Vikings to forfeit seventh-round pick for salary cap violation

We make a lot of jokes about the love that Minnesota Vikings’ General Manager Rick Spielman has for seventh-round draft picks. When today got started, the Vikings. . .who had 12 picks in this year’s NFL Draft. . .had just one selection in the draft’s final round.

And now, they have none.

Numerous sources, including Mark Craig of the Minneapolis Star-Tribune, are reporting that the Vikings are being made to forfeit their seventh-round pick in this year’s draft due to “a salary cap violation involving a practice squad player.” The violation is from 2019 and it is not being reported at the present time which player it pertains to.

The Vikings’ seventh-round pick was slotted at #242 overall. In addition to the loss of a draft pick, three team executives were fined $10,000 each. It has not been disclosed who those individuals are, either, and it probably won’t be, which is fine.

This means that the Vikings are now down to only 11 selections in the 2021 NFL Draft, which is about six weeks away or so. I’m sure that, by the time the dust settles on 1 May that the Vikings will have made at least one seventh-round selection, and likely will have made several. As of today, however, they do not have any picks remaining in that part of the draft.