The Vikings Are Sloppy Football Team — And It Shows
The Minnesota Vikings fell to their sixth loss of the season thanks to a Cairo Santos field goal as time expired at US Bank Stadium. In truth, Minnesota was fortunate even to have a chance at winning the game after a performance riddled with errors and poor play.
The Minnesota Vikings are playing like a sloppy football team, and it’s becoming increasingly obvious as mistakes pile up across all three phases in 2025.
The 19-17 loss realistically ended any hopes Minnesota had of making a run to the playoffs this season. From here, it would take an incredible run over the last seven games that, quite frankly, this team doesn’t look capable of.
The Vikings? Just Plain Slop.
The team’s young quarterback will take a lot of the heat, but the problems right now in Minnesota certainly don’t begin and end with J.J. McCarthy. The 2025 Vikings are a sloppy football team in all three phases of the game. Thankfully, the false start issues that plagued the offensive line in Week 10 were tidied up in Week 11. There was just one false start with Christian Darrisaw, the guilty party.
Kevin O’Connell’s team is capable of good things, but there’s not enough of it to outweigh the slop. Over the last two games, we have seen all the signs of what makes a bad football team.
McCarthy’s passing accuracy has been poor, which is not entirely unexpected, but we need to start seeing improvement. When he gets into a rhythm, it looks good; when he’s not, it looks wild. The discrepancy between the good and the bad is too vast, and there’s too much bad.
The Vikings’ cause on Sunday wasn’t helped by their receivers’ case of the dropsies. There were times when McCarthy’s inaccuracy and lack of touch made catches harder than they needed to be, but there were also some flat-out drops.
That is a recipe for a bad day on offense. If that were the only problem, I wouldn’t have so much concern. McCarthy either comes good or he doesn’t, and we move on, and the Vikings’ receivers are talented enough to put Sunday down as just a bad day at the office. However, the problems for the Vikings don’t end there.
Sloppy Play All Over the Team
Against the Ravens, penalties were a game wrecker, and we had fumbles on special teams. Myles Price has proved to be a dynamic returner; however, three fumbles in 10 games are a concern that needs tidying up. Will Reichard is a solid kicker, but outside of that, the Vikings’ special teams unit has been poor and collects penalty flags at an alarming rate. As it stands, special teams coordinator Matt Daniels will be fortunate to still be in a job next year.
It feels harsh to criticize the defense after they kept the Bears to just 19 points despite being kept in the field so much that there was little time to rest. However, this defense could be great, but there are some issues of their own making that are holding them back.
This might be the worst tackling defense I’ve ever seen from a Vikings team. The number of times we see a defender get their hands on a QB or runner in the open field but either fail to finish the tackle or gain another 5-10 yards downfield is actually insane. There are notable exceptions like Blake Cashman and Andrew Van Ginkel, but the tackling on this team has been very poor this season.
Minnesota invested heavily in the defensive line this offseason, but the best players are still the ones who were here last season. In hindsight, they might have wanted to improve a secondary that is one of the league’s weakest. Coverage had been a weak area of the team for a while, but the ability to take the ball away went some way to make up for it. Through 10 games this season, the Vikings have only three interceptions as a team – only the New York Jets have fewer. Married with turning the ball over on offense, the Vikings have a turnover differential of -9; once again, only the Jets are worse.
Question Marks Over the Leadership
When a team looks this sloppy, there is only one place to look. Leadership. A team is a reflection of the people who lead it, and right now that reflection doesn’t look good. Where the blame lies is open to debate, with question marks over the performance of Kwesi Adofo-Mensah, particularly in the draft, and O’Connell’s in-game decision-making.
Both need to be better if the Vikings are going to find consistent success, rather than the one-good, one-bad season trade-off we have seen through the first four years of their tenure. The impatient might be calling for firings already, but I’m not there yet – though the GM is on a shorter leash. O’Connell’s .623 win percentage is not to be sniffed at, and it has earned him the right to try to fix this mess.
That does need to happen. A sloppy team that lets itself down with fundamentals like this team is doing right now just isn’t good enough.
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