Vikings Compared to ‘Dumb and Dumber’ Film
If you’re looking for a logical comparison regarding the 2025 Minnesota Vikings’ offense, former Vikings linebacker Ben Leber has the special sauce: a quote from Dumb and Dumber.
Not a place where any NFL team wants to be, the Minnesota Vikings have been compared to the 1994 screwball comedy movie ‘Dumb and Dumber.’
Minnesota’s season had bent off the rails, mainly due to poor offense, and that’s evidently a prompt to channel Dumb and Dumber quotes.
Vikings Offense Is Like Dumb and Dumber
Not an enviable comparison.
The Ben Leber Comparison
Leber spoke about the Vikings’ horrid loss at Seattle, their first shutout in about 20 years.
He said, “I know this is gonna sound bold, but I think our offense is broken. I think systemically, our offense is broken, and I’m not sure what it’s gonna take to fix it. You know that line in Dumb and Dumber when one of them says, ‘Just when I thought you couldn’t get any dumber, you go and do something like this?'”
“This is how I feel about this Vikings offense right now. After last week to this week, just when I thought the offense couldn’t get any worse, they go out and have a performance like they did today.”
It’s also worth noting that Leber is usually seen as an eternal optimist for the Vikings, making this critique especially hard-hitting.
QB Play to Blame
How in the hell did Minnesota get to Dumb and Dumber status? It’s the quarterbacks, stupid.
J.J. McCarthy is the NFL’s worst passer through 13 weeks per EPA+CPOE. He also has the second-worst efficiency of any quarterback in the last two decades through his first six starts, trailing only JaMarcus Russell.
And when McCarthy sustained a concussion, undrafted rookie Max Brosmer took over, somehow playing worse than McCarthy last weekend.
In September and October, Carson Wentz steadied the ship to a degree, but Minnesota lost him to a shoulder injury in late October.
The Vikings’ miserable offensive output is almost exclusively due to atrocious quarterback efficiency.
Kevin O’Connell Woes with Young QBs
O’Connell has cooked with Kirk Cousins, Joshua Dobbs (for two games), Nick Mullens, Sam Darnold, and the aforementioned Wentz (sort of) in his young head coaching career. His win-loss record with veteran quarterbacks is stellar.
O’Connell has not cooked with rookie passers. All iterations of his offense with J.J. McCarthy, Jaren Hall, and Max Brosmer have mostly resembled garbage.
According to this map of the Vikings’ offense, they’ve only gone four inches. And O’Connell’s offense fell off the jetway again.
There is also an “Excuse me, Flo?” joke in there somewhere from Dumb and Dumber involving Brian Flores. You decide.
Now What?
The prognosis? Well, fans will merely wait for McCarthy’s lightbulb moment — if that’s a thing.
Most young quarterbacks show their true-true colors around 250-300 dropbacks in the pros. McCarthy is about two games from that mark. If the math is correct, the consistent form of McCarthy — good or bad — should bleed through in Week 15 at Dallas or Week 16 at New York.
Otherwise, if McCarthy isn’t any good, the franchise will be quarterback shopping in three months.
More from Leber
Leber also said after the loss, “Our offensive line is beat up, we’re injured, we missed the left side of our offensive line, we missed Ryan Kelly again in this game because of a hip injury, so we had three backups playing on our offensive line against maybe the best defensive front that we’ve played this whole season.”
“It’s not gonna work. Midway through the fourth quarter, we had 11 yards rushing. Awful. I know that we want to run the football, but it’s hard to when our offensive line can’t block anybody. They had seven guys in coverage most of the time, didn’t have to blitz. Brosmer’s out there running for his life, and then when he wasn’t, he was throwing to guys that were covered. All of you at home, I agree with you.”
Leber played off-ball linebacker for the Vikings for five seasons in the late 2000s.
He continued, “I don’t know what we’re doing putting the ball in Max Brosmer’s hands on 4th and 1 on that play, in their red zone. On a rollout pass for a ‘non-athletic’ quarterback against one of the best defensive fronts in the league. It took away points, it took away opportunity, I think it killed the confidence of this team.”
“Run the ball. I know that we weren’t running it with amazing efficiency, but it’s one yard. It was actually probably less than one yard. Let’s hope that this is rock bottom. Let’s hope this is it. I can’t believe I’m saying this, hopefully McCarthy is back next week because he actually gives us a fighting chance against the Commanders.”
The Vikings’ Dumb and Dumber offense will face the Washington Commanders‘ defense this Sunday at U.S. Bank Stadium. Minnesota is expected to lose by a point or two. Minnesota will invite Washington right in for tea and strumpets.
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