EDEN PRAIRIE, Minn. — The Vikings have tried to move past a victory the same way they pushed through a loss in the opener: with the mindset of unaccomplished work to be done.
"We haven't done anything," Head Coach Mike Zimmer said Wednesday. "We cannot think that, 'Whoa, everything is great now that we've won one game.' We have to have the same intensity, and part of it is me talking to the team, talking about the things that I expect, the way we go about our business and the way we prepare for the ballgame, whether it's on game day or on Saturday or Wednesday."
Zimmer said players responded to the season opener by bringing "a little bit of an attitude" to their home opener. They'll be at home again this week when they host San Diego (1-1).
After two weeks, the Vikings are one of 14 teams (43.8 percent of the league) that are 1-1. Nine are 2-0, and nine are winless.
Teddy Bridgewater mentioned applying the "24-hour rule" to enjoy the win for a limited amount of time, similar to the maximum amount of time that players dwelled on the San Francisco loss.
After opening in the late game of the Monday Night Football doubleheader and bouncing back in despite a shortened week, the Vikings returned Wednesday to begin their first "normal" week of 2015, with Tuesday's off, followed by three days of practices.
"It's great to get back to work this week, just like last week we want to put the Detroit game behind us," Bridgewater said. "It's great to be able to get back at home this week."
Was it a penalty? After Sunday's game, in which Anthony Barr was flagged 15 yards for an unnecessary roughness penalty for a two-hand push of Matthew Stafford out of bounds, Zimmer said he wants Vikings "to play with more poise." On Wednesday, however, the coach said, "I probably owe Anthony Barr an apology because I talked to the officials last night.
"These quarterbacks now, they're starting to slow down as they go out of bounds and kind of egging these things on, and so that was one of the things we talked about," Zimmer said. "(The officials' representative) said yeah, it probably should not have been called.
"I had to call them about something else, and we just started talking about [it] because I saw in a couple other games where these guys are going out and they step out late," Zimmer said. (Stafford) was running parallel and kind of slowed down. What he told me was they do not get protection if they slow down. They need to try to get out of bounds."
Captain's log: The Vikings taking a lead against the Lions early and success against the run prompted Detroit to throw the ball 53 times. The byproduct of that was a total of 65 snaps (by press box tally) for Captain Munnerlyn to cover the slot a week after San Francisco's incorporation of a heavy set for running the ball limited Munnerlyn to 15 snaps in the opener.
"It felt awesome to be back out there with my guys and get a lot of reps," Munnerlyn said. "If you stop the run, they've got to pass the ball, and that's when I come in the game and try to make plays."
Zimmer said he liked what he saw from Munnerlyn against the Lions.
"He was more disciplined in the things we were asking him to do, being in the right position and that's important," Zimmer said. "That position is a hard position because a lot of things happen in there. You've got to be involved in the running game, you've got be involved in covering guys one on one, you've got to be involved in zones. There's a lot of things that go on with calls that you make and alignments and formation tendencies and things like that and blitzes as well."
Turn it up to 11: Zimmer was asked about crowd noise helping the Vikings in their home opener last week and said, "I think we want it louder this week."
To be clear, Zimmer is speaking about only when the Chargers have the ball and the Vikings are on defense, not when the Vikings have the ball, so that communication when San Diego goes no-huddle becomes tougher.
Injuries update:Brandon Fusco (concussion) did not participate at Wednesday's practice. Shamar Stephen (knee) fully participated.
For the Chargers, S Jahleel Addae (ankle), G/T D.J. Fluker (ankle), WR/KR Jacoby Jones (ankle), G Johnnie Troutman (forearm), C Chris Watt (groin) and LB Tourek Williams (foot) did not participate. TE Ladarius Green (concussion) was listed as a limited participant. LB Kyle Emanuel (shoulder) and G/T Chris Hairston (knee) fully participated.
