Questions Answered: The New Guy, the Baker Mayfield Stuff, Brkic to the Enemy
The following questions are about current Minnesota Vikings topics, answered by PurplePTSD. Today is the June 13th edition, addressed in a from-the-hip fashion. If you have questions, please email them to [email protected].
Also, please note: These are opinion-based responses. Some answers will be incorrect from time to time. But we’ll try to keep that to a minimum.
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Q: Will the new guy Andre Mintze have an impact on the 2022 Vikings?
A: Mintze has one big thing going for him as far as the 2022 Vikings are concerned — youth.
He was an undrafted free agent last year in Denver, hence the Ed Donatell connection. With the Broncos, Mintze fired up a 55.6 grade from Pro Football Focus in six games played.
At 23 years old, he could catch on the NFL or peter out like many before him. We don’t predict he’ll morph into a starter or anything like that. However, with a good summer showing, he could snag some defensive snaps, especially because the Vikings have no true-blue third pass rusher after Danielle Hunter and Za’Darius Smith.
Q: Do you realistically believe Baker Mayfield will end up with the Vikings?
A: No.
Mayfield will land somewhere, but it probably won’t be with a team that spends $35 million per season on its QB1. He can either marinate in limbo, waiting for a team’s QB1 to get hurt — and insert Mayfield with a Cleveland trade.
Otherwise, Mayfield will be an unrestricted free agent next March, a reasonable time for a team to sign the man for a prove-it deal.
Overall, the rise and fall of Baker Mayfield is very, very strange.
Q: Since Gabe Brkic ended up with the Packers, will the Vikings rue their decision to release him?
A: Well, Brkic wasn’t good enough to stick around for the summer, so the Vikings couldn’t simply hang onto him because they feared the Packers might scoop him.
The fear is that he’ll turn into Daniel Carlson for the Las Vegas Raiders, but that is largely just fan paranoia. Mason Crosby will probably win the kicking job this summer, and Brkic will sign elsewhere.
Unless the Vikings scouting department and new coaching staff are abysmal, waiving Brkic shouldn’t be considered a doomsday ordeal. Yet, it is odd and “of course they did” that the Packers were the one team to claim him.
Dustin Baker is a political scientist who graduated from the University of Minnesota in 2007. Subscribe to his daily YouTube Channel, VikesNow. He hosts a podcast with Bryant McKinnie, which airs every Wednesday with Raun Sawh and Sally from Minneapolis. His Viking fandom dates back to 1996. Listed guilty pleasures: Peanut Butter Ice Cream, ‘The Sopranos,’ and The Doors (the band).
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