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EDEN PRAIRIE, Minn. -- It's not exactly the scenario he drew up in his head, but Leslie Frazier stood at the Winter Park podium on Monday afternoon as head coach of the Minnesota Vikings -- "interim" tag officially removed.
"My desire, my hunger, to bring a world championship here has increased exponentially," said Frazier, who had interviewed for seven different head coaching jobs over the past three years while still defensive coordinator with the Vikings.
"Sometimes in life, you have dreams, you have aspiration, and sometimes, you achieve those, and sometimes, you fall short. But for me, this is a dream come true. And to be doing it in a place where I'm very familiar with the surroundings, very familiar with how we operate -- you couldn't ask for a better situation.
"Which makes me believe that it's only a matter of time before we deliver what our fans and this organization deserves -- a world championship. I believe it's going to happen. I believe it in my heart."
The last six weeks have provided a unique set of circumstances -- or as Frazier put it, "unprecedented" -- including the firing of coach Brad Childress on Nov. 22, the collapse of the Metrodome roof, two relocated games and a snow-related postponement in Philadelphia.
Frazier led the Vikings to a 3-3 record through the chaos, prompting owners Mark and Zygi Wilf to praise the head coach's "consistent composure and steady guidance" in a team-issued press release.
"Some of the advice I got from different people was don't look at it as interim, look at is as you are the head coach of the Minnesota Vikings and approach that way," Frazier said. "That's what I began to do from Day 1. You are the head coach of the Minnesota Vikings. Make decisions based on that fact. From that point on, that's the way I approached it every single day, never looking at it as an interim, but you're the head coach of the Minnesota Vikings."
And now it's official.
Frazier addressed a variety of other issues during the roughly 17-minute session with reporters, including:
Program evaluation
The plan is to meet over the next two days with members of the Vikings' personnel department and coaching staff to discuss roles and potential changes.
"I really like our coaches," Frazier said. "I'm going to sit down with all of our coaches ... and just discuss roles, just talk about going forward, what's the best way for us to approach things to give us the best chance to be successful."
Frazier added, "One of the things you want to do in this role that I'm in is look at everything from top to bottom and try to figure out what do we have to do to not be in the situation that we ended up in this season. That's one of the things I mentioned to our team in our meeting this morning.
"Every single guy, go back and do a little personal inventory. What do you have to do to make us a successful team next season? I've got to be able to do the same thing. Just go back to our staff and ascertain what's the best thing to do going forward."
Quarterback situation
Although the team is "very pleased" with rookie Joe Webb, short- and long-term plans needs to be constructed at the quarterback position -- and bringing back 41-year-old Brett Favre is not an option.
"In my mind, in all my conversations with him -- with Brett sometimes you almost want to say never is never."
"I cannot think of any circumstance of where I would pick up the phone and say, 'Brett, do you want to come back next season?' I can't think of any circumstance where that would occur."
As for whether the Vikings should lean toward grooming a young quarterback or bringing in a veteran, Frazier said, "That's one of the things that we're going to have to determine in the weeks to come. Can we develop a young guy and get what we want? Because we don't want to be a team that's hovering around 4-12, 3-13. You don't want to be that.
"At the same time, you don't want to bring in a stopgap guy and not develop a young quarterback for the future. So, we've go to sit down and go through all that and make a determination of whether or not to go with a veteran guy, or do we need to bring in a young guy?
"I think we all want a young quarterback that we can develop and build our franchise around. That would be ideal, to find the next Matt Ryan or Joe Flacco. That would be ideal, and we'll sit down and discuss that."
Scheme changes
Frazier said he won't marry himself to any scheme on either side of the ball, instead matching scheme to personnel.
"I've been a part of the West Coast (offensive) system here and other places as well. It's a very good system," Frazier said. "I don't want to be married to anything. I want to really open it up and make sure we're doing the right thing that ensures that we have the best chance at being successful."
Philosophically, Frazier sees the Vikings being a dominant run team, a dominant run defense and aggressive on special teams.
"Our mantra is not a whole lot different than it was six weeks ago when I took over -- stop the run, run the football, don't turn the football over, take the football away," Frazier said. "That's what we want to be able to do, minimize the penalties, in particular the procedure penalties."
Regarding the offense specifically, Frazier said, "I believe you could see it being to take shape over these last six games. We really want to be effective trying to run the football. We showed signs of being able to do that. Trying to be a dominant run team."
