Minnesota Vikings head coach Mike Zimmer has been coaching NFL defenses for over two decades now. But his pass defense’s performance against the Los Angeles Rams on Thursday night stood out to him for the wrong reasons.
The Vikings allowed the Rams offense to go off for 556 yards of offense Thursday night. Rams QB Jared Goff, in particular, had a career night as he completed 26 of 33 passes for 465 yards and five touchdowns to post a perfect passer rating (158.3).
That putrid performance led Zimmer to exclaim after the game that that was the worst pass coverage he’s ever been in charge of.
“At this point, I don't know,” Zimmer said per Courtney Cronin of ESPN. “Probably, anywhere I've ever been, I've never been this poor in pass coverage, so we're going to have to look at everything we're doing at get back to doing things correctly.”
Obviously, things aren’t trending in the right direction for a Vikings defense which played so well last season. While there’s no shame in being unable to shut down arguably the best offense in the league on the road, they weren’t close to even stopping the Rams, which they'll need to do if they hope to contend for a Super Bowl this season.
Moreover, that awful showing in LA comes just a week after they were completely embarrassed by the Bills and rookie quarterback Josh Allen at home. The ongoing drama with troubled defensive end Everson Griffen also won't do the defense any favors.
Things won’t get any easier for the Vikings, who host another top NFC contender in the Eagles on the road in their next game. If Zimmer can’t get his struggling pass defense sorted out by then, they risk getting burned by Carson Wentz and dropping a third-straight game, which would put even more pressure on the Vikings coach.
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