Questions Answered: Who Will the Vikings Draft? | Favorite FA Move | Kirk Cousins Back?
VikingsTerritory answers questions about the purple team each week, which are fielded via email, direct message, and social media activity.
Questions Answered: Who the Vikings Will Draft, Favorite FA Move, Kirk Cousins Back?
Vikings football will heat up again in 2.5 weeks when the draft gets underway, but until then, folks have questions about the state of the purple team.
This is the mailbag for the week. Last week’s can be viewed here.
Question: Who do you think the Vikings will draft with their first pick?
Answer: Admittedly, this one is incredibly tricky, mainly because the roster needs are so minuscule after free agency. With a gun to our head, we’ll say a trade back or two, with the eventual draft selection of a cornerback — we’ll say Benjamin Morrison or Shavon Revel Jr.
Minnesota can trade back and grab more draft picks somewhat easily, and in fact, could trade down more than once. Such maneuvers would put general manager Kwesi Adofo-Mensah somewhere in the pick range of 32-45, and about five cornerbacks will be available in that spot, possibly including Maxwell Hairston (Kentucky), Trey Amos (Mississippi), Azareye’h Thomas (Florida State), and Morrison + Revel Jr.
Because of the “depth” at that spot, we’ll say a trade back, plus a CB draft pick. Give us Morrison from Notre Dame or Revel Jr. from East Carolina.
Question: What’s your favorite move from Vikings’ free agency?
Answer: There are many, but signing center Ryan Kelly really moved the needle for VikingsTerritory.
Because of continuity, most assumed Garrett Bradbury would be back in 2025 — this website included — and we’d just have to accept that the team didn’t like to change or improve at center.
Well, that theory was wrong, and Kelly is a four-time Pro Bowler in the house to get the J.J. McCarthy era off to a hot start. Mean interior defensive linemen used to abuse Bradbury on the regular, and with Kelly in place, fans don’t have to worry about that as much — or just expect it to happen.
Minnesota proved seriousness about the offensive line, and the Kelly free-agent signing knocked it out of the park.
Question: Do you see any scenario where Kirk Cousins returns to Minnesota as the QB2 this season?
Answer: It would be an absolute longshot scenario, one Minnesota could explore if it utterly struck out on all other backup quarterback options.
In theory, trading for Cousins to support J.J. McCarthy would be just fine. Cousins is probably the best backup quarterback in the NFL right now. However, it might seem foolhardy symbolically. Would it really make sense to employ the quarterback from 2018-2023 behind the new guy?
In simple terms, the pairing feels awkward.
Question: Are the Asante Samuel Jr. rumors true?
Answer: They sure sound like a tall tale — an anonymous tip from the neighbor of somebody’s friend who saw Samuel Jr. at a Florida nightclub wearing a Vikings hat. That actually sounds fictional.
However, we checked with some of our usual sources about Samuel Jr. eventually signing in Minnesota, and none of them ruled it out. In similar situations, such sources would say, “Nope.”
They didn’t do that with the Samuel Jr. gossip.
It could be real.
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