Linval Joseph had knee surgery this week

Fans of the Minnesota Vikings got a bit of a surprise earlier this week when defensive tackle Linval Joseph went from being a full participant in practice to being a non-participant and, ultimately, being scratched from this week’s game against the Dallas Cowboys. Now, we know precisely why that happened.

According to Ben Goessling of the Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Joseph actually had surgery on his meniscus at some point this week. The team does not know how long he’s going to be out, but Goessling says that his sources with the Vikings are “optimistic” about it.

The team has a game against the Denver Broncos at U.S. Bank Stadium this coming Sunday, and we almost certainly won’t see him in that one. The Vikings then have their bye before having what looks to be a very tough road trip to Seattle to take on the Seahawks on Monday Night Football in Week 13. We’ll have to see whether or not Joseph is ready to go by then.

The nature of the surgery that Joseph had on his meniscus isn’t known. If you’ll recall, it was a meniscus issue that derailed most of Adrian Peterson’s final season with the Vikings in 2016. Obviously, the injury wouldn’t affect Joseph the same way it affected Peterson, but the big man is still going to miss some time.

Linval Joseph’s health situation is something we’re definitely going to need to monitor. We’ll be keeping our fingers crosed and hope that he’s back sooner rather than later.