2015 Minnesota Vikings: Vikings Release First Preseason Depth Chart

Arif Hasan   |  

Aug 4, 2015

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The Minnesota Vikings have released their first depth chart of the preseason and it’s a little surprising. We’ve put it into an easier-to-read table below:

2015 Vikings Depth Chart: Offense

2015 Vikings Depth Chart: Defense

2015 Vikings Depth Chart: Special Teams

Worth noting is the conspicuous absence of an injured Josh Robinson, who likely won’t be on the Week 1 roster, instead designated for short-term injured reserve or the PUP list to begin the season.

They don’t list the personnel order for the slot receiver or nickel corner spots, which is a bit disappointing because the Vikings were in a three-receiver set for over 50 percent of their snaps last year and were in nickel for the majority of snaps as well.

As far as we can glean, the order of the nickel receivers goes from Jarius Wright to Stefon Diggs, then Isaac Fruechte—though the second and third team have been much more generous about switching around who plays in the slot than the first team, so “slot receiver” is a small misnomer there.

This means that the fact that Cordarrelle Patterson is “ahead” of Wright is not useful (who has seen more time with the ones), though it does clarify a little bit where Patterson is in relation to Stefon Diggs, who is behind Thielen at “WR2.” I suspect that Diggs will move ahead of both in a more realistic depth chart and ahead of Thielen in the kind of depth chart the Vikings are releasing.

For the nickel set, we don’t have a clear understanding of who the two linebackers will be (though we’ve seen a lot of Chad Greenway and Anthony Barr, we’ve also seen Audie Cole and even Eric Kendricks take those snaps) but do have some understanding of the nickel cornerback.

Captain Munnerlyn has played behind the top two cornerbacks and slips into the slot. After him, Trae Waynes, when he comes on to the first team, plays on the outside as Terence Newman moves inside, while Waynes plays on the inside on the second team. Sherels has also taken snaps in the nickel, but much more often we’ll see Jalil Carter on the inside. I would speculate that in a depth chart, Sherels would be ahead of Carter.

Notably, the linebackers have not changed since the open of camp and Hodges is playing in the SLB role with Watts as the WLB. The WLB on the second team has changed around, and Hodges, Watts and Brian Peters have all played there. Josh Kaddu keeps slipping down spots on the roster and is now the lowest on the depth chart of all the linebackers.

Robert Blanton still has a spot as the safety opposite Harrison Smith, and today we saw Andrew Sendejo take reps ahead of Antone Exum in three-safety sets.

On offense, the right guard position has been held down by Mike Harris, but we may see Tyrus Thompson challenge for it. David Yankey has been playing tackle the last few days with Carter Bykowski injured and this morning, Bykowski took third-team left tackle snaps instead of Babatunde Aiyegbusi while Yankey stayed with the second team, and Zac Kerin filling in at second-team left guard. Kerin also took first-team center snaps with John Sullivan gone from the team (in order to see his new baby!), but started out camp rotating at third center with Tom Farniok. Bobby Vardaro has taken center snaps as well.