An offseason that started with cap consternation among Minnesota Vikings fans has turned into a team with a clear direction and an exciting rookie quarterback in J.J. McCarthy.
Looking back to this time last year, there were questions about how the Vikings were setting up their future. The team was coming off a 13-4 season but an inglorious Wild Card exit in the playoffs. It was clear that the 2022 team’s record oversold its true talent. However, for most teams, the record would be a signal to push their chips into the table and maximize what they could out of the roster. Facing a cap crunch, Kwesi Adofo-Mensah and the rest of the team’s leadership moved on from aging veterans and hunted for value deals rather than locking up high-level free agents for the long term.
The Vikings also had lingering questions about high-level players. Kirk Cousins was entering the last year of his deal. Justin Jefferson was eligible for an extension, and T.J. Hockenson holding in during camp with an “ear infection.” Given those circumstances, it was fair to question exactly what the front office’s long-term plan was and whether the team would ever commit to a player.
Fast-forward one year, and the picture has clarified. The Vikings have their QB of the future in McCarthy, and a star core of Jefferson, Hockenson, Christian Darrisaw, and Jonathan Greenard all signed through 2027.
If you go back to the list of offseason questions, the biggest were about the team’s ability to re-sign Kirk Cousins and Danielle Hunter and whether they would be able to accommodate that plan with contract extensions for Jefferson and Darrisaw.
They missed on signing Cousins. But given that the team still has almost $20 million in cap space, including $28.5 million dead money for Kirk, it’s apparent that the team wasn’t interested in keeping him long-term at his market price. Hunter also walked, but the team spent big on getting younger at the position by signing Greenard and drafting Dallas Turner. The team is also projected for $54 million in cap space next season, which would be seventh in the NFL.
Taking care of their own
Free agency was just the start of Minnesota’s offseason, and their two biggest moves were keeping Jefferson and Darrisaw in the fold. In both deals, Adofo-Mensah showed that he learned from last offseason in terms of timing.
Jefferson was the team’s top priority. Despite certain media members attempting to drum up drama in the negotiation, messaging from Jefferson and the team was clear that they were working on a deal that would make him the highest-paid non-QB in the NFL, and that’s exactly what they did. At the draft, Adofo-Mensah mentioned that when Jefferson signs his deal, he deserves the whole week to celebrate. The Vikings turned the team’s mandatory minicamp into that celebration, as the team signed Jefferson and prevented him from missing any time.
Contrast that to what happened with Hockenson last year, CeeDee Lamb and the Dallas Cowboys, or Brandon Aiyuk and the San Francisco 49ers. With a new projected starter in Sam Darnold, Jefferson’s missing time could have been severely detrimental to Minnesota’s season because he has no established chemistry with Darnold or rookie McCarthy, who will likely eventually take over as the starter. Being on the practice field means opportunities to build rapport.
The team also gave its fans a gift on the eve of training camp by getting a Darrisaw extension done before the team started camp. That ensured that the team doesn’t have to deal with a hold-in like Tristan Wirfs or speculation like they saw around Jefferson last offseason.
Hopefully, this offseason represents a new standard for Minnesota’s front office: On-time deals that prevent players from missing practice time and getting Darrisaw done a year early compared to Jefferson. Granted, it’s easier to do large contracts for no-brainer candidates like Jefferson and Darrisaw. Still, we should commend Adofo-Mensah for getting the deals done in a timely manner.
Minnesota’s front office cut those issues off before they could become distractions in a year when several notable players, like the ones mentioned above or the Green Bay Packers with Jordan Love, let a contract extension they knew they were going to get done fester and create a hold-in situation during training camp.
Creating Win-win contracts
Getting the deals done is one thing, but perhaps the most impressive part of Minnesota’s offseason has been the quality of the contracts they’ve handed out. Jefferson and Darrisaw got good deals for themselves, but they also received ones that were comfortable for the Vikings long-term.
Jefferson is obviously the best WR in the NFL, and given his age, you could argue he’s still on an upward trajectory even though he’s already reached the top. He got more money than any non-QB and got a really strong guarantee package, with three of his four extension years functionally guaranteed. It’s extremely rare, even for QBs, to get that type of guarantee package. With $125.75 million in functional guarantees, he eclipsed Nick Bosa by over $4 million total.
How can a player who got the largest contract in non-QB history have a deal that’s good for his team? To understand, we need to look at contracts relative to their cap environment.
Jefferson signed his $35 million per year deal with a $255.4 million salary cap. On the other hand, the salary cap was only $208.2 million when Tyreek Hill signed his $30 million per year deal in 2022. That massive jump in available cap means that Jefferson’s deal takes up 13.7% of the cap at signing, while Hill’s deal took up 14.4%.
Another point of comparison would be Bosa, who got a $34 million per year deal with a $224.8 million salary cap. His deal took up 15.1% of the cap at signing. For Jefferson to match that in the current cap environment, he would have had to get $38.6 million per year on his deal. Within the structure of the deal, the team was able to keep Jefferson’s cap numbers low through 2025 and has plenty of room to move his cap hits from 2026 to 2028 into the future with void years.
