5 players the Vikings need to play well to beat the Bengals in Week 1

4.  RB Dalvin Cook

Cook’s first carry on Sunday will be his first carry in a game since Week 16 last season, as he missed Week 17 due to a personal matter and the Vikings held him out of preseason action. He’s the engine to the Vikings’ offense, off of which everything else succeeds or fails, so he has to hit the ground running against Cincinnati.

Cook is reportedly among the Vikings key players who is not vaccinated at this point. But that’s beside the point here, unless it becomes an issue before Sunday’s game. Cook has missed at least one game due to injury in each of his four NFL seasons, and if he hadn’t missed two games last year he surely would have reached 400 touches (356 touches in his 14 contests).

Cincinnati’s defense is not set up to offer a lot of resistance to Cook and the Vikings’ offense on Sunday. It’s worth wondering if he’ll have to ramp up to game shape with fewer snaps in Week 1, ceding more work to Alexander Mattison than might be expected.

Regardless of his raw snap count, Cook should easily get toward 20 touches against the Bengals. What he does with his touches, with no excuses for lack of preseason action or any possible conditioning shortcomings, will be critically important to the Vikings’ chances to win.