Top 5 Vikings Off-Season Moves
Dustin Baker
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Minnesota entered the 2020 offseason as copper-squeezers. It’s true — the penny-pinching was mandatory as the team has allotted lucrative contracts to many nucleus guys such as Anthony Barr and Kyle Rudolph.
Some contracts should make the front office grin, though. See the deals of Danielle Hunter, Eric Kendricks, Ifeadi Odenigbo, and Adam Thielen, to name a handful.
The Vikings one splashy free-agent signing was the acquisition of nose tackle Michael Pierce of the Baltimore Ravens. Pierce was inked to be the younger clone of the exiting Linval Joseph.
In Minnesota’s longstanding 4-3 defensive scheme, head coach Mike Zimmer enjoys rotund defensive tackles that can stuff the run. The thrill of Pierce’s arrival has since fizzled as the 27-year-old opted out of the 2020 season due to coronavirus concerns. His contract effectively hits pause, and Minnesota can [hopefully] expect to see him on the practice field next summer.
Aside from the Pierce hubbub, “major” free-agents deals were nil. However, that doesn’t equate to an uneventful offseason.
The Vikings swapped veteran wideout, Stefon Diggs, with Buffalo for draft picks. The next few seasons will determine if that transaction was wise or fatuous.
The verdict largely depends on the performance of rookie pass-catcher Justin Jefferson who Minnesota scooped out of the first round of the 2020 NFL Draft to be Diggs’ replacement.
Five Vikings offseason moves notably jump out of Rick Spielman’s briefcase as influential. Here they are ranked from in ascending order of impact.
5. The Laquon Treadwell Era finally ends
Inarguably, the 2016 draft selection of wide receiver LaquonTreadwell was ill-fated. He is a tremendous dude and a smart football player, but he did not work out for the Vikings.
What’s more, it isn’t even so much that his performance as a first-round pick was lusterless. Faulty draft decisions happen to all NFL franchises periodically.
The problem with his tenure in Minnesota is that the Vikings “got used to” to valueless production at the WR3 position. When Treadwell made a simple reception, it was a big deal. It should not be a jump-for-joy situation when a WR3 merely catches the football.
The third wide receiver on a football team should be nabbing crucial third-down catches, snatching four-to-seven touchdowns per season, and complementing the WR1 and WR2 on a routine basis. Treadwell never, ever did that.
With Treadwell now dirty-birding in Atlanta, the Vikings can cultivate a true WR3 that doesn’t effectuate breaking news solely for making a competent play.
4. Letting cornerbacks walk
Vikings fans did a very weird thing this spring. They openly admitted [complained] that the Vikings 2019 cornerback play was abysmal.
Across the board, fans and pundits decried Xavier Rhodes and Trae Waynes for suspect performance.
So, the Vikings let those two walk via free agency and also lost nickel corner Mackenzie Alexander, who spurned the Vikings reportedly because he was salty about playing the Week 17 mini-Bye against the Bears.
Then, the same fans became nervous about cornerback depth when the Vikings replaced the aforementioned players via the draft. Minnesota had limited funds to acquire any keynote corners. Therefore, the draft was a sensible location to replenish the depth chart.
There were two realistic options for the Vikings to remedy the CB situation: 1) Embark on the 2020 season with some combination of Rhodes, Waynes, and Mackenzie Alexander or 2) Rebuild the cornerback room for cheap.
Minnesota chose the latter.
One can, of course, be skittish about an abundance youth at the position. But to chide the 2019 cornerback play, watch those culprits leave, and then claim the team is “rebuilding” is beyond bizarre thinking. Rebuilds do not occur when a team recently reached the divisional round of the playoffs and soon after extended the head coach and quarterback.
Period.
Try to imagine the fans’ sentiments if Minnesota chose to re-invest in Rhodes and Waynes as their solution. Yikes.
3. Re-signing Dan Bailey and Britton Colquitt
Alas, the Minnesota Vikings have a competent kicking situation. From 2014 to 2018, Minnesota had the worst extra point conversion percentage in the NFL. They also missed 34 field goals (or about seven per season).
Kicking stabilized in 2019, beautifully. Last season, Dan Bailey was the NFL’s fourth-most accurate field goal kicker (93.1%). He still missed four extra points, but as they say, “progress not perfection.”
Field goal and extra point kicking have been the bane of Mike Zimmer’s head coaching existence. It finally felt steady for Zimmer and his Vikings in 2019. This is attributable to Bailey and his holder, punter Britton Colquitt.
As a reward, so to speak, the Vikings extended the contracts of both Bailey and Colquitt this offseason. Bailey re-upped for three more years at a total price tag of $10 million. Colquitt also signed on for three more seasons. This alignment is no coincidence.
2. Extension of Kirk Cousins
Kirk Cousins received via the oft-scrutinized contract from 2018, which seems like a steal when compared to the whopping 10-year $450 million dollar contract that Kansas City Chief’s QB Patrick Mahomes received received this off-season according to Betway.
He clearly earned it, though, as the Vikings opted to retain his services through the year 2022. That’s right, Minnesota nailed down continuity at the quarterback position — something the team has not had since the days of Daunte Culpepper. And even that was relatively brief (and ended tragically).
Since Cousins became a Viking, the team has the fourth-best overall passer rating in the NFL. This stat is irrefutable. To plot for a future post-Cousins, whether it be via trade or draft, would be to surmise there are other quarterbacks [somewhere] that can propel the team to a passer rating higher than fourth-best in the business. Is this possible? Yes. Is it realistic?
Absolutely not.
The utopian vision would be for every team to find its Patrick Mahomes through the draft. The dystopian vision is the team jettisons a proficient quarterback in favor of a youngster, and he up ends being Christian Ponder-like. This would set the franchise back at least three years.
The Vikings — after a 13-year search — have a signal-caller that brings consistency to the quarterback spot. The team made the right choice to extend Cousins.
1. Mike Zimmer remains boss for at least four more years
In the last five years, the Vikings have been the league’s fifth-best team via win percentage (.631). That’s a better win percentage than the Green Bay Packers and Baltimore Ravens and exactly tied with the Seattle Seahawks.
Needless to say, Minnesota has not won a Super Bowl. It’s a major caveat. Yet, Mike Zimmer has never put forth a lousy product. Even in his rookie season, the Vikings were competitive with a roster that showcased virtually no offensive playmakers outside of Kyle Rudolph’s reliable hands.
With Zimmer, the Vikings are assured to be a competitive squad as defense is his calling card. Good or great defense enables nearly any NFL team to be .500 or better. It’s just the nature of the beast.
Under the previous administration, Leslie Frazier, the Vikings ranked 31st in the NFL in defense allowing 26.6 points per game. Only the Las Vegas Raiders were worse from 2011 to 2013.
During the Zimmer era, the Vikings rank second in the NFL in defense surrendering just 19.2 points per game. Only the New England Patriots have been better.
Because of his defensive acumen, the Zimmer extension was the right move and was the best of the offseason.