How happy are you with this draft?

[hibbingviking]

mel kiper and jon gruden didn't like the Patterson pick they thought teo would be better. mayock and Irvin loved the Patterson pick . Vikings picked the best players available and got better like they were suppose to do.

[VikingLord]

Let me ask this - how did you feel when the Vikings drafted Adrian Peterson when they already had Chester Taylor, or when they drafted Randy Moss when they already had Cris Carter and Jake Reed?

The 1st round of a draft is not about filling immediate needs. It's about getting the best players available. Spielman did that tonight. Gave up a lot to get Patterson, but I feel really good about his future.

[yezzir]

mel kiper and jon gruden didn't like the Patterson pick they thought teo would be better. mayock and Irvin loved the Patterson pick . Vikings picked the best players available and got better like they were suppose to do.

Mayock trumps all those dudes.

[mondry]

I realize that Sharriff is a super value pick who plummeted from a likely #3 spot, I also realize that Xavier was a top 10 talent as well. And I also know on most boards, Cordarelle is either the #1 or #2 receiver, but at this point I just don't feel that excited about this group.

Shariff. Because of the falling DT's, to me that just increases our odds of getting a 1st round quality DT in the 2nd round. I don't think we need a new starting DT in 2013. I hate to be a negative Nancy about this, but we were 11th against the run in the entire NFL. I didn't see the urgency in drafting him. I realize he is considered top 5 overall talent so we would be "fools" to pass up on him, but everyone else did before us.

Xavier. He seemed like a top 3 cornerback and all, but have we given up on Chris Cook already? Josh Robinson showed flashes, and I think would've been solid as a starter in 2013 and would've continued steady improvement. Cook enters this year healthy and picks up where he left of as a rising big-man CB. Now we have 3 starters for 2 CB spots, or do we? Do they let Xavier sit a year? In any case I think we were fine with Robinson/Cook and maybe add a free agent for depth or a 2nd or 3rd rounder.

Cordarelle. I know he's highly touted, but he just seems to have all the ingredients of a classic NFL 1st round WR bust. It's just a feeling, but I was hoping some other team would've taken him so we could've grabbed Keenan Allen, Justin Hunter, or Hopkins, and let them get the "bust". And with receivers sliding so far in the 1st, it seems that the 2nd round would still have been packed with guys that we could've grabbed instead of Patterson. And they keep talking about Cordarelle being a "project". so does that mean he doesn't even play until 2014?

Don't get me wrong I'm not crapping over this draft, and hopefully all 3 guys will end up starting on Week 1 and all show superiority over the other guys at their positions, but I just know we could've been a very well rounded complete team had we drafted a MLB like Te'o. We now have a glaring hole at MLB with nobody, or an Erin Henderson experiment. And without a 2nd round pick we likely won't get any of the top 5 MLB's. Letroy Guion might not have been a Pro Bowler but I don't think he was that bad at all. We were 11th against the run. Cook and Robinson seemed ready to hold their end while Harrison made plays. Keep in mind, I'm not predicting failure at all, I justt don't feel that great about getting outstanding "value". If I want "value" I'll go to Wal-Mart, I just want guys that will complete the pieces of the Vikings puzzle, and i think we picked up 2 redundant pieces and one questionable piece, and we still have a gigantic gap at linebacker as our only real weakness that won't get addressed this year. (Urlacher is not a solution.)

YOU CAN CHANGE YOUR VOTE

Wow where to start with this one?

Shariff - You think this guy is just a run stopper? Of course that's his strong point but having someone in the middle that demands double teams free's up your DE's to be 1on1 and that means they get to the QB more. Your complaint is that other teams passed on him? You know how many teams passed on Teo right?

Xavier - In today's NFL the nickel CB is on the field a LOT, I'm not sure how it will all play out but I could EASILY see cook and Xavier on the outside on the big guys like Megatron / Marshall and Robinson moved to the slot where he'd be a nightmare. Why on earth would he sit for a year?

Cordarelle - Well I have the same feeling you do and I obviously hope I'm wrong. Others here really like the guy and I'm willing to at least watch him play for a bit before writing him off! He doesn't play till 2014? These guys are first round picks, they aren't RAW quarter backs who sit for a year and "learn on the bench." Even patterson who is raw will contribute right away on special teams and one of the good things about this situation is you really can dust off the percy harvin playbook and get some good use out of it from the get go with Patterson. That is the #1 thing keeping me sane right now is that we have experience and a system in place to make use of this guys talent while he works on other parts of his game. I think we'll be okay.

