2 Vikings Most Likely to Be Cut Before a 2026 Cap Crunch
The Minnesota Vikings are a bit handcuffed as it stands when you take a look at their 2026 cap availability. Per OverTheCap, Minnesota has a difficult -$35,983,572 cap number to deal with. Luckily, cap room is very manipulable; therefore, the Vikings do have paths out of these circumstances.
There are two players that the Vikings can straight-up release to help clean this up a bit. Minnesota very well could opt for a restructuring of these gentlemen’s agreements, but they seem to be the path of least resistance without getting into all of the ideas of restructuring contracts and all.
Take these with a grain of salt, as they aren’t perfect solutions. Rather, this is to show that this cap mountain isn’t insurmountable.
TE T.J. Hockenson (w/post-June 1st designation)
This is one of the more obvious ones, but there’s a reason. This move could clean up some serious room on the Vikings’ books that they need to clear.
Our own Tom Rudelius actually touched on this in late November:
“Hockenson has no guaranteed money on his contract, and the Vikings can save $16 million by cutting him this offseason.
It seems reasonable that the Vikings would want to lower Hockenson’s pay, given his decline in production over the last two seasons, but it also seems plausible that Hockenson would take a slight pay cut rather than having to seek a new contract elsewhere.”
Here’s what it looks like if the Vikings were to release T.J. Hockenson, per OverTheCap:
- 2026 Cap Savings: $16.020,000
- 2026 Dead Cap: $5,330,000
- 2027 Cap Savings: $16,265,000
- 2027 Dead Cap: $7,090,000
- 2028 Dead Cap: $1,175,000
There’s a little dead cap there, but the benefit of getting that contract off the books far outweighs the downside of having some dead cap down the road.
C Ryan Kelly
The Ryan Kelly experiment (along with the rebuilt offensive line) has been a major disappointment in 2025. It has been hard for them to all be on the field at the same time, which is part of the problem in itself.
Kelly has dealt with injuries all year. He was taken out of games in Week 2, 4, and 13, and missed all games between Week 5 and Week 11. Concussions ravaged most of his season, but his Week 13 exit against the Seahawks was due to a hip flexor. This is big for an aging offensive lineman, so it’s likely he will also miss Week 14 against the Commanders.
And here’s the money breakdown if he were released in 2026 with a pre-June 1st designation:
- 2026 Cap Savings: $12,117,500
- 2026 Dead Cap: $0
The Vikings Have Decisions to Make
Ryan Kelly’s contract does end after the 2026 NFL season comes to a close. However, there doesn’t seem to be much of a point in going through with the deal if Kelly can’t stay healthy at all.
2026 is the time to make tough decisions, and the Vikings will be forced to do so if they want to remain cap compliant because, well, they have to.
These releases get you down to only roughly -$12 million, meaning other minor-scale moves could get you to a more respectable spot. The status of Javon Hargrave, Brian O’Neill, and others is something to keep an eye on.
