Vikings '14: Out In The Cold

English: TCF Bank Stadium on September 12, 2009 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

This Minnesota Vikings season will be spent mostly outdoors for the first time since 1981.  For the next two years, they will be playing at the University of Minnesota's football stadium while their new home in downtown Minneapolis is under construction.

Do the Vikings have a team that can survive in all kinds of weather?  In their last Metrodome season, they were 5-10-1.  Leslie Frazier and most of his coaching staff have been replaced by Mike Zimmer and his new coaching staff, which includes former NFL head coach Norv Turner as offensive coordinator.

Nothing's wrong with the offense if you have Adrian Peterson and Cordarrelle Patterson in the backfield.  It's the quarterback position that needs work.  After a disastrous 2013 season in which three different signal callers were used, Matt Cassel has been named the starter for this season.  Rookie Teddy Bridgewater is apparently the Vikings' quarterback of the future, but right now he's an understudy.  Christian Ponder?  As of this writing, he's still a Viking.  What the team plans on doing with him, who knows?

It also appears as if Peterson is reaching the end of his effectiveness as a playmaker, having reached the advanced age of 30.  Oh, he could fool us all and his greatest seasons could be yet to come.  But when reports surface that Peterson has allegedly been calling Dallas owner Jerry Jones about possibly finishing his career as a Cowboy, it makes you wonder.  Didn't another superstar just leave the Twin Cities?

The defense will be even less capable of stopping the other team's offense, now that Jared Allen has taken his talents to Chicago.  Chad Greenway will have to take up the slack in leading a team of rookies and free agents in improving its numbers on turnovers, and that won't be easy.

A neck-and-neck battle for third place in the NFC North with the Detroit Lions, along with a 6-10 finish, may or may not be enough to warm the freezing hearts of Vikings fans.  But as we've said before, the team is in transition mode until 2016.  And Mike Zimmer is a transition coach.  Don't expect too much.

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Our picks for who will make it to the playoffs in January.

NFC EAST:  Philadelphia Eagles
NFC WEST:  Seattle Seahawks
NFC NORTH:  Green Bay Packers
NFC SOUTH:  New Orleans Saints
WILD CARDS:  Chicago Bears and San Francisco 49ers

AFC EAST:  New England Patriots
AFC WEST:  Denver Broncos
AFC NORTH:  Cincinnati Bengals
AFC SOUTH:  Indianapolis Colts
WILD CARDS:  Kansas City Chiefs and Houston Texans