NFL Draft Rumors: Vikings not targeting wide receiver?

The Minnesota Vikings have been pegged for a wide receiver in the upcoming 2016 NFL Draft, but general manager Rick Spielman is doing his best smokescreen before they’re on the clock.

Look around at the multitude of mock drafts circulating the internet in the days leading up to the 2016 NFL Draft and you’ll see wide receiver is a popular pick for the Minnesota Vikings.

The Vikings own the No. 23 pick in the first round of the draft that kicks off on Thursday night from Chicago and could use a receiver to give Teddy Bridgewater another weapon to work with.

Minnesota could be in a position to take Josh Doctson, Corey Coleman, Laquon Treadwell or Will Fuller when they’re on the clock, but Vikings general manager Rick Spielman is keeping all of his options open.

“I do think there’s a lot of quality at that position as you go down through it,” Spielman said, via Vikings.com. “There’s different styles, different types, small ones, tall ones. I’ve mentioned earlier, we don’t look so much at the height, per se, as the catching radius. There’s fast guys, there’s possession guys, so there’s a lot of different flavors.”

Spielman struck gold last year with Stefon Diggs in the fifth round of last year’s draft and he turned in a promising rookie season so there is truth to the statement that you can find talent later in the draft.

But was this just a smokescreen attempt by Spielman to get other teams off the scent?

I have to think it is.

The biggest need for the Vikings may be a wide receiver but if the draft board doesn’t set up that way and Doctson, Coleman, Treadwell and Fuller are all off the board, Spielman may choose to take the best player available and look to draft a receiver in the later rounds.

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