With no 'uncomfortable middle' in Cousins talks, the Vikings pivot to the future

Kwesi Adofo-Mensah and Kevin O'Connell talked confidently on Thursday about the 'alignment' on their path forward at quarterback

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By Matthew Coller

EAGAN — When the Minnesota Vikings’ leadership spoke to the media on Thursday, Kevin O’Connell looked like a man who has been grinding quarterback tape for 22 hours per day after his first quarterback as a head coach walked out on him for more money.

One thing that has seemingly kept the Vikings’ coach up at night — aside from watching clips of his dream quarterback in the upcoming draft — is the way Kirk Cousins performed just before tearing his Achilles against the Green Bay Packers.

“That partnership of getting to build our offense is something we're really proud of and quite honestly the way [Cousins] was playing when he did get injured was how I envisioned us getting to that place – and then hopefully sustaining that for a long period of time,” O’Connell said.

Reaching QB-HC schematic Zen is not easy. During Cousins’ tenure in Minnesota he changed play callers four times and it appeared to be benefitting him greatly to have O’Connell in his ear in back-to-back seasons. When Cousins went down he had a 103.8 quarterback rating and the second highest PFF grade of his career.

It wouldn’t be football if somebody wasn’t wondering what could have been. You can’t blame O’Connell for thinking that if Cousins returned for the 2024 season that the Vikings could have picked up where they left off in Week 8 and put a little cash into the defense and running game and then jumped right back into the ring with the NFC North.

But Cousins chose Atlanta after the Vikings couldn’t match the Falcons’ price.

“When I called Kirk, we joked about ‘the uncomfortable middle,’” general manager Kwesi Adofo-Mensah said. “That's what deals should be. And we weren't able to find that, and that's hard from a basis of appreciation for the player… Just sometimes it gets to a place where that uncomfortable middle isn't somewhere where you want to go – where a different team can go because in their team, in the timeline of their team, they're in a just a different situation.”

O’Connell now faces a decision at quarterback that will define his tenure as the Vikings head coach. Picking and developing a franchise QB from scratch is a lot more daunting than Cousins coming back. It isn’t just the devil you know, it’s the devil with a decade of knowledge, refined mechanics and an established leadership. The devil you don’t know — a rookie QB — has no idea what it’s like in the big leagues, much less understands how to execute an NFL offense pre and post snap.

The ball simply can’t be rolled out for Justin Jefferson, Jordan Addison and TJ Hockenson. Now those guys must get on the same page with somebody new and learn a new offense designed for someone else’s skills than they have been used to working with. Gameplans aren’t ready made now, they will be a painstaking game of trial and error.

But even with all that considered, O’Connell acknowledged that the way things played out with Cousins was ultimately best for the franchise’s future.

“As much as I would have maybe liked to have Kirk here, the right thing moving forward for our team is where we are today,” O’Connell said.

It shouldn’t be lost on the Vikings coach that the next group of men introduced on Thursday were probably not going to be on the team had they paid out the same price as Atlanta did for Cousins’ services. Andrew Van Ginkel, Jonathan Greenard and Blake Cashman are Day 1 signings, not second-wave longshots like the Marcus Davenports of the world. O’Connell has to keep in mind that his job isn’t just to get the most out of the QB, it’s to win games by any means. A better stocked defense will help make that happen.

Cousins’ exit may still feel like a gut punch to the coach who enjoyed working with him so much (and went 17-9 overall together) but it isn’t a shocker that he left. After all, Cousins pronounced on his way out that he wanted to land with the team that put down the most commitment i.e. “what the dollars represent” and “structure.” Cousins noted in his press conference with the Falcons that he got the feeling the Vikings only wanted to go year-to-year with him.

That means the brass had time to prepare their contingency plans as they waited for Cousins’ decision.

“I think it all goes back to our process that goes into it, the communication and that alignment, that I personally think is the most important thing,” O’Connell said. “My confidence level in the folks around me on our coaching staff and obviously Kwesi’s department and the opportunity we have here from the Wilfs. I'm very confident in where we're going to go at that position in the future.”

General manager Kwesi Adofo-Mensah was asked directly if the plan is to draft a quarterback. He said that he would “not say that” they needed to pick a QB.

“When we enter this draft, we have the flexibility to go either way. If the opportunity comes where that player’s available, we’ll take it,” Adofo-Mensah said. “If it’s not available in that sense, we’ll continue to build around and then find potential odds at a long-term solution, in addition to what we’ve already brought in.”

Common sense would tell us that what they have already brought in, journeyman Sam Darnold, is not going to be enough to build around to satisfy the Vikings’ head coach and offensive weapons. Or at least the odds aren’t particularly good of Darnold turning into a franchise quarterback when he is 21-35 as a career starter with a 78.3 QB rating a near 1:1 touchdown to interception ratio.

Adofo-Mensah did not seem comfortable using the term “bridge quarterback” when referring to Darnold but there aren’t many other interpretations of a short-term contract for a team suddenly in dire need of finding their franchise guy.

The next step for the Vikings after signing their experienced QB, quality defensive free agents and star running back Aaron Jones is to complete the circle of a plan that appears to have been hatched from Day 1 of the Adofo-Mensah/O’Connell era and draft a quarterback.

That may require trading up in a draft that is heavy with QB prospects and QB-needy teams. The Bears, Commanders and Patriots are near locks to take quarterbacks and there are teams around or behind the Vikings in the draft order like the Giants, Broncos and Raiders who could be targeting whichever quarterbacks the top teams do not take. The Vikings may have to move heaven and earth to move up in order to avoid getting left out of the party but with oodles of cap space set for 2025 and stars in place on offense they could sacrifice future draft capital without corroding the roster.

In the recent past we have seen teams make pre-draft trades in March and April to move up with a quarterback in mind. The coming weeks might require Adofo-Mensah to toss value charts to the wind and make sure O’Connell gets his next quarterback to build an offense with.

And then O’Connell can move on from the what-ifs with Cousins and onto the next phase of his time as head coach — the one that will determine how he’s remembered in Minnesota.

“I'll forever be grateful for my time that I had with [Cousins] but at the same time, this is an exciting time of year as we start building our team for 2024,” O’Connell said.

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