Vikings: Mike Zimmer contract extension was easy call

The Vikings clearly did the right thing by signing Mike Zimmer to a contract extension.

Zygi Wilf and the Vikings brass have had to make a lot of tough calls over the years, but this wasn’t one of them.

Extending Mike Zimmer was as no-brainer as no-brainers come.

Zimmer’s 18-14 record over two years doesn’t begin to tell the story of what the coach has done for this franchise.

Before Zimmer, the Vikings seemed without direction or identity as a team.

Since Zimmer’s arrival, the Vikings have taken on a clear personality and established themselves as one of the rising teams in the NFL.

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Think back to how miserable the Vikings were in 2013, the year before Zimmer arrived.

Coming off a playoff season, Minnesota’s defense cratered and its offense lost all sense of continuity as it cycled through three different subpar quarterbacks.

There was very little reason for hope when Zimmer arrived in 2014, but the new leader quickly locked things down, leading the team to a surprising 7-9 record.

In 2015, the Vikings built on Zimmer’s great rookie season, going 11-5 and making the playoffs.

A defensive mastermind, Zimmer has transformed the Vikings’ D from one of the most vanilla units in the league into an aggressive, ever-shifting horror-monster.

The defensive renaissance in Minnesota has perhaps been Zimmer’s signature achievement. Overall, Zimmer has totally remade the team culture in his own image.

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It’s a bit of a cliché to talk about a coach putting his “stamp” on a team but that’s exactly what Zimmer has done with this Vikings unit.

Under Leslie Frazier, the Vikings totally lost any sense of killer instinct as a team. Ownership knew they needed a 180-degree change from the soft-spoken Frazier style and they got it with the notably loud, foul-mouthed Zimmer.

New contract extension for Zim? A no-brainer. And the coach is buying McDonald’s tonight.

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