Blair Walsh missed another field goal Monday night and the one he made, a relative chip-shot from 37 yards, was not exactly down the middle.
Walsh’s first quarter miss so concerned Mike Zimmer that later in the quarter the coach elected to go for it on 4th-and-3 on the San Francisco 37 rather than put Walsh on the field for another try.
Naturally the media had questions after the game about whether the Vikings were considering bringing in another kicker to “push” the struggling Walsh.
And Zimmer said that this is not the plan at least right now (via ESPN):
"“He hit 28 out of 28 in practice last week. He’s got to carry it to the game,” Zimmer said. “And it’s worrisome.”But Zimmer made one thing clear: The Vikings still are not considering bringing in competition for Walsh.“I’m bringing in consideration for him to pull out of this thing and start kicking like he’s capable of kicking,” Zimmer said."
It has been suggested that the Vikings should bring in a place kicking specialist and let Walsh concentrate on kickoffs until he can get himself sorted out.
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But I don’t see the Vikings doing this for two reasons:
1. They don’t want to use up another precious roster spot on a kicker.
2. They just gave Walsh a new contract and it would look very bad for Rick Spielman if they appeared to be giving up on him already.
I sort of suspect that if Mike Zimmer had his way Walsh would already be out the door, but this isn’t Zim’s call to make, it’s Spielman’s.
Spielman is the guy who wasted a draft pick on Walsh and then gave him a contract extension while he was in the middle of a slump.
Spielman knows that he would look like a chump if he booted Walsh now and if there’s anything Spielman can’t stand it’s looking like a chump.
So the Vikings and Mike Zimmer are stuck with Blair Walsh and his head full of spiders.
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