Fans and media sure can be a picky pack of people.
We look at a 252-pound middle linebacker like Jasper Brinkley, call him a "two-down thumper" and complain that he lacks the speed and agility to be a "three-down playmaker."
Then we look at a 232-pound middle linebacker like Eric Kendricks, call him a "three-down playmaker" and complain that he lacks the size of a "two-down thumper."
Unless Brian Urlacher climbs into Hot Tub Time Machine III, returns to the year 2000 and brings his younger self back to sign with the Vikings, Kendricks looks more like the NFL's modern version of the three-down middle linebacker than most of us realize. (Besides, we all know by now that you can't interact with yourself when you travel back in time. Duh.)
If that's not good enough to calm your nerves, let's all crawl out onto a very short limb and suggest that Vikings coach Mike Zimmer might have a better idea as to the type of middle linebacker who best fits the defensive scheme he has been building for decades.
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