DeeJay Dallas barely had time to unpack before the Vikings started leaning on him.
Signed to the practice squad on Sept. 2, just 11 days before the season opener, Dallas has moved fast from late arrival to a player Minnesota may need in a bigger way Sunday against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. With Jordan Mason on injured reserve and Aaron Jones Sr. dealing with a minor knee injury, the running back room suddenly looks a lot thinner.
The trust piece came early. Less than a day after Dallas was elevated from the practice squad, offensive coordinator Wes Phillips pulled him aside during pregame warmups.
“I’m glad to have you and I trust you completely,” said Phillips on Sept. 15, recounting the moment.
Dallas said the comment “meant the world” to him.
That trust showed up immediately in the opener. Dallas played six offensive snaps, all on third downs, and added 19 snaps on special teams in the Vikings’ comeback win over the Packers. He followed that with eight offensive snaps against the Bears in Week 2, when Jones handled most of the work on the ground.
In Chicago, Dallas had two carries for eight yards and caught a 12-yard pass. He also stayed busy on special teams, logging 15 snaps there in Week 2.
That phase of the game may have been where he made his biggest early mark. Dallas delivered a key block on Myles Price’s 68-yard kickoff return against Green Bay, a play teammates described as one of the biggest momentum swings in the win.
“It opened right up for me,” said Price postgame in the locker room. “Shout out DeeJay. Had a huge block over there to help set it up perfect.”
Dallas also has a photo connection that has turned into a bit of a running joke. It’s a reference to NHL player Brandon Tanev, whom Dallas connected with while in Seattle. Dallas said he hopes opposing teams show the picture in meetings.
“Teams probably will look at it and say, ‘Oh, this guy is making a joke,’” Dallas told reporters Thursday. “I’m not making a joke.
I’m serious. I’m so serious.”
His path to Minnesota started after a change in Jacksonville. Dallas spent the offseason and training camp with the Jaguars, then re-signed with them in February after a short stint there at the end of the 2025 season. When Jacksonville waived him on Aug. 31, the Vikings front office came calling.
General Manager Nolan Teasley and assistant GM Trent Kirchner both knew Dallas from their time with the Seahawks, where they drafted him in the fourth round in 2020.
Dallas said he leaned on advice from family while sorting through the move.
“My uncle, I consider him a wise man, and he told me, ‘You gotta kind of expect opportunity out of adversity,’ ” Dallas said. “What that means is, yeah I got cut, but there’s 31 other teams. ... [I] just found a home here.”
Part of why that home came together quickly is Dallas already had relationships inside the Vikings’ running back room. He knew Mason from training together when Mason was preparing for the draft in 2022, and he had developed a friendship with Jones after competing against him for years.
“I told [Jones] when I first got here, ‘Bro, I never thought we were gonna be teammates,’ ” Dallas said. “We go way back.”
The playbook, at least by Dallas’ account, came together quickly too. Asked last week how much of the Vikings offense he knew, he answered:
“All of it,” Dallas said. “Most of it.
Like 98 percent. I know there’s some stuff that I probably don’t know, but I’ll continue to work at it.”
Dallas said he views the learning curve as “part of the process,” and pointed to lessons he picked up early in his Seattle days from Russell Wilson, Bobby Wagner and K.J. Wright.
Phillips said Dallas was already in the film room with running backs coach Curtis Modkins the night he arrived, focusing on protections. The thinking was that once that part was handled, the rest would follow.
Special teams coordinator Matt Daniels has noticed the same thing from a different angle. With C.J. Ham retired after last season, the Vikings lost a veteran voice in those units, and Daniels said Dallas has already started filling that space.
“There’s a level of trust that’s already being built amongst him and the punt unit. ... He’s kind of just this calming voice, really kind of the poise in the noise, and he brings a physicality and play style that really fits being a Vikings player,” Daniels said.
“He epitomizes that. Tough, loves football and he’s a really good teammate.”
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The loss of Jefferson changes the entire shape of Minnesotas offense, because so much of the passing game is built around his ability to stretch coverage and create answers when the pocket gets messy. Even with Kyler Murray back after going through concussion protocol, the Vikings were forced to move forward without the player who usually gives the quarterback his safest and most explosive target, and that is a problem with bigger implications than one game. [Read more 🡒]