2025 Draft Grades

[JustInTime]

For real. Especially for insecure people that have been touched when they were little boys. 

But for real though, draft grades right now mean absolutely nothing. No one knows. I think Jackson was an absolute amazing pick. Then you add in Turner from last year, and things look a lot different. I will give Kewsi credit for the last two years.

Typically accusations are confessions. If true in this case it would A) explain a lot and B) Let me urge you to seek professional psychiatric counseling.

[Canthony]

   

Typically accusations are confessions. If true in this case it would A) explain a lot and B) Let me urge you to seek professional psychiatric counseling.

[supafreak84]

Matt Miller at ESPN on his best round 6 value pick;


Miller: Kobe King, LB, Minnesota Vikings (No. 201). King is a run-and-chase linebacker who is tough for blockers to handle when he's crashing downhill in the run game. He was graded as a fourth-rounder on my board thanks to his between-the-tackles toughness, so the Vikings received exceptional value selecting him toward the end of Round 6.

[Canthony]

Matt Miller at ESPN on his best round 6 value pick;


Miller: Kobe King, LB, Minnesota Vikings (No. 201). King is a run-and-chase linebacker who is tough for blockers to handle when he's crashing downhill in the run game. He was graded as a fourth-rounder on my board thanks to his between-the-tackles toughness, so the Vikings received exceptional value selecting him toward the end of Round 6.

Kobe King was someone I really liked. About two months ago I said we needed a new MLB and no one was looking that way. I think that was a great value pick. Should be a good get for us.

[JustInTime]

Matt Miller at ESPN on his best round 6 value pick;


Miller: Kobe King, LB, Minnesota Vikings (No. 201). King is a run-and-chase linebacker who is tough for blockers to handle when he's crashing downhill in the run game. He was graded as a fourth-rounder on my board thanks to his between-the-tackles toughness, so the Vikings received exceptional value selecting him toward the end of Round 6.

Which Pace pretty much does as well. Fiancé is a Penn State grad so chances are I’ve seen King more than Miller. We needed someone who can cover which he does a pinch better than Pace, but not enough to make a tangible impact. Definitely an improvement over Asomoah.

[supafreak84]

Which Pace pretty much does as well. Fiancé is a Penn State grad so chances are I’ve seen King more than Miller. We needed someone who can cover which he does a pinch better than Pace, but not enough to make a tangible impact. Definitely an improvement over Asomoah.

Agreed. Definitely needed an upgrade at backup LB. Out of our later picks, King and Ingram-Dawkins both look the part

[Bunsen82]

I will give this draft A-. Look at the draft as trying to maximize the impact of the picks we had, with that I think it was a success. A primary objective this off-season was to to make the trenches better and to make our team better running the ball and defending the run.

1. Jackson completes our offensive line rebuild. He will make the guard position much more comfortable to the QB by limiting pressure and being a road grader when running the ball. I really think his positional flexibility on being a very solid tackle sealed the pick in my opinion, it allows for maximum flexibility especially with Darrisaws uncertainty. After Jackson the guard quality fell off a cliff. This has been a theme I have seen for a while. Where the quality of NFL quality lineman is going down each year as mire and more college offenses are going away from pro offenses. With that being said the rarity factor meant you could find more quality for other positions later in the draft.

Trade. This trade had excellent value dropping 5 spots to improve our 6th round pick. By 45. Ultimately trading back later in the draft and picking up a solid backup QB that only costs 1.5 miilion a year. This is an immense value added maneuver allowing the team to spend more money to pick up any final pieces to the puzzle. My gut feel is Watts was their target, once he was off the board they pivoted to the next pick

3. Felton - they state KR but honestly the route running and athleticism has the potential for him being as good as Addison. The Vikings have done an exceptional job at picking WR lately for a position that generally has a poor hit rate. Route running and flexibility in routes appears to be the common denominator of most of the WR they have picked lately. Felton had excellent production even with a weaker QB.

5 Ingram Dawkins - picked purely for his athleticism not toe the production on the field. This appears to be a Florio pet project. We succeeded in the past with Hunter, but this is a lotto ticket - not hitting the Fareway. Yes he could rally improve with better coaching and it’s not that I don’t recognize the potential, if this pick hits this draft will be off the charts as I do think the other 2 will be major successes, the odds of that is incredibly slim 25% or less. Granted it’s the 5th round.

