This doesn’t seem to be in line with what the Vikings have been trying to do this offseason by getting younger. Henderson is well past his prime and has a hard time staying healthy since he broke his femur in 2009. As it stands now, Jasper Brinkley is set to replace Henderson but he is coming off a hip injury that sidelined him last year. Depth at linebacker is still a bit cloudy but I still question whether E.J. is still in the Vikings plans next year.

Vikings Roster Moves

The Vikings continue with some more shuffling of the roster. Vikings cut ties with defensive back C.C. Whitlock, an UDFA from South Carolina. Also, after placing a waiver claim on offensive lineman Kevin Murphy, the Vikings released him after reportedly failing a physical.

After the two releases, offensive lineman Levi Horn was added to the roster. Horn played for the Bears last season even though most of his time was spent on the practice squad. Horn is 25 years old, listed at 6’7, 315 lbs and played college ball for Montana.

Vikings current roster is at 89 and they are allowed to carry 90 players at this point in the off-season.

Vikings turn down HBO’s Hard Knocks

Judd Zulgad reported that the Vikings turned down an offer to be featured on HBO’s series called Hard Knocks which goes in depth of a teams training camp. Vikings also turned down the same offer last year.

Would of been nice to get to see an extended look at what happens in Mankato but have to understand why the Vikings would turn down the circus of cameras and media following them around.

Coming off a 3-13 season and many new faces are set to start or contribute this year, an extra week can only benefit the players and coaches.

Defensive End, Nick Reed (6’1, 248 lbs.) who played college ball at Oregon and has been with the Seahawks, Bears and Bucs in his 2 years of the NFL. Reed got some playing time as a rookie with the Seahawks playing in 16 games while totaling 17 tackles, 1 sacks and 2 pass deflections. He also appeared in 10 games for the Bears and Bucs but made little impact during that time.

Vikings also used a waiver claim on offensive lineman, Kevin Murphy(6’7, 295 lbs.). Murphy is a product of Harvard who went undrafted. The 49ers picked up Murphy after the draft but released him after his short stint with the team.

To make room for these two, the Vikings waived offensive tackle, Jose Valdez and defensive end Kevin Cyrille. Spielman continues to shape the camp roster by trying to find more talent to come in and compete this offseason.

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The bill was signed to cheers during a ceremony attened by Vikings owners and key legislators.

The existing Metrodome site will be used for the new stadium

The Vikings will pay just under half the cost of the $975 million project. The state of Minnesota and city of Minneapolis will share the remaining costs.

State lawmakers approved the bill last week out of concern that the team might leave the state unless it got a new stadium. The Vikings will sign a 30-year lease to remain at the site.

The next step will be for the 13-member Minneapolis City Council to give its approval.

Adams signed a reserve/futures contract earlier this offseason but was a long shot to make the roster. According to Jeremy Fowler, Adams agent said the Vikings cut Adams now to give him a chance to find work elsewhere.

The roster spot the Vikings gained in releasing Adams was given to UDFA OG Tyler Holmes (6’5, 308 lbs.) out of Tulsa.

JON KRAWCZYNSKI, AP Sports Writer

The Metrodome always felt like a rental property for Zygi and Mark Wilf, two New Jersey real estate developers who purchased the Vikings in 2005 with the hopes of moving out of the place as quickly as possible.

Now the Wilf brothers will have a home of their own, hopefully by the 2016 season.

One day after winning their seven-year fight for a new stadium, the Vikings owners started to lay out their vision for the $975 million project they hope will serve as a recruiting tool for free agents for decades.

They appear to be leaning toward footing the bill for a retractable roof, which could help them bring a Major League Soccer franchise to Minnesota. They also see a stadium and plaza with cutting-edge technology and lots of open spaces for fans to congregate.

“We’re going to try to get the maximum number of features within the budgets that we can make this a facility that is going to be exciting to the fans,” Mark Wilf said Friday. “We know it’s a competitive landscape to attract our fans to the facility and we’re going to want to make it something special. To the extent that (a retractable roof) can get there, we’re going to try to do it.”

The Vikings and the NFL are contributing $477 million toward the project, with $348 million coming from the state and $150 million from Minneapolis. If the Wilfs want a retractable roof, they will have to fork over even more money. State lawmakers put a provision in the bill that allows for a retractable roof, but the Vikings would have to pay the extra cost.

The price tag of such a feature isn’t immediately known because the architects have yet to be hired, but Zygi Wilf has long been keen on the idea of an open-air stadium like his beloved New York Giants had in the Meadowlands when he was younger.

“If it’s snowing very, very hard, we’ll open up the roof,” Zygi Wilf quipped.

When asked if that meant a roof was definitely in the plans, Wilf backed off, saying he wasn’t sure yet. The plans are in their infant stages, with just a few artist renderings shown to the public that could change dramatically over the next eight to 12 months of the design phase. The most recent depiction shows a circular stadium with a huge plaza and green space.

The Wilfs visited every new stadium in the league, from Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis to new football palaces in New Jersey and Dallas to research ideas for their own venue.

