With some bad injury update news for the Minnesota Vikings coming off their Week 1 win over the Chicago Bears, a monstrous opportunity for second-year EDGE rusher Dallas Turner could present itself.
Head coach Kevin O’Connell provided an update on players who either missed or left the game on Monday night, and it wasn’t exactly great news for some key Vikings players on defense. Middle linebacker Blake Cashman “will miss some time,” O’Connell said, while two other starters, CB Jeff Okuda and EDGE Andrew Van Ginkel, are currently in concussion protocol.
It’s too early to speculate on Okuda or Van Ginkel in terms of their chances of playing in Sunday night’s home opener against the Atlanta Falcons. But with the NFL’s five-step concussion protocol, players face an uphill climb to get cleared on a short week like the Vikings are facing.
The Vikings do have the luxury of roster depth, especially at EDGE defender. If Van Ginkel needs another week to get medically cleared, all eyes will be on the 22-year-old Turner Sunday — under the bright lights at U.S. Bank Stadium, no less.
Minnesota Vikings fans could finally get to see what Dallas Turner can do in a starting role
Turner has now played in 18 games with the Vikings, including last year’s playoff game against the Los Angeles Rams. He’s yet to record his first NFL start, but it’s hard to hold that against him.
Van Ginkel and Jonathan Greenard are both All-Pro-caliber EDGE defenders, and while Turner was a highly-touted prospect coming out of Alabama, he’s not yet close to challenging either player in Brian Flores’ defense; nothing proves that point more than Minnesota’s one-year extension for Van Ginkel this offseason.
With that said, there isn’t a single Vikings fan out there who doesn’t wonder what Turner could do with a more prominent role. He rotated in for 29 defensive snaps in Monday night’s opener in Chicago, per Pro Football Focus. While he showed some positive strides (especially against the run), he remains a player who’s extremely tough to gauge. PPF charted him for two pressures on 17 pass-rush snaps (11.7% pressure rate) and graded him 52.1 overall; most Vikings fans would contend he looked better than that, but the evidence would have to be buried deep in Monday’s game film.
Questions like that have been burning for fans since the Vikings traded a haul of draft capital to move up and select Turner with the 17th overall pick in the 2024 draft. Of course, everything hinges on Van Ginkel's health, and the hope here is that the Vikings can be as close to full strength as possible.
But we could finally start getting some real answers on where Turner is in his development in short order, and that's a storyline worth following in the coming days.