Future of the Vikings, part 7: How will the Vikings rebuild their secondary?

Kwesi Adofo-Mensah isn't inheriting much to work with in the defensive backfield

Sign up for Purple Insider for $7 per month or $64 per year to get credentialed access inside the Vikings, from in-depth analysis to behind-the-scenes features to the ever-popular Friday Mailbag. Photo courtesy of the Minnesota Vikings

---

By Matthew Coller

The last two seasons have been nightmarish for the Minnesota Vikings’ secondary.

In back-to-back years, they attempted to rebuild the cornerback group — once through the draft, once through free agency — and failed miserably. As a result, the Vikings gave up the eighth most passing yards in 2020 and fifth most in 2021. Now with few development options and two starters set to hit free agency, new general manager Kewsi Adofo-Mensah’s faces the challenge of revamping the team’s weakest position group.

Before we get into the options, let’s have a look at how we got here…

Following the 2019 season, the Vikings lost three of their draft success stories in Xavier Rhodes, Trae Waynes and Mackensie Alexander. They were forced to release Rhodes due to his high cap hit and struggles in ‘19 and Waynes and Alexander opted for the free agent market. The Vikings’ answer to losing Rhodes, Waynes and Alexander was to give a bunch of young players a chance and see who emerged.

They hoped when selecting Mike Hughes in the first round of the 2018 draft that he could take eventually over one of the three starting cornerback jobs. Undrafted free agent Holton Hill briefly showed flashes as an outside corner in ‘18 when filling in for Rhodes so he was given a chance to battle for the starting gig despite two suspensions in 2019. The Vikings picked three more corners in the 2020 draft in Jeff Gladney (first round), Cam Dantzler (third round) and Harrison Hand (fifth round).

None of it worked. Hughes, who had previously suffered ACL and neck injuries, got hurt again and only appearing in four games. Hill also went down and then was (somewhat mysteriously) released later in the season, Dantzler showed flashes but got hurt three separate times in his rookie year and Gladney struggled.

The Vikings’ answer in 2020 was to sign three new starting corners. They added veteran Patrick Peterson to a one-year, $10 million contract and later brought Alexander back and signed veteran Bashaud Breeland. During the offseason, Gladney was arrested for domestic violence and released early in training camp after being indicted, leaving the three vets and Dantzler to vie for starting jobs. However, it did not appear from Day 1 that Mike Zimmer was holding an open competition. Dantzler was sent to the bench and Breeland was given the starting job from the time the veteran was healthy.

While Peterson’s performance was relatively solid in 2021 with PFF ranking him 48th out of 82 starting corners, Breeland and Alexander were two of the worst cornerbacks in the league ranking 78th and 82nd. Dantzler ended 17th, giving credence to criticisms about Zimmer not giving young players enough trust/opportunity.

Breeland was cut before season’s end because of a practice altercation and Peterson and Alexander are now hitting the free agent market.

At safety, the Vikings franchise tagged Anthony Harris in 2020 only to see his play decline and have him sign in Philadelphia at half price. They signed Xavier Woods to take his place and he saw a season full of ups and downs, ultimately grading in the middle of the league, 32nd out of 64 starting safeties.

Expectedly the Vikings got a strong showing out of Harrison Smith, who PFF ranked as the 10th best player at his position. While Smith hasn’t shown signs of falling off the map with his performance, the contract extension he signed prior to 2021 does open the door for issues down the road. He carries a $13.5 million cap hit in 2022, sixth highest in the NFL, and $17-plus million in 2023 and 2024.

So what are the Vikings’ options at corner? How will they replace Woods at safety? How will they approach Smith’s contract situation?

Adofo-Mensah could put a suggestion box outside of his office for ideas to replace his starting cornerbacks.

We know that the answer is not to sign bottom-barrel free agents to one-year contracts with plans for them to start and the Vikings might not be in a position to get into a bidding war for the top free agents like Stephon Gilmore, JC Jackson or Kyle Fuller but there is a bevy of young-ish options that could be willing to sign longer deals.

Seattle’s DJ Reed, 26, ranked seventh by PFF last season. Tampa Bay’s Carlton Davis, 26, also cracked the top 30 graded corners. Chiefs CB Charvarius Ward, Buffalo’s Levi Wallace and Rams CB Darious Williams are each under 30 years old and rated in the top 40 by PFF.

These might not be franchise-changing players but we know two things about defensive backfields: A) They are weak-link systems B) good players can be elevated under the right circumstances, which opens the door for bang-for-buck signings.

The Vikings are already being connected to cornerbacks in the draft. ESPN’s Mel Kiper mocked them Ahmad Gardner from Cincinnati in his first mock draft of the offseason. Quarterback will certainly be at the top of the conversation for the Vikings during the buildup to the NFL Draft if they trade Kirk Cousins but corner should be at the top of their non-QB list. This could be a good year to look for DB help with six of the top 30 players on PFF’s big board coming from the corner position.

The solution could be a combination of both approaches. Over the last two years, the Cincinnati Bengals threw free agency numbers at the problem, signing Trae Waynes, Chidobe Awuzie, Mike Hilton and Eli Apple. They missed on Waynes, who has been hurt, but hit on the others enough to form a competitive DB group. The Tampa Bay Bucs built their secondary through the draft with Sean Murphy-Bunting, Jamel Dean, Mike Edwards, MJ Stewart and Carlton Davis all being selected between 2018 and 2019.