Matthew Coller: Vikings vs Lions is a battle of time horizons
EAGAN — Can you imagine how much sleep Kwesi Adofo-Mensah and Brad Holmes have lost while planning their teams’ future paths?
Immediately following the 2020 season, the Detroit Lions hired Holmes, who had been serving as the director of college scouting for the Los Angeles Rams, as their general manager. Sixteen days later Holmes delivered a gut punch to Lions fans by trading long-time quarterback Matthew Stafford to the Rams in exchange for two first-round picks and quarterback Jared Goff.
Holmes also let quality receivers Kenny Golladay and Marvin Jones Jr. walk in free agency and replaced them with Tyrell Williams and Breshad Perriman on one-year, $3 million deals. The Lions made no major signings that offseason and spent their first three draft picks in the trenches, waiting until the fourth round to beef up the receiver position with Amon-Ra St. Brown. The Lions probably aren’t shocked that No. 7 overall pick Penei Sewell is a budding star but nobody could have seen St. Brown’s instant rise coming this year — though swinging six times in the first 115 picks does improve the odds of finding a diamond in the rough. In rebuild mode, Holmes wasn’t in position to take the same “F— them picks” tack as his previous boss Les Snead.
The 2021 Lions season went as you might expect. They won three games and finished 25th in offense and 31st on defense.
But something started to happen toward the end of the year. Detroit went 3-3 over its final six games. They ran for at least 95 yards in every game and Goff posted a 103.3 QB rating during that span. Head coach Dan Campbell appeared to keep the team engaged with his over-the-top, die-for-the-team attitude — and quietly, a good staff around him. Current offensive coordinator Ben Johnson’s role increased throughout the year and defensive coordinator Aaron Glenn showed some chops.
Through two weeks of Year 2 of the Holmes/Campbell era, the Lions are suddenly an intriguing team in the NFC. Certainly the oddsmakers in Las Vegas are not buying a complete turnaround yet as their over-under was 6.5 wins in most books heading into the year and they are six-point underdogs to the Minnesota Vikings on Sunday at US Bank Stadium but with the development of the team and addition of No. 2 overall pick Aidan Hutchinson, Detroit has earned the label as a team on the rise. No longer would a loss to the Lions be considered a complete embarrassment for Minnesota.
“You just see the growth of their team,” Vikings head coach Kevin O’Connell said.
The Vikings’ organization had an opportunity this offseason to follow Holmes’ path. After firing Rick Spielman and Mike Zimmer, they considered trade offers on Kirk Cousins, Danielle Hunter, Harrison Smith, Adam Thielen and other veteran players. But rather than let the proven (yet aging) stars leave they decided to bring them all back, in several cases making their cap and roster flexibility more difficult in the future.
Detroit had to go full Shawshank Redemption last season, crawling through a sewer to come out on the other side with two top-15 premium position draft picks and other young players further developed. And they haven’t reached the beach yet with significant holes still remaining on defense and an unclear future at quarterback. The Vikings did not want to crawl through a river of you-know-what with hopes of coming out clean on the other side.
Owner Mark Wilf said prior to the season that ownership played a significant role in the decision to run things back with hopes of returning to the postseason with a chance at a magical run. The strong implication following Zimmer and Spielman’s exit was that the players believed — and owners agreed — that a change in culture could get them over the hump following a season filled with close loses.
Adofo-Mensah called it a “competitive rebuild,” but few were the signs of rebuilding, aside from draft day trades with the Lions and Packers. When it came to cutdown day, the brass cut nearly the entire 2021 class, which was justified based on camp performance but also didn’t exactly scream patience and development.
So expectations are deservedly high for the Vikings. With their offseason choices they sold a winning 2022 season to fans.
The results at the moment are inconclusive. In Week 1, it looked like the new regime had all the answers. In Week 2, there was probably some smirking on the Zimmer ranch. The whole story is far from being told.
Sunday’s matchup between these two teams is the first of many that we’ll be watching closely as the tale of two timelines. If the Vikings’ attempt to swing for the fences this year by keeping their veterans and signing older star players like Za’Darius Smith, Patrick Peterson and Jordan Hicks doesn’t work, they will likely be forced into a 2021-Lions type rebuild, which will set them back a year from where they could have been. On the other hand, a deep playoff run would mean their approach was justified and they could retool in the offseason and take another shot with Cousins at the helm.
Detroit doesn’t have much uncertainty. Their window to win is officially open. At some point they will look to upgrade from Goff in the draft and sign every free agent that moves or make a big trade for an expensive star.
It’s a blueprint that has been laid out a number of teams post-tank. Most notably Miami went all-in by adding Tyreek Hill after years of grinding back into relevance.
That doesn’t mean the future is lost for the Vikings if they don’t win this year. In 2015 the Eagles and Rams were both 7-9 before trading up to draft Carson Wentz and Jared Goff, respectively, and they made the Super Bowl in 2017 and 2018. However, it would be a sign that they misread the writing on the wall.
Sunday’s game between the Vikings and Lions acts as a green flag for these two teams racing toward chasing down the Green Bay Packers in the NFC North. The Lions can show that they are the up-and-coming team in the division or the Vikings can prove that they should be taken seriously in competition with the Packers for the North crown this year.
The answers to the long-term ramifications of each team’s philosophical decisions will play out over the coming seasons but suddenly there is intrigue between the Lions and Vikings for the first time in a long time.
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