INDIANAPOLIS — Spend enough time around the leaders of sports teams, and you’ll hear how hard it is to maintain an approach. To follow through on a plan. To be unwavering about a vision.
Wins develop overconfidence. Losses create irrationality. Ownership intervenes. Egos divide.
Avoiding these traps is harder to practice than it is to preach. Over time, contract statuses and complicated decisions are the stress tests that either break or strengthen.
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Minnesota Vikings regimes of the past could probably talk about these dynamics for hours — about how they believed they could stick to a consistent roster-building plan before eventually deviating.
Thus far, general manager Kwesi Adofo-Mensah and head coach Kevin O’Connell have not done that. They’ve stuck to the plan.
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That is not to say their first two seasons have gone perfectly. The Vikings’ 2022 draft class left the defense devoid of young, high-end talent and in need at many of the positions they targeted just two years ago.
They have, though, made moves with low risk and potential upside. They have cleared a runway for more financial flexibility than they’ve had in some time while also trying to stay competitive and establish valuable offensive scaffolding for a potential franchise-changing quarterback. The task is tall because these objectives are often in conflict.
“Money spent today is money you don’t have tomorrow,” Adofo-Mensah said Wednesday at the NFL Scouting Combine. “The key is, it’s not because we like to go up there and say those words. It’s about the four-year window or three-year window.”
Again, easy to say, hard to do when the pressure mounts.
“They’re kind of at war,” Adofo-Mensah said of trying to make the most of both the present and future. “I don’t view that as a negative. You just have to make sure you’re mindful of (the ramifications of) both.”
Notably, these next few weeks present another test of the Vikings’ ability to keep rowing down the stream they’ve built. Adofo-Mensah and O’Connell are entering their third seasons at the helm and have yet to win a playoff game. Longtime quarterback Kirk Cousins is an impending free agent.
Almost 4 months in now…encouraged by the progress! Grateful tor all the help around us pic.twitter.com/s6udNzo9VO
— Kirk Cousins (@KirkCousins8) February 26, 2024
Minnesota’s decision-makers have not been shy about their preference: They’d like to bring Cousins back, and they think the 35-year-old was playing at a Super Bowl level before his torn Achilles last season. But they’d also like to sign him to a contract that allows them to not only be nimble in free agency in the coming years but also to benefit from the advantages gained from a rookie quarterback contract.
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The sooner the Vikings absorb Cousins’ $28.5 million dead cap hit, which is the result of last year’s restructured deal, the more surplus value they’ll generate from a rookie at the position, and the more they’ll have to spend in free agency. Conversely, the further the Vikings push Cousins’ money into the future, the fewer resources they’ll have to use elsewhere on the open market.
“Any time you go into situations like this … it’s a negotiation,” O’Connell said Tuesday. “You try to come to an agreement that works for both sides as we try to not only build our football team for 2024 but also do some things to help us sustain for the future as well.”
Last year, Adofo-Mensah put the Cousins negotiations in simple terms. He shared that the Vikings prioritized long-term flexibility, while Cousins sought long-term security. The Vikings were willing to commit to Cousins for more than one additional year — at a cost.
Cousins opted for a shorter-term option, believing in himself the way he has in the past. Market demand increases value. Cousins benefitted from this strategy in the past. Once again, the number of suitors and level of interest elsewhere is likely to play a huge role in where Cousins ends up in free agency.
How far the Vikings may or may not be willing to go will partially hinge on how comfortable they are with risk. Drafting a quarterback comes with a heavy dose of uncertainty. Unlike some teams, like the Los Angeles Rams, the Vikings are intentional about how they utilize formal interviews. One of O’Connell’s first post-playing jobs revolved around preparing quarterbacks for pre-draft interviews. He uses the experience to dissect canned responses.
“It happened yesterday,” O’Connell said. “You have a couple of players that give you the same answer unprompted, and they drive the conversation to where they want it to go. Which is what I used to teach guys to do. And they say the same phrase, and I go, ‘Where are you training at?’ They say, ‘I’m here.’ Who else is there? They rattle off names.”
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In some of the interviews, O’Connell and the coaching staff attempt to fill in gaps by displaying film and asking them to explain their thought processes. In evaluating quarterbacks, accuracy, processing ability and toughness are paramount. The meetings inform the team’s decisions.
But Adofo-Mensah also mentioned Wednesday that there is always uncertainty in drafting a player.
“When they show up to your door,” Adofo-Mensah said of potential draft picks, “it’s an unknown.”
Other unknowns exist, too, if the Vikings are willing to absorb the risk that comes with moving on from Cousins. They’d have extra money to spend in free agency, but they’d still have to sign the correct players. They could draft a player with accuracy and processing speed, but they’d also have to develop him in the right way. They could lay out a detailed plan, but in the end, results are what generate believers — especially out of teammates (like Justin Jefferson) who need to believe in the long-term vision to sign on for the long haul.
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Adofo-Mensah and O’Connell have talked about sustainability since they took over — the idea of wanting to establish a lengthy window of contention that would give them a high probability of reaching and winning a Super Bowl. The path toward that goal is not singular. But talk to any former executive, and they’ll tell you that straying from the original plan is one of the primary ways the plan can go awry.
The Vikings have not done that yet. But they also haven’t faced a fork-in-the-road negotiation of this magnitude.
(Photo: Jeffrey Becker / USA Today)