[indianation65]

I'm not exactly sure what's the difference between "Happy with what we did," and "Pleased," but I'll vote.

...wisdom

[mosscarter]

the problem is mondry; since when do you trade 4 picks for a guy that will play on special teams?? get serious here.

[JonPurpleHaze]

And they keep talking about Cordarelle being a "project". so does that mean he doesn't even play until 2014?

This Patterson dude wears #84 so he gets a 2 yr. pass with me (despite the duplicate picks traded), his highlight video is encouraging, he will be an upgrade with returns right now!

http://youtu.be/RjxkQXlCAfE

[UKViking]

I like who we got, but I cant help but feel we could have just moved up in the second round for a cheaper price and still have gotten Patterson (if he was still there) Hunter or Allen. Again though, I do like the picks. I just hope we don't have to give up too much now to get an MLB.

[Rus]

Only reason I didn't feel like we kicked serious @$$ is because the trade for Patterson was maybe a little too steep for what they got, and maybe not an effective use of picks. It was a reasonable trade...the valuable picks were near the bottoms of their respective rounds...but I think the Vikes could have gotten two good players for maybe the price of one + a few bucks. I think they technically save money by ditching three picks in favor of one guy, but better quality backups could have been gotten out of those rounds.

That said, Patterson has all the tools you want in a #1 receiver. I wish they had only traded their second and fourth to move up in the second to grab Woods instead of popping all the way up into the first. It was probably the best Spielman could do. Tavon Austin is shorter than Percy Harvin with about the same 40 numbers. He's also not near as physical. I don't think Austin will end up as a #1 receiver unless he goes all Steve Smith on the NFL. Patterson could very well end up as a #1 guy.

Other than that, that was the first time in awhile where I watched a really, really talented player start dropping and it was the Vikings that jumped on him, even though he plays the same position as Kevin Williams. That was reasonably audacious...not a move that Childress or Denny Green would have done. Maybe Tice...maybe. Floyd is a FAST DT for his size. Give him a little room and he's going to destroy quarterbacks. I wouldn't be surprised if Alan Williams and Co. work out a way to get him in the defense on third downs for sure, even to move Kevin Williams over and play the both of them. He's a lot like Kevin Williams with he turned out for the draft...maybe not the greatest college numbers, but he seems to draw a lot of blockers like Williams did in college.

Xavier Rhodes basically makes it so teams will have to beat the Vikings defensive backs with speed...because size isn't going to matter much with two 6'+ press guys at the corners. Alan Williams will probably have to tweak his schemes some to take advantage of that, though. Also, Rhodes isn't probably well suited to drop in and do exactly what Winfield used to do, aka, help the linebackers against the run. It's going to be tough for teams reliant on big receivers though.

The only thing that bugs me is what they're going to do at middle linebacker...but I completely understand what Spielman did because you can't have talent like those guys staring you in the face and not take them, especially when each of them plays at a position of need.

I knew after they took Patterson that this was going to be an A+ draft in the eyes of most of the draftniks and analysts. Spielman is going to get a lot of props. I don't know if it was the most effective route to take trading those second day picks to take a receiver that is somewhat unproven (and that he could get two guys that weren't too far off for a lower salary than just one guy), but it sure is grabbing a lot of attention. Plus, his trade wiped away my weird, sick feeling that he was going to draft Tyler Bray in the second or third round. Forget Te'o, he's a model citizen and perfect player compared to Tyler Bray. All that talent and no brain to go with it.

I've been calling Spielman the "Anti-Kahn". You know I'm as much of a tortured Wolves fan as I am a tortured Vikings fan, and if nothing else, it makes great sense to me.

[Arma]

Patterson has a very very good work ethic. From what I've heard from Volunteer fans; he was one of the few players when times got rough he was still giving it his alll..the anti-Moss if you want to put it that way. Right now he's a 6'2 version of a young rookie Harvin. Afew years down the line, unlike Harvin, he has the measurables to be a very formidable deep threat once he learns the ins and outs. Oh and he has this guy named Greg Jennings to help him through this process, you know the guy who is known for helping other young Packer WRs get in tune? How anyone can hate the pick for essentially giving up only as 3rd (2nd and offsets moving to the 1st, the 4th wasn't even ours to begin with, and a 7th we got from some black market deal that someone landed in our boards from TJack).

