KO's Offense Discussion 2024

“Whether they were dialed in to me or whether they were not having me in the loop at all didn’t really matter to me,” he said. “Whatever quarterback they go and get, I’m going to make the best out of the situation, and I’m going to give them all the confidence in the world, like he’s the number one quarterback in the league.”

Jefferson was one of Cousins’ most outspoken advocates; he will play the next stage of his career with more NFL stature than his quarterback, and will have reporters approaching him regularly for his thoughts on the players throwing him the ball. Listening to him speak about Darnold and McCarthy now, it’s clear there’s the same intent that coursed through his comments about Cousins. He wants his quarterbacks to believe they can make any throw on the field, and to trust he’ll come down with any ball they send his way.

”It’s going to be different,” Jefferson said. “But I want it to be the same for them to have the confidence in me to go and make a play, just like Kirk did in those opportunities and those situations. I low-key want them to have more confidence than what Kirk had. Kirk is more comfortable in the system, [with] him running it early on in Washington. It’s just to give them an extra boost and extra confidence; I want to go up and make a play for them whenever they give me the chance.”

O’Connell and offensive coordinator Wes Phillips say Jefferson was more assertive as the Vikings installed their offense, sharing what he’s learned and the details the team has added to plays over the past two years. He’s spent time with Darnold drilling the nuances that are unique to his routes.

“I might put a little extra step or two, just to make a move on a corner, that some other receivers might not do,” Jefferson said. “They might rush the route, or try to beat them with speed, where I more use my footwork.”

The details in his routes are there to counter the outsize attention he’s long faced from defenses, who often break tendencies to put extra safety help on Jefferson’s side or devote multiple defenders to him. Particularly on underneath routes, Phillips said, the Vikings give Jefferson the freedom to read a coverage scheme or a cornerback’s leverage and adjust his steps.

“He was always great down the field. But if you want to catch a ton of balls in this league, you also have to be able to run underneath routes as well,” Phillips said. “So those types of things that I’ve really seen an improvement on.”

Those routes change the Vikings’ playbook “a good bit,” Jefferson said, and they might seem unorthodox to a quarterback who’s new to Minnesota. In addition to his meetings with the Vikings’ quarterbacks, O’Connell holds regular strategy talks with Jefferson, asking for his input on ways the offense can manipulate a particular play and providing reminders of how he can help Darnold with what the coach called “all these little detailed things you can’t really put in a playbook.”

“You look at certain coverages, whether it’s third downs or base game plan, but you’ve obviously got to have an understanding that they’re probably going to throw a little wrinkle at us for him,” Darnold said. “And then coming out here every single day [for practice] and seeing how they treat Justin, whether it’s a safety over the top, or even the safety acting like he’s going to be over the top and the coming down in coverage, it’s definitely a good look for what we’re going to get during the season.”

The extra work is a function of a problem most passers would quickly invite.

“I think any quarterback would love the chance to have to adjust to throwing to Justin Jefferson,” Phillips said. “The trust that you can have to anticipate throws when he’s about to make a cut, whereas maybe a [normal] guy you’d want to just take one more click and make sure he’s crossing this guy’s face, you just know that Justin’s gonna do it.”

If the Vikings’ new quarterbacks have that trust in him, Jefferson reasons, they’ll have more trust in themselves. It’s a thesis central to the Vikings’ transition at quarterback, and, perhaps, to the future of their offense.

“I just try to give the quarterbacks confidence to throw me those 50-50 jump balls,” Jefferson said. “Sometimes, it’s a little bit difficult for them to really just give me a chance, knowing I’m going to come down with it. It’s difficult trying to read the different schemes and their normal reads. But when I have that matchup or they see it’s that type of game, I always try to give them that word in the back of their head, that they have me as an option if things get ugly.”

The results with the big folks on the field in 2023 were not inspiring. Among 14 teams that used 12 personnel (one RB, two TE) at least 20% of the time, the Vikings ranked 12th in Expected Points Added.

In general, passing out of 2-TE sets works. Out of the 14 regular 12-personnel users, had positive EPA when throwing the ball. A lot of teams performed much better on a per-play basis, including the two teams in the Super Bowl. Kansas City’s EPA per play went from 0.03 with three receivers (15th) to 0.22 (7th) with two tight ends. San Francisco’s jumped from 0.27 (1st) to 0.61 (1st).

