What would happen to 2026 Vikings if there was an expansion draft?

During the off-season, the media come up with creative ways to fill the void. There are fun exercises and big projects centered around what-ifs. Well, Bleacher Report released a what-if when they brainstormed the idea of what the NFL would look like with an expansion draft. Let's take a look at what the Minnesota Vikings roster would look like if this took place.

The first step in an expansion draft is protecting players on each team's roster; those who are not protected are eligible. Here are the players who would hit the draft:

• RB Aaron Jones
• TE Josh Oliver
• WR Myles Price
• LB Chaz Chambliss
• CB Zemaiah Vaughn

Here are the proposed rules:

The expansion team is required to claim either 30 players or $114.456 million in contracts (38 percent of the 2002 salary cap). In 2002, the Texans claimed 19 players but hit the financial threshold by committing $41.6 million (58 percent of the cap) to those 19 guys.

That seems like a good balance, as the expansion team will also have a draft class to pay and can do its own separate work on the open market.

In this exercise, we'll push it a little bit further but aim to cap this fictitious team at 65 percent of the 2026 cap, which works out to about $195 million.

While a potential addition to the NFL is likely a long way off, it was certainly a fun exercise to take a peek at what could be.

This article originally appeared on Vikings Wire: NFL Offseason: What would happen to the Vikings in an expansion draft?