The Vikings were not subtle about executing their offseason plan, and their bluntness paid dividends.
They added Jonathan Allen and Javon Hargrave to the interior of their defensive line via free agency while also paying Will Fries and Ryan Kelly to anchor their interior offensive line (along with top draft pick Donovan Jackson).
“We spent the offseason really focusing on building the idea of the 2025 Vikings,” Vikings General Manager Kwesi Adofo-Mensah said Tuesday ahead of the start of training camp Wednesday.
The idea? Get better in the trenches after being humbled in two season-closing losses, particularly a playoff defeat at the hands of the Rams.
Just how much better the Vikings actually got will be determined more on the field than off it, but two very optimistic rankings this week caught my eye — as I talked about on Wednesday’s Daily Delivery podcast.
First, NFL analyst Warren Sharp posted on social media Monday his rankings of the front sevens (linemen and linebackers) for every NFL team.
He had the Vikings No. 1, the very top of the heap.
That surprised me, to say the least, because I haven’t thought of them in that light. But looking at the depth chart of the Vikings’ base 3-4 defense reveals a reasonable case:
