Vikings locker room reacts after 23-6 loss to Bills on Monday Night Football

I would say the better team won tonight. We ended up with results like we did today. Obviously, they were more prepared. They were a better team tonight. And shout out to the Buffalo Bills for, you know, coming in and handling business. But we've got to be better. And thankfully, we've got a short week moving on in the NFC North opponent to, you know, get that taste out of our mouth. How hard is it to be better, though, when you're being asked in defense to defend 70-something plays? It's team game, man, team game. Every time we step on that field, we expect it to get a stop. And no matter if it's 100 plays, no matter if it's three plays, The standard in our room is get a stop. So it's never how many plays we played. It's never that. It's always are we going to stop, which we did, give them 23 points. You can't do that. How do you process how the offense was playing today? To be honest, I only can tell you what we did. I'm worried about my job. I got kids at home to feed, mouths to feed. So I'm worried about making sure my job is done first. I think as a defense, the scheme was executed well. We did good in the run game. We just got to find a way to. Not get them in the end zone. I think those two scoring drives hurt us a lot. You know, we could have still been in the game if we just give up three in those situations. Josh, the reality is 43 minutes almost you guys were on the field compared to 17. So, I mean, physically. Physically. There's got to be a point, right, where things kind of maybe break through. You're only human. Yeah, we're only human. I understand we're in shape. We rotate a lot. I think you guys get caught up in the time of possession, but we move in. You guys see the sideline. We got four or five guys running in and out every play. We do a good job on that front. And at the end of the day, once we're out there, we're out there. You know, you can't in this. Game of football, you can't beg, you can't plead, you get what you get. And today we got a lot of snaps, and we got to make do with what we do. So I think we handled it well. Obviously, just got to keep progressing and going on that upward trend as the season continues to move forward. What led to their success on that James Cook touchdown? Was that a 15-play drive? Yeah, I just think us not being able to get off the field on third down, those long drives, not winning first, second down, giving them third and manageable. I mean, you get it. 6-5, 6-6 quarterback to just lean forward, he getting the first down, you know. We got to stay out those situations like we were doing earlier in the game when it was second and ten, third and nine, you know. We stay in those, we give ourselves a good chance. You know, you get in the third and two to three, third and one to four, we give ourselves a harder chance to stop them. So I think staying out of those third and shorts would be better. I think that was a big key to those two game-winning drives. They had a lot of manageable third downs. We got to get them some harder, harder, more risk-taking plays. I don't know, you know, I mean, it's just, you feel like you make a couple plays, and then, you know, we just hurt ourselves, and we stall, or, you know, whatever it is, or, you know, you can't go three and out, so, yeah, I mean, I think you just can't go three and out, and I don't know how many plays we had on offense, but it probably wasn't many, and that's never a good sign. Do you think you have any of them, other than offense that has this much talent, just can't seem to get firing on all cylinders? No, I mean, I don't know. I mean, you know, Sundays are when we get to have fun, you know, when we get to roll and do what we do and show what we do. You know, but it's just we're not we're not able to do that right now. And that's that's frustrating. And we're just not doing it. And that's frustrating. I mean, I feel like this is another emphasis, you know, on just finishing all four quarters, you know, playing all four quarters strong. But, you know, definitely going back into the lab tomorrow, this week, you know, and fixing some things. How hard is it to just kind of keep and sustain that energy? I mean, right out of the gate, you know, you guys were getting to Josh. You guys were almost picking him off and all that stuff left and right. But, you know, close to 43 minutes time of possession. Mattel was saying that that shouldn't matter. But physically, do you guys just kind of feel it creeping on when you're on the field that much? I mean, no, you know, we know what kind of playing, you know, this game of football. So, you know, whatever situation, you know. That's presented so, you know, we're warriors. So, you know, so we go out there, you know, no matter what adversity, no matter what situation it is, I feel like we have the mental fortitude of the defense, you know, to be put in whatever situation, you know, and thrive. What did you see early that you could get to him so quickly? What did you see early that allowed you to get to Josh so quickly, especially in that first half? I mean, just playing ball, you know, I feel like, you know, you know, a little crowd advantage, you know, at home and stuff like that. But, you know, I feel like, you know, just being prepared throughout the week, you know, to make plays and stuff like that, you know, in the past. But we're more importantly in the run too, so. Dallas, what is the biggest challenge when they have such a great time of possession? Saying mentally strong, more important, those type of