The Vikings Need Byron Murphy Jr. to Lead Their Cornerback Room

Expect Murphy to see significant time at both outside corner and in the slot in 2023.

Cornerback Byron Murphy Jr. feels like one of the Vikings' most important players in the 2023 season. The headliner of the team's free agent haul in March, Murphy will step in as Minnesota's No. 1 cornerback following the departure of Patrick Peterson and essentially the rest of last season's CB room.

The Vikings need young players to step up at that position, whether it's second-year pros like Akayleb Evans and Andrew Booth Jr. or rookies like Mekhi Blackmon and Jay Ward. But they also need Murphy, their undisputed top corner, to have a big first year with his new team.

Selected in the second round back in 2019, Murphy was good but not great during his four seasons with the Cardinals. While PFF grades are far from a complete metric, his marks ranged from 59 to 67 over the past three seasons — or just a bit above average. 2022 was Murphy's best year in terms of tackling success rate, completion percentage on passes in his coverage, and penalty avoidance, so the Vikings are hoping the 25-year-old can continue improving as he enters his prime.

One notable thing that Murphy brings to Brian Flores' defense is versatility. During his Arizona tenure, he spent 49.7 percent of his nearly 3,500 defensive snaps at outside corner and 42.8 percent of those snaps in the slot, plus 253 snaps at non-CB alignments like box safety.

According to Vikings head coach Kevin O'Connell, Murphy will play on the outside in the team's base defense and slide inside frequently when they're in nickel.

"I think, as he's done in his career, recently in Arizona, you saw him in those base downs playing outside corner position, and then seamlessly transition inside to be one of the better nickels, in my opinion, in football," O'Connell said on Friday. "Byron's off to a great start (here). Every single day, you just get a feel for the type of movement skills he has, the experience he has in a wide variety of doing different jobs. You can tell he loves football, he's showing some real leadership traits as well."

If Murphy can take the next step towards being a consistently great inside-outside cornerback with the Vikings while also establishing himself as the leader of that room on and off the field, it would go a long way for the success of Flores' defense.

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