“Public spaces to us seem a very exciting place to gather,” Mark Wilf said. “Whether it’s the plaza outside, you hear about the Lucas Oil Stadium, the way they have the large areas where people can gather, wide concourses, clubs. We want to really enhance the ability for people to come together.”

It will be the first time in the Vikings’ 51-year franchise history that they will have a place of their own. They shared Metropolitan Stadium with the Twins for 21 seasons, then shared the Metrodome with the Twins and University of Minnesota football team for most of the past three decades.

“We want to get people out of their homes and come to the stadium and enjoy that,” Zygi Wilf said. “The features that we have there will evolve. As much as we’ve seen other stadiums, this will be our own. This will be a Minnesota Vikings stadium on its own. It will have its own footprint and own features that will be different from others.”

Sightlines in the stadium and proximity to the field will be a priority. One of the Metrodome’s endearing qualities is the noise level that the fans generate, ear-splitting volume that gives the Vikings one of the better home-field advantages in the league. The Wilfs want to recreate that atmosphere as much as possible.

“It’s very important that fans feel they’re not watching it from a blimp, that they’re watching it from close to the field,” Zygi Wilf said. “That’s very, very important. We underestimate that when we go to other stadiums, the fan experience, sit in those seats and see how it would be, and a lot of stadiums don’t have the closeness as we’re trying to get here.”

The Wilfs declined to put a number on the revenue that is expected to be generated from the new stadium and also said they weren’t ready to discuss nearby commercial development just yet. Mark Wilf said they are considering personal seat licenses as a form of generating more revenue, but have not made a decision.

They did object to depictions that the $477 million Vikings share was overstated. Critics have said the Wilfs are putting little of their own money in, relying primarily on a $200 million loan from the NFL and revenue from stadium naming rights and other related business to foot their portion of the bill.

“The reality is, whatever sources or ways we go about putting together the private investment, we’re at risk for the investment,” Mark Wilf said. “From that standpoint, it’s something that should not be forgotten.”

The stadium is scheduled to be ready for the 2016 season, and the Vikings are hopeful of bringing a Super Bowl here as early as 2017. Mark Wilf said they hope to only need to play one season at the university’s TCF Bank Stadium, “but it very well may be two.”

The stability the stadium provides should help the team attract big-name free agents, Zygi Wilf said.

“When a guy comes to a team, the traditions from an ownership standpoint and fan experience, it’s very, very important to come here and know that you can raise a family here in a way that you don’t have to worry about the future, that you have the support of alumni,” he said. “That also has the ability to attract and I think that will be the best competitive advantage that we can have from this.”

By a vote of 36-30, the Minnesota Senate approved the $975 million bill to fund a new downtown Minneapolis stadium for the Vikings, the Minneapolis Star Tribune reports.

After the Vikings increased their outlay by $50 million, the House approved the measure at 3:30am local time. With the Senate and House approving the measure, the bill will go to Governor Mark Dayton, a supporter of the bill who will approve the deal with his signature, perhaps as early as Thursday.

“We delivered,” said Republican Senator Julie Rosen (R-Farmington), who sponsored the stadium bill. “We are going to have first-class stadium we can all be very, very proud of.”

Under the revised plan, the Vikings would pay $477 million, or 49 percent of the costs of constructing the facility. The public outlay is $498 million, with the state of Minnesota paying $348 million and $150 million coming from the city of Minneapolis.

Since having surgery on December 30th to repair a torn ACL, Adrian Peterson still has the goal to be back in action by September 9th, the day the Vikings open the 2012 season against Jacksonville.

Eric Sugarman has the same goal for the star running back. Only Sugarman, the Vikings’ head athletic trainer, wants to attach an asterisk to all the talk of a triumphant opening day return.

“I love Adrian,” Sugarman said according to Dan Wiederer of the Minneapolis Star-Tribune. “But let’s make this clear: I’m still not going to be quoted as saying he’s going to play in the first game. That’s not fair. I don’t know that.”

So what about Peterson’s eagerness to vocalize Sept. 9 as a potential milestone date?

“He’ll keep throwing that out there. And good for him,” Sugarman said. “That’s great. That’s obviously our goal, to get him playing the first game. But only if he’s functionally safe to do it. This is our franchise. We can’t be foolish about this.”

On Wednesday, Peterson and Sugarman will hold a news conference to update the progress of the eager running back’s rehabilitation. To save you the suspense, Sugarman’s message will be straightforward: There’s plenty to be encouraged by in Peterson’s rehab. But there’s still a long way to go before the Vikings’ medical team will be ready to activate the green light.

To this point, now nearly 19 weeks removed from surgery, Peterson has attacked his recuperation without setback. He began running on land again in late March and has progressed

Sugarman said Peterson’s left quadriceps is back to about 80 percent strength. Peterson also has no swelling in his left leg and has regained normal motion.

“Now it’s all the functional stuff,” Sugarman said. “Which is really the hard stuff. That takes months.”

“Right now, when he tries to stop on a dime, he looks like he’s on ice,” Sugarman said. “That’s normal. Deceleration is the hardest thing for those guys. Now we’re starting to pound all that over the next couple months — function and deceleration. That should just take us right to where hopefully he needs to be.”