Minnesota Vikings: Bringing in QB Marc Bulger Should Be a Free Agency Priority

The NFL free agency frenzy has officially begun, and all eyes are on the Vikings and a few other teams with the popular opinion that they will bring in a veteran quarterback. 

Donovan McNabb seems to be the consensus pick for the Vikings to bring in, but some other names include Kyle Orton, Matt Hasselbeck, Kevin Kolb and Vince Young. 

Originally, Carson Palmer was also in the mix, but because Bengals owner Mike Brown refuses to trade Palmer, the veteran QB will likely retire. 

One name that some seem to overlook is free agent Marc Bulger, who spent 2010 backing up Joe Flacco in Baltimore. 

The way I see it, the Vikings won't look to bring in Orton or Kolb because they both could still be long term options and the Vikings want to utilize rookie Christian Ponder as quickly as possible. So that narrows the earlier list down to Vince Young and Donovan McNabb. 

Vince Young has been linked to the Vikings through his lockout practices with Adrian Peterson, combined with the fact that his former QB coach Craig Johnson from Tennessee now works for the Vikings. 

The reason I don't think Young will be brought to Minnesota is because I believe the Vikings are done trying to give veteran QBs a second chance and want to invest in their rookie QB. That being said, Young doesn't have much to offer Ponder as a mentor-type player and therefore doesn't fit what the Vikings are looking to do during free agency.

Donovan McNabb is probably the veteran most often linked to the Vikings. McNabb makes sense for a few reasons: Vikings head coach Leslie Frazier spent some time under Andy Reid in Philadelphia during McNabb's tenure as an Eagle. McNabb would also make sense as a veteran leader to take over a team full of veterans that is built to win right now. 

That's all fine and good, but how would McNabb take to being replaced by a rookie QB half-way through the season for the second year in a row? I'm not saying that McNabb has an ego problem, but there is a reason why he and Redskins coach Mike Shanahan did not work out together. 

McNabb has has a solid career as an NFL QB, and I think he deserves to finish his career with a team where he can be the leader until he decides he's done. Instead of being pushed aside by another rookie and forgotten about once again before he's cut, he can continue to lead for the remainder of his career.

To me, Miami and Seattle make more sense for McNabb, so I wouldn't count on him in purple in 2011. 

So why Bulger? 

Marc Bulger spent from 2002-2009 in St. Louis, where he proved himself as a solid QB with a career passer rating of 84.4. In his career, Bulger has thrown for 122 touchdowns and 93 interceptions: not ideal, but better than many QBs have fared in the NFL. In 2010, Bulger signed a one-year contract with the Baltimore Ravens, where he spent the year backing up Joe Flacco.

Bulger's long, relatively successful career in combination with the fact that he doesn't have a problem backing up a young QB are the traits that the Vikings should be looking for in free agency. 

Bulger could come in to Vikings training camp and create a competition with Joe Webb and Christian Ponder. A competition will bring the best out of all three candidates and ultimately allow the two youngsters to improve before being thrown into a starting role. 

Whether Bulger won or lost that competition, he would still have a lot of veteran insight to the team as well as reinforcing the team's depth at QB a little bit. 

Bulger could also come with a smaller price tag than many other QBs in free agency, which would make him an attractive option for the Vikings, who do not have a lot of cap room. 

The Vikings have reportedly already started signing many undrafted free agents. If they haven't already, they should consider looking at QBs like Bulger to help fill their need for a veteran QB to help break in Ponder.