EDEN PRAIRIE, Minn. -- The Minnesota Vikings are continuing to stand by kicker Blair Walsh after his rocky start to the regular season Sunday, and for his part, Walsh says he knows how to fix the problems.
Walsh missed two field goals and an extra point in the Vikings' 25-16 Week 1 victory over the Tennessee Titans.
"I know Blair's our guy," special-teams coordinator Mike Priefer said, adding he wouldn't look for another kicker right now.
"Going forward, he's going to be the guy," Priefer said.
Walsh, who missed a 27-yard field goal wide left at the end of the Vikings' wild-card loss to the Seattle Seahawks, pulled a 37-yarder left on his first attempt Sunday. He missed a 56-yard attempt left just before halftime, and pushed an extra point right after Eric Kendricks' 77-yard interception return for a touchdown in the third quarter. Walsh, though, connected on four field goal attempts in the second half, including a 50-yarder.
"I told him -- and I think he agreed with me -- he's too good a kicker to miss the type of kicks he's missing. The 37-yarder, he can't miss to start the game. The PAT, he can't miss that. The [56-yarder] at the end of the half, a lot of kickers are going to miss that. He's good enough to make that, but it was still a very difficult kick. We need him to step up, and that's what I told him at halftime. We needed him to step up, and he did."
Walsh, who played his first game Sunday on the four-year, $13 million extension the Vikings gave him in July 2015, said the scrutiny of his performance has been at a higher level in the eight months since his miss against the Seahawks, but he added, "You deal with it. You live with it, and you move on.
"I'm confident in what I do every day. I enjoy my life, I enjoy being part of this team, and I'll continue to do my best."