I can't even explain the suprise of Rhodes and Floyd (both top 10 prospects in my eyes) dropping to us! Only Star was better then Floyd, and Rhodes was my #1 CB.

Here's what I see:

Round 1: Floyd
Round 2: Rhodes
Round 3: Patterson

And we still have I think 5 picks left? Any draft over 10 players is way too much! Usually you want around 7-9, and considering 3 of ours are already day 1 starters..I can't even think of a word that describes how beautiful that is. A+++++

[Arma]

Couldn't agree more. Actually out of our 3 first rounder, I am worried about Rhodes. Floyd...I think will be the quickest and most disruptive DT in the league in 3 years. He might not have the sack # to show it like Suh or a young KWill, but he will be great. Patterson I've already explained (I just love the kid. Big, strong, fast, hard worker...).

Now Rhodes, I love too but we really need to start taking advantage of our gigantic CB tandem. What I mean is...TIME TO START PLAYING HOW THE SEAHAKWKS PLAY THEIR CORNERS. Press coverage all day, use that length and strength of your cornerbacks to disrupt recievers. I do hope Alan Williams tweaks his defense to allow Cook and Rhodes to shine.

Floyd had I think 3 of the 4 sacks of all of Florida last year. They had no outside passrush so getting to the quarterback isn't exactly an easy task. So I never got that knock. Now he's playing with some future HOFers in Williams and Allen. Also Mayock had Floyd going #3 to the Raiders, I think many Viking fans agree that Mayock's word on the draft can almost be taken as the Bible at times. I see a lot of Warren Sapp and John Randle in this young man, and it's got me pumped! Last time the Vikings had 3 first round picks? One of them ended up being some man named Alan Page.

On Rhodes; I'm a bit concerned on him too, atleast for this coming year. Defiantly expect growing pains, but this guy has the sky as a limit. There's not many people who have his size and his athleticism, and he has a nose for the ball to boot! Last year we actually ran quite a few press packages, and we really don't run a "real" Cover-2. I'll have to look more into that again tho as my brain has some cobwebs as it's been a few months since I've really cared about NFL Football. Cook/Robinson/Rhodes/Harrison are a very formidable backend. My big concern is having Robinson reach his potential, as last year he fizzled out pretty hard.

[Purple bruise]

People need to realize how important the play of the interior (dts) is to the MLB. They take up blockers and "free" up the linebacker to make plays. KW is only a shadow of his old self and this is a great way to work in the next generation star tackle. JA, BR and Griffen probably had ear to ear grins when they saw that pick. He should/will make a big difference collapsing that middle and freeing up the outside even more.
Excellent draft Mr Spielman

[Purple bruise]

From NFL.com: Adam Schein:
Vikings dominate another draft
"I thought Sharrif Floyd was the best defensive tackle in the draft. I wouldn't have batted an eye if he had been picked third overall. He slipped to No. 23, and Minnesota Vikings general manager Rick Spielman pounced on someone I could have seen him trading up to pick. What a genuine steal. I also loved the needed selection of physical corner Xavier Rhodes with the pick that was acquired from the Seattle Seahawks in the Percy Harvin deal (No. 25). Then, to replace Harvin, Spielman traded with the New England Patriots to get back into the first round at No. 29 and nab Cordarrelle Patterson. Though he's not polished as a receiver, Patterson will instantly help on special teams."
http://www.nfl.com/news/story/0ap100000 ... ts-misstep

[JellyBean2144]

I love our draft choices!!! OMG!! Of course time will tell. But based on needs, we did well. We have a decent DB in Rhodes that will help in our Tampa 2 defense.. WR pick, Patterson is a decent move. Time will tell. But right now, I love the pick. And the DT spot. Floyd is a nice addition to the squad. I like our 1st round moves. We drafted to our needs. Great job, Vikings

[King James]

All 3 guys will start I can guarantee. Jennings and Patterson will be on the outside. Rhodes and Cook will be on the outside on D. Floyd will start but will probably be the guy to replace Kevin Williams eventually. All the players we drafted are big and physical and can explode at their position. Im confident that these 3 can help improve our team drastically.