6. King - this team struggled to stop the run especially when our 2 primary starters were out. King will be able to stuff the run. He will also be a special teams staple. Yes the coverage aspect needs work, but for this pick you got outstanding value. His talent dictated a 4th round or 5th round or higher based on production, and with teams expected to run the ball more, another thumper was needed. Go back to the mantra running the ball and stopping the run. They want to be able to win any type of game,
and King increases our ability of the opponent wants to try to run the ball down our throats. This is an A+++ pick in my book.

6. Bartholomew. Sounds like a lunch pail type of guy, does everything right with the ability to be a better pass option. Effectively will be a solid backup. It was a solid pick. We have a TE spot open, but in they aren’t just going to give it to Bartholomew. They picked up 2 more TE as UDFA’s. Both were top 10 remaining TE not picked yet. There should be a solid competition for this spot.


UDFA- the Vikings have really been utilizing UDFA extremely well the last couple of years. Spending some cheap money for an excellent return. This year looks similar. As mentioned above Nesbit and Yurosek are both solid TE to add to the completion. Brosmer is our next QB3 project. He has talent but at best a backup in the future, but he did receive our highest guarantee from what was public. Logan Browns tape looks like a a 4th round back up tackle to me with upside to be a starter. Punching a teammate and getting kicked off a team really hurt his draft stock, but for the Vikings it creates an opportunity for both the team and the player. I think Brown is the most likely player to make it on the roster from this group. There is a handful of other players that could flash.

I do think it appeared we avoided the defensive backfield in the draft which you wonder if intentional, or just missed out on players like Watts. I think this gets resolved this week with more signings. They say a draft is successful if you can find 2-3 solid players. I think this draft will easily do that. The UDFA picks and Ingram Dawkins pick will determine if this was a great draft that paid off much more than the limited draft capital we had for the weekend.

[JustInTime]

Agreed. Definitely needed an upgrade at backup LB. Out of our later picks, King and Ingram-Dawkins both look the part

Yup. Pretty easy path to making the roster.

[StickierBuns]

Good mix of opinions on the Draft. Obviously we all know that Draft grades can't really be known right now, but opinions and personal analysis is all we have a few days after the Draft so its interesting to get everyone's very early feedback.

You can't control who gets picked before you. At #24, you'll see guys you love snatched up. And you can't trade up or trade down every year, teams don't do that. You pick your spots and sometimes the best move is no move at all. Is the juice worth the squeeze? And if so, can it even be accomplished? Hitting on whomever you pick is the most important thing, regardless of where it is you pick: trade value, comp. etc all really irrelevant if they turn out to be duds.

[MaroonBells]

My take.

General Thoughts: As I have previously mentioned, after Booker, Zabel, Harmon, and Barron were off the board, the draft lost a lot of lustre for me. Booker reuniting with JJ was just a massive karma groove. Really wanted Harmon as I've wanted a replacement for Kevin Williams forever. This guy has Chris Jones type traits. The Steelers have previously drafted my man crushes, Keanu Benton and Payton Wilson in recent years so what's one more theft by the...Stealers. Zabel was my next highest want simply because I didn't think Barron would be available.

My hope was to come out of the draft with either an impact trench guy or a legit CB1 that would allow BFlo the ability to mix in more man coverage. I wouldn't have hated Henderson at 24 but I think value wise Harvey was a better balance of draft capital cost and potential production. Definitely thought iLB was a lot closer to a need than most. TE was a no brainer simply based on current roster configuration. WR was no where on my radar so I spent very little time review this class save for Savion Williams. 

So, that's my starting point for this review. My prism if you will that will obviously impact my take on the 2025 class. 

Donovan Jackson. Again for transparency I didn't give Jackson much of a review pre-draft as I locked in on Booker and Zabel a good 2 months ago. Post draft I dug in. Came away impressed with all the elements you want in a good guard, had the triangle numbers, production, position flexibility, played in a top conference, and had an excellent run in the college football playoffs. Got to see his first start at LT and thought Abdul Carter would have a field day. Jackson held his own and over the next 800 or so snaps at LT had some in the scouting community stating he might be a better LT prospect than guard.

Upside: Completes the interior OL rebuild that could eventually lead to year over year Super Bowl contention. Pairing him with Darrisaw should lead to a dominant left side for many years. Should be a solid to very good LG for the next decade. He's not John Hannah or Randall McDaniel, but if you squint hard enough you might get a Vikings version of Steve Hutchinson. 

