Steve Smith's Debut Ruined by Frerotte-Led Vikings

The Minnesota Vikings came back to beat the Carolina Panthers 20-10 on Sunday afternoon at the Humphrey Metrodome. The Panthers scored the first 10 points of the game, but couldn't hold on against the surging Vikings.

The Vikings' defense, led by stud middle linebacker EJ Henderson, awakened from its slumber to shut down the Panthers' offense, and quarterback Gus Frerotte stepped up after being named the starter earlier this week. 

The Panthers gained only 204 yards.  Minnesota strangled the Carolina rushing attack in particular, allowing only 2.47 yards per carry.  Panthers running backs Jonathan Stewart and DeAngelo Williams only combined for 42 yards on 17 carries.

The Vikings defense came up with a stop every time it needed to.  If the Bears' defense was good, this defense was insane.  Now that I'm mostly over my frustration about not getting anything done on offense, all I can say about that Minnesota D is wow.

Vikings MLB EJ Henderson really made his presence known—he racked up twelve tackles—eleven solo and one assisted.  He penetrated the initial line of Carolina blockers and broke crucial plays up on his own time and again.   

It seems Vikings head coach Brad Childress made the right move in replacing former starting quarterback Tarvaris Jackson with now-starter Gus Frerotte. 

Frerotte shredded the Panthers' pass defense, accumulating 204 yards and going 16-for-28, in addition to tossing a touchdown pass.  Frerotte also threw an interception that clanked off of his receiver's hands and bounced into Panthers cornerback Chris Gamble's hands. 

The Panthers used the first possession of the game to advance down the field to the Vikings' 25-yard line, where they were forced to settle for a field goal.

At the 9:58 mark in the second quarter, Carolina punched it in from the Minnesota two-yard line to go up 10-0. That was all the Panthers would get.

After that the Vikings started clicking on all cylinders. 

The wheels started turning when a Ryan Longwell 28-yard field goal capped off a 69-yard drive that started at the Minnesota 22-yard line.  This score made the tally 10-3, Carolina.

The Vikings went into halftime with all the momentum after cornerback Antoine Winfield blindsided Panthers field general Jake Delhomme on a brutal hit off a strong side blitz.  

Delhomme would have seen Winfield coming, but he was already locked onto Steve Smith. 

Winfield stripped Delhomme of the ball and returned it 19 yards to the house, evening the score at 10 just before halftime.

The Panthers kicked off to Minnesota at the start of the second half.

The Vikings quickly culminated the resulting five-play, 80-yard drive with a 34-yard pass to tight end Visanthe Shiancoe to put them up 17-10.  This touchdown put Minnesota up for good.

The Vikings' last score came on a Ryan Longwell 32-yard field goal with 11:34 left in the fourth quarter. 

The Panthers survived with the lead until Winfield returned his forced fumble on Delhomme for a touchdown.

Carolina's rush defense was porous against second-year beast RB Adrian Peterson and his punishing counterpart, Chester Taylor.  Its offense was, at best, sporadic.  The running game in particular was stopped cold from the beginning. 

The pass defense is what really kept the Panthers in the game for awhile.

Countless early passes that should have been caught were dropped either because Minnesota's receivers had butterfingers or because a Panthers defensive back delivered a bone-jarring hit that knocked the ball free. 

But Minnesota's offensive coordinator soon made an adjustment.

Instead of trying to throw deeper passes, the Vikings started tossing shorter passes underneath the Carolina secondary.

With the linebackers having to stay close to the line of scrimmage to prevent giving one of Minnesota's running backs anything easy and the secondary playing way off the line of scrimmage (as is defensive coordinator Mike Trgovac's coaching style), Frerotte found receivers on short passes all day. 

Frerotte had a better day than his 204 passing yards indicate.  He was much more than a game manager—he made plays whenever he needed to, for the most part. 

In the final two frames he flat-out dominated, completing 7 of 10 passes for 107 yards, including a picture-perfect 48-yard bomb to receiver Bernard Berrian.

The Vikings obviously played a great game.  But there are two main reasons for this Panthers' loss.

One reason is the pedestrian job of coaching Carolina's whole staff did today. The biggest violator is offensive coordinator Jeff Davidson. 

I know that the Panthers love to run the ball—every Panthers fan knows that very well.  Both head coach John Fox and general manager Marty Hurney have made that clear thousands of times in the past. 

That was obviously Davidson's game plan today—run, run, run, and run some more.  Going into the game that seemed like a great approach. 

The Vikings' run defense had not really showed up yet this season. 

They let Packers RB Ryan Grant pick up 92 yards on 12 carries in their season-opening Monday Night game.  Last week they did shut down Joseph Addai, but he hasn't gotten going yet and he's running behind the worst offensive line he's dealt with in his tenure with the Colts. 

Today they showed up.  Minnesota clearly kept the run stagnant, yet Davidson stubbornly continued to go to the run.  He refused to make an adjustment. 

What makes his intractability even worse is that he finally had one of football's best receivers at his disposal in Smith; but he didn't use him!!!  Smith had only four catches for 70 yards.

It looked as if Smith would be a big part of Davidson's game plan; the first play-call of the game was a curl to Smith for a first down. 

But after that Smith may as well have still been suspended for another week—he virtually disappeared!

It bewilders me that Davidson stuck with an ineffective running game when he had a great passing attack to utilize.

But it wasn't entirely Davidson's fault.  Trgo should have made some adjustments, too. 

The Vikings didn't initially throw the ball well because they were playing right into the Panthers' deep-coverage pass defense. 

But Minnesota OC Darrell Bevell changed tactics and started calling shorter passes aimed to get the ball to receivers over the top of the run-committed linebackers and underneath the deep pass-conservative secondary.

The result?

Minnesota's passing game hit on all cylinders.  The receivers got the ball where they could do damage, and they took advantage. 

But did Trgo change strategies?  No.

He kept the secondary in deep-coverage schemes.  He needed to put the secondary in more press coverages.  Some short-pass committed Dime-Flat schemes would have worked wonders against Minnesota's air attack.

But he didn't.

The other reason is the offensive line. It only just barely blocked well enough to score 10 points in the first half.

The second half was a hundred times worse. 

The O-Line killed every big play the Panthers' offense made in the second half. Most of the team's 12 penalties for 67 yards were inflicted in the final two quarters. 

Sure, you could say that the offensive line couldn't hear anything in the rockin' Metrodome.  This probably contributed somewhat.

But I think that the line is definitely still gelling.

Most of the Panthers' penalties this year have been false starts.

This is still a very new line the Panthers have.  In each of the first three games Carolina has played one of the most defensively-sound teams in the NFL.  That's murderous on a group of offensive linemen that's still learning to trust each other. 

They all feel like they have to do everything to protect the QB or block for the RB on every play.  They know that these opposing defenses are extremely good.  This makes them anxious. 

This anxiety makes them jump the snap count to get an early edge on the defensive line, even if it's just a very slight edge.  This results in a false start. 

Basically, these offensive linemen don't completely trust each other.  They still need to gel—maybe a lot—before they can become the cohesive unit the Panthers need for their running game to become truly venerable. 

So there you have it.  The Vikings played a great game.  They deserved to win.  

But don't worry, Panthers fans. 

Carolina has the personnel to succeed.  Their coaches just need to learn how to best work their players into the game plan, and their offensive line needs some more time to gel.  But they will get there.  They're on their way.