T.J. Hockenson injury update: Vikings TE ahead of schedule, Kevin O’Connell puts doubt in Week 1 availability

Minnesota Vikings tight end T.J. Hockenson was enjoying a monster 2023 season before it unfortunately came to an untimely end. He caught 95 passes for 960 yards and five touchdowns across the team’s first 15 games, only to tear his ACL during a Week 16 loss against the Detroit Lions.

Hockenson said earlier this offseason the team did not yet have a firm timeline for his return, but head coach Kevin O’Connell told reporters on Friday that the tight end is ahead of where they thought he would be at this point in his rehab process.

“Every time I see him working on the side field, it becomes awfully tempting to corner [executive director of player health and performance] Tyler Williams somewhere in the building and demand answers on when we’ll be able to start implementing him off the PUP and get him a little bit of work,” O’Connell said. 

“Whether it’s just simply individual, some routes on air, start getting him some timing with our quarterbacks. But where he’s at, albeit very well ahead of maybe where some of the medical folks thought he would be, there is an injury there that, a timeline exists. And we’re going to stay true to that while also giving him [opportunities] to push to maybe shrink that timeline a little bit.”

That said, O’Connell isn’t getting ahead of himself, and when asked if he was considering the possibility that Hockenson could be ready for the start of the 2024 season, he quickly shot it down. 

“No. Not yet. No,” O’Connell said. “I don’t think it would be responsible at this point, with where he’s at in his rehab, to start thinking about, ‘Are we gonna have him? Are we not?’ I want him thinking about what he can control, which is what he’s done an unbelievable job of so far, which is just his daily mission of attacking this thing one day at a time.”

Hockenson tore his ACL on Dec. 24, but did not get surgery until Jan. 29 as he had to wait several weeks for the swelling in his knee to subside. The prospect of him potentially being available in the first week of September seems highly unlikely — especially considering his importance to the team and the size of his contract. The Vikings will likely get Hockenson to peak health before getting him back on the field, and that could take until several weeks into the regular season.