Purple Rumor Mill: Sam Darnold’s 2025 Team, Tom Brady’s Vikings Take, Wes Phillips
VikingsTerritory’s Purple Rumor Mill is a two-day chronicle each week. All the week’s rumors are lassoed and plopped in two spots — articles on Saturday and Sunday — for review. Today is the December 15th edition.
Purple Rumor Mill: Sam Darnold’s 2025 Team, Tom Brady’s Vikings Take, Wes Phillips
Remember — rumors are rumors. What you read on weekends in these pieces is what the world is talking about pertaining to the Vikings, not necessarily items that will come to fruition.
Here’s the second batch of the week. Yesterday’s can be read here.
Rumor: The dark horse candidate for Sam Darnold’s next team — is the Los Angeles Rams.
Los Angeles Rams signal-caller Matthew Stafford will turn 37 in two months, and one lingering question about his career trajectory is longevity.
Can he continue to perform at a relatively high level, or will his skill set begin to fall off like Kirk Cousins, for example, in Atlanta? Tom Brady set the standard before retiring after the 2022 campaign, but not everybody thrives deep into their 40s on the football field.
Aaron Rodgers can attest.
And while Stafford has not hinted at retirement, it wouldn’t be weird one bit if he announced his exit from the sport after this season. That’s what older quarterbacks eventually do. Well, if Stafford takes that plunge this offseason, you better believe Sean McVay could replicate what Kevin O’Connell has done for Darnold’s career in Minnesota.
Vikings fans spent months daydreaming and predicting a “Baker Mayfield-like” season for Darnold in 2024, and those postulations came true — and then some. The Mayfield comparisons would go full tilt if Darnold left the Vikings for the Rams and latched onto that franchise as its permanent quarterback.
Darnold would excel in Hollywood if Stafford retired.
Rumor: Per Tom Brady, Justin Jefferson is the best wide receiver in the NFL, getting the nod over Ja’Marr Chase, who is all the rage right now.
Brady insinuated this week that wide receiver Justin Jefferson is the sport’s top wideout amid everpresent “Ja’Marr Chase or Justin Jefferson” debates. For Brady, considered by many the greatest football player of all time, it’s Jefferson.
Brady was asked on Fox Sports airwaves who he’d toss the rock to if he could throw to anyone in the NFL. He replied, “Great question. A couple tough choices out there. I know Ja’Marr Chase — what a year he’s having, but I’m saying Justin Jefferson. He can do everything from any spot on the field. He goes deep. He goes short. Catch the ball, catch and run, touchdowns, third down. He’s a ridiculous player.”
“Jefferson reminds me so much of my former teammate and Viking Randy Moss. So if it comes down to choosing only one, he would be the one right now,” Brady added about Jefferson.
Few outside the state of Ohio disagree.
Rumor: Wes Phillips spilled the beans this week about Sam Darnold’s future, and the guy sounds like a man heading to a new team in the offseason.
Vikings offensive coordinator Wes Phillips made it sound like Sam Darnold would probably play elsewhere in 2025.
“I think we all know that Sam is going to be a sought-after type of guy from wherever that may be. Whatever his future ends up being, I know all of us in this building are going to be happy for him, no matter where that ends up being. I don’t think he has to worry about that anymore,” Phillips told reporters.
Minnesota drafted rookie quarterback J.J. McCarthy last April, and the franchise seems poised to hand him the QB1 baton next year. McCarthy tore his meniscus in mid-August, canceling his rookie campaign.
“I would hope he would kind of say, ‘Hey, the body of work that I’ve put in so far is going to take care of the future. Really, all I need to worry about is right now.'”
“The worry might’ve been, ‘OK, this might be my opportunity to play.’ He’s past all that. He’s proven the doubters, and he’s proven that he can play in this league. Let’s just make this the best possible season we can have,” Phillips continued.
“Sam has really taken heed to all the cliches: Be where your feet are planted; be in the moment; let’s go 1-0 this week; let’s worry about this game plan. Whether there’s been praise — which there has been a lot for him this year — he hasn’t let that affect him, and when games don’t go necessarily we want to, or he wants to, he hasn’t let that affect him either,” Phillips added. “He’s been consistent in his demeanor, in his approach, in his work ethic, and that’s where we want to be. The most important game is the next one, and for this week, it’s Chicago.”
Darnold is on pace for roughly 4,300 passing yards, 38 total touchdowns, and 13 interceptions this season. That production will probably fetch him a contract between $40-$50 million in 2025.
Phillips has a golden opportunity to say something in the arena of, “Sam is our quarterback right now, and I don’t handle his contract business for next year.”
But he didn’t do that.
Phillips basically stated the obvious — the Vikings won’t deviate from the J.J. McCarthy plan. He’s the future.
The Vikings Quietly Re-Signed an Old Friend
Dustin Baker is a political scientist who graduated from the University of Minnesota in 2007. Subscribe to his daily YouTube Channel, VikesNow. The show features guests, analysis, and opinion on all things related to the purple team, with 4-7 episodes per week. His MIN obsession dates back to 1996. Listed guilty pleasures: Peanut Butter Ice Cream, ‘The Sopranos,’ Basset Hounds, and The Doors (the band). He follows the NBA as closely as the NFL.
All statistics provided by Pro Football Reference / Stathead; all contractual information provided by OverTheCap.com.
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