The Minnesota Vikings clinched an improbable win over the Detroit Lions on Sunday to keep their season alive. Otherwise, it could’ve spiraled pretty quickly, with the disastrous Thursday night game still in the back of everyone’s minds.
Once Promising Vikings Defender Has Quietly Gone Missing
In that game, the Vikings relied on some good-old blitzes to get the job done, continuously moving Jared Goff off his spot. Overall, it felt like the best all-around defensive performance of the season, besides what will be remembered as the “Isaiah Rodgers Game”.
To make that happen, various players had to play well at all levels. Surprisingly, Brian Flores sent practice-squad player Fabian Moreau onto the field for 24 defensive snaps, equaling 37.5% of the defense’s plays. Jeff Okudah suffered a concussion in the game prior and missed the matchup against his old team.
The next man on the depth chart is actually Dwight McGlothern, an undrafted sophomore, but the young defender is nowhere to be found. He was active on gameday, but he didn’t log a single snap on offense or special teams.
That’s quite the hard fall from being one injury away from playing 20 or 30 snaps a game to being demoted to CB5 behind a 32-year-old from the practice squad. But that’s been the journey for McGlothern this year.
The Vikings have just four corners on their 53-man roster, and Moreau was called up in both games that Okudah has missed with his two separate concussions. In the first one — against the Falcons in Week 2 — McGlothern was CB3 behind starters Byron Murphy and Isaiah Rodgers and appeared on 11 defensive snaps. The Vikings also experimented with some Jay Ward looks.
McGlothern arrived after the 2024 draft as an undrafted player and immediately drew some buzz. Then, he showed promise in spring practices and continued on that trajectory in the preseason, when he was a standout performer. His reward? He remained with the franchise for the entire 2024 campaign, although he barely saw the field.
In the past offseason, he was pretty much the only remaining corner, as Murphy, Moreau, Shaq Griffin, and Stephon Gilmore were all set to become unrestricted free agents, and the Vikings could’ve elevated him at least to a rotational role.
Instead, Murphy was re-signed, and Rodgers was acquired. Okudah joined as the new CB3, and only crumbs were left over for McGlothern, Mekhi Blackmon, and other roster hopefuls like Zemaiah Vaughn.
His second preseason wasn’t quite as strong as the first, but Flores and his crew still kept him on the team as the fourth cornerback. Overall, McGlothern still has decent numbers in his six-game sample in August, having been targeted a total of 13 times over the last two preseasons for eight catches and 65 yards. He also grabbed an interception, and the passer rating allowed of 42.1 is about as good as just throwing the ball in the dirt.
The problem for McGlothern is that if he isn’t trusted on defense, there’s no reason to keep him around because he doesn’t offer any special-teams prowess (his preseason tape on coverage units was relatively poor), as proven by the latest shutout on his stat sheet.
Teams can dress only 48 players on gameday, and those players need to contribute on offense, defense, or special teams, which is why special-teamers often have long careers, while backups without talent in the third phase vanish from the league rather quickly.
He’s still only 23 years old, but he won’t be on the team much longer if that trajectory continues.
Editor’s Note: Information from PFF, Over The Cap, and Sports Reference helped with this article.
