Vikings start final day of draft with tackle Willie Beavers

By foxsports
Published

EDEN PRAIRIE, Minn. (AP) The Minnesota Vikings have added another offensive tackle, taking Western Michigan's Willie Beavers in the fourth round of the NFL draft.

The Vikings took six picks into Saturday for the final four rounds, and they started the afternoon by targeting a critical position in front of quarterback Teddy Bridgewater and acquiring Beavers with the 121st overall selection.

In the fifth round, at No. 160, the Vikings drafted Missouri linebacker Kentrell Brothers.

This was the second straight year the Vikings used the fourth round to take a tackle, after picking Pittsburgh's T.J. Clemmings in 2015. Clemmings started the entire season as a rookie at right tackle. Matt Kalil, the fourth overall pick in the 2012 draft, didn't miss a game at left tackle. The Vikings returned right tackle Phil Loadholt from an Achilles tendon injury that kept him out for all of 2015, and they signed veteran Andre Smith as a free agent.

Kalil, Loadholt and Smith are all playing on expiring contracts, though, and Clemmings had his share of struggles. The other tackles on the roster, Carter Bykowski, Austin Shepherd and Jeremiah Sirles, are 25 and under with limited NFL experience.

Beavers started every game at left tackle last season as a fifth-year senior for Western Michigan, earning a first team All-Mid-American Conference selection. The Broncos finished 8-5 after the program's first postseason victory, over Middle Tennessee in the Bahamas Bowl. The 6-foot-4, 324-pound Beavers first cracked the lineup at the end of his freshman year and never lost his spot, starting 40 straight games.

Beavers initially signed with Illinois out of high school in Southfield, Michigan, a suburb of Detroit, but the program overcommitted with that class in 2011 and Beavers was essentially cut.

''That was the dream of mine, playing in the Big Ten, and when they told me that it was hurtful,'' Beavers said, adding: ''God got me through it.''

Western Michigan doesn't typically face many premier pass rushers in the MAC, so Beavers will have to use his well-regarded agility to his advantage in the challenging tradition to the NFL. He played some guard at the Senior Bowl.

''Wherever they put me on the offensive line, I'll be good,'' Beavers said.

After taking Mississippi wide receiver Laquon Treadwell in the first round Thursday, the Vikings picked Clemson cornerback Mackensie Alexander in the second round Friday. General manager Rick Spielman traded the third-round selection to Miami for a sixth-rounder this year and picks in the third and fourth rounds in 2017.

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