Again, in our efforts to work smarter rather than harder, here is amiller92's coverage of today's Minneapolis City Council vote about the Vikings' stadium bill. Getting closer, folks. -Chris

Not that it was particularly a surprise, as the vote went exactly as expected, but the Minneapolis City Council just voted 7-6 in favor of the stadium package that was approved by the state. They met as the Committee of the Whole today for almost four hours before finally getting around to the voting.

The yes votes: Samuels, Johnson, Tuthill, Reich, Hofstede, Quincy and Colvin Roy.

The no votes: Hodges, Glidden, Schiff, Gordon, Goodman and Lillegren.

Feel free to thank and/or excoriate them at your discretion.

My report on the meeting, and maybe a half-hearted attempted at an Arif-style draft board for the council after the jump.

Update: As Bjorno points out in the comments, this was not the final city council vote. The official city council action will be tomorrow, but this vote tells us no one has switched sides (yet). I had intended to make that clear, but failed.

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I don't know about you, but I'm bored. Very bored. Almost as bored as this.

We're in that dull stretch of off season after the NFL draft when not too much is happening. The drafted players are getting signed to contracts, the 90-man roster the team is going into training camp now has to cut a player you probably don't know yet when they add a player you probably don't know yet, and even the stadium situation is mostly settled. Well, "settled" is a relative term because the stadium bill (passed by the Minnesota Legislature and signed by Gov. Mark Dayton) is going before the Minneapolis City Council on Thursday, but since there isn't much the non-Minneapolis resident can do to influence that vote, I refuse to get emotionally involved in that particular hurdle.

Things have gotten humdrum and something had to be done. Welcome to your Track 2 Challenge for the Minnesota Vikings 2012 season soundtrack.

Contest details after the jump.

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Is it time to give Percy Harvin a new deal?

I have been looking at the current Vikings players and their contract status. I am not going into detail about the current cap number or any of that business as it is very difficult to come up with an accurate number. Right now the free agents for 2013 will be Phil Loadholt, Asher Allen, Jasper Brinkley, Jamarca Sanford, and many of the free agents we signed to one year deals this year like Jerome Simpson, Geoff Schwartz, Jerome Felton, Zachary Bowman, Chris Carr, and a few others.

The most important player is Percy Harvin. I think it is time to get a contract extension done. I think it should be done before the start of the season too. He is signed through 2013 but is only going to make 915K this year and 1.55 mil next year which is woefully underpaid based on his performance.

Why is that you say? Why shouldn't the team wait and see if he can "do it again" and then offer him a new deal?

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We had our big article yesterday about the Minnesota Vikings getting six of their ten draft picks signed to rookie contracts. Shortly after that post went up, the number moved up to seven as the Vikings signed their remaining fourth-round pick, USC tight end Rhett Ellison, to a four-year contract.

Ellison was the second of the Vikings' three fourth-round selections a month ago. He split his time at USC between the fullback and tight end positions, and will probably be asked to do a little bit of both for the Vikings as well. His pick was one that had a lot of fans confused at first, but appears to be making a bit more sense going forward.

With this signing, the Vikings' top three picks still remain unsigned. Deals have not yet been worked out for USC tackle Matt Kalil, Notre Dame safety Harrison Smith, and Central Florida cornerback Josh Robinson. I would suspect that we'll hear about Robinson's deal sooner rather than later. I'm not sure, however, how long it will take the two first-rounders to get their deals completed.

Well, rather than spacing the rookie signings out a bit more and giving poor, needy bloggers like us something to write about, Rick Spielman and the rest of the Minnesota Vikings organization apparently thought it would be best to just do a whole bunch of them at once.

Yes, after we reported the signings of defensive lineman Trevor Guyton and linebacker Audie Cole, the Vikings have just announced that they now have six of their ten draft picks under contract.

In addition to Guyton and Cole, the Vikings have signed two of their three fourth-round picks, Arkansas wide receivers Greg Childs and Jarius Wright, defensive back Robert Blanton, who the Vikings took in the fifth round out of Notre Dame, and their sixth-round selection, Georgia kicker Blair Walsh.

I'm assuming that all of the contracts signed thus far are four-year deals. If any of them aren't, we'll update this post to reflect that.

That means that the Vikings have four picks left to get signed. They still need to ink both of their first round picks, USC offensive tackle Matt Kalil and Notre Dame safety Harrison Smith. In addition, they still need to sign their third round pick, Central Florida cornerback Josh Robinson, and their other fourth-round pick, tight end Rhett Ellison out of USC.

