Leslie Frazier and the Purple came out of Sunday with a big win over playoff-contending Philadelphia, but off-the-field news has stolen some of the positive attention Minnesota may have gotten for the victory.
According to multiple reports, the Vikings are one of two teams that have contacted Penn State head coach Bill O’Brien, the one-time Patriots offensive coordinator.
The other team is the Texans, who fired head coach Gary Kubiak at the beginning of December, and are currently being coached by defensive coordinator Wade Phillips.
O’Brien’s contract reportedly has a $7.73 million buyout should he choose to take an NFL contract, a fee the team would pay for the right to employ him. He currently makes $1.9 million at Penn State.
Additionally, Frazier is under contract until 2014, so to buy out his contract, pay a buyout fee for O’Brien as well as fork over his salary would come to quite the hefty sum.
Vikings team president Mark Wilf has not tipped his hand as to what he plans to do about the head coach position when the offseason comes around, though should these reports of contact with O’Brien be true, it could only spell bad news for Frazier.
Frazier, for his part, shrugged of the report, according to the Pioneer Press, saying, “it’s not important at all.”
