Vikings won't tag Darnold but do they really want him back?

The big-time NFL Insiders say the Vikings are interested in keeping Darnold. Are we buying it?

© Mark J. Rebilas-Imagn Images

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By Matthew Coller

Late Monday night, ESPN’s Adam Schefter and NFL Network’s Ian Rapoport reported that the Minnesota Vikings will not place the franchise tag on quarterback Sam Darnold.

That means that the other QB-needy teams around the league were either not willing to do the Vikings a favor and give them draft capital for a tag-and-trade or the offers weren’t worth the Vikings sending Darnold packing to the highest bidder.

Off to free agency you go then, Sammy Dimes. Thanks for the memories.

Or not?

The addition to both insiders’ reports was that there is interest in the Vikings and Darnold remaining together. In the NFL.com story about the Vikings not using the tag, it says: “Rapoport and [Tom] Pelissero added that all parties are working through options to potentially keep him in Minnesota.”

Huh.

At the NFL Combine last week, head coach Kevin O’Connell noted that 2024 10th overall draft pick QB JJ McCarthy was improving in his rehab from knee surgery to the point where he was likely going to be ready to start the offseason program. That seemed to be a signal that it was time for him to take the reins and that Darnold would either be moved or hit free agency. Are the suggestions about the Vikings and Darnold being interested in a reunion in the same vein as last year’s reports that the Vikings would bring back Kirk Cousins at the right price? It ultimately turned out that the Vikings price was far enough below the Atlanta Falcons that Cousins packed up and went south.

Will they give a courtesy low-ball offer to Darnold and say thanks for the memories and give McCarthy the ball or are they actually serious about Darnold coming back?

If they are actually working through ways for him to come back to Minnesota, that might mean that the interest around the league in Darnold isn’t nearly what we would all expect with so many QB-needy teams. Or maybe he thinks that taking a job with the Raiders, Titans, Giants or Browns is a trip right back to “Old Sam” town. He wouldn’t be a crazy person to take less money in order to throw the football in the direction of Justin Jefferson and retain the coaching services of the Coach of the Year in O’Connell.

If Darnold returned, one person in the league unrelated to the situation suggested a three-year contract similar to that of Baker Mayfield — only cap-inflation adjusted. That would look something like three years, $120 million with $60 million guaranteed and the Vikings could structure out his contract to carry a low cap hit in the first year. Mayfield’s was around $7 million in 2024, for example. The Seahawks did the same thing with Geno Smith.

Why would they bring back Darnold after such a miserable end to the season and with McCarthy looking ready?

First, because teams don’t throw out the bigger picture in favor of two games. Darnold played top-10 football in 2024 and O’Connell probably remembers that Cousins was better in Year 2 of his offense. The idea might be that they can create a win-now 2025 season with Darnold being fully locked into the offense from the start and they can add two new offensive guards and a running game around him. If they got a similar performance only TJ Hockenson and Christian Darrisaw were fully healthy, the ceiling might be viewed as even higher than it was last year when their limitations as a roster ultimately undid them in the postseason against the Rams.

Giving Darnold the QB1 slot for 2025 would give McCarthy a real year to develop. He wasn’t able to practice at any point last season, so he would be able to work through another training camp and practice every day for a full season. McCarthy would be the ripe old age of 23 by the time 2025 ended, giving him plenty of time to keep growing. And he would still have two years left on his rookie contract for the Vikings to utilize that advantage.

But there are a lot of holes in that scenario. What if McCarthy outplays Darnold in training camp? Is there going to be a competition that could result in Darnold being traded?

If Darnold took the Vikings deep into the playoffs in 2025, would they trade McCarthy at the end of the year? If Darnold struggled midseason like he did in 2024, would they bench him for McCarthy a la Cousins/Penix Jr. in Atlanta?

What would the implications on the salary cap be if Darnold went 9-8 and missed the playoffs and the Vikings decided they wanted to turn the ball over to McCarthy? Would they be hurting themselves like Atlanta with Cousins or Russell Wilson with the Broncos? Or could they set up a tradeable contract and some type of no-trade clause that would allow Darnold to avoid being moved after 2025 to the lowly teams of the NFL?

We do have to keep in mind that O’Connell knows what he’s doing when it comes to quarterbacks. If he believes that it’s a better idea to let McCarthy grow more behind the scenes for another year while the Vikings try to chase down the top teams in the NFL, it’s hard to argue against that. Who would know better about what McCarthy needs long term? Who would know better how good Darnold can be?

How good can he be?

It won’t be easy for anyone to forget what happened in the last two games of the season where Darnold went from looking like a true franchise QB in a win over the Green Bay Packers to collapsing versus Detroit and Los Angeles. Even if there are plenty of explanations beyond the quarterback for the struggles against the Rams’ vaunted defensive line, it does make you wonder if there are limitations with a quarterback whose highs are high but whose lows can be that low. Can they truly compete for a Super Bowl against the big boys of the NFC like Philadelphia and Detroit if their QB is capable of falling off that hard?

The Vikings might also look at that through a historical lens and say: Sure they can. There are a ton of quarterbacks who have been battered in their first playoff games and then recovered. In Joe Flacco’s first five playoff games, he totaled one touchdown and six interceptions. Eli Manning lost 23-0 and threw three interceptions in his postseason debut. Both QBs went on to win Super Bowls.

On the other side, there are plenty of QBs who weren’t good enough to get it done in the playoffs and never got their redemption. If they extend Darnold, we will have to wait an entire season to find out which way it goes — if the Vikings make the playoffs.

The riskiest part of bringing back Darnold is that there’s no guarantees that the things that went right in 2024 will go right in 2025. The schedule is harder. The team was healthy last year. They were at the top of the NFL in turnovers forced and sacks. If they end up with a run of bad luck, it will be a wasted year and possibly cap issues in the future.

The high end results, though, of either the Vikings getting back to the playoffs with a strong regular season record or them getting an opportunity to trade Darnold for significant return next year might be too strong to deny.

It also might feel like a much riskier path to have that bad luck go against McCarthy in his first time starting and potentially set him back. O’Connell has said before that teams ruin QBs more than QBs let down their teams. That would suggest that he is always going to proceed with caution.

So what are the odds of a Darnold return? It still doesn’t seem all that high. The one thing that might be difficult to overcome for Darnold is the fact that the Vikings still have a QB on the roster that the HC declared the “franchise quarterback.”

Would he rather go elsewhere and be the guy? Or is there no other team willing to make him the guy?

Within the coming week-plus, we will get the answers. The Vikings decision will shape their offseason and how they approach their timeline.

Welcome to the offseason, everyone.

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