Vikings pick Caleb Banks at 18, hope he's ready for season - ESPN

EAGAN, Minn. — The Minnesota Vikings made one of the boldest and riskiest selections Thursday in the first round of the NFL draft, choosing Florida defensive lineman Caleb Banks at No. 18.

Banks has twice broken his left foot in the past year, costing him most of the 2025 season at Florida and requiring surgery after the NFL scouting combine in March. He sent a letter to NFL teams last week that identified the injury as a broken fourth metatarsal bone and projected he would be ready to resume football activities in June.

Speaking Thursday night, coach Kevin O'Connell would say only that «our hope is that we'll be able to prepare him for the regular season and have him for that.»

In large part because of injury questions, ESPN's Mel Kiper ranked Banks No. 62 on his final predraft Big Board. Three other ESPN big boards ranked him between No. 44 and No. 48.

But O'Connell referred to Banks as «a top-10 caliber talent and difference-maker,» and Vikings interim general manager Rob Brzezinski added: «If it wasn't for the foot, we would have had no chance of [drafting] him. And so, we're looking at it as an opportunity from that standpoint to acquire a really unique talent.»

Brzezinski is serving in a temporary role in part because former general manager Kwesi Adofo-Mensah, who was fired Jan. 30, conducted some of the NFL's least-productive drafts during his four-year tenure from 2022 to 2025. Adofo-Mensah was aggressive in drafting players with injury histories, believing they represented value on the draft board, and used the same approach in free agency. Two of those players were defensive linemen the Vikings signed during the 2025 free agent market, veterans Javon Hargrave and Jonathan Allen. Both were released this spring.