FanPost

Not the usual Mock Draft you'd see

Welcome fellow Vikings warriors, the way I'd like to do mock draft is to manually pick players for every team and see how the draft falls for our favorite team.

Preparation

So, I start by preparing the list of needs for each team, list of free agents and retirements for each team, the changes in coaching staff and the way their offense or defense operates because of that in this new league year, the cap situation for each team and their ability to sign their own quality free agents before looking for getting any of the best free agents who become available in the Free Agency and some more important factor as I learn through the time from January to April. Then, I start learning about college players, look at some of the film available, read scout reports and form an opinion on them, the ranking of players in each position group, the suitability if players in different schemes and so on and so.

I started doing this mock early January, but there are still a lot of things that could become more apparent as time flies by. New coaches would share their philosophy, some teams would switch their defense to a different method that would necessitate personnel movement in off-season, or a team tries a new offensive coordinator and new scheme, some teams could change their run game alone to different scheme, some major players become available on trade block, and so on and so.

The point is NFL draft is not just about running mock draft in different simulators, and the automated programming doesn't take into account a million things that happen over these four months of free agency, without a revolution in artificial intelligence of these automation.

The needs for a team going into free agency could differ much from their needs going into the draft. It could look one way in January and completely unrelatable in April. The assessment of players could turn upside down after Combine, and more important revelations about their history and medical situations among other factors.

I don't think I could capture all of them in this practice either, but it is really fascinating while learning about the league this way. So I do a version of mock Draft before Combine, another one after early Free Agency, one final version before the actual draft in Las Vegas. All of that helps me learn what other teams are looking to get in draft, and how all of that affect Vikings' prospect of getting targeted players in each round. After doing all this process, one still couldn't predict how and what Draft day trades could happen and how Draft would evolve after each of those. T

best I aim to do is to learn as much as possible, and in the process become more knowledge on new prospects and the league overall as we enter new league year. That might help understand how different factors affected Vikings over the draft as we get to look back and how our draft room performed considering the information learned through the off-season and Draft days. That generates a lot of appreciation for what they do and could also cause more disappointment if they don't account somethings, at least there would be some balance in knowing more.

Method

I like to use The Draft Network simulator, and their two boards - Predictive Big Board and TDN Player Rankings. They do a great job of updating these boards weekly from January so I am impressed with their big board over any other online competitors in this domain.

However, they don't have compensatory draft picks added yet and thus this mock draft wouldn't have them included, for example, Vikings only got 7 Draft picks and I've got only 4 rounds covered in this one month. So, forgive me for only having four rounds and only 4 picks here for all this talk. I will share more as I get to have more idea of late round prospects.

I'm sharing this just to see how fellow Vikings fans think about top 123 prospects that I've included in this mock draft here. Let me know what you think of Vikings selection, or share your knowledge and ideas on where certain players may get drafted and such. Thank you.

Round 1


1 CIN Joe Burrow, QB

2 WAS Jeffrey Okudah, CB

3 DET Chase Young, DE

4 NYG Isaiah Simmons, LB

5 MIA Tua Tagovailoa, QB

6 LAC Justin Herbert, QB

7 CAR Derrick Brown, DT

8 ARI Andrew Thomas, OT

9 JAX Javon Kinlaw, DT

10 CLE Mekhi Becton, OT

11 NYJ Jedrick Wills, OT

12 OAK Kristian Fulton, CB

13 IND Jordan Love, QB

14 TAM DeAndre Swift, RB

15 DEN CJ Henderson, CB

16 ATL AJ Epenesa, DE

17 DAL CeeDee Lamb, WR

18 MIA K'Lavon Chaisson, DE

19 OAK Patrick Queen, LB

20 JAX Jerry Juedy, WR

21 PHI Damon Arnette, CB

22 BUF Yetur Gross-Matos, DE

23 NEW Neville Gallimore, DT

24 NOS Lavishka Shenault Jr, WR

25 MIN Trevon Diggs, CB

I think Vikings would be best advised to go for CB early, as we may need day 1 starter to compensate for some of the losses in our position group. At this point, I think we'd be able to sign Mac Alexander but might not have Rhodes and Waynes in the roster next season. I like Diggs in this draft class, even more than some of the higher ranked CBs in this big board as seen above. I think he's a play maker, and more importantly has excellent mirroring and positioning skills in coverage, which we've been lacking in Vikings defense recently. He may need improvement in run support, but I hope his deficiencies there are coachable with this staff.

