With five and a half minutes left and down by ten points, Christian Ponder ended the Vikings hopes of winning by throwing two troubling passes deep, one of which ended up in a defender’s hands for an interception.
The Seahawks were then able to use their running game to chew the clock and essentially put the game to rest in drawn-out fashion.
The Vikings, for the second week in a row, were the only NFC North team to lose and are now closer to last place of the division than first place. At 5-4, the Vikings uphill battle to qualify for the postseason, and that battle is one I have trouble seeing them win with a passing game like this.
Your final score is 30-20, with Adrian Peterson rushing for 170 yards, but Christian Ponder only nabbing 58 yards through the air.
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Obviously another atrocious performance by the passing game in general, but the defense really crapped the bed today as well. D-line should be completely embarrased by how badly they got pushed around and I think this was the worst I've seen Erin Henderson and Jasper Brinkley play together. I gave them a break last week because the offense and special teams put them in such bad positions the entire game, but other than the early Percy fumble, that wasn't the case at all today. Coach called them out in a late week post for last weeks performance and he was right.
The defense played good enough to win, while I will admit they(Little Henderson, Brinkley, Guion) need to be replaced it is a little hard to put more than a fraction of the loss on them.
i'm surprised that ponder has regressed this long. i wanted to see him bounce back, now i'm wondering if he's got it in him at all
Brett,
Will you side with me yet and admit Ponder is (very close to) a lost cause. It is only his 2nd year yeah but wow he looks awful. In the first few weeks he looked "not bad" while not bad can lead a team to the playoffs he has been bad, and worse since. I still think we give him to the end of the year but after another god-awful performance I am sending my scouts to USC/Tennessee/Oklahoma/Arkansas to scout the top 4 QB's in next years draft class(no I am not counting Geno Smith hes gonna suck). I could be wrong but I believe that Ponder will be gone within 3 years and not starting anywhere after next year at the latest. This is the point where Mr Grant will say to calm down and I am overreacting, give the kid some time, or another reason I am wrong but I'm sorry I am right here. Ponder is a bust and Frazier should be fired, if by some miracle they turn their horrible qb play around Ill gladly eat my words but it isn't going to happen(my track record is 100% when I say a qb is dead).
As to the loss I can't blame anyone other than Ponder. Wr play was decent this game, defense was good enough to win, AP was, well AP. Yeah we allowed 30 points, but thats because we couldn't get any passing offense going, this isn't 1960's or even 1990's football where "Offense sells tickets but defense wins championships" no football is about offense now(and this is coming from a guy who played defense).
yeah, ponder looks to be in trouble. if his confidence isn't there, they'll replace him sooner than if only his physical skills were betraying him, and if our O could've clicked, they wouldn't have had as many opportunities to score 30 pts.
the last two weeks we looked bad against the run, but we did play against two good runners. we need a phat pat
You've got every right to be frustrated, Skol, as I felt we should have been much closer to winning this game. I agree that Ponder is making no points for himself right now, and I was most unhappy with the play calling on our third trip in to the red zone. Its time this team gets its passing woes corrected somehow. However, I do not agree that the defense played well enough to win. That was an ATROCIOUS performance by our defense, and if they continue to play that way, we are going to be back to needing to win games 38-35, and that's not going to get us anywhere.
Consider this, Skol, about yesterday's opponent. Seattle had not scored 30 on anyone else in the league through the first 8 games, and were having all sorts of trouble in the red zone, and yet we let them parade into the end zone all day long. Meanwhile, 6 of their eight opponents were held to 20 points or less (including the Packers - 12). This is a tough team to score on. You may want those high scoring wins, but the fact of the matter is that 30 points allowed will almost always result in a loss. Only two winning teams in the entire league allowed more that 20 points yesterday, while 6 of 7 teams that gave up 30 lost. We needed to win this game 23-16.
Yesterday was another testimony to the fact that the team who wins the line of scrimmage wins the game. We are losing that battle on both sides of the ball right now. And, as good as we tackled earlier in the season, well....
Couldn't have said it better myself.
Well, that's actually not true, I probably could have said it better, but not by much.
I'm tempted to see a compliment there, but I know how hard that would be for you. As a result, I am exercising the common sense that tells me, "No, there is no compliment there", (although "not by much" could serve as a consolation prize.)
