The Minnesota Vikings are going to look a lot different at wide receiver this season.
Just like last year at this time, the Minnesota Vikings have more wide receivers on their 90-man roster than any other position. Unlike last year when they were looking to bolster one of the best receiver duos in the NFL, they have a much larger gap to fill.
Currently, the roster has 12 wide receivers, which is one more than they had last year at this time. Of the dozen, seven of them came to the team as undrafted free agents. Outside the seven seasons that Adam Thielen has been with the Vikings, the remaining adds up to only 11 seasons.
Last year the Vikings were looking for a solid third option to complement Thielen and Stefon Diggs. Like this season, the Vikings used two draft picks to bolster their roster. Unlike last year, where they waited until the final round to add a receiver, the Vikings addressed the need immediately in the first round. With pick 22 overall which they received from Buffalo in the Diggs trade, the team selected Justin Jefferson from LSU. For Jefferson, a member of the NCAA Champions, expectations are going to be doubly high in Minnesota.
The off-season extension that Vikings gave quarterback Kirk Cousins indicates that the passing game is still important. In order for him to be effective, he will need capable targets on the field.
So many questions need answering when the Minnesota Vikings start training camp. Here are six of them.
Is Adam Thielen ready to be elite—again?
Since breaking into the starting lineup in 2016, Adam Thielen has been the Vikings’ most effective pass catcher. From 2016 to 2018, he led the team in receiving yards. His back-to-back 1000-yard seasons were the first since Randy Moss strung together six seasons from 1998 to 2003. His 1,373 receiving yards in 2018 were the most by a Vikings’ receiver since Moss amassed over 1,600 yards in 2003.
Thielen opened the 2018 season with an NFL record eight-straight games with 100 receiving yards. He finished the season with career-highs with 113 receptions, 1,373 yards, and nine touchdowns.
From 2014 through 2018, Thielen played in every regular-season game. Starting out as a special teams player the first two seasons before breaking into the offense as a starter. A very durable player in his career, Thielen missed six games last season due to a hamstring injury. The injury limited him to only 418 receiving yards.
Thielen will be turning 30 in August. Hopefully, his career can continue to mirror that of another Vikings’ great: Cris Carter.
Like Thielen, Carter only had two 100-yard seasons before age 30. After 30, he rattled off six straight, with an average of 1,188 yards per season and three times led the NFL in touchdown receptions.
If the Minnesota Vikings are to succeed in 2020, they will need Thielen at his best.
Can Justin Jefferson break the recent bust of first-round draft picks for the Vikings?
Justin Jefferson is the eighth wide receiver drafted by the Vikings in the first round. The best of this class is by far Randy Moss. In his hall of fame career, Moss played eight seasons with the Vikings and ranks second in receptions, yards, and touchdowns behind Cris Carter.
Since drafting Moss 21st overall in 1998, the Vikings have missed on three of their last four first-round picks used on wide receivers. The four receivers drafted include Troy Williamson (seventh pick 2005), Percy Harvin (22nd pick 2009), Cordarrelle Patterson (29th pick 2013) and Laquon Treadwell (23rd pick 2016). The best receiver of this bunch is Harvin who caught 280 passes for 3,302 yards and 20 touchdowns.
None of these players lasted more than four seasons with the Vikings.
Playing only two seasons at LSU, Jefferson finished with 165 receptions for 2,415 yards and 24 touchdowns. That is more yards and touchdowns than the Vikings’ last first-round draft pick, Treadwell. In three seasons at Ole Miss, Treadwell finished with 202 receptions for 2,393 yards and 21 touchdowns. It is also more receptions, yards, and touchdowns than Williamson had while playing at South Carolina. In three seasons, Williamson finished with 91 receptions for 1,754 yards and 13 touchdowns.
What will help Jefferson in his transition to the NFL is last season LSU passed more than they ran the ball – the norm for most NFL teams. Also, if Adam Thielen returns to WR1 form, there will be less pressure on Jefferson to contribute, allowing him more time to acclimate to the pro game. The situation is similar to when Moss joined the Vikings in 1998 with Cris Carter established as the top receiver.
This is a much better situation than when Williamson joined the Vikings in 2005. With no clear top receiver on the roster to replace Moss, the expectations were extremely high for Williamson. That year tight end Jermaine Wiggins led the Vikings with 69 receptions. Williamson finished with only 24 receptions—the seventh most on the team.