26 MIA JK Dobbins, RB

27 SEA Tristan Wirfs, OT

28 BAL Kenneth Murray, LB

29 TEN Jeff Gladney, CB

30 GBP Henry Ruggs III, WR

31 SF AJ Terell, CB

32 KAN Noah Igbinoghene, CB


Round 2


33 CIN Bryce Hall, CB

34 IND Josh Jones, OT

35 DET Tee Higgins, WR

36 NYG Xavier McKinney, S

37 LAC Austin Jackson, OT

38 CAR Justin Jefferson, WR

39 MIA Grant Delphit, S

40 ARI Ross Blacklock, DT

41 CLE Julian Okwara, DE

42 JAX Jaylon Johnson, CB

43 CHI Jacob Eason, QB

44 IND Jalen Reagor, WR

45 TAM Lucas Niang, OT

46 DEN Prince Tega Wanogho, OT

47 ATL Raekwon Davis, DT

48 NYJ Cesar Ruiz, C

49 PIT Terrell Lewis, DE

50 CHI Robert Hunt, OG

51 DAL Antoine Winfield Jr., S

52 LAR Zach Baun, DE

53 PHI Brandon Aiyuk, WR

54 BUF KJ Hamler, WR

55 ATL Kyle Dugger, S

56 MIA Denzel Mims, WR

57 HOU Jonathan Taylor, RB

58 MIN Justin Madubuike, DT

I wanted to select a replacement for Reiff or Elflein, but I really like this player. I believe he could add pass rushing urgency to the interior of our defensive line. I also think we may not have Linval Joseph and Everson Griffen in roster next year, and this may be the right place to address the trenches, and the board has presented with another defensive player that could solve some of the problems in Vikings defense early into the year.

59 SEA Lloyd Cushenberry, C

60 BAL Curtis Weaver, DE

61 TEN Joshua Uche, DE

62 GBP Isaiah Wilson, OT

63 KAN Nick Harris, OG

64 SEA Jonathan Greenard, DE


Round 3


65 CIN Leki Fotu, DT

66 WAS Donovan Peoples-Jones, WR

67 DET Cameron Dantzler, CB

68 NYJ Bryan Edwards, WR

69 CAR Solomon Kindley, OG

70 MIA Ben Bartch, OT

71 LAC Tyler Biadasz, OG

72 ARI Clyde Edwards-Helaire, RB

73 CLE Ashtyn Davis, S

74 JAX Brandon Jones, S

75 IND Rashad Lawrence, DT

76 TAM Zabari Zuniga, DE

77 DEN Tyler Johnson, WR

78 ATL Cam Akers, RB

79 NYJ Marlon Davidson, DE

80 OAK Quartney Davis, WR

81 OAK Jalen Hurts, QB

82 DAL Cole Kmet, TE

83 DEN Matt Hennessy, C

84 LAR Richie Grant, S

85 PHI Malik Harrison, LB

86 BUF Ben Bredeson, OG

87 NEW Brycen Hopkins, TE

88 NYJ Shane Lemieux, OG

89 MIN Hakeem Adeniji, OG

All sites list him as OT, it's true he could very well be an OT in NFL but he has got experience all over the offensive line. What more, I believe he's one of the closest matches for outside zone blocking scheme. And, he seems to have better anchoring ability in pass protection. He seems to be available later in day 2 of the draft because of scheme fit and some concerns about his tackle radius as OT, which some scouts suggest wouldn't be an issue if he transitions to a Guard. He seems to be the right fit for our scheme, he may need some time to transition early in the year but I believe he could replace Elflein at LG soon and make life easier for Bradbury as well. If he works out better as OT, coaches may have an answer for that position as well.

90 CLE Thaddeus Moss, TE

91 OAK Logan Stenberg, OG

92 BAL Chase Claypool, WR

93 TEN Damien Lewis, OG

94 GBP Hunter Bryant, TE

95 DEN Jordyn Brooks, LB

96 TEN Akeem Davis-Gaither, LB


Round 4


97 CIN Netane Muti, OG

98 WAS Adam Trautman, TE

99 DET Troy Dye, LB

100 NYG Darney Holmes, CB

101 HOU Essang Bassey, CB

102 LAC Michael Ojemudia, CB

103 CAR Joe Bachie Jr., LB

104 ARI Cheyenne O'Grady, TE

105 CLE Matthew Peart, OT

106 JAX Markus Bailey, LB

107 TAM K'Von Wallace, S

108 SF Jeremy Chin, S

109 ATL Amik Robertson, CB

110 NYJ Zach Moss, RB

111 OAK Michael Pittman Jr, WR

112 IND Shaquille Quarterman, LB

113 DAL AJ Green, CB

114 PIT Josiah Deguara, TE

115 NEW Derrell Taylor, DE

116 LAR Justin Strnad, LB

117 PHI Julian Blackmon, S

118 BUF Francis Bernard, LB

119 NEW Troy Pride Jr, CB

120 NOS Mohammad Barry, LB

121 HOU Alton Robinson, DE

122 MIN Alohi Gilman, S

This player sounds like someone Zimmer would love to have. He is good in coverage and run support, and also is an excellent Blitzer. He may need some grooming in coverage and play making on the field, but he already has high Football IQ on diagnosing plays and formation from offense, from QBs' ways of progressions and tendencies. He seems to be a good leader in the team too, actually a transfer from Naval Academy early in college football career. If we couldn't retain Anthony Harris, I'd expect us to sign Sendejo and Kearse that would provide this player some time to learn Zimmer's defense while starting to play in games in rotation.

123 SEA Devin Duvernay, WR

This FanPost was created by a registered user of The Daily Norseman, and does not necessarily reflect the views of the staff of the site. However, since this is a community, that view is no less important.