A Vikings Narrative Is Crumbling Fast
For one week, Minnesota Vikings fans have assumed or insinuated that former general manager Kwesi Adofo-Mensah lost his job, in part, because he took a two-week paternity leave in 2023 while still working from home. Under scrutiny, though, that narrative has collapsed.
The initial reporting about Adofo-Mensah’s termination took on a life of its own — that wasn’t right.
While Adofo-Mensah’s NFL peers might’ve thought his paternity leave was unusual, the Vikings owners did not fire him for that reason.
Family Leave Did Not Get Adofo-Mensah Fired
The draft habits sunk Adofo-Mensah, not family leave.
Tom Pelissero Corrects the Record
NFL Network‘s Tom Pelissero hopped on KFAN this week, and among several topics, dispelled the false paternity leave narrative.
He told the Power Trip Morning Show, “To pin it on ‘He took paternity leave three years ago,’ even if you’re bringing it up to say, ‘But that wasn’t it,’ you’re introducing a topic that had not been a topic. Sure, is there a level of frustration that comes when you feel like you’re having to do more because your co-worker is out? You don’t fire a guy three years after he took paternity leave. Like, what are we even talking about? It’s just wild. Like, we all knew that.”
“Yeah, he wasn’t around in the summer of 2023. He missed chunks of the spring and missed part of training camp. But I never got any sense that it was some long-standing thing. It was well known that that happened and that there was some frustration from the people in the building about it, but it never changed the relationship. So, this idea that it was this toxic environment is, frankly, complete and utter nonsense.”
So, the family bonding angle was mentioned by Vikings-themed reporters, and it took on a life of its own as one of the smoking guns why Adofo-Mensah lost his job.
Pelissero added, “I will say this, there is a habit for certain people, if they get beat on a scoop, to immediately lend additional details to the story that may or may not be 100 percent grounded in fact. So, you ended up with a bunch of tweets thrown out there into the universe, that suggested things, that based upon all my knowledge of the situation are not entirely accurate.”
“The idea that this was a toxic environment, there was tension between — Kwesi and Kevin are friends, personally. They have always been good. There was not a fight. There was not a blow-up. It was not, quite frankly, like it was at the end of the Mike Zimmer-Rick Spielman era, two guys that I like a lot, but they weren’t talking. It was never like that.”
League Confusion Does Not Equal a Reason for Termination
The Athletic appeared to lead the charge in noting Adofo-Mensah’s paternity league as strange around the NFL. Adofo-Mensah even reportedly worked from home during the leave, but it’s just rare for anyone associated with the NFL to prioritize family time.
And because it’s abnormal in NFL-speak, social media users piled on, suggesting Adofo-Mensah’s termination might’ve occurred partly because of his newborn leave. However, that happened three years ago, and for the Wilfs to fire Adofo-Mensah now for it is just ridiculous.
Pelissero also cleared the air further on Adofo-Mensah and O’Connell: “They had disagreements. They didn’t see eye to eye on certain aspects of roster building. In the end, you have a quarterback situation that needs to be sorted out. You have a salary cap situation that needs to be sorted out. As the Wilfs heard all the information, and they always do this every year, they have people come to New Jersey, and they have a series of meetings.”
“They asked a lot of pointed questions. They got some honest answers, and they came to the conclusion that this was just not the right partnership moving forward. Not just between Kevin and Kwesi, but the entire organization. And I don’t think you need to come up with some wild story about why it didn’t work.”
One QB Away from Being Trendsetters
It’s also worth noting that Wilfs seemed to encourage Adofo-Mensah’s paternity leave at the time. The owners are known as progressive thinkers, so when the general manager spent time with his family after his wife’s childbirth, few batted an eye.
In fact, had Adofo-Mensah kept his job — meaning that J.J. McCarthy turned into a franchise quarterback this season — the Vikings’ brass would’ve been championed as trendsetters and destroyers of past norms.
In reality, Adofo-Mensah got fired, he took paternity leave as a side note in 2023, and now some have claimed that hurt his job security.
A raw deal for Adofo-Mensah.
It’s the Draft Record
Adofo-Mensah was not canned for spending time with babies. His draft record sank the ship, with a possible side dish of Sam Darnold playing in this weekend’s Super Bowl as horrid optics.
The man had 28 chances to draft new players since the start of 2022, and to date, just five have projected as long-term success stories relative to draft position:
- Jordan Addison
- Levi Drake Rodriguez
- Jalen Nailor
- Will Reichard
- Dallas Turner
Of course, the verdict remains out on players like McCarthy, Donovan Jackson, Jay Ward, and Tyrion Ingram-Dawkins, but on the whole, Adofo-Mensah banked a 17%-20% hit rate in the draft.
That percentage alone will get any drafter fired — not parental leave.
You must be logged in to post a comment.