20 Vikings-related takeaways from the NFL Combine
The combination of draft picks taking part in events and NFL insiders converging on the same city as coaches, scouts and GMs at the NFL Combine again provided a great deal of insight (and questions) about what’s to come with the start of free agency and the lead up to the draft. Let’s have a look at what we came away with through a Vikings lens…
1. It doesn’t feel like a long-term deal with Kirk Cousins is imminent
Let’s begin with a few caveats: Not everything that’s said in Indianapolis by general managers is true and things in the NFL can change quickly. With that said, the Vikings are in a strange spot with their quarterback. He’s coming off a career high in wins in which he bonded with his head coach and was Mr. Clutch on a weekly basis yet his contract situation makes his future uncertain.
Cousins is going to be 35 next season and quarterback prices are skyrocketing, particularly with Giants QB Daniel Jones reportedly asking for $45 million per year and DeShaun Watson landing the most guaranteed money of all time last offseason. Cousins appears to be in a position to ask for much more than he got when the new regime arrived.
“From their side, they want it as certain as possible, and from our side, we want flexibility,” GM Kwesi Adofo-Mensah told beat reporters. “You’re always trying to be solutions-oriented and find a way that works for both people.”
It’s hard to figure a solution that lands between Cousins wanting certainty and the Vikings wanting flexibility. Adofo-Mensah also mentioned in his podium session the quality of the roster that can be built around Cousins, which has proven to be difficult for two groups of decision makers.
Would the Vikings and Cousins’s representation simply let him go into the final year of his contract with no future deal? He’s certainly bet on himself before.
2. Aaron Rodgers’s decisions probably impacts whether Derek Carr ends up in the NFC
UPDATE: Derek Carr is reportedly signing with the Saints
It appears that the New York Jets are far and away the favorite to land Aaron Rodgers if he decides to return. Multiple reports have surfaced that the Packers are ready to move on, which means that if he comes back and gets traded to New York there will be a domino effect for Derek Carr, who reportedly is leaning toward the Jets if the opportunity arises. Carr would then start looking for other strong teams in need of QBs and both the Panthers and Saints are at the top of the list. While you can debate about Carr’s skill for days, it’s clear that he’s capable of leading good teams to the playoffs. The weak group of NFC quarterbacks would get stronger in comparison to teams that ran out Andy Dalton, Baker Mayfield and Sam Darnold last year.
Rodgers said on a podcast that he will “make a decision soon enough.”
3. Let’s not pretend Anthony Richardson’s unbelievable Combine didn’t matter — or that anyone knows if he will work out in the NFL
If you have seen the take that Anthony Richardson’s all-time great performance “confirmed what we already knew,” well, Vegas does not agree. The betting odds for Richardson going at the top of the draft jumped after his showing. Rightfully so. There seem to be a lot of folks who want to turn him into the hotly-debated prospect of the year for content sake but his legendary Combine performance combined with other circumstantial factors like the fact it was his only year as a starter, he’s 21 years old, Florida threw downfield more often than almost any other team, he’s a prolific runner and that his best games in college were dominant, will very likely entice one of the QB-needy teams at the top. And it should. In years past we have seen Josh Allen, Lamar Jackson and Jalen Hurts all chided for their imperfect passing ability only to see them develop into stars.
Here’s what Jeremy Fowler of ESPN wrote:
“One NFL scout I spoke to said his team was internally debating whether Richardson would go in the top 12, and most agreed that he would. And that was early in the week, before the
fantastic workout
.
One league exec called Richardson a blend of Cam Newton,
Josh Allen
and
Justin Fields
. And multiple teams I spoke to this week said his interviews were impressive, too, and that the QB was comfortable in those settings.”
Nobody knows whether any quarterback will work out in the draft. If analysts are purporting to have any certainty about Richardson because of his completion percentage, reader beware. There are no sure things either way. But we can logically say that his ceiling is through the roof because of his athletic profile.
4. Odds seem to be increasing that Adam Thielen ends up elsewhere
The vibe from both Adofo-Mensah and Kevin O’Connell was that they are aware difficult decisions will need to be made with veteran players who were key producers on their 13-win team last season. The big question leading into the coming weeks has been: Who stays, who goes? One player has upped his chances of landing in the “goes” category: Adam Thielen. It seems that his role in the offense is an issue, which is a little bizarre considering his age and that playing a secondary role to Justin Jefferson was inevitable and helped lead them to a top-10 offense.
Thielen’s contract would cause the Vikings to eat a $13.5 million dead cap hit and only gain $6.4 million in space (per OTC) but it might be better to move on now rather than ending up with an uncomfortable situation with a future Ring of Honor player.
Andrew Krammer of the Strib wrote about the realistic possibility Thielen is elsewhere next season. ESPN’s Jeremy Fowler wrote the same thing in his Combine buzz column.
5. Could Dalvin Cook really be back?
The most inevitable seeming move for the Vikings in the next few weeks appeared to be cutting Dalvin Cook. He’s hitting the age where running backs traditionally fall off and his cap hit is untenable. But NFL Network’s Tom Pelissero said in a radio interview that he believes Cook will return to the Vikings. That would mean very likely re-working his contract and working with him on his role. His agent recently has made noise on social media about the pass-first Vikings not leaning enough on their Pro Bowl running back.
