Vikings Named a Loser of the Week
This week featured the release of the NFL’s regular season schedule, and as expected, the Minnesota Vikings won’t have an easy trek.
The schedule wasn’t kind to the Vikings, says Bleacher Report.
Obsessive Vikings fans have known the team’s opponents for four months, but the order was made public on Wednesday night. You can check out the schedule here.
The 18-week docket has few easy spots for the purple team, so just like last year, Minnesota must morph into an overachiever.
Meanwhile, Bleacher Report identified schedule winners and losers on Thursday, and Minnesota fell in the sinful category. Kevin O’Connell’s squad is a schedule “loser,” per BR.
Bleacher Report Calls Vikings a Loser of the Schedule Release
BR’s Gary Davenport nominated a handful of winners and losers, and the Vikings weren’t so lucky.
He explained: “The Minnesota Vikings were arguably the most surprising team in the NFL last year, coming from nowhere to go 14-3. In 2025, they are going to be one of the most disappointing teams in football — the squad with the largest decrease in wins relative to 2024. And the schedule isn’t helping matters any.”
“The Vikings already had problems, whether it’s an unproven quarterback coming off a major injury in J.J. McCarthy or a pass defense that was among the league’s worst a year ago. Early on at least, things should go fairly well for the Vikes. Just one of their first five opponents made the postseason a year ago (the Pittsburgh Steelers, who have questions galore of their own this year).”
Almost all purple fans commonly agreed that the schedule, on the surface, was a murderous obstacle.
Davenport added, “But that first real test of the season is also the first of two straight international games for Minnesota, and that sort of shake-up to a team’s routine can be tough. The Vikings have Week 6 off, but once they get back, their seventh-toughest strength of schedule (.557) starts to tighten up. Minnesota plays a brutal four-game gauntlet beginning in Week 7: Philadelphia, at the Chargers, at Detroit and Baltimore.”
“After that, half of Minnesota’s opponents made the playoffs last year, including both meetings with the Packers and a Christmas Day go-round with Detroit. Last year, the Vikings played six games against teams that won more games than they lost. They were a .500 team in those contests. That’s not going to cut it this season, even if the Vikes continue to beat the teams they should defeat.”
All told, over half of Minnesota’s schedule comprises games versus 2024 playoff teams.
The 5th-Toughest Path
CBS Sports ranked all teams’ schedules per difficulty this week, and unsurprisingly, the Vikings checked in at the naughty part of the list.
Minnesota has the NFL’s fifth-toughest schedule per opponents’ 2024 wins and losses. The road will be bumpy.
And CBS Sports is not an outlier; nearly every strength-of-schedule entity uplifts Minnesota’s opponent difficulty in the top five.
Same as Last Year
The good news? This website wrote last year that the Vikings had the league’s “fifth-toughest” schedule, and it just didn’t matter.
Minnesota barnstormed opponents out of the gate, running their record to 5-0 before a little adversity struck. It will be asked to do the same in 2025 — hang tough with a vicious opponent gauntlet, including games against the Super Bowl champion Philadelphia Eagles, Baltimore Ravens, Cincinnati Bengals, and, of course, the Green Bay Packers + Detroit Lions four times altogether.
A Roster That Can Handle It
Thankfully, the Vikings aren’t some huge underdog story or little engine that could. The roster has been carefully constructed by general manager Kwesi Adofo-Mensah, deep in all the right spots after 2025 free agency and an offensive line, for once, that fans brag about to anyone who’ll listen.
The only “shaky” spot on the depth chart is the quarterback. J.J. McCarthy has never taken an NFL snap.
8.5 Wins per Sportsbooks
Oddsmakers believe Minnesota will pull down eight or nine wins in McCarthy’s first year, a commendable figure as teams with rookie quarterbacks aren’t often pegged for winning records.
Minnesota’s defense ranked second leaguewide in 2024 per EPA/Play, and the group arguably improved with enhanced defensive tackle personnel. The defense, on paper, should be fine.
But as far as the schedule is concerned, the Vikings are considered losers this week.
The Newest Viking Is Official
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