In the history of the bye weeks, never has there been a more embarrassing loss than the one the Vikings handed to themselves in 2005. It was a week that sealed the fate of a head coach, cemented Daunte Culpepper and Fred Smoot’s legacy as punchlines, and would change the meaning of the term “love boat” forever. So it is only fitting that in this bye week iteration of comparing statistics, that we look at the Vikings’ greatest opponent: Themselves.




Over the past decade this team has started out fast before. Sometimes with good results like in 2017 where the team started out 4-2 and went on to lose in the NFCCG despite losing its starting QB for the second straight season. Other times things went south quickly after a quick start, like in 2016 when the Vikings started out 5-1, and after suffering an embarrassing loss to the Eagles, went on to suck hard for the rest of the season. One team improved on their early success, the other collapsed, and while the Vikings might hope they are the former, do the numbers actually point to them being closer to the latter?







First up, let’s compare these three teams DVOA rankings as well as their opponents in those first 6 weeks.




2016








I was very surprised at just how good that Vikings’ team was in 2016, particularly their defense. It was elite through the first third of the season and while a lot of that is because of a weak schedule (they played mostly bad offenses), it is still pretty impressive. Their opponents overall were very average on average making the 5-1 start compared to what happened the rest of the season very surprising.







2017












The 2017 team started out with a more difficult schedule and still managed to go 4-2 despite huge season ending injuries to their starting QB and star rookie RB. They did get blown out by second best team they faced during that period after a strong first game against the best, but they only faced one truly bad team in that stretch and still managed to go 4-2 and play better than all but seven other teams through six games.




2022




The 2022 iteration of a Vikings team off to a hot start is by far the worst of the three despite having the easiest schedule. They have faced one defense that has been above average or better and only one team overall that would be considered above average according to DVOA. There is some good news here though. First, this team is not like the 2016 team that collapsed after 5-0 start and began to play terrible for the final eleven weeks of the season after teams either figured out the simple offense the Vikings were running for Bradford, injuries caught up with the team or both. It is playing poorly to start the season and still winning, and even if the teams they are beating suck, they are still NFL teams. They have the opportunity to start playing better and have a lot of room to grow, which would give them a shot to beat good teams. Second, the final eleven weeks are looking to be almost as easy as the first six. The Vikings play some good teams that I expect them to lose too based on how they have played the only good team they have faced, but most of the teams they play are bad. Looking at that 2016 schedule after the Viking went 5-1 that was not the case:












There were some bad teams left on that 2016 schedule, but most were at least average and the Vikings lost to every one of those above average teams, along with the Lions who had the Vikings number that year. That shouldn’t happen in 2022 where only four teams are average or better and they face the 31st, 30th, 29th, 27th and 25th best teams.







Other numbers to consider are the scoring margin between those three seasons:







2016 (first six games)



7.5 (winning by an average of 11.2 points)







2017 (first six games)



3.2 (winning by an average of 10.75 points)







2022



3.5 (winning by an average of 7.6)







The 2022 Vikings have a higher scoring margin than the 2017 team which is good, a much lower scoring margin than 2016 team, which might also be good since that team collapsed.







There are other factors to a team collapsing or building on early season success of course. The Vikings have a brand new head coach and are running new systems on both offense and defense and while they could start to play better in those systems, like the Vikings and their brand new QB started to do in 2017, they could collapse once another team shows the league how to defend what they are doing like happened with the brand new QB in 2016. With all three of these years the Vikings were adapting to changes on the fly and while one of those teams went in a very positive direction, the other completely collapsed once there was enough film on what they were doing. Injuries also play a factor and did more so in 2016 than a relatively healthy 2017 (after they lost their starting QB and RB that is). This 2022 team has been incredibly healthy, more healthy than either the 2016 or 2017 Vikings’ teams.







Looking at the numbers this Vikings team is not really like either 2016 or 2017 and is arguably much worse than both of them. They are winning, but they are doing it while not playing well against bad teams while the 2016 and 2017 teams won playing really well against better competition. That didn’t work out for the 2016 hot start Vikings’, but it certainly worked out better than expected for the 2017 team. Lets hope the Vikings improve on things over this bye week, stay off the lake and come out read hot against an improving Cardinals team.