44-7!

The New York Giants offered no resistance to the Vikings in Sunday’s 44-7 beatdown, so it’s difficult to assess if the Vikings are back or if they just beat up on a team that didn’t want to be there and was missing a number of starters because of injuries.

But that’s a debate for another day. What we know right now is that if the Philadelphia Eagles lose to Dallas, the Vikings get the number two playoff seed, a week off and would only have to win two games to reach the Super Bowl – both of which would be played indoors, on turf and (if New Orleans loses its divisional round game) in the Metrodome.

As Pacifist Viking points out, the Vikings have been deadly on turf. Their Super Bowl chances are greatly enhanced if they don’t have to play on grass and are really enhanced if they play at home, where the offensive production has been superb and where opposing offences have to worry about crowd noise and false starts and all that stuff, not the other way around.

So while we all wait to see how the Cowboys-Eagles game goes, here are some thoughts on the Vikings after the win over the Giants.

12-4
Twelve win seasons are not easy to get. The Vikings 12-4 record is only the sixth time in 48 seasons the franchise has had 12 wins or more. Outside of the 15-1 team in 1998, this is the best Vikings regular season record since the 1975 Vikings went 12-2.

Brett Favre
Four touchdown passes, 316 passing yards, a season high 148.7 quarterback rating and no interceptions – and all of this was done in three quarters of action. Favre doesn’t look like a player who is fading right now.

If the Vikings flame out in this year’s playoffs, I’m confident it won’t be because of Favre.

Sidney Rice and Percy Harvin
The amazing thing about Rice is even when he isn’t open, he’s open. He’s got great body control, great hands and great leaping ability, which allows him to make difficult catches, often by jumping over or around defenders.

As for Harvin, last week against the Bears, I remember he caught a screen pass from Favre and was tackled for no gain. Now why do I remember that play? Because it’s the first time I’ve seen Harvin go down on first contact all season.

We all knew Harvin was fast. But what we didn’t realize is how tough he is. The first defender never brings him down.

Adrian Peterson
Did anybody find it odd Peterson didn’t touch the ball on the Vikings first drive? ESPN’s Kevin Seifert did.

Jasper Brinkley
We didn’t hear much positive or negative about Brinkley in this game because the Vikings won so easily, but it seems the rookie middle linebacker is viewed as a key reason for the Vikings defensive failings of late.

I won’t argue that Brinkley has played all that well or that the Vikings don’t miss E.J. Henderson. But what I will argue is that the Vikings problems the past five games aren’t any different than they were when Henderson was playing in the previous 11.

All season long the tackling has often been shoddy, the secondary has routinely been abused, tight ends have too often beaten our linebackers on pass routes downfield and the run defence has been surprisingly vulnerable.

So this isn’t all Brinkley’s fault. The Vikings defence might be worse off with him in there, but the problems are team-wide and require improvement from everyone if those problems are going to be fixed.

The Vikings just don’t need Jasper Brinkley to play better. They need Jared Allen and Kevin Williams and Madieu Williams and Ben Leber and Chad Greenway and the rest of the defensive starters to play better.

All those players seemed to play better in this win, but it's easy to look good when the opposition plays so badly. Those players need to play better for the rest of this month if the Vikings hope to play in February.