2018 Minnesota Vikings Mock Draft Database, v5.0

It’s just another Saturday here in Minnesota Vikings land, which means that it’s time for the latest update to our 2018 Minnesota Vikings Mock Draft Database. We’ve bumped up the number of Mock Drafts to 80, and even though I wanted to start eliminating some of the older ones, I couldn’t find enough decent drafts to make up the difference. . .apparently not a lot of folks updated their mocks this week. Hopefully next week we can start weeding out some of the older mocks in our Database.

For now, however, here are the mocks that make up this week’s numbers.

In a trend that really isn’t likely to reverse itself anytime soon, the offensive line continues to crush the competition as far as which position group pundits have the Vikings focusing on. They’ve increased their percentage of the overall “donut” from a shade under 63% last week to just a little over 66% this week, meaning that two out of every three mocks in our Database for this week is projecting the Vikings to address their offensive line with the 30th overall selection in this year’s Draft.

Out of ur 80 selections this time around, the offensive line picked up 53 of them (66.3%). Once again, Texas-El Paso guard Will Hernandez is destroying the field, as he appears 20 times (25%) in the Database for this week. Ohio State guard Billy Price is still his closest competitor, but he dropped a bit to just seven selections in this week’s Database (8.8%). Notre Dame offensive tackle Mike McGlinchey and UCLA offensive tackle Kolton Miller are right behind Price with six selections each this week (7.5% each).

Continuing with the offensive linemen, there’s another tie behind those pair between Texas offensive tackle Connor Williams and Oklahoma offensive tackle Orlando Brown. Each of them has four selections this week (5% each), and while Williams has held steady for three weeks running now, Brown appears to have overcome his disastrous Combine performance a bit, as he’s climbing on our list.

Georgia guard Isaiah Wynn is next on our list with three selections this week (3.8%), and Iowa center James Daniels re-joins the Database this week (after having no selections last week), appearing two times (2.5%). Ohio State offensive lineman Jamarco Jones rounds things out for the offensive linemen this week with one selection (1.3%), while Louisville offensive tackle Geron Christian drops off of our list for this week.

The second-highest mocked position group for this week is now the defensive backs, though both the defensive backs and the defensive linemen are at a nearly 5-to-1 disadvantage to the offensive linemen. This week, defensive backs appear 11 times in our Database (13.8%), and again they’re mostly being buoyed by Central Florida cornerback Mike Hughes. Hughes’ name appears five times in our Database for this week (6.3%), giving him more selections than any other non-offensive lineman. Only one other defensive back appears multiple times this week, and that’s Iowa cornerback Joshua Jackson. Jackson is mocked to the Vikings three times this week (3.8%).

The other defensive backs appearing in this week’s database each got one vote (1.3% each). They are:

• Florida State safety Derwin James
• Louisville cornerback Jaire Alexander
• Auburn cornerback Carlton Davis

The defensive linemen are right behind the defensive backs with ten selections this week (12.5%). Michigan defensive tackle Maurice Hurst has re-taken the lead among the defensive linemen with three selections this week (3.8%), but that’s because Florida defensive tackle Taven Bryan actually dropped down to two selections (2.5%) this time around. They are the only two defensive linemen with multiple selections this week. Five other defensive linemen received one pick each this week (1.3% each), and they are as follows:

• Alabama defensive tackle Da’Ron Payne
• Washington defensive tackle Vita Vea
• Boston College defensive end Harold Landry
• Ohio State defensive end Sam Hubbard
• North Carolina State defensive tackle B.J. Hill

We’ve put tight ends and receivers together in one group, and that group is next up on the list with three selections this week (3.8%). Everyone that was in the Database last week. . .Clemson wide receiver Deon Cain, South Dakota State tight end Dallas Goedert, and Penn State tight end Mike Gesicki. . .held steady with their one selection each from last week (1.3% each).

Last week, I mistakenly had Georgia prospect Lorenzo Carter listed as a defensive lineman and not a linebacker, and we’ve had another linebacker added to this week’s Database, so I split them off into their own separate group. The new addition to this week’s Database at the linebacker position is Boise State linebacker Leighton Vander Esch. Carter and Vander Esch each have one selection in this week’s Database (1.3% each).

Last, but not least, we lost one running back this week. . .but we gained another one. Louisiana State running back Derrius Guice does not appear in our Database for this week, but he’s been replaced by another SEC runner in Nick Chubb out of Georgia. Chubb has just the one selection this week (1.3%), and I’m still not sure why anyone is mocking a running back to the Vikings in Round 1, but it is what it is.

With the new additions, we’ve now had 35 different players mocked to the Vikings at #30 overall by the various pundits across the internet. As someone pointed out in the comments in a previous version of the Database, this is going to pay off huge when Rick Spielman decides to trade out of the first round to accumulate more picks.

In any event, here are our graphic representations for this week, starting with the mostly purple “Donut graph.” There were getting to be too many names to spread out around the outside of the circle, so I change the format slightly, leaving the percentages for each player on the circle but putting a legend on the side rather than having each individual name near the actual graph itself. Hopefully this eliminates some of the clutter.

If the graph is not large enough, you can always click on it for the purposes of embiggening.

Lastly, we have this week’s “Jell-o salad” graph, tracking how players have risen and fallen over the course of the six weeks we’ve been doing this year’s Database. It’s getting a little crowded with all the different players, but like the donut graph, one color is totally dominating the rest from start to finish.

That’s all we’ve got for this week’s version of our Minnesota Vikings Mock Draft Database, ladies and gentlemen. We’ll be back again next Saturday with even more mocks and, hopefully, enough new ones to start weeding out those that haven’t been updated for a while.