Report: Choosing McCarthy Over Darnold, Rodgers Led to Vikings GM's Firing

The timing of the Vikings' firing of general manager Kwesi Adofo-Mensah — 26 days after their season ended — raised a lot of eyebrows and questions about what spurred the decision when teams typically move on from general managers in the days immediately following a season.

While speculation ran rampant after the Jan. 30 announcement, a report from the NFL Scouting Combine suggests that the decision had everything to do with how Adofo-Mensah handled the quarterback situation last offseason.

"It's not because of paternity leave or his relationship with Kevin O'Connell," ESPN's Peter Schrager said Thursday morning from Indianapolis.

"They fired the GM because he had Sam Darnold, Daniel Jones, and an interested Aaron Rodgers in the building, and he said, no, we're good with J.J. (McCarthy), and Max Brosmer and Carson Wentz are gonna be his backups. They're not going to make the same mistake twice."

If that's true, then perhaps Vikings owners, Zygi and Mark Wilf, couldn't stomach moving forward with Adofo-Mensah after watching Darnold lead the Seahawks to the Super Bowl. Adofo-Mensah was officially fired five days after Darnold led Seattle to the Super Bowl. Nine days later, Darnold and the Seahawks beat the Patriots and hoisted the Lombardi Trophy.

“They fired the GM because he had Sam Darnold, Daniel Jones, and an interested Aaron Rodgers in the building, and he said, no, we're good with JJ and Max Brosmer and Carson Wentz are gonna be his backups.”

- @PSchrags on Kwesi’s firing as Vikings GM

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— The Purple Persuasion (@TPPSkol) February 26, 2026

Adofo-Mensah was part of the team's season-ending press conferences on Jan. 13, which was four days before Darnold began his playoff march, and he was representing the Vikings at the Senior Bowl practices Jan. 27-29 before getting the axe.

According to Adam Schefter, "there was talk about an underlying 'tension' in the Vikings' building." He cited a league source who claimed it got "ugly" in Minnesota.

Purple Insider's Matthew Coller suggested that Adofo-Mensah's relationship with the organization began to fracture in 2023, and it became known in NFL circles to the point that other potential general managers were preparing for the Vikings' job to open.

"There were other executives around the league, in 2023 into 2024, who were preparing their applications, who were preparing their resumes, who were getting their agents ready to go to the Minnesota Vikings to present their clients as potential general manager fits," Coller said on his podcast. "It's not some scandal or anything; it's more of just a communication connection between him, the rest of the front office, the belief from the coaching staff, and the rest of the front office."

Earlier this week, Adofo-Mensah landed a front office job with the San Francisco 49ers, where he'll have a role in the personnel department. Meanwhile, O'Connel and Rob Brzezinski, the 28-year Vikings employee who is serving as the interim GM on top of his natural role as the executive vice president of football operations, have praised Adofo-Mensah since arriving in Indianapolis for the Combine.

"His relationship with myself, and mine with him, is always going to be important to me. It was always strong, and it will maintain that strength long after we're done working together. That's what we try to do here," O'Connell told Vikings Entertainment Network's Tatum Everett.

Brzezinski echoed O'Connell: "We all loved Kwesi. He had a profound impact on our organization, so that change was hard."

No matter how you slice it, Adofo-Mensah is gone. The Vikings felt the move was justified, and now the franchise's fate is in the hands of O'Connell and Brzezinski, who are tasked with overcoming limited cap space and a murky quarterback situation to get the team back to the playoffs in 2026.