Post by Funkytown on Sept 3, 2023 12:11:22 GMT -6
O'Connell ached over the 31-24 wild-card loss to the Giants because it meant the end of all the joyous locker room scenes. He agonized over all the little details he believed could have made the difference — yes, right down to his call on that play at the end of the game. The faces of Vikings fans who would stop him at the grocery store or the airport with a "Just once before I die" stayed with him, too.
"You're just responsible for everything," he said. "And if you're leading from the front, all those moments in locker rooms where we came from behind or did this and this ... if you're going to enjoy that as much as you do, the harder moments hit you probably 10 times worse. If you're leading the right way, you look inward first. That one really stuck with me for a while."
He's past dwelling on the loss, but it impacted the Vikings' frenetic offseason, and stoked their coach's conviction for 2023.
"We don't know what will transpire in the future," O'Connell said. "But I tried to focus on not letting that be the defining moment, for anything other than doing things with that much more passion moving forward."
Building a championship standard
The play that inflamed sports-talk radio debates, about whether Kirk Cousins should have tried Jefferson in double coverage rather than throwing short for T.J. Hockenson on fourth-and-8 against the Giants, is not in the Vikings' 2023 playbook.
"I don't know if that play will ever be in an offense again," offensive coordinator Wes Phillips said. "Not because it's not a good play. Sometimes, you just have those memories."
O'Connell revisited it, as part of his postseason self-evaluation, asking himself if he could have done more to help his quarterback. "It's easy to focus on the end," he said. "Any time you call a play that doesn't work out, there's always a better play that lives somewhere on the call sheet."
His introspection went deeper than that, though, and the changes it produced were more substantive.
Donatell was fired after a run of 400-yard games for opposing offenses at the end of the year, while the head coach called publicly for a more aggressive defense. As O'Connell revisited the season, and particularly the 17 unanswered points the Vikings gave up after an opening touchdown drive in the playoff game, he wondered if he could have made his defensive philosophy clearer all along.
"Was I enough of an influence on the defense to where, maybe even without 'Flo' here, football philosophy could have come to life?" he said. "Because that's my job: to help the coordinators understand the intent I have for that time of the game and the decisions they make as play-callers. That's where you look back on the overall process. Ultimately, we won a lot of one-score games, came back from behind a lot, but we didn't in the end."
Much of the work to help coordinators and players understand what he wants from them, he said, happens more effectively during the offseason or the practice week.
Doing it during a game "is hard for this reason only: It's not fair for me to do it in the moment. It's not fair to the players; it's not fair to the coaches. But it is fair if, throughout the week or the offseason, you're building that philosophy, so everybody can feel the same confidence that I do in that moment.
"That's probably the biggest part of it, just making sure everything we're doing in this building has a championship standard. When we reach it, acknowledge it. And when we don't reach it, acknowledge it."
"You're just responsible for everything," he said. "And if you're leading from the front, all those moments in locker rooms where we came from behind or did this and this ... if you're going to enjoy that as much as you do, the harder moments hit you probably 10 times worse. If you're leading the right way, you look inward first. That one really stuck with me for a while."
He's past dwelling on the loss, but it impacted the Vikings' frenetic offseason, and stoked their coach's conviction for 2023.
"We don't know what will transpire in the future," O'Connell said. "But I tried to focus on not letting that be the defining moment, for anything other than doing things with that much more passion moving forward."
Building a championship standard
The play that inflamed sports-talk radio debates, about whether Kirk Cousins should have tried Jefferson in double coverage rather than throwing short for T.J. Hockenson on fourth-and-8 against the Giants, is not in the Vikings' 2023 playbook.
"I don't know if that play will ever be in an offense again," offensive coordinator Wes Phillips said. "Not because it's not a good play. Sometimes, you just have those memories."
O'Connell revisited it, as part of his postseason self-evaluation, asking himself if he could have done more to help his quarterback. "It's easy to focus on the end," he said. "Any time you call a play that doesn't work out, there's always a better play that lives somewhere on the call sheet."
His introspection went deeper than that, though, and the changes it produced were more substantive.
Donatell was fired after a run of 400-yard games for opposing offenses at the end of the year, while the head coach called publicly for a more aggressive defense. As O'Connell revisited the season, and particularly the 17 unanswered points the Vikings gave up after an opening touchdown drive in the playoff game, he wondered if he could have made his defensive philosophy clearer all along.
"Was I enough of an influence on the defense to where, maybe even without 'Flo' here, football philosophy could have come to life?" he said. "Because that's my job: to help the coordinators understand the intent I have for that time of the game and the decisions they make as play-callers. That's where you look back on the overall process. Ultimately, we won a lot of one-score games, came back from behind a lot, but we didn't in the end."
Much of the work to help coordinators and players understand what he wants from them, he said, happens more effectively during the offseason or the practice week.
Doing it during a game "is hard for this reason only: It's not fair for me to do it in the moment. It's not fair to the players; it's not fair to the coaches. But it is fair if, throughout the week or the offseason, you're building that philosophy, so everybody can feel the same confidence that I do in that moment.
"That's probably the biggest part of it, just making sure everything we're doing in this building has a championship standard. When we reach it, acknowledge it. And when we don't reach it, acknowledge it."
But after a year as head coach, O'Connell has made peace with the job's CEO-like nature. Even if things like roster-building, contract negotiations and the oversight of TCO Performance Center's amenities take him away from football, they merit his involvement.
"It's easy to look the other way sometimes, but I try to never do that," he said. "What I've learned is, right, wrong or indifferent, there's always time. It might take personal sacrifice to find that time. But it's important."
Unearthing precious minutes in his day, then, is a vital task. O'Connell has too many roles to play to sit around for long.
"I truly feel like it's a special thing to do it the way I want to do it," he said. "The relationships matter. People matter. Culture matters. And the Xs and Os and the football, it all matters. I have a direct role and influence on all that, and that's not a responsibility you can take lightly. I feel as comfortable as I ever have to take on this challenge every single day."
"It's easy to look the other way sometimes, but I try to never do that," he said. "What I've learned is, right, wrong or indifferent, there's always time. It might take personal sacrifice to find that time. But it's important."
Unearthing precious minutes in his day, then, is a vital task. O'Connell has too many roles to play to sit around for long.
"I truly feel like it's a special thing to do it the way I want to do it," he said. "The relationships matter. People matter. Culture matters. And the Xs and Os and the football, it all matters. I have a direct role and influence on all that, and that's not a responsibility you can take lightly. I feel as comfortable as I ever have to take on this challenge every single day."
... and neither is this Chris guy.