DENVER — It was supposed to be a happy homecoming for Bisi Johnson.
Instead, it became a hurtful one for the Colorado native with more than 20 friends and family in attendance at Saturday's Vikings-Broncos preseason finale for both teams, a 23-13 win by Denver.
The fourth-year receiver caught two passes for 25 yards, including an 18-yarder on third-and-1 to help Minnesota kick a field goal before halftime.
On the other side of intermission, however, Johnson suffered a knee injury while working on Minnesota's punt coverage team.
"Bisi, with the knee, we're going to have to run some more tests on that," Head Coach Kevin O'Connell said during part of his opening statement. "It did not look good to me. Unfortunately, we lost him for the rest of the night.
"We'll make sure we get him in to see our doctors. He'll make the trip back with us and we'll get him evaluated as fast as we can," O'Connell added. "He's had a really, really good training camp and done everything we've asked of him at multiple spots."
View photos from the Vikings-Broncos 2022 preseason game at Empower Field at Mile High.
O'Connell was unsure if the injury occurred on the same knee that Johnson had surgically repaired after tearing his ACL last season.
Before the game, the Vikings named 33 players, including receivers Justin Jefferson, Adam Thielen and K.J. Osborn, who were not expected to play.
It was an approach by O'Connell to have as many starters as healthy as possible for Week 1 against Green Bay on Sept. 11.
"I know our fans would love to see all of our players out there," O'Connell said. "I cannot wait until we get our full group of guys out there. We do practice very, very hard and evaluate our roster on a daily basis. We constantly stress to our guys as part of our plan of attack to have them at their absolute best on Sept. 11.
"I feel like we're right on schedule to do that, but anytime you lose players that have had the kind of productive camp that Bisi's had for example, that sticks with you," O'Connell added. "I'm crossing my fingers that we get some good news there for sure, but I do think it underscores just, no matter what happened tonight, I know we didn't win a game this preseason, but as of tomorrow morning, all of those records are going to be 0-0 and we'll have 17 games to play."
O'Connell said he was disappointed about Bisi and is hoping for "some positive news in some capacity because he's earned a right, in my opinion, to be on our football team."
"So if it's something that physically he's unable to do that, we'll love him up and make sure that whenever we can get him healthy, he'll be back and ready to go," O'Connell added.
