Despite the fact that the Vikings are coming off a 2019 playoff berth, Minnesota finds itself in quite the hole to start 2020.
The team is 1-5. The defense has struggled to keep opposing offenses off the field. Most quarterbacks have not had too many issues picking apart the young Vikings secondary.
But it’s not all on the defense. Kirk Cousins has been inconsistent. One thing Cousins has not done well is finding a variety of targets in the passing game. Players like Bisi Johnson and Kyle Rudolph haven’t been huge factors in the offense.
Rudolph recently spoke with CBS Sports about the Vikings’ start to 2020 and how the team addressed the bye week.
“When you go back and look at it — for us as an offense — we break things down and study and you wouldn’t believe at 1-5 you would be in the top five and top three in almost 10 statistical categories. And when you look at that it makes you wonder how we are losing football games. Then you go and look at ‘okay, what are we not doing so well’ and then you see our lack of execution in the third quarter and turnovers. Just like we were in the top three in a lot of categories, we were in the bottom three — if not last — in all of those.”
Rudolph also said the bye gave the team some perspective.
“We studied it and now we got to address it. We have a 10-game season starting with three straight division games to get this thing back on track.”