Daily Norseman
The Minnesota Vikings completed the first of two joint practices with the New England Patriots today at TCO Performance Center. There were a lot of noteworthy things that took place during this practice. Here are my notes.
It probably isn’t news that an offensive line with Garrett Bradbury at center and a couple rookies at left guard and left tackle had a tough time against the Vikings’ defensive front, but they did. By one count among the Patriots media here they allowed a total of six sacks, plus were flagged for two holding penalties. So, it was a pretty dominant performance by the Vikings’ defensive front- a theme we’ve seen throughout training camp that is likely to carry-on into the regular season.
What wasn’t so good was the performance of the Vikings’ secondary in pass coverage. There was a blown coverage that led to an easy toss-and-catch touchdown for Drake Maye to Mack Hollins and another one to TreVeyon Henderson, who had another nice catch on tight coverage from Blake Cashman- all three plays shown below.
But apart from the coverage lapses, it was pretty much small ball for the Patriots- short runs and passes- with plenty of pressure from the Vikings’ front seven who dominated the Patriots’ offensive line.
The Vikings secondary did have a couple picks of Josh Dobbs- both pick 6s, one by Dwight McGlothern and the other by Jay Ward.
In drills, however, things didn’t go so well for the Vikings’ secondary.
I didn’t see much from the Patriots first-team offense in the ground game, but the lapses in pass coverage gave the Patriots’ first-team offense some easy TDs – something the Vikings’ first-team offense did not have. Vikings’ CB Byron Murphy Jr. talked a bit about the lapses in coverage after practice was over:
When the Vikings’ first-team offense was out there, it was mostly short completions and running plays- similar to the first preseason game- only this time T.J. Hockenson was McCarthy’s favorite target- although he hit Jordan Addison and Jalen Nailor a couple times too.
One of the takeaways from this practice was that outside of Jordan Addison, the other Vikings’ receivers working with the first-team- Lucky Jackson and Jalen Nailor- aren’t getting open much. I don’t believe Lucky Jackson was targeted at all today.
A certain amount of the small ball thing may also have been the play calling. There weren’t a lot of vertical routes on the call sheet today in 11-on-11s, and maybe that was by design. Certainly Kevin O’Connell isn’t showing a lot, even in joint practices, which is normal. But it may also be that they’re working on the run game and run blocking with three new interior linemen and a new running back, and also working on the screen game rather than the deep route concepts that are a big part of O’Connell’s offense. But with Justin Jefferson not participating, perhaps...
