going well, the facts would show that fans should be looking more at the weak play of two of their three biggest stars. Coach Childress can only put Favre and Allen in a position to go out and do their jobs; he can't do their jobs for them. He also can't really bench either player, as they still give the team its best chance to win.

It would appear that a turnaround for the Vikings is very much dependent on Brett Favre and Jared Allen stepping up and bringing the kind of focus and determination they showed a year ago. Because as last year showed, when Favre is being cooperative with Childress and sticking with Childress' system, and Allen is getting the job done, Minnesota is a very good team.