Barr's Usage

Last year’s problematic Minnesota Vikings defense probably didn’t deserve to be held together, hence the drastic offseason rebuild.

That said, they don’t have a clear replacement for their most valuable defensive departure from last year’s team.

Eric Wilson left for the Philadelphia Eagles in free agency on a one-year, $2.75 million deal, which in retrospect would’ve been affordable for the suddenly cap-healthy Vikings. Minnesota will instead stage a four- or five-man competition for Wilson’s third-linebacker role as they seek to replace the only linebacker in football that recorded at least three interceptions and three sacks last year.

While the LB3 role has diminished in recent years, Wilson’s value wasn’t exclusively in his work as a base linebacker, but in his ability to step into larger roles when Anthony Barr or Eric Kendricks went down. Neither Barr nor Kendricks have played a full 16-game season since 2017, opening the door for Wilson to make 25 starts over the last three seasons, including 15 in 2020 where he took Barr’s place as the man wearing the green dot (i.e. charged with relaying the plays to the defense).

It was Wilson’s longest stretch of starts to prove that he could be more than just a sub-package player and/or special teams ace, and it conveniently came in a contract year. His production suggested that he should’ve been paid more, but the depressed salary cap may have harmed his negotiating position.

There’s a WAR-like stat on Pro-Football Reference called Approximate Value, which attempts to isolate an individual player’s value to his team. By that measure Wilson’s 2020 was better or equal AV to three out of six Kendricks seasons and three out of seven of Barr’s seasons. That doesn’t exactly mean he brings the same talent to the table as the two Pro Bowlers, but it does say something about what his splash plays meant to the defense last year — or would have meant if other parts of the defense held up their end.

“It’s impossible to replace some guys like that,” Kendricks said during mini-camp. “Eric Wilson obviously did well for us on [special] teams and obviously made a huge impact for us on defense last year, but we’re without him this year.”

Wilson wasn’t a perfect player, but he excelled in an area that is central to being a linebacker in today’s NFL: Affecting the passing game. Minnesota was confident enough with Wilson that he stayed on the field in lieu of a nickel corner about 10 snaps more per game than third linebackers in years past.

The stats back up the Vikings’ decision to give Wilson more run. He recorded solid PFF coverage grades of 67.7 (out of 100) in 2019 and 65.5 in 2020 — good for 15th among starting linebackers. Wilson gave up just a 78.9 QB rating on passes thrown his year last year — third best in the NFL behind only Kendricks and Chicago’s Roquan Smith — and he’s produced a solid pressure rate as a blitzer with 22 pressures in 119 career pass rushing snaps.

Replacing those things won’t be easy.

Not a ‘thumper’
In Mike Zimmer’s early years as Vikings HC, he was using Jasper Brinkley and Ben Gedeon as the team’s base linebackers. Brinkley was a 275-pound bruiser who once made 100 tackles for the 2012 Vikings. Gedeon wasn’t the size of a 3-technique like Brinkley, but tackling was his primary skill. He missed just one tackle between the 2018-19 seasons but was kept off the field on passing downs and only played more than 30 snaps twice in his career, which was seemingly cut short due to concussions.

Zimmer often called these run-stopping types “thumpers.”

There has been a clear transition in recent years from thumpers to players like Wilson, who converted from safety in college. While Wilson was a diamond in the rough who emerged out of undrafted free agency, the team invested a fourth-round pick in Troy Dye and a third-round pick in Chazz Surratt the last two drafts, giving them a pair of lighter coverage linebackers from the Wilson mold.

“I think one of the big things is that all of these linebackers are made to run nowadays. Two-down middle linebackers are like dinosaurs and are extinct,” Zimmer said. “All these guys have to be able to be good in the passing game and good in the running game. Quite honestly, the number of base defensive plays that you have are way down compared to what it used to be.”

Wilson was observably talented when it came to having a nose for the football. He intercepted Philip Rivers, Russell Wilson, Matthew Stafford. He forced a fumble and recovered two more. He also blocked an extra point.

But there is a tradeoff to investing in Eric Wilson types; that the tackling skills once valued so greatly from that position get diminished. Wilson ranked 44th of 52 full-time linebackers in PFF’s tackling grade last season, which was closely related to his 48th-of-52 ranking in run defense. He tied for seventh in missed tackle rate, which was put on display during the final quarter of the season when teams rushed for 165 yards per game in Kendricks’ absence. Again, some of that was due to the rest of the defense not offering much help.

Dye struggled mightily, too, as he took a significant number of LB3 reps after Barr got hurt. There were 179 linebackers that registered a run defense grade in 2020 — Dye ranked 174th. With 4.48 speed, though, Dye should be able to run with any tight end and most running backs in coverage.