The reason EPA is better with 2-TEs across the league is that teams usually use 12 personnel when they are in situations where they can either run or pass. Only four teams threw at least 60% of the time out of 2TE sets, the Vikings passed 48% of plays. We rarely see the beefy dudes out there on third down and that’s where a lot of negative plays happen.

Unfortunately for the Vikings they were one of the two teams that did not improve through the air with more size on the field. Their passing EPA per pass went from 0.06 in 11 personnel to -0.11 with an extra tight end and one fewer receiver. You could say that the numbers were thrown off by the plethora of backup QBs playing after Kirk Cousins got hurt but even teams with backup or bad QBs like the Falcons, Titans, Bears and Giants ended up better. Not to mention the Vikings were still the 12th best EPA/play team when passing out of 11 personnel.

Where they were improved was on the ground. The Vikings went from 28th in EPA/play with 11 personnel to 13th with an extra TE out there. That’s probably not a coincidence since Oliver ranked as the third best run blocker with 200 or more run snaps.

“It’s a big bonus when an offense has a tight end like Josh where you can count on him to have a single block,” linebacker Blake Cashman told Purple Insider. “A lot of tight ends can’t do it. As linebackers, we all have a lot of respect for JO because he’s one of the better blocking tight ends in this league. But he’s also a duel threat. You have to respect him in the pass game. If he’s run blocking or you’re blitzing, you have to have a plan. A lot of guys aren’t thinking about that when they’re taking on a tight end, it’s usually strike and shed but a guy like that can anchor and you have to approach him like a tackle.”

Over the last two seasons the Vikings have had one of the better trios of receivers in the NFL, whether it was Jefferson-Thielen-Osborn or Jefferson-Addison-Osborn, it stands to reason that they would live in 11 personnel often because that was a strength. Oliver’s presence was much heavier on the run side (243 run snaps vs. 154 passing) because they had exceptional receivers for the passing downs and Hockenson.

They were also a wildly pass-heavy offense, throwing the third most out of 11 personnel of any team in the NFL.

But entering 2024, the personnel has changed and the quarterback might benefit from a less pass-first offense than the one that was built for veteran dart-thrower Kirk Cousins.

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“From a simple preparation standpoint, you get into the week in and week out of a season, if you've got to watch multiple personnel groupings, that takes time away from honing in on maybe an extra detail in this grouping or that grouping,” O’Connell explained. “It's really kind of just changed the way I go about the week. We've kind of evolved and tried to do some things with our run game, learning, different ways of not only doing that, but then how does that affect the past game and the ability to marry it all up?”

Darnold might benefit greatly from marrying it all up. In 2022, when Darnold had one of the best stretches of his career, he graded 73.3 by PFF when using play-action and 56.7 without it. In 55 play-action attempts, he only had one turnover-worthy play and one sack and went 33-for-55 with 8.2 yards per attempt.

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“If a team is getting big personnel and big bodies as a linebacker you’re thinking that you’ve gotta strap up and play some big-boy football,” Cashman said.

Since the Kubiak-Stefanski years, we haven’t seen many defenses need to strap up and play big boy football against the Vikings. Back in the 2019 opener against the Falcons, Cousins threw 10 passes while Dalvin Cook ran 21 times at 5.3 yards per carry and demoralized Atlanta. In two years with KOC, Cousins won just two of his 17 victories while throwing 30 passes or fewer.

Star RB Aaron Jones should play a significant role in playing better big-boy football this year than the Vikings did with Alex Mattison in 2024. Jones averages 5.0 yards per carry for his career and has a knack for embarrassing tacklers.

That’s part of the point. Mixing personnel isn’t just about confusing or bullying the opponent, it’s also about finding ways to enhance the best players, whether it’s more push for Jones or more room for Jefferson.

“I feel like they stack the box a little bit more whenever we have bigger guys in our offense,” Jefferson said.

SumerSports’ data only includes 2022 and 2023 but there was a 2% uptick in plays out of 2-TE sets from year to year and an increase in teams passing more than 50% of the time when using the larger gentlemen. It certainly isn’t a new idea to use more blocking types but it might be something that continues to evolve around the league as defenses get smaller and faster every year.

“I’ve been around long enough to have played in an era when [using bigger personnel] was more en vogue,” safety Smith told Purple Insider.

Maybe it will be again in 2024.