What could have been.

AGRforever wrote:
We have the defense. We have the offense less a QB. This coulda been us. What could have been.

Roger that!  We'll see if JJM's 3rd year is the charm and injury free...

The Seahawks have asked very very little from Darnold in this game. Makes you wonder why.

Canthony wrote:
The Seahawks have asked very very little from Darnold in this game. Makes you wonder why.

He's made some very big pass plays and leading his team.  Very, very little is a gross exaggeration

Add in 306 yards and 3 TD is very, very little???

Canthony wrote:
The Seahawks have asked very very little from Darnold in this game. Makes you wonder why.

lol are we watching the same game?

Canthony wrote:
The Seahawks have asked very very little from Darnold in this game. Makes you wonder why.

346 yards, 3 TDs and no picks and also a few key scramble, yeah very little!  Lol!

FIRE KWESI

THIS ^^^

JR44 wrote:

346 yards, 3 TDs and no picks and also a few key scramble, yeah very little!  Lol!

Just not a fan. However, the Seahawks should beat the Patriots as they are the better team. I still think you have to go with the QB you picked top 10. Hindsight always sucks. I think the decision was the right one.

Sam Darnold is headed to the Super Bowlpic.twitter.com/fSX76RuX11

— VikingzFanPage (@vikingzfanpage) January 26, 2026

The Seahawks and the Patriots can win Super Bowls, fall off the map, hire new regimes and build back up to be Super Bowl teams again…

… all while the Vikings stumble around trying to win a playoff game. Any playoff game. With no Super Bowl trips since the 70s.

It’s wild.

— Phil Mackey 🎙 (@PhilMackey) January 26, 2026

DeepFreeze05 wrote:
https://x.com/PhilMackey/status/2015622374477980080

It is all about having owners who know how to put the right people in charge of the franchise.  The GM and coach right now are both a complete disaster who wouldn't know what a Super Bowl QB looked like if they got to see them in practice and games for a full season.  Next year is going to be a complete mess if we think we are running back with this same crew.

To be honest, a lot of things went wrong, not just QB for us. I also think we could learn a lot from both offenses tonight, scheme-wise. I'm not sure KOC has the offense that can attack defenses in enough ways, yet. I think a good defense still just takes it away and we have no counterpunch. I'm just saying I don't think Darnold, here, would be equal to Darnold in Seattle.

Sammy would not have had the success here that he's had in Seattle. For one, Kubes is a superior play caller to KOC, especially in his use of the screen game. Seattle's RBs even without Charbonnet, are better than Minnesota's. Seattle's OL is also better than Minnesota's especially in pass pro. All factors that have led to the success of Sammy's season.

Knucklehead wrote:
Sammy would not have had the success here that he's had in Seattle. For one, Kubes is a superior play caller to KOC, especially in his use of the screen game. Seattle's RBs even without Charbonnet, are better than Minnesota's. Seattle's OL is also better than Minnesota's especially in pass pro. All factors that have led to the success of Sammy's season.

Wow, don't agree with any of that. For the Vikings in 2024, Darnold had more yards, TEN more TDs and far fewer turnovers than he did this season in Seattle. And 2025 would've been Darnold going into his 2nd season in KOC's offense too. He would've played great here again, probably quite a bit better than in Seattle is my guess. 

But again, while they could've found a way to keep him, it's pretty hard to justify paying a QB $100M over 3 years when you just drafted your franchise QB. That's what it would've taken to keep him. And even THEN, he'd still be competing in Minnesota. There was no competition in Seattle. So in other words, it likely would've taken much more money to get him to stay than what he got from Seattle.

StickierBuns wrote:
So prepare yourself Viking's fans: this whole offseason is going to suck on social media and national media. Vikings fucked up not resigning Uncle Sammy, org. is screwed with JJ McCarthy, KOC/KAM sucks, the Wilfs blow: pick your narrative. KOC does need to right the offensive ship for '26 however, all drama and angst aside...ideally with McCarthy as QB1. That'll show his instinct was right. But who knows?

Most interested to see who Minnesota brings in to compete with JJM for QB1.

Yeah X is chock-full of armchair geniuses dunking on the Vikes today.

I'm not too worried about people on X, but what they're saying isn't not totally unfair. We did have Kubiak, Darnold, and Bradbury all here and they've all had more success very quickly without us. Of course none of the keyboard warriors were pounding the table for the Vikings to re-sign Darnold or Bradbury after we flamed out last season but nevermind all that...

Watching the Seahawks go to the SB I absolutely feel like it could've been us. They're built very similarly. Last year we had the QB but no O-Line and worse FG Kicking. This year we had a better defense and kicking, but no QB. The life of a Vikes fan.

