The 6-0 Vikings Aren't Frauds Because No One is Fooled

The Minnesota Vikings eked out another grind-it-out, defensive smothering of an inferior opponent while managing to raise questions for their offense.

In a way, this was supposed to be the best possible scenario for the Vikings offense; the unit had been as healthy as one could possibly imagine coming off of a bye week, and the early-season rust should be all but gone.

With a week to self-scout, surely they could hone in on the items the offense needed to improve.

Many readers don’t realize that they aren’t logged in or aren’t reading the full story! Only paying subscribers (including those on a free trial) have access to the full written content on Wide Left. Make sure you’re logged in or subscribed if you want to access everything we’ve written.

_{Wide Left is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support our work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.}

This was an opportunity against a below-average defense (allowing +0.07 EPA entering Week 7) whose offense surrendered field position regularly, allowing teams to start on their own 31.9-yard line on average, seventh-worst among defenses in the NFL.

They were the second-worst defense in the NFL at generating turnovers and allowed the fifth-worst yards per play in the league (5.97). This should have been a get-right game, right?

The Vikings offense scored one touchdown, with three field goals supplementing the effort to produce a 16-point outing. Luckily, the defense was once again dominant. They took an offense with an above-average points-per-drive output this year (2.22) and an average success rate (42.1 percent) and smothered it to within an inch of its life.

Despite an early rushing touchdown — courtesy of the only 15-plus yard run the Colts would manage all game — Indianapolis was held to their season-low in points, with ten. This was, of course, helped along with a pair of field goal misses from the previously reliable Spencer Shrader, who entered the game without having missed a field goal and just one extra point.

Let’s talk about how it happened.

The Vikings, it might surprise you to learn, blitzed a lot.

Importantly, however, they blitzed a lot for a team that has already redefined what it means to “blitz a lot” — this was their most blitz-happy game of the season at 92.6 percent (per PFF). We are inching ever closer to the brass ring: a 100 percent blitz rate.

This is a good time to check the Vikings’ season-long blitz rate and how it compares to other NFL team-seasons.

This was almost destined to be a poor matchup for the Colts. This year, Daniel Jones has only generated a success on 45.3 percent of plays when blitzed, turtling to throw at one of the shortest distances in the NFL against pressure looks: 5.96 yards downfield. The Colts ranked 26th in EPA per play against blitzes.

On top of that, the Vikings are one of the most prolific Cover-2 users in the NFL, a weakness for Jones, who ranks 30^th in EPA per play against Cover-2 looks. Against all zone coverages (the Vikings rank second in zone usage, per PFF), the Colts rank 28th.

Indianapolis generally did well against four-man rushes with man coverage on the back end. That’s not what the Vikings do.

In this game, the Vikings put pressure on at a 59.3 percent rate, the highest pressure rate in the NFL in Week 7. It is the second-highest pressure rate a quarterback has seen all year, with only Malik Willis game against… the Vikings in Week 4.

The Vikings defense has the No. 1 (Willis, Week 4), No. 2 (Jones, Week 7), No. 4 (Jordan Love, Week 1), and No. 7 (Caleb Williams, Week 2) spots on the pressured leaderboard.

No other team has more than one top-ten performance. Indeed, no team has multiple performances in the top 20, with only Seattle making a repeat appearance in the top 21 (No. 16 against Justin Herbert in Week 4 and No. 21 against Marcus Mariota in Week 3).

Jones was under loads of pressure. This time, it didn’t necessarily come from Dallas Turner, who led the league in pressure production through the first four weeks. Instead, it came from off-ball linebackers.

Blake Cashman had one of the best defensive games of football I’ve ever seen from a linebacker. He stuffed the traditional box score stats — 12 tackles (8 solo), 2 sacks, 3 QB hits, and 4 (four!!) pass deflections.

But he also dominated the advanced charting stats, too. His four pass deflections came on just 15 coverage snaps, an absurd rate of 26.7 percent of coverage snaps where he deflected the pass. The next-highest belongs to Max Melton for the Cardinals against the Chargers in Week 1 — 13.3 percent. After that, Quentin Lake for the Rams against the Giants in Week 2 had three on 31 snaps (9.7 percent).