I am not a fan of the bye week but I realize that the players need it. If the NFL is ever going to 18 games then I can imagine that there will be two bye weeks. They might even expand the game day rosters by another couple of players. But the bye week is here and there are probably not any games I want to watch in their entirety. Maybe Kansas City vs Detroit? I’d want to see how Baltimore does against the Rams but only if Lamar Jackson plays.
I’ll have to figure something out though because the “honey-do” list is omnipresent and indelible.
What games are you going to watch?
Minnesota Vikings News and Links
What can we glean from Vikings’ trip to Dublin, London?
Minnesota Vikings coach Kevin O’Connell recently found a way to succinctly describe his team’s 10-day international road trip.
“You’re almost to the end,” a journalist remarked during a news conference last Friday.
“Two sleeps,” O’Connell interjected, mimicking the phrasing parents sometimes use with restless children. “Two sleeps left. But who’s counting?”
Vikings players, coaches and staffers were more than ready to head home two sleeps later. A trip that began with confidence proved to be a challenge, one that would test any NFL team’s routine-oriented process.
The Vikings’ medical staff was taxed by a rash of injuries, and their personnel department had limited options to fortify the roster. Some players and coaches took advantage of the free time abroad to see the sights, first in Dublin and then in London. But many said they felt out of sorts while away from their families and admitted they were much more tired — because of the change in sleep patterns and limited recovery tools — than they feel during a normal NFL week.
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“It was tough,” tight end T.J. Hockenson said. “You’re not eating the way you normally eat. You’re not getting the recovery you normally get. You’re not seeing the people you normally see. You’re not getting the ‘juice’ you usually get. There’s so many things that go into it. But we talked about it all week. There’s so many excuses. You can point to one. You can point to two. You can point to 20. At the end of the day, it’s like, ‘Let’s grind. Let’s not seek comfort.'”
Hockenson precisely paraphrased the weeklong message delivered by O’Connell, who said he’s a “big believer that if you’re looking for obstacles and excuses, you’re going to find them.” It was O’Connell’s way of asking everyone in the organization to move past a suboptimal working environment.
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No one on the Vikings’ football staff is more no-nonsense than defensive coordinator Brian Flores, and even he found himself vacillating between the benefits and detriments of so much time away.
“I’m not a homebody, but I certainly miss my family,” Flores said. “They were here for Ireland. That was great. Once they go, it’s just, the boys had a game [that I missed]. We had a lot of FaceTime. But it’s good to be here with the team. There’s certainly some team building and camaraderie happening. … Guys are out catching up, spending time together. That’s good from a team bonding standpoint.
“Overall, look, you get an opportunity to go overseas, to go to London, to go to Ireland, see the world, that’s great. It tells you what football can do for you.”
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As a majority of Irish fans waved NFL-provided “Terrible Towels” and sang wildly to the traditional playing of “Renegade” by Styx at the start of the fourth quarter — a Steelers staple back at home at Acrisure Stadium — the Vikings were clearly impacted by the unfamiliar surroundings.
They committed nine penalties, including a false start on a silent cadence by normally reliable left tackle Christian Darrisaw. Right guard Will Fries inexplicably ran downfield to block on a passing play, wiping out a third-down conversion to the Steelers’ 6-yard line. The Vikings settled for a 41-yard field goal. Two defensive players, cornerback Byron Murphy Jr. and linebacker Dallas Turner, responded to post-play provocation from the Steelers and received personal fouls.
“You play certain teams and you know what you’re kind of signing up for,” O’Connell said. “That’s not to take a shot at anybody, but that falls in direct alignment with playing the game that they wanted to play.”
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Acquiring reinforcements was a geographical and administrative challenge. Any player the Vikings signed would have to have a passport and be ready to jump on a transatlantic flight on Tuesday to be ready for Wednesday practice. The Vikings ultimately added one practice squad lineman, tackle Matt Waletzko, just to give themselves an adequate number of players for a normal practice.
O’Connell later suggested the NFL should make roster accommodations in the future.
“Like anything the NFL has done from an international standpoint, anything is possible,” he said. “I think they’ve tried their absolute best and we’ve got a great group of people that work for us in-house that have made the trip very much one that I think is absolutely doable. I think there’s going to be some factors in the future if this is something that is going to become a normal reality.”
By the end of the week, most players had had their fill.
“I’m definitely ready to go home,” Allen said Thursday. “We’re creatures of habit. Not being able to have my routine isn’t as fun, but it is what it is.”
