Locked On Colts - Daily Podcast On The Indianapolis Colts - Crossover Special with Locked On Vikings

Episode Date: September 17, 2020

On today's episode, Evan Sidery is joined by Locked On Vikings host Luke Braun to preview Sunday's important matchup between the Indianapolis Colts and Minnesota Vikings. Who holds the edge?Starting off in Minnesota, is Kirk Cousins poised to be the next QB to take advantage of Indy's defensive scheme? Former Viking Xavier Rhodes will play an underrated role in order to stop Minnesota's primary outside weapon. If the Vikings are able to establish the run early, how will the Colts be able to stop them?For the Colts, Philip Rivers has to be salivating after seeing Aaron Rodgers shred Minnesota's secondary. However, Indy will need to find offensive balance in order to defeat this Vikings squad. Jonathan Taylor and the Colts' offensive line will need to win the trench battle in order to notch a victory at Lucas Oil Stadium.Closing the show, Evan and Luke provide their predictions against the spread. Will Minnesota cover the -3 spread Indy has the advantage on? Expect a shootout on Sunday, where the team who holds the ball last could exit as winners. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You are Locked On Colts, your daily Indianapolis Colts podcast. Part of the Locked On Podcast Network, your team every day. Hello everybody, welcome back into your biggest Locked On crossover special here on the Locked On NFL channel, part of the Locked On Podcast Network. Today, as always, I am your host Evan Stattery of Locked On Colts, joined by Luke Braun of Locked On Vikings here to preview this week two matchup, a very evenly paced match I think on both sides of the field here Luke, between the Colts and the Vikings, the home opener for the Colts at Lucas Sola Stadium.

There will be 2,500 fans in attendance for this one. First off, Luke, how are you doing today, and what's your instant thoughts on this matchup? Because I think it's going to be a really good one. Yeah, I'm doing all right, as good as you can expect for an 0-1 team going up against another desperate 0-1 team. Obviously, 0-2 is that like kiss of death you never want to see. But yeah, headed into this one, I'm really intrigued about this matchup, especially because there's some old friends on the other side of the ball. And I'm excited to kind of get in and break it down. You know, it was a really tough matchup to go up against the Packers

and Aaron Rodgers playing at his best. So I'm interested to kind of take on a new team that I'm less familiar with. Yeah, this Colts team definitely a shocking loss down in Jacksonville. so I'm interested to kind of take on a new team that I'm less familiar with. Yeah, this Colts team definitely a shocking loss down in Jacksonville, a team who everyone thought was going to be tanking for Trevor Lawrence. Gardner mentioned with 19 of 20 in that game, and they're trying to bounce back here against this Vikings team, like you mentioned, who's also desperate for a win here on the road,

Indianapolis. Let's start off the show. We're going to hit on the Vikings first, Luke, and then we'll transition into the Colts talk with you, as well as closing with some predictions on this game as well, which I think is gonna be a really fun one here. Let's start off here with the Vikings, where like you mentioned, they lost 43-34. And I feel like the honestly, the score, they got a couple late scores there and make it a little bit closer. But what was your impression of that game where look at Aaron Rodgers just picked apart that young secondary? Yeah, it's that's the case right

there. Aaron Rodgers picked apart the young secondary. The game is not as close as the score would indicate. It was pretty much a blowout up and down the field. So we're all kind of licking our wounds. We're looking at the cornerbacks, looking at what went wrong. And more importantly, is that going to keep going wrong? Or is this just some like one-time fluke? Or was it just something special Aaron Rodgers did and my take on it is that what the Packers did is uh with a very very quick passing attack Aaron Rodgers got the ball out of his hands really really fast and neutralized a whole bunch of blitzes um and the the wide receivers won very very fast against the quarterbacks and the quarterbacks were always going to be a bit of a question mark headed into the season. We talked about that when we did a crossover back in the offseason.

But I don't think we expected them to be this bad, and I kind of think it's going to be hard for other teams to replicate what the Packers did. It required perfection from them on a whole bunch of fronts. So if you can do that, if you can get the ball out quickly, and if you can win off the line of scrimmage quickly, yeah, you can beat the Vikings. And that's doable, but that's really, really hard. Yeah, when you also look at this Vikings team,

of course, missing Daniil Hunter, Yannick Ngakwe is still getting acclimated to this defense as well. Are you worried, at least on the Colts front, going against this team that really makes its heyday in the trenches? You have one of the best offensive lines in the NFL. Phillip Ruzet, very smart quarterback, very efficient when he has time. Did not get sacked last week. He was 34-44 as well. He had those two intercepts that were costly for this Colts team, but if he has time, he can pick apart a team a little bit on defense. Do you feel like maybe that could be an encore performance for this defense

