If you asked me what the Minnesota Vikings were going to do once the Baltimore Ravens took Zay Flowers at 22, I would have told you they’re taking a quarterback or trading down. Kirk Cousins is a free agent next year, and the Vikings owe him $28 million the year after that. Why not get a quarterback on a rookie contract to take over him while they pay off his dead money? Or, if they weren’t going to go that route, why not trade down and stock up on defensive players?
Instead, they took Jordan Addison.
The Addison pick didn’t come out of nowhere. Minnesota needs a receiver after letting Adam Thielen go, and Addison should join K.J. Osborn in helping take pressure off Justin Jefferson. ESPN calls the former Pitt and USC receiver a savvy and elusive route runner who separates from man coverage and finds pockets in zone looks. Sounds like a perfect replacement for Thielen. NFL.com’s Lance Zierlien says Addison is an inside/outside wideout with the speed and agility to work confidently on all three levels of the field. Choosing him probably tells us they’re still a pass-heavy offense.
“It is very important that any receiver that plays in our offense, regardless of personnel group, that you’re in the game with Justin Jefferson for us to have the ability to move him around,” Kevin O’Connell said after the draft. “Then activate you versus some of the premier coverage looks you can get with how people defend Justin.
“This player gives us a chance to do a lot of different things. And then pair him with K.J., possibly working against single coverage and working away from some of the overloaded looks that Justin tends to see. We want to make people pay for that.”
Addison is a great pick, but Minnesota’s decision to select him probably tells us more about how they felt about their other options. They didn’t trade up to take Anthony Richardson at No. 3. Will Levis and Hendon Hooker were available at 23, but the Vikings passed on them. Turns out, they may have been on to something. Levis slid to 33; the Detroit Lions got Hooker with pick 68. Minnesota also didn’t load up on defense, even with a glaring need at corner. The New York Giants took Deonte Banks with the next pick, and five of the next seven were defensive players.
The Vikings also didn’t have to pick at 23. Given on defense, it made a lot of sense for them to down to get more picks. However, pundits felt this was a particularly weak draft. Therefore, it was probably unwise to give up their lone premier pick in hopes of adding defensive players later in the draft. Minnesota gave up its second-round pick in the T.J. Hockenson trade, so No. 87 was their earliest Day 2 selection. They traded that pick to the San Francisco 49ers for three picks. Later, the Vikings moved pick 119 to the Kansas City Chiefs for 134 and a fifth-rounder next year.
Ultimately, the Vikings added young players to their defense, along with a developmental quarterback. They just did so in a creative way. They could have traded up for a quarterback to sit behind Kirk Cousins for a year. Instead, they took a project QB, Jaren Hall, in the fifth round. They could have used pick 23 to get a second-rounder and potentially another third, then loaded up on defense. Instead, they maneuvered around the middle of the draft and grabbed CB Mekhi Blackmon (pick 102) and DB Jay Ward (134) and traded up for DT Jaquelin Roy (141). Finally, they got a high-upside running back, DeWayne McBride, at 222. Worth noting? Addison and Blackmon played at USC together, and Ward and Roy were teammates at LSU.
“We kind of set just plans and guidelines,” Kwesi Adofo-Mensah said after Day 2 of the draft. “If these players were to fall to a certain place, we’ll call with this deal. Ultimately, you have no idea if somebody will accept that deal, but we had all those conversations. Look, credit to the league: The draft kind of went how the board was going. There was no inefficiency [in] the market, and there was nobody left that we wanted to go up that high for.”
Ultimately, the Vikings got what they needed, assuming they correctly evaluated the players they took. They got a receiver to take pressure off Jefferson, a project quarterback, and added to the defense. It’s more about the order that they did it. Richardson will probably be NFL-ready sooner than Hall. There were good cornerbacks available in the late-first and second rounds. Addison will either become a brilliant pick, or we’ll be left wondering why they didn’t go another route. That’s the nature of taking a receiver in the first round. It’s also how a draft where the Vikings had many needs and only five picks was going to go.
