Who Are the Vikings’ MVPs at the Bye Week?

Let’s see what our readers had to say

We’ve got the results of our SB Nation Reacts Survey for this week, so let’s get to what you folks thought about our Minnesota Vikings questions during the bye week.

Our first question, once again, had to do with how confident everyone is that the Vikings are moving in the right direction. Just like last week, the overall number is still pretty high, but there was the slightest of drops.

Of those who responded to our poll, 96% of them feel that the purple are heading in the right direction. Here’s how that number has trended through the season to this point:

• Week 1 – 77%
• Week 2 – 92%
• Week 3 – 97%
• Week 4 – 98%
• Week 5 – 97%
• Week 6 – 96%

It feels good to feel good, doesn’t it? Again, I’m not sure what we need to do in order to get everyone on the same page here, but 96% is still a pretty solid mark.

Our other two questions this week had to do with who is the Most Valuable Player on each side of the ball for the Vikings heading into the bye week. We’ll start with the offensive side, where the result isn’t all that surprising, but there was at least some dissension.

For this one, 51% of our respondents went with quarterback Sam Darnold as the team’s Offensive MVP through the first five weeks. It’s been quite the season for Darnold, and I think a lot of people expected him to be better in Minnesota than he’s been with his other teams, but I’m not sure how many envisioned something like this. Justin Jefferson came in second in the poll with 27% of the vote, while Aaron Jones came in third at 20%. There were 2% of our respondents who believe it’s someone other than one of those three players.

I have to be honest. . .I went with Jones. He’s added a dimension to this offense that simply wasn’t there last season, and we saw what happened against the Jets offensively when he wasn’t out there. We’ll have to see how his injury affects things over the next few weeks but hopefully he’ll be back sooner rather than later.

Lastly, we’ll look at the defensive side of the ball, and this race wasn’t even close.

Andrew Van Ginkel destroyed this one like he’s been destroying passing lanes all season, garnering 87% of the vote. Jonathan Greenard checked in with 6% of the vote, while Blake Cashman was the choice of 5% of those who responded to the poll. Once again, the “other” category came in with 2% of the tally.

Surprisingly, if you check with our friends from FanDuel, Van Ginkel isn’t even a thought when it comes to the NFL’s Defensive Player of the Year vote. Right now, he’s at +15000. . .that’s fifteen thousand. . .to win the award. For comparison’s sake, the odds-on co-favorites are Aidan Hutchinson and T.J. Watt, both of whom sit at +300. Van Ginkel isn’t even the highest-rated Viking on that list. That distinction goes to Greenard at +10000. Even Pat Jones II is sitting at +13000 on the FanDuel board.

So, I guess if you’ve got $100 burning a hole in your pocket, you could throw it down on one of those three guys in the hopes of racking up a five-digit payday. I’m just shocked that all three of them, particularly Van Ginkel, are so low on the totem pole in that category.

Those are our SB Nation Reacts results for the bye week, folks. We’ll have more questions for you next week to voice your opinions on. Thanks to everyone who participated in this week’s poll!