A Good Defense and a $1.3 Million Quarterback: Minnesota’s 2026 Season, by the Numbers

The 2025 Vikings finished 9-8, but the record hid a sharp imbalance. BBMI ranked Minnesota 6th in defensive EPA per play and 7th against the pass. The offense ranked 22nd overall and 29th through the air. Minnesota started 4-8, won its final five games and still missed the playoffs. No Vikings player was named to the initial Pro Bowl roster, the franchise’s first shutout there since 2014.

The quarterback room explains most of the gap. Minnesota started three passers. J.J. McCarthy, in his first active season after missing 2024 with a knee injury, threw 11 touchdowns and 12 interceptions in 10 starts. He missed time with ankle, hand and concussion injuries. Carson Wentz made five starts before shoulder surgery ended his season. Undrafted rookie Max Brosmer started the remaining two games. O’Connell has now used eight starting quarterbacks in four seasons, and the offensive line cycled through 26 different five-man groupings.

The final standings left almost no separation. Green Bay took the NFC’s last playoff spot at 9-7-1, while Minnesota finished 9-8. The difference between them was the Packers’ tie.

What BBMI’s model says

BBMI’s preseason model rates Minnesota 0.0 points per game against an average opponent, 18th of 32, and projects 8.4–8.6 with a 30% chance to make the playoffs, 6% to win the NFC North and 0.7% to win the Super Bowl. That is last in a division where the model prefers all three rivals.

Before any 2026 games, BBMI’s NFL rating is market-anchored, seeded by win-total priors that already reflect schedule. It becomes genuinely opponent-adjusted once the season starts, so preseason it sorts teams into tiers rather than splitting hairs.

The range carries the real information. The simulation’s 10th percentile is 6 wins and its 90th is 11, a five-win band around a .500 projection. The market sits in the same place: DraftKings listed Minnesota’s win total at 8.5, priced near even money on both sides, as of August 20.

BBMI 20,000-season simulation · 80% range.

Minnesota opens at home against Green Bay on September 13, the team that claimed the final NFC playoff spot ahead of it. BBMI’s neutral-field ratings separate the teams by 2.8 points, but home field narrows the Week 1 projection to Green Bay by 1.0, with Minnesota at 46.9% to win.

The quarterback bet

Minnesota’s answer at quarterback is Kyler Murray. Arizona released him, and the Vikings signed him a day later to a one-year deal at the veteran minimum, roughly $1.3 million. Murray’s guaranteed 2026 compensation totals $36.8 million, so with offset language applied, Arizona remains responsible for roughly $35.5 million of it. It is a low-cost move for Minnesota, but not a low-risk one.

He is not competing for the job. O’Connell named Murray the Week 1 starter on August 11, after 10 training-camp practices. McCarthy remains behind him, with Wentz and Brosmer also on the roster.

Murray still offers legitimate upside. The 29-year-old is a two-time Pro Bowler who has surpassed 3,700 passing yards four times and 500 rushing yards three times. His mobility also gives O’Connell something his recent quarterbacks have largely lacked. The question is whether Murray can stay on the field. He played only five games in 2025 before a foot injury ended his season, and he has completed a full schedule once in the past five years.

A cost-cutting offseason

With Rob Brzezinski overseeing football operations on an interim basis, Minnesota entered the offseason more than $40 million over the cap. The offseason began with restructures and cost-cutting before Minnesota added lower-cost help at several positions.

The 2025 defensive-line investment came apart. Jonathan Allen and Javon Hargrave, both signed the previous spring, combined for seven sacks in 33 games and were released. Hargrave signed with Green Bay. Edge rusher Jonathan Greenard was traded to Philadelphia during the draft, with Minnesota receiving pick No. 98 in 2026 and a 2027 third-round pick while sending a seventh-rounder the other way. Greenard then signed a $100 million extension with the Eagles.

Center Ryan Kelly retired after three concussion-protocol stints in a single season. Minnesota did not add a veteran replacement: Blake Brandel leads the unofficial depth chart, with seventh-round pick Gavin Gerhardt behind him.

