The Vikings enter night two of the 2023 NFL Draft with plenty of holes yet to fill but just one pick, 87th overall (3rd round), on the board for Friday night.
After not acquiring more draft capital, and a possible second round pick, by trading down from 23rd overall, the Vikings left themselves with just one pick Friday and three picks Saturday. For a team that’s averaged 12 picks over the last four drafts that’s a miniscule number.
One way for Kwesi and co. to acquire more picks would be to trade some of the veterans on big salaries whose futures are still up in the air.
Plenty has been made about Dalvin Cook’s long term future in Minnesota but according to a note from CBS Sports’ Jonathan Jones, Za’Darius Smith might be a trade chip during the last two days of the draft.
“Keep an eye on what Minnesota may do with outside linebacker Za’Darius Smith,” Jones wrote Friday. “He still has two more years on his deal and is set to count $15.49 million against the cap this season. There are some rumblings the Vikings could move him.”
According to OverTheCap.com the Vikings have just over $1.1 million in cap space before signing any of their draft picks.
If the Vikings were to trade Smith before June 1 they would only incur a $3.3 million dead cap, freeing up around $12.1 million in space
The 31-year-old linebacker is coming off a season in which he racked up 9.5 sacks in the first nine weeks of the season and only a half sack in the last eight games.
