The simple view of reading posits that reading comprehension can be decomposed into a print-specific component (concerning decoding and sight word reading) and a language comprehension component (concerning verbal and metalinguistic skills not related to print). One might properly consider lexical skills, indexed by vocabulary measures, part of the language component; however, vocabulary measures end up taking up substantial amounts of print-dependent reading comprehension variance, presumably because of the interrelations among semantic, orthographic, and phonological specification of lexical entries. In the present study we examined the role of vocabulary in the prediction of reading comprehension by testing alternative formulations within the context of the simple view. We used cross-sectional and (1-year) longitudinal data from 436 children in Grades 3–6 attending regular classrooms. We quantified the proportion of variance accounting for reading comprehension that could be attributed to vocabulary measures. We then tested a latent variable model positing a mediating position for vocabulary against a model with lexically based covariation among the simple view components. We discuss the results in an attempt to bring together the simple view with the lexical quality hypothesis for reading comprehension.