After a 2025 season that was derailed by quarterback play, the Minnesota Vikings are looking to fix the problem this offseason. Neither Kevin O’Connell nor Kwesi Adofo-Mensah went as far as throwing the towel on J.J. McCarthy during their end-of-season press conferences. But it didn’t look good for the young signal caller, who vowed to add competition to the quarterback room.
With that, the Vikings appear ready to make a move. Minnesota could dive into the free-agent market to find competition, but the options aren’t inspiring. The Vikings could swing a trade, but as they found out with their Godfather offer for Drake Maye, they need to find a team willing to make a deal.
It has some Vikings fans set on Joe Burrow, whose perceived unhappiness has made him a TikTok trend as the offseason approaches. But while chasing Burrow is fine, the Vikings may have boxed themselves in, creating a situation where it could be “Burrow or bust.”
The appeal of bringing Burrow to Minnesota is obvious. The 29-year-old is one of the league’s most recognizable figures, putting up passing numbers and oozing charisma. He was the quarterback of one of the most dominant offenses in the history of college football in 2019, when his top target happened to be Justin Jefferson.
With Jefferson one sail pass away from filling up his “Crash Out” jar, trading for Burrow would keep the superstar happy and be the missing piece for a team that believes they’re a quarterback away from contending for a Super Bowl.
But it’s one thing to want Burrow. It’s another thing to need Burrow.
McCarthy’s struggles were only part of the equation for why the 2025 season went south. But Sam Darnold‘s success left extra egg on the faces of the front office staff, who likely will have the Wilf family breathing down their necks as they begin the offseason. The Vikings can’t come up empty-handed. Unfortunately for them, their options already appear to be drying up.
San Francisco 49ers quarterback Mac Jones is one of the most popular non-Burrow targets on the trade market. Tapping into the same pipeline that helped O’Connell unearth Darnold two years ago, the Vikings could be impressed in Jones’s performance (2,151 yards, 13 TD, six INT) as a fill-in for Brock Purdy this year. A Day 2 pick may be enough to get the job done.
But Kyle Shanahan told reporters this week that he’d “be very surprised” if Jones were traded this offseason.
“You always listen to people with trade offers,” Shanahan said. “But we’re not into getting rid of good players. So I’d be very surprised if Mac wasn’t around us next year.”
Shanahan has more autonomy than most head coaches in the league, so that either means that Jones isn’t available or it would take an excessive amount of capital to swing a trade.
For a team short on young talent, coughing up a second-round pick and potentially more for Jones would be a poor decision. Still, it could also lead the Vikings down another dead end.
Kyler Murray is another popular target, and it’s possible the Arizona Cardinals could be so hell-bent on moving on that they would consider releasing him. But, as the Vikings saw with Darnold, it takes just one team to make an offer and create a market.
That team might be the Pittsburgh Steelers. PennLive’s Nick Farabaugh wrote earlier this week that new head coach Mike McCarthy “has really liked Kyler Murray” in the past, and ESPN’s Josh Weinfuss added that an “NFC source” believes that the “market starts with a third-round pick.”
The Vikings will likely have a pair of third-round picks to play with, owning the No. 82-overall pick and projected for a third-round pick for Darnold’s departure, according to Over The Cap. But the Steelers have even more draft capital with two third-round picks, one via the George Pickens trade to the Dallas Cowboys last spring, and a projected compensatory pick. Pittsburgh also has a projected total of 12 picks in this year’s draft, giving them the ability to add something that would sweeten the pot.
If Murray and Jones aren’t available, the waters get really muddy. Tua Tagovailoa has a $56.2 million cap hit next season and likely won’t come here due to his history with Brian Flores. Lamar Jackson is another possibility, but the Baltimore Ravens likely chose him over John Harbaugh by firing the legendary coach earlier this month. The Los Angeles Chargers likely didn’t hire Mike McDaniel as their offensive coordinator to trade Justin Herbert, and Kirk Cousins may stay in Atlanta after all, due to Michael Penix Jr.’s injury history and previous relationship with Kevin Stefanski.
With Daniel Jones likely to choose the Indianapolis Colts over the Vikings for the second straight year and the other top options being Aaron Rodgers, Russell Wilson, and Marcus Mariota, the Vikings may be scraping the bottom of the barrel before Darnold potentially hoists a Lombardi Trophy in two weeks.
That puts the bet back on McCarthy, but even he has an uphill climb. A lot can happen in the offseason, but it’s daunting when you consider he has to refine his accuracy, tweak his footwork, and mature as a quarterback in a single offseason. Some quarterbacks, like Drake Maye and Josh Allen, have done it before. But it’s one hell of a bet to make when jobs are on the line.
With all of this in mind, Minnesota’s hope may be that Burrow wakes up one morning and decides he no longer wants to be in Cincinnati. Still, the Vikings would also be dealing with an organization that sat on Carson Palmer’s trade request for an entire year before sending him to the Oakland Raiders.
Depending on a single player to save a franchise is no position a general manager wants to be in. But with the quarterback market already shaping up, a Burrow blockbuster may be their only hope.
