A Flawed Roster, The Allure of Failure, and The Kwesi Decision Hovering Over Week 6
K. Joudry
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In Week 7, the Vikings are nearly guaranteed to lose. San Francisco is the best team in the NFL, a remarkable reality when we consider how much they spent on Trey Lance (who is now in Dallas). The Kwesi decision, though, may be made before that game arrives.
What may be more consequential is the result from Week 6. The Vikings travel to Soldier Field for a date with the rebuilding Chicago Bears, a team that also has a 1-4 record. While Minnesota’s GM has been consistent in his desire to thread the needle within a balanced approach to reconstructing the roster, Chicago’s GM has placed no such limitations upon himself. In 2022, Chicago obviously tanked, a move that paid off in the form of elite draft capital and a trade that brought D.J. Moore to town.
Basically anyone predicting the Vikings’ season back in August or even September would have anticipated a win following the trip to The Windy City. What about right now, though? Personally, I’ve got the Bears pulling off the minor upset, largely due to Justin Fields showing some magic and the Vikings failing to keep their offense in a good rhythm.
In 2020, the Vikings began their year with an 0-3 record before picking up a win in Week 4 and then a loss in Week 5. The Atlanta Falcons, a very poor team, awaited in Week 6. Instead of seizing the opportunity, the Vikings slipped down to 1-5, effectively ending their season. Even worse, the team found a way of making themselves somewhat respectable with a 7-9 record.
Rick Spielman, to his credit, leveraged his more modest draft position into a Christian Darrisaw selection, but snagging a franchise left tackle later in the first round is far from a sure thing. More often than not, the elite talent at premium positions — QB, WR, OT, DE, CB — are found toward the top of the draft.
Kwesi Adofo-Mensah understands this better than anyone in Minnesota.
A Major Kwesi Decision Hovers over the Vikings
The issue is one we considered during the summer on PurplePTSD: “Why a Disastrous 2023 Could Lead to Vikings Prosperity.” The narrative is one that’s fresh in the minds of many Vikings fans. A strong team that has a horrendous year could step into a prosperous future, one where elite talent from the draft very quickly thrusts a team back into prominence.
Take a look at some of the basic thoughts from the piece that came out on July 11th:
Let’s get something out of the way: the Vikings are not tanking. Sure, there are plenty of fans and analysts (and surely even some NFL scouts, GMs, and coaches) who believe they should embrace a tank, but that’s not something the ownership or management are interested in pursuing.
If, in the end, the Vikings live in the NFL’s basement, it’ll be because they fell well short of internal expectations, not because they actively tried to be bad.
Still true, the Vikings are not trying to play bad football. The team’s leadership came into the season expecting to challenge for the NFC North, but the on-field product has made that aspiration supremely unlikely.
What will be fascinating to see is if the GM decides to shift gears. After all, there is tremendous talent to be had at the very top of a draft.
Consider how things went for the San Francisco 49ers as a result of their very poor 2018 season:
Even more wild is that the [Nick] Bosa add stands along other significant additions from the same draft. Deebo Samuel – who beat out Justin Jefferson for the AP1 spot in 2021 – was taken 36th overall. Dre Greenlaw, an underrated linebacker, went 148th. In other words, San Francisco crushed their draft.
Obviously, the further down things go, the less that high draft placement matters. Snagging players like Bosa and Samuel at the top of the 1st and 2nd, though, is a surefire recipe to give one’s team a major boost. Each player offered All-Pro play while still in their initial 4 years in the NFL (or, put differently, the length of the standard rookie deal).
Obviously, there’s no guarantee that Minnesota picks a pair of players on the same level as Bosa and Samuel, but the odds of doing so increases when placed so high in the draft. Both are cornerstone players for Kyle Shanahan.
Dropping the Bears game would mean Minnesota has slipped to 1-5. An upcoming date with the 49ers will almost certainly lead to a loss, and it’s a game that should function as yet another piece of evidence for how the franchise should proceed.
The best team in the NFC is going to present a pile of problems as a result of Nick Bosa and Deebo Samuel, players who were picked in the 2019 NFL Draft when Kwesi Adofo-Mensah was employed by San Francisco. The GM will remember this experience well, and one wonders if he’ll implement some of the insights he gleaned while in SF to help get Minnesota back into contention.
Editor’s Note: Information from Pro Football Reference helped with this piece.
Kevin O’Connell Needs to Evolve
K. Joudry is the Senior Editor for Vikings Territory and PurplePTSD. He has been covering the Vikings full time since the summer of 2021. He can be found on Twitter and as a co-host for Notes from the North, a humble Vikings podcast.