Show Host Airs False and Bizarre Claim about Vikings
It’s all because of an easy schedule.
Show Host Airs False and Bizarre Claim about Vikings
The Minnesota Vikings have sprinted to a 5-0 record out of the gate in 2024 thanks to a cakewalk of opponents, says Woodward Sports‘ Neal Ruhl.
“The Minnesota Vikings are not a threat to the Lions. When you’re a crappy team, and you get an easy schedule, that’s the way this works. It’s designed for this everyone,” Ruhl said on the Woodward Sports YouTube show this week.
For context, these are the Vikings’ wins so far:
- New York Giants — W (28-6)
- San Francisco 49ers — W (23-17)
- Houston Texans — W (34-7)
- Green Bay Packers — W (31-29)
- New York Jets — W (23-17)
Before and after each meeting — and to this day — Minnesota’s last four wins have occurred against teams with Top 12 Super Bowl odds, rendering Ruhl’s claim absolutely false. In fact, the exact opposite is true: it would be challenging to script a more difficult schedule for the Vikings.
Ruhl didn’t stop with the easy schedule declaration. “In 13 days, the Lions will be in first place in the NFC North,” he continued, “They will be. And everyone will say, ‘Oh, I knew the Vikings were no threat, and stuff like that.’ I like how it’s going down, because if you think that this is what the Vikings are, let me let you in on a little secret about how the NFL works everybody, when you suck and you don’t make the playoffs, this is what the scheduling is designed to do everybody.”
According to ESPN’s Football Power Index (FPI), the Vikings have played the league’s sixth-toughest schedule through five weeks, which is the antithesis of “easy.”
Minnesota also leads the NFL in victory margin, defeating teams by an average of 12.6 points per game. And, yes, that includes the aforementioned four Super Bowl contenders.
Per Sharp Football Analysis, Minnesota undertook the NFL’s third-hardest schedule in 2024, a raw deal for a team that finished in third place inside the NFC North a season ago. Thankfully for the team’s sake, a brutally tricky schedule simply hasn’t mattered.
The Vikings have some flaws, indeed, despite the 5-0 start — they turn the ball over too frequently, have experienced some special teams gaffes, and teams with superstar interior defensive linemen give them problems — but an easy schedule is a theory conjured out of thin air.
Nevertheless, when Minnesota hosts Detroit in Week 7, the showdown mentioned by Ruhl, the purple team is an early three-point underdog.
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Dustin Baker is a political scientist who graduated from the University of Minnesota in 2007. Subscribe to his daily YouTube Channel, VikesNow. The show features guests, analysis, and opinion on all things related to the purple team, with 4-7 episodes per week. His Vikings obsession dates back to 1996. Listed guilty pleasures: Peanut Butter Ice Cream, ‘The Sopranos,’ Basset Hounds, and The Doors (the band). He follows the NBA as closely as the NFL.
All statistics provided by Pro Football Reference / Stathead; all contractual information provided by OverTheCap.com.
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