Of spending the week in London, O’Connell said: “It should feel as normal as possible to our guys while dealing with not sleeping in your own bed and all that stuff, but that’s kind of little stuff to me.”
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“We’ve had some success as of late with some of the quick passing game,” O’Connell said in London, “and I think that’s a credit to Carson’s discipline of getting the ball out of his hands, trusting progressions. In some cases the ball’s coming out to a third or fourth progression in the same amount of time that another player might spend on number one.”
Through it all, O’Connell seemed to want McCarthy back on the field — but only after he advanced through a predetermined set of landmarks. That left the impression that Wentz could remain the starter after the Week 6 bye, when the Vikings will host the Philadelphia Eagles on Oct. 19.
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Darrisaw had taken all 76 of the Vikings’ offensive snaps the previous week in Dublin, his second game since returning to the lineup, and could be seen repeatedly getting up slowly between plays.
“Those [76] snaps that I took last week was a lot,” Darrisaw said. “My body is just getting used to it.”
Former Vikings QB praises ‘next level’ preparation by Kevin O’Connell
Daniel Jones was part of the Minnesota Vikings for less than two months, but his time with the franchise left a big impression on him before his breakout performance with the Indianapolis Colts this season.
Jones has led the Colts to an impressive 4-1 start, completing 71.3% of his passes for 1,290 yards, nine total touchdowns and three interceptions. He was recently on the Fitz & Whit podcast with ex-players Ryan Fitzpatrick and Andrew Whitworth, where he talked about his short time in Minnesota and how it opened his eyes after six years with the Giants.
“I always thought I worked really hard, I tried to work really hard, and it was important for me to prepare; watching film, study. I think I did that,” Jones said. “But going to Minnesota, I saw how Sam [Darnold] prepared. I saw how Kevin [O’Connell] prepared those guys, Josh McCown, Grant Udinski, that crew, and how detailed they were, day-in-and-day-out on every little bit of the plan.
“How they’re going to study it. What they’re looking for, walking through it, quizzing each other in the quarterback room. That made a big impression on me: ‘this is maybe the next level of some of that stuff.'”
4 concerning Vikings statistics that must improve after the bye
Sack percentage (offense): 11.7 percent
NFL rank: 32nd
Through five weeks, no team has taken more sacks than the Vikings, whose quarterbacks have gone down 21 times on 180 dropbacks. That 11.7 percentage leads the league; the Ravens are the only other team with at least a 10 percent sack rate on offense.
Third down conversion percentage (offense): 31 percent
NFL rank: 31st
Percentage of first downs gained via rush (defense): 47.1 percent
NFL rank: 32nd
The raw numbers for the Vikings’ rushing defense (yards per game, yards per carry, etc.) aren’t great. But this stat we found was particularly interesting: 47 percent of Vikings opponents’ first downs are coming on the ground, which is the highest rate in the league. Teams aren’t having a ton of success against the Vikings through the air, but why throw the ball when you’re confident you can move the chains with the run game?
Accepted penalties per game: 8.8
NFL rank: 1st (in a bad way)
6 Major Points About 2025 Vikings at Week 6 Bye
Since 1990, when the NFL expanded to six playoff teams per conference, teams that opened 3-2 have made the playoffs 50.3 percent of the time. In that same span, teams that opened 2-3 made the playoffs 22.3 percent of the time.
Chasing evasive takeaways | by Rob Kleifield
Minnesota’s defense has stolen the ball twice in its four other games. Overall, the Vikings are averaging 1.4 takeaways per outing.
But only 0.5 sans the flash-in-the-pan performance against the Bengals.
Power of the ‘Invisible Presence’ | by Rob Kleifield
Here’s how O’Connell phrased the power presiding over Minnesota (even more than 4,000 miles from home):
“Our locker room is just about the right stuff. It’s hard to explain. We call it the invisible presence, and it’s something that needs to be built and carved and shaved to each individual team every single year, but it’s important, and it’s something that matters. And I’m sure there’s going to be people that listen to that and think that’s the strangest thing they’ve ever heard. But so be it. It matters to the Minnesota Vikings.”
Whether J.J. McCarthy starts against Eagles is about more than his ankle
Clearly, the first bar for McCarthy to clear in order to put himself in consideration for the Week 7 start is to show that he’s back to full strength. He needs to get in a full week of practice and demonstrate that he can drive off of his back ankle while throwing the ball, as well as move around athletically without any issues.
But that alone won’t be enough.
