The Minnesota Vikings have more wide receivers on their roster than any other position. Here is a look at who could make the team in 2019.
The Minnesota Vikings have done an exceptional job of finding some pretty good receivers in unlikely spots.
Boasting one of the best wide receiver tandems in the league with Stefon Diggs and Adam Thielen, the Vikings currently have 11 receivers on their 90-man roster, more than any other position.
Only four of them have come to Minnesota through the NFL Draft—this includes Dillon Mitchell and Olabisi Johnson, seventh-round draft picks this year. The other two are Diggs, a fifth-round pick in 2015 and Laquon Treadwell, a first-round pick in 2016.
Six of them, including two-time Pro Bowler Thielen, made their way to the league as undrafted free agents. The remaining receiver is an undrafted transfer from the CFL in Brandon Zylstra.
Excluding Thielen and Diggs, the remaining nine receivers have accumulated a total of 99 receptions for 930 yards and three touchdowns during a combined nine seasons. Compare that to Thielen, who caught 113 passes for 1,373 yards and nine touchdowns in 2018.
The Vikings will likely keep five or six wide receivers on the roster during the regular season. With the top two spots completely locked down, who has the best chance of making Minnesota’s final roster come Week 1 against the Atlanta Falcons?
The Top Three
Stefon Diggs, Adam Thielen, and Laquon Treadwell are all locks to make the Vikings’ final 2019 roster. Last season all three set career highs for receptions, receiving yards and touchdowns.
Still, for many, the inclusion of Treadwell on this list may be a surprise. The highest drafted receiver on the roster, Minnesota selected Treadwell with the 23rd pick in the first round in 2016.
To add a little salt to the wound, there were six wide receivers drafted after him in 2016 who now have more career receptions in the NFL including Michael Thomas of the New Orleans Saints.
There is no upside for the Vikings to part ways with Treadwell this year unless they can find someone willing to trade for him. The prospects that a team would be willing to part with anything for a former first-round draft pick with only 56 catches and one touchdown in three seasons are not very good.
On the positive side, and there is one if you look closely, Treadwell is coming off the best year of this short career with 35 receptions for 302 yards and that one touchdown in 2018.
Also, with Minnesota failing to pick up the fifth-year option of his rookie contract, Treadwell lost the opportunity to make more than $10 million in 2020 and he will be playing for his next contract during the upcoming season.
Perhaps that will provide enough motivation for some improved play from him this season.
Second-Year Players
Six of the wide receivers on the Vikings’ current 90-man roster were with the team last season. Along with the previously mentioned locks to make the team are Chad Beebe, Brandon Zylstra, and Jeff Badet.
The leader of this trio is Beebe who caught four passes for 39 yards in three games last season. Beebe, an undrafted free agent from Northern Illinois, also has experience as a punt returner as he returned 48 punts for 329 yards in college.
Due to this, he appears to be the early leading candidate to take over the punt returning duties for Minnesota in 2019 with the departure of Marcus Sherels to the New Orleans Saints this offseason.
With the possibility of winning the Vikings’ punt returning job, Beebe has a good chance of making the team this year. His presence on the roster would also allow some flexibility for Minnesota to have an extra wide receiver much like Sherels gave the team flexibility as an extra cornerback.
Zylstra is another small town Minnesota kid like Adam Thielen looking to make it with the team he grew up cheering for.
He finished his college career at Morehead-Concordia after transferring from Augustana College in South Dakota. Zylstra was active for all 16 of the Vikings’ games in 2018 but he made only one catch for 23 yards and he returned four punts for just 26 yards.
Prior to signing with Minnesota last year, Zylstra played two seasons in the CFL and he led the pass-first league in receiving with 1,687 yards on 100 receptions in 2017. Although he did appear in 16 games last season, his chances of making the Vikings in 2019 may depend on beating out Beebe as the punt returner.
Badet is an interesting case for Minnesota. The team added $75,000 to his base salary as an incentive to keep him from signing with the New York Jets this year.