if they allow Rivers to have some time? I'm definitely a little concerned about that. Here's the deal with the pressure, though. A lot of that was neutralized by quick passes. I think there's something like Aaron Rodgers had the most passes under two seconds in the league in week one. He got rid of the ball unbelievably quickly, and it neutralized a ton of pressure. And what would otherwise be noted as pass rush wins kind of were rendered irrelevant. You also have Yannick Ngakwe, who is still acclimating to the offense or to

the defense. But you know, each week is going to get a little bit easier there. Of course you guys are super familiar with in Gawkway, haven't played in the AFC South for all that time. So I would expect that he gets better as the season goes on. If Adio Denebo is the other starter opposite in Gawkway right now with Daniel Hunter out, I thought he was going to be a starter for most of the season goes on, um, Fadio Denibo is the other starter opposite, uh, Ngakwe right now with Daniel Hunter out. I thought he was going to be a starter for most of the season until the

Ngakwe trade. And I was actually fine with that. I think he can be a good player. He had a decent game against the likes of like David Bakhtiari. Um, and again, it was just that he didn't have a lot of time to get home because the ball was out so quickly.

Every time I'm more worried about the interior. I mean, Quentin Nelson is going to kick the crap out of like Shemar Stephan and Jaleel Johnson. That's a wild mismatch. So getting pressure up the interior is going to be really difficult. But Mike Zimmer and Dom Capers, who's a defensive assistant coach right now, those are two of the most dynamic blitz designers in the league. So I don't think if the Vikings are smart, this won't come down to mano y mano, you know,

Quentin Nelson versus Jaleel Johnson. That's not going to be a matchup that they can win. They're going to have to come up with some interesting blitz packages to kind of manufacture some pressure on, on Phillip rivers. And I think that's kind of similar to what they did last time they played Phillip rivers, which actually was last year in week 15, when he was on the chargers, they managed to get a whole lot of pressure on him and kind of, he kind of had a meltdown game in that one. There were seven turnovers from the

Chargers offense. So that I think is going to be what it all comes down to is not necessarily the player on player matchup, but more the scheme on scheme. And can Zimmer and Capers come up with a way to manufacture pressure when their number one pressure generator is still on IR? Looking at the opposite side, this Vikings offense against the Colts defense, who is, over the last six weeks, kind of last year, the regular season, the last month in December, the secondary is really starting to fall apart. You're even adding in the former Viking Xavier Roester,

who plays periodists here. They still allowed a historic performance in week one from Gardner Minshew, who really looked like Drew Brees out there, which we saw in December. He went 29-30 against his Coles defense. Minshew on Sunday went 19-20 for 190-plus yards. You have to imagine, Luke, that Kirk Cousins is looking at chops looking at the secondary. Yeah, I was really surprised to see, looking at what Jacksonville was able to do to the secondary.

Cause I was kind of high on him. I mean, I, I thought Xavier Rhodes could pull it together and at least, you know, play like a cornerback too. I liked Rocky Sin coming out. I thought he would be something. Of course I'm, I'm big on Kenny Moore. It seems like, and correct me if I'm wrong here, this matchup is going to be a little bit softer on the outside than it is on the inside. You know, I would much rather go up against Rhodes and Yasin than like Kenny Moore and

Darius Leonard on the inside, like Lee Cooker and stuff. So I think that's where it's going to come out. So what we're going to see is Adam Thielen who can play inside or the slot. And I think that's going to change matchup to matchup. You're going to see a ton of Adam Thielen outside deep routes, and it's going to be up to Rhodes and Yassin to kind of cover him. But I think like the, the Vikings still really like to go deep.

Gary Kubiak loves his like play action, deep shot, and you're gonna have to keep up with Adam Thielen or else that could get really explosive. That's going to be the way that they're going to try to generate explosive plays. At this rushing attack too. I love the duo that Minnesota has put together.

Dalvin Cook, of course, signed his extension a couple weeks ago. You also have Alexander Mattis in the second year pro to Boise State, who I'm very high on as well. Even though the Colts defense, they acquired DeForest Buckner, they kind of struggled a little bit against undrafted rookie James Robinson for Jacksonville last week in the first half. They kind of settled down later on the game as Minshew got going too, which kind of just canceled each other out. But if the Vikings can establish a run against this team and really win that trench battle against DeForest Buckner, Justin Houston, et cetera, this could really be a high scoring affair for this Vikings offense if they get it going. Yeah. I mean, I wouldn't be too worried about any defense with like Darius Leonard and DeForest Buckner. And like, I like the roster

that you guys have over there, but Gary Kubiak, Dalvin Cook with a fresh new hot contract and the run blocking, at least in week one, was actually one of the few bright spots, which is surprising because the offensive line has been kind of a bugaboo in Minnesota for a long time. But the run blocking was pretty nice. And then they actually managed to be fairly efficient when they were able to run.

