PALM BEACH, Fla. – The NFL owners' meetings, which took place this week at the Breakers resort, serve as the unofficial close of free agency. Teams can still sign players to their roster, of course, and the Vikings, who have only four draft picks to use toward the 23 open spots on their roster, will likely have more business to conduct.
But the most active phase of free agency is over for 2025, and the Vikings' activity could reach a relative lull for much of April. They still plan to sign a veteran quarterback for 2025, and could look for other upgrades to the roster before training camp. At the Breakers, though, all indications continued to be the Vikings will follow a narrow course of roster-building through the next several weeks, as they pursue a strategy that might yield as many as three extra draft picks.
The NFL awards compensatory draft choices to teams who lose more unrestricted free agents than they sign, and a year after Kirk Cousins' departure put the Vikings in line for a third-round comp pick in 2025, the exits of quarterback Sam Darnold and left tackle Cam Robinson could bring a third- and fifth-round pick in 2026. The league distributes comp picks through a formula based on contract value, playing time and postseason awards; teams receive extra choices if they lost more high-value UFAs than they signed. Players who were released by their former teams don't count in the formula, so the lucrative deals the Vikings reached with defensive tackles Jonathan Allen and Javon Hargrave won't cancel out the players they lost.
Vikings coach Kevin O’Connell said Tuesday the team could earn a third comp pick in 2026. Here's how that could happen: If wide receiver Trent Sherfield Sr., who signed a two-year, $6 million deal with the Broncos this offseason, plays enough on offense to earn $1 million of incentives in 2025, it could push his deal into the comp pick formula. Sherfield gets an extra $500,000 if he plays 40% of the Broncos' offensive snaps, and another $500,000 if he finishes with at least 30 catches. While "not likely to be earned" incentives like the ones in Sherfield's contract generally do not count in the comp pick formula, the 2020 collective bargaining agreement makes an exception for NLTBE incentives in the first year of a player's deal. So if Sherfield is a regular contributor to the Broncos' offense, his deal could be big enough to factor in the formula, putting the Vikings in line to receive a third comp pick next year.
The team's internal projections make a third comp pick seem plausible enough that the Vikings will be selective with their free agent additions at least until 3 p.m. on April 28. After that deadline, free agents no longer count in the comp pick formula for the 2026 draft, meaning the Vikings can sign a veteran quarterback without risk of losing draft capital next year.
They could also pursue a trade for a veteran backup: possibly even Kirk Cousins, who lost his starting job with the Falcons and is believed to want out of Atlanta after just one season there. Falcons coach Raheem Morris said this week he doesn't expect Cousins to participate in the team's offseason program, and while the quarterback would have to waive his no-trade clause, a source familiar with his thinking said earlier this month he might be interested in a return to the Vikings. It could be a long shot: The Vikings would have to work out a trade, and Cousins would have to accept a backup role just a year after he left Minnesota because of the Vikings' plans to draft a first-round QB (only to be surprised by the Falcons' selection of Michael Penix Jr.). But given Cousins' familiarity with the offense and his continuing friendship with O’Connell, a return to the Vikings isn't out of the question.
At least until the conclusion of the draft, such a trade might be a more likely avenue for the Vikings to add a veteran quarterback than the free agent market. Even as they made more than $300 million of contract commitments this month, they prioritized players who'd keep them in line for a draft pick surplus next year. The strategy has been careful enough that the Vikings don't seem likely to deviate from it now.
Here are a few other things I learned this week at the owners' meetings:
• General Manager Kwesi Adofo-Mensah said last week he sees Jordan Mason as a "four-minute back" who can help the Vikings seal games, and O’Connell expounded on the theory this week, talking about how Mason can help in short-yardage and goal-to-go situations while putting Aaron Jones in better position to succeed. The coach said Jones has been at his best when he's in a "1A, 1B backfield structure," like he was in Green Bay with A.J. Dillon, and Jones surpassed 100 yards in each of his final five games with the Packers when he returned from injury to help Green Bay reach the divisional round of the playoffs in 2023. "He can be a total game-changer every time he touches the ball," O’Connell said of Jones. "So it was always about bringing Aaron back — we really assumed that from Day One — but who are we going to pair with him?" O’Connell said there were some "great options" at running back in the draft, but Mason, who ran for 100 yards against the Vikings last September, provided "what we were looking for, before our very eyes."
• Shortly after the Vikings signed center Ryan Kelly, the veteran joined their recruiting pitch for guard Will Fries, texting his Colts teammate about joining him in Minnesota. With the Vikings in a bidding war for Fries with several other teams, his relationship with Kelly might have made the difference.
• While Blake Brandel could go into the offseason program as the left guard, and benefit from playing between Kelly and Christian Darrisaw (once the left tackle is recovered from his torn ACL), the Vikings could still pursue competition at the spot, either through the draft or free agency. If North Dakota State's Grey Zabel is still available when the Vikings pick in the first round, he could be a candidate for the team at No. 24.
• The Vikings went to London last year; could they fly across the Atlantic Ocean for a road game this fall too? They play three teams that host international games this year; the possibility of them opening the season in Brazil against the Chargers sounded remote at the owners' meetings, and the Vikings might not return to London to face the Browns there for the second time. The game worth keeping an eye on, in fact, might be the one against the Steelers. Pittsburgh will host the NFL's first game in Dublin this fall, and while the Packers (who just earned international marketing rights in Ireland) have been rumored as a possible opponent, it's believed the Steelers might want to keep the Packers game in Pittsburgh — especially if it's Aaron Rodgers facing his former team. That could leave the Vikings, Bills or Seahawks as possible opponents for the Steelers in Ireland. We'll learn the matchups in the coming weeks, but the possibility of a Dublin game for the Vikings seemed plausible this week.
