For sure, training camp begins Wednesday with areas of concern — namely, cornerback depth and the health of key starters returning from injury — but one didn’t need to be a mind reader to grasp O’Connell and General Manager Kwesi Adofo-Mensah’s confidence during their media session to kick off the season.
“It’s time for us to acknowledge what we’re actually trying to build here,” O’Connell said. “What that’s going to take is, in my opinion, an invisible presence in this building of understanding that we are capable, but we’ve got to put in a lot of work to feel totally worthy in those moments to get to where we want to get to.”
In other words, they believe they have what it takes. Now they must prove it.
Prove it in the postseason, not just in the regular season. That’s the next step missing from the O’Connell/Adofo-Mensah regime so far.
The annual shuffling of the NFL playoff bracket resembles a crowded harbor on a summer morning. Teams come, teams go. The line separating being a playoff team and non-playoff team is thinner than toilet paper in a port-a-potty.
Barring a cataclysmic injury derailment, the Vikings should be a playoff team again. The personnel moves made this offseason underscore a recognition that substantive changes and not just tweaks were necessary to become more than a playoff entrant.