http://espn.go.com/blog/nfcnorth/post/_/id...-receiver-depth

I'm trying to figure out what his rationale is. Is he using the stats?? James Jones barely played last year due to injury.

Gosh, i'll take Jones over most of their guys. Am I being a homer myself? Bobby Wade is just plain average , i'm sorry.

Crap, you know Minny is gonna pick up Ruvel Martin. Yet another Minny pickup, from GB.

I have my doubts Martin would sign with the vikes, especially if he gets any other offers. After all he is good friends with Rodgers and to have to play with Favre might not be so appealing to Ruvell.

I read that. Total homer pick. Even Bears fans are calling him out on it.

He's basing this on what? This is laughable. The Packers have one of the best WR corps in the entire NFL. The Vikings don't even come close.

Can a team be said to have a "good depth" when they don't even boast a #1 WR on their roster? Berrian is a #2 at best and seems like a one dimensional deep threat. He obviously must think Harvin is going to be a stud.

And now they just cut Bobby Wade, so, uh.....yeah.

LOL, when did this happen?

But back to the original point...I suppose it could be close at the end of the year IF Harvin has a great year, and IF Rice improves, and IF Favre has a good year.

That's a lot of 'if's'.

Even then, they still aren't in the same class IMO.

Did anyone read all the comments posted after the ESPN article? Basically everyone told Seifert he was full of it.

Assuming that Donald Driver gets T-boned by a Mack track driving into Lambeau and the flaming remains of his wrecked car goes flying into the parking lot, striking and instantly killing James Jones, Greg Jennings and Jordy Nelson, then I agree that the Vikings will have the best wide receiving corps in the division.

Wade is gone. here's the link:

ESPN

That pretty much shoots more holes in Seifert's article too. He's already responded with more excuses and Homer-ism:

"Ok. Ok. Okaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaayyyy!!!!!! You win. Egg, meet face.

That’s right. Minnesota didn’t do me any favors Thursday morning by releasing receiver Bobby Wade and reportedly replacing him with veteran Greg Lewis. (It’s probably a bad deal for Wade, too, but this isn’t his blog. It’s mine.) The move doesn’t suggest the Vikings had the same opinion of Wade’s ability to provide depth as I did in this week’s Have at It feature.

I think most everyone is surprised by the timing, if not the substance, of this move. Wade, after all, restructured his contract last week and took a 50 percent pay cut in the process. Typically when a veteran agrees to such an arrangement, the understanding is that he will make the team. Otherwise, the player is released and gets an opportunity to sign elsewhere during the mad rush of final-cut weekend.

I’m not totally sure why this happened, but here are some possible explanations:

1. The Vikings are more concerned about the health of receiver Bernard Berrian’s hamstring than they are letting on. Berrian suffered the injury in the first quarter of the Aug. 14 preseason opener at Indianapolis and missed the rest of the preseason. He was limited in practice Wednesday but all indications have been that he’s ready to come back. But if the Vikings are worried about him, Wade -- a slot receiver -- probably wouldn’t have been an ideal replacement. Lewis is more of an outside/speed receiver.
2. Childress has long had an affinity for players he once coached in Philadelphia. Lewis, a 2003 Eagles draft choice, joins a long line of ex-Eagles players to have paraded through Minnesota over the past four years. The list includes offensive lineman Artis Hicks, fullback Thomas Tapeh, receivers Billy McMullen and Todd Pinkston, and quarterbacks Mike McMahon and Koy Detmer.
3. The Vikings didn’t want to guarantee Wade’s new contract, which is believed to be worth $1.5 million. That would have happened if he were on the roster this weekend. As it is, the Vikings still had to pay Wade for one day of practice. At $1.5 million per year, Wade would receive a Week 1 “game check” for $88,235.29. That’s nothing for the Vikings, however. They once paid Detmer more than $90,000 to practice for three days in 2007.
4. Childress grew weary of Wade’s refreshing but highly public profile. I doubt it’s the reason Wade is gone, but he did use a crude word to describe Chicago quarterback Jay Cutler this summer and also told reporters it was clear that Tarvaris Jackson would defeat Sage Rosenfels in a training camp competition at quarterback. Like most coaches, Childress isn’t big on players making news with their mouths.


We may never get a full explanation. But at least the Vikings improved their receiver depth today, right?"

WHATEVER SEIFERT!!!!

Thanks, JASIII. Great Laugh

Well this just proves his point! They are so deep at WR that they can let a stud like Bobby Wade go. Or...something like that.

A part of me was hoping he would try to take that angle.

