VikingsTerritory’s Purple Rumor Mill is a two-day chronicle each week. All the week’s Vikings rumors are lassoed and plopped in two spots — articles on Saturday and Sunday — for review. Today is the February 22nd edition.
Vikings Rumors: Justin Jefferson’s Trade Endorsement, Aaron Rodgers, Darnold & NYJ
Remember — rumors are rumors. What you read on weekends in these pieces is what the world is talking about pertaining to the purple team, not necessarily items that will come to fruition.
Here’s the first batch of the week. All past rumors can be read here.
Rumor: Justin Jefferson has urged Cleveland Browns EDGE Myles Garrett to join him in Minnesota.
Ken Blaze-Imagn Images.
Jefferson openly recruited the 2023 Defensive Player of the Year, Myles Garrett, last week, suggesting the phenom EDGE rusher should join the Vikings’ roster this offseason.
“Myles, you know where to go, brother. Hey, we need one, two extra pieces, and you’ll fill in that piece. We need you,” Jefferson recently told Garrett from afar on a USA Today podcast.
Of course, Jefferson was prompted to “say something” to Garrett, so it shouldn’t be construed that the Vikings wideout desperately pleaded for his services or anything of the sort. It’s just that any team landing Garrett this offseason would handsomely upgrade its roster.
Don’t expect anything to come from this one. Every player would like Garrett on his team’s roster.
Rumor: Jared Allen thinks Aaron Rodgers should lead the Vikings in 2025.
Kirby Lee-Imagn Images.
Hall of Famer Jared Allen wants Aaron Rodgers to lead his old team in 2025.
“Reluctantly, yes. Only because I experienced it with Brett,” Allen told Kay Adams this week when she asked if he’d support Rodgers in purple. He likened Rodgers to Brett Favre whose career has totally resembled Rodgers’.
“And it’s creepy how it’s the same path, right?” Allen said about Rodgers’ career arc compared to Favre’s. “Brett went to the Jets, everybody thought he was done, he came to us in 2009, and he had fire. He was hungry, and we went out and destroyed the North. … I’m not opposed.”
This is a neat idea, but the Vikings have J.J. McCarthy on tap to lead the franchise. They likely won’t onboard a quarterback 20 years older than McCarthy.
Rumor: Sam Darnold could return home this offseason … to the New York Jets.
New York Jets quarterback Sam Darnold (14) runs off the field after the Jets defeat the Cleveland Browns, 23-16, at MetLife Stadium on Sunday, Dec. 27, 2020, in East Rutherford. © Danielle Parhizkaran/NorthJersey.com via Imagn Content Services, LLC.
The Jets recently announced that Aaron Rodgers would not return to New York in 2025, so equipped with all new leadership, led by general manager Darren Mougey and head coach Aaron Glenn, a new QB1 will be on the menu.
And that could be Sam Darnold, argues BR’s Brad Gagnon. “My February prediction? The Vikes let Darnold get away in favor of McCarthy. The Steelers stick with Wilson. Cousins goes to the Raiders, Darnold goes back to the Jets in place of Aaron Rodgers, Carr becomes a bridge in Cleveland, the Titans and Giants draft Ward and Sanders, respectively, and Fields is left fighting for opportunities in a place like Pittsburgh, San Francisco, Cleveland, Las Vegas or New Orleans,” Gagnon wrote with a flurry off offseason quarterback predictions.
“Darnold, the league’s sixth-highest-rated passer from this past season, is slated to hit free agency, as is future Hall of Famer Russell Wilson. Both quarterbacks could get away from their incumbent teams due to the presence of younger, intriguing signal-callers in Minnesota (2024 first-round pick J.J. McCarthy) and Pittsburgh (2021 first-round pick Justin Fields),” Gagnon added.
This is a reasonable theory, especially if Darnold personally is interested in a reunion. Let’s face it: New York needs a quarterback, and this draft doesn’t have many 1st-Rounders for the assignment.