2023 Minnesota Vikings Fantasy Football Preview

This installment in 4for4's Team Preview series will take a look at the Minnesota Vikings. The series will cover every team in the NFL, going over every fantasy-relevant player with betting angles throughout.

Editor's Note: Find all 32 NFL Team Previews Here!

Updated 8/14

Vikings Through the Air

• QB: Kirk Cousins
• 2-WR Sets: Justin Jefferson, Jordan Addison
• WR: K.J. Osborn
• TE: T.J. Hockenson

Year one under Kevin O’Connell resulted in a dream for fantasy with the Vikings finishing top three in drives per game (11.8, first), weekly pass attempts (39.5, third), and pass play rate inside the red zone (62.6%, second). Although that salivating volume would normally lead to ceiling performances for quarterbacks, Kirk Cousins' touchdown rate (4.5%), yards per attempt (7.1), and fantasy points per game (17.2) declined for the third consecutive year as he mustered just three top-five finishes with none prior to Week 14.

That voluminous approach is still expected to carry over (if not increase) given that GM Kwesi Adofo-Mensah had the foresight to quiet-quit on the final year of Cousins’ deal in allowing OLB Z’Darius Smith, CB Patrick Peterson, DE Dalvin Tomlinson, MLB Eric Kendricks, Adam Thielen, and Dalvin Cook to walk. A high-end QB2 with no rushing upside, the 35-year-old’s results range from an occasional top-10 finish to being benched in the second half of the year. I only draft Cousins when completing Vikings stacks in best ball tourneys and prefer to avoid him altogether in redraft leagues. Fifth-round rookie Jaren Hall has reportedly looked "vastly better" than veteran Nick Mullens in camp if eyeing the next man up in 16-team Superflex leagues.

If your life were on the line, drafting anyone other than Justin Jefferson with the 1.01 would signal your last meal. He unfathomably left meat on the bone as the WR2 in points per game (17.9) in converting just 2-of-14 end zone targets into touchdowns, the lowest rate (14.2%) among eight players with at least 13 targets in the paint. Jefferson’s 8.0-yard depth of target as a safety valve underneath also leaped to 11.4 alongside T.J. Hockenson, who then gifted JJ a higher ceiling by soaking up a team-high share of targets (60%) within nine yards of the line of scrimmage. Don’t overthink it, especially with Minnesota's league-high 18 targets inside the 10 up for grabs.

Hockenson is mistaken for a player with a position-winning ceiling when that hasn’t been the case throughout his career. His opportunity did increase dramatically at the trade deadline, surging from 6.1 targets per game (sixth) with the Lions to 8.8 (second) in Minnesota, but his actual production when he changed teams remains overblown.

His two performances with 80-plus receiving yards in Minnesota also occurred against the same Giants defense that permitted the ninth-most receptions to opposing tight ends, and without Jordan Addison in the fold.

Albeit a more reliable option to close the year, registering five top-12 finishes over his last 10 games, Hockenson is a player who won’t lose your league at his current cost but won’t win it for you either. In other words, there's no need to prioritize his floor in the fourth/fifth round amid the second tier of quarterbacks and limited pool of competent wideouts there. It's more justifiable to draft him in PPR leagues.

The 2021 Belitnikoff Award Winner for the nation's most outstanding wideout, Addison (5'11/173) pasted the ACC as a 19-year-old with 100-1,593-17 receiving before transferring to USC under offensive guru Lincoln Riley and seeing his slot rate dip from a nice 69% in his final year with Pittsburgh to an egregious 19% (with 59-875-8) in 2022. He did not do himself any favors at the combine, testing as a below-average athlete with a suboptimal frame, but did reportedly cut his workout short for back tightness.

Addison's 3.28 Yards Per Route Run against man coverage (fourth in this class) in his final year with the Trojans, not to mention his immediate opportunity with No. 23 overall draft capital in place of Adam Thielen, are huge wins for the rookie's outlook. I fully expect him to overthrow K.J. Osborn in two-wide sets down the stretch and out-target Hockenson as a weekly WR3/4 for redraft leagues.

No team averaged more dropbacks from 3-WR sets than the Vikings last year, keeping Osborn on the map by default. We shouldn't write him off as a spike-week dart since he earned 8.2 targets per game (19.5% share) with three top-14 finishes over the final month of the season. Ignore any "Jalen Nailor" hype — he totaled 57 snaps on offense and does not pose a threat to Osborn barring injury.

Vikings On the Ground

• RB: Alexander Mattison, Ty Chandler, DeWayne McBride, Kene Nwangwu
• Projected OL (L-R): Christian Darrisaw-Ezra Cleveland-Garrett Bradbury-Ed Ingram-Brian O’Neill

Any pro argument for Alexander Mattison's three-down status entails depending on an entirely different coaching staff's use of him in six career starts for Dalvin Cook. The former admittedly averaged 23.3 touches in those six games but only 'got there' for volume, struggling as recently as last year with 3.8 yards per carry (52nd) and the lowest rate of carries to explode for 10-plus yards (5.3%) among 61 qualifiers with 70 runs.

Perhaps the volume is there and everything I've said is moot. But even his opportunity through the air is in question since the Vikings funneled the league's fourth-lowest rate of targets to their backfield under O'Connell — Cook actually ran the third-most routes at his position. And chasing an ambiguous situation with a 46 ADP has historically been a quicker way to lose your fantasy leagues than win them. I have Mattison ranked 69th overall behind every receiver through Addison (71.9 ADP).

The depth we should be taking shots on includes 2022 fifth-rounder Ty Chandler and seventh-rounder DeWayne McBride, absent from offseason workouts following March's hamstring injury. Chandler offers the archetype we want to burn our last pick on given his 95th percentile speed (4.38 40) at 5-foot-11, 204 pounds, comping to Jamaal Charles and Tevin Coleman as an 85th percentile athlete. Forgotten during rehab, McBride quietly led this class in 10-yard carries despite facing the fourth-highest rate of stacked boxes (eight-plus defenders) in his final year at UAB. I want to leave every draft with one of Chandler or McBride, in that order.

Vikings Win Total

Last year's team infamously went 13-4 on the back of an 11-0 record in one-score games despite finishing with a -3 point differential — that of a .500 team — and is now leaning on DC Brian Flores (a great hire!) to turn things around on defense with worse pieces. The Vikings also ran hot with Football Outsiders' fifth-fewest Adjusted Games Lost to injury.

Sportsbooks have already baked in Minnesota's inevitable regression with an 8.5 Season Win Total and No. 2 odds to win the division (+260) behind Detroit (+155). But against the league's eighth-toughest schedule based on Vegas' projected Win Totals (and second-hardest schedule of opposing offenses), I'm more than comfortable wagering on last year's anomalies crashing back to Earth with an alternate Under at plus odds.

Best Bet: Vikings Under 7.5 Wins +175 (FanDuel)