Future of the Vikings, Part 1: Quarterback paths

We begin our yearly offseason series by weighing all the factors for the Vikings at quarterback

© Brad Rempel-Imagn Images

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The Future of the Vikings series looks at the major storylines and options for every position on the field along with an analysis of each player’s 2024 season. For Part 1, we look at the Vikings’ paths at quarterback…

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By Matthew Coller

When Sam Darnold walked off the field at State Farm Stadium in Glendale, Arizona, the consensus from every analyst and fan alike seemed to be that he had played his last game in purple and ruined his chances over the last two weeks of getting any type of contract in the future.

Just because the world thinks something is going one way doesn’t mean we should ignore the options that are in front of the Vikings when it pertains to the future of their quarterback position. So let’s have a look at three different paths and what they would mean to the front office and coaching going forward.

McCarthy Time

The Vikings’ 10th overall pick in the 2024 draft put together a terrific training camp and played very well in his lone preseason game before being forced to undergo season-ending surgery. In a press conference to announce that McCarthy would be out for the year, head coach Kevin O’Connell declared that McCarthy was a “franchise quarterback” and there was no reason to believe the head coach was blowing smoke.

If the Vikings move on from Darnold by franchise tagging him and then trading him to a QB-needy team, they would get assets in return along with all the cap space they would save by moving on from Darnold to stack up the roster around McCarthy.

There have been a number of examples where teams have similarly moved on from good quarterbacks to swing at greatness, including the most notable when the Kansas City Chiefs traded Alex Smith and placed Patrick Mahomes in the driver’s seat.

Considering that there were cracks in the offensive line and secondary that showed themselves in the playoffs, it makes complete sense for the Vikings to pour their cap dollars into top-notch free agents to recreate last year’s offseason when they were able to bring in Jonathan Greenard, Blake Cashman and Andrew Van Ginkel, only this time with interior linemen, DBs and maybe a pass-rushing defensive tackle.

It is clear from the state of the NFC that the contenders are stacked and going nowhere. The Lions’ roster peaked as they went for 15 wins despite some injuries on defense, the Eagles remain a force, the Packers are still contenders and Washington looks to be a contender for many years ahead with Jayden Daniels at quarterback.

The Vikings can ill-afford to run out a good-not-great roster and expect to hang. With a shortage of recent draft picks that have turned into key starters, they will need all the cap space they can get in order to rebuild parts of the roster that could undergo a lot of change.

If McCarthy had been healthy all year and practiced behind the scenes, this wouldn’t feel like a very complicated decision. But his knee surgery and the high bar that the Vikings set this year with 14 wins does add layers to the decision.

Between 2022 and 2023, McCarthy threw a total of 654 passes. In preseason, he threw 17 passes. In training camp he worked almost exclusively with the second team. That’s a very, very small amount of work for a quarterback when you consider Daniels had 1,438 pass attempts in his college career and Michael Penix Jr. nearly reached 1,700.

Only the Vikings and O’Connell know where McCarthy stands in his recovery and how far he would need to go in order to take over. If they feel that McCarthy will be ready by the end of next offseason to lead the franchise going forward, then the choice will be as easy as everyone says.

If they have hesitation about how much progress he would need to make in order to play 17 NFL games on a team that now has high expectations for 2025, then finding a way to bring back Darnold would have much more merit.

The team may consider the fact that McCarthy is just about to turn 22 years old and will still have two years of his rookie deal ahead in 2026 and 2027 if he spends another year developing behind Darnold. Last year O’Connell was adamant that he would not rush McCarthy in until he felt he was truly ready.

That’s easier said than done though. This year the Vikings avoided any pressure concerning the QB situation because McCarthy was injured but if he’s fully healthy then the media/social media sharks will be ready to pounce at the first chance they can call for Darnold to be benched for McCarthy. Anyone can say that “outside noise” isn’t a factor but the NFL proves all the time that nobody is immune to it.

O’Connell’s job security also plays into the mix — though it’s unclear in what way. If O’Connell signs a long-term extension with the Vikings, it should allow for them to have some leeway in essentially a rookie year for McCarthy in 2025. Or he could view an extension as added heat to repeat the 2024 season and continue to stay in line with the Lions and Packers at the top of the division.

O’Connell’s viewpoint is a fascinating part of this. Coaches’ records don’t come with asterisks that say “*He was developing a QB that year.*” Any season where they aren’t a contender puts the HC under the gun and that becomes more possible with a QB who hasn’t played before than it does running back a QB who threw for 35 touchdowns already.

