The Vikings’ Definition of Success in 2025
The Vikings are in a weird spot this year, and they did it to themselves.
Not that that’s a bad thing by any means, but last season they were a 14-win wild card team, and this year they’re a major question mark, all because J.J. McCarthy is taking the reins, and rightfully so. Even though the purple team won so many games last year, the “regression” of going from Sam Darnold, now with the Seahawks, to McCarthy, coming off an injury, is enough for sportsbooks to put the Vikings’ over/under 2025 win total at 8.5.
So, by betting definition, a successful season for these Vikings is nine wins or greater, but what is the true metric that can be used to define what “success” means for this bunch?
Well, to be frank, there really isn’t one. Success is a pretty relative term. However, if I were to drop the “lawyer” argument, I’d say it’s probably dependent on whether McCarthy is very obviously the guy since that is what they’re hitching their wagon to as we roll along. However, that’s too simple of an answer to the loaded question.
It’s just that there is more to next season than McCarthy being the clear quarterback of the future; there are other guys on the team, too, and some darn good ones. Everyone else also has a contract, and it would be foolish to think the Vikings are solely looking for 2025 to be just “the year they were proven right about giving the keys to the kingdom to Jonathan James McCarthy.”
Kevin O’Connell and the gang are obviously looking to win. Harrison Smith is on what feels like the final leg of his multi-year retirement tour (that hasn’t officially been a retirement tour, but it pretty much is), Andrew Van Ginkel is on the final year of his deal he signed in 2024, Brian O’Neill is turning 30 in September, Justin Jefferson is getting older, the list goes on.
The clock moves too fast for 2025 to only be about McCarthy being good.
Not to mention, a year of McCarthy’s rookie contract has already been burned, and the kid hasn’t played a snap yet. The entire idea of letting Kirk Cousins get paid by some other unsuspecting team was to build a juggernaut around a young signal-caller on a relatively cheap deal, and it sort of seems like the Vikings have done that, at least on paper.
It all boils back down to winning games, and that obviously goes without saying. Everything else is just context. The rest of the story is up to your perspective; how far into the playoffs do you have to go to call a season good? Is winning the Super Bowl really the only way you can call a season successful? There are no true answers to those questions, but the context surrounding them holds the answers.
But it would be pretty cool if J.J. McCarthy was really good and the Vikings won the Super Bowl this year, right?
2 Vikings Candidates for a Shocking Trade in the Next Year