The Minnesota Vikings have announced they added cornerback Natrone Brooks to the practice squad on Thursday, giving the 26-year-old another foothold in a league career that has mostly been spent on the margins of active rosters.
Brooks arrived in the NFL as an undrafted free agent with the Atlanta Falcons after the 2023 draft.
His path to that signing was the usual junior-college detour: two seasons at Copiah-Lincoln Community College, then a transfer to Southern Miss, where he finished his college career before Atlanta brought him into camp.
The Falcons waived him at the end of that first preseason and quickly re-signed him to the practice squad, a pattern that would define the next two years.
He returned on a futures deal in 2024 and spent the following seasons moving between the practice squad and the active roster as injuries and roster math opened brief windows.
That shuttle produced a full season of game experience in 2025. Brooks appeared in all 17 games for Atlanta and finished with 10 tackles and two pass deflections, modest production that reflected a depth role rather than a starting assignment.
He re-signed with the Falcons in March, then was among the team’s final cuts in late August as Atlanta shaped its 53-man roster. Detroit signed him to its practice squad on September 10.
That stay lasted a little more than two weeks; the Lions released him on September 28, and Minnesota claimed the opening three days later.
For the Vikings, the move is a low-cost depth addition at a position that absorbs injuries every week.
Brooks is listed at 5-foot-11 and 175 pounds, a smaller corner whose value has been availability and special-teams or sub-package work rather than outside starting reps.
Practice-squad deals of this kind rarely carry guarantees beyond the standard weekly pay, and they can be ended with little notice if a preferred option becomes available.
They also keep a player in the building, eligible for elevation on game weeks if the active roster needs a body.
Brooks’s career so far has been a sequence of short contracts and quick releases, interrupted by one full season of snaps in Atlanta.
Minnesota’s practice squad is the latest stop on that circuit, not a commitment to a larger role.
Whether he stays through the rest of the season will depend on injuries elsewhere in the secondary and on how he looks in practice against a Vikings roster that has already been active on the transaction wire this fall.
