01-15-2022, 03:49 PM
(01-10-2022, 08:32 PM)TheLeonardLeap Wrote: You're wrong and they do. Here's the scoring defenses he's been a part of with the Bengals/Vikings...
BENGALS
2007: 24th
- - Zimmer Arrives - -
2008: 19th
2009: 6th
2010: 24th
2011: 9th
2012: 8th
2013: 5th
- - Zimmer Leaves - -
2014: 12th
VIKINGS
2013: 32nd
- - Zimmer Arrives - -
2014: 11th
2015: 5th
2016: 6th
2017: 1st
2018: 9th
2019: 5th
2020: 29th
2021: 24th
Vikings D fell apart at the end, but that was because in 2020 they lost all 3 of their starting CBs (we took 2 of them) and they had to roll with two 2020 rookies and a 2019 7th rounder. Then in 2021, Kirk Cousins had a $31m cap hit, and they had $25.6m in dead cap in a year where it shrank $16m.
Either way, in a 14 year span he had 9 top-10 defenses with two of those 5 where he didn't have one being the years he showed up. Tack on 6 of those years being top-6. That's really damn good.
Meanwhile there's people in this thread happy with Lou Anarumo having the 25th, 22nd, and 17th scoring defenses despite a TON of money spent bringing in high quality FAs.
The Vikings won a playoff game with Case Keenum as their starter and Latavius Murray as their #1 rusher. They were a missed 27 yard FG away from winning a playoff game a different year with Teddy Bridgewater as their starter.
Good post dude, and I don't disagree with the overall sentiment. Zimmer was largely a very good DC here, I wasn't saying he wasn't.
But you didn't bold the most pertinent point of that sentence... that I never felt the defence would take over a game when it mattered most. Scoring defensive averages wouldn't be the relevant statistic for that. We'd need to identify the crunch games in each season and see how the defence did in those, versus how they performed in the other games to see if they dropped off.
The example that most sticks out to me was when our defence got absolutely slaughtered by the Chargers running game, in a season where we went 8-0 at home and had given up 17 points a game at home. Finishing 5th in scoring defence means absolutely sod all when they couldn't be counted on in the playoff game. (And no, I'm not blaming the defence for that loss, the offence did sweet FA to help them!).
In terms of performances in the playoffs.... Maybe that's a little unfair, as our defence was very good against the Texans (2nd time) and they did their job against the Colts IIRC (in 2014 or whenever it was). In every playoff game, our offence was atrocious, so don't get me wrong I'm not blaming these on the defence. Of course their performances weren't helped by how bad the offence was.
That's purely opinion, and stats may not back me up. But I look at the Ravens/Steelers defences in those same years and they could be defining in big games. It always seemed to me in crunch moments, our defence gave up the last minute TD etc. That matters far more than how their scoring defence averaged over the course of a season. But, I will concede I don't have stats to back up my opinion. And I will also concede that it doesn't necessarily suggest Zim was the problem either.
To me Zimmer is a very good coach, but typifies the struggles teams like the Bengals/Vikings have. He got us to a good level, but we never went further (i.e. 0 playoff wins with him - not that I'm blaming him as the reason we didn't win any of those games). With the Vikings... he's got a 2-3 playoff record in 8 years, and they had some decent teams in that stretch. It seems to me like he's a guy who can improve a team, but not get them beyond a point.
And back to the point of this thread, would I have him back at DC? Yes if we're getting the Zimmer DC of old. But he's 8 years removed from being a DC. Looking at the past in sports rarely works. With that said, if I read in the offseason we hire him as next year's DC, I won't be crying about it either.