6. The Vikings are really trying to let Justin Jefferson know they want him to sign an extension
“I don’t want to be the Vikings GM without this guy on our team, so it’s a priority,” Adofo-Mensah said. “We have to make sure we do it in an order that we can do it in given all the other decisions we have to make. It’s not just having an elite player because I think people – maybe they appreciate the talent, maybe they don’t. The human is even better. Seeing it up close every day and he just wants to win.”
7. Would the Ravens use the non-exclusive tag on Lamar Jackson?
It does not appear that Lamar Jackson and the Ravens are close in extension negotiations since reports are that Jackson wants to eclipse DeShaun Watson’s number for most guaranteed money ever. The Ravens can franchise tag him for $45 million but that’s a difficult move considering they have $24 million in cap space.
Fowler wrote that the Ravens have considered using the non-exclusive franchise tag, which is one-year, $32.4 million. Peter King wrote that he couldn’t find a team in Indy that was interested in Jackson but maybe that’s just because it doesn’t appear possible yet that he could actually leave.
If the Ravens non-exclusive tag him, it becomes extremely possible that another team would negotiate a new deal and give up the two first-round picks that it costs if the Ravens do not match the offer. It doesn’t feel like an exaggeration to say that if Jackson goes to another team it will send shockwaves through the entire league and have all kinds of impacts based on where he goes.
8. It looks like Daniel Jones is really going to push the $45 million thing
Reports have continued to spill out of Jones’s camp that he is going to hold steady on the $45 million per year mark for his next contract. ESPN is reporting that the Giants are willing to go with a very high number for Jones (estimated around $40 million per year), which is interesting because they could franchise tag him and wait another year to get a larger sample size on his fit with Brian Daboll. Any deal that Jones signs will impact how other QBs, including Kirk Cousins, see their market value. While Jones played well this year, he’s a test case for how far a QB can push a team. He’s only had one quality season and the gap between his asking price and a rookie QB deal or replacement QB like Baker Mayfield is massive.
9. Some cornerbacks and D-linemen who the Vikings could target made their case
This year we don’t really need to rank the Vikings’ needs because they are pretty obvious, especially on defense. They need cornerbacks and pass rushers. Kevin Cole of the Unexpected Points newsletter scored all the Combine prospects on a weighted scale and a few potential Vikings targets who have been mocked in their general range produced very good scores. Here’s the most notable:
— Maryland CB Deonte Banks ran a 4.35 40-yard dash and ranked fourth best CB by Cole’s scale. He’s 18th overall on PFF’s Big Board.
— Mississippi State’s Emmanuel Forbes (36th on the Big Board) also hit 4.35. He ranked ninth in Cole’s overall Combine score.
— Georgia’s Kelee Ringo (74th Big Board) and South Carolina’s Cam Smith (38th Big Board) were 10th and 11th, respectively, out of 37.
— Pass rusher Nolan Smith (21st) scored in the 99th percentile by Cole’s metrics, running a preposterous 4.39 40-yard dash at 238 pounds. With Brian Flores’s base in the 3-4, OLB types are worth paying attention.
— Adetomiwa Adebawore (40th) from Northwestern ran sub-4.5 at 282 pounds. Maybe he doesn’t profile as a Flores fit but he did rank third of all DEs.
— Pittsburgh DT Calijah Kancey (13th) only ran the 40-yard dash in Indy but blazed a 4.67 mark at 281 pounds.
— Clemson DT Bryan Bresee (20th) finished fourth in Cole’s metrics.
Cole joined the Purple Insider podcast to talk about his models here.
10. The Vikings clearly want Dalvin Tomlinson back but other offers might be too high to match
The deadline for the Vikings to extend Dalvin Tomlinson before his $7.5 million dead cap hit sets in was supposed to be earlier this month but the two sides agreed to move it back. It was obvious from Adofo-Mensah’s comments that they want him back.
“Look we love Dalvin,” Adofo-Mensah said. Same thing whenever you have good players in your building and good people, you want to do everything you can to keep them. Obviously, we have a lot of decisions to make, so we’re trying to buy ourselves a little more time.”
The price tag is not going to be easy to handle, however. There are 10 DTs who make more than $16 million per year and Tomlinson is coming off his best season in terms of pressuring opposing QBs. He could comp himself to Vita Vea, who makes $17.5 million per year. That might be too rich for Minnesota’s blood, particularly because there aren’t many DTs on the market beside Javon Hargrave.
11. The Bears are probably trading down rather than taking a QB and the Panthers make so much sense as a trade partner
If Chicago is planning to trade Justin Fields, they are giving zero indications of it in public. Ryan Poles talked extensively with the Chicago media in Indy and dropped a handful of breadcrumbs that indicate the Bears want to see more of Fields before they make a decision and start to rebuild their empty roster with draft picks. No team makes more sense in a trade-down scenario than the Panthers. Unless they get Derek Carr, Carolina will be looking for a QB they can truly buy into with Frank Reich in charge and they can dangle Brian Burns as a trade chip whereas most opposing teams can only offer draft capital.
