Are the Vikes contenders?

Sub par play of their OTs cost the Chiefs a Super Bowl in 2020.  Jawan Taylor is not in the same league as Orlando Brown Jr. [Narator: both Taylor and Brown Jr play in the National Football League] Point taken, but you know what I mean.   And they lost Andrew Wylie at the other tackle spot and are replacing him with a 30 year old journeyman.  

And now their receiving corps is based on Kadarius Toney being good.  And Kelce is a hall of fame TE, but he's about 1,000 years old [Narator: Travis Kelce is 33 and will turn 34 in October].  Point taken, but here is a list of the players who are older than Kelce and had at least 1 receiving target in 2022:
Tom Brady - Retired
Marcedes Lewis - Retired
DeSean Jackson - Unsigned
AJ Green - Retired
Russel Wilson - Active
Julio Jones - Unsigined
Cole Beasley - Unsigined

So the Chiefs passing game rests on two bad tackles, a guy who has 55 catches in 3 years, and literally the oldest receiving target in the NFL.  That's a recipe for regression.  They knew these were risks too, which is why all signs pointed to the Chiefs being the team trying to trade up with the Vikings, likely for Addison (a huge need for them), or OT Anton Harrison (also a huge need).  

The Chiefs will be good (probably), because of Reid and Mahomes, but they aren't run away favorites for anything.   Heck, it's possible that the Chiefs don't even make the playoffs: Joey Bosa is the kind of player who could wreck a game with 2 bad tackles while Justin Herbert goes bombs away to Mike Williams, Keenan Allen, and Quentin Johnson - then the Chargers steal the AFC west on a tiebreaker and 3 wild cards to to the Ravens, Jets and Dolphins.  

I will challenge any take that says "well, team X is so much better than everyone else that the season is a foregone conclusion".  That is never true, NFL teams are too tightly packed.

I would look towards Isiah Pacheco to become a star for KC next season too. So far he has proven to be better than any RB on the Vikings roster and significantly better than our current starter. He is the threat at RB KC thought they were getting with CEH when they spent a 1st on him.

I would think a competent coaching staff wouldn't waste a season of Mahomes by not giving him any weapons and know what they are doing. Hopkins is still available for instance, and they could have signed him if things were really that bad.

KC will be elite again this year and have a good shot at winning it all.

They aren't stupid, they're desperate to pay Taylor $20M because there aren't enough good tackles to go around in the NFL.  The Vikings had an up close look at an average tackle for 4 years in Riley Reiff, he wasn't great, Darrisaw was an immediate and obvious upgrade.  Over the last 4 years, Garrett Bradbury has been regarded as absolutely putrid, except for 2022 when he improved to passable.  

Here is a comparison of grades between the 4 years the Vikings saw of those two familiar players vs Taylor's 4 year career so far:



Taylor's grades line up pretty much exactly the the putrid years of Bradbury (minus Bradbury's improvement), and never approach the middle of the road performance Reiff delivered.  That's really bad.  Maybe Taylor will get better, but he has not been good.  If you want to argue that Taylor has been an acceptable OT, then I'll expect you to write a manifesto about how Bradbury wasn't that bad his first 3 years [that's sarcasm, I don't expect anyone to write that].

Last year, Juju Smith-Schuster wasn't Tyreek Hill, but he was much more highly regarded than anyone they have now, he was a 26 year old who already had a 1400 yard season under his belt.  

The point of all of this isn't to say the Chiefs suck - they're probably still pretty good.  But they are the odds on super Bowl favorites right now.  


Neither would I, and that's the point.  The Chiefs are the best the NFL has to offer (in the eyes of Vegas) and they have clear weaknesses (in addition to their strengths).  And if even the best team is flawed, then every single contender is going to need to finds solutions throughout the season.  And in that reality, the Vikings are clearly contenders.

Is there a Hot Take Alert emoji around here somewhere?

This is less hot than it appears. Here is a deeper look at the Chiefs:

They won 14 games last year. Their over / under win total right now is 11.5 wins, so they already have a pretty strong projection for regression.

