What's happened to the Vikings' ability to create turnovers on defense?

Throughout the Kevin O'Connell era, the one statistic most closely correlated to wins and losses has been turnover margin.

That's a major indicative stat for every team, but it's felt especially true for the Vikings. Since 2022, when they at least break even in the turnover department, they've gone 33-5, including playoffs. Only the Chiefs and Eagles have a better winning percentage in such games in that span. When the Vikings lose the turnover margin, they're 5-20.

This season, the Vikings have lost the turnover battle six times, including in their most recent games against the Bears and Ravens. They're 1-5 in those contests. They've broken even in that department three times, winning two of them. And in ten games, they've won the turnover margin just once, when they forced five of them in a blowout win over the Bengals.

On the season, the Vikings' -9 turnover differential is the NFL's second-worst, ahead of only the 2-8 New York Jets.

Much has been made about Carson Wentz and J.J. McCarthy and an offense that has struggled to take care of the football. And rightfully so, as the Vikings are tied for the NFL lead with 13 interceptions thrown and are second with 18 total giveaways, behind only the Seahawks.

But the other side of the ball has played a significant role, too. A Vikings defense that was so successful in creating takeaways last season has just nine of them this year. And as mentioned earlier, they had five in one game back in Week 3. That means they've come up with four total takeaways in their nine other games combined.

Last year, the Vikings finished tied with the Steelers for the NFL lead in takeaways with 33. A season later, they're on pace to end up with just 15.

So, what's happened? Where have the takeaways gone? There's no clear and obvious answer, but there are several things we can point to in order to try to help explain it.

The easiest one would be the departure of Camryn Bynum, who had three interceptions and two fumble recoveries last season. Another big one is that the Vikings have spent more time trailing this season, which has led to fewer obvious passing situations. Last year, Vikings opponents passed the ball 63.3 percent of the time, the highest rate in the league. This year? Just 50.2 percent, the second-lowest rate in the league. Fewer passes leads to fewer opportunities for interceptions or strip-sacks.

The Vikings' turnover magic seems to have left with Cam Bynum. | Jeffrey Becker-Imagn Images

Another part of it is just random variance. It's hard to explain something like Byron Murphy Jr. going from six interceptions last year to none this year. Anecdotally, it feels like the Vikings have been close on a number of plays that haven't quite ended up as takeaways. In the Bears game alone, there were a few. There was a Chicago fumble deep in their own territory that was kicked around and then recovered by Rome Odunze. Dallas Turner was a half-second away from a pick-six, and he also had a tipped pass that landed just in front of Josh Metellus. Caleb Williams had a ball come loose late in the game that he was able to quickly scoop back up.

O'Connell believes that eventually, the takeaways will come.

"I think you just gotta keep playing," he said. "You gotta keep punching. You gotta keep raking, hammering, going at the football when ball carriers have it, getting population to the ball to see how many purple hats we can have arriving at the ball to have those opportunities, not only to punch it out, but then get it when it ends up on the ground, and then catch the ones they throw to us. If we do get one thrown our way, we gotta make that play.

"And then, the tips and overthrows have to — the law of averages should even out on those at some point. And we just gotta keep staying the course. It's much like the mindset of our whole team right now. They will come. You just gotta keep staying the course and reap the benefits of the harvest when they come by doing the right things along the way leading into it."

This will be a tough week to break out of the slump, as the Packers' seven giveaways this season are tied for fourth-fewest in the league.

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