A-
Minnesota Vikings
A franchise passer in McCarthy headlines a A- weekend for the Vikings.
by VikingGeek ·
2024 NFL Draft
· 18 picks
· 7 steals
· 10 reaches
Call it belief, call it a gut call, but Joe Milton III at slot 139 is 61 spots clear of consensus, and that is the headline. Little to argue with here, and the A- says so.
J.J. McCarthy gives the offense a face and a plan, and the grade leans heavily on whether he hits. Whatever else happened, they won the night they took Newton. The phones were where this weekend was really won.
For all the activity, edge rusher went untouched, which is hard to explain.
The kind of weekend a front office frames and hangs on the wall.
Pick-by-Pick
In the Round 1 slot they get their guy under center for the next decade, reach and all. Exactly the need they had to hit.
A clean, defensible pick in the 34th pick with a little surplus value in Brian Thomas Jr.. A sensible fit for a spot that needed help.
Mekhi Wingo at Round 3, Pick 4 is an overdraft of the loud, memorable kind. Another box on the needs board, quietly ticked.
Maason Smith at pick 78 is the kind of overdraft that needs everything to break right. It plugs a real leak on the depth chart.
They will replay Kiran Amegadjie at No. 86 for years; that is how good the value is. That was the need underlined and circled, and now it is checked off.
Quietly one of the better values of the day, Trey Benson at pick No. 100. A real hole, addressed with a reasonable pick.
They liked Matt Goncalves enough to skip the value, taking him in the 103rd pick. A must-fix position, and they treated it like one.
Brenden Rice at the 116th overall pick is daylight robbery; nobody expected him to last. It shores up a spot that genuinely needed the help.
A cornerback of that caliber at Round 4, Pick 29 is the definition of value, full stop. Useful body for a position without much behind the starter.
A wild overpay on Joe Milton III in pick 139, the sort that defines a class for the wrong reasons. The one spot they could not leave alone, and did not.
They robbed the room for Javon Foster here, a fall nobody at the table saw coming. It answers the question that was keeping the coaches up at night.
They paid a round early for AJ Barner in No. 157, more than the board wanted. One more legitimate question on the roster, answered.
Circle this one: Josh Newton at the Round 5 slot is a fall that decides a draft. Stacking talent where they were already deep.
Mason McCormick at pick No. 177 is a first-round grade at a bargain-bin price, no notes. They walked in needing this and walked out with it.
They paid up for Frank Gore Jr. at No. 212 when waiting would have done the job. A need, and now a little less of one.
Brevyn Spann-Ford at pick No. 216 is the pick scouts circle, and not in a good way. It fills a real need, too.
This one needs a full-page explanation: Evan Anderson in Round 7, Pick 12, miles early. A sensible fit that makes the depth chart a little sturdier.
A swing that ignored the value entirely, Evan Anderson well ahead of where he belonged. The roster fit checks out.