Why the Minnesota Vikings Haven't Been Too Patient in Free Agency

The Minnesota Vikings have been unusually quiet in free agency for a team shy of .500 in the regular season not too long ago.

For some, this isn’t a problem—after all, there is some truth to the idea that getting involved in the hype of March may not mean anything in the pressure cooker of January.

There’s conventional wisdom here: Good teams don’t spend in free agency.

But many of those good teams are already good. They have the players they need and sign contract extensions with them throughout the season. Filling in glaring holes isn’t something they need to put on a priority list. It's easy to forget that the Packers started their dominance by trading a first-round pick for a backup quarterback from Atlanta.

At the same time, teams can remain bad through overreliance on free agency. Bloating cap space and filling the roster with overpaid players at the risk of signing role players leads to massive risks. The biggest spenders almost invariably overpay, valuing the player they just bought more than anyone else on the market.

How does a team get good?

An example of a team who mixed free-agency aggression with smart draft strategy and player retention is the Seattle Seahawks, who famously went through 500 player transactions in the first 22 months of the new regime and in 2011 signed the second-most players in free agency, per Spotrac’s free-agency tracker, handing out the second-most in average yearly salary. They ranked fourth in new money in 2012, too.

Between 2011 and 2014 (as far back as Spotrac’s data goes), New England had the third-most new free agents, and Denver spent the second-most in average salary per year.

It turns out that perennial contenders Green Bay and Cincinnati spent the least, along with Pittsburgh, who has only recently declined.

You can find losers at the top and bottom as well. Tampa Bay, Washington and Oakland populate the top of these lists, while Detroit remains at the bottom.

No one gave out more guaranteed money than Denver (and it’s not all, or even mostly, wrapped up in Peyton Manning), and no one gave out less than Cincinnati. Just ahead of Cincinnati, however, is Houston, while Tampa Bay falls right behind Denver.

There’s no one approach that consistently wins free agency, so each case must be viewed in its particulars.

The only thing that seems to hold any significance at all when testing the number of wins a team accumulates in the four-year period and with the four variables of free agency—total money, average per year, total guaranteed money and number of new free agents acquired—is the total guaranteed money. The more a team gives out, the worse they have been.

Adding new players to the roster doesn’t seem to impact the total number of wins, and the total amount of money named in a contract and the average salaries per year of new free-agent contracts don’t seem to matter.

Even the guaranteed-money statistic is deceptive at best—the worst teams may just have to guarantee more money to attract free agents; it may not be the case that guaranteeing money is bad by itself.

So the question isn’t whether or not it is a bad general strategy to spend on free agents. Some teams spend a lot of money on a lot of role players, like Baltimore does. Other teams spend a lot of money on a few players, like Denver does. Losers do both as well: Detroit spends very little on outside players but tends to distribute it well, while Oakland likes a splash.

In the case of the Vikings, they tend to slow-play free agency and spend big on only one player, if that. They rank on the lower end (23rd) in average per year of new deals given to outside players and rank 16th in total guaranteed money handed out. They rank 26th in the total number of free agent transactions outside the team as well.

That’s a fine strategy. The biggest slow-players in the last four years—assuming that a low average salary and very few transactions are good barometers—are Green Bay and Pittsburgh. The teams that sign a lot of free agents and spend a lot of money (Chicago and Tampa Bay) haven’t been stellar recently (though New England, again, ranks pretty highly in that regard).

But if it feels like the Vikings are playing this one slowly, that’s because they are. In the third day of free agency, they’ve signed exactly one new player—a backup quarterback. The only reason they signed him was because they traded the other one away—for late picks, not a player.

Adam Bettcher/Getty Images

Even in what was a slow 2012, the Vikings had signed two players in the first three days, both with the expectation of playing significant snaps (Jerome Felton and John Carlson). In 2013, they not only made an impact trade on the first day of free agency (Percy Harvin to Seattle for a first-round and seventh-round pick that year and a third-round pick the following year), but signed starter Jerome Simpson soon thereafter, picking up another starter (Greg Jennings) shortly following that.

In 2014—not a splash year by any means—they signed four new players in the first three days, three of them starters (Linval Joseph, Jasper Brinkley and Captain Munnerlyn).

The point is that the Vikings moved faster in previous years despite being slower than most teams in the NFL.

It’s good to be patient, but are they being too patient?

Teams will always find better value in the second and third waves of free agency, but it’s difficult to make the same argument four days after the game has begun.

Sure, the players the Vikings will sign—if they sign any—will be undervalued compared to their peers, but what good is an undervalued special teams piece against a slightly overvalued starter?

The Vikings have some level of need at safety, linebacker, defensive end, receiver, cornerback, guard and possibly running back, depending on how the still-stalled situation with Adrian Peterson works out.

The Vikings have let the best value at safety fly by, with not even a visit or serious inquiry into safety Rahim Moore, who signed with the Texans for only $4 million a year, per John McClain of the Houston Chronicle.

