A screenshot on Joshua Metellus' phone serves as a simple reminder.

In mid-July he noticed a post on X that emboldened a list of the league's top safeties determined by team executives, scouts and coaches. It bothered him a great deal. He wasn't even honorable mention.

How could top football minds disregard the 26-year-old defender? Metellus was literally everywhere in 2023. He intercepted a pass, defended five, forced four fumbles, had 2.5 sacks, 116 total tackles and 10 hits on quarterbacks while playing 1,065 defensive snaps. It could be viewed as a disrespectful oversight.

But Metellus isn't hung up on it in that way. He's instead used it as an impetus for his growth this season.

The Vikings captain saved the incomplete ranking and recently set it as his phone's wallpaper. It's quick motivation; a daily nudge that tells Metellus, "I'm not where I want to be, yet. People don't look at (No.) 44 and say, 'Oh, he's the best defensive player in the NFL,' yet. In my head there's a lot more to get to."

He's on the right path.

Metellus is unshakeable now, whereas last year he was thrust into full-time starting roles and spent so much of his energy trying to acquire confidence. He logged 396 defensive snaps at slot cornerback, 377 off the ball in the box, 206 on the defensive line, 29 defending outside receivers and 55 as a free safety.

"There's not really a lot of guys, if any, who do, necessarily, what I do," Metellus affirmed. "I mean, you've got guys who do a little bit of this, like Brian Branch and Kyle Hamilton, they play in the slot and at deep safety – I do that too – but then they don't play as much as Jamal Adams would in the box, or Derwin James would. Derwin James, this year, has done a lot of moving around and that's been really cool to see. But to the extent that I do it, I don't think I really know too much about [anyone doing] that."

The encore in 2024 is striking, adding a counterargument against the top-10 position survey, corroborating it's inconsiderate – to no one's fault, really – of what exactly Metellus is achieving weekly.

His job varies from play-to-play, which makes his mind his best weapon on every defensive series.

On first down, Metellus may be pressed up on a slot receiver, disguising zone coverage; on second, he's in a linebacker stance, ready to flip his hips and perform a deep-middle-of-the-field drop or read blocks and cork running lanes; on weighty downs he could be creeping into the A gap or walked up on the edge, stalking cadences, and dropping into the hook/curl zone after the snap – or assailing the quarterback.

"I play football. I play defense. I don't know how to describe it," Metellus said, smiling. "We don't even know how to describe it. We just still call me a safety that does nickel things [and] linebacker things."

Metellus can execute those things and is thus one of the select players actually capable of juggling a scale of responsibilities as large as his thanks to the fastest-twitch non-muscle in his body – his brain.

Metellus ascribed his capacity to learn, store and tap information to lessons far away from the field.

"I don't think it's a football [skill]," Metellus urged. "I think football highlights the great things we do well, but I think it's just [related to] life. Like I've always been an adaptable person. If I put my mind to it and I take my time, I can do this, this and this and this. I might not be the best at it, but I'll be pretty good.

"That's what my mindset is, just being adaptable 'cause I've had a lot of adversity through life," Metellus added. "I had to be adaptable. I was the oldest of six kids, single-parent home. So I always put a lot of pressure on me to show up and do things, and I was able to wear different hats – and that's transferred over to the football field once I learned how to apply that the right way, and it's showing in my play."

In the 1950s, former Penn State coach Rip Engle coined the strong safety of his defense as the "monster back" and later changed it to the more flattering "hero back." (No doubt, that label embodies the spirit of Metellus' position.) Metellus said it would be cool if there was a moniker attached to his hybrid post.

Maybe he can dwell on that in the offseason; his moving around is taxing enough.

"I genuinely do not know what to call it," Metellus proudly shook his head.

Because he sticks with Vikings defensive backs in position meetings, Metellus is not afforded all of the individual coaching points that are privy to the team's inside linebackers or edge rushers, for example. His high-level functioning on game day demands extra work during the week – arriving to the facility early and leaving late, picking apart film cut-ups of linebackers, and badgering coaches and teammates.

"When we're in the team [meeting] room, I specify a lot," Metellus shared. "Like I'm one of the guys in there asking the most questions, like, 'All right, when I'm here, do I do this?' Or like, if I hear somebody chatting about potentially something I could be a part of, I'm being nosy, and that's really just what it is.

