History has shown that teams in the NFL tend to have a window of opportunity to win the Super Bowl before the salary cap catches up with them and they are forced to rebuild. For many teams, staying under the cap and still being a playoff team requires a delicate balancing act and a high level of creativity once we get into the free agency period. That is where we are at right now, with one week of transactions in the books. Some teams jumped into the free agent market with both feet in an effort to make a big splash, while others were more about filling holes and trying to get a little stronger in positions of weakness. The Minnesota Vikings have been knocking on the door of serious success for the past few seasons and have the core of a very good team. They have not made any major moves as of yet, but they have been looking to strengthen their squad. Here’s an overview of the Minnesota Vikings and their NFL Odds as it stands.
Minnesota Vikings Odds After Free Agency Week 1
Player Movement and Possible Future Moves
For the past few seasons, the Vikings have been a team that has been great on offense, but who have been missing an elite starting QB to take them over the top. The addition of Kirk Cousins was supposed to address that, and while the Vikings have been better on offense with Cousins at the helm, they have still come up short in the postseason. They finished the season with a 10-6 record to get into the playoffs. They won in the Wild Card, but they were then ousted by the 49ers in the Divisional Round.
For the Vikings, this offseason will more than likely be all about replacing any players that they lose to free agency. This is a pretty strong team from top to bottom, so there really isn’t that much tweaking required to get them to the next level.
One of the first players out the door when free agency opened was Linval Joseph, who bolted to the Chargers. The Vikings were quick to react to that, picking up a very good DT in Michael Pierce from the Baltimore Ravens. Pierce is a great run stopper, but he has had some issues in showing up to camp out of shape, so this is a small risk. After years of struggling with their kicking game, the Vikings finally found someone reliable in Dan Bailey, so perhaps no surprise that they inked him to a new 3-year deal. Minnesota seem intent on keeping their key players before going any deeper in the FA marker, which is why they also offered new deals to S Anthony Harris and FB C.J. Ham. Other than that, it has been pretty quiet in Minnesota.
The Vikings appear to be very close to putting together a Super Bowl team, so it will be interesting to see how they handle the rest of free agency.
The Minnesota Vikings Odds to Win the Super Bowl
The Vikings need to be viewed as a definite playoff team again next season, but the question now is whether they can deliver the goods in the postseason. They are sitting at +2500 right now, which is a great price for a team of this caliber.