snaps. It definitely, it could weigh in on anybody. We are human at the end of the day, but I feel like that's opportunity for us to band together as brothers in the defense and really just embrace the moment. Enjoy the difficulty, the situation at hand, and come together. When you see Murph not only get the pick, but take it back as far as he did, how good is that to see? I mean, it's pretty far to take it to the house, but still he had a great play, not only the pickoff, but the return. Yeah, you know, one of the bright spots of the day. But, you know, I thought he was going to take a knee, but he kept running. So, you know, I had to be the best teammate I could, you know, and block. So, you know, hopefully he was going to crib it. Shout out Murph. You guys just kind of quickly put this in the rearview mirror. Shorter week, then you got to go on the road in Green Bay. I mean, you know, you got to turn the page fast, you know, especially on Monday night games. Thank you very much. But I feel like, you know, that's just how the NFL is. You know, you got 18 weeks with 17 games. So, you know, you got to be able to change the momentum. You turn the page fast and, you know, just move on, you know, from whatever win, loss, tie. So, yeah. I kind of had a thought, like, should I just run this out? And then I ran it out, kind of got gassed towards the middle. But, yeah, obviously, yeah, just trying to go get the ball and make a play. I think as we're back out there two plays later, is this kind of the theme that you guys are feeling? I wouldn't say that. Just, you know, just being ready for whenever the defense has to hit the field and go make plays. Appreciate it. Thank you. Dallas said he thought training camp. I guess, what do you think is clicking for you in that regard again this year? I would just say just sticking to the scheme and obviously just listening to Coach Lowe because everybody, like I said, everybody on this defense can make plays and when the opportunity comes, they come. So obviously I had one today. Went to go make the play, but I just feel like obviously just being in the right area, attacking the ball and just trying to get to the ball is gonna help me keep making plays. Finally, they have such a big time of possession advantage. What's the biggest challenge from a defensive perspective? Obviously, you know, early downs, getting the stop. Obviously, forcing them to do something they don't want to do on the offensive side. You know, third and long those situations, put them in those situations, make the quarterback, you know, kind of, you know, get the ball down the field. But, you know, I was just going out there trying to get the stop. That's the biggest thing. Barry, can you take us through, we just got here, take us through that pick. You tracked the ball, I mean, even in traffic. And then to have the wherewithal, I think Dallas said he thought you were going to put your knee down, but you just went off of it. I thought about putting my knee down. I was a little tired, but now I was like, man, I've got to try to go make this play. And I just ran. I obviously tried to make some guys miss, kind of got gassed up towards the middle of it. But, yeah, I just wanted to go, you know, obviously try to finish that play and obviously get a pick six, but we're going to get it next time. Well, tracking that, it's almost like how Jets has to track it in the air. Like, what goes through your mind when you see it that way? When the ball's in the air, obviously, it's on my side, it's mine. That's my mindset. Obviously, just go attack the ball. So that's, you know, if it's up there in the air, it's mine at the end of the day. Mentally, I know that you talked about time of possession. How do you guys mentally, when you see exactly your play, but then the offense can't get it clicking, you're back on the field immediately, how do you flush that mentally and physically? You know, it's obviously just the guys on the sideline and obviously you got Coach Flo, you know, just keeping that energy, making sure everyone's still on the same page. We're still locked in. And obviously as a defense, we're excited to go out there, obviously go get the job done, go make more plays. So, you know, situations come, we're always ready. But like you said, like I said, we want to be on that field to make plays. So it doesn't matter when, where, what time, anything, we want to be out there. Thank you. A lot of offenses here that scored a lot of points and put up a lot of yards and haven't been able to do it to this point, really, to the level we want to. And it's frustrating, but it's not it's not gonna change my belief in the people in here. How do you feel about just the cycle of quarterback play you have and having gotten out of that position? You know, if I can, I can't really control that. I can control what I can control. No matter who's back there, try to give them as much time as possible and take some, you know, heat off with a positive run game. Didn't think we were good enough there tonight. And, yeah, just keep going. I mean, we just do it. So, just keep going. Brian, you guys only have 11 carries. Does that surprise you with how you guys want to play the game? Yeah. Yeah, I guess, I didn't know it was just 11, but what are you going to do? Brian, how do you deal with the frustration of controlling what you control? You know you have so much talent on this offense, but still yet now, it's still not kind of meshing. Yeah, I mean, frustration is what it is, but you can't let it affect you every day. You can't go about your business frustrated. You