"I'm not the most athletic or the fastest, strongest, but I'm not the slowest, the weakest," Metellus added with strong assurance that his wits are his best asset. "I can match up physically, but what takes me that extra step to get me my wins or help the team win is that mental part of it, whether that's being mentally calm, having great energy, or that's me just knowing where I'm going faster than the other guy."

The effort doesn't go unrewarded — or unnoticed.

"We always talk about progress being the process, and this guy is constantly learning, and constantly growing and looking for ways [to improve]," Special Teams Coordinator Matt Daniels said recently. "The great ones want to be coached. They want to be coached hard, but most importantly, they want to be told the truth. And the thing about Metellus is that he's a truth seeker. He wants that open, that true, honest communication on what he does well, what he needs to improve on; how can he get better?"

Metellus insisted Vikings coaches know his tics well enough to not bother sugarcoating things.

He's also aware of facets that require sharpening. Metellus feels so much more comfortable diagnosing run plays this year, but he thinks his eyes can be better; he has only missed two tackles this season after whiffing on 13 in 2023 but believes his tackling isn't where it needs to be, yet. He's challenging himself to zipper up his coverage, despite already lowering his completion percentage allowed and intercepting two passes, including one in Week 14 thrown by former teammate Kirk Cousins. His implementation of yoga and pilates — once per week during the season and every day he can out of it — has helped him stay healthy and apply his "God-given abilities the right way," he said. Flexibility is essential to his roles.

Metellus also is careful not to lose sight of the physicality that complements his mentality so well.

"I know there's a couple times, even this year," Metellus admitted, "where my mind's going, thinking about all these different things and then I forget to just go be a dog and run through somebody's face."

One of the truths that he's seeking, successfully, is patience – a forbearance to thrive wherever, however.

"I'm just more about the team (this year)," Metellus emphasized. "What's our standard? What's my standard of play each week? What do I want to show on tape even if I'm not making the splash plays yet – I know I will, that's just who I am – but it's more of just being locked into my role and focusing on that."

Vikings Defensive Coordinator Brian Flores sang praise this month for Metellus' enormous effect: "He's one of these guys who's in this postseason accolades kind of thought process for me. I'm not sure there's a guy who plays as many different positions as he does, and adds as much value to a team as he does."

This season, Metellus is playing a few yards back from the line of scrimmage and inside the tackle box at a higher rate, partly because starting linebackers Blake Cashman and Ivan Pace, Jr., have been shelved, at different times, with injuries. Also, because Metellus has grown into a very skilled inside linebacker.

"I think his ability to play there and nickel-type roles and safety-type roles and man-to-man, like all of those things is, in my opinion, the most impressive because it's hard for a lot of people to flip their brain constantly into different roles," future Pro Football Hall of Famer Harrison Smith noted.

Flores played up Metellus' defense against the run as his single biggest improvement. Smith, a linebacker and safety at Notre Dame and recurring playmaker in the box over the course of 13 pro seasons, agreed.

"This year you can just tell he's very decisive," Smith asserted. "When he knows, he goes. It's aggressive. It's physical. He tackles well. Like a lot of his linebacker run fits look like a very good linebacker doing it."

Metellus tipped his hat to Cashman and Pace, who are "dogs" in their own right but have different strengths, and mentioned that his unique opportunity to interact with and be in the mix of each position group has helped his development. Metellus has recognized from Cashman a mastery of assignment and from Pace a manual on defeating blocks with finesse, which is important for a safety playing linebacker.

"I'm realizing what works for me in the box," Metellus revealed. "Obviously, I'm not gonna just go run straight into the face of a lineman, even though I do sometimes, and think that's how I'm gonna win. I gotta be able to see things better and use my speed to counteract some of the stuff that's going on.

"I'm at the point now, if I'm gonna do it, I'm gonna do it. Whatever happens after, I'll just learn from it," Metellus continued. "Because I get the sense that the coaches trust me, my teammates trust me, that I have good instincts – so if I feel something or if I tell somebody to do something, it kind of just goes."

That's the main difference between Metellus' breakout last season and consummation this year as someone playing an impossible-to-perceive position, deserving of the highest respect across the league.

"Again, the guy is as versatile as they come," Daniels said, "but he's continuing to progress."

That list of top-10 safeties acts as a microcosm of the motivation Metellus pockets to be the best.

"I'm not an All-Pro, yet," he bluntly said. "That's the goal. I think of myself as an All-Pro player. Whether that's safety, nickel, linebacker, whatever you wanna call it, I think I'm an All-Pro. So until I get there, there's a lot more work to be done – and once I get there, there's gonna be more work to keep that."