The Minnesota Vikings - and fantasy football owners desperate for wide receiver production - surely enjoyed the rookie season efforts of Stefon Diggs. Diggs, a fifth-round pick in the 2015 NFL Draft out of Maryland, proved an explosive playmaker while hauling in deep pass after deep pass from Vikings quarterback Teddy Bridgewater last year. He finished the 2015 season with 52 receptions for 720 yards and 4 touchdowns. Unfortunately, Diggs was pretty much alone as a consistent outside threat for the Vikings offense - and, really, he wasn't even that consistent.
Sure, there's a kind of chicken and egg debate here - is Bridgewater, a good, not great quarterback thus far, more to blame for the lack of production from the Vikes' receiving weapons, or are the lackluster weapons keeping Bridgewater from truly breaking out? Mike Wallace's comments on the way out the door and the lack of development from guys like Charles Johnson and Cordarrelle Patterson seem to point in one direction, but those players all have issues of their own.
And while the offense of the NFL's Minnesota-based franchise will surely continue to be keyed by Adrian Pederson and their tough, powerful run game, it would behoove GM Rick Spielman and head coach Mike Zimmer to give Bridgewater another threat to pair with Diggs.
And should he fall to No. 23 in the first-round of the 2016 NFL Draft, that threat should be former Ole Miss wide receiver Laquon Treadwell.
Treadwell certainly isn't the fastest guy, but at 6-foot-2, 221-pounds, he brings size, leaping ability and an expansive catch radius. In short, he'd be the perfect complement to a guy like Diggs, who could take the tops off defenses, allowing Treadwell to feast on underneath routes.
Of course, this assumes that Treadwell falls to the 20's, and considering there aren't that many elite wide receivers expected to be available in the first-round of the 2016 NFL Draft and Treadwell looking more and more likely to be the cream of that mediocre crop, it wouldn't be surprising to see a team trade up into the mid-to-late teens to nab him.
Then again, despite his fantastic college production - Treadwell finished his junior season for the Rebels with 82 receptions, 1,153 yards and 11 touchdowns - Treadwell's lack of speed will be a big hindrance to his draft stock and could drop him down far enough for Spielman and Zimmer to reach him.
Really, it's early still and there are no guarantees at this point of the pre-draft process - or really even when the draft kicks off in late April - but with Zimmer indicating recently that a veteran wide receiver may not be the direction the Vikings go, and every pass-catcher on the Vikes roster not named Diggs failing to distinguish themselves or garner further touches, Treadwell looks like a mighty attractive option come draft day.