Of course, game situation got away from them and it kind of didn't matter. But their actual ability to set up zone runs and actually get some production there seemed pretty nice. So I wouldn't be surprised to see the Colts have to like stack the box a little bit and, you know, really suck everything up and inside, which would again, create more vulnerability on the outside. And you're really going to have to ask a little bit more of your corners, I think, of your outside corners than Jacksonville made you ask of them. Yeah, and also, just real quickly before we move on to some Colts talk, Luke, because, of course, Darius Leonard is one of the best linebackers in the NFL, maybe a little bit slept on, even still, entering into his third year in the NFL. I think you can say the same as well, if you're not familiar with the Vikings, with Eric Kendricks, who's one of the best linebackers in the NFL,

too. I think Kendricks and Litter might be in the same tier as far as linebacker play goes. For Colts fans out there listening to this, Luke, can you just describe Eric Kendricks' level of play? Yeah, it's, I mean, I'm not particularly, we'll talk about Darius Leonard because I'm not too familiar with his style. I just know he's good. But yeah, Eric Kendricks, he's an off-ball linebacker. He's a cover linebacker. But basically, basically a lot of the times his job is if there's a combo block, the defensive tackle tries to hold off the combo block and he figures out and, and, and then his job is to like read the gap and kind of to gap around it. Um, in a, in a sense, like kind of abstract way to describe it. But, um, basically, yeah, if, if the combo block is held up and the defensive

tackle doesn't let the guard get to the second level and block Eric Kendricks, then Kendricks can basically pick his gap and read the play and try to go get the running back. And he'll rack up a million tackles that way. But the other thing he's really good at, and this is, I think, one of the most fascinating parts of this matchup, is covering the flats. Both he and Anthony Barr are incredible at covering the flats. It's and Anthony Barr are incredible at covering the flats. It's something that has been a strength of the Vikings for a long time, ever since Zimmer got here and brought Anthony Barr and Eric Kendricks into the defense. And that means a lot of, you know, swing pass to the running back type stuff. It has not been successful against the

Vikings. That's the kind of thing that they've been a lot better at defending than other teams. And I know that Phillip Rivers loves to throw to his running backs. Week one, the Colts, what was it, 17 passes to the running backs, including one of the touchdowns to Naeem Hines. That is going to be a really interesting thing. Kendricks is going to be asked to go sideline to sideline a lot, and he's one of the few linebackers that can do that and go sideline to sideline, stick with the flat,

and stop a swing pass from suddenly becoming a 20-yard scamper down the sideline. Yeah, Kendrick is one of my favorite linebackers to watch in the NFL. And I think for AFC football watchers like the Colts fans out there, they might not be too familiar with Eric Kendrick, but that needs to be very fun to watch, that linebacker matchup between Leonard and Kendrick here on Sunday at Lucas Oil Stadium here. But we're going to transition on into some Indianapolis Colts talk. Before we do so, I want to take a quick break for our sponsors.

This season, get football on your time with NFL Game Pass. You can catch every snap from every game in full game replays and see all the plays in just 45 minutes with condensed games. You'll learn from the league's best players in over 40 film session episodes and get access to the entire NFL Films archive. Go to nfl.com slash gamepass to start your free trial today. All righty. We are back here for segment two of our crossover special today. Luke Braun of Locked On Vikings, Evan Sattery of Locked On Colts. Luke, I'll give you the floor here to

discuss some Colts talk, and unfortunately after a disappointing loss on Sunday, the Colts like the Vikings trying to scratch and claw back the 500. Yeah, this is going to be, whoever leaves this game with a loss is going to really, really be reeling, and then it's going to be whoever leaves this game with a loss is, is going to really, really be reeling. And, and then it's going to be an uphill climb for the rest of the season, just to make it into the post season, let alone make any noise in January. So I guess my first question for the Colts comes down to Phillip rivers.

