How to Beat the Rams

I still find it interesting to revisit these post game. This one is particularly difficult.

What Was Right
- The Vikings did seem to play more coverage and didn't let much go deep. Despite the final score, I thought this was effective at stopping the Rams passing game.
- The only effective way to move the ball was through the air, the ground game was only there as an occasional alternative.
- Comebacks either way were tough. The Rams efficient passing game was able to convert 1st downs consistently enough even without the big strikes.

What was Wrong
I did not see Sony Michel coming. And even if I had, I wouldn't have been that threatened by him. The real question is, was I wrong about Michele, or is this something that the Vikings should have been able to stop? (and was therefore so basic that I shouldn't' have to talk about it)

In general, my feeling is that unless there is a particularly dominant running game, a running attack can't win a game on its own. The Rams rushing attack certainly doesn't fall in this dominant category. That means when I look at a team that runs a lot, I don't really care about a high yards / per carry - because sooner or later one negative run gets the team off schedule and the drive dies. Sony Michel in this game had a good, but not eye-popping 4.9 yards per carry; or 5.3 if I take out his last 3 attempts that were basically fancy kneel downs. This was close to a career game for Michel, but even if I had known that stat line ahead of time, I would still have been more worried about a 60 yard bomb to Van Jefferson.

The problem with Michele was that he was very close to this average on almost every carry. His YPC wasn't inflated by 1 or 2 big plays. This means he was never getting that drive stalling negative run play. So to answer my own question on if I should have seen this coming, I have to ask: is it reasonable to expect a defense with Pierce, Tomlinson, Barr, Kendricks, Smith as the best run stoppers to stop Sony Michel on (making up a number) 1 out of every 5 rush plays?

My opinion is that is a reasonable expectation, and this was unexpectedly bad.

This makes the loss sting more. If it's something we should be able to do and didn't, the game is more like the Lions loss where it was there for the taking and the team didn't take advantage of the opportunity. In the fire / keep Zimmer season, this may be the most damaging loss (even more than the Lions or Dak-less Cowboys).

I kind of used "Sony Michel" as a stand in for "Sony Michel + offensive line + play calling".  I didn't even go into the Rams being down 2 tackles and losing their center early in the game, if anything that is a reason for me to be even harder on the Vikings. I agree with your point on the scheme and that we should have an answer for it.  I also feel like zone blocking is common enough that it doesn't really count as an exception, just something every defense should be ready for. 

If anything your comment makes me scratch my head even more.  If the whole foundation of the Vikings defense system is "play your assignments" (gap / zone / man / whatever), I would think that general general defensive mindset should be better against zone blocking runs than a more power system.  In theory, if players have their assignments taken care of, you should have a guy there to take on the runner.