1 Vikings Defender Will Have a Breakout Year in 2023
Janik Eckardt
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The Minnesota Vikings could have different personnel in 2023, especially on the defensive side of the ball. Some starters of the previous season are set to leave the team in free agency, others could face their release as the organization has to maneuver through problems with the salary cap, and others didn’t play well in 2022 and could be released for that reason.
However, different players will get a chance every time a veteran leaves the club. Some backups will have way more prominent roles and can prove their worth. Running back Ty Chandler and cornerback Andrew Booth are two of them.
1 Vikings Defender Will Have a Breakout Year in 2023
A longtime Vikings star is somehow both a player with declining play and a huge salary cap hit. Veteran linebacker Eric Kendricks could very well be the first cap casualty of the Vikings off-season. The purple team can save $9.5 million in cap space by parting ways with him.
Kendricks was one of the premier linebackers in the game during his prime, and until 2020, he was one of the stars of Mike Zimmer’s defense. Father time is still undefeated, and he stole some of Kendricks’ athleticism once he turned 30. That drop in speed was noticeable in 2022.
His backup was rookie Brian Asamoah. The third-round pick had low expectations for his rookie campaign because he was stuck behind veterans Jordan Hicks and the aforementioned Kendricks. However, he found a way to play meaningful snaps for the Vikings despite neither Kendricks nor Hicks missing any time with injuries.
Asamoah is a great athlete, something the Vikings’ defense lacked in 2022. His athleticism and explosiveness are how a linebacker should look in the pass-heavy and extremely fast NFL.
In his rookie campaign, Asamoah appeared in 16 games, starred on special teams on 285 snaps, and added 119 on defense. At the end of the season, the Vikings actively tried to insert him into the lineup to give the veterans some rest and provide a spark for the defense.
Asamoah had some fantastic plays, including a game-changing forced fumble and recovery against the Giants on Christmas Eve. The rookie shined with elite speed and aggressiveness.
The hire of defensive coordinator Brian Flores will also help him. Flores is a great defensive coach and linebackers coach for the Pittsburgh Steelers and had the same role in New England between 2016-2018. That experience with the linebacker position should help Asamoah’s development. A Tweet of his after the Flores news broke suggests his excitement.
Flores is running a blitz-heavy scheme, and he needs versatile players. Asamoah’s speed can be a big part of his plan.
It is unlikely for both linebackers to be back. The Vikings can free up $5 million in cap space by releasing Jordan Hicks. He had some solid games but proved to be a liability in others. The defensive scheme didn’t help him, but he also lost a step in the last few years.
A case can be made that Asamoah should’ve played even more over Hicks in the 2022 campaign. Bringing the veteran back doesn’t make sense when a younger and cheaper player is waiting for his chance.
PFF agrees with Asamoah as one of the top breakout players.
PFF’s Brad Spielberger recently highlighted linebacker Eric Kendricks as a potential surprise cut candidate for the Vikings. A new defensive scheme, Kendricks coming off a bad year on the wrong side of 30 and there being a lot of money on his contract starts to add up.
That could open up a huge void of opportunity for a young, athletic linebacker like Asamoah, who made several plays in limited action as a rookie. His best play was a forced fumble where he simply took the ball away from an opponent, creating a turnover single-handedly.
Sam Monson, PFF
All signs point to a massive breakout campaign for Asamoah in 2023. Get ready for a lot of buzz in the next six and a half months.
Janik Eckardt is a football fan who likes numbers and stats. The Vikings became his favorite team despite their quarterback at the time, Christian Ponder. He is a walking soccer encyclopedia, loves watching sitcoms, and Classic rock is his music genre of choice. Follow him on Twitter if you like the Vikings: @JanikEckardt
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