Thoughts on the Vikings 5 GM finalists
Interim GM Rob Brzezinski is included, along with a rising star AGM and two former Viking scouts
By Matthew Coller
And then there were five.
On Wednesday, Jonathan Jones of CBS Sports reported that the Minnesota Vikings have their five finalists for their open general manager position and they will be doing in-person interviews for the group.
Let’s dive into each candidate’s case for becoming the next GM…
- Vikings interim GM Rob Brzezinski
Heading into the offseason, it was totally unclear how Brzezinski would operate as the interim general manager. Would the Vikings’ salary cap expert hunt down every single cap dollar that he could find and sign free agents like it was going out of style? Would his actions reflect the team’s desperation to get back to the postseason and win in the playoffs, where they haven’t had success since 2019? Would we come away from the offseason thinking that Kevin O’Connell and Brian Flores got everything they wanted, regardless of the consequences?
Turns out none of that happened. Instead Brzezinski managed the offseason like he was protecting the franchise from long-term harm while still keeping alive the idea of winning with this group of core players.
The Vikings re-worked contracts for Aaron Jones and TJ Hockenson to keep them on board, moved on from expensive defensive tackles Javon Hargrave and Jonathan Allen, traded veteran pass rusher Jonathan Greenard for two third-round picks and $34 million of cap space over two years.
They made quiet moves outside of signing Kyler Murray to a $1.3 million deal. They added a little depth in the secondary that was lacking with DB James Pierre. They waited out the crazy free agent market to sign WR Jauan Jennings and used restricted free agency to bring in a quality backup tackle in Ryan Van Demark.
In terms of running the draft, Brzezinski appeared to lean heavily on the coaching staff. It isn’t difficult to see the path for any of their selections and where they fit in right away and long term. We never know how any draft is going to turn out, particularly with a “risky” player like Caleb Banks at the top but they aimed to improve their interior D-line, found depth and a long-term option at linebacker, grabbed two players to help the run game and got a quality cornerback prospect.
While many of the draft analysts didn’t grade them highly (note: draft grades have not proven to correlate with draft success), there was clear logic in every pick.
When the Vikings sit down with each candidate, they should be asking: Where is the edge? What is the advantage to hiring this person?
With Brzezinski, the advantages are his emphasis on understanding capital, whether that’s in the form of draft picks or cap space. His experience in the front office also has the respect of others that are likely to remain in the building and he already has a strong preexisting relationship with Kevin O’Connell and Brian Flores.
Brzezinski also has the trust of ownership to be their liaison in Minnesota and understands the dynamics of working with them.
- Broncos AGM Reed Burckhardt
A year ago at this time, the Denver Broncos promoted Burckhardt to assistant general manager under GM George Paton.
When we talk about familiarity with how things are done in Minnesota, Burckhardt certainly checks that box. He spent 13 seasons with the Vikings, starting off as an intern and then working his way up through the scouting side. When Paton was hired by the Broncos, he took Burckhardt with him.
The upside to bringing Burckhardt back to Minnesota is his background in player evaluation. He was a college quarterback who made his bones on the road scouting players and separated himself within the Vikings and Broncos front offices for having a good track record with his evaluations and strong voice in the room.
Combining the things that the Vikings did to build their strongest rosters under Rick Spielman between 2012-2017 along with the Broncos’ approach of putting together an offense that fit with an inexperience QB and a monster defense.
The downside would be inexperience. While he certainly knows the business and the franchise inside and out, Burckhardt has only been an AGM for a year.
Overall, the edge to hiring Burckhardt is bringing on a younger leader who can push the franchise forward and grow into the role. If the emphasis is going to be heavily on the draft, the Vikings will need someone who can hit more than they miss and have the approach of stockpiling capital.
- Bills AGM Terrance Gray
The Vikings’ owners clearly were interested in candidates that know the interworking of the franchise, which hints that they are happy with a lot of the executives inside TCO Performance Center but want someone who can work with them effectively.
Gray was with the Vikings for 11 years until 2017 when he moved to Buffalo, where he served as director of player personnel and then was promoted in 2025 to AGM.
Gray has been on the radar as a potential GM over the last two years, getting interviews with the Jaguars, Chargers and Raiders between 2024 and 2025.
