Vikings’ sneakiest big move of the offseason? The late-night trade for RB Jordan Mason
Alec Lewis
The game had just ended, and here Jordan Mason came, weaving through the tunnels toward the San Francisco 49ers’ locker room.
A massive “SC Top 10” pendant dangled from his neck. One of the television cameramen filming this walk lobbed a question: “How does it feel? Week 1, and you got the dub.”
“I feel great, man,” Mason responded. “I feel blessed. I’ve been working for this moment.”
Next to him, a teammate hollered, “That boy a dog!” The camera panned to future Hall of Fame tackle Trent Williams, who was minutes removed from an on-field interview filled with praise of Mason.
Last fall, the third-year running back started the regular-season opener in the place of the injured Christian McCaffrey. Mason posted 147 rushing yards on “Monday Night Football” against the New York Jets. Williams swore it wasn’t a fluke, and the next week validated his opinion.
The 49ers flew to Minnesota and squared off against one of the NFL’s best defenses. San Francisco lost that afternoon to the Vikings, but Mason made an impression. He ran for 100 yards on 20 carries, pressing the edge constantly, then hop-stepping his way into cuts in ways that had the Vikings players and staff raving about the performance afterward in the locker room.
Who is that dude? Where did he come from? Why hasn’t anyone heard of him until now?
It’s no wonder the Vikings sprang at the opportunity to trade for him in March.
Minnesota finalized the move late Saturday night after a whale of a week to open free agency. The team had spent more than $100 million on new players for the trenches, and rightfully, the signings of guard Will Fries, center Ryan Kelly and defensive tackles Jonathan Allen and Javon Hargrave occupied the headlines (along with the quarterback conversation).
The Vikings didn’t need to spend meaningful resources on another running back. They had re-signed veteran Aaron Jones, and the NFL Draft class provided plenty of intriguing prospects. If Mason, then a restricted free agent, had not surfaced as a possible option, the Vikings would’ve likely prioritized a late-round running back. His availability intrigued Minnesota’s brass for reasons beyond his performance in Week 2.
First, there are the advanced statistics. Next Gen Stats developed a metric using player-tracking data to assess the degree to which running backs generate more yards than expected. In 2024, Derrick Henry ranked first, followed by Saquon Barkley. Who trailed them at No. 3? Mason. He forced missed tackles at a rate comparable to Henry. His rushing yards after contact reside among the league’s best.
Vikings general manager Kwesi Adofo-Mensah has said that running back production is about as difficult to parse as at any position. The ground game hinges on offensive line success. Scheme and run-game design are integral, too. However, Mason checks all the data boxes to determine the future impact.
Then there’s everything else — the answers to these questions: Who is that dude? Where’d he come from? Why hasn’t anyone heard of him until now?
It seems impossible these days, but some talent still slips through the cracks. Maybe evaluators are too focused on speed over feel. Maybe coaches rely too heavily on prospect camps. Mason grew up in the heart of the South, about 30 minutes north of Nashville. Yet for a time, the only Division I college offer he received came from the University of Texas-San Antonio.
Andy McCollum, who in the late 2010s recruited small-town Tennessee high schools for Georgia Tech, couldn’t understand. He pulled Mason out of a cooking class at Gallatin High. Mason “yes, sir”-ed his way through questions in the hallway. Teachers later confirmed that the well-mannered youngster was a solid student in addition to his exceptional football abilities. McCollum relayed the report to then-Georgia Tech head coach Paul Johnson, who peppered him.
“Who else is recruiting him?” Johnson asked McCollum.
“Well, nobody.”
“Why not? What’s wrong with him?”
“Nothing.”
Johnson almost grunted, not satisfied with the responses. It wasn’t enough that Mason ran for 2,050 yards and 23 touchdowns as a high school senior despite defenses putting nine defenders in the box against him. It wasn’t enough that the only player to beat him out for Mr. Football was a rangy receiver named Tee Higgins. It wasn’t enough to hear stories about Mason running for more than 200 yards while sniffling between plays with the flu during one game for Gallatin, then visiting an urgent care afterward to receive an IV.
It wasn’t even enough after McCollum convinced Johnson to sign Mason. First, Georgia Tech recruited Dontae Smith, then it coveted Jamious Griffin. As if those two weren’t acceptable, even as Mason ran for 899 yards and averaged 5.2 yards per carry as a sophomore, the Yellow Jackets went after another running back, Jahmyr Gibbs. Indeed, even current Georgia Tech coach Brent Key considers it close to embarrassing that a team with Mason and Gibbs in the backfield finished 3-9.
“Them two jokers together were unbelievable,” said Tashard Choice, then Georgia Tech’s running backs coach.
As the 2022 draft approached, Key, Choice and others begged NFL coaches and scouts to take a chance on Mason.
Go back and watch a Thursday night game from early in Mason’s career, they’d say. It was fourth-and-2. Georgia Tech had called a timeout. Amid a huddle near the sideline, Mason urged the coaches: “Give me the ball.” He took an up-the-middle carry that initially looked stonewalled, but Mason churned his feet and somehow wiggled his way across the first-down marker.
Go back and watch a Duke game from later in Mason’s career, they’d say. Mason noticed a linebacker creeping toward the line of scrimmage. He shouldered pass-protection responsibilities for the play, and in practice, coaches challenged the running backs to wave at the blitzers pre-snap as a display of confidence. So Mason did it. The linebacker nodded. They collided in the “A” gap, Mason flattened him, and they dapped up after the play.
Coaches like Key and Choice raved about Mason’s vision and processing. The only way to describe it was to think of a putt-putt course with a windmill. The putter has to hit the ball at the perfect time for it not to get sideswiped, just as the running back has to hit the hole while defenders float toward him like a tidal wave. The best backs don’t just see the hole, but they cut and climb at the precisely correct times. Mason had a knack for this, they said. Yet nobody in the NFL seemed to care.
They asked about his 40-yard dash time. It maddened Choice, who at least took solace in the fact that Mason landed at arguably the best place an undrafted running back could land. Mason played sparingly in his first couple of seasons, but eventually McCaffrey dubbed him “Mariano Rivera,” the 49er whose sheer presence meant the victory had been secured.
Last year’s opportunity, combined with growth that both Mason and legendary 49ers running backs coach Bobby Turner talked about at length, caught the attention of teams like the Vikings. They viewed the exchange of a fifth-round pick for a 26-year-old with minimal tread on the tires as a no-brainer.
Still, the deal was overshadowed by everything else the Vikings had done. Even now, the focus is elsewhere, but Mason couldn’t care less.
He knows it won’t be long before he’s ripping through another defense. It won’t be long until his team’s most accomplished players are left to do the talking for him afterward, hollering some iteration of what those who get to watch him daily always come to believe: That boy a dog!
(Photo: Stephen Maturen / Getty Images)
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