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

Kevin Seifert Apr 24, 2026, 12:29 AM ET

Close Kevin Seifert is a staff writer who covers the Minnesota Vikings and the NFL at ESPN. Kevin has covered the NFL for over 20 years, joining ESPN in 2008. He was previously a beat reporter for the Minneapolis Star Tribune and Washington Times. He is a graduate of the University of Virginia.

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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 Jr. 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 selecting 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.

Adofo-Mensah's departure suggested the Vikings would take a safer route in the 2026 draft, but they had a need in what has been considered a thin draft for defensive linemen. The Vikings liked Banks' size (6-foot-6, 327 pounds) and were impressed with his performance at the Senior Bowl. They soon sent defensive line coach Ryan Nielsen to visit him privately -- Banks said Nielsen was the first NFL assistant coach to schedule time with him -- and brought him to Minnesota to have their doctors examine his foot.

"I think we have the best doctors in the country, if not the world," Brzezinski said, "and we have complete confidence in them. There's nothing without risk in any player you select, but we feel very good about where Caleb will be when it's time to go to training camp. And so we're comfortable with the injury."

O'Connell also touted the team's medical staff, saying: "A lot of people around the league come to some of our folks, specifically in regards to foot and ankle stuff. And we spent a lot of time, lengthy time, just making sure we all felt really good about it so that Caleb can come here with the excitement that we have for him."

Banks said he initially broke his foot in the second quarter of Florida's season-opening game against LSU and then took a shot to help him continue playing. The approach "didn't work," he said, and he appeared in only three games during the season.

He was healthy enough to participate in the Senior Bowl but rebroke the foot at the combine in what Banks called "a freak accident." Banks said he was practicing his drill starts the night before his on-field workouts and felt a pop.

"I had on some little skill cleats," he said, "some cleats I shouldn't have had on running at 40 in 330 pounds."

Banks participated in some position drills the next day at the combine but ultimately dropped out because of discomfort from the injury.

"It was kind of crazy," he said.

In the letter to NFL teams, Banks said he had a scan last week that was read by Dr. Norman Waldrop, a foot and ankle specialist with the Andrews Clinic. Speaking to reporters Thursday, Banks said his goal is to drop weight and play at 310 or 315 pounds to limit the strain on his foot.