Upon Further Review: Vikings vs. Cardinals

Dalvin Cook looked great. The rest of the Minnesota Vikings’ first-team offense did not.

Head coach Mike Zimmer and the Vikings exited the field with another meaningless preseason victory by topping the visiting Arizona Cardinals 20-9 on Saturday afternoon, but not without exposing some concerns with Kirk Cousins and the 11 offensive starters.

Cousins played the entire first half and led six drives. It went like this: punt, touchdown, punt, punt, punt, missed field-goal attempt. He finished the game 3-for-13 with 35 passing yards and was sacked twice for a total loss of 11 yards. Cousins overthrew Diggs badly on a deep ball on the first drive and, simply put, looked bad. Real bad.

It wasn’t a fun day for wide receiver Chad Beebe, either. Once thought as the runaway candidate for the third option at receiver, Beebe didn’t catch any of his three targets and had a bad drop on a third down.

How about some positivity? Cook made his preseason debut and scampered for an 85-yard score on the Vikings’ second offensive drive. Zimmer then proceeded to take Cook out faster than the running back sprinted to the end zone.

The defense didn’t allow a touchdown for the second straight week and the first teamers were mostly solid, even with defensive tackle Linval Joseph sitting out. Zimmer wasn’t too happy with the Vikings allowing Arizona five third-down conversions in the first half (on 11 tries), but you can’t be too harsh on a unit that allowed nine points.

Quick reminder: it’s preseason.

The sky is not falling … just yet.

Here’s a recap of Saturday’s game (STORY | PHOTOS):

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