Any safeties below the age of 27 (the only ones the Vikings will seriously consider signing) are either restricted free agents or Kelcie McCray of Kansas City, who played 57 total (bad) snaps this past year.

If they expanded their search to those who are at age 27 instead of below it, they could sign Kurt Coleman (cut last year in Vikings camp), Taylor Mays (demoted multiple times under Mike Zimmer in Cincinnati), Danny McCray (who wowed Chicago enough that he earned 172 snaps behind a mediocre tandem), Tommie Campbell (one snap), Jeron Johnson (98 snaps) or Quinton Carter (a bad set of 221 snaps).

Which is to say they’d be signing depth players, not starters.

Hope isn’t lost for finding a starter at safety, however. They could sign an aging vet like Dawan Landry, whose last year with the Jets wasn’t bad despite his being 32, or Bernard Pollard—cut from the Titans, but honestly still a player with some fuel left. Danieal Manning isn’t a terrible option at 33, either.

They could go a little younger and grab 28-year-old Jeremy Miles. Ron Parker is still available despite a stellar year at Kansas City, and 29-year-old Dwight Lowery is a starting-capable safety. Stevie Brown from New York, at age 28, could hope to recapitalize on the acclaim he earned in an eight-interception season in 2012, but he hasn’t actually been all that great since then.

Still, that’s the kind of talent worth coaching up. Other available players include Louis Delmas (28) and Brandon Meriweather (31).

At linebacker, the Vikings could still pursue some older players who played well—Lance Briggs, Philip Wheeler or Akeem Dent—or go after some slightly younger players like Rolando McClain and Brandon Spikes. Geno Hayes is still available, and so is Jason Trusnik. Mason Foster may be worth a look, as might Jacquian Williams.

Older cornerbacks worth looking at include Rashean Mathis, Tramon Williams (who left New Orleans without a deal and who may be on the Vikings’ radar, per ESPN's Darren Wolfson), Alan Ball or Tarell Brown.

Thearon W. Henderson/Getty Images

There are still young, good cornerbacks out there, too. Chris Culliver remains unsigned, and though he comes with a number of off-field issues, he's still a talented player to whom the Vikings have reached out according to Chris Tomasson of the St. Paul Pioneer Press.

Sterling Moore is an intriguing talent who could play at either corner or safety and did both well last year at the age of 25. Perrish Cox is also unsigned and could be worth looking into—his year started off with a bang before he hit a wall.

The Vikings are also one of four teams to express interest in Patrick Robinson, according to Scott Brown at ESPN.

There’s no need to go over every position area. There are still talented players out there at every position, and the Vikings may be able to play the compensatory-pick game while they’re at it—targeting players who are cut and therefore don’t figure into the 2016 compensatory-pick formula.

That’s exactly what’s happening with former Zimmer defensive end Michael Johnson, who is reportedly likely to sign with either Cincinnati or Minnesota, according to Tomasson.

Complicating the "need" equation is youth. The Vikings have young, unproven players at each position who have shown promise. At receiver, one of Charles Johnson or Cordarrelle Patterson may emerge, while at linebacker, Audie Cole or Gerald Hodges may be an answer. At guard, developing David Yankey may be the plan—even after the Vikings were somewhat in play for Clint Boling, per Tomasson.

At cornerback, it’s difficult to say that Captain Munnerlyn’s struggling year is representative of the player he is. His struggles on the field were due to confusion, not a lack of talent, and the reason he was brought in was because of the clear talent he showed in Carolina.

That he had the worst year of his career in his first year with Minnesota more likely means that he can grow, not that he’s stuck where he is. If anything, at least regression to the mean gives us some confidence that Munnerlyn will play better.

Along with that is the fact that Josh Robinson genuinely played well at cornerback, even when his evaluation includes a high-profile game against Chicago in which he struggled. The rest of the year, he had good performances, and he started off the year incredibly well.

And though the Vikings had some struggle at safety, it’s easy to underrate the performance of Robert Blanton (who, with some strength training, would not have had nearly as bad of a year) or the talent of Andrew Sendejo (where high-profile mistakes washed out flashes of high-level play). The Vikings chose to start him over a healthy Blanton because of how well he did on a consistent basis.

And though discussions about running backs may be dead in the water until something happens on the Peterson front, there are not only talented running backs in free agency but on the roster as well, where Jerick McKinnon may be ready for a full-time role.

If it so happens that the Vikings don’t like their internal talent at one or two of these positions, they can still look to the draft, where it’s possible to land two to three starters if lucky, and there's certainly the possibility of grabbing one.

Rich with talent at running back, pass-rusher and on the offensive line, the Vikings could end up stealing more than one starter at a position of need.

It’s true that we’re seeing talent fly off the board in free agency while the Vikings move slower than they ever have. It’s also true that there are a number of good teams who only got to that point with bold moves in the offseason.

But it’s OK.

All snap count data courtesy of Pro Football Focus.