Kevin O’Connell intimated Friday that Kirk Cousins, Justin Jefferson and the starters on offense and defense will begin Sunday’s regular season finale against the Chicago Bears, but how long they play is the question.
“We’ve got a pretty clear cut plan with how we want to go about the whole game, but we’re going to go in with the expectation of our guys going and try to get off to a good start and play good football,” O’Connell said.
O’Connell said they’ll probably get backups “some snaps here and there.”
Any player who is dinged up or battling an injury is far less likely to play.
“You gotta be smart about where they’re at. What type of risks for possibly aggravating a current injury or potentially, more importantly, making it worse. We don’t know quite when we’ll play next week yet. It’s possible we could play on Saturday and we’ll have to fast forward the week a little bit on shorter-term notice,” the head coach said.
“This is the time when you rely on the communication of how each player on our roster is feeling. It’s been a long season for a lot of guys, played a lot of snaps.”
If the Vikings beat the Bears and the 49ers lose to the Cardinals, the Vikings will get the No. 2 seed in the NFC playoffs and face the Packers, Seahawks or Lions in the first round. If the 49ers win or the Vikings lose, the Vikings will be the No. 3 seed and host the Giants on Wild Card Weekend.
Minnesota has already ruled center Garrett Bradbury and defensive lineman James Lynch out with injuries, and Za’Darius smith, Cam Dantzler and Brian Asamoah are all questionable. Smith’s status is not because of an injury.
“It’s a personal matter for him. The full expectation is he’ll be in Chicago with us,” said O’Connell.
