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ESPN is reporting that Brad Childress signed a contract extention.
The reports say that it will keep him in Minnesota through the 2013 season, so an added 3 years to the contract he already had.
This might get me thrown out of the Secret Vikings-Bloggers Club, but I don’t really see that as a bad thing, and I don’t see it as being too early.
First impressions are worth a lot, and Chilly did not make a good one. He came in and turned a team that was already shaky at 9-7 upsidedown, and turned them into a 6-10 team. Basically because of his hiring, the team lost a franchise quarterback, and because he decided to settle for letting Brad Johnson start the following year, the team lost all hope of any kind of offense. I was not a fan. Neither were the rest of the the Vikings fans.
But since then, he has slowly and steadily improved the team.
The team was 6-10 in his first year, 8-8 in his second, and 10-6 with a division championship in his third. In his fourth year he has started at 9-1, and it would take a total catastrophe for his Vikings not to improve on their record for the fourth year in a row. At this present time, his coaching record with the Vikings is 33-26. That’s a 79% winning percentage.
If you finish one regular season with a 79% winning percentage, you’d have a 12-4 season. Most people would consider that successful.
He definitely knows how to build talent on the team.
Since his hiring, the team has added Chester Taylor, Steve Hutchinson, Ray Edwards, Jared Allen, Chad Greenway, Ben Leber, Cedric Griffin, Bernard Berrian, Sidney Rice, Percy Harvin, Brett Favre, and of course, Adrian Peterson.
Hutchinson would’ve been an upgrade over any left guard that the Vikings had in place before Childress came.
Chester Taylor was an immediate improvement over Michael Bennett. Then Adrian Peterson became an improvement over Chester Taylor.
The receiving squad in Tice’s last year was Nate Burleson, Koren Robinson, Marcus Robinson, and Troy Williamson. The current team of Berrian, Rice, Harvin, and whoever you want to put at #4 is better. It would be better if you put ME at #4, and I’m a slow computer nerd who would have a heart attack before I ran 50 yards. Allen and Edwards are upgrades over Udeze and Erasmus James. Shiancoe is an upgrade over Jermaine Wiggins. Ryan Longwell is an upgrade over Paul Eddinger. EJ Henderson is better at middle linebacker than Napoleon Harris. Chad Greenway is better at weak-side linebacker than EJ Henderson was. Ben Leber is better than Dontarrious Thomas. Cedric Griffin is better than Fred Smoot.
…And even though it took a while to get there, our 40 year old Brett Favre is better than Daunte Culpepper has ever been without Randy Moss.
Nearly everything has been upgraded.
And now that he’s had time to get all his pieces into place, the team is scoring more points and winning more games than we have in over a decade.
There are still things about Brad Childress that frustrate me, but I think I would be able to say that about any coach. I’m an Iowa Hawkeye fan, and I think Kirk Ferentz is an excellent coach, but he still irritates me sometimes.
But as bad as Childress’s first impression was in Minnesota, I think he’s changed the team around.
Brett Favre has a lot to do with that, of course, but I think even with a Tarvaris Jackson led team this year, the Vikings would still be 6-3 or so right now, with very good chance to repeat as Division Champions.
If your a Vikings fan that holds onto that first impression of Chilly, I certainly can’t fault you. But try to look at the job he did last year, and the job he’s doing this year, and see if your impression of him improves at all.
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I know this is this is old but what calculator did u use 2 get 33-26 as a 79% winning %? I get 55.9%. Even now 36-28 is 56.25%
That said, I have lightened up on my feelings for him but this is the first year out of 4 that the team met expectations. You can talk about winning the division but for me they needed to get to the division round last year with the talent that was added after yr 2.
I still would not have extended him (would have had the beat NO regardless if the won or lost the SB).
I am not saying he should not get any credit for the turnaround of the team but the vast majority for me goes to Zigi. NONE of this happens under good old Red.