The New Orleans Saints sat and waited at No. 29 and ultimately took Clemson DT Bryan Bresee in the 2023 NFL Draft, but that wasn't their only potential path.
According to a report from Darren Wolfson of 5 Eyewitness News in Minnesota, the Minnesota Vikings received multiple offers for the No. 23 pick, which they rebuffed. One of those was from the Saints, the other the Kansas City Chiefs. The Vikings ultimately selected standout USC receiver Jordan Addison amid a run on wide receivers late in the first round.
“They told me if I fall to them, they were going to make sure they grabbed me,” Addison said on a video conference call from the draft with reporters in Minnesota.
It's unclear what the target would've been for the Saints had they moved up, or what the cost would've been. Players that were selected from 23 to 28 include Addison (Vikings); Maryland CB Deonte Banks (Giants); Utah TE Dalton Kincaid (Bills); Michigan DT Mazi Smith (Cowboys); Oklahoma OT Anton Harrison (Jaguars); and Clemson DE Myles Murphy (Bengals).
“We explored potentially moving up. We explored potentially moving back, and at the end of the day we felt like sitting there and letting one of the players that was in our group come to us," Allen said after the first round. "And we got one of the players that we were really excited about getting.”
The Saints head coach said there wasn't much time spent on any mega trade that might have landed New Orleans in the top half of selections. Saints GM Mickey Loomis had said a day earlier that the Saints didn't really have the ammunition for such a move. But the Saints did work out scenarios for trades and what it might cost to move anywhere from 15 to 27.
One thing worth noting is that one pick after the Vikings, the New York Giants traded up one spot to No. 24, sending the Jaguars Nos. 25, 160 and 240 in the deal, a steep price to climb one spot. One obvious reason for such a move would be to prevent a team later in the draft from leapfrogging them for a player they wanted.
Allen said by the time the Bengals got on the clock at 28, they knew they'd get one of the two players they really wanted, marking the wait-and-see result as a successful one.
Last year, in their first draft under Kwesi Adofo-Mensah, the Vikings traded the 12th overall pick to Detroit and moved all the way down to No. 32 to net two additional second-day selections.
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