Five Vikings Players with Unique Contracts and the Hints about their Status for 2025
Going into the 2025 offseason, there were five Vikings players who had a unique feature as part of their contracts.
All of safety Harrison Smith, corner Byron Murphy Jr., corner Stephon Gilmore, quarterback Sam Darnold, and running back Aaron Jones had dead money scheduled to hit the books due to Kwesi Adofo-Mensah putting void years into their contracts (a tactic used to carve out cap room in the 2024 budget). The way that Minnesota has navigated these void dates and the dead money offers a clue about how Minnesota could proceed when deciding whether to re-sign them.
Five Vikings Players and The Void Hint
Start off with some of the recent news. Both of Murphy and Jones were supposed to see the void deadline pass, officially moving dead money onto the books for 2025. Not a total deal-breaker for bringing them back, but an odd outcome if an extension is in the works.
Well, a pair of NFL insiders offer updates on the pair of players.
Dan Graziano passed along this tidbit about the corner: “Per a league source, the Vikings and CB Byron Murphy have agreed to push back the void date on his contract. Originally, the deal voided 23 days prior to the start of the league year (either today or tomorrow). Now, it’s the day before the start of the league year, which means Murphy cannot be franchised (since that date is past the deadline for teams to use the franchise tag).”
Field Yates passed along this update about the running back: “The Vikings and RB Aaron Jones agreed to move the void date on his contract from this Monday until the final day before free agency. If Jones had not been extended by Monday, the team would have taken on $3.2M in dead money in 2025. This expands the window for Jones and Minnesota to continue to negotiate a new deal that would avoid that amount hitting the cap in full for 2025. It doesn’t guarantee a new deal will be reached, but it buys time for both sides if there is interest in hammering one out before free agency.”
So, there are a pair of hints within those updates.
The Vikings clearly want to retain the services of last season’s RB1 and CB1. Murphy is coming off a season where he snagged 6 interceptions and 14 passes defended, doing so while showing his versatility yet again. Meanwhile, Jones set a career high for rushing yards while proving to be an adept option as a pass catcher. The Vikings would be wise to retain the 30-year-old runner.
On the other end of things are Gilmore and Darnold, both of whom have seen money from their 2024 contract hit the books. The veteran corner is going to account for a $2,333,334 in dead money even if he comes back. And then Darnold is sitting at $5,000,000 in dead money despite the possibility of him being brought back.
The aforementioned update from Graziano offered these thoughts on Darnold: “Interestingly, they did NOT reach the same agreement with QB Sam Darnold, whose contract still voids 23 days before the start of the league year. If they don’t do a new deal with Darnold before the contract voids, then $5 million in remaining signing bonus proration would accelerate onto their 2025 salary cap as dead money for Sam Darnold. Upshot here: They still CAN franchise Darnold, but can’t franchise Murphy or Aaron Jones (who also pushed his void date back).”
Finally, there’s the status of The Hitman, a legend in Minnesota.
The veteran safety is still a solid starter, someone capable of moving all over Brian Flores’ defense. True, he’s not playing at the same level as the 2017 version of himself — a truly elite safety — but he’s still a good starter. Does he come back in 2025 (a recent piece on Vikings Territory considers the topic)?
Last season, the 36-year-old safety played more than 1,000 snaps. He picked up 87 tackles, 3 interceptions, 10 passes defended, 1 sack, and 3 tackles for loss.
Right now, the Vikings are in the calm before the storm. Things are going to start heating up in short order due to the arrival of the NFL Combine and then free agency in March.
Some hints have emerged in recent days and weeks, but we’ll soon get ironclad clarity on how Minnesota is going to proceed before too long.
Editor’s Note: Information from Pro Football Reference and Over the Cap helped with this piece.
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 social media (Bluesky & Twitter). If you feel so inclined, subscribe to his Substack, The Vikings Gazette, for more great Vikings content.
