EAGAN, Minn. — Let’s begin the Dallas Turner discussion with a flashback.
In September 2022, the Minnesota Vikings hosted the Detroit Lions at U.S. Bank Stadium. Detroit had drafted edge rusher Aidan Hutchinson that year, and right tackle Brian O’Neill studied him before their matchup. Hutchinson sprang powerfully off the line of scrimmage. He bent in a way that looked like his joints had joints.
But O’Neill got the better of him in that first matchup. Hutchinson left the field that day with one quarterback hit. While leaving the locker room, O’Neill thought, Eh, he’s got a chance to be a pretty good player.
“With all due respect,” O’Neill said Wednesday.
Ten weeks later, in December of that 2022 season, O’Neill lined up across from Hutchinson again.
“And that day,” O’Neill said, “he was a f—ing problem.”
His point?
“There’s definitely a learning curve,” O’Neill said. “Anytime you’re playing a position in the trenches, you were just more athletically gifted than everybody in college. That’s how I was. That’s how plenty of guys were. That’s how Hutchinson was. It takes a little time to understand angles, sets, protections and what risks you can take.”
This applies to Turner, the Vikings’ first-round pick who has played just seven snaps over the last two games. In his rookie season, Turner has one sack, three pressures, four tackles and one tackle for loss. Among the 30 first-year players who have rushed the passer 30 times, his pressure rate ranks 17th.
Welcome to the NFL, Dallas Turner!
The @vikings rookie gets his first-career sack 💪
📺: #MINvsNYG on FOX
📱: https://t.co/waVpO8ZBqG pic.twitter.com/9KiwhxvE40— NFL (@NFL) September 8, 2024
When first-rounders play sparingly and produce minimally, questions arise. Turner’s situation is magnified further by his acquisition cost. The Vikings essentially climbed 25 spots (from No. 42 to No. 17) for a second-round pick (2025), third-rounder (2025), fourth-rounder (2025), fifth-rounder (2024) and sixth-rounder (2024).
There is also some underlying angst in Minnesota because of what happened with safety Lewis Cine. In the 2022 draft, general manager Kwesi Adofo-Mensah traded back 20 spots — within the NFC North, no less — and took Cine with the 32nd pick. Cine was confined to a special teams role initially, then a gnarly compound leg fracture zapped some of his explosiveness. Even after Brian Flores replaced Ed Donatell as the Vikings’ defensive coordinator in 2023, Cine remained sidelined and was ultimately cut this preseason.
Turner’s lack of playing time and production warrant a conversation, but let’s consider some context.
One of the central differences in the Vikings drafting Cine and Turner lies in the coaches doing the evaluating. Flores, a former scouting staffer with the New England Patriots, prioritizes fit. Athletic traits matter — you can’t teach explosiveness. But does the player have the requisite acumen and willingness to learn necessary for Flores’ specific system?
Turner checked all of the traditional scouting boxes. He dominated in the SEC at Alabama, ranking in the top 10 in the nation in 2023 in sacks, pressure rate and pass-rush win rate. His combine measurements (arm length, vertical leap, speed) topped the draftable edge rushers in almost every category. Dane Brugler, The Athletic’s draft expert, ranked Turner as his top edge rusher and wrote, “He has the freaky tools to be a potential impact player in the NFL who should continue to improve as his body and rush attack mature.”
When Flores was asked following the draft what he liked most about Turner, he responded, “What didn’t we like?” The Vikings, Flores said at the time, coveted Turner. But nobody inside the TCO Performance Center believed Minnesota would have the opportunity to draft him, especially considering the team also wanted a high-end quarterback in the first round.
Another major difference between Turner’s introduction to the NFL and Cine’s is the players in front of Turner at his position. Cine battled Cam Bynum, who had never played safety, for a starting spot in 2022 and lost quickly. Turner, meanwhile, plays the same position as Jonathan Greenard, who has the third-most pressures in the NFL (behind Nick Bosa and Hutchinson), and Andrew Van Ginkel, whose coverage ability grades as the best among NFL edge rushers. The Vikings have explored using Turner at off-ball linebacker, but that position may ask more than any other on Flores’ defense in terms of run-stopping rules and pass-coverage techniques.
Finally, consider the differences in the way the coaches spoke about Cine and Turner.
“All rookies are always fighting to catch up, I don’t care what’s going on,” Donatell said about Cine’s playing time in 2022. “And, when you miss time, that compounds it. All rookies will be in a battle until they start next year. We’re always playing catchup. It can be done. We have good teachers around them. But we can never rest because there’s so much work to be done.”
Just this week, Flores said this of Turner: “He’s a young player. He’s got a bright future. I’ve heard the talk about snap counts, and I think it’s just hard to make a determination on a player and what he is based upon seven games in his career. I think Dallas is going to be just fine. I think everybody wants everything right now, and he does, too. We’ll get him out there.”
Head coach Kevin O’Connell has said that he believes Turner eventually will be “an absolute monster” for Minnesota. Flores unpromptedly invoked Cam Heyward as a player who struggled to find his footing early in his career and has become a Hall of Fame candidate.
“He’s pretty freakish athletically,” O’Neill said. “He’s got extremely long arms. He’s really quick-twitched. He’s fast off the ball. He has some pretty unique and hard-to-find athletic tools. And that’s only going to fare well for him moving forward as he continues to get better and better and grow as a player.”
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Greenard, who mentored Will Anderson Jr. last season in Houston, said Wednesday that Turner “has been a great listener, a great learner, and he’s going to be really good.” Fellow edge rusher Jihad Ward, who does not mince words, concurred with Greenard’s opinion that Turner would “be great.”
Sure, these words would have more impact if they had accompanying pressure rates like the ones fellow rookies Jared Verse (Rams) and Laiatu Latu (Colts) have compiled. Notably, though, both Verse and Latu are more than two years older than Turner, who spoke Wednesday about the first half of his rookie season.
“Knowing the room I was coming into, and the defense I was coming into, and all of the great minds in the building,” he said, “I knew I had a very, very big opportunity to be a sponge and soak up all the information I can.”
Here was the 21-year-old providing perspective. And if he still has faith in his long-term trajectory, why shouldn’t we all?
(Photo: Steve Luciano / Associated Press)
