Do you think Achilles ever changed his stance or his style of fighting to try and protect his heel?
In the Iliad, the hero Achilles’ mother dipped him into the River Styx, rendering him invulnerable — except for his heel, where she held him. Later, an arrow that hit his infamous “Achilles’ heel” killed him.
That’s gotta be a tough way to finally go down. If I were Achilles, I think I’d be neurotically overcompensating for that vulnerable heel every chance I got; constantly terrified that I’d step on something wrong one day and pay the ultimate price.
I also wonder if this is how Brian Flores has felt walking around TCO Performance Center since the day the Minnesota Vikings hired him. Minnesota’s defensive coordinator has excellent talent along the defensive line, bright young stars at linebacker, a future Hall of Famer at safety, and one of the most exotic and effective schemes in football.
He feels almost as unstoppable as Achilles in his prime. Still, he’s had to hide a crucial weak spot from opposing offenses most of his time in Minnesota. A Flores’ heel, if you will. In my opinion, the cornerback room has been that critical weakness. As things stand now, Flores’ heel remains a real concern.
It’s been three straight years of the Vikings papering over their hole at cornerback. As they’ve “competitively rebuilt” the roster, it’s impossible to allocate limited resources fully to every single position, and they’ve mostly prioritized other positions over corner.
Flores knew he had to coach defense, conceding that his outside corners are going to be replacement-level players, with the exception of Byron Murphy Jr., who’s a solid but not elite CB1. Guys like Shaq Griffin and Stephon Gilmore played fine in stretches, but opponents also exposed their limitations, which is likely why neither is still on the team.
So, how does he do it? How does Brian Flores keep scraping by with a cadre of slappies at one of the NFL’s most important position groups? And can he do it again this season?
He starts by minimizing the number of them on the field. Flores is a league leader in three-safety “Big Nickel” packages, which allow him to take a linebacker off the field but add a third safety in lieu of an additional cornerback. Last year, the three-safety packages with Harrison Smith, Josh Metellus, and Cam Bynum were practically their base defense. That allowed them to mitigate teams’ ability to attack their lack of cornerback depth.
However, unless they’re willing to force Metellus to mitigate his versatility with a more prominent safety role, or they’ve seen progress we haven’t yet from Theo Jackson, we can expect the safety room to take a small step back after losing Bynum. Absent an abundance of riches at the position, I’m not sure how much we can anticipate three-safety defenses being a Flores staple in 2025.
There’s also the type of coverage the Vikings run. Flores seldom called defenses requiring cornerbacks to operate in classic press-man coverage. That’s probably wise, knowing the guys he’d have covering in those situations and the amount of pressure he’d be bringing. If you’re gonna drive without a seatbelt, it’s probably best not to do so flying down the autobahn.
The Vikings ran lots of off zone coverage, rallying to the ball as tacklers while trying to generate pressure quickly. That’s an easier assignment for the corner, letting them read and react to the quick-developing play. On the other hand, anytime a blitz failed to generate pressure and the secondary was asked to cover for longer than a few seconds, things quickly broke down (just rewatch the Los Angeles Rams or Detroit Lions games if you need an example).
That should be fully on the table for Flores again in 2025, now with a new-and-improved defensive front that should be even better at generating pressure when Flores calls his patented stunts or blitzes. Suppose the pass rush and coverage assignments can work in tandem even better than last season. That should also give many of their unproven corners like Mekhi Blackmon and Isaiah Rodgers a chance to build some confidence.
The Vikings could also add corners before the season starts. They have been sitting on a healthy-sized chunk of 2025 cap space since before the draft, seemingly designed intentionally to give them cap space for at least one more legit free-agent acquisition.
They could bring back Gilmore, as Matt Fries suggested in a piece last week. The Vikings could see if the Miami Dolphins want to trade Jalen Ramsey, or they could finally bring the offseason’s Asante Samuel Jr. rumors to fruition. All come with various levels of gas in the tank and injury histories, but Minnesota would be adding a player with starting experience to line up opposite Byron Murphy Jr.
While we’re talking about Murphy, it’s worth mentioning that he’s a damn good player who thrived in this system last season. However, he’s just not a player who’s so elite that he can compensate for the rest of the secondary by locking down an opposing team’s stud receiver one-on-one, which few corners in the modern NFL can claim to do. He’s a nice player whom the organization should feel confident about. Still, the secondary is a weak-link system, and his presence alone isn’t enough to protect another weak link on its own.
There’s also the possibility that some of the young, untested talent that they’re betting on in the likes of Rodgers, Blackmon, or even Jeff Okudah could prosper under Flores’ tutelage. Rodgers has had stretches of good football in his career. Blackmon flashed as a rookie before his injury last offseason. Okudah has been a bust since coming into the league as a top-five pick. Still, suggesting that a player who once boasted talent worthy of that selection could eventually develop into a solid third or fourth corner is preposterous.
Brian Flores will have another good defense in 2025. He’s too good and too maniacal of a defensive mind not to put something amazing together again. Still, it’s disappointing to see another season where the cornerback room remains a major question mark for him to solve — another Flores’ Heel for him to compensate for and hide. If this team is going to take the next step to winning games deep into January, they can’t afford another arrow to the heel like they did near the end of 2025.
