Will the Minnesota Vikings defense take a step back in 2020?
The Minnesota Vikings have been known as a defensive team during Mike Zimmer’s tenure with the franchise.
Since Zimmer arrived in Minnesota prior to the 2014 season, the Vikings have ranked no lower than 11th in points allowed and 14th in yards allowed. While part of that has been under Zimmer’s leadership, 2020 will be his biggest challenge yet.
The Vikings have lost five starters on the defensive side of the ball since they last took the field and with no on-field reps during a virtual offseason, they’ll rely on a slew of new players to carry the torch.
In addition, some of the veteran leadership that has been on the defensive side of the ball has also moved on. Linval Joseph is now with the Los Angeles Chargers, Xavier Rhodes is a member of the Indianapolis Colts and Everson Griffen appears like he has played his last snap in Minnesota despite still being a pending free agent.
Although Minnesota added some talent both in the draft and in free agency this year, there will still be an uphill battle to meet the standards Zimmer has established during his time with the team.
Let’s look at some of the questions that remain on defense and see if the Vikings can keep things going in 2020.
Will the Vikings miss Griffen?
In what has been a tradition over the past couple of years, the Vikings have transitioned on their defensive line from aging veterans to younger players with more upside. Just as Brian Robison was released in 2018, another veteran presumably bit the dust this offseason with Everson Griffen’s departure.
That puts the spotlight on a couple of players to replace Griffen’s production, but none more so than Ifeadi Odenigbo.
The Northwestern product has worked his way up from being a seventh-round pick, to a practice squad member, into a part-time rotational role last season. His first year with regular playing time went well as Odenigbo recorded seven sacks while also showing the ability to play on the edge or in the middle of the defensive line.
A versatile piece along the defensive line is good, but the question of what’s behind Odenigbo is also a valid one. Whereas the Vikings had Odenigbo to spell Griffen last season, they could look to a combination of Anthony Zettel (who hasn’t recorded a sack since 2017) and rookies D.J. Wonnum and Kenny Willekes, who are wild cards in Minnesota’s draft class.
Either way, it appears that the Vikings are going to move on from Griffen at some point. But it will be curious to see if they’ll regret letting him leave.
Will someone emerge as a pass-rushing 3-tech?
Last season, the Vikings were excited to sign Shamar Stephen away from a one-year stint with the Seattle Seahawks. As current Minnesota co-defensive coordinator Andre Patterson sang his praises, there weren’t many Vikings fans that were excited and Stephen rewarded everyone by ranking 116th in pass rusher productivity rating and run stop percentage per Pro Football Focus.
So the Vikings might love Stephen more because he’s in a position to help others such as Eric Kendricks and Anthony Barr make plays, but they still need someone that can create penetration in the middle. Free-agent acquisition Michael Pierce should help, but it would be great if they could find a pass rusher to team with him on the inside.
One name that could step up is Armon Watts. The 2019 sixth-round pick out of Arkansas wasn’t on the field much last season. But when he was, he recorded a 5.7 PRP rating which would have ranked 25th in the NFL among qualifying defensive tackles.
Another possibility is fourth-round pick James Lynch, who collected 13.5 sacks during his junior season at Baylor. Although he’ll have to transition from an edge rusher to the inside, there’s potential there for Patterson to work with.
The rest of the group has been given chances to take the lead, but none of them have ever come up with it. Regardless, Minnesota will need someone to step up and help take the load, otherwise, it could be a struggle in the trenches.
Can the Vikings get more out of Barr?
Anthony Barr was just about on a plane to sign with the New York Jets when he had a sudden change of heart during the 2019 offseason.
Instead of getting more money in New York, Barr opted to sign a five-year, $67.5 million deal with the Vikings, and some thought they would see him get the opportunity to make more splash plays as he did in his rookie season.
That didn’t happen and Barr had a year that made him look like a lighter version of Stephen. It wasn’t that he had a bad season as his 79 tackles were a career-high, but he didn’t make a visible impact with just 1.5 sacks and six tackles for loss.
Entering the second year of his lucrative contract, Minnesota will need to have Barr step up, but Mike Zimmer and his staff also need to allow him to do so.
Barr has rushed the passer just 12 percent of the time during his career in Minnesota and a lot of that had to do with what was around him as Ben Gedeon and Eric Wilson didn’t provide the same impact in coverage.
Heading into this season, there’s a couple of things that could help including the addition of rookie Troy Dye, who had a 77.6 coverage grade from PFF in his senior season at Oregon. With Dom Capers also joining the coaching staff, there could also be more wrinkles that allow Barr to get to the passer and let the Vikings be more aggressive.
Who will be Minnesota’s starting cornerbacks?
This will be a question that garners the most attention between now and the beginning of the 2020 season. With Xavier Rhodes, Trae Waynes, and Mackensie Alexander all departing in free agency this year, the Vikings are essentially starting from scratch in the secondary and it could take a while to figure everything out.
The incumbents are intriguing, but far from locks as Mike Hughes and Holton Hill have had their ups and downs since coming into the league.
Hughes is Minnesota’s elder statesman at corner with five career starts. But he suffered a multi-ligament knee injury during his rookie season in 2018 and he ended last year by injuring his neck.
There’s also Hill, who impressed as a rookie but landed in Mike Zimmer’s doghouse last season with a pair of four-game suspensions.
That’s where the youth movement comes in. First-round pick Jeff Gladney is a sticky cornerback that would work well in the slot, but the Vikings don’t have the opportunity to teach him the position without on-field drills. Even the addition of Cameron Dantzler has potential, but he could be behind the eight-ball as well as he looks to make up for lost time.
Minnesota won’t have too much time to figure this out as they’ll face Aaron Rodgers, Philip Rivers, Deshaun Watson, and Matt Ryan in four of their first five games in 2020. If they don’t figure things out quickly, it could be a long season for the Vikings secondary.
Can Mike Zimmer adapt on the fly?
The Vikings have new co-defensive coordinators in Andre Patterson and Adam Zimmer, but everyone knows that the teams’ defense will go through the man running the controls.
Mike Zimmer has not relinquished play-calling duties despite the changes, so his old-school approach will be put to the test with a crew of younger players.
But this could also be to Zimmer’s advantage. A lot has changed since he took over in 2014 and some of his previous mistakes that left players sprinting for greener pastures could come in handy while trying to mold his new defense.
An even better advantage for Zimmer should be the number of impact players that are still on this defense. Eric Kendricks was an All-Pro last season and Danielle Hunter continues to be one of the best pass-rushers in the league. Even the eleventh-hour decision to keep Anthony Harris looks great when he’s the perfect compliment to Harrison Smith.
Zimmer will have to adapt when it comes to building his defense, but he definitely won’t be alone. The question is if the Vikings have made too much change, too quickly which would bury their chances in 2020.