Under the Spielman regime, the Vikings made a habit of extending their own players, to mixed results. Players not living up to their deals as they age is natural, which is why teams don’t like to fully guarantee deals. However, the team managed to create a unique circumstance for themselves when they extended Danielle Hunter for a five-year, $72 million deal he vastly outplayed. That created complicated negotiations on a cap-strapped team that eventually led to Adofo-Mensah paying Hunter more to play on a one-year rental last year.
In breaking down the Darrisaw extension, sharp analysts like Arif Hasan have drawn comparisons to the Hunter deal, which would put the team in danger of having a repeat of that nightmare. While Darrisaw didn’t hold out for the best possible deal as Jefferson did, I think this is actually a pretty solid deal for him. At $26 million per year, Darrisaw’s deal was essentially structured as a copy of Penei Sewell‘s contract with a value that was a pro-rated version of Andrew Thomas‘ extension. Given that Sewell was the most recent big OT contract and that Darrisaw looks very similar to Thomas from an accolades perspective, the comparisons make sense.
NFL contracts are mostly negotiated on precedent. That’s why I was able to project Darrisaw’s extension so well.
Given that, I think Darrisaw did about as well as he could in the negotiations. He and Sewell both have their contracts functionally guaranteed through 2027. His $77.5 million in functional guarantees is 15.7% more than Thomas’ $67 million, which outpaced the cap inflation of 13.6%. His three-year cash flow of just under $58.8 million beat the $54.6 million Thomas got and was basically the midpoint between that and Sewell’s cash flow of just under $63 million.
However, when looking at that cash flow, there’s an important factor that people aren’t considering. Extensions tack on to the end of contracts, they don’t replace them. Considering that he was drafted higher and had a better fifth-year option value because of his All-Pro status, Penei Sewell was owed just under $23 million over the next two years before he got extended. By comparison, Darrisaw was owed about $18.5 million. Thomas was even owed more than Darrisaw despite being drafted a year earlier. He had $19.2 million left on his extension because he was the fourth-overall pick instead of the 23rd. If you account for the about $4.5 million difference, Darrisaw beats out Sewell in terms of three-year cash flow.
Darrisaw’s deal may not be stronger than those of Trent Williams and Laremy Tunsil, who are both heavily decorated veterans. Still, it’s very much on par with his peers in Sewell and Thomas. At the second-highest average annual value among offensive linemen, it’s far better than the deal that Hunter signed, which placed him at 13th in AAV among edge rushers for the 2018 season.
While Darrisaw’s deal is good for him, given the market, it’s not as strong as it could be. The reason is the same as why I didn’t expect the Vikings to get an extension for Darrisaw done this offseason in my piece projecting his deal. When a first-round pick signs after his third season, the deal doesn’t kick in until 2 years after he signs it. From a cap perspective, Darrisaw’s contract is now six years, $122.5 million. That allows the Vikings to defer a big cap hit until at least 2026. It also means Darrisaw gave up the natural salary cap increase that raises the overall value of deals, and also the extensions for key players like Wirfs and Williams, who are looking to reset the OT market.
I don’t think Darrisaw is too upset about the opportunity cost of signing the deal. He mentioned that he’s looking forward to letting his parents retire after signing the deal.
Ultimately, the Vikings created win-win extensions for Jefferson and Darrisaw. Jefferson got a market-setting deal, and Darrisaw was second for OTs, coming in just behind a player with more accolades from the same draft class. For the Vikings, the deals set the market but didn’t overextend the value compared to the cap, which helps them retain flexibility.
Avoiding future roadblocks
With a great offseason behind them, Minnesota’s front office will have to keep the momentum going. It doesn’t seem like considering market extensions will be an option for any of their 2022 draft picks, but they have some more tricky situations to parse through. The Vikings have many key players hitting free agency in 2025, including Cam Bynum, Byron Murphy, and Harrison Phillips.
However, Josh Metellus may be the most interesting situation. He signed a two-year, $8 million extension last offseason as a key special teams player who was projected as a depth piece at safety. Metellus immediately transcended that role and became a turnkey in Minnesota’s unique defense, playing well above his pay grade. Four million dollars per year is poor pay for someone who played well over 90% of the snaps at a high level, so it’s likely the Vikings will have to make a contract adjustment.
The situation is reminiscent of Adam Thielen, who signed a four-year, $19.25 million deal in 2017 only to have a breakout season and get a much larger extension two years later. Hopefully, the Vikings will find a way to avoid the fate of that deal, which ended up becoming a burden and the Vikings released Thielen with two years remaining on it.
Kwesi Adofo-Mensah led the Vikings to a great offseason this year due to timely contract negotiations. The team still has holes, though, especially in the secondary. Hopefully, he can build on his success and continue the streak of quality deals he began this year.