KOC might also believe that Darnold’s success is proof that his his coaching, system and weapons are enough to bolster any quarterback’s chances of success.

The bottom line: If the Vikings feel like McCarthy will be fully prepared to lead an NFL franchise by next September, then there is little reason to wait to turn the ball over to him. If they think it would be smarter to give him more time because he missed all of 2024, then it would be better to bring back Darnold.

Darnold on the franchise tag

Before your eyes turn red with rage over the idea of Darnold returning, here’s a quick recap of his season: The 27-year-old QB threw for the third most yards, tied for the second most touchdowns, had the sixth highest QB rating, and led the second most game-winning drives in a single season of any quarterback in Vikings franchise history. He ranked by PFF as their eighth best quarterback and had the third most Big-Time Throws in the NFL.

So it’s possible that the Vikings will consider more football games in their evaluation than just the last two they saw. O’Connell suggested just that when talking about Darnold’s season right after the loss and in his end-of-year press conference.

If they would prefer that McCarthy has more time to develop but they do not want any long-term commitment, they could franchise tag Darnold and play out the 2025 season with plans to either move onto McCarthy or extend Darnold, depending on how things played out.

What tagging Darnold would allow them to do is keep an entire passing offense together that produced the eighth best passing Expected Points Added in the NFL this year and hope that he continues to play at the same level as 2024 or grow upon it the same way Kirk Cousins did in Year 2 of O’Connell’s offense.

The question would be whether they could keep key in-house free agents and still sign other free agents with a $40+ million tag number for Darnold.

The Vikings could also structure deals to have smaller cap hits in 2025 the way they did with Greenard, Cashman and Van Ginkel in 2024 to work around a $71 million dead cap number. Those three combined added up to $12.3 million in cap space in 2024. It’s common practice around the league to do it this way.

Let’s go all the way down that road to see if the math adds up…

Per OverTheCap.com, the Vikings have about $60 million in cap space now. Say the Vikings use $40 million on Darnold for 2025 and they have to check off the following boxes:

— Bring back Byron Murphy Jr. and sign another quality starting corner

— Re-sign Cam Bynum

— Add a top-3 guard free agent

— Add a top DT free agent

— Add a FA running back

— Keep or replace role players like Shaq Griffin, Dalton Risner, Trent Sherfield, Jonathan Bullard, Jerry Tillery etc.

If they structure contracts for Murphy and another quality starting corner in the second tier of CB contracts, we could use Tampa’s deal with Jamel Dean (four years, $52 million). His first year cap hit was $3.8 million.

Comparable for Bynum in a dream world for him would be Xavier McKinney’s four-year, $67 million. McKinney’s 2024 cap hit was $7.8 million.

Comparable for a free agent DT like Levi Onwuzurike would be Denver’s Zach Allen, who signed a three-year, $45 million deal with a 2024 cap hit of $7.7 million.

Comparable for Teven Jenkins is Hunt’s $20 million per year deal with a $6.4 million cap hit for 2024.

Aaron Jones’s cap hit this year was $3.8 million.

The combined cap hits for role-playing Vikings free agents is around $25 million.

That’s around $60 million in cap space, $40 million more than they would have if they tag Darnold.

We’re not done yet though. The Vikings can restructure the contracts of Brian O’Neill ($8 million), Jonathan Greenard ($13 million), TJ Hockenson ($7 million), Josh Metellus ($4 million), Harrison Phillips ($3 million) and Blake Cashman ($3 million) and cut Ed Ingram ($3.3 million). That adds up to $41 million.

What’s the bottom line of all this math? If the Vikings want to do everything on their checklist to improve in 2025, they would need to pull every single lever at their disposal and use a lot of the Wilfs’s money in signing bonuses and contract conversions but it is not impossible.

There is another option that pertains to the franchise tag: The tag and trade.

How many teams would be willing to wheel and deal with the Vikings if they were offering up Darnold? With only two projected first-round quarterbacks and the next best free agent QBs as Russell Wilson, Daniel Jones and Mac Jones, there might be at least a half dozen clubs making the phone call. Teams like the Raiders, Steelers, Giants, Titans, and Browns are not only struggling at QB currently but have been problematic at the most important position in the sport for years.

A tag-and-trade could net the Vikings back draft capital that they desperately need. Before comp picks are handed out, they have three draft selections for 2025. Would one of those teams be willing to give up a second and third-rounder for Darnold or more? The return has to be considered heavily in the formula of whether to bring Darnold back or not.

Short-term Darnold deal