It’s a bit tough to engage fully with Mock Draft Season in Minnesota, at least in 2025. Every time you read…
Pick 24 (Minnesota Vikings):
…it feels almost dishonest. That’s not the fault of the mock drafters, of course, but every Vikings fan knows Minnesota has to trade down. They have four picks in the 2025 draft, and their first-rounder is the only major carrot they can dangle to recoup the draft capital they spent for J.J. McCarthy and Dallas Turner last season. They almost have to take advantage.
The only reason not to move down is if someone falls to 24 who the Vikings can’t pass on — not simply a talented player, but someone who also perfectly fits Minnesota’s needs. And if Malaki Starks drops into the Vikings’ lap, they must take their lumps in the middle rounds and scoop up the Georgia safety.
Malaki Starks has a knack for big plays in Atlanta! – What city will he be making big plays in next??⬇️ ⬇️ #UGA #SEC #CFB #CFP #NCAA pic.twitter.com/NHZRbcBoT2
— The Players' Lounge (@ThPlayersLounge) March 31, 2025
You have until exactly the end of this sentence to get your “Kwesi Adofo-Mensah drafting a safety in the first round” jokes out of your system. Now that we’ve gotten those out of the way, we can get to why it would be wise for the Vikings to get safety help early. It’s not a hard case to make. Minnesota just lost Cam Bynum in free agency, and Harrison Smith is coming back for his 14th (and probably final, for real this time) season. Josh Metellus is listed at safety but is more like a pawn that Brian Flores can turn into whatever chess piece he needs on any given play.
Smith seemed to wear down by the end of the season, playing an astounding 92% of Minnesota’s defensive snaps. The Vikings will want depth to roll back the workload for their 36-year-old future Hall of Famer, and drafting Starks on Day 1 would be the most Minnesota could do to guarantee that Smith can meaningfully reduce his minutes.
Starks is young (he won’t turn 22 until November) but has a ton of high-level SEC experience. He’s played 14 games in each of his three seasons as a Bulldog, where he ranked third on the team in tackles (68) as a freshman, fourth (55) as a sophomore, and first as a junior. Not only does Georgia play in the SEC — they dominated. Starks gets some of that winning-team shine, including a National Championship title in his freshman year.
Georgia went 5-2 in seven SEC Championships and bowl games, all against opponents who combined for an 84-11 record otherwise. Starks made an impact during those games, combining for 30 tackles, an interception, and a pass deflection during those seven massive games. The Georgia defense took teams averaging 37.4 points and held them to 21.4 points per game.
Malaki Starks with the play of the game to save a touchdown and make Missouri settle for 3 in a 26-22 victory #GoDawgs
pic.twitter.com/Ak5bdDwJrC
— 704 Dawg (@FSFRecruits) October 2, 2022
So why might he be available to the Vikings at 24? He’s a player who gets mixed reviews in the scouting community, with his Big Board rankings ranging from anywhere between the top 10 to the end of the first round. If your team prizes physical traits above all else, they will probably not look terribly hard at Starks. He ran a 4.5 40-yard dash and had a 33” vertical jump at the combine, which put him in the lower half among his position group. A team looking for safety help in the first round might easily prefer South Carolina’s Nick Emmanwori, an off-the-charts physical freak.
But there’s speed, and there’s game speed. Starks clearly has the latter. “While others might run faster or jump higher, Starks plays the game with rare courage and conviction to trust his instincts in crucial moments,” wrote Bucky Brooks. “He not only displays the football IQ of a seasoned pro but moves like a cornerback and hits like a linebacker.”
The ability to process on defense is every bit as important as the physical side of the game, and that football IQ is a big reason why Harry the Hitman remains a force in his mid-30s. It’s that skillset that the Vikings will miss one day, and Starks has the potential to provide some version of that. The word “centerfield” keeps coming up in scouting reports, and that’s something Minnesota will want once Smith — 37 career interceptions (and counting) — hangs it up.
But seriously, watch this interception again and tell us how Starks can’t run fast or jump high enough to be an impact NFL safety:
Oh my goodness. This is why Malaki Starks is a blue chip prospect pic.twitter.com/NqkR9qS3G9
— Billy M (@BillyM_91) August 31, 2024
The specter of Lewis Cine might loom over this selection, but the fact is that Starks is a different player from the (supposedly) hard-hitting strong safety from 2022. Starks not only has the ball skills and brain to make an impact, but he’d get a year to soak up everything he can from one of the best to ever play Starks’ style of safety. In the hands of Flores and Smith, Starks could be one of the few players who’d justify Minnesota sticking and picking at 24th overall.