Darren Hails looks back at the Vikings news from Thursday, 16 July to Wednesday, 22 July 2026. The quarterbacks will get most of the attention when camp opens, but Brian O’Neill’s contract, Blake Cashman’s health and a defense moving on without Harrison Smith may tell us just as much about this team.
Training camp is close enough now that people have started making predictions about who will win battles that haven’t actually begun.
Kyler Murray is the favourite. J.J. McCarthy still has believers. Carson Wentz is the dependable backup. Max Brosmer is apparently too good to sneak onto the practice squad. Justin Jefferson has been asked about the competition again, former players have given their view and every quarterback comment has been examined as though the Week 1 depth chart is hidden inside it.
I get it. Quarterbacks are important, especially when you have two of them trying to win the same job. I have also written enough about Murray and McCarthy this summer to know when the story hasn’t moved.
This week, it didn’t.
O’Connell still hasn’t named a starter. There has been no change to the practice-rep plan because there haven’t been any practices! Jefferson said he trusts the process and expects both quarterbacks to bring their best. Sensible answer, nothing to panic about and not much more to add until the football starts.
The better questions this week were elsewhere.
Will Brian O’Neill be a full participant when veterans report? Is Blake Cashman’s finger genuinely nothing to worry about? Are the Vikings now planning as though Harrison Smith won’t return? And after trading Jonathan Greenard, are they really prepared to enter the season with no proven third edge rusher?
Murray versus McCarthy will dominate the cameras. The rest of the roster may decide whether the winner has a good enough team around him.
Brian O’Neill’s Contract Has Become A Camp Question
Brian O’Neill has spent most of the summer in the same slightly awkward position. He is still one of Minnesota’s best and most reliable players, he is entering the final year of his contract and nobody seems quite sure whether the Vikings want to pay a very good tackle who turns 31 in September any more money.
That uncertainty may finally reach the practice field.
In his pre-camp look at Minnesota’s offensive roster, Alec Lewis wrote that O’Neill is probably the only offensive player with an unresolved contract situation and that his early-camp participation, or lack of it, will be worth watching.
That isn’t to say that O’Neill definitely plans to hold in. It doesn’t mean he is about to refuse every competitive rep until Nolan Teasley slides a new contract across the table. It does mean the first offensive-line session now has a second question attached to it.
The obvious one is at center, where the Vikings are betting that Blake Brandel can make the switch and give Murray or McCarthy the interior protection they will need. The less obvious one is whether O’Neill will be beside him for every part of camp.
O’Neill is entering the final season of the five-year, $92.5 million extension he signed in 2021, with a 2026 cap hit above $23 million. Another deal could reduce that number and keep one of the NFL’s better right tackles in Minnesota beyond this season. It would also commit new money to a player who has dealt with lower-body injuries and is reaching the stage of his career where Teasley has to think about the next contract as well as the last one.
I can see both sides of it. The Vikings drafted Caleb Tiernan to improve their tackle depth and perhaps become part of the long-term plan. They can’t hand out expensive extensions based only on what a player has already done.
Even so, this offense is trying to rebuild its running game, settle a new center and choose between two quarterbacks with recent injury concerns. Creating another unknown at right tackle would be asking for trouble.
Teasley doesn’t have to panic and meet every demand before the first practice. He does need a clear plan. If O’Neill is limited because the contract remains unresolved, it stops being summer paperwork and starts affecting the football.
Cashman’s Finger Is Small News With A Bigger Warning Inside It
Blake Cashman is expected to be ready for camp, which is the first and most useful bit of this story.
Darren Wolfson said Cashman has been dealing with a finger issue that has lingered from last season, but he expects the linebacker to be a full participant when camp begins. This is not the moment to declare a defensive emergency because somebody has a sore finger in July.
Still, Cashman’s health is one of those minor stories that points towards a bigger roster question.
He led the Vikings with 144 defensive tackles last season despite playing only 13 games. Eric Wilson had an excellent year alongside him, recording 115 tackles, 6.5 sacks, 17 tackles for loss and four forced fumbles, but the rest of the inside-linebacker plan is far less settled.
Ivan Pace Jr. lost defensive snaps when Wilson took his chance. Second-round rookie Jake Golday has the speed and versatility to earn an early role, although Brian Flores has never been interested in giving away snaps based on draft position. Behind them are players trying to turn special-teams value or Canadian Football League experience into a roster place.
Cashman has never played a full NFL season. That doesn’t make him unreliable, but it means the Vikings have to prepare for games without him rather than treating his absence as an unlikely emergency.
The official linebacker camp preview described Cashman as the clear LB1 and put Golday’s first-year role among the group’s main questions. The finger shouldn’t change either of those things if Wolfson’s update is right. It should make the coaches use camp properly.
Give Golday difficult communication work. Find out whether Pace can win back some trust. Let Wilson continue wearing the green dot. Work out who can hold the middle together if Cashman misses a week or two.
The Vikings don’t need a crisis plan for a finger injury. They do need a proper backup plan for a player who makes Flores’ defense noticeably better whenever he is on the field.
The Vikings Are Printing A Team Without Number 22
Last week, Harrison Smith’s future was still a blank canvas. This week, the Vikings’ own camp preview made the picture a little less blank.
Craig Peters wrote that it appears Smith’s number 22 won’t be on the roster when camp opens. He also noted that the team’s Training Camp Playbook and Vikings Yearbook went to print without Smith for the first time since 2011.
