Sinking Vikings drop Childress

— Hastily hired five seasons ago to bring order to a disheveled franchise, Brad Childress vowed to lead the Minnesota Vikings the only way he knew how - in case this was his only crack at being a head coach.

After an eventful and often tumultuous run marred recently by player unrest, livid fans and a boss angry about abrupt personnel decisions and a 3-7 start this year, Childress is out.

His conservative approach to offensive strategy and rigid communication style are gone, too, leaving behind a talented team that’s out of the playoff race and a leadership vacuum in an organization trying hard to rebuild public goodwill toward a new stadium.

Childress was fired Monday, one season after he famously picked up Brett Favre at the airport, got a contract extension and came within a field goal of reaching the Super Bowl. Owner Zygi Wilf read from a script and wouldn’t get into specifics about his decision a day after the Vikings were blown out at home by rival Green Bay.

“It’s often difficult to articulate one reason why change is needed,” Wilf said.

Wilf mentioned his “deep respect” for Childress, his hand-picked replacement for Mike Tice in 2006.

“He was an integral part of helping this franchise turn the corner and re-establishing ourselves as a force in the NFL,” Wilf said, “as well as bringing in players who did an excellent job representing themselves and our organization in this community.”

Defensive coordinator Leslie Frazier, who has interviewed seven times for NFL head coaching jobs, will serve as interim head coach for the remainder of the season. He wasted no time in answering a big question: The 41-yearold Favre is still the starting quarterback despite his 17 interceptions and looming retirement, whenever that may come.

“There’s no hesitation from me in that regard,” Frazier said, later adding: “I’m of the belief that Brett Favre is going to get it going and the turnovers are going to come down and we’re going to get going as a football team.”

Frazier wore a suit and a solemn look at the podium during a news conference, looking like he was already auditioning for the permanent job. He said he expected the full effort of his players for the rest of the season, despite the shattered title hope.

Childress went 40-37 with the Vikings, including 1-2 in the playoffs. He was all in with Favre, riding his 2009 season to the NFC Championship Game and then going down this year under the weight of his struggles to regain that rhythm. But the team’s problems transcend Favre.

Asked if he’d give Favre more freedom to run the offense as he saw fit, Frazier laughed.

“If you ask Brett that question I’m sure he would say, ‘Give me all the latitude in the world.’ But we do have a system in place,” Frazier said. “There may be some tweaks to the system. We’re going to talk about that.”

Sports, Pages 17 on 11/23/2010

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