As of 7/24, the Chiefs are a -165 favorite to win the AFC West; this gives them about a 60% chance to win the division. In the 2022 pre-season, the Packers were a -185 favorite to win the NFC North so they were given about a 65% chance to win the NFC North last year. So the 2022 Packers were a stronger division favorite than the 2023 chiefs when 2 time reigning MVP Aaron Rodgers crashed them out of the playoffs by throwing a season sealing interception on a potential game winning drive late in the 4th quarter vs the Lions (I just like to throw in that recap). There is no such thing as a sure thing.

In 2022 the Chiefs didn't distance themselves from their divisional competition much last year. Both their games against the Chargers were 3 point wins, one of which required a comeback TD in the last minute of the game for the win. The Nathaniel Hackett era is the equivalent of a wet fart in Broncos history, and the Chiefs beat the Broncos by 3 six days after Hackett was fired. The Chiefs also only managed a 1 pt win vs the Pirates of Penzance (Vegas failed a 2pt conversion inside 5 min remaining in the game, and had another short to win it). All told, the Chiefs were 6-0 in their division, but 5 of those 6 wins were one score games. Their only division game that wasn't a 1 score win was when they boat raced the Jarrett Stidham led Raiders in week 18, who were playing for draft position at that point. Sustaining 1 score wins is a risk for the Vikings and it is a risk for the Chiefs.

In 2022, they benefitted from 4 non-divisional games against basement teams: Cardinals, Colts, Rams, Texans - one of those teams they lost to (Colts) and another took them to overtime (Texans).

In 2023, their schedule is brutal, they have non-divisional games against at least 8 teams that have playoff aspirations:
Bills (really good)
Eagles (really good)
Bengals (really good)
Jets (really good... probably... or a total car crash... possibly)
Vikings (I know that team!)
Lions (Everyone says they're good, so I guess)
Jaguars (division favorite. Vegas says they're good, not sure I believe it)
Dolphins (Dolphins are defiantly all in on 2023, we'll see if it works)

Their "easy" non-divisional games aren't even that easy, I don't think any of these teams are as bad as any of the 2022 Rams / Colts / Texans / Cardinals:
Patriots (Bill Belichick is one on their cupcake games)
Bears (They'll be better than 2022, but I don't know if that's good yet)
Packers (whatever)

And in their division:
Chargers - Are all-in with spending to maximize the last cheap year of Justin Herbert (The Chargers are already over $60M over the cap in 2024 with the money they have pushed out)
Broncos - Have some nice pieces and will certainly be coached better than last year
Raiders - Are... still in the division... but the Chiefs still can't beat them more than twice.

All told, the Chiefs had a lot of close games last year, their roster looks worse to me, and their schedule looks way harder.  Just for good measure, their most explosive playmaker, Kadarius Toney, was injured about 5 minutes into training camp. And if they don't sort out Chris Jones' deal, that would leave a gigantic hole in their middle-of-the-road defense (it will probably get sorted out, so I'm not factoring that in yet).

The Chiefs will probably still be good, but this is a recipe for a season that could turn a lot worse than people think. Stuff happens. The Rams were 7 games worse after winning the Super Bowl in 2021 despite still having smart-ass Sean McVay and Matthew "he's-good-now" Stafford.

What you should take from all of this is the line between good team and Super Bowl is razor thin.  For the Vikings that means that they already have an established offense and some pieces on defense (Hunter, Harrison Smith), so it doesn't take many of the unknown players working out to flip from regular-good to Super Bowl quality.  Looking at the OP, one of the key criteria is 7 great players; Mahomes only counts for 1, so according to that one criteria, the Vikings are closer than the Chiefs.

That is a pretty brutal schedule, though I could see them cleaning house in our division. I could see a bit of SB hangover too to be honest, though I'll say I have a lot of respect for Andy Reid in that department. He does a good job of generally keeping his teams prepared. 

But I would ask this. How many teams have an over/under above 11.5? I'm not a gambler, but I would guess that's still pretty high by gambling standards as those O/U numbers tend to center around the midpoints. Vegas still expects them to be a playoff team with that total. Though I could definitely see someone making money on betting them to be a 10-11 win team. Given how good the AFC is, that could still win the SB too.