This is actually 2 questions:
- How do you proceed after the bye
- How do you proceed after the season
As you can imagine, Vikings fans have a lot of opinions here. You have your Kirk loyalists, your tank commanders and even your Dobbs defenders.
It’s a bit of a cluster, but I am confident /r/nfl will have the answers.
Let’s start with the 1st question. You have 3 options here:
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Start Mullens: very likely this will give you the best chance to make a playoff run, but let’s be real… you are not going to do anything when you get there.
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Start Dobbs: Maybe you could delude yourself into thinking last week was a blip and not his luck running out?
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Start Hall: He looked good in the couple of series he played, why don’t you see what you have to get a more accurate picture for our next question?
Now on to question 2, again we have 3 options here:
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Resign Kirk, make no mistake, you will not get a discount. Let’s assume it’s a market rate deal. He will be 36 for most of next season coming off the injury.
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Fuck them picks and try to get in spitting distance of one of the top QB prospects in the 2024 draft.
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Let it fall to you, take a QB in the top 50ish picks, have Hall and rookie QB dual it out, let the chips fall where they may.
It’s a complicated situation, and we need answers. Obviously Kwesi is here religiously so give him some good advice.
There's probably a hard cap of early playoff exit, no matter who is at QB.
The best choice is Hall starting if he's physically good to go. Tiny sample size, but the seal was cracked. He looked sharp and balanced in ATL. Evaluate him and compete at the same time. Dobbs showed the offense doesn't need anything special in their passer to be OK. Just HIT OPEN RECIEVERS, WITHOUT MAKING THEM LEAVE THEIR FEET WHEN ITS NOT THAT TYPE OF SITUATION.
I can't take watch our receivers get blown up on very routine shit.
The conservative and most likely choice is Mullens starting because of the intangible "best shot, blah blah."
I'm afraid they will go with the worst option, leaving Dobbs out there...while simultaneously forcing him into a box that relies on his weakest attributes and ignores his few strengths.
My wild and fun plan would be Mullens/Hall, but with a twist that we build a little package of stuff that utilizes Dobbs skillset (without telling him, but telling everyone else), then randomly throwing him in on drives. Describing the plays on the fly to him and letting him use raw instincts and unprepared defenses to do wacky athletic shit.
Tough choice. Depends on so many factors.
I hope we can get a healthy Kirk back for 1-2 years without a meaningful jump in price. But if he can return to form, he's probably worth market price. We also would hopefully see what Hall looks like in live action by then, and that can inform drafting considerations.
I don't know what else sounds fun for the near future. I don't want to trade up and sell the farm for a lottery ticket. We don't win those here in MN.