An undrafted free agent in 2018, Badet spent last season on the Vikings’ practice squad. He also provides flexibility to Minnesota having returned punts and kicks while playing for Kentucky and Oklahoma in college.
Badet has one thing that cannot be coached—speed. This summer, Badet, along with Trae Waynes, will be competing in a 40-yard dash tournament for NFL players.
For Beebe, Zylstra, and Badet, it could come down to who wins the Vikings’ punt returning job. Right now, Beebe has the best chance to make the final roster.
Based on Minnesota’s interest in retaining Badet, he is likely ahead of Zylstra to make the final roster. Zylstra was active all last season, yet he was only targeted twice. So his best chance to make the team may have passed.
Four Rookies and a Free Agent
The remaining five receivers on the Vikings’ current roster are all new to the team. Four of them are rookies, two drafted in the seventh round this year and two who were signed as undrafted free agents.
Taken by Minnesota in this year’s NFL Draft are Dillon Mitchell from the University of Oregon and Olabisi Johnson from Colorado State University.
Mitchell, who left Oregon following his junior year, led the Pac-12 Conference with 1,184 receiving yards to go along with his team-leading 75 catches and 10 touchdowns last season. During his college career, he also returned 21 punts and three kickoffs.
Johnson spent four seasons at Colorado State and he finished with a total of 125 receptions for 2,019 yards and 11 touchdowns. He also returned 26 punts for 170 yards and one kickoff for 23 yards during his time at the school.
In the history of the Vikings franchise, they have drafted a total of 76 wide receivers, 34 of them in the seventh round or later. Of this group, only eight ever caught a pass in a regular season game.
The most recent seventh-round draftee to catch a pass is Stephen Burton taken in 2011. Burton played only three seasons in the NFL, two of them with Minnesota and he finished with 15 career receptions.
The most successful of this group is Sam McCullum, a ninth-round draft pick by the Vikings in 1974. McCullum played 10 seasons in the NFL, four with Minnesota and six with the Seattle Seahawks.
If the odds are stacked against the seventh-round draft picks, then the road is even tougher for the Vikings’ two undrafted free agent receivers, Alexander Hollins and Davion Davis.
Hollins comes from Eastern Illinois and in two seasons he had 127 receptions for 1,796 yards and 23 touchdowns. In four years at Sam Houston State, Davis caught 226 passes for 3,181 yards and 40 touchdowns. From his sophomore season on, he caught at least 10 touchdowns.
Minnesota Vikings
Hollins and Davis do not have to look far to find someone who made it from where they are starting out. Of course, it did take a year on the practice squad and contributing on special teams for a couple of years before Adam Thielen was able to break out for Minnesota.
The final newbie comes to the team with ties to the Vikings assistant head coach and offensive advisor, Gary Kubiak.
Jordan Taylor joined the Denver Broncos in 2015 as an undrafted free agent when Kubiak was the team’s head coach. Taylor spent his rookie season on the Broncos’ practice squad and he made the team’s active roster in 2016.
During two seasons with Denver, he was active for 26 games, making two starts. Taylor comes to Minnesota as a free agent with 29 career receptions for 351 yards and two touchdowns. He also missed the entire 2018 season after having surgery on both of his hips.
With previous NFL experience under his belt, Taylor is the favorite in this group to land a spot on the Vikings’ 2019 roster.
Which receivers will make the final 2019 roster?
The number of wide receivers the Vikings will carry on the final roster in 2019 will depend a lot on the quality of the entire roster.
With one of these players likely winning the team’s punt returning position, it is likely there will be six receivers kept around for next season.
There is a possibility that Minnesota could be looking to still add another veteran receiver to round out the group this year, a lot like they did with Aldrick Robinson last season. Robinson joined the team after being released by the San Francisco 49ers in September. The Vikings also had Kendall Wright and Tavarres King in training camp last year before finalizing the roster.
Of the 11 receivers currently on the roster, the following will make the team.
- Adam Thielen
- Stefon Diggs
- Laquon Treadwell
- Chad Beebe
- Jordan Taylor
- A veteran to be named later
The best chance for the remaining players is to make the practice squad.