What Kevin O’Connell and the Vikings also need to see from McCarthy is evidence that he’s learned from what went wrong in his first two starts and that he’s ready to effectively operate their offense upon his return. That starts, at a basic level, with the fundamentals of his lower-body mechanics. He needs to be dropping back with proper technique and tying his feet to his eyes as he goes through progressions. And then he needs to get the ball out of his hands a lot quicker than he did in his first two NFL starts against the Bears and Falcons.
Vikings had a surprising emergency plan if both QBs went down in London
Had an emergency arisen, running back Cam Akers would’ve been inserted at quarterback. Coincidentally, the Vikings ran a trick play that saw Akers throw a 32-yard touchdown pass to tight end Josh Oliver.
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Akers isn’t a stranger to the quarterback position. In high school, he played quarterback but was a five-star recruit as a running back — the No. 7 overall recruit in the country, per 247Sports. He passed for 3,128 yards with 31 touchdowns and rushed for 2,105 yards and 34 touchdowns en route to being named the Gatorade Player of the Year in Mississippi as a senior in 2016.
Latest NFL news potentially opens the door for the Minnesota Vikings to fix their run defense with 1 simple move
The Minnesota Vikings’ run defense has been an issue so far this season.
Through five games, the Vikings have allowed 132.2 yards per game on the ground, which ranks 25th in the NFL. However, they are only allowing 289.8 yards per game, which ranks sixth. They are still first in the league in EPA per play on defense at -0.12, but that drops to 25th in EPA/rush, which is positive at 0.008.
Many will look at the trade of Harrison Phillips as the catalyst for these issues. Still, there is a possibility the Vikings find his replacement, making a move that fits general manager Kwesi Adofo-Mensah.
Tuesday afternoon saw a couple of trades across the NFL, and one of them stood out in a big way. The Baltimore Ravens traded a promising young edge rusher in Odafe Oweh to the Los Angeles Chargers.
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That leads to the all-important question: Will the Ravens have a fire sale now that they are 1-4? If they do, the Vikings should inquire about nose tackle Travis Jones.
A third-round pick in the 2022 NFL Draft, Jones has been a constant on the Ravens’ defensive front. It isn’t just about stopping the run with Jones; he can do a little bit of everything. You don’t want him to be a designated pass rusher, but he can push the pocket and absorb multiple blockers with his 6-4, 338-pound frame. He can also do a nice hump move that would make him and Jonathan Allen friends.
The numbers show that Minnesota Vikings offense is set for positive regression and it’s easy to see how they get there
The good news for the Vikings is that you can attribute the majority of those to the lack of continuity on offense due to injuries, especially at center and quarterback. Having the starters return is going to be hugely impactful, as will the bye week, where O’Connell will work on a solution to fix this. So many of these can be fixed by just being smarter and more cohesive.
Going into the season, the Vikings were looking to improve in two areas: short yardage runs and red zone success. They still need to improve in short yardage situations, but they have been improved in red zone conversion rate.
Last season, the Vikings went 14-3 with a lot of success on offense, but they didn’t succeed in the red zone. They ranked 19th in the NFL at 55.7% (34 touchdowns in 61 trips). This year, they have improved in the red zone, albeit with a smaller sample size at 66.7% (10 touchdowns in 15 trips). One of the biggest factors for that success has been Jordan Mason, who has three touchdowns, all of which are inside the five yard line. That is a very good sign that the Vikings have found success in fixing this issue, especially with the issues on the offensive line. Theoretically, if they can get healthy, this should make things even better.
Is Minnesota’s Post-Bye “Gauntlet” Really A Gauntlet?
The Eagles are 4-2, and the Vikings play the 3-2 Chargers on the road four days later. After a 10-day break, they play the 4-1 Lions on the road, then return home for 1-4 Baltimore.
Already, the back end of the “gauntlet” doesn’t look as difficult. The Ravens are considering everything after their worst start since 2015. However, even though the Eagles, Chargers, and Lions lead their division, they don’t look as formidable as they did at the beginning of the season.
Where the Vikings stand in the NFC playoff picture entering Week 6
The Vikings are one of four NFC teams with a 3-2 record (Seahawks, Commanders, Rams) heading into Week 6. Each division leader in the NFC (Eagles, 49ers, Bucs, Lions) sits on a 4-1 record, while the Packers sit in the middle ground on a 2-1-1 record after their wild 40-40 tie with the Cowboys in Week 4.
So, if the playoffs were to start today, Minnesota would make the postseason as the No. 7 seed thanks to tiebreakers over the Commanders and Rams. The Seahawks hold a ‘strength of victory’ tiebreaker over the Vikings, so they currently are the No. 6 seed in the NFC.
