Vikings left to wonder what went wrong

Associated Press

MINNEAPOLIS

In January, Brett Favre and the Minnesota Vikings were NFL darlings, a feel-good story of a team and a quarterback that finished one play away from the Super Bowl.

Just over 10 months later, Favre and the Vikings are a punchline, a 3-7 self-described “embarrassment,” that got its coach fired during the season.

After being soundly beaten by division rivals Chicago and Green Bay in successive weeks led to the firing of coach Brad Childress, the Vikings have spent the past few days contemplating just what went wrong to cause such a spectacular collapse.

In a word — everything.

“We’re 3-7,” tight end Visanthe Shiancoe said in an impassioned postgame blasting of the team on Sunday. “You go 3-7 you always want to blame somebody else. Sometimes you can’t blame somebody else. Sometimes you have to focus on yourself and what you’re doing wrong. And that’s everybody. Not just one individual. Not just a couple of guys. It’s everybody.”

Even after Favre spent another summer waffling about his plans to play and finally decided to rejoin the Vikings in mid-August, the expectations were still sky high.

But Favre leads the NFL with 17 interceptions and his 69.8 quarterback rating ranks 32nd in the league.

Off the field, it’s been just as rocky for the 41-year-old. The NFL is investigating allegations that Favre sent inappropriate messages to a game-day hostess when they both worked for the Jets in 2008.

The defensive line of Jared Allen, Kevin Williams, Pat Williams and Ray Edwards, which led the league in sacks last season, is not putting enough pressure on the quarterback.

Pro Bowl receiver Sidney Rice waited until August to have surgery on his injured hip and just played in his first game last week. And other high-priced players such as receiver Bernard Berrian, safety Madieu Williams and most of the offensive line have underperformed as well.

“I don’t think there’s anybody on our team that can stand back and say, ‘You know what? I’ve done my part. I’m not the reason we’re 3-7,”’ interim head coach Leslie Frazier said. “And if we have a guy like that, that guy has been a selfish individual.”

Things really started to turn sour after the Vikings traded a third-round pick to New England to bring receiver Randy Moss back to Minnesota last month. Childress abruptly decided to cut him after just four games, with Moss’ lack of production on the field and antics in the locker room forcing the coach’s hand. But his unilateral decision upset ownership.