There will be plenty of training camp competitions amongst the Minnesota Vikings in July and August, particularly concerning positions like cornerback, tight end, punter, kicker, and wide receiver, to mention a few.
Meet the Powerful Roster Bubble Player for the Vikings
Another will take place at safety, which is actually just code for Lewis Cine, the dominant member of the Vikings’ roster bubble insignia.
26 months have passed since the Vikings selected Cine as the first selection of the Kwesi Adofo-Mensah + Kevin O’Connell era, and during that time, the team’s supporters had wished for Baltimore Ravens safety Kyle Hamilton. In fact, some people refuse to leave draft bygones be draft bygones; in fact, that’s all they speak about.
Four games into his debut season in 2022, Cine fractured his leg and was forced to recover before joining the team the next year. The young defender had high expectations going into last summer, but as training camp and the preseason approached, it became obvious that Cine was operating with players who were clearly reservists.
After that, the 2023 season began, and during garbage time in a blowout at home against the Green Bay Packers, Cine witnessed eight pitiful defensive plays. That concluded Cine’s second year, save for any action involving special teams.
Now, Cine might be moved for a late-round draft selection, make the regular season roster in 2024, or face a roster cut at the end of August. The stakes are those. He is the Vikings roster bubble candidate overall due to a combination of his first-round selection stock, injury history, high expectations from the past, and general misunderstanding about his potential among observers.
This week, Vikings.com also revealed a little bit more about Cine’s 2024 initiatives. “Cine participated in a lot of repetitions during the sessions held last week to wrap out the offseason program, along with other players who stayed in Minnesota. He has largely been training with the development groups on a field apart from the first squad until last week, according to Craig Peters. “I didn’t observe too much of what was going on among the developmental field since we can’t watch and cover two fields at once very well.
That seems like the complete opposite of a former first-round pick who is about to take over as a starter or even secure a spot on the roster.
The previous week,
Cine has been deemed a “make or break” player by the Draft Network. As a first-round selection in 2022, Cine remains at the top of the class that is on the verge of becoming historically poor. To be fair, Adofo-Mensah performed better in 2023, Justin Meloo of TDN stated, adding wide receiver Jordan Addison to an already outstanding supporting group. “The icing on the cake would be Cine realizing his potential this season and rewriting the narrative based on Adofo-Mensah’s first draft.”
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