The hiring of Childress was an improvement over possibly hiring Fassel, or several other offensive minded coaches, simply because he has a record of working well with QBs in the past, which will be a critical area in the near future. The fact he impressed former coach Bud Grant is also worth a lot.

Childress may be able to improve the nucleus left in the wake of Mike Tice's regime, and take the Vikes further into the playoffs with the money Wilf will spend that Red would not. He will not be asked to completely rebuild the defense, which is not his forte, perhaps just the LB corp.

One concern with Childress at this point is his ability to discipline his players. He dealt with T Owen's misbehavior in the best possible manner, not being in commplete control of him as was head coach Reid. Because Childress followed Reid's line in taking a hard stance with TO, that is a sign he'll be the disciplinarian that is desperately needed to build a 'team' mentality. It will also eliminate excessive mistakes we saw with the flurry of rookies brought in to rebuild what Green left behind.

As we await the press conference today, to hear him speak as to possible changes he will make and which current coaches he may retain, I wonder how long it will take those few consistently pessimistic Viking fans to call for him to be fired? I will take the 'under' if Vegas sets the over/under mark at the end of one season. Maybe it will start after the first loss?

Finally, I wonder who Coach Brad Childress will prefer as starting QB? Could he possibly have a favorable bias toward someone with a name similar to his?

Good points RW. I think the fact that Childress was seen in a shouting match with TO earlier this season indicated he will not back down from anyone. I saw one quote that TO actually respected Childress. If Childress has TO's endorsement....addd to Bud's....this can't be a bad thing!

I thought I read somewhere during the TO fiasco that Childress actually went to Reid and recommended the eventual course of action the Eagles took.
The fans will turn on him quickly Vike fans always do. But I think it was a good hire. It will be interesting to see what happens. One would have to believe Culpepper was discused in interviews which in my mind the winning canidate's opinion would have had to matched the Vikings opinion.

Lonnie: The one question I hope will be answered at the forthcoming press conference would be his plans for starting QB next year, especially if the Poutin' QB is not ready to go.

On a food note: Wasn't Eller's PPE supposed to be at MOA? I swore I heard his commercials for it on KFAN about 2 or 3 years ago.

Was Torii Hunter consulted about this move.* If not, there could be trouble in the Twins clubhouse.

For those of you, who only follow a sport where the ball is oblong, Torii Hunter is the CF for the Minnesota Twins, who annointed himself "team leader" and managed to disparage the manager, a fragile young future star on the team, and the front office for various things throughout the season. One of his big gripes was not being consulted about a coaching change, thus my nod to Team Leader, thinking that why should Team Leader restrict himself to his own sport.

I'm very interested to see what Childress says about the QB situation. This seems like a good move at head coach, but one can never be sure. I'm excited to see what will happen.

My bet is that one of the reasons why Childress was brought in was his success with McNabb. Another would be that the Eagles rarely turned the ball over.

Add those two things up, and I'd bet the Vikes want Daunte to be the starter if he is ready. Brad is a great backup QB and an average starter. Daunte, when he's right, is a top 5 QB. The only reason that there is any question is because of the knee injury.

Souhan's just pissed off because he thought he was going to get another 2 weeks worth of columns out of speculating about the new coach, and now he actually has to work.

If Souhan ain't whining, Souhan ain't happy.

TBird41;

I'm not so sure the Vikes want DC to be starting QB. And I disagree about Brad. DC was under .500 and Brad was much over .500 as a starter in 2005. What has been said to date by Wilf is that DC will be on the opening day roster. That doesn't commit the Vikes to starting him, and it may actually say "we won't cut him". So if he "want(s) to play where (he) is wanted", any team that wants him will have to pay comensation in the form of players and / or draft picks.

Wilf also cannot say Daunte will start since he doesn't know if Culpeppper will recover from three ligament tears. Few players come back as effective after one ligament tear, let alone three.

So, the Vikes will review the 2006 free agent QB market and collegiate QBs in the draft, while perhaps holding private trade talks with Enny, Tuna, Green Bay, and Al Davis about dealing Daunte. They'd be foolish not to research other QB opportunities with the uncertainty about Culpepper's recovery, his ability to significantly reduce mistakes, both mental and physical, and his 'nautical naughtiness' trial (character issue).

RW, as far as Culpepper being under .500 and Johnson being over .500, I think there's more to it than that. Culpepper was trying to score on every play; he was trying to carry the team and force big plays. Johnson was just trying to move the chains. Also, the defense stunk when Culpepper was playing, they improved greatly around the time Johnson took over. Finally, the teams that Culpepper played (Tampa Bay, Cincinnati, Atlanta, Chicago, Carolina) are TOUGH teams. Johnson got some easier teams (Detroit twice, Green Bay, Cleveland, St. Louis). The only tough team Johnson beat was the Giants (no small feat) so we can't say Johnson is so much better for the Vikes than Culpepper is.

On the other hand, we still don't know how well a Moss-less Culpepper can play. If we get a decent O-line and can get Birk back at Center, that will help. However, with our opponents not having to worry about Moss, receivers are open less and the running game finds less success. I think the ideal situation is still to draft a young guy (we could certainly trade Culpepper to Denny Green in Arizona for a few good early picks) and let Johnson start and mentor the new guy. I think that we can find success in Culpepper too, so it wouldn't be a bad thing to keep him.