It truly is, as Chuck Dickens once wrote, the best of times and the worst of times. At least it’s been that kind of a season for Minnesota Vikings fans. J.J. McCarthy looks lost and then he leads an incredible comeback and then he looks like Lt. Frank Drebin accidentally put on his uniform — and then he’s hurt again, and then he looks pretty cool. The run defense gets shredded until it locks up tight. Everyone is injured but then they’re back on the field and that helps, sometimes.
A .500 record implies relative mediocrity, but rarely has .500 looked this erratic.
It may be a mad, mad, mad world for Minnesota football fans, who are riding an emotional roller coaster that would never be deemed safe for Camp Snoopy. But if you’re looking for a little good news — comforting, stabilizing, calming good news — take note of an NFL trend that continues to tilt in the Vikings’ favor.
The shine may have worn off Kevin O’Connell’s apple just a little bit in 2025, but he didn’t win Coach of the Year for nothing, and he remains a well-regarded leader, give or take a Carson Wentz shoulder. It’s also universally accepted that KOC benefits tremendously from having Brian Flores, one of the top coordinators in the entire league, running the Vikings’ innovative defense. Flores is exactly the kind of ace coordinator who becomes the belle of the ball when the head coach hiring cycle begins anew in January — and exactly the type of coordinator whose sudden absence can cause a serious disruption in a developing team.
But the chances of Flores leaving Minnesota for a promotion seem to be dwindling a bit even as he continues to perform well with an aging, banged-up roster. His contentious relationship with the league is bound to remain a factor, no matter the conciliatory rhetoric. But also consider that the trend of teams looking for offensive-minded head coaches appears to be gaining even more momentum, at least this far into the season.
It’s not just that offensive-minded wunderkinds, á la Sean McVay, get more media attention because they’re young and flashy. That may be a factor, but coaches who come from a primarily defensive background remain in the minority, and among their dwindling ranks are some of the most frustrating, mystifying coaches in the league.
There are a few obvious exceptions. Dan Campbell, Sean McDermott, and Nick Sirianni lead three of the league’s most successful squads, even though almost everyone outside of Philadelphia loathes Sirianni like he just microwaved fish the morning after sleeping over in their mom’s room. Mike Tomlin, John Harbaugh, and Todd Bowles are cool. And sometimes the clock strikes midnight on a promising offensive mastermind, and he suddenly turns from a beautiful princess into a girl who looks like Mike McDaniel. (I’m thinking specifically of Mike McDaniel, in this case.)
But the appeal of the high-toned offense remains strong, and a lot of these head coaches most closely associated with their defenses aren’t making a strong case for the pendulum to swing the other way. Some of the most disappointing teams and ghastly decision-making have come from their ranks. And it’s pretty rank indeed.
It’s really tough to think of a worse coaching decision all year than Dan Quinn leaving star quarterback in the game during the waning minutes of a blowout, only to see Jayden Daniels’ left arm get turned into one of those air-powered tube dancers wildly flapping in all directions to announce a used-car sale.
In fact, when I tried to think of a worse coaching decision, the first thing that came to mind was the clock management that led to the Atlanta Falcons blowing a 28-3 lead in the Super Bowl, and that was Dan Quinn, too. Given the fact that me, the announcers, and everyone I follow on Twitter was questioning the decision before the injury occurred, it’s fair to assume that an offensive-minded coach would’ve taken greater care of their most valuable asset.
In terms of similarly dumb moves this season, the Arizona Cardinals’ defensive-focused head coach Jonathan Gannon springs immediately to mind. Arizona fined Gannon $100,000 for making aggressive physical contact with running back Emari Demercado after Demercado made one of the most bone-headed plays in sports, which was only one blunder among the (frankly) Frank Drebin-esque bumbling that led to perhaps the stupidest and most undisciplined loss of the season, to the woeful Tennessee Titans.
Yeah, Mike Vrabel has the New England Patriots looking pretty sharp, but Raheem Morris has led the Falcons to some truly uninspired losses, and Pete Carroll’s Las Vegas Raiders look downright bad. And that list of defensive head coaches is starting to get pretty short.
For something closer to a one-to-one comparison, consider that last season, two of the most coveted head coaching candidates were both coordinators for the Detroit Lions. Both got jobs with cursed teams — although the Chicago Bears are more “My car never works and it always rains on my birthday” cursed, while the New York Jets are “Neither you, nor your children, nor your children’s children shall ever know a moment of happiness” cursed.
Ben Johnson’s schematic artistry on offense has led to some thrilling victories and the blossoming of Caleb Williams in Chicago. Glenn’s Jets, meanwhile, are back in the hunt for next year’s No. 1 draft pick, which they seemingly trade back and forth with the Carolina Panthers every year. Two gurus, two new head coaches, two very different outcomes.
There’s no reason to think this wave of offensive-minded head coaches has crested yet.
And then there’s the long-simmering discrimination lawsuit Flores filed against the NFL and several teams specifically, including the Miami Dolphins, where he was previously employed as a head coach before coming over to the Vikings. I’m no legal expert, so I’m not going to delve into the merits of Flores’ lawsuit — although an awful lot of teams seem to view the Rooney Rule as a loophole at best and a PR shield at worst — but it’s just plain naive to think the lawsuit, which remains an inconvenient, ongoing truth, doesn’t hurt Flores’ chances as a head-coaching candidate. Hard to imagine that Flores himself isn’t perfectly aware of this.
The unintended consequence in this nexus of circumstances is that the Vikings have one of the best damn defensive coordinators in the league, and there’s no reason to think he’s leaving anytime soon. Paired with the undisputedly innovative Kevin O’Connell, Flores is an essential component of one of the most creative, resilient, always-evolving coaching staffs in the NFL. That sets the Vikings up for the kind of consistency and stability that sounds pretty appealing for a fanbase that can feel a little queasy with the frequent fluctuations between dizzying highs and despairing lows.