Sidenote- Raiders fans have moved onto Mendoza but Geno Smith leaving the Seahawks and them becoming the "best" team, and going to the Raiders only to help make them the worst team, is a sharp turn of events ha.

I'd say that cherry-picking memories for pity parties doesn't do much good.

Sam is on a team that is suited to his playing style, including good line protection and a running game that can be the focus of their offense.

We have many of the needed ingredients, but our offensive line had how many variations last season? Remember Atlanta running right through our defense? Remember the drops, the errors, the constant wishing for better CBs?

JJM earned most of the good and bad commentary that he gets, but it's romanticized fiction to put it all on the Sam to JJ change.

MyIdaho wrote:

He's made some very big pass plays and leading his team.  Very, very little is a gross exaggeration

Add in  306 yards and 3 TD is very, very little???

25-36 is a 70% completion rate.   I would take that all day every day.

I think what this comes down to the decision was made, come hell or high water the organization was going to use the rookie contract of McCarthy to propel the Vikings to a Super Bowl by buying players. One could point to the Patriots right now as to the legitimacy of that strategy. However, the one BIG difference IMO is the drafting and FA pickups. Second is the coaching. Just how pray tell can Bradbury leave the Vikings and become a great player in NE? Ed Ingram the same thing. Vikings let Tonga walk as well. I have no way of knowing this but had the Vikings told Sam he was the starter going in and JJ the backup would he have stayed? Why not make it a priority to sign Darnold and if he falters and JJ is the guy so be it.

If Darnold was on our team and we were playing either the Rams or Seattle (assuming Seattle had viable QB play), would it have turned out any different than last year vs either the Rams or Lions? In my mind, we’d still be calling 4 second long pass plays, still not running the ball, still got a broken Oline, Darnold still taking a ton of sacks, a ton of hits, getting flustered and making mistakes.

The offense Seattle ran yesterday was markedly different than what we ran. They weren’t trying to hit homeruns every play. Darnold was efficient. He was hitting open receivers wherever they were, not just 25 yards down the field, and frequently they were much closer to the LOS than what we normally run. Multiple times, you’d see them hitting a 7 yard pass, than another 5 yard pass to move the chains.

I just don’t think KOC has learned any lessons from the past two years. I think he’s still of the mindset that once the players get good enough, he’ll be able to run his perfect offense, but he needs superstars at every position for it to work, and when you don’t have superstars at every position, you get the 2025 offense which looks like one of the worst offenses in our history. Meanwhile, other OCs are designing offenses for the QBs they have, the OLines they have, etc. Their offenses look different depending on which defenses they’re playing. If the defense takes away what they do best, they pivot to attack what the defense is weak at.

medaille wrote:
If Darnold was on our team and we were playing either the Rams or Seattle (assuming Seattle had viable QB play), would it have turned out any different than last year vs either the Rams or Lions?  In my mind, we’d still be calling 4 second long pass plays, still not running the ball, still got a broken Oline, Darnold still taking a ton of sacks, a ton of hits, getting flustered and making mistakes.

The offense Seattle ran yesterday was markedly different than what we ran.  They weren’t trying to hit homeruns every play.  Darnold was efficient.  He was hitting open receivers wherever they were, not just 25 yards down the field, and frequently they were much closer to the LOS than what we normally run.  Multiple times, you’d see them hitting a 7 yard pass, than another 5 yard pass to move the chains.

I just don’t think KOC has learned any lessons from the past two years.  I think he’s still of the mindset that once the players get good enough, he’ll be able to run his perfect offense, but he needs superstars at every position for it to work, and when you don’t have superstars at every position, you get the 2025 offense which looks like one of the worst offenses in our history.  Meanwhile, other OCs are designing offenses for the QBs they have, the OLines they have, etc.  Their offenses look different depending on which defenses they’re playing.  If the defense takes away what they do best, they pivot to attack what the defense is weak at.

This is 100% correct. It would have looked a lot like the Rams playoff game last year where our offensive line was getting pummeled, but OConnell was still calling these deep developing pass plays. 29th in called run plays since KOC has been the coach. He's not changing, so good luck to whoever the quarterback is going to be and they better hope the offensive line can stay healthy. Also good luck to whoever the new o-line coach is going to be because you are going to get blamed for it.

I think you need to look at the Rams more than Seattle when it comes to a "cousin" of the Vikings offensive philosophy...

On that offense? Stout offensive line, Puka/Davonte, just enough running and a pin point general in Stafford stir the drink.

They also got more stout on their DL in a year to better compete in division games.

I think their GM doesnt get enough credit. If McCarthy grows into the real deal at QB, the Vikings will look more like the Rams up North than Seattle.