My impression is that he was looking to stir up comments. I just don't buy that the guy can cover football and come away with the idea that the Vikings have a superior set or receivers then Green Bay.
Bernard Barian would be in a dogfight for the #4 spot on our roster. Jones and Nelson are more versatile players then him. Sidney Rice has plenty of potential, but is hardly proven, and nobody really knows how good Percy Harvin will be as a WR. As a gadget guy--PR/KR/Reverses, Wildcat formations, etc.--but as an all around receiver?
The guy can't be that dumb. At the end of the day, he's still an employee at ESPN and needs to manufacture controversy in order to generate responses so he can prove to his higher ups that he's worth the paycheck.
If he really believes the Vikes have a deeper set of receivers, he needs a new job.

If he's going to work at ESPN he's going to have to leave his bias at the door. Oh....wait.... ...um....nevermind.

His rationale was that their was a smaller drop-off from #1 and #2 in Minny than in Green Bay. Well that's not saying much. His biggest flaw is that he is using the stats from a WR that was their #2 last year who will be a #3 this year as proof that he is better than our #3. That is the thing though. We have a true #1, #2, #3, #4, and #5 WR on our team that don't shuffle around. Our WR corps is established and it is one of the best in the NFL. He got bashed hard-core. Even by Vikings fans. Bernard Berrian looks better than he really is because teams are stacking the box to stop Peterson. Its the other way around for the Packers. The running game looks better than it is because teams are afraid of our 1-2 punch with Jennings and Driver. You can't stack the box against the Packers. Berrian makes big plays because he gets single coverage pretty much exclusively. Sometimes even blown coverages because teams are focusing on Peterson.

Yeah, he also compared Wades stats from 2008 to Nelson's of 2008. Since they are(or now, were)both #4 guys this year. Thats a really flawed way to look at things since Wade got far more opportunities in 2008. And even then, they weren't that far off from each other.

Normally I think the guy usually writes pretty fair stuff, but it looks like he had a brain fart on this one.

Just to throw it out there, Seifert did basically say that he was wrong once Wade was released. The part where he said at the end "But at least the Vikings improved their receiver depth today, right?" was actually linked to the word sarcasm from our neighborhood friendly dictionary.com

Still, the fact that it was suggested at all is laughable. The Packers are a pass first offense and the Vikings are a run first offense. The real question would be, if the Vikings lost Peterson and the Packers lost Jennings, which team would suffer more?

Seifert is a tool. His homerism for the queens on BSPN's website is ridiculous. Take whatever he says with a huge block of salt.

You are absolutely right. It's a rare publication that writes articles to inform or attempt an old school persuasion anymore. The only thing that counts on the Internet is how many people come to read something. It's page views and CPM right now in this economy.

The only thing I go to ESPN's site for anymore is college scores on Saturdays.

It's the only thing that counts anywhere in the United Supermarket of America. Or anywhere else on the planet for that matter.

He also was trying to claim that the phantom illegal contact call on Harris was a legit call. Even after Pereira came out and said that it indeed was a bad call, Seifert is still trying to backup his claim that it was a legit call. The head of NFL officiating came out and said that the call was a bad one. If it wasn't blatantly a bad call he isn't going to come out and criticize the officials. Seifert is a tool.

On another, John Clayton is also trying to make the same point that the Vikings have one of the most talented WR groups in the NFL and that they are a deeper group than the Packers'. Clayton is really drinking the Koolaid. He has the Vikings as his #3 ranked team. I really don't understand all the hype. Favre will fade at some point in the season. They better hope that they don't need him to win a game through the air anytime soon. Although his QB Rating was decent on Sunday, the Vikings averaged less than 4 yards per pass play against Cleveland. That isn't good.

Well, he's just embarrassing himself at this point. I know saying controversial things create a buzz, but that's just rediculous. That was as bad as any call you'd ever see and when the head of officiating acknowledges it, you know it was bad. As you say, they don't like to admit they were wrong.

He might at least TRY to be objective.

He also said it didn't affect the outcome of the game. While it didn't directly affect the outcome of the game it forced the Packers to play a completely different style of game. They should have never been losing with 2 min. left on the clock. The Packers should have got the ball back on that failed 3rd down completion. The contact was definitely within 5 yards and the contact was marginal. Even after 5 yards the officials shouldn't be making that call, especially the way it impacted the game. He barely touched Hester. Pereira also said that the alleged penalty was not in the area of the play. If an official is going to call illegal contact away from the play it better be pretty obvious. That was one of the worst calls I've ever seen, yet here is this Minnesota homer trying to legitimize it. This is football. They've got to let these guys play. Especially late in the 4th quarter.