New Vikings Defender Says 2024 Will Be “Special”
It’s been stated time and time again that many around the NFL landscape are considering 2024 to be a bridge year for the Minnesota Vikings as they try to figure out what they have in J.J. McCarthy, whilst Sam Darnold plugs the hole.
However, that isn’t how the players and coaches at TCO Performance Center are viewing it. Just a couple of days ago, new running back Aaron Jones, former bitter rival with the Green Bay Packers, stated how much the Vikings are embracing an “underdog” role in 2024, detailing how it is up to the team to control the narratives surrounding them.
Well, another member of the Vikings’ 2024 Free Agency class agrees with him and even took it a step further than Jones.
Jones is on the record for calling Minnesota the “underdog,” but brand-new linebacker and Eden Prairie native Blake Cashman went as far as to say that 2024 would be “special” for the purple team in a mini-presser after Saturday’s boiling-hot practice in front of a packed TCO Performance Center.
It’s gonna be a very special year, and this team, you know, the coaches, the players…it’s a very tight group. That camaraderie, those relationships can be the difference-maker to take a team very far into the playoffs.
Vikings LB Blake Cashman
Cashman is no stranger to teams that outperform the expectations placed upon them by the general NFL viewer base. He was a key contributor to last season’s Houston Texans team, which many considered to be in the early stages of a rebuild. However, under Demeco Ryans and behind the arm of rookie QB C.J. Stroud, the Texans won the AFC South and absolutely dismantled the Cleveland Browns in the wild-card round of the playoffs this last January.
That victory was only the Texans’ fifth playoff triumph in franchise history and their first since defeating the upstart Buffalo Bills with Deshaun Watson back in January of 2020, even before the COVID-19 outbreak. Houston would fall the next game to MVP Lamar Jackson and his Ravens of Baltimore, but the point remains: virtually no one expected the Texans to be a force to be reckoned with and be considered a legitimate contender this soon, but that’s exactly what they accomplished at an accelerated rate, and Blake Cashman was very much a part of the ride and the reason why.
Cashman himself was the apple of the eye of many Vikings fans during the 2019 NFL Draft process, mostly of course, because of his upbringing in Eden Prairie, Minnesota, and his collegiate career taking place with the Minnesota Golden Gophers. He also would’ve been a welcome addition for the purpose of depth around that time as Minnesota searched for some reliability behind Eric Kendricks at the middle linebacker spot. He would, of course, end up being snatched up just five selections before the Vikings by the New York Jets with the 157th selection. Minnesota would take a linebacker by the name of Cameron Smith out of USC 162nd, a potential indicator that their eyes were on Cashman at that selection.
This year, however, Cashman will likely be the guy in the middle next to Ivan Pace. With the Vikings now operating mainly out of the 3-4 and nickel packages, demanding two MLBs on the field at most given times, the Vikings defender will be an intricate part of the second edition of the Brain Flores defensive vision in Minneapolis and has just as much of a role in making 2024 “special” as anyone else on the roster.
Vikings Embrace the Underdog Role in 2024