Vikings defense on pace to do something NFL hasn't seen in 17 years

There was a lot that linebacker Blake Cashman had to unlearn after signing with the Minnesota Vikings. The principles of defense he learned growing up in Eden Prairie and refined while playing for the Gophers might as well have been a different language. Even what he did with the New York Jets and Houston Texans after reaching the NFL wasn t applicable. The exotic scheme defensive coordinator Brian Flores deploys was unlike anything Cashman had seen. He was lost trying to pick it up. It wasn t until the Vikings traveled to Berea, Ohio, in August 2024 for joint practices against the Cleveland Browns that he started to understand why it was going to work. I needed some real reps to see it come to life, Cashman said. I saw the frustration and the stress that it causes. It has hit a different level lately as the Vikings have established themselves as the best defense in the NFL with a pathway to potentially enter the conversation among the best defenses of all time.