Mike Zimmer did his best Bill Belichick impression on Wednesday
By Adam Patrick
The Minnesota Vikings head coach didn’t have much to say when speaking to the media.
Disappointing is a fair word to use when describing how the 2020 season has gone for the Minnesota Vikings.
After heading into the year with hopes of earning their second-straight playoff appearance, the Vikings began the 2020 campaign with an embarrassing 1-5 record. Luckily, Minnesota was able to claw their way back into postseason contention by winning five of their first six games after their bye in Week 7.
The steam eventually ran out for the Vikings, however, and they’ve been on the losing end of the scoreboard in each of their last three matchups. Due to their performance during the last few weeks, Minnesota is now guaranteed to finish with a losing record for the first time since 2014.
Minnesota Vikings head coach Mike Zimmer kept his answers short on Wednesday
During his tenure as the head coach of the New England Patriots, Bill Belichick has been known to give short, uninformative answers to questions from reporters at times. On Wednesday, Vikings head coach Mike Zimmer seemed like he was doing his own impression of Belichick.
Zimmer’s virtual meeting with the local Twin Cities media lasted for less than four minutes and this probably had to do with the types of answers he was giving to the questions being fired his way.
One of the first few questions asked to the head coach had to do with the success of Minnesota’s offense this year and how he felt they’ve performed. Zimmer replied with a, “yeah, I thought offensively they did a nice job.”
That was all he had to say about that. Nothing about the impressive seasons Justin Jefferson and Dalvin Cook have had, nothing about Adam Thielen getting back to normal after being bothered by injuries in 2019, and nothing about the progression of his young tight ends.
Then a little later, Zimmer was asked if he thinks some of the Vikings’ rookies have hit a wall with their progression this year based on the team’s recent struggles. Minnesota’s head coach responded to this by saying, “I don’t know you’d have to ask them.”
Okay then. At this point, the reporters participating in the virtual meeting were starting to understand that Zimmer wasn’t interested in really answering any of their questions. It didn’t take long before their time with the Vikings head coach was over.
Something certainly seemed off with Zimmer on Wednesday. He usually saves this type of demeanor for his press conferences that come directly after disappointing losses.
Maybe he’s just like a lot of people in the world currently. Maybe he’s just ready for 2020 and this season to be over so he can get to working on ways to get Minnesota back into the playoffs next year.
Or maybe one of the Vikings interns bought him the wrong chewing tobacco. Who knows?