The front office turned over too. GM Kwesi Adofo-Mensah was fired in January after four seasons, and Seattle assistant GM Nolan Teasley was hired to replace him. O’Connell, extended in early 2025, is secure. So is defensive coordinator Brian Flores, who interviewed for the Pittsburgh and Baltimore head-coaching jobs, stayed, and signed a new deal reportedly worth more than $6 million a year.

The defense: still the identity, but younger

Flores’ unit is the reason Minnesota projects anywhere near .500. The spine returns: edge rushers Andrew Van Ginkel (7 sacks) and Dallas Turner (a team-high 8), linebackers Blake Cashman, Eric Wilson and Ivan Pace Jr., cornerbacks Byron Murphy Jr. (a 2024 Pro Bowler) and Isaiah Rodgers, and safeties Josh Metellus and Theo Jackson.

The interior is where the losses landed. Greenard, Allen and Hargrave are all gone, and the replacement plan is a draft class: Caleb Banks (first round, Florida), Domonique Orange, Jake Golday and Jakobe Thomas. Four of the first five picks were defenders, and several members of the class will be asked to contribute quickly. Banks carries real injury risk, with two surgeries since the start of his final college season.

Depth took another hit in the preseason opener, when veteran safety Jamal Adams tore his right quadriceps tendon and was ruled out for the season.

The unit should still be good. It is also younger, thinner and considerably cheaper, and Flores has built top-tier defenses with less. One nuance worth naming: Minnesota ranked 21st in rushing yards allowed per game last season, but BBMI grades the same unit 8th in rushing EPA, so the run defense is better than the raw yardage suggests.

Around Jefferson

The receiver room did change. Minnesota signed Jauan Jennings, who caught 55 passes for 643 yards and nine touchdowns last season, and he is listed as a starter alongside Justin Jefferson and Jordan Addison (whose camp thumb injury imaged clean). Jalen Nailor left for Las Vegas.

Jefferson’s 2025 numbers show the cost of Minnesota’s instability at quarterback. He caught 84 passes for 1,048 yards on a career-high 30.1% target share and scored twice: career lows in yardage, touchdowns and catch rate, from a receiver who has now posted 1,000 yards in each of his first six seasons, a feat matched only by Randy Moss and Mike Evans.

T.J. Hockenson, who missed the final two games with a shoulder injury, restructured his deal and returns at tight end alongside Josh Oliver. The backfield is a committee: Jordan Mason (758 yards at 4.8 a carry) and Aaron Jones, who took a pay cut to stay, split first-team work, with rookie Demond Claiborne adding speed.

Improving the run game is one of the clearest assignments for new assistant head coach Frank Smith, who spent the previous four seasons as Miami’s offensive coordinator. O’Connell’s offenses have ranked 29th, 22nd, 25th and 30th in EPA per rush across his four seasons (2022 through 2025), and Minnesota’s late-season winning streak came with a run-first identity shift. Up front, health matters as much as talent. Left tackle Christian Darrisaw says he feels better than he has in two years, and simply avoiding another season with 26 different line groupings would be meaningful progress.

The games that matter

The schedule opens against the team that finished one place ahead of Minnesota: Green Bay at U.S. Bank Stadium on September 13, the Vikings’ first home opener since 2023 and only the third time they have opened a season by hosting the Border Battle.

Then the year turns unusual. Week 11 is at San Francisco, played in Mexico City on Sunday night, the first game in franchise history staged in Mexico. Week 15 brings Detroit to Minneapolis on Sunday night, and the season closes at home against Chicago, the defending division champion. Four primetime games in all, with no Thanksgiving or Christmas date this year.

What it adds up to

BBMI lands close to the market: roughly 8.5 wins, fourth in the NFC North, a 30% chance to make the playoffs. Minnesota does not need Murray to return to MVP form. It needs him to make the passing game functional often enough for the defense to matter.

That leaves a wide range of outcomes. Better quarterback play could put the Vikings back in the postseason race. More injuries, a slow start from the rookie defenders or another uneven offensive season could leave them near the bottom of a difficult division.

BBMI is expanding its NFL coverage as the season approaches. Model ratings are preseason and update as real games are played.