The Seer Sees A Purple Meltdown
Illness has felled the Seer this week, and so we're going to focus only on the Vikings game. At this point, the Seer is 96-77, good for a 55.5% success rate against the spread.
This game is such a no doubter, we can't even fathom it.
Seahawks @ Vikings, Vikings by 1
Run, don't walk, to your phone or computer to put your money down on this one. The Vikings of the late '90s and early '00s have specialized in horrific collapses. It can happen in one game (twice in the NFC Championship to very beatable teams), or it can happen after a 6-0 start to a season (also twice). A demolitions expert couldn't make the Vikings implode any better than they have, and this year is proving to be another addition to a rich tradition.
Specifically, they are having problems with offense, defense, special teams, and coaching. Other than that, things are going well. The Twin Cities are, above all else on sporting matters, a Vikings town. Everything else pales in comparison. And so, it's really quite comical to hear the great media debates over whether the offense or the defense is the bigger problem. There is great gnashing of teeth over which unit sucks worse, when any clear-headed person can see that the whole team sucks.
Personally, put the Seer in the "Defense" category. When you let non-entities like the Chargers and Raiders dominate your defense, you've got a problem. No doubt, the offense has stunk it up (and whatever happened to that great offensive line?), but when you're constantly behind it does tend to make it tougher to run your offense. (And it doesn't help when the QB doesn't seem to be able to read a defense or hit a secondary receiver, but making such claims too loudly in this town will get you labeled as a racist, so you didn't hear that from the Seer...)
The biggest issue is that they just don't have the talent yet. The secondary routinely leads the team in tackles, never a good sign, and supposed impact DT Chris Hovan has been non-existent. He had exactly as many tackles against the Rams as the Seer did-Zero. They are said to have a problem when teams attack "the edges", meaning that if teams can run or pass to the outside, the LB's aren't fast enough to get there, and since the D-line can be blocked with just a five-man front, offenses can send out backs to the flats, which happen to be on "the edge". It's a nasty spiral, made more nasty because the Vikings were supposed to be better on the D-line this year. Now they have to upgrade the defensive line again, in addition to rebuilding the linebacker corps.
Seattle is a gifted offensive team, with an adequate defense. If that sounds a lot like the Rams, they're pretty good comps. And we know what the Rams did to the Vikings, right? (48-17...)
The thing is, it would be so like this Vikings team to explode with a couple long passes to Moss and a big Bennett run. They are explosive, in theory. The Vikings always seem to be just good enough to string their pathetic fans along for the maximum amount of pain, and a win in this game really puts them in good shape for the playoffs, not that any playoff game won't be a giant orgy of agony for Vikings faithful in the form of some 38-17 drubbing.
But if the Vikings lose, at home, to a team that their fans probably think the Vikings should beat (but in reality is a lot better than the Vikings), it's going to get ugly in this town. Mike Tice's reign will start to be seen for the era of futility it has become. It's hard, sometimes, to know just how good or bad a coaching staff is, but I always like to look at penalties. The Vikings are second in the NFL in penalties, with 102. The leaders, with 112, are the Raiders, another sad-sack bunch with an overmatched coach and no discipline. Combine that with a near-weekly penchant for poor uses of timeouts, poor decisions on when to go for it on fourth down, and other transgressions which the Seer probably can't see or understand, and it's pretty clear that the Vikings might be rebuilding their coaching staff next year, too.
It's gonna get ugly.
The Seer Sees: Seahawks beat the spread
11:06:43 AM 
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