Sherman Lewis, whose long coaching career included 12 seasons as an NFL offensive coordinator, has died at the age of 83.
Lewis was an All-American halfback at Michigan State, and in 1963 he finished third in Heisman Trophy voting. He also won three Big Ten titles in track and field.
Although he was drafted by both the NFL and the AFL in 1964, he chose to begin his professional playing career in the CFL with the Toronto Argonauts. He would later play in the AFL for the Jets in 1966 and 1967, seeing most of his action as a punt and kickoff returner.
In 1969, after his playing career ended, Lewis returned to Michigan State to begin his coaching career. He was an assistant for the Spartans for 13 years before Bill Walsh hired him to work on the 49ers’ coaching staff in 1983. Lewis stayed in San Francisco for nine seasons.
In 1992, 49ers assistant Mike Holmgren was hired as head coach of the Packers, and Holmgren hired Lewis to be his offensive coordinator, a role Lewis filled for Holmgren’s entire tenure in Green Bay.
After eight years as the Packers’ offensive coordinator, Lewis spent two years as the Vikings’ offensive coordinator and two more years as the Lions’ offensive coordinator. His final season of coaching took place in Washington in 2009.
Vikings Clips
NFL Network lost its schedule-release show. It’s nevertheless gaining a late-season Saturday doubleheader.
In Week 16, on the day after Christmas, NFLN will televise a game at 4:30 p.m. ET and 8:00 p.m. ET.
The schedule identifies four potential games for the two slots: Buccaneers-Falcons, Bengals-Colts, Commanders-Vikings, and Panthers Steelers.
The decision as to which games will slide from Sunday to Saturday will be made during the season.
Coupled with a Thursday night game and three Christmas Day games, Week 16 will have 10 total windows — one more than Thanksgiving week. That leaves only eight games to be played on the Saturday afternoon windows.
There’s one less name for the Vikings to consider for their General Manager opening.
Albert Breer of SI.com reports that Chargers assistant GM Chad Alexander has declined the team’s request for an interview. Per the report, Alexander is comfortable with his spot in the Chargers’ front office and wants to remain on hand through the 2026 season.
Alexander is in his third year working under GM Joe Hortiz with the Chargers. He worked for the Jets and the Ravens — where Hortiz also worked — before joining the Chargers.
In addition to internal candidate and acting GM Rob Brzezinski, the Vikings have also requested interviews with Lions assistant GM Ray Agnew, Broncos assistant GM Reed Burckhardt, Dolphins assistant GM Kyle Smith 49ers assistant GM RJ Gillen, Bills assistant GM Terrance Gray, Rams assistant GM John McKay, Seahawks assistant GM Nolan Teasely and Titans assistant GM Dave Ziegler.
Vikings receiver Justin Jefferson had a consistent starting quarterback for his first four seasons in Kirk Cousins.
While Sam Darnold played well for the Vikings in 2024, Minnesota started three QBs in 2025 with mainly poor results: J.J. McCarthy, Carson Wentz, and Max Brosmer. Minnesota went 9-8 last season, but the quarterbacks combined to throw for just 2,802 yards with 17 touchdowns and 21 interceptions on a 61.4 percent completion rate (running back Cam Akers also had a 32-yard touchdown pass).
That level of play is part of why Jefferson finished with just 1,048 yards and two touchdowns, despite playing all 17 games. The only other time in his career he finished with fewer than 1,400 yards was in 2023, when he appeared in just 10 games.
The Vikings signed Kyler Murray in free agency, and he’s widely expected to be the team’s Week 1 starter. But McCarthy, Wentz, and Brosmer are all back — and ostensibly all have eyes on that QB1 spot.
In a Friday interview with NFL Network’s Good Morning Football, Jefferson was asked what he’d like to see from Minnesota’s QB derby this offseason.
“Just competition, for real,” Jefferson said. “Just to see who’s going to be that last man standing, who’s going to be that dog, who’s going to be that leader to carry us throughout this season — because that’s definitely a missing piece that we’re looking for and something that’s very important to our team, which is the quarterback spot. So just seeing that competition, battle — seeing those guys come every single day leading the team and trying to spark, especially the offense, is definitely something I’m looking forward to. And just going out there and just connecting with any quarterback who’s throwing the ball, that’s the main, important thing this training camp.”
