Report: Vikings 'have shown interest in adding' Trent Williams

The Pro Bowl tackle sat out the 2019 season while waiting to be traded.
Report: Vikings 'have shown interest in adding' Trent Williams
Report: Vikings 'have shown interest in adding' Trent Williams /

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Trent Williams is a 7-time Pro Bowl left tackle and the 31-year-old star is reportedly on the Vikings' radar to one degree or another. 

According to ESPN's John Keim, the Vikings "have show interest in adding Williams," who was teammates with Kirk Cousins in Washington from 2012 to 2017. Keim notes that Washington has "pegged teams in the so-called window to win now" as possible trade partners. Keim wrote: 

"To maximize this window, the Vikings could bolster their offensive line. Reiff has been decent, but he'll count $13.2 million against the cap this season. If Minnesota cut or traded Reiff, it would recoup $8.8 million in cap space. That would leave the Vikings room to acquire Williams. If they wanted to keep Reiff, they could slide him inside, but would then need to find another way to create cap room -- perhaps by trading safety Anthony Harris, who will make $11.4 million on the franchise tag."

Minnesota currently has approximately $13.1 million cap space, according to Over The Cap. Williams comes with a 2020 cap charge of $14.5 million, meaning trading for him would almost certainly require the Vikings to make sacrifices. 

It's been reported that the Vikings are open to trading Harris, a star safety whom the Vikings franchise-tagged for $11.4 million. That would help offset most of Williams' salary in a trade, but losing Harris would put another hole in a Vikings secondary that has already lost Xavier Rhodes, Trae Waynes, Mackensie Alexander, Jayron Kearse and Andrew Sendejo in free agency. 

What's more is that trading for Williams would likely need to be coupled with a contract extension since Williams is not signed beyond 2020. 

Then there's the Dalvin Cook situation. Will the Vikings be able to trade for Williams, sign him to an extension, and extend Cook, who is entering the final year of his rookie deal?

Keeping Cook probably won't be a bargain considering the market price could be set pretty high by any one of the stars from the loaded 2017 draft class signing an extension. That class includes Christian McCaffrey, Alvin Kamara, Joe Mixon, Aaron Jones, Leonard Fournette, James Conner, Kareem Hunt and Cook. 

Throw in the fact that Minnesota still has to sign its draft class (13 picks), finding money for everyone will require some magic by Rob Brzezinski, the executive vice president of football operations who has a history of pulling rabbits out of his hat to make the roster and contracts work. 


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Joe Nelson
JOE NELSON

Title: Bring Me The Sports co-owner, editor Email: joe@bringmethenews.com Twitter: @JoeBMTN Education: Southwest Minnesota State University Location: Minneapolis, Minnesota Expertise: All things Minnesota sports Nelson has covered Minnesota sports for two decades, starting his media career in sports radio. He worked at small market Minnesota stations in Marshall and St. Cloud before joining one of the nation's highest-rated sports stations, KFAN-FM 100.3 in the Twin Cities. There, he was the producer of the top-rated mid-morning sports show with Minnesota Vikings announcer Paul Allen.  His radio experience helped blossom a career as a sports writer, joining Minneapolis-based Bring Me The News in 2011.  Nelson and Adam Uren became co-owners of Bring Me The News in 2018 and have since more than tripled the site's traffic and launched Bring Me The Sports in cooperation with the Sports Illustrated/FanNation umbrella. Nelson has covered the Super Bowl and numerous training camps, NFL combines, the MLB All-Star Game and Minnesota playoff games, in addition to the day-to-day happenings on and off the field of play.  Nelson also has extensive knowledge of non-sports subjects, including news and weather. He works closely with Bring Me The News meteorologist Sven Sundgaard to produce a bevy of weather and climate information for Minnesota readers.  Nelson helped launch and manage the Bring Me The News Radio Network, which provided more than 50 radio stations around Minnesota with daily news, sports and weather reports from 2011-17.