Introducing the Vikings Breakout Player for 2025
The 2025 season has been one of struggle, disappointment, and the occasional bright spark for the Minnesota Vikings. One such positive has been the team’s breakout player for this season — Jalen Redmond.
VikingsTerritory introduces the Vikings breakout player of the 2025 season: defensive tackle Jalen Redmond.
Redmond had bided his time for the opportunity to play in the NFL. Despite impressing at the scouting combine, he went undrafted in 2023 and eventually found his way onto the practice squad of the Carolina Panthers.
Jalen Redmond Busts into Stardom for Vikings
Redmond never made the final roster in Carolina and would ultimately go to the XFL to keep his football career alive, signing with the Arlington Renegades. The Vikings offered him a way back into the NFL coming into the 2024 season, and he has never looked back.
Redmond made it through the initial roster cuts, and although he was waived in October, the Vikings brought him back to the practice squad, eventually promoting him to the active roster on November 6, where he has remained ever since.
He would get plenty of opportunities to play in the second half of the 2024 season, and he grasped them. Redmond appeared in 13 games in his debut season, including two starts. He amassed 18 tackles, including 6 tackles for loss and a sack, as well as 2 pass deflections. He impressed enough to be re-signed for the 2025 season.
Impressing in 2025
Despite the Vikings going out and spending a lot of money on veteran interior defensive linemen in free agency. Redmond earned his place on the roster again in 2025 and has been comfortably the standout performer at that position over the first eight weeks of the season. Kevin O’Connell was vocal about wanting to improve in the trenches after his team was dumped out of the playoffs by the Los Angeles Rams last season. The only improvement seen is the development of Redmond.
The decision to spend big money on Jonathan Allen and Javon Hargrave, and trade away nose tackle and lead run stuffer on the team, Harrison Phillips, currently looks like a major miscalculation by Vikings general manager Kwesi Adofo-Mensah.
Allen and Hargrave haven’t had the desired effect, while the defense has struggled badly defending the run. Even more bad news comes with Allen and Hargrave’s huge salary cap hits next season, which will remain hefty even if the team cuts ties with the two players.
The Season So Far
Over the course of the first seven games, Redmond has established himself as a starter, playing on 65% of defensive snaps. His time on the field has been increasing as he’s proven himself a capable every-down player, to the point that he played 63 snaps (83%) against the Chargers last time out. Hargrave’s snap count is trending the other way, down to 50% over the season and just 30% against the Chargers.
The reason for Redmond’s increased playing time is apparent from the stats. Through seven games, he has amassed 20 tackles, including a team high 3 sacks and 5 tackles for loss. He also has 21 QB pressures, 4 QB hits, 2 pass deflections, and 1 forced fumble.
For his efforts, Pro Football has him graded at 76.1, an impressive 15th ranking at the position across the league. Redmond has certainly been one of the bright sparks of this season, and the next contract he signs should be considerably bigger than the 1-year, $960k one he got this year.
Redmond will get the chance to impress again this Sunday, as the Vikings take on the Detroit Lions in a big divisional battle at Ford Field.
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