Leslie Frazier understands slapping the "rebuilding" tag on his Minnesota Vikings is risky business in this day and age.
With patience at a low, today's coaches are launched into the organ grinder without warning, and the "five-year plan" has become a clanging gong to ticket-buyers.
Minnesota has signed but one free agent -- tight end John Carlson -- and that has sections of the fan base in uproar. But as he enters his second full season with the Vikings, Frazier promised his team isn't done shopping.
"We still want to find a wide receiver that can really threaten the field vertically," Frazier told The Star Tribune this week. "We also want to improve our secondary, along with our linebackers also.
"We're going to look to do that, we're going to look to upgrade our team. We may do it through free agency, but we're definitely going to do it through the draft as well. But, yeah, we're still looking at some players in free agency. ... It's not closed. We're still looking."
The Vikings are 6-16 under Frazier's watch. When he stepped in for the fired Brad Childress in 2010, Frazier inherited an aging, off-the-tracks squad that needed overhaul. That takes time, but in a league where Giants coach Tom Coughlin was strapped to the hot seat less than a year ago, Frazier knows the slow-and-steady approach could prove fatal.
"Not in our profession. Somebody else will be sitting in this seat if I look to the future," Frazier told The Star Tribune. "I have to get our guys ready to have a good season next year. We need to have a good year."
