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Adam Thielen may be the most treasured Minnesota Vikings player in franchise history.
Attending Minnesota State-Mankato on a modest $500 scholarship, the Detroit Lakes native went undrafted and worked his way up from the practice squad to becoming a Pro Bowl receiver. Enough can’t be said about Thielen’s contributions to his home-state team.
However, Thielen acknowledged his future with has been a “tough” decision by the organization in the past due to an increasingly heavy toll on the Vikings’ finances.
“There’s going to be some tough [roster] moves and decisions ahead, and I’ll probably be a part of those decisions, but I couldn’t be more excited about the direction of the team,” Thielen said last offseason on KFAN, per Sean Borman.
For a second consecutive offseason, Thielen restructured his contract to stay with the team, but that restructuring hasn’t been a pay cut, but a maneuver that pushed more of his earnings down the road to create cap space and add free agents to the defense.
It’s a wager that is paying dividends in 2022 with the Vikings (5-1) off to their best start since 2016, however, it’s also created a mess for both sides in the coming years that Minnesota will have to address eventually.
Analyst Urges Vikings to Stop ‘Catering’ to Adam Thielen
On an October 29 airing of the SKOR North podcast, Phil Mackey and Judd Zulgad discussed several problematic contracts down the line for the Vikings.
Minnesota has $101 million, roughly 44% of the expected cap space next season, sunk into just five players who will be over the age of 30 — Kirk Cousins (34), Harrison Smith (34), Za’Darius Smith (31), Eric Kendricks (31) and Thielen.
“I think you have to come to grips very quickly here that there is a collection of longtime, very familiar, well-liked players who have to be moved on from here within the next two years,” Zulgad said.
Thielen’s name surfaced due to his $19.9 million cap hit next season, which currently ranks 14th at his position, per Over the Cap. His nearly $20 million payday in 2023 is on-par with Stefon Diggs, who led the league in receptions and receiving yards in 2020 and ranks second in both receptions per game (8.2)and receiving yards (109.3) per game this season.
By the past offseason’s standards with wide receiver contracts skyrocketing, Diggs at that rate is a steal. Thielen, on the other hand, isn’t producing like a player at that pay grade.
Through six games this season, Thielen ranks 38th in receptions per game (4.8) and 54th in receiving yards per game (47.3). Thielen remains one of the league’s best red-zone weapons with the fourth-most receiving touchdowns (26) since 2020, however, he is fading out of the Vikings offense with just two touchdowns so far this season.
Thielen is still a reliable weapon on the offense and an asset to the team, but his cap hit next season doesn’t match his contributions to the team as he approaches the age of 33 next offseason.
Mackey urged that Minnesota find a way to sort out the contract before it becomes a bane on the team’s ability to rebuild the roster in the coming years.
“I think there’s room for two thoughts here. From a fan perspective, wouldn’t it be really cool to see Adam Thielen, from Detroit Lakes, Minnesota, growing up a Vikings fan, hoisting a Lombardi trophy this year or next year? Yes, it would be cool. Do the Vikings owe anything to Thielen beyond the scope of the team’s success? If they’re catering to Thielen over the team that’s where I draw the line,” Mackey said. “I think this contract caters to Thielen beyond the point o his value to the team. Good for him for getting paid… but that contract is a problem in 2023 that they can’t easily escape.”
Deadline Upcoming for Thielen in March
On the third day of the 2023 league year, March 19, Thielen’s base salary of $11.8 million becomes fully guaranteed. The Vikings could reach a restructuring before that date and push those earnings further down the road in the form of void years.
But that’s a hole the organization has been digging for some time.
The other option that would lighten his cap hit the most would be to cut him with a post-June 1 designation, which would save $13.4 million of cap space, per Over the Cap. Minnesota would only have to eat Thielen’s $6.5 million signing bonus next season.
Neither options are pretty at this juncture, but it only gets worse in 2024, with Thielen’s cap hit exceeding $21.6 million.
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