The Minnesota Vikings wide receiver has been picking up a lot of momentum this offseason and he could have a significant role in 2019.
When Chad Beebe was signed as an undrafted free agent by the Minnesota Vikings last year, it was a move that went relatively unnoticed by most. Many figured Beebe was merely just another camp body that the Vikings added to fill up their 90-man roster.
Measuring at 5-foot-10 and 183 pounds soaking wet, the odds of the former Northern Illinois wide receiver making Minnesota’s roster in 2018 didn’t seem very high.
But then came last year’s training camp and Beebe kept getting open, and open, and open, and open, and open. Multiple Vikings defensive backs had a difficult time covering the rookie receiver and the team’s coaching staff took notice.
Despite his efforts, Beebe actually didn’t end up making Minnesota’s active roster to begin the 2018 season. Instead, he began the year holding down a spot on the Vikings’ practice squad.
Eventually though, Beebe was added to Minnesota’s active roster and he ended up appearing in a total of three games last season before a hamstring injury prevented him from participating in any more.
This year, he is in the middle of the battle to be the Vikings’ No. 3 receiver. Beebe is back to juking defenders out of their shoes and he’s been getting a lot of praise from the team’s coaching staff this spring.
He could very well be heading into a season where he becomes a little more well-known among Minnesota’s fan base. But before that happens, let’s just dive into who exactly Chad Beebe is and how he got to where is now as a wide receiver for the Vikings.
Born into football
Chad Beebe was born during the summer of 1994 when his father, Don, was preparing for another season with the Buffalo Bills after helping the team make it to four straight Super Bowls. Like his son, Don was a wide receiver and he used his quickness and intelligence to make up for what he lacked in size.
The elder Beebe spent nine years in the NFL with the Bills, Carolina Panthers, and Green Bay Packers. In 1996, he was a member of the Packers team that ended up defeating the New England Patriots in Super Bowl XXVI.
Chad began playing tackle football when he was just 7-years-old. As a freshman at Aurora Christian High School in Illinois, he already had a goal of making it to the NFL one day like his dad.
There was just one problem. Beebe was only 5-foot-1, 107 pounds as a freshman in high school and his chances of making it as a professional football player seemed very slim.
Still, he worked his butt off and by his senior year, he had grown to be 5-foot-8 and 140 pounds. By the time his final season at Aurora Christian came to a close he had offers from Division I schools like Northern Illinois, Ball State, Illinois State, and North Dakota. He even had some interest from Northwestern and Purdue.
Beebe chose to stay close to home and he decided to attend Northern Illinois. This was just another step in his ultimate goal of reaching the NFL like his father.
Injury hiccups in college
As a true freshman at Northern Illinois in 2013, Chad Beebe didn’t end up out on the field until the school’s eighth game of the season. But Beebe made the most of his limited playing time and in his first-ever appearance for Northern Illinois, he ended up hauling in an 81-yard pass for a touchdown against UMass.
During his sophomore year at the school, Beebe saw the field much more often. He appeared in 12 games in 2014 as both a receiver and the team’s punt returner.
Unfortunately, Beebe suffered a brutal injury during Northern Illinois matchup against Bowling Green State in the Mid-American Conference Championship. During that game, he broke two bones in his left forearm that required two metal plates and 13 screws to fix.
Despite his injury, Beebe was back on the field with his teammates less than six months later during the Northern Illinois spring game in 2015.
He went on to appear in all of Northern Illinois’ games in 2015 and then the unthinkable happened as he was preparing for his senior season at the school. During the summer of 2016, Beebe suffered a leg injury during 7-on-7 drills that resulted in a tendon in his hamstring needing to be reattached.
Luckily, he was granted a medical redshirt for 2016 and he was able to recover in time to take the field for his final season at Northern Illinois in 2017.
Beebe has said that he didn’t put up the type of numbers in college that had originally envisioned for himself (64 catches, 930 yards, three touchdowns). But he still credits his time at the school for helping him prepare for the next step in his journey to the NFL.
Vikings give him a shot
After he was not selected in the 2018 NFL Draft, Chad Beebe got offers from two teams to come and try out for them. One was the Vikings and the other was the Indianapolis Colts, whose head coach, Frank Reich, is a former teammate of Beebe’s father when they were with the Buffalo Bills together.
Well, Chad never ended up getting the chance to try out for the Colts. That’s because he did so well during Minnesota’s rookie minicamp that the team decided to sign him before anyone else could.
Once Beebe found a spot on the Vikings’ 2018 roster, it didn’t take much time for him to receive praise from head coach Mike Zimmer and former offensive coordinator John DeFilippo.
After spending the first portion of his rookie season on the practice squad, Beebe was added to Minnesota’s active roster for their Week 9 matchup against the Detroit Lions.
In his very first NFL regular season game, it didn’t take long before he was frustrating the opposing defense with his ability to get open. By the second half against the Lions, Beebe was getting a lot more attention from the defense, even getting double-teamed at times.
Unfortunately, he caught the injury bug again and it resulted in him only appearing in three games for the Vikings last year. Still, Beebe made enough of an impression on Minnesota to earn another shot with the team in 2019.
His future in purple
It’s already been proven that Chad Beebe has the talent to play in the NFL. How long he is able to stay in the league is something that remains to be seen.
For 2019, there’s a good possibility that he could open the season as the Vikings’ third receiver behind Adam Thielen and Stefon Diggs. Beebe has had an impressive spring for Minnesota during their OTA and minicamp practices and he appears to be in the lead to land the No. 3 receiver role for 2019.
Now, there is still a lot of time until the start of the regular season and plenty of things can change before then. But there are not a whole lot of reasons to believe that Beebe won’t end up as the Vikings’ third receiver this year.
This offseason, he’s been receiving even more praise from Minnesota’s coaching staff than last year. Mike Zimmer, Kevin Stefanski, and Gary Kubiak have all taken time to rave about Beebe over the past few months.
Even Diggs has taken to social media to express how excited he is for the young receiver’s upcoming season with the Vikings.
After beginning his career in Minnesota on the roster bubble, it seems like the narrative surrounding Beebe for 2019 is just figuring out how often the team can get him out on the field.
What lies beyond that for the young receiver is up to him. But if these past few months are any indication of what’s to come, Beebe could be the next great undrafted receiver to make a name for himself in a Vikings uniform.