Naturally, the Vikings aren’t looking for bad tacklers. But that can be a side effect when trying to groom young players that may not be physically developed. Take the rookie Surratt, for instance, who weighs 230 pounds and was playing quarterback at North Carolina as recently as 2018. Tackling NFL ballcarriers won’t be programmed into him after one spring of film sessions.

What Surratt offers is the same thing Dye and Wilson offered — flexibility to defend multiple positions. There’s where his value lies in today’s NFL.

“I think I’m a versatile player,” Surratt said on draft day, “so I think I can line up at any of the three linebacker spots, Will, Mike or Sam.”

Plenty of competition
Dye and Surratt will both vie for Wilson’s spot, though Surratt was inactive for most of the offseason program. They’re not the only candidates.

“Nick Vigil has done a nice job. Blake Lynch, Troy Dye,” Zimmer listed off during mini-camp. “We got a lot of competition as well. [Tuf] Borland has done a nice job. The more that these guys continue to go and add to the depth of our linebacker spot, I think it will be really good for our special teams as well.”

Vigil was the team’s second free agent signing after Dalvin Tomlinson, and while he’s struggled as a tackler throughout his career, he ranked ninth in opponent QB rating during his last year as a starter in Cincinnati. There’s also value in his seasoning as a sixth-year veteran because the Vikings are looking for more than a hit-the-guy-with-the-ball type of player. Diagnosing an opponent’s passing scheme is its own skill.

“It’s a defense [with the Vikings] where you play a lot of different coverages,” he told reporters in April. “You’ve got to be able to do quite a bit of different things. You’ve got to be a smart player where you can think and diagnose very fast, and I think I do a good job of that. And yeah, the techniques are one of the biggest things in this defense – you’ve got to be very technique-sound because you do a lot of different stuff. So I think that plays to my strength in that aspect.”

Zimmer also mentioned Lynch and Borland. Lynch is a former UDFA who had the unfortunate distinction of making his only start when the Vikings gave up 52 points in New Orleans. He’s another coverage type at 235 pounds, up 10 pounds from his listed college weight at Baylor. Borland is a current UDFA who seems like a longshot to win the job, but he could make the roster as a special teams guy.

The notable linebacker not given a Zimmer shoutout was Cameron Smith, fresh off a heart surgery to repair a bicuspid aortic valve. Smith would be the feel-good story of the year if he became the team’s third starting linebacker, but he is known as a run-stopper without the same coverage prowess as his peers.

That might’ve flown for 2014 Zim; probably not 2021. Opponents are gameplanning to exploit weaknesses, and the Vikings would ostensibly rather give up a few extra yards on the ground than have their LB3 get burned on a wheel route.

Wilson gained the team’s trust despite his limitations against the run, probably because he was good at, well, pretty much everything else. His successor has big shoes to fill, even if he’s not playing the most glamorous defensive position.

“We’re looking forward to someone else stepping up and creating their own role,” Kendricks said. “You don’t have to be Eric Wilson, for sure, but you’ve got to be your own player that brings your own attributes to the game and look forward and just have that enthusiasm of coming into work and coming into play and be excited to make plays.”

On a defense where many big question marks have been addressed, this is one smaller area where there is still uncertainty.

Adam Zimmer on Barr’s return

Going into his eighth year of being Anthony Barr’s position coach, Adam Zimmer knows his impact as well as anybody.

As we’ve written about before on this website, Barr’s impact is largely intangible.

“There's a lot of things he does. Number one, he calls the defense. He gets everybody lined up. I think it makes life a lot easier on Eric Kendricks, where Kendricks likes to just play ball -- find ball, see ball, get ball. Anthony allows him to do that more instead of having to worry about, 'Oh, I gotta get the front set, I gotta get the pressure set, I gotta alert this, alert that.' Anthony does a lot of those things for us. He's also noticeable for the offense. They gotta account for him in protections and where they send the back and all these things. He does a lot of good things for us, but the number one thing is that he helps everyone calm down and be able to play fast.”

Zimmer also reflected on Barr’s rookie year of 2014 when he showed up and made an immediate impression on the young coach.

“I remember the first year we got him, we were having a hard time playing a certain route, passing it off because it's happening so fast -- he missed all of OTAs because he was at UCLA, and all of a sudden he comes in, we get that exact same route the first time he gets it and he covered it like it's nothing. I think you're born with that sometimes and your intelligence and instincts always kick in with that.”

Through three four practices, Barr and Kendricks look to be right at home in the center of the Vikings defense.