No matter who ends up starting this year, Jefferson would like to have a consistent QB1 throwing him passes for years to come.
“Yeah, that’s definitely something that is… I want that, for sure,” Jefferson said. “It’s definitely difficult for those types of things to happen. But just like me being with Kirk for those first four years of my career, just building on that connection, building on that relationship, that’s something that’s unbroken. That’s something that you just don’t find anywhere.
“So it definitely would be great to have a quarterback — the same quarterback — for these next couple years going down the line. But we already know that’s something that’s very difficult to do in this league. But for sure, to keep on that quarterback for these next couple years, and build that relationship, and create that spark, that’s definitely the plan.”
In his six stellar seasons, Jefferson has recorded 579 receptions for 8,480 yards with 42 touchdowns.
We don’t know if Fernando Mendoza will be starting at quarterback for the Raiders in Week 1 of the regular season, but we do know who the Raiders will be playing in the first overall pick’s potential debut.
The NFL’s schedule reveal on Thursday night shows that the Raiders will host the Dolphins at 4:25 p.m. ET on Sunday, September 13. The game will be on Fox.
Mendoza will have to get the nod over Kirk Cousins in order to start for the Raiders. Offseason addition Malik Willis is expected to make his first appearance for the Dolphins. Both teams will definitely have head coaches making their offseason debut as Las Vegas hired Klint Kubiak in February and Miami hired Jeff Hafley in January.
Sunday will also feature a pair of divisional games in the late afternoon window. The Packers will visit the Vikings while the Commanders will be in Philadelphia to renew their acquaintance with the Eagles. The NFC North matchup will be on CBS while the NFC East clash will be broadcast by Fox.
The other late game on Sunday afternoon will see the Cardinals visiting the Chargers on CBS. Arizona could have Jacoby Brissett, Gardner Minshew or rookie Carson Beck at quarterback for that contest.
The 1 p.m. ET games will send the Bills to Houston for a date with the Texans while the Browns go on the road against the Jaguars. The Colts will host the Ravens, the Saints will visit the Lions, the Buccaneers will travel to Cincinnati for Dexter Lawrence’s first game as a Bengal, and the Steelers will kick off the Mike McCarthy era — with or without Aaron Rodgers — at home against the Falcons.
Previous reports revealed that the Jets will be in Tennessee and that the Bears will head to Charlotte to face the Panthers. The Jets-Titans game will be on CBS along with the Bills-Texans, Ravens-Colts and Browns-Jaguars games. All the other 1 p.m. games will be on Fox.
The entire Week 1 slate will kick off on Wednesday, September 9 with a Patriots-Seahawks Super Bowl rematch in Seattle on NBC. Thursday will bring a Netflix game between the 49ers and Rams in the NFL’s first game in Melbourne and Sunday night will find the Cowboys at MetLife Stadium to meet the Giants on NBC’s Sunday Night Football. Those games were all announced ahead of Thursday’s full schedule reveal, which was also the case for the ESPN Monday night game between the Broncos and Chiefs in Kansas City.
All of the international matchups for the 2026 NFL season were announced on Wednesday morning.
We already knew the first two games on the schedule. The 49ers and Rams will meet in the NFL’s first-ever game in Melbourne, Australia in Week 1 while the Ravens and Cowboys will head to Brazil to play a game in Rio in Week 3.
There will be three straight weeks of games in London kicking off the next week. The Colts will face the Commanders at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in Week 4 and the Eagles and Jaguars will square off in the same place the next week. The Jaguars will stay in London to take on the Texans at Wembley Stadium in Week 6.
From there, it will be on to Paris for the first time in league history. The Steelers will battle the Saints at Stade de France in Week 7.
The Bengals-Falcons matchup in Madrid in Week 9 was announced earlier this week and it will be followed by a Patriots-Lions clash at Allianz Arena in Munich the next weekend. The NFL’s return to Mexico City will come in Week 11 when the Vikings and the 49ers square off on Sunday Night Football.
NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell has talked about his desire to see the league play international games each week and the NFL is moving closer to that goal in 2026.
The Vikings requested interviews with Lions assistant General Manager Ray Agnew, Broncos assistant GM Reed Burckhardt and Dolphins assistant GM Kyle Smith for their General Manager job, Tom Pelissero of NFL Media reports.
Agnew joined the Lions in 2021 when Brad Holmes became the GM. He was previously with the Rams as director of player personnel.
Burckhardt became the Broncos’ director of player personnel in 2022, but spent 13 years with the Vikings as a pro scout before that.
Smith is in his first year with the Dolphins, but held the same role with the Falcons from 2023-25. He worked his way up in the Commanders’ organization from 2010-20, becoming vice president of player personnel before leaving for the same job with the Falcons in 2021.
The team now has nine external candidates plus internal candidate Rob Brzezinski.
Chargers assistant GM Chad Alexander, 49ers assistant GM RJ Gillen, Bills assistant GM Terrance Gray, Rams assistant GM John McKay, Seahawks assistant GM Nolan Teasely and Titans assistant GM Dave Ziegler are the other candidates.
Adrian Peterson had an eventful trip to the Vikings’ facility last week.
Peterson thought he was in town to speak to the team’s rookies ahead of their minicamp, but the Vikings had something to share with him. While Peterson was filming content for the team’s website, former Viking John Randle entered the room and showed Peterson a display that revealed he has been elected to the franchise’s Ring of Honor.
Peterson was the seventh pick of the 2007 draft and he spent 10 years with the Vikings. Peterson led the league in rushing three times during that stint, including a 2,097-yard season in 2012 that ranks as the second-best single-season effort in NFL history. He was named the league MVP that year and is the last non-quarterback to win the award.
Peterson, who is the Vikings’ all-time leader in rushing yards and rushing touchdowns, also set the NFL record for single-game rushing yards by busting loose for 296 yards in a 2007 game. He will also be eligible for election to the Pro Football Hall of Fame for the first time in 2027, so there could be back-to-back honors for Peterson in the near future.
The Vikings have officially added a pair of young defensive players.
Minnesota announced on Monday that the club has signed defensive lineman Smith Vilbert and linebacker Bangally Kamara.
Both Vilibert and Kamara had participated in Minnesota’s rookie minicamp on a tryout basis.
Vilbert split his time in college between Penn State and North Carolina, playing for the Tar Heels in 2025. Kamara began his collegiate career at Pitt before transferring to South Carolina and finishing his time at Kansas last season.
The Vikings have added quarterback Kyler Murray to a depth chart that includes 2024 first-rounder J.J. McCarthy. So who will win the starting job?
It’s all TBD.
“They envision it being a true competition: Kyler Murray versus J.J. McCarthy,” Tom Pelissero of NFL Network recently said on The Rich Eisen Show, via NFL.com. “And both these guys are going to go into this believing they’re gonna win this job. I don’t know frankly how friendly that quarterback room is going to be. It’s going to be a very competitive quarterback room.
“From everything that I’ve understood, it is truly wide open. They’re keeping an open mind as a coaching staff.”
A “true competition” favors Murray, in our view. He’s more accomplished. More proven. All things equal, he should be able to win the job.
For McCarthy to win it, he’ll need to step up. Ball out. Outplay the first overall pick in the 2019 draft. The player who was named offensive rookie of the year before making it to the Pro Bowl in 2020 and 2021.
Even if McCarthy wins the job, he’ll need to hold it. That means staying healthy. He has missed all of his rookie year due to a preseason knee injury. In 2025, he missed seven games.
A “true competition” will help both get ready to play. Chances are they both will.
The question becomes when the competition will end. At some point, the Vikings need to get their starter ready for the regular season. Which means getting him all of the first-team practice reps, sooner than later.
And one key factor in the competition is the opinion of the locker room. If one player stands out over the other, the rest of the players will know. And they’ll expect that guy to be the guy.
