Throughout the early weeks of a rough 2016 season, the Vikings continued to give kicker Blair Walsh second chances, in the apparent hope that he could eventually get his career back on track without the kick to the pants that would come from getting cut. It didn’t work, the Vikings eventually cut him after he missed eight kicks in nine game, he got the message, and now (after making eight of eight kicks on Sunday night for the Seahawks) his career is back on track.
“Nobody wants to get released, but I’m also the first person to say that if I had made more kicks I would still be [in Minnesota] right now,” Walsh said recently, via Chris Tomasson of the St. Paul Pioneer Press. “But I know my ability. I know that I have produced in this league, and everyone has seen that, And I can continue to do that.”
Those comments conflict to a certain extent with sentiments expressed elsewhere by Walsh, who is quoted in Tomasson’s article as having spoken to the Associated Press, the Tacoma News-Tribune, and KCPQ-TV.
“It wasn’t fun trying to work through it and get better,” Walsh said of his experience in 2016. “Unfortunately, I didn’t get a chance to finish out the year. I thought I would be able to correct it, and I didn’t get that chance. But it’s all right. I’m happy with the place I’m in, and I wouldn’t change anything.”
He also addressed the missed 27-yarder that kept the Vikings from beating his current team in the playoffs.
“It’s part of my career,” Walsh said. “It’s part of what I’ve done. It’s a very small part, and that’s how I like to treat it. That kick’s not going to define me.”
It already has defined him in the eyes of Vikings fans, and that will never change. Unless he misses a potential playoff-game-winning field goal against the Vikings while kicking for Seattle.