know, you're frustrated right now, you're frustrated tomorrow until about 3, 4 o'clock, and then it's, yeah, you'll play the Green Bay Packers on the road. The best parts of this team are going to come out. We're all excited and motivated to try to make it better. You know, go put our best game forward or go put our best game out there on Sunday. And, you know, going to practice on Wednesday frustrated isn't going to help anything. So, you know, you have a heightened sense of urgency for sure. I don't know. You know, and when you go to, you know, run a double team, you can have some hate in your heart. But, like, I mean, you know, you can't really, you know, that's not, you know, you're not going to change my whole personality just because we're frustrated. You know, you've got to go attack. Do you feel the urgency just with how good the defense is today? Like, do you feel the weight, I guess, of what they've been able to do? How do you think about that? Yeah, for sure. I mean, they've been playing one of the best defenses in the NFL, and, you know, that's one of the main reasons why we're a 6-2 football team. And, you know, kind of that sense of urgency to pick up, you know, our end of the bargain and match it and try to beat some of these teams that we know are going to be in the playoffs. Thank you. Can you explain what took place? I mean, just the offense ain't getting it done. Defense did a phenomenal job once again. It's getting those turnovers and getting those stops on a very, very good offense. Thanks. So we just got to figure it out on the offense. What's the biggest key to the offense improving, moving forward? All right. I'm not sure. We got to figure it out. So, um... That's something that we don't have the answer to at this very moment. Thank you for having me. Yeah, we just got to figure it out. Because you do feel the weight of how well the defense is playing, keeping you guys in those games and not being able to get together even now, this part of the season? Oh, yeah, for sure. This is something that we've kind of been saying for the past weeks since the season started, that the offense has got to pick up the slack and we've got to help the defense out a little bit. So, you know, we've just got to figure that out. What's the confidence level? The offense can't pick up the slack? Oh, it is. It's confidence there for sure. I mean, if you look at the film, we're there. We're just a couple steps away from executing and doing what we need to do to get where we want to go. So, yeah. What is the difference? When you had 24 seconds left in the first half, then you guys were coming on a little bit. Is it the up-tempo style, or was it just happenstance? I'm not 100% sure. Sure. Once again, we just got to figure it out. Justin, what's your confidence level with the quarterbacks currently on the roster? Um... I mean, I always said it doesn't really matter who's throwing the ball. As long as it gets to us, that's all that matters. It's up to us by making those plays. You know, yeah, we just. It's tough, definitely tough. Is that the issue, though, that you are open and the ball is not getting to you? Just like I said earlier in the week, it's an all-11 thing. It's not really a quarterback thing or an O-line thing or a receiver thing. It's just all-11 guys just executing our plays every single play, and tonight we didn't do that. How important is it for the offense to stay together at this point and not let this be like where the deals kind of come up because you guys only do have two losses. Yeah, you know, that's the difficult part about, you know, what we're going through at the moment. You know, we're six and two, but We still got to figure it out on offense, and we're still struggling on offense, honestly. So we just got to find ways to simplify it and make it easier for everybody and just go out there executing the plays, not thinking, and just go out and play ball. We have the talent. We have the guys in the room and on the offensive side of the ball to make plays and make something happen. We just got to make the plays. So you said simplify it. Do you think that's the key? I'm not sure what the key is, whatever the key is, we gotta find it and make sure that Going forward, you know, we're not having the same issues and coming back to this camera, you know, talking about the same things. So, you know, offensive side of the ball, that's kind of the only missing piece at this very moment. You know, defense is playing pretty good, very good ball. Special teams is doing what they need to do. Will is making field goals. We just got to do better as finishing drives, extending plays, extending drives. And putting points on the board. Last couple. Is the solution maybe Nolan bringing somebody in before the deadline tomorrow afternoon? Not sure. That's on Nolan. That's on Kale. That's their job. My job is to continue to get open, continue to be the leader of the team, and come next week and hopefully things change. How do you keep the offense loose? Every time you hear championship caliber defense, small windows of careers, how do you keep it loose so it doesn't become too tough? Um, that's a great question. That's something that we all kind of got to figure out. We all got to come together at this moment. It's definitely a difficult moment, frustrating moment is to, you know, seeing how well this team could be. But the offense at this very moment is kind of holding this team back. So as an offense, as a leader of this team, we got to just figure it out and come ready next week. Well, this week, I should say. Thank y'all.