Carolina at Minnesota

The NFL is the one professional sport where a team's season can end after the third game. 0-3 is a hole that no team has ever dug themselves out of. Even with a win in their next game, a team is still 1-3 and already a quarter of the way through the season. There's not much time to catch-up, especially if any of those losses came to division rivals.

The Minnesota Vikings find themselves facing this very possibility; an off season full of hope and expectations close to being drubbed out before they even get their star safety and veteran left tackle on the field. If they allow Carolina to beat them at home, there will be no coming back. The 2008 Vikings will be playing for a draft pick.

Brad Childress responded to the enormity of this game by benching Tarvaris Jackson. Gus Frerotte will start. (Ever notice that everybody says "Ta-var-iss" and "Fer-ott"? Where did those extra R's go?) The only reason, and a valid one, is that the Vikings are 0-2. It is actually a much more complicated situation. Jackson is still the only real option the Viking have for the future. This team is built to win in the next couple years, and drafting another QB will be a waste of the veteran talent on the team. Free-agency is rarely the answer for NFL teams at the quarterback position. 

And Jackson is being benched for the team's record more than for his play. His failures have been blown out of proportion after both games. Everybody who claims that he has digressed clearly did not watch Jackson in 2006 or 2007. More accurately, Jackson seems to be playing at the same level as he was in Weeks 16 and 17 last season; which is to say, he isn't throwing the ball very accurately. 

Jackson has been the victim of the incompetence of teammates and coaches alike. Visanthe Shiancoe has dropped at least two critical passes, on of them a touchdown that almost certainly would have giving the team a large enough cushion to beat Indianapolis last Sunday. Childress and offensive coordinator Darrell Bevell have produced some of the most conservation and predictable game plans that this spectator has ever seen. To say that they were trying to protect Jackson goes beyond understatement. Jackson has not been allowed to do anything other than hand the ball off and throw slants. Since the defense knows this, there are usually about four defenders on Bernard Berrian or Bobby Wade.

Jackson could have produced these exact same performances, and still be the starter had the Vikings won either game. But, Childress is under pressure to win, and win now, so Frerotte is the man. 

So can the Vikings climb out of this hole and become the contender they were predicted to be? At least for one week, yes, they can. Frerotte will bring some balance and some confidence to the offense, and they should be able to put up more than 20 points between Frerotte and the running game. The desperation factor cannot be overlooked in this game either. The Vikings have to win this game, and they have enough veterans who know it. Add to that that the game is at the Metrodome, and the Vikings should have an emotional edge on Sunday. 

Vikings 24, Panthers 16