Officially, the 28-year-old is assistant offensive coordinator/assistant quarterbacks coach. Unofficially, he’s mentor to J.J. McCarthy, protégé of Kevin O’Connell and the most likely to go off the grid in the mountains somewhere.
The man who’s become one of the Vikings’ most important coaches is, quite often, the man who can’t be found.
Grant Udinski is on some faraway practice field, doing extra work with a quarterback when Kevin O’Connell gestures over reporters’ shoulders to point him out in a news conference. Long after players and coaches had left on Fridays last November, Udinski stayed on the Vikings’ indoor field, for cram sessions with Jaren Hall and Joshua Dobbs that sometimes lasted six hours.
To J.J. McCarthy’s frequent 11:30 p.m. questions about the Vikings offense this spring, offensive coordinator Wes Phillips simply responded, “Text Grant.” Udinski added McCarthy to the small group of people whose texts break through the do-not-disturb settings on his phone. O’Connell gets the same priority, two years after Udinski, then the coach’s personal assistant, forgot to give him the dates for a Rocky Mountain hiking trip and a question from O’Connell was lost in spotty cell service, leading to dozens of texts and voicemails making sure he was OK.
”When I say he’s all football, all the time, I mean it — if he’s not hiking a mountain in Colorado,” O’Connell said. “And he’s not staying in the most luxurious accommodations. He’s sleeping on the side of a mountain somewhere. I mean, if we could ever do a day in the life of him when he’s not doing football, it would be much more exciting than when he is.”
Since hiring Udinski in 2022, O’Connell has promoted him twice. This year, the 28-year-old’s official title is “assistant offensive coordinator/assistant quarterbacks coach.” His unofficial roles include: mentor to McCarthy; post-practice pass rusher or receiver for Sam Darnold; advance scout and practice lieutenant for Phillips; complement to QB coach Josh McCown; “Crazy Grant” to O’Connell’s kids; confidant, protégé and occasional comedic target for O’Connell.
Udinski recalls plays with such specificity, McCarthy is convinced he must have a photographic memory. McCown watches Udinski lead a presentation to the team’s quarterbacks and sees a young O’Connell.
“It reminds me a ton of Kevin, when I had him as a quarterbacks coach [in 2015 with the Browns],” said McCown, a former NFL quarterback. “You could tell immediately, with his presence and intellect, he was going to be a really good coach. That’s definitely what I can feel from Grant.”
O’Connell came up with a cadre of fast-tracked coaches under Sean McVay in Los Angeles. He thinks within a few years, Udinski could be an offensive coordinator or even a head coach. “It would not surprise me if he’s on a pretty skyrocketed timeline,” O’Connell said. He jokes with Udinski, “When I’m working for you years from now, please go easy on me, no matter how I treat you right now.”
Effusive praise and good-natured grief are part of a package deal from O’Connell, often to the people he holds in high esteem. “He’s as unique of a guy as I’ve ever been around,” the coach said of Udinski, “and I care for him tremendously.”
Udinski meets all of it with the same bashful smile, grateful he can lose himself in football most of the year and on a fjord in the summer.
“When it’s something you love doing, and there’s no, ‘Well, I’m going to have this Plan B or this other plan’ — when you know, ‘This is what I’m going to do,’ it makes it a heck of a lot easier,” Udinski said.