Congratulations to all of the newest members of the Minnesota Vikings!

As was mentioned in the comments section of the post we made about it last night, the National Football League did adopt the rule that states that all players will be mandated to wear a full set of pads, to include knee and thigh pads, by 2013. This gives the manufacturer the 2012 season to work on things like comfort and safety before it becomes mandatory for everybody.

There were two other rule changes that were adopted by the NFL this morning as well. The first one was to move the NFL trading deadline from Week 6 to Week 8. I'm not really sure how much impact this is going to have, if any. . .the NFL trading deadline is already the most meaningless of the four major sports, and I'm not sure how much pushing it back two weeks will affect that.

The other one is significantly more important, in my opinion. The league adopted a rule that will allow one "marquee" player (the terminology used in the article) to come back from the Injured Reserve list after Week 6 and return to the lineup after Week 8. The example the article uses is that of Terrell Suggs, the Baltimore Ravens' linebacker that tore his Achilles tendon playing basketball a couple of weeks ago. Under the old rules, if the Ravens were to put Suggs on IR, he would be done for the 2012 season. Now, they could put him on IR and let him continue to rehab, and then bring him back after he misses the first six weeks of the season.

This sounds a lot like the rules for the Physically Unable to Perform list, like the Vikings did with the Sidney Rice situation back in 2010, but I'm sure there are probably a few differences between the two lists. Once I find out more, I'll pass it. But the important thing is that the injured reserve list no longer automatically means a lost season for the player in question.

The signings are coming fast, and quite possibly furious as well. Just a couple of hours after the announcement that one seventh-round pick had agreed to terms, the Minnesota Vikings signed their other seventh-round pick this afternoon, North Carolina State linebacker Audie Cole.

#Vikings have signed seventh-round LB Audie Cole to a four-year deal.

— Pioneer Press (@VikingsNow) May 22, 2012

The deal that Trevor Guyton signed that we mentioned earlier was also a four-year contract.

Cole was the 210th overall selection in this past year's draft, and the only player the Vikings took at the linebacker position, which is one that was thought to need significant help this off-season.

The Vikings now have two draft picks down and eight to go. I'm not sure how long it will take them to get the other eight players under contract, but I'm guessing that it isn't going to take all that long.

Congratulations to Audie Cole on officially becoming a member of the Minnesota Vikings!

The final player drafted by the Minnesota Vikings in 2012. . .and the first to sign his rookie contract, as we told you just a little bit ago. . .is defensive lineman Trevor Guyton out of the University of California.

Guyton played all along the defensive line for the Golden Bears, seeing time at both defensive end spots as well as spending time inside at defensive tackle. He has the necessary size to be able to see time at both positions in the NFL as well, measuring in at around 6'3" and 285 pounds.

Guyton didn't play much early in his career at Cal. As a freshman, he played in the final three games of the season, and recorded three tackles. During his sophomore year, he was the primary backup to Tyson Alualu (who was a top 10 pick in the 2010 NFL Draft by the Jacksonville Jaguars) at left defensive end. He participated in 11 games, collecting 13 tackles, one strip-sack, and four tackles for loss.

He really started coming around as a junior in 2010, where he again played in 11 games and started the last four. He wound up amassing 29 tackles on the year, 20 of which came in the four games that he started. He also had 4.5 sacks and 8.5 tackles for loss. For his efforts, he was the recipient of the Bob Tessier award, which the Golden Bears give to their most improved defensive lineman.

Guyton truly shined as a senior, starting in all 13 games for the Golden Bears and leading the team with 5.5 sacks. He also had 12 tackles for loss, good for sixth in the Pac-12, forcing two fumbles and recovering two others. He was named to the All-Pac 12 second team for the season.

Trevor Guyton might have been the biggest steal that the Minnesota Vikings picked up in the 2012 NFL Draft. Both Mike Mayock of the NFL Network and ESPN's scouting services had him listed among the top 100 players available going into draft weekend, so for the Vikings to get him in the seventh round (number 219 overall) appears to be a truly impressive heist. I mentioned his versatility earlier, and it will be interesting to see where, primarily, the Vikings have him lined up on the defensive line. I think that Trevor Guyton has the chance to make a real impact on this team pretty early on, as the depth on the defensive line is a bit of a question mark.