Justin Jefferson Shows Off Limitless Ceiling in Debut of Vikings' New Offense
Justin Jefferson hasn't been shy about his goals for his third NFL season.
The 23-year-old wants to become known as the best wide receiver in the league. He wants the Vikings to win the Super Bowl. And he wants to become the first player to ever reach 2,000 receiving yards in a season.
He's off to a pretty good start on all fronts. Jefferson had a career day on Sunday afternoon in the Vikings' 23-7 victory over the Packers, catching nine passes for 184 yards and two touchdowns. He had 158 of those yards by halftime. It was the latest dominant, breathtaking performance by a player who now has five career games of 150 or more yards. One more would tie Randy Moss for the most such games in NFL history before turning 24.
"That's my goal," Jefferson said about getting 2,000 yards. "No better way to start it off than with 180, right?"
Jefferson has already made plenty of history in his career, including becoming the first player to ever reach 3,000 receiving yards in their first two seasons. He's set the bar quite high for himself from an individual standpoint. Still, Sunday's game against Green Bay showed that Jefferson might be able to reach even greater heights this season.
Why? Because of how he's being used and who's calling the plays. In Kevin O'Connell, the Vikings have an offensive-minded head coach again. O'Connell and offensive coordinator Wes Phillips came over from the Super Bowl-winning Rams and implemented their version of Sean McVay's offense in Minnesota this offseason. It's the system that helped Cooper Kupp win last year's receiving triple crown with a ridiculous 145/1,947/16 line.
Even when defenses knew the Rams wanted to get the ball to Kupp last year, both during the regular season and LA's run to the title, they couldn't stop it from happening because Kupp is so talented and was moved around so much.
Now Jefferson is in that role. The Vikings moved him all over the field against the Packers, making it impossible for them to shut him down. He lined up outside, in the slot, and even in the backfield on at least one play. Jefferson went in motion before the snap many times. He ran all kinds of routes from all kinds of alignments in all kinds of formations.
"Coach (O'Connell) came from the Rams and we saw Cooper Kupp always open," Patrick Peterson said. "I knew this was going to be a really good marriage with these guys. He's got aspirations of being a triple crown this year and he's well on his way. He's just very, very talented, and now you have an offensive guru like KO that's calling plays and finding new ways of getting him open, moving him around a lot. As you saw today, in the backfield a little bit, on jet motions, going down the field, over (routes). When you have a receiver like that, you want to get him the ball as much as you can, and KO's one of the best at it."
The Packers made some questionable strategic choices on defense in this game. They didn't have their top cornerback, Jaire Alexander, follow Jefferson, and Alexander ended up seeing less of that assignment than some expected. Jefferson admitted he was surprised he didn't see the amount of double teams and cloud coverage he's become accustomed to seeing.
But even if future defenses adapt and try different approaches to limit Jefferson, the versatility he has in this offense will make that awfully difficult.
"First and foremost, I credit Justin for being able to handle a lot," O'Connell said. "We moved him around a lot, we asked him to play multiple spots. He's not just an X receiver that lines up over here and dictates coverage. We're not going to allow that to happen."
The debut of the Vikings' new offense couldn't have gone much better, particularly when it came to getting Jefferson open. He's capable of making contested catches with the best of them, but he didn't have to do much of that on this day. Jefferson was wide open on most of his nine catches, including the game's opening touchdown (which came off of motion), a 64-yard catch and run in the second quarter, and his second touchdown of the first half, a 36-yarder.
Over 70 percent of Kirk Cousins' air yards were targeted at Jefferson, who had an NFL-leading 82 yards after the catch in this game.
"They do a nice job of putting them in different positions, whether it's in the slot, whether it's motioning," said Packers head coach Matt LaFleur. "It seemed like he was in motion quite a bit, just moving him all over the place. You've got to give them credit. They put him in premier spots and attacked our coverage well, and certainly we had a couple blown coverages, as well, where we're cutting him loose. If there's anybody you don't want to cut loose, it's No. 18."
Looking forward, the dangerous thing about the Vikings' offense is that Jefferson isn't the only weapon they have at their disposal. Far from it. Dalvin Cook, one of the league's best running backs, had 23 touches for 108 yards against the Packers. Secondary receivers Adam Thielen and K.J. Osborn had quiet games as Jefferson detonated, combining for 50 yards on six catches. Tight end Irv Smith Jr. was eased back into the game plan and didn't catch either of his two targets.
Over the course of the season, all of those players will be counted on. Jefferson is the No. 1 option, but if teams overcommit to stopping him, the Vikings have other players that Kirk Cousins can find.
"That’s the thing that I like about our offense," Jefferson said. "We move so much and we have so many players on our offense that you can’t really stick with one player."
All offseason, we heard about how excited Jefferson was to play in this offense under O'Connell — to be the Minnesota version of Kupp. It took just one half of football in 2022 to understand why. Jefferson has done some incredible things in his first two NFL seasons, but this offense looks like the perfect setting for him to keep ascending and pushing the limits of what's possible in year three.
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