You could certainly argue that Buffalo has been blessed with finding a top-three quarterback in the NFL and that’s largely driven their success but that wouldn’t be fair to Brandon Beane or the front office. They have navigated Allen’s contract and put together strong rosters around him, particularly on the defensive side, where the Bills have been in the top half of the league every year since extending their elite QB.
Is there an edge? Well, Gray brings credibility to the front office as someone who has worked his way through multiple successful franchises, beginning right out of college with Kansas City. His earliest work in the NFL included player development. With the Vikings rarely picking at the top of the draft, they will need to focus on finding talent that they can hone over a number of years.
- Rams AGM John McKay
The familiarity aspect in this case is with O’Connell rather than the Wilfs. McKay started in 2016 as a scouting assistant. Before being named AGM in 2025, he was the director of pro personnel and also served as assistant director of pro scouting.
The Rams’ website describes his role as:
“He also evaluates all 32 rosters prior to free agency, writes advance scouting reports for upcoming opponents and evaluates college players prior to the draft.”
Having only been in the business for 10 years, it seems like a pretty large leap to general manager. However, McKay has football in his blood. His dad is Rich McKay, who was the Atlanta Falcons GM in the early 2000s and then president and CEO until 2025. His grandfather coached USC in the 60s and 70s and the Tampa Bay Bucs in the late-70s and early 80s.
While the Vikings’ focus has seemingly been on the draft side (and McKay has some experience there), the edge to hiring him would be the relationship with O’Connell and bringing over more of The Rams Way to Minnesota.
The Rams have a very good argument for being the most innovative franchise in the NFL along with the Philadelphia Eagles. They not only won the Super Bowl in 2021 but they tore down and rebuilt the roster to reach the NFC Championship last year. When you talk about “forward thinking,” the Rams are one of the first teams that comes to mind, whether it be from coaching methods, drafting, free agency decisions or trades.
In making this hire, it has to be part of the thought process that the Vikings have perpetually been a stuck-in-the-middle franchise with some pop-up seasons. How can they get to a place where they are in the mix every year? Can McKay borrow processes from L.A. that have worked and bring them here?
- Seahawks AGM Nolan Teasley
You could argue that a franchise might be able to have a hot run of drafting and then land the right quarterback and end up with a Super Bowl ring. But the Seattle Seahawks GM John Schneider has built two Super Bowl winning teams. One with Russell Wilson and the Legion Of Doom and in 2025 with the NFL’s best defense and an offense led by a physical O-line and top-notch No. 1 wide receiver around Sam Darnold.
Teasley started with the Seahawks in 2013 and worked his way to pro personnel scout and then director of pro personnel in 2018. He has been the AGM for two years.
Seattle describes his role on their website as:
“Teasley oversees football operations while working collaboratively with President of Football Operations/General Manager John Schneider in all aspects of player acquisition via the draft, free agency and trade proposals.”
The advantage to hiring Teasley is that he has no connection whatsoever to the Vikings. He would bring a fresh pair of eyes to a team that has been good for a long time but needs something more to push them over the top. He played a key role in a rebuilding process in Seattle post-Wilson that saw the Seahawks crush the draft and nail free agent and trade acquisitions to build the strongest roster in the NFL.
But they didn’t do it quickly or in a panic. It was over several seasons of methodically adding and adding to the point where they were ready to win and found the right mix of coaching and QB play.
Schneider should be considered one of the best at roster construction and evaluation in the NFL over the last two decades. It would make sense to bring on board someone that he’s been working closely with.
I like Rob and think he’s done a perfectly fine job this offseason, but I think I’d prefer they bring in somebody new to shake things up a bit.
Some additional context that might be relevant here in breaking down the external candidates (aside from Brz).
Kevin O'Connell and John McKay may not know each other that well. McKay was the Rams assistant director of pro scouting in 2020 when KOC was brought in as the OC and pass scheme coordinator. McKay got promoted to director of pro personnel in 2021, KOC's last year in LA (their Super Bowl season). I don't know how much contact a coach/coordinator would have with a scouting director or even pro personnel director. Obviously they'd know each other but it's not like they worked together day in and day out. The equivalent relationship on the Vikings current org chart would be Sam DeLuca (director pro personnel) and Wes Phillips (OC) or Josh McCown (pass game coordinator).
