Will the Vikings Completely Turn Over the Quarterbacks?
Ted Schwerzler
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There is no more important position in sports than that of an NFL quarterback. With so much influence over a team’s operations, having a competent quarterback at the highest level is a must. The Vikings saw that firsthand after Kirk Cousins went down in 2023, but will any of their rostered players be back for 2024?
Will the Vikings Completely Turn Over the Quarterbacks?
Going into this past season, there was already uncertainty about how Kwesi Adofo-Mensah, Kevin O’Connell, and the Minnesota Vikings would handle the quarterback position in 2024. Kirk Cousins was on just a one-year extension, and the team spent only a fifth-round draft pick supplementing by adding Jaren Hall. The future was always murky, but it has never been less clear.
As Cousins returns to a clean bill of health from a torn Achilles, he continues to say all the right things with a desire to stick in Minnesota. Ultimately, that decision will come down to whether the dollars make sense, and the discussion has shifted with an aging signal caller returning from a substantial injury. Minnesota played four different quarterbacks in 2023, though. Could all of them be gone?
Let’s look at them on a case-by-case basis:
Kirk Cousins
Unquestionably, the best of the bunch, even returning from an injury, Cousins will be back if he wants to be. The Vikings have some money to spend there, and they’ll offer him a substantial deal. It may not be the market value or touch the high end of what he could get, but that is a decision he should have to weigh.
Regardless of his previous immobility, returning from a big injury at 36 years old isn’t ideal, and the team is far enough away in other aspects that money has to be spread around. If Cousins wants a two-year deal around $60 million, then he should be in the building tomorrow. If $80 million is what he covets, well then, talk is cheap.
Nick Mullens
Under contract in the final year of his deal with Minnesota, Mullens is set to make $1.9 million in 2024. However, the franchise has an out this offseason and would incur just a $375,000 dead cap hit should they cut him. Backup quarterbacks are important, but after what we saw this season, does either side really want to run it back?
This won’t be Mullens’ decision, but Minnesota must weigh the performance as he took over for Cousins. Brought in to be a veteran backup should Cousins go down, Mullens continually made rookie mistakes and awful decisions during his time under center. That is all true before even considering how often he simply threw the ball up for grabs. There was definitely a willingness to take chances here, but they were often miscalculated.
Josh Dobbs
Acquired as an emergency addition with Mullens being on injured reserve after Cousins went down and rookie Jaren Hall being the only available option, he should be considered good as gone. There were definitely high moments, and there could have been a few more if the gameplan favored his skillset better. That said, his contract is up, and it makes little sense to bring back a guy who was benched and then inactive for most of the stretch run.
Jaren Hall
This may be the group’s most interesting case, and Hall seems like a lock to return, given his rookie deal. He did not look good in a limited run during year one, but expecting much more from a fifth-round project is probably fool’s gold anyway.
Greater importance will be placed on developing Hall before he needs to be elevated again, and the hope would be that no more emergencies arise. If all goes well here, Hall sits for at least the next year and then develops into a usable backup that looks like Mullens at his best.
If the Vikings don’t keep Cousins around, then there should be no less than two new quarterback additions this offseason. If the longtime veteran is retained, then a new rookie ready to be called upon can take over the backup spot.
Ted Schwerzler is a blogger from the Twin Cities that is focused on all things Minnesota Twins and Minnesota Vikings. He’s active on Twitter and writes weekly for Twins Daily. As a former college athlete and avid sports fan, covering our pro teams with a passion has always seemed like such a natural outlet.
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