I was forced to defend your views, as I completely agree with them. Know how hard that is for me???
I had to allay too much effusiveness with the slightest of pejoratives. Surely you understand.
You bet I understand. I'm on a couple of really strange sounding medications myself.
Meanwhile, I will endeavor to effusive less agreeable views so that you might more comfortably allay your guile upon them. (thank you... thank you very much.)
rogaine and viagra are strange sounding???
What do you get when you mix Rogaine and Viagra?
A: Hair that stands straight up on your head.
Hey, hey, hey... uncalled for Cal (or is that uncaled for Call?) I use neither of those products as I find I have (almost) no issues with any areas they might treat. As long as we are posting riddles however...
Q: What do you call meditations by Tim Tebow?
A. Christian ponders.
Coach...that was...great.
i see the ol bandwagon has some space
brett favre used sidney rice like a camera app on his cell phone, but they didn't do that so much today. rice was supposed to, according to the hype, have a big game against us. they also dropped passes, their qb threw a few bad ones, and they still beat us. it was actually a good, entertaining game until the 3rd qtr.
and next is detroit, who is improving, while we're going to try and hold ponder's hand until he puffs up his balls and plays like a first round qb
I'm sorry, but allowing 30 points is not "playing good enough to win," especially after allowing yet another RB to go over 100 yards on the ground. I'm not going to defend Ponder by any means, our passing game is so bad right now it's ridiculous, but the Seahawks controlled things up front before the time of possession should have taken a toll on them. I can understand them breaking down in the 4th quarter, but they were jumping off sides and blowing gap assignments the entire game. Even if the passing game was functional and this turned into a shootout I don't get the impression we would have won. The defense needs to take some share of the blame for this loss.
Outside of Peterson, pretty much the rest of this team was unwatchable.
Ponder doesn't just look bad, he looks REALLY bad. That's a definite concern.
Tomb, I'm finally gonna join you and call him "Big Reach" Ponder. Yikes!!! I heard Greg Colemans report after halftime and he was saying there were recievers open but Ponder wasnt seeing them.
The more I see out of Alan Williams defense the less I like it and dont get me started on Muskrat.
That's funny, I forgot about "Big Reach."
Normally I LOVE being right...but in this case...not so much. He really looked AWFUL.
Haha I remember on more than one occasion you and Coach going back and forth about this. I cant wait to see if our fearless leader is still gonna defend his position? No offense intended Coach.
No offense taken, johnny. The book isn't closed yet on Ponder, but I certainly expected better than this in year two. We HAD to get started down the road of developing a QB in that draft, so I don't fault what the brass did there. Even so, its time Ponder gets things going in a better direction than this.
Book isn't closed, but it is closing.
worst draft pick....ever? hmmmmm
Haha you might have had this pegged right from the start Count.
I agree with Cal, I want to see MBT get some time, nothing to lose at this point.
Tough to beat Troy Williamson, but Ponder's making a pretty good case.
AP is such a great RB. just wow. enjoy him, he won't play forever. lynch was good, too, and it was good to see reisner contribute. at this rate, we might finish with 6 wins. after our start, that'd be a let-down, but an improvement from last season. it's important that we find out, for the rest of this year, if ponder is our man. i'd like to see MBT, too, kid has an arm
I think I was more bothered by Ponder's play today than I have been his past few stinkers. Even last week I could find some positive things like him making an effort to look off the safety, but his play today was just terrible. The accuracy issue is something I thought he could work through, but it's getting old and his decision making is getting worse as the season goes on. I also don't see him doing anything on the sideline to try and rally the troops when things are going bad. The camera just shows him standing alone looking puzzled. I'm not writing him off as the whole passing game is a mess, but I thought the struggles today were more on him than Musgrave, atleast in the first half. The second half I'm not so sure. Other than the last play where Percy came open across the middle as the ball was being intercepted on the sideline, I don't recall seeing anyone running wide open, but Ponder's perception of what is open has certainly changed since that first month of the season. The defense still gets a couple thumbs down from me as well today.
Is it just me or does Ponder consistently throw the longer balls into double and triple coverage and more times than not out of bounds and uncatchable?
Geez I cant believe we've had no comments from Angry Brett or Angry Freds?