The last comparison breaks down when looking at the Treadwell situation. Perhaps the problem had too much talent wide receiver with Thielen and Stefon Diggs firmly established as the starters along with Patterson and Jarius Wright making up the unit.
At the time, receiver was not the most pressing need for the Vikings, and perhaps that was good since things did not work out for either side. After failing to make the final roster last season, only to be re-signed early in the season, Treadwell has made a complete break from the team signing as a free agent with the Atlanta Falcons.
Overall, Jefferson is coming into a good situation—there is a need on the roster with a very good veteran that will alleviate some of the pressure he will face this season.
Who emerges as WR2?
Before the Vikings traded away Stefon Diggs, they had the luxury of having two wide receivers with the potential to be WR1 on many teams. As a duo, Adam Thielen and Diggs, they were always in the conversation as one of the best in the NFL.
Now they need to determine who will be the starter alongside Thielen.
At this point, with no OTA’s in place to provide any tangible input, the leading contender is Tajae Sharpe. After Thielen, Sharpe, a fifth-round selection of Tennessee in 2016, has the most experience of the remaining receivers on the Vikings’ roster.
Even with missing the 2017 seasons with a foot injury, Sharpe joins the Vikings with 92 receptions, 1,167 receiving yards, and eight touchdowns. While nowhere near the kind of performance the Vikings lose with Diggs’ departure, it is the most of any receiver on the roster not named Thielen. In the three seasons Sharpe played with the Titans, he started 29 of 47 games. In 2019, he only started six games but had his highest catch percentage at 71.4—not that bad considering Diggs’ catch percentage last season was 67.
On a slightly negative note, in the three seasons that Sharpe played with Tennessee, the best he ever finished was third among the wide receivers in receptions. There needs to be a step-change improvement for him in order for the Vikings to be successful.
Pushing Sharpe for the WR2 position will be Bisi Johnson. A seventh-round draft pick from last season, Johnson was active for the entire season last year, making six starts. He finished with 31 receptions for 294 yards and three touchdowns. His catch percentage of 68.9 falls right on top of Diggs’ career mark of 68.4 percent over five seasons.
Last year, I did not predict Johnson making the team, but with the experience of an entire year under his belt, this year he will not only make the team, but will have a significant role and could be the reason Sharpe fails to make the final roster.
Having already detailed Justin Jefferson’s situation on the previous slide, and with the hefty expectations that come with a first-round draft pick, Jefferson is certainly in the mix to win the WR2 position. According to a tweet from PFF College, Jefferson had 109 receptions from the slot position. That means he only caught two passes outside the slot.
There is a good chance this is where he plays the most this season. That does not necessarily drop him down to WR3, but it might give another receiver a better shot at earning the other outside position.
Which newcomer emerges as the biggest surprise?
Leaving Justin Jefferson out of this conversation for now, mainly because of the high expectations associated with being a first-round draft pick, along with how low Laquon Treadwell set the bar as the most recent first-round wide receiver selected by the Vikings.
In franchise history, the Minnesota Vikings have drafted 51 wide receivers in the fifth round or later. Only 20 of them ever registered a reception in the NFL. Bisi Johnson, one of two seventh-round wide receivers selected last season, is the most recent from this list. Stefon Diggs, a fifth-round pick in 2015, tops the list with 365 receptions in five seasons.
The Vikings added another fifth-round pick at wide receiver this year selecting K.J. Osborn from the University of Miami. Osborn played three seasons at the University of Buffalo before transferring to the University of Miami. His best season came as a junior when he caught 53 passes for 892 yards and seven touchdowns for the Bulls.
The Vikings also signed UDFA’s Quartney Davis from Texas A&M and Dan Chisena from Penn State. According to Walter Football’s wide receiver ranking, they projected Davis as a fourth to sixth-round selection, actually ranking him ahead of Osborn. However, they also point out that Davis had a disappointing season and should have remained in school for his senior year.
According to the Vikings website, Chisena transitioned from track playing only two seasons of football and catching only 14 passes—although Sports Reference.com he only caught three passes. No matter, the best chance he has of making the team will be as a special teams player and not as a wide receiver.
