The topic of pure progression has been a major talking point across the NFL this season.
In an attempt to explain what pure progression is in its most basic form, head coach Kevin O’Connell talked about how he recently showed the Vikings a few clips from a game plan put together by defensive coordinator Brian Flores.
Minnesota Vikings head coach Kevin O’Connell talks with Minnesota Vikings quarterback J.J. McCarthy (9) between plays in the fourth quarter of an NFL football game against the Washington Commanders at U.S. Bank Stadium in Minneapolis on Sunday, Dec, 7, 2025. (John Autey / Pioneer Press)
If somebody were to pause the tape at random while the quarterback was dropping back to pass, O’Connell noted that it would be nearly impossible to decipher which coverage Flores had his players in at any given moment.
That’s how good a lot of defenses have gotten at disguise. Not only do they shape shift before the snap, they shape shift after the snap. The goal is making sure the quarterback doesn’t know the coverage until it’s too late.
That’s what pure progression attempts to combat.
It’s rooted in giving quarterbacks less to think about when they drop back to pass. They are given a set of reads that dictate where to go with the ball, rather than having them read coverages in the heat of battle.
If the first read is open, the quarterback throws the ball to the receiver. If the first read is not open, the quarterback progresses to the second read. And so on.
“You attack voids and vacancies based upon the way the play is set up,” O’Connell said. “There’s a lot of layers to that, and it takes a lot of time to talk about.”
The pros and cons of pure progression have been discussed at length while young quarterback J.J. McCarthy has struggled to adapt to the highest level. There are some people that believe it’s the best way to go about it because theoretically it always lead a quarterback to an open receiver. Others believe it stunts the development while opening the door for more catastrophic plays.
Asked to explain what he thinks pure progression is at its core, McCarthy replied, “It’s a great way to have an answer against every single coverage.” His understanding of the concept hasn’t yet translated to sustained success.
Maybe that’s not all on McCarthy considering to the way veteran quarterback Kirk Cousins recently described pure progression. He got familiar with it while playing for the Vikings and had a lot to say about it now that he plays for the Atlanta Falcons.
“I can get on this soapbox,” Cousins told reporters. “Because I lived the jump.”
As he reflected on his career as a whole, Cousins went deep into how he learned the position almost exclusively through the lens of having to read coverages. He would go through something of a checklist before the snap — mostly taking into account where the safeties were lining up — then figure out where to go with the ball after the snap.
“Then what happened was defenses got so good at disguising it, and I would be so stressed going into games,” Cousins said. “The whole game plan is built on if it’s single high or split safety, and I can’t see if it’s single high or split safety.”
The implementation of pure progression under O’Connell helped relieve some of that stress Cousins was feeling. That doesn’t mean it was easy for him to grasp a new way of operating the offense.
“It was like, ‘Whoa,’ ” Cousins said. “It was a lot in my mind. I’m used to kind of simplifying it and cutting the field in half. I had to kind of work through that and get to where that was more natural.”
As difficult as it was for Cousins in the early stages, once he got used to pure progression, he started to see the benefits.
“You’re not stressing as much during the week about, ‘What if I can’t see coverage?’ ” Cousins said. “You say, ‘Well, it’s OK, I don’t have to see coverage.’ It’s more after the snap, ‘Where are they going?’ I can kind of progress through from there.”
There have been bright spots for McCarthy over the past couple of games that suggest he getting more comfortable with pure progression. He was solid in the win over the Washington Commanders, then followed it up with even better performance in the win over the Dallas Cowboys.
“I thought there were some great examples of decision making from J.J. trying to activate some play passes down the field,” O’Connell said. “We wanted to try to stay balanced enough to allow those explosives to come our way and we were able to do that.”
Minnesota Vikings quarterback J.J. McCarthy runs into the end zone for a touchdown during the first half of an NFL football game against the Dallas Cowboys Sunday, Dec. 14, 2025, in Arlington, Texas. (AP Photo/Julio Cortez)
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