Of course there are other reasons to consider McKay as a GM candidate, given the Rams success in team building over the past few years with him having an important role there. The Rams front office has taken an unusual approach to roster building: trading picks for blue chip vets, skipping the combine, etc. It's unclear if that's something the Wilfs would see as a positive or negative -- if they want an "innovative" GM at this point. It's also unclear if McKay is responsible for the Rams approach, or if he'd want to continue that as the GM for another team -- the internal dynamics of NFL front offices are impossible to understand from the outside. I think many Vikings fans would be unhappy if the new GM is trying to be innovative. After the Kwesi experience, many seem to want a "back to basics" approach instead.
Terrance Gray didn't have a leadership role with the Vikings before the Bills hired him away in 2017. He was a college scout at that point. His front office experience is all in Buffalo, where he's been one of the executives since at least 2022 (when he was promoted to director of player personnel). While the Bills have been one of the most successful teams in the league over the last several years, the 2022-25 era has arguably been a disappointment, given that they have basically the best player in the league but haven't been able to win the AFC. The team seems to have peaked with the 13 seconds game loss in KC, and that was in 2021. I don't think they've drafted well in the last few years.
Reed Burckhardt by contrast was promoted within the Vikings front office before he left, and was tabbed at one point by Rick Spielman as a future GM. He was the assistant director of pro scouting for Minnesota in 2020, then director of pro scouting in 2021. He was hired away by George Paton in 2022, a year after Paton took the Broncos GM job -- Paton said Burckhardt was one of the two Vikings front office staff he was determined to bring with him to Denver. Burckhardt wasn't involved in the trade for Russell Wilson, which was completed a couple of months before he moved to Denver.
Broncos front office has been re-organized around Sean Payton since they traded for him in 2023. Their model of a GM and personnel department supporting a HC who controls football operations is probably similar to what the Vikings are trying to do around KOC. They even have a similar dynamic with a highly successful DC who was a former HC in Vance Joseph, who likely has some personnel control on that side of the ball.
In that time, the Denver braintrust has built one of the best rosters in the league, despite a lack of early draft picks (most of them traded for Russell Wilson and for Payton himself). They've made only two 1st round picks since 2022 (Bo Nix #12 and Jahdae Barron #20) and their next highest pick was at #60. Broncos instead have found value with mid- and late-round picks (especially Nik Bonitto), free agent signings (Zach Allen, Hufanga, Franklin-Myers, McGlinchey), and now trades with the big move this year for Jaylen Waddle. Paton has given credit to Burckhardt for their work in free agency, so he's played some direct role in that. The result is that the Broncos probably have the best roster in the AFC, and would've gone to the Super Bowl last year if not for Nix's injury.
Nolan Teasley seems to be the favorite candidate of the fans who want an outsider with no ties to the organization or KOC, especially coming off a Super Bowl win with the Seahawks. Seattle's front office did a great job navigating out of the Pete Carroll / Russell Wilson era and they've hit on an absurd number of draft picks since 2022. Their draft record for several years prior to that (2017-21) was pretty bad, though it's unclear to what extent Teasley would be responsible for that. Carroll did seem to have some role in personnel selection as the HC working with GM John Schneider. Teasley's resume is impressive and I think he'd be a strong hire, but the lack of connection to the Vikings or the HC probably makes it less likely he's the guy for the Wilfs. A number of fans seem to want an outsider GM to take over the organization and replace everyone, but that doesn't seem to be the plan as the Wilfs are building around KOC.
...to sum that up, I think Teasley and Burckhardt are probably the strongest outside candidates, with McKay an interesting possibility, depending on your appetite for innovation. Not sure any of them have strong ties to KOC, and Burckhardt is only one with actual front office experience in Minnesota.
I think Burckhardt should be the favorite given his prior experience in the organization, and the likely parallels between the Broncos front office dynamic around Payton and what the Vikings seem to be trying to do to support KOC.
I think the Wilfs would have liked to bring back George Paton, and it was no coincidence the Broncos announced he'd gotten an extension right around the time the Vikings GM search began. They can still hire Paton's right-hand man in Burckhardt, and that would be a strong choice given his role in the Broncos impressive roster building over the last few years. Might also help that Burckhardt is a local guy, from small town Russell MN (population 348)