EAGAN — In the hours leading up to Day 2 of the NFL Draft, NFL Network’s Ian Rapoport hinted that the Minnesota Vikings could take Malik Willis with the 34th overall pick, which they acquired from the Detroit Lions in a first-round shuffled of picks. Not only did they not go with a quarterback but Willis was passed over by the entire league until pick 86 and the Vikings instead selected a cornerback with a serious injury history, an offensive lineman with arrest and sexual assault allegations in his past and an undersized linebacker.
The Vikings moved down from No. 34, trading with the Green Bay Packers, who moved up to select wide receiver Christian Watson. In exchange the Vikings got two draft picks in the 50s. The draft value charts made an appearance for the second straight night and this time they were in lockstep: The Vikings got better value.
They quickly moved back up in order to select Andrew Booth Jr., a cornerback from Clemson.
At that point, the plan started to become clear. The Vikings entered the draft with only three picks out of the first 155 and needed to stack up more talent to rebuild the roster with players they could grow for the future.
“This thing is dead in the water if we don’t develop players,” senior football advisor Ryan Grigson said.
Booth Jr. has much to like about his development potential. He’s still 21 years old and allowed quarterback ratings against of 70.0 and 59.6 (per PFF) in 2021 and 2020, respectively.
“He’s got length and he’s got good hips, he can turn the ball over, he’s got really good ball skills,” Grigson said. “But me personally, I feel like doing him this fall, the one thing that stuck out about Andrew Booth besides his athleticism and the way he competes is how much he cares. He just seems like a guy that… it just speaks to his background, his football character, he loves football. He’s a football junkie.”
Related: Get to know Vikings first-round pick Lewis Cine
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With all of his shining statistics and skills, some draft enthusiasts expected him to be a first-round pick. When Booth Jr. arrived on his conference call with the Twin Cities media, he said that he wasn’t surprised that he dropped to the second round because he played hurt for his entire college career.
“From the team’s perspective, I didn’t do the combine or the pro day so I kind of made it hard for everybody to love me,” Booth Jr. said. “I know everybody really, really liked me, but I was hard to love, though.”
“I haven’t played healthy since like high school,” he said.
Booth Jr. explained that he had surgery to correct a core muscle issue in 2021 but ended up having it again this spring. He had a quad injury as well, which caused him to miss the Combine.
“I won’t tell you exactly what I said to our team doctors, I was joking, but I was, like, you guys sure?” Adofo-Mensah said of Booth Jr.’s medical reports, adding that he’d talked to Booth Jr.’s trainer about how the previous injuries hindered him.
If healthy, Booth Jr. has a chance to provide immediate depth to a cornerback group that desperately needed improvement and a potential quality long-term starter. Patrick Peterson, Cam Dantzler and Chandon Sullivan are slated as starters but there are no corners with significant experience behind them. However, the Vikings’ decision to take a player who fell because of medical concerns will be questioned if he can’t stay healthy in the NFL. Booth Jr. did say he expects to be ready for minicamp.
Up to that point, the Vikings’ plan fit together. They got two secondary players to restock a group that struggled mightily over the last two years and both prospects are considered of the hard-hat-wearing variety. Football junkies, as Grigson said. Earlier in the day, Lewis Cine shined in his press conference, talking about his excitement to watch film with Harrison Smith and how he couldn’t wait to take on football as his new job.
But then the Vikings took Ed Ingram, a guard out of LSU who missed the entire 2018 season after an arrest. He was accused of sexually assaulting two girls when he was 16 and they were 14 years old. He was reinstated in 2019.
“Of course a lot of teams talked about it,” Ingram said about background questions. “My way to address it was I’m just focused on football like right now I’m just focusing on football.”
Ingram, who was taken at pick 59, was projected by Pro Football Focus to be taken in the fourth round. While he naturally will be expected to compete at right guard, he only played left guard at LSU.
Vikings co-director of player personnel Jamaal Stephenson said: “We’re aware of the charges that occurred in 2018… it’s a serious charge and it’s something we investigated and we vetted him and feel good about where we are.”
Ingram produced one of the best pass blocking PFF grades in the SEC and allowed just 11 QB pressures last year, which likely attracted the team to picking him. Still, guard doesn’t fall very high on the positional value chart and Ingram’s history draws quite a few reasonable questions about whether the utopian culture the Vikings are trying to create should involve players with very serious recent allegations.
“We had an extensive process, and we’re comfortable with the person,” Adofo-Mensah said. “Knowing the character of the person, what you are getting, who he is on a day-to-day basis, his values. You’re betting on the forward and you’re betting on everything you were told, but, again, extensive process. We got to this place, and we feel comfortable with our decision.”
Adofo-Mensah wanted to avoid this being considered “his draft,” but he certainly did that by putting his reputation on the line picking Ingram.
With their final pick of Day 2, the Vikings selected linebacker Brian Asamoah from Oklahoma. He’s the third linebacker the Vikings have picked in either the third or fourth round in the last three years.
“I think what we’re being intentional about is getting the best players,” director of college scouting Mike Sholiton said. “It just happens to be we’ve taken three different defensive players. I think looking at Andrew [Booth Jr.] and [Lewis Cine], who you met earlier today, you’ve got three weapons at different levels.”
Per the PFF big board, the Vikings did well to take Asamoah at pick 66. He was ranked by PFF as the 48th best player in the class despite his lack of size (6-foot, 226 pounds).
The linebacker room is crowded though and the positional value at linebacker may be lacking. Per a PFF study, the surplus value of an average linebacker is the lowest of all the positions except running back. That doesn’t so much feel in line with the “analytical” approach that was expected — or that even seemed like was happening after the Vikings traded down from the 34th pick.
“The game is evolving… the things that happen on a football field haven’t changed, the importance of each thing maybe has changed, right?” Adofo-Mensah said. “Someone like Asamoah…you talk about somebody who has the skill set to do everything we need in this modern game.”
As the Vikings head into the third day of the draft, the summation of the first two days looks like this: They have made moves that ultimately involved two players on opposing teams who could make a difference in NFC North races going forward — Jameson Williams to the Lions and Christian Watson to the Packers. Their picks outside of Lewis Cine have a chance to be difference makers but either carry risk or aren’t at positions that are generally hard to replace in free agency.
The team’s immediate depth could be improved if the picks hit immediately and long term some issues could be solved. But, did the Vikings move the needle beyond what would have been expected when the previous front office was calling the shots? We will find out in the years to come. On Friday night, it did not feel like that was the case.
