Image courtesy of Vikings.com
Some critics of the Minnesota Vikings were quick to point out the “strength of schedule” that they faced early on in 2015 as a reason for their success. The convincing 20-10 victory against the Atlanta Falcons, however, is a good start to quieting that crowd one week after the Vikings suffered their worst loss of the year at the hands of the Green Bay Packers.
This week featured numerous solid performances across the roster, but this will be the shortest list of nominations for our heralded (by me) weekly award. I’ll get to that in a second, but first we should review the 2015 winners thus far:
WEEK ELEVEN: Teddy Bridgewater
This week’s nominations feature only two guys. You can click “OTHER” if you like, and cast your vote via the comments section, but if you think someone outside of these two guys deserves the game ball this week then you are simply overthinking things.
ADRIAN PETERSON
Adrian Peterson walked into Atlanta prepared to face the NFL’s top run defense. He walked out of Atlanta as the league’s top rusher and dropped the Falcons all the way to the nine spot on the rushing defense rankings. He amassed 158 yards on 29 carries, a 5.4 yard per carry average, wearing down that Atlanta Falcons defense with every carry. Outside of a clunker of a dropped pass, none of Peterson detractors appeared on Sunday, as he held up well enough in pass protection and kept himself from turning the ball over. He scored both of Minnesota’s touchdowns for the day, including a beautiful 35 yard nail-in-the-coffin dash to put the game away late in the fourth quarter. Peterson added two catches for 29 yards to his already impressive day.
ANTHONY BARR
The Vikings won the turnover battle against Atlanta, a point of emphasis after the Green Bay loss, and a huge part of that were Anthony Barr’s two forced fumbles. The first came early in the game after Falcons running back Tevin Coleman sprinted for 46 yards, but Barr made the ultimate hustle play when he snuck up behind Coleman and punched the ball out to prevent points from going on the board. The second came late in the game, just prior to Peterson’s long touchdown run, when Barr stripped quarterback Matt Ryan on fourth down to effectively end Atlanta’s hopes of a comeback. Technically, Atlanta recovered that second fumble for themselves, but the turnover on downs was every bit as effective as a Vikings recovery. Even outside of those splash plays, Barr was just generally a roaming monster all afternoon, and he put together an eight tackle outing (one for a loss) and added a pass deflection to his stat line.
OTHER: I know, I know… there are other guys worthy of notice for the job they did on Sunday. Still, Peterson and Barr stand alone on that top shelf in terms of being dominant game-changers. If you disagree with that statement, go ahead and click “OTHER” and cast your vote via the comments section below.
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Gotta go with Zach Line this week. His lone reception for a 1st down in the opening quarter clearly struck fear into the hearts of the Falcon defenders. If you look closely at the game tape, every defender was keying in on Zach, even when he was sitting on the bench. My second choice would be Anthony Barr.
Can't believe whoever created this poll slighted Zach Line.
I went with AD. He had some great runs, some great 4-5 yard runs.
I think Rhodes should've gotten a mention, was all over the Julio...maybe the best WR in the game right now.
I agree on Rhodes but don't think he could have beat these two. I voted for Barr because I think if he doesn't force that fumble, it's a completely different ball game.
Hey,did you just copy my post Brett? :)
I went with Anthony Barr.His turnovers were crucial and helped take momentum from Atlanta and swing it back our way.If Tevin Coleman scores we could have been looking at a whole different ball game.
Adrian played great too,but I just felt that Anthony deserved this one a little more.
I JUST said the same. Great minds think alike?
Clearly Barr for this week, but Exum Jr. got the job done filling in for Harrison and deserves some praise for his performance this week as well.
Wonder what the missing ingredient is with our defense?? If we would have played GB like we played Atlanta we would be 9-2. I'm still trying to get the San Fran game out of my memory banks. We have a Jeckell and Hyde kinda defense. Maybe it's because of young players. I really think if we can play consistently like the Atlanta game, we are going to win a lot more games. They are the best in the NFL when they are ON. What does Zim have to do to keep them ON in the big televised games??
I love All Day and I'm happy for him because, trust me, I always said that he still has at least 2-3 season like this before start a slowly decline, but I cannot give my vote to anyone not named Anthony Barr today. His 1st FF was a truly masterpiece to see, a wonderful mix of vision, athleticism and technique. It may be rhetorical but really, this kid has a bright future to come, hopefully as bright as Vikings one..
barr
I went with 'Other'. Harrison Smith once again. I know, I know, he wasn't even playing. Doesn't matter. It was Harrison's unselfishness, taking himself out of the game, to Give Antione Exum his first NFL start.
If he hadn't done that, we'd not have a had a chance to see that Exum can play football! What a magnificent gesture! Player of the Week! (Harry, still haven't received that game-worn jersey. Did you lose my address??)
If you ask nicely, maybe Ole can hook you up with an authentic game-worn purple thong.
True that, Tomb. I have a game worn "Escaped Convict and Warden's Wife" Purple Thong that I would be willing to part with.