Vikings Mum on Culpepper

In a press conference scheduled to introduce their new VP of player personnel, Fran Foley ended up fielding questions on Daunte Culpepper’s status.

Three weeks after Fran Foley was officially announced as the new vice president of player personnel, he was introduced to the media, but instead of a slow opening dance with the media, Foley was met with inquiring questions about the status of quarterback Daunte Culpepper.

Culpepper’s relationship with the team has been rumored to be on shaky ground for weeks, but on Wednesday a report on profootballtalk.com said the Vikings were openly shopping the quarterback with trade inquires to other teams.

“My position will be that we’re not going to talk about our football business in public. It’s just not going to happen. It’s not the way that I do business and it won’t be the way that we’ll do business from this point forward,” Foley said.

The Vikings have issued a new media policy, and Foley held firm to their desire to keep future personnel decisions in-house, a departure from the era of Mike Tice as the head coach.

“I won’t talk on any evaluation of any current player. Legally I can’t do that in some cases. Whether it’s Daunte or another player, I can’t give you an evaluation on him as a performer or our plans with the player,” Foley said.

When asked how he would evaluate Culpepper, who is rehabilitating from torn medial collateral, anterior cruciate and posterior collateral ligaments suffered on Oct. 30, Foley cited the game tape available on Culpepper.

“You can only evaluate what you have. There is game footage on him. You can go back, there is history on a player,” Foley said. “Preseason tape, there is everything. That’s part of the evaluation.”

But Foley wouldn’t give his opinion of Culpepper as a player. The press conference was scheduled before the Culpepper trade story appeared, but it probably wasn’t the timing Foley had hoped to be introduced.

Vikings owner Zygi Wilf, who introduced Foley, declined comment as well.

Last month, head coach Brad Childress said he had indications that Culpepper might be able to do limited footwork in minicamps.