5 Vikings players who have boosted their stock in the first 5 weeks
QB Carson Wentz
Two things can be true at the same time: One can believe J.J. McCarthy should get the starting quarterback job back once he’s healthy, while also recognizing that Wentz did exactly what the Vikings needed him to do over the past three weeks while McCarthy was hurt. The Vikings had to find a way to go 2-1 or better, and they were able to do that.
Wentz was able to provide offensive competency for the Vikings, which they struggled to find during McCarthy’s first two games. He got the ball into the hands of Jefferson and his other weapons, completing 69 of 100 passes for 759 yards, five touchdowns, and two picks. Out of 37 quarterbacks with at least 50 dropbacks this season, Wentz ranks 17th in passer rating, 13th in adjusted EPA per play, and sixth in completion percentage over expected.
RB Zavier Scott
CB Isaiah Rodgers
DT Jalen Redmond
Redmond, on a league minimum salary, leads the Vikings in sacks (3) and is the team’s highest-graded defensive tackle by PFF. His pressure rate is right in line with Hargrave’s and higher than Allen’s, and he’s been a better run defender than both vets.
DT Levi Drake Rodriguez
He’s been overshadowed a bit by Redmond’s emergence, but Rodriguez has had quite the start to the season in his own right. The 2024 seventh-round pick, who played at the smallest of schools in college, looks like a legitimately good NFL defensive tackle. LDR uses his violent hands to make plays against the run — his four tackles for loss are tied with Redmond and Greenard for the team lead — and to occasionally supply some pass rush juice. He figures to play 30+ snaps on a weekly basis moving forward.
5 Vikings players whose stock has fallen in the first 5 weeks of 2025
WR Adam Thielen
Five games in, it looks like a move that simply didn’t have to happen. Thielen has been targeted eight times and has caught a total of four passes for 37 yards, plus a two-point conversion. And after at least seeing a good bit of playing time in the first three games, Thielen has played a total of 26 snaps (out of a possible 141) since Addison returned to the field in Week 4. He’s barely on the field right now, and it’s tough to see how that changes without an injury to Justin Jefferson, Addison, or Nailor. Perhaps most notably, the Vikings went with running back Zavier Scott in a receiver role over Thielen late in the loss to the Steelers in Dublin.
QB J.J. McCarthy
With Wentz being included in the “stock up” article, McCarthy has to go in this one. To be clear, 55 dropbacks in two games is simply far too small of a sample size to panic about a highly-drafted 22-year-old quarterback who has shown a lot of encouraging signs in preseason and training camp action, not to mention leading an incredible fourth quarter comeback in his regular season debut. There’s still plenty of reason to believe O’Connell is going to get quality play out of McCarthy, and perhaps very soon.
But we also can’t totally ignore the data we currently have on McCarthy, which isn’t pretty. Out of the 37 QBs with at least 50 dropbacks this season, he ranks dead last in sack rate, 36th in adjusted EPA per play and completion percentage over expected, and 35th in passer rating and success rate. He was right there with guys like Cam Ward and Joe Flacco as one of the NFL’s least effective quarterbacks in his first two games before suffering a high ankle sprain, even with the great final quarter in Chicago mixed in.
TE T.J. Hockenson
LB Ivan Pace Jr.
DT Jonathan Allen
One of the Vikings’ big free agent acquisitions of the offseason hasn’t done much to make his impact felt over the first month. Allen doesn’t have a sack, and PFF has charted him with 11 pressures on 123 pass-rush snaps. That’s a nine percent pressure rate, which is slightly below his career norms.
7 Trades the Vikings Could Pull Off This Month
College Football Today
7:30 p.m. | No. 24 South Florida at North Texas | ESPN2
9 p.m. | Fresno State at Colorado State | CBSSN
9 p.m. | Rutgers at Washington | FS1
Ian Strong | Rutgers | WR | 6’3″ | 211 | JR
Eric O’Neill | Rutgers | EDGE | 6’3″ | 250 | RSR
Kwabena Asamoah | Rutgers | OG | 6’2″ | 311 | RJR
Denzel Boston | Washington | WR | 6’3″ | 209 | RJR
Jonah Coleman | Washington | RB | 5’9″ | 229 | SR
Tacario Davis | Washington | CB | 6’3″ | 190 | SR
Carver Willis | Washington | OT | 6’5″ | 291 | RSR
I want to see Coleman and Davis tonight.
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