Vikings Alarm Bells Ring over Dallas Turner
The Minnesota Vikings will unleash outside linebacker Dallas Turner in 2025, following a small-ish season for the Alabama alumnus in 2024 as a rookie.
Dallas Turner’s preseason showing has sparked concern in Minnesota, with questions swirling about his readiness for a major defensive role in 2025.
With Pro Bowl pass rushers ahead of Turner on the 2024 depth chart, Turner played about 28% of defensive snaps last season, a generally paltry figure for a 1st-Rounder.
And with one preseason game in the books, the Voice of the Vikings, KFAN’s Paul Allen, sounded a bit worried this week about the 22-year-0ld.
Dallas Turner Will Need Some Mighty Performances Soon
Some believe Turner is trending in the wrong direction.
Paul Allen Raises Eyebrows with His Dallas Turner Observations
On his daily show, Allen stepped in front of his microphone and discussed Turner, relating to Gabriel Murphy’s performance in last weekend’s preseason game.
Allen said Wednesday, “What do you do with Dallas Turner? I’m just going to lay it out like that. What do you do with Dallas Turner? Where do you play him? How much do you play him? Do you care that he was a first round pick. Do you care that Gabriel Murphy is outperforming him in training camp and the Texans game?”
“Do you care that O’Connell came into the Texans game really, really excited to watch the Dallas Turner performance? I certainly can’t say the HC of the Minnesota Vikings thought it was a bad performance; I wouldn’t know. I just know that there wasn’t a lot said about Turner after the Texans game, and there was a lot said about Gabe Murphy. So, I guess that would be the potential proverbial dark cloud on the horizon.”
Naturally, the comments turned heads. Every Vikings fan wants Turner to pop off in 2025. Allen’s statement dials that back.
Premature Panic?
Turner played nine snaps last Saturday in the 20-10 dub over the Houston Texans. He just didn’t accrue any sacks or quarterback hits in the small sample.
Murphy, on the other hand, more than tripled Turner’s snap count, seeing action on 29 defensive plays while sacking Texans quarterbacks twice (technically 1.5, per the stat sheet) and logging 5 quarterback hits. Murphy obviously fetched the headlines, and rightfully so.
But Turner played a starter’s workload by preseason standards. Murphy is a reserve EDGE rusher. Turner might’ve terrorized Houston if he played three times his allotment.
Good News for Gabriel Murphy
Before training camp, Murphy sat firmly on the Vikings’ roster bubble, battling for an OLB4 regular season spot against Bo Richter and Tyler Batty. But based on the initial summer depth chart, plus the wildly wonderful preseason showing, Murphy seems to have all but locked in an OLB4 job this summer.
Here’s a novel thought: maybe Minnesota can enjoy two explosive pass rushers — Murphy and Turner. That is allowed.
Turner’s Go-Time Is in 3 Weeks
The preseason means next to nothing for Turner. He may not even play this weekend or next.
His go-time is September 8th against the Chicago Bears, Minnesota’s Week 1 opponent. If Turner gets to Week 13 or an adjacent time and has not logged many pressures and sacks, then it might be a reasonable time to wonder about his career trajectory.
However, sounding alarm bells over nine preseason snaps just feels frantic and overwrought. Give the man time. It’s severely unlikely for him to devolve into a Lewis Cine or Andrew Booth.
In fact, Turner performed quite well in his limited 2024 sample. The guy just needs snaps.
More on Turner
One week ago, SI.com‘s Will Ragatz called Turner a training camp riser: “Turner has done exactly what the Vikings hoped to see from him in his second training camp. He’s carried over the momentum he built during the offseason program and has been all over the field, making plays with both the first-team defense and the second unit.”
“He clearly trained hard this offseason to get his body ready for year two, and all the signs are pointing towards a breakout season as a big part of Brian Flores’ defense. The Vikings feel like they have three starters at outside linebacker.”
That’s the total opposite of Allen’s talker.
And Turner’s teammate, Jonathan Greenard, said about the youngster a couple of weeks ago: “He just looks locked in. I think that he just understands that he has a real opportunity to come in and change the game. I think obviously when you’re younger, you’re trying to get as many opportunities as possible.”
“But at the same time, you can’t control those things. All you can control is your effort, and what you know whenever your number is called – you make those plays.”
Greenard is likely the best judge of character in this situation.
The Vikings OLB1 added, ‘I think he did a good job in those situations last year. But this year, he’s going to have a little bit of a bigger role now, and we’re going to ask a lot of him. And at any point in time, your number could be called at any moment, and I know he’s going to go in there and just dominate.”
Perhaps panicking about Turner’s nine preseason snaps is silly.
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