“Watermelon Ball” gives Matt Daniels of the Vikings a tool to bring boredom back to NFL kickoffs

The Vikings blocked a field goal attempt and recovered a deflected punt to allow a 15-yard touchdown drive in Sunday’s overtime win at Chicago. So naturally, special teams coordinator Matt Daniels spent most of his 18 minutes with reporters on Tuesday discussing the two big kicking errors that turned an 11-point lead into a tie in the final 1:56 of regulation .

Forgive us for our sins and our journalistic curiosity, Vikings Nation, as some of us ignored the good and went straight to the ugly because we wanted to know how the hell the Vikings inadvertently injected so much unnecessary excitement into an otherwise lifeless aspect – Kickoffzzz – from today’s NFL.

“Obviously, things probably could have gone a lot more smoothly,” Daniels said.

NFL teams have played 1,841 times this season. 574 opponents have returned. That equates to a response rate of 31.2%, which still seems boring unless you buy into the NFL’s new and shamelessly homemade “Dynamic Kickoff” rules and the way they’ve broken last year’s record, at least so far have improved -Low response rate of 22.1%.

The Vikings aren’t convinced more returns are a good thing. That’s why their touchback rate is 85.71%. Only the Rams’ rate (88.89%) is higher.

That brings us to Kicking Gaffe #1.

Vikings interim kicker Parker Romo, who would be celebrated for winning the game with a 29-yard walkoff, also helped nearly lose the game when he botched the kickoff, which was only the eighth , which was returned all season against the Vikings.