Vikings Territory: Return Of Everson Griffen To Vikings Is The Cake Topper For Offseason

Press release from Vikings Territory:

2021-08-23

The Minnesota Vikings will re-sign Everson Griffen this week, barring an unforeseen and last-minute change of heart.

August 23, 2021

Griffen ranks seventh on the Vikings all-time sack list.

First, Griffen traveled to Texas, starting his pandemic season with the Dallas Cowboys. He was later traded to the Detroit Lions and reunited with Adrian Peterson for about half of a season. Here’s the skinny per Pro Football Focus from those endeavors:

And this would have been the best pass-rushing grade on the 2020 Vikings outside of Yannick Ngakoue, who was traded to the Baltimore Ravens during the Vikings week last October. Minnesota’s defense struggled tremendously last year, so even a hypothetical Griffen presence on the 2020 roster wouldn’t have changed much.

Mackensie Alexander (CB)
Bashaud Breeland (CB)
Everson Griffen (DE)
Parry Nickerson (CB)
Patrick Peterson (CB)
Sheldon Richardson (DT)
Tye Smith (CB)
Dalvin Tomlinson (DT)
Nick Vigil (LB)
Stephen Weatherly (DE)
Dede Westbrook (WR)
Xavier Woods (S)

The return of Griffen also aids Danielle Hunter, a player that missed all of 2020 with a scary neck injury. Hunter has never played a professional football game without Griffen somewhere on the roster. He’s habitually been Griffen’s running mate and inconveniently never received the chance last year to test life without Griffen. The wait will continue.

Griffen has three weeks to acclimate to the 2021 Vikings. He must dethrone Stephen Weatherly and D.J. Wonnum for the RDE role. So far, Weatherly and Wonnum are the frontrunners for the job with a slight advantage trending toward Wonnum because of an impressive training camp. Although, Weatherly is listed as the RDE1 on the team’s current unofficial depth chart.

There is no word yet on the financial figures from the soon-to-be deal.

This press release was produced by Vikings Territory .The views expressed here are the author’s own.