Who’s to Blame for the Vikings’ Disappointing Start? We Are.
That’s right, you and I are the cause of the Vikings’ disappointing start to the 2025 season, where the team has somehow clawed out a 1-1 record despite seven quarters of terrible football.
No, it’s not that we’re bad fans—U.S. Bank Stadium was rocking on Sunday night for the home opener against the Falcons.
The problem is rather that we set our expectations too high. When the average Vikings fan expects that the team is going to seriously contend for the Super Bowl—as preseason polls of the fan base repeatedly suggested—there is a high likelihood of disappointment.
Part of it is simple math: 32 teams every year want to win a Super Bowl, and only one gets to do it. And if you haven’t been one of the elite teams in the recent past, it’s even more difficult to take the step up. Vikings fans frequently lament the fact that the team has only one playoff win since 2018, but the sad reality is that only 16 teams—half the league—have more than one playoff win in that time. The Vikings’ recent struggles are not exceptional.
This is compounded by the challenge of starting a first-year QB. Even great QBs take time to adjust to the speed and complexity of the NFL game, and although there was hope that the QB whisperer Kevin O’Connell could bring J.J. McCarthy up to speed more quickly, there were also plenty of data points (Jaren Hall, Josh Dobbs, Nick Mullens) showing that not every QB can consistently thrive in the KOC system.
We Vikings fans were spoiled by the team’s unexpected success in 2024, which was due in large part to the performance of their free agent class. Sam Darnold, Andrew Van Ginkel, Jonathan Greenard, and Blake Cashman played like Pro Bowlers and carried the team to a 14-3 record.
This result is highly atypical: teams built on free agents usually fail because teams tend to extend their best players, leaving only old, bad, and injury-prone players for free agency. The 2024 Vikings’ free agents somehow avoided injuries and played the best football of their careers. In 2025, however, the luck has run out: the team is beset by injuries, and the much-heralded free agent signings have not yet solved the problems along the offensive and defensive lines.
There is still time for the Vikings to turn things around, but it is time for us to recalibrate our expectations of this team. The 2025 Vikings—like so many other teams—looked great on paper. But if the Vikings want to succeed—both this year and beyond—they need to see much better play from their young players, especially McCarthy.
This is how the great dynasties of the 21st-century NFL are built, with good QBs surrounded by homegrown talent and good coaching. From what we’ve seen so far this season, the Vikings need significant improvement on all three fronts.