Head coach Kevin O'Connell intimated Friday that Cook and other key starters on offense and defense may not play the entirety of the Vikings' Week 18 game in Chicago, Joe Nelson of SI.com reports. "We've got a pretty clear cut plan with how we want to go about the whole game, but we're going to go in with the expectation of our guys going and try to get off to a good start and play good football," O'Connell said.

EDGE Analysis

Minnesota is assured no worse than the No. 3 seed in the NFC playoffs regardless of how this weekend's games transpire, but since the Vikings will need a win over the Bears plus a Cardinals win over the heavily-favored 49ers to climb to the No. 2 seed, O'Connell may not have much incentive to expose key players to an injury heading into the wild-card round. While Cook and all of the Vikings' other starting skill-position players look poised to play at least one series, the uncertainty of whether they'll play much beyond that makes it tough to reliably project any in Week 18 season-long or DFS lineups.