Young Viking Draws “Sky Is the Limit” Comment from Teammate

The Minnesota Vikings invested big-time during last year’s draft, acquiring not only one but two high-profile players in the first round. As a result, the Vikes got only one player out of the second and third rounds of the 2024 and 2025 drafts: Wideout Tai Felton.

Young Viking Draws “Sky Is the Limit” Comment from Teammate

While those draft Fridays were boring to some extent for Skol Nation, nobody would care about that if the two big guys reached their potential. J.J. McCarthy will be this year’s starting quarterback.

The other guy, pass rusher Dallas Turner, will remain as a backup on the depth chart, although that doesn’t mean as much as at QB because it is a rotational position and backups can play significant snap numbers, too.

Turner is a massive breakout candidate for the Vikings in his sophomore season. Too much talent is hidden somewhere inside of him, with freakish athleticism that you can’t learn. There’s a reason why he was favored to be drafted by the Falcons 8th overall rather than slipping to 17, where the Vikings scooped him up.

His debut season was not as flashy as his first-round draft pedigree would suggest, primarily because of the tough competition for snaps on the edge. A true champagne problem for the Vikings, free-agent additions Jonathan Greenard and Andrew Van Ginkel were simply too good to be taken off the field.

One of them, Van Ginkel, received a sweet extension on Tuesday. The other, Greenard, gave a presser and was asked about Turner.

Asked what he’s seeing from Turner moving forward, he said:

Oh man, [the] sky is the limit. Just seeing him weather every storm last year, [it] was just great to see him mature. Understanding that you’re a younger guy playing behind older guys, it doesn’t mean anything on you. It’s a matter of use that time to get better, use that time to understand how could I be in this position. When it’s my time, I’m going to take advantage of these opportunities. And the times he did, you see him making more plays, it started to click for him, and even translated into the offseason.

He was still here as soon as the season ended, in the weight room with me, working out. He hardly [took any] time off, even though I told him, this is the only time after your rookie year you’re going to be able to have a break, downtime, ’cause the season never stops. It’s just great to see him absorb all this information, retain it really well, and obviously, just put it to use.

Y’all saw the videos [of him working out], nobody told him to do any of this, this is all his own understanding of what he wanted to get better at, and just use that as an opportunity to be a better pro. I’m excited to see everything he’s been doing in the offseason come to fruition.

Turner ultimately appeared in 16 games (he missed one with a minor knee injury) and recorded three sacks, 20 tackles, three tackles for loss, and one interception, playing a total of 300 defensive snaps and 226 on special teams.

Patrick Jones departed in free agency, and his 459 snaps are now available for Turner and other backups. Furthermore, rotating Greenard and Van Ginkel more often to preserve energy and have them at their best when it’s truly needed in the fourth quarter could make sense, too. They both played north of 900 defensive snaps.

Head coach Kevin O’Connell recently suggested folks shouldn’t write him off entering year two: “I hope people haven’t forgotten about Dallas Turner,” the head coach insisted. “[He is] really a guy that I’m expecting a huge jump from year one to year two. He really started to come on as the season went on last year. It’s a tough group, tough lineup to crack when you’ve got those top two guys playing the way that they were.”

Turner joined as a raw but otherwise explosive player and showed flashes of his talent in his rookie year. Working hard throughout the offense and spending some time with a Pro Bowler like Greenard can help him get closer to his potential.

The sky is the limit, but patience is required.

Editor’s Note: Information from PFF, Over The Cap, and Pro Football Reference helped with this article.