Daniel Jones may have had a path to ending up with the Minnesota Vikings before the 2026 NFL trade deadline.
The Vikings had some familiarity with Jones, which would’ve helped. He played there at the tail end of the 2024 season after his New York Giants release — and while Jones didn’t get any game action, he got to know Kevin O’Connell.
The Colts are rebuilding, and the Vikings have wanted a new quarterback to potentially take over for Kyler Murray and Carson Wentz.
While expensive, Jones might’ve been one of the best options available.
He’s not the choice the Vikings made, though.
Daniel Jones Decision for Vikings
The Vikings aren’t trading for Jones.
Reports emerged about 85 minutes before Tuesday’s trade deadline that the Vikings are instead trading for Kirk Cousins from the Las Vegas Raiders.
Cousins had a much longer tenure in Minnesota and now returns.
Given that Jones didn’t have a long list of suitors, this might lock him into being with the Colts for the rest of the year — although that could certainly change before the buzzer.
Why Vikings Wanted Kirk Cousins, Not Daniel Jones
Cousins comes a lot cheaper than Jones and doesn’t have the financial implications of next season on his contract. That seems like the obvious reasoning here.
NFL insider Jordan Schultz also shared this on X:
“Kirk Cousins has been a focal point of the #Vikings’ search for a QB, so much so that Kevin O’Connell made it very clear to ownership that he was the No. 1 target, per multiple league sources.”
Maybe Jones was in the picture. That’s certainly what NFL Network’s Ian Rapoport implied in a report heading into Tuesday.
But if Jones was in the picture at some point for the Vikings, he wasn’t in the picture by the end.
A follow-up report from Schultz implied the Colts didn’t want to trade Jones before the deadline.
If Jones winds up staying with the Colts through the end of the season, it’ll be in large part because the Vikings chose to trade for Cousins instead.
Colts, Vikings Make Final Daniel Jones Trade Decision