It’s rare for one play to take up so much mental space, especially when it easily could have turned out another way.
But the decision to run a zero blitz by defensive coordinator Steve Wilks resulted in an end-of-half touchdown for the Vikings’ Jordan Addison on Monday night. After Charvarius Ward ripped the ball away from Addison on an interception on the opening drive of the game, Addison returned the favor to put the Vikings up 16-7.
Ward, for his part, credited Addison when talking to reporters Wednesday.
“The kid made a good play,” Ward said. “That’s all I can say. He made a good-ass play. I thought I had it. And next thing you know, he had it and he’s running into the end zone.”
But the burden lies with Wilks, who Kyle Shanahan said “messed up,” and knew it. He spoke on Thursday, and while he stressed a desire to shift the focus to the Bengals, he opened by taking credit for the error:
I take full responsibility for that call. I have to do a better job in putting the guys in a better position. We have good players. I know that and can’t really press the issue. With that, you know, moving forward, it’s my responsibility to do that. So I wish I could take it back. But again, I gotta do better.
I can’t press it. Our players, again, they have shown an ability to be able to do certain things, and I got to be able to trust that and I know exactly what we have and the caliber [of] guys there. And once again, I take full responsibility for putting those guys in that position.
Shanahan also talked about the decision with Tom Tolbert later Thursday, and said the issue wasn’t innate with the play call. It was the play call at that time.
With 16 seconds remaining and no timeouts, Shanahan said the Vikings didn’t have enough time to run a pass play to get roughly 20 yards, get up to the line of scrimmage and clock the ball for a long field goal attempt.
Had there been 18 or 19 seconds, that would have been a viable option, and Shanahan said the call would have made sense in that context. He, too, took credit for the error, while simultaneously pointing out that it was an “unnecessary” call.
“It’s ultimately up to me,” Shanahan said. “I mean, I heard that and I should have called a timeout and changed it, but I didn’t.”
He said a previous series was also a factor in the call. Earlier, Kirk Cousins had a 14-yard completion on 2nd-and-24, which set up a conversion on a 3rd-and-10, in the form of a 30-yard chunk screen play against a blitz off the right side.
Shanahan said the idea was to not let Cousins sit back and deal without pressure in his face, but the timing wasn’t right.