Downside: It's a fucking G! Highly fungible position. Brandel was solid to good with Darrisaw to his left and a mediocre at best Bradbury to his right. My assumption was with a return of Darrisaw and a much better Kelly flanking him, he would return to early season form. Plus with another year starting he could turn into a very good player.

Opportunity Cost: There were a couple better options that we could have explored. I won't get into speculating that we could have traded up for a more impact player (Harmon) simply because we didn't have the ammo. The two safeties that went after Jackson are directly tied to the Ravens organization. Starks went to Baltimore and Emmanwori went to Seattle who is coached by the former Baltimore DC. When you consider that Harry is done after this year, Jackson has little experience and Mettellus is a FA not addressing safety was extremely shortsighted. When looking at the pick from a value and roster continuity perspective it's a below average return. But, if these leads to deep playoff runs year over year, then...its a fucking safety..

(I'll be much briefer going forward)

Tai Felton. I like what I've seen so far. Looks to have some really good run after the catch ability. Little on the light side but that can be fixed. Not stout in contested catch situations but seems to have decent traits in other faucets of the game. Returned 8 kicks in college, but I believe we will try him there. 

My big problem with the pick is Nailor and Powell combined for 52 targets last year. Ill assume WR3 targets will decrease in an offense destined to run more. This was a really poor use of draft capital. I would have gone with Bhaysul Tuten. He'd be the heir apparent to Aaron Jones and is a helluva kick returner. Took two to the house his junior year and averaged nearly 29 a return. At best Felton is WR3 for the next 3 or 4 years. The only upside is the massive karma as former slender Terrapins have fared well. This pick doesn't hold up to minimal scrutiny. Yuck.

Tyrion Ingram-Dawkins. First of his name, lord of the arm over and double handed swipe. Traits galore. Fastest 10 yard split at the combine. He'll compete for Edge4 with a couple guys, Ritcher and Murphy, who are pretty much polar opposites. This will be an interesting camp competition. Good use of our limited draft capital.

Kobe King. The one guy in this class that I mocked at least once. Definitely a position of need as we didn't fare well when Cashman and Pace missed time. I would have preferred an iLB like Demetrius Knight who went much earlier. King is a larger Ivan Pace with maybe slightly better coverage ability. Meh.

Gavin Bartholomew. Based solely on numbers he's likely to get more meaningful snaps than anyone not named Jackson or Felton. Very short arms for a 6-5 guy. Try hard blocker who'll need time in the weight room. One of several team captains we drafted.

Final analysis: In a couple ways this draft had a look and feel similar to Kwesi's first draft. Lots of guys with high RAS scores and team captains. I believe the similarities end there. Jesus I hope it does. Final judgement will pretty much rest on the impact of Jackson. If he turns LG into a strength and is the last cog to the Maul of America™ it will be a ringing success. Anything short of that the opportunity costs sacrificed and the absolute waste of drafting Felton when better and more impactful prospects were available will be greatly amplified. Grade: D+ to a B

While I agree that taking a guard in the 1st isn’t exactly maximizing impact, the Vikings were in a position to take BPA. And I liked Jackson more than most. I would’ve taken him over Booker. I had Zabel about even. There's more than a few in the draft community who ranked Jackson as the #1 guard.

I liked that Zabel had experience at 4 out of the 5 OL positions, but he did that at NDSU, facing future farmers from Fargo. He did look good at the Senior Bowl facing real NFL talent, so I'll give him that, but Jackson played left tackle for the national champions and faced off against the likes of Abdul Carter. After one down game, he adjusted and ended up playing really well down the stretch. That kind of failure, adjustment and rapid improvement bodes well IMO.

I do you give you credit for waking me up to the LB need. LB wasn’t even on my radar as a position we might draft until you started talking about Dimmy Knight.  Our interest in Carson Schwesinger confirms that. I suspect that if we had traded to the 2nd round, he could’ve been a target.

Agree about Tuten over Felton. But I wouldn’t compare this to the ’22 draft. We had 10 picks that draft and missed on all of them. This draft is more like 2023. Few picks, good looking 1st rounder, no 2nd rounder, and a promising 3rd rounder. If we can get Addison and Blackmon-like impacts from Jackson and Felton, I’ll consider it a success.