Taylor Heinicke To Return To Practice On Monday

UPDATE: Or, you know, maybe he’ll be back to practice on Wednesday.

With the Minnesota Vikings coming off of their bye week, there hasn’t been a whole lot of news coming out of Winter Park, but this qualifies, I think.

According to Chris Tomasson of the St. Paul Pioneer Press, quarterback Taylor Heinicke will be returning to the practice field on Monday for the first time this season.

Heinicke was the story on the first day of the Vikings’ training camp when he showed up unexpectedly (at least to us fans) with his foot in a cast. Then the story came out about how he had suffered the injury by attempting to break into the house of a friend who had locked himself out. He put his foot through the glass on the door and injured it, causing him to miss all of Training Camp. It was a bit of a blow for the Vikings, as Heinicke was expected to compete with Shaun Hill to be the primary backup to Teddy Bridgewater.

Instead, the Vikings put Heinicke on the Non-Football Injury List. He had to stay on the list into the regular season, which meant he had to miss the first six weeks of the season. Now that he is returning to practice, the team will have 21 days to place him back on the active roster. If they fail to do so, Heinicke will go on injured reserve and have to miss the rest of the season.

The Vikings’ quarterback situation is a bit different now than it was back in camp, with Sam Bradford entrenched as the starter. Hill played in the season opener against Tennessee, and though he wasn’t spectacular, he did enough to lead the Vikings to victory. Thanks to his missed opportunity in Training Camp, it appears any chance that Heinicke had to unseat Hill as the primary backup has gone by the boards for this season, but he’ll probably have a real chance next year depending on when Bridgewater returns.