Zimmer On Daniel Carlson's Release: 'Did You See The Game? Pretty Easy'
EAGAN, Minn. (WCCO) – Minnesota Vikings General Manager Rick Spielman did what he had no choice but to do on Monday, releasing kicker Daniel Carlson after Sunday's dreadful performance in which he missed three field goals, costing them a win.
As WCCO's David McCoy reports, the Vikings weren't about to take any chances on it happening again.
The question came right at the beginning of Monday's news conference. And Mike Zimmer was ready for it: What went into the decision to release Daniel Carlson?
"Did you see the game? Pretty easy," Zimmer said.
Nothing has come easy for the Vikings with kickers. I won't drudge all your favorite memories back up, but in just his five years here, Zimmer himself has already dealt with it twice.
"It's just hard to figure out. You think you've got a guy for a while and then he goes out and misses three in a big game," Zimmer said. "But things happen I guess."
The new guy appears to be Dan Bailey, who Zimmer said was coming to Minnesota on Monday to take a physical, but that the Vikings had not yet officially signed. Bailey, who spent the last seven years with the Dallas Cowboys, is the second-most accurate kicker in NFL history. He was released by Dallas in a surprise move at the end of the preseason.
Now he'll get to kick for a contender, indoors, where he's a career 89.9 percent. The Vikings getting the reliable leg they very dearly missed on Sunday. They traded up into the fifth round to take Carlson, the highest they'd ever taken a kicker, and at the expense of other needs like offensive line.
They won't get that fifth round pick back, or the win that slipped away, but cutting bait now was a move the Vikings had to make.