The First Three Rounds In GIF Form

The NFL Draft is always a roller coaster of emotions for every fan base. Those emotions can range from anticipation, to frustration, to elation, rage, depression, and everything in between.

Fans of the Minnesota Vikings are not immune to these mood swings, even if the Vikings didn’t have a first round pick. So let’s try and capture what we went through emotionally over the first three rounds.

And by ‘we’ I mean what I went through.*

*Emotions may vary

First Round

Oh, hey. The NFL Draft. Cool. Vikings don’t have a pick because of the Sam Bradford trade. Hey, overall it was a good trade, but as far as the draft goes? I’ll just be over here, waiting patiently for the second round.

What's that? The Bears have traded up? This could be for a really good defensive player. This might adversely affect the Vikings.

Wait...they drafted WHO?

And they gave up...WHAT? TO MOVE UP ONE SPOT?

But then you realize that the Vikings usually can’t beat the Bears in Chicago, regardless of who their quarterback is. And losing to Mitch Trubisky would be, um, bad.

Second And Third Round

Then, when we woke up today, we knew that the Vikings would have three picks, and could really address some big needs.

As the day wore on, we were all waiting for 6 PM central to get the show on the road. And then, finally, round two started!

And as round two unfolded, a couple of players Vikings fans were really hopeful about got drafted by other teams. And we were sad. And we weren’t sure what was going to happen.

The Vikings are sitting way too far down to get the best offensive lineman or runni—wait what? The Vikings have made a trade AND ARE ON THE CLOCK?

But wait. Man, the Vikings could screw this up. I mean they might have traded up for Joe Mixon. Or somebody else they probably didn’t need to trade up for. And it probably cost an arm and a leg. DAMN IT!

Deep breaths. Let’s let John Randle calmly tell us who we’re going to select. REGULATORS, MOUNT UP!

Johnny, I could swear you just said Dalvin Cook. Dalvin Cook? DALVIN COOK!

DALVIN COOK!!

As the second round drew to a close, though, offensive linemen started coming off the board, and it looked like the Vikings might not get a good offensive lineman when they were up in the third round. And if they didn’t, the main goal of upgrading the offensive line would be a failure.

Just when it seemed like all good offensive linemen were out of reach, another trade up!

And they get Pat Elflein!

And they didn’t have to trade away their other third round pick in the process!!

And as the Vikings came up on their second third round pick, Rick Spielman traded down and accumulated a couple more picks.

And then, they traded down yet again, ending up with one more pick than they originally entered the draft with. AND they got Dalvin Cook and Pat Elflein.

As for rounds 4-7?