Of course, we should always remember some very important words when we talk assuredly about what a team is planning: “Josh Rosen is our quarterback.”
12. Some undersized players are pretty intriguing in this draft
If you think the league is trending toward quickness over size, it seems that you’re going to be right in this draft. Mike Renner of PFF pointed out six intriguing players who are undersized and could get drafted fairly high and possibly make an impact on teams. Two of them could catch the Vikings’ eye: Pittsburgh DT Calijah Kancey and Houston WR Tank Dell. If you recall, the Vikings were willing to pick an undersized linebacker in Brian Asamoah last year at a position that appears to be leaning toward speed over power. Kancey is an interior pass rusher — a spot that continues to grow in value. Dell is a receiver. It was only two years ago that debates raged over DeVonta Smith’s weight and then he quickly became a quality receiver.
13. Nobody knows if Jalen Carter’s arrest will make a difference in his draft stock
In some of the strangest drama in years at the Combine, projected top prospect Jalen Carter was only a few minutes away from speaking at the podium when there was an announcement that a warrant was out for his arrest pertaining to a street racing incident that left one of his teammates dead. Yahoo! Sports’ Charles McDonald asked around Indy and couldn’t get a consensus on what’s next for Carter. It isn’t exactly like the famed Gasmask Bong incident because there is time in between for teams to investigate the incident and potential legal ramifications but if the case isn’t cleared up by draft time it may be hard for clubs to know how to handle the explosive DT on draft day.
14. The NFLPA survey is a big deal
The NFLPA released a survey of over 1,300 players that ranked their teams in every area pertaining to player happiness, from food to facilities to treatment of families and the Vikings graded between A- and A+ in every single category. While ranking at the top is way less dramatic than ranking at the bottom, the survey created a lot of conversations around Indy about how it might impact things like free agency and players signing contract extensions. For the Vikings, it paints them in an incredibly positive light to all players outside the organization. It puts a feather in Kevin O’Connell and Kwesi Adofo-Mensah’s cap for improving the culture and sports science relating to player health and gives them another argument for why certain players should stay. It’s also likely to press some teams to play catch up.
15. CJ Stroud can really chuck a football
Anthony Richardson stole the show by looking like Von Miller playing quarterback but CJ Stroud may have subtly taken over the No. 1 overall spot with his throwing performance. Matched with his last two college games, Stroud effortlessly delivered pass after pass on the money.
“CJ Stroud is having one of the best throwing sessions I’ve seen at the Combine,” NFL.com draft expert and former scout Daniel Jeremiah said on Twitter.
16. Miami might do something crazy at QB
There’s increasing buzz that the Dolphins might move on from QB Tua Taguvailoa, which is strange following a fantastic breakout season. But he suffered multiple concussions and the Dolphins already tried to lure Tom Brady last year (and lost a draft pick because of it).
17. The 49ers probably go with a journeyman backup type but what if…
Brock Purdy’s surgery was delayed by swelling. Nobody really knows what the 49ers have in Trey Lance. That reality prompted GM John Lynch to say that the concerns about Purdy and Lance will probably push them to sign a veteran QB, which some have suggested could be Baker Mayfield.
Would they call the Vikings about Kirk Cousins if the two sides do not have an extension in place? There’s a lot of hurdles to get over, especially why the Vikings would give an NFC contender their good quarterback but if they reached an impasse and decided to hit the reset button like Detroit did with Matthew Stafford… you never know. It still seems like an extreme long shot.
18. The Vikings could go with a ‘developmental QB’ in the draft
Every year you can talk yourself into an intriguing mid-to-late round quarterback. Most times those picks are basically lit on fire but last year’s Brock Purdy find might inspire some teams to take that swing. Kevin O’Connell was up front about his reasoning for meeting with QBs at the Combine.
“I do that every single year,” O’Connell said. “The guys in the draft, free agency, just looking at the landscape of the league, and then all of the quarterbacks on our roster and how we feel about our position. There’s a reason I feel so strongly about Kirk. I’ve been very honest about that. I believe in him as a player and was really proud of the way he played this year. But we always have to be evaluating.”
There are a few names the Vikings could consider, including: Tennessee’s Hendon Hooker, Purdue’s Aidan O’Connell, Fresno State’s Jake Haener, Georgia’s Stetson Bennett and Houston’s Clayton Tune.
19. Minnesota’s Mo Ibrahim has a lot of competition for mid-to-late round RBs
The Strib wrote about his outlook in the draft here. It doesn’t appear he will get drafted very high but Ibrahim’s college production points toward the possibility of him being the late-round RB steal that we see almost every year.
20. The Lions should be aiming for Jalen Ramsey
NFL.com ranked Ramsey’s potential landing spots and placed the Lions at No. 1. If that happens, the Detroit defense would instantly project as being much, much better than they were last year. It would be an all-in move from GM Brad Holmes.