So after excusing Jefferson from this list, and projecting Chisena’s best option being on special teams, that leaves this as a two-person competition between Osborn and Davis. After not being drafted, Davis should come into camp with something to prove, and with the ability to learn from another undrafted wide receiver on the team, look for him to turn a few heads during training camp. It will not hurt that he also has a slight size advantage over Osborn.
How many wide receivers will the Vikings take into the regular season?
Checking out the Vikings’ depth chart at wide receiver over the years the tendency has been to carry six wide receivers through the season. Last year was a bit of anomaly as they opened the season with only four—Adam Thielen, Stefon Diggs, Chad Beebe, and Bisi Johnson. If didn’t take long before they needed to add reinforcements as Beebe played in only three games before an ankle injury cut ended his season. The team re-signed Laquon Treadwell who finished the season with one start and nine receptions. They also were without Thielen who missed six games last season with a nagging hamstring injury.
These injuries resulted in running back Dalvin Cook finishing second on the team in receptions (53) and receiving yards (519) behind Diggs. Cook led the team in touchdowns with 13, but interestingly enough, there were all on the ground.
With the struggles of the wide receiving position last year, expect the Minnesota Vikings to open the season with six receivers on the active roster while carrying a couple of promising players on the practice squad. That leaves four players currently on the roster without a chair when the music stops.
Who makes the final roster?
Here is a look at how the position shakes out when the season opens.
The locks: Adam Thielen, Justin Jefferson, Bisi Johnson, and Chad Beebe.
While there may be questions about his health and effectiveness after missing six games last season, the only way Thielen fails to make the team is if one of his legs falls off during training camp.
Almost as big of guarantee is Jefferson. There is no way a first-round pick does not make the team. In the history of the Vikings, only two of 60 players drafted in the first round failed to play with the team. The Vikings selected defensive tackle Jim Dunaway with the third overall pick in 1963, but he chose instead to play with the Buffalo Bills of the AFL. In 1965 the Vikings drafted wide receiver Jack Snow eighth overall and traded him to the Los Angeles Rams before the season started.
Despite limited to only three games in each of the last two seasons, Beebe will continue to impress and once again make the final roster—despite only catching six passes for 109 yards in two seasons.
On the bubble: Tajae Sharpe, Alexander Hollins, and K.J. Osborn.
That leaves eight players battling for the last two spots. Sharpe, with 47 games of experience will be the remaining favorite to make the roster. Sharpe makes the team with a role most like that of Jarius Wright’s. The final spot will come down to second-year player Hollins, who played in five games late last year as an undrafted free agent and K.J. Osborn this year’s fifth-round draft pick. Whichever player fails to make the final roster will most likely end up on the practice squad. Because the Vikings seem to like their new toys better than the older ones, Osborn makes the final roster.
Practice squad: Quartney Davis and Alexander Hollins
Despite getting snubbed in the draft and signing with the Vikings as an undrafted free agent, Davis most likely winds up on the practice squad along with Hollins when the season opens.
Fail to make the cut: Dillon Mitchell, Davion Davis, Dan Chisena, and Bralon Addison.
Mitchell, the Vikings’ seventh-round draft pick from last season never made it the active roster. With a dozen receivers on the roster, it will be tough to stand out. Mitchell spent last season on the practice squad.
Davion Davis, an undrafted free agent from last season shuttled back and forth from the practice squad a couple of times last season and made his debut in Week 8 against the Washington Redskins. On the season, he was active for two games but failed to get into a game.
As mentioned on an earlier slide, Chisena’s only shot to make the squad is on special teams. Those odds are still long and the Vikings will not keep a player solely as a special teams player and with limited experience as a receiver, they will not have a spot for him.
Bralon Addison, an undrafted free agent, signed with Denver in 2016. The only NFL action he has was with the Chicago Bears in 2016 when he returned two punts and a kick. According to the Vikings website, he spent the last two seasons playing in the CFL for the Hamilton Tiger Cats. The Vikings regularly sign players out of the CFL who have shown some success there. Rarely do they make the final roster. The last was Brandon Zylstra in 2018 who led the CFL in receiving yards playing for the Edmonton Eskimos in 2017. Despite those credentials, Zylstra, a Minnesota native, only caught a single pass in 2018 for the Minnesota Vikings.