Vikings Schedule

Vikings Schedule - Will there be a late-season spark after Brad Childress’ firing?

The Dallas Cowboys have played more to their potential since they dumped Wade Phillips, going 2-1 under Jason Garrett. And the only loss was Thanksgiving’s down-to-the-wire 30-27 loss against the defending Super Bowl champion New Orleans Saints.

The Vikings’ schedule gives them a pretty good shot at finishing on a 4-2 run with winnable games at Washington today, hosting Buffalo next week, hosting the Bears on Monday Night Football in Week 15 and at Detroit in Week 17.

Week 14 hosting the New York Giants and Week 16 at Philadelphia are the other two games.

Would a 4-2 or 3-3 record extend Leslie Frazier from interim to full-time?

Frazier does have two Super Bowl rings — one as a player with the 1985 Chicago Bears and one as the defensive backs coach for the Indianapolis Colts in 2006. In 11 of his 12 years as an NFL coach, Frazier has been with winning teams.

He’s certainly respected around the league, earning seven head coaching job interviews in the past. And he comes with Tony Dungy’s recommendation.

But Dungy also said earlier in the season on NBC that the Seattle Seahawks were the best team in the NFC.

While many fans are happy to see Childress go, Frazier still remains as personnel from his tenure. Even though it seems the best thing Childress did was hire defensive coordinators (Mike Tomlin, Frazier), will Frazier do enough to separate himself from that widely criticized regime?

Mike Tice was the only other head coach in Vikings history to be an interim coach. He stuck on, but seemed to be on a short leash from fans from the get-go. And Tice produced as many playoff wins (1) as Childress did, albeit with a far less talented team.

Around the NFL, only the San Francisco 49ers Mike Singletary and the Oakland Raiders’ Tom Cable are head coaches who went from a midseason interim coach to a full-time one the next season.

Cable has had an interesting tenure in Oakland, but all in all has the Raiders 5-5 and in the AFC West hunt.