A printed programme doesn’t make a retirement official. Smith could still decide he wants another season, and the Vikings could still welcome him back. But the club is now preparing its summer material, its roster and presumably its first-team defensive work without him.
That feels more definite than another week of waiting.
Josh Metellus is the obvious communication leader. Theo Jackson’s defensive snaps jumped from 78 in 2024 to 530 last season, while Jay Ward went from 28 to 248. Third-round rookie Jakobe Thomas was drafted because Flores liked his range, aggression and ability to line up in several places.
None of them should be asked to become Harrison Smith. That would be unfair and probably impossible. Between them, though, they have to replace the communication, disguise and quick corrections Smith has provided for years.
The nickel group will show us how Flores wants to do it. Byron Murphy Jr. and Isaiah Rodgers should take two corner spots, but everything around them can move. James Pierre is pushing for work outside. Metellus can play safety, slot or closer to the line. Jackson and Ward have more experience than they did a year ago, while Thomas may force his way into the conversation if he learns the defense quickly enough.
This is where the first few weeks of camp become more useful than another retirement rumour. Which five defensive backs are together when Flores installs his pressure packages? Who makes the calls? Does Metellus stay deep more often, or can one of the younger safeties release him into the flexible role that makes him so valuable?
I would still be happy to see Smith come back. I am also glad the Vikings appear ready to start without him. You can respect everything a player has done without leaving the rest of the position group in the waiting room.
Minnesota Is Betting On Its Own Edge Rushers
We have spent most of the offseason looking at veteran edge rushers the Vikings could sign. The Vikings, as far as we know, have spent most of it not signing them.
The latest official outside-linebacker preview sounded less like a team preparing to add a recognised name and more like one ready to test its current group.
Andrew Van Ginkel and Dallas Turner are the starters. Turner led Minnesota with eight sacks last season and now gets the full-time role created by the Greenard trade. Behind them are Bo Richter, Tyler Batty, Chaz Chambliss and undrafted rookies Arden Walker and Cam’Ron Stewart. Golday may also spend some time learning Van Ginkel’s job after beginning on the inside.
There is upside there. There is not much proven NFL pass rush.
This isn’t a demand to sign the first veteran whose name people recognise from four years ago. The Vikings should only add somebody who improves the group and accepts the role available. It is, however, a reminder that Teasley’s decision not to buy experience is still a decision.
Turner has to become more than a useful young rusher. He must handle a larger workload, set the edge and create pressure often enough that offences cannot simply turn all their protection towards Van Ginkel. One of Richter, Batty or Chambliss then needs to become a dependable third option rather than a nice training-camp story.
Golday is the interesting wild card. If he can play inside, rush from the edge and contribute on special teams, his versatility solves several roster problems at once. Flores will love the possibilities, but the rookie still has to learn several difficult jobs without becoming average at all of them.
For now, the Vikings are betting on development. Camp has to show whether that is confidence or wishful thinking.
Five Minnesota Teams Are Taking Flag Football To A Global Stage
Not every part of a weekly Scroll needs to involve a contract, injury or depth chart.
Five youth teams are representing Minnesota at the NFL FLAG Championships from 23 to 26 July: Chosen Frozen, Blaine Bengals, Fadesss Fighters, Jsizzles and Eagan High School.
The tournament in Indiana has more than 350 boys’ and girls’ teams from around the world. Eagan are part of a girls’ game that is growing quickly in Minnesota, where 104 high-school teams competed this year and the sport is working towards full sanctioning.
That is a much better growth story than anything involving a summer power ranking.
The NFL talks constantly about becoming a global game, and those of us supporting from the UK and Ireland hear plenty about international fixtures, marketing plans and new territories. Youth flag football is where that phrase starts to feel real. Children can play without needing a full set of pads, schools can build teams more easily and a group from Minnesota can share a tournament with players from around the world.
Good luck to all five teams. I won’t pretend to have completed a full under-10s scouting report, but I am reliably informed that this won’t stop the internet producing one.
Ten Years Of U.S. Bank Stadium
U.S. Bank Stadium turned ten on Wednesday.
Since opening on 22 July 2016, it has welcomed more than 11.4 million visitors across nearly 2,200 events. It has hosted a Super Bowl, a Final Four, major concerts and all sorts of community events, with a two-night SummerSlam next on the list.
For Vikings fans, the memories are simpler. The Minneapolis Miracle happened there. So did the 33-point comeback against Indianapolis. We have watched brilliant football, dreadful football and enough last-second chaos to make the building feel much older than ten.
The stadium is marking the anniversary with ten days of giveaways, including tickets for a 2026 Vikings home game. Its 11th season begins with the Ravens preseason game on 22 August before Green Bay visits for the regular-season opener on 13 September.
That Packers game still feels a long way off. It won’t once the players report.
Rookies are due on Sunday, veterans on Tuesday and the first public practice follows on Saturday, 1 August. By then, we should know whether O’Neill is fully involved, Cashman is genuinely fine and the defense has accepted that Smith is not walking through the door. We will also get our first proper look at the edge rotation and, yes, the quarterbacks.
Murray versus McCarthy will still be the headline. It should be. But the winner needs protection, a healthier defense and a roster that can survive more than one injury.
The quarterback battle may decide who starts the season. The other camp questions will help decide what sort of season he is starting.
UK & Ireland Vikings Fans
If you’re following the Vikings from this side of the Atlantic, keep an eye on the UK & Ireland Minnesota Vikings Fan Club for fan-first coverage, community updates, podcasts and events as training camp begins.