Analyzing What Caleb Banks Needs to Do to Win Defensive Rookie of the Year

Is there a path towards a Defensive Rookie of the Year Award for Caleb Banks?

Breaking down everything Caleb Banks must do to be a legitimate DROY candidate with the Vikings this season. | IMAGN IMAGES via Reuters Connect

He struggled in the preseason. He's openly admitted to conditioning issues just weeks before the season. He's not even projected to start. And yet, Caleb Banks' path to the 2026 NFL Defensive Rookie of the Year Award may be smoother than it appears.

The Minnesota Vikings took Banks 18th overall in the NFL Draft, ignoring analysts' big boards and fans' pleas for now-Bears safety Dillon Thieneman. But at 6-foot-7, 327 lbs, and with the wingspan of a bald eagle, there aren't many people on the planet built like Banks. But after playing in just three games during his final year of college football and then injuring his foot at the NFL Scouting Combine, Banks's immediate future looked murky at best.

Still, the Vikings took a leap of faith and made Banks their guy.

Since the draft, results with Banks have been mixed. While his conditioning can be excused after spending most of his summer rehabbing the foot injury, the troubling issues that pushed him down in the draft have reared their ugly head again in the preseason. His size is a bit of a blessing and a curse, and pad-level and getting pushed off the spot have continued to plague him.

He's committed to fixing those parts of his game, though, and there's a very real path where Banks works his way up into the starting lineup rather quickly and, potentially, a path to DROY glory.

Caleb Banks has a more realistic path to DROY than at first glance

While Banks hasn't shown enough yet to earn a starting role, he won't have to overthrow established stars in order to get there. Tyrion Ingram-Dawkins and Levi Drake Rodriguez are a couple of late-round picks from the last few years with names much longer than their time spent in the starting rotation. They have just 26 tackles and three career sacks combined, and despite looking solid this offseason, aren't written in ink as starters.

Once he's back into game shape, it's reasonable to think Banks could earn some significant snaps fairly early in the season, opening the door to a DROY push.

Besides his anticipated slow start, another big hurdle Banks will face is his position. Just three defensive tackles—Aaron Donald (2014), Sheldon Richardson (2013) and Ndamukong Suh (2010)—have won the award in the past three decades. Donald was the most recent winner nearly 12 years ago, notching nine sacks from the interior to take home the hardware.

It would be a terrific story to see Caleb Banks become the first DT to win the NFL Defensive Rookie of the Year Award in over a decade. | IMAGN IMAGES via Reuters Connect

Banks is probably more of a disruptor than a sack machine, and he never had more than 4.5 sacks in any season in college. With first-year pass rushers like David Bailey or Rueben Bain Jr., Banks likely won't pace the rookies in sacks. But what he can offer is pure destruction.

Potentially, a bite from one of his many exotic pets will give Banks the superhuman powers he needs to rack up double-digit sacks, but more than likely, his size and athleticism will power him towards a game-wrecking resume. Banks's 85-inch wingspan is the longest recorded at the combine in the past 30 years, and his 9.84 Relative Athletic Score is the 34th best ever for a defensive tackle (h/t MathBomb).

Caleb Banks is a DT prospect in the 2026 draft class. He scored an unofficial 9.84 RAS out of a possible 10.00. This ranked 34 out of 2046 DT from 1987 to 2026.

Splits projected, all times unofficial, agilities left to run.https://t.co/qcTjqsIuuv pic.twitter.com/ffVzXNsc3A

— RAS.football (@MathBomb) February 26, 2026

Banks simply has traits that can't be coached, and the coaching is coming hard and fast from one of the best defensive minds in the NFL, DC Brian Flores.

After working back from injury, Banks may get off to a slow start in 2026. And despite the bust labels already being thrown around, weekly improvement from the first-year Viking's enviable foundation could build up to something rather quickly.

Five or six sacks, a dozen tackles for loss and maybe an interception or two into Banks's big mitts may be enough for him to shock everyone and win DROY.

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