I'll be honest. I don't have a lot of faith in Phillip rivers at this stage in his career at the end of his time in, in Los Angeles. I kind of thought he was washed. I kind of thought he was going to retire at the end of the year. So it's surprising to see him kind of do this retirement tour a year in, in Indianapolis. And I feel like a lot of that has manifested itself in a whole bunch of short passing to the running backs and he loves throwing to his

running backs. So is that like a staple of the offense or is that just a lot of checkdowns? Is that the intention? Are we trying to be like a throw to Naeem Hines, throw to Jonathan Taylor screen type of offense? Or is that just kind of what Phillip Rivers is doing? And is it, I mean, is that hamstringing you guys? Or is that like the plan? I think it certainly seems like the plan, honestly. When Frank Reich spoke earlier this week,

they mentioned that their screen game is one of their strongest parts of the offense. And you look at their stats from week one, Rivers threw to running back 17 times on that. almost half of their attempts were to running backs that were completed which goes to show you how much he loves this running back group unfortunately Marlon Mack tore his Achilles in week one he's out for the rest of the season but now Jonathan Taylor the high second round rookie from Wisconsin now takes that that bell cow role nine hines will step in as that third down scat back playing that Danny Woodhead Austin Eckler type type role. I think moving forward here, it's going to be a bread and butter stable

with Rivers as quarterback. You're going to see a lot of screenplay for Naeem Hines, even more so for Jonathan Taylor too. He even had six catches in the second half in week one. I imagine it might be even around that number each week for Taylor because he's going to be getting a lot of line share snaps outside of Hines on third down. Yeah, I think moving forward with this offensive line, you see how Quentin Nelson, Ryan Kelly, Anthony Costanzo, the rest of the offensive line, they're able to move well in space. We saw a lot of very good screen attempts. Jonathan Taylor busted off a 36-yard screen early on in the second half

against this Jaguars team. I have to wonder if history will be itself this week in the Casolo Stadium because, like Reich said, it's going to be one of the staples of the offense. And Rivers, as we know throughout his career in san diego and los angeles loves utilizing those running backs i imagine heinz and taylor are primed for a big week in the past and maybe again and throughout the rest of the season yeah it's definitely an interesting like dfs play for those two guys um but elsewhere in the skill positions i mean there's not much question about the colts offensive line that's going to be really really difficult to generate any pressure. And everybody's very familiar with

Phillip Rivers because he's been in the league for a million years. But the wide receivers, I think, are one of the more interesting unknowns, at least for me, being somebody not that familiar with the Colts. Paris Campbell, I mean, we kind of know T.Y. Hilton, but he didn't play. And I thought he was mostly a slot guy or preferably a slot guy. But y'all put Paris Campbell in the slot. And then, of course, like Michael Pittman coming in, Zach Pascal, I thought he was mostly a slot guy or preferably a slot guy, but y'all put Paris Campbell in the slot. And then of course, like Michael Pittman coming in, Zach Pascal, I thought looked really nice on tape, although he didn't quite have the production to match.

So when it comes to this wide receiver group, if you were a defensive coordinator preparing for the Colts, is T.Y. Hilton the guy you're like still the most scared of? And who else is worth like really game planning around? I would say T.Y. is probably still the number one option. At least I would say that for the next couple weeks because he was kind of shut down a little bit by C.J. Henderson, the Jaguars' top pick in Week 1.

Henderson kind of had his way against T.Y. And hopefully moving forward here, T.Y. is able to bounce back because we heard a lot in the preseason, at least in the training camp area, that Rivers and Hilton were building a really good rapport, that Hilton was really having a great training camp as well. But I think, honestly, moving forward here, I would buy a lot of stock on Paris Campbell, who, like you mentioned, is our slot receiver. You see Michael Pittman Jr. on the outside, too.

Zach Paschal, as well. They share that load. Opposite T.Y. Hilton on the outside. But I think Paris Campbell is such a mismatch in the slot. 4'3", 1'0", 6'0". We saw a lot of targets for Paris Campbell in Week 1. Eight targets. He caught six of those, and one of those was an interception that Rivers threw in a double coverage to try to get Paris Campbell the ball. He's such a great player on crossing routes, on those deep posts. They barely missed a touchdown as well in week one.

Rivers got hit before he could throw it, and Campbell was kind of racing into the end zone ahead of the defensive back there, and it really could have been an easy score for Campbell if that ball was placed in the right area. I think moving forward here, Paris Campbell could be the leading reception getter for the Colts this year, even more so than T.Y. Hilton, because Campbell's already proven with his high catch rate, even last year, even though he battled a lot of injuries,

that he is a very reliable target. He's a security blanket. I think we already saw in week one that Campbell and Nahe Mines are kind of turning into the out ready for Phillip Rivers as those really athletic guys can get out in space and create extra yards after catch. I think Paris Killam moving forward here could turn to the Colts number one option, but I think T.Y. Houghton and any sort of week could bust out when he wants to. Yeah, that makes sense. And honestly, Campbell is the one that I think matches up best against the Vikings just because they have right now Mike Hughes in the slot. Hughes might move outside. We might have Gladney in the slot because rookie Cameron Dantzler's on the

injury report. That's something to watch. So I think Campbell coming out of the slot is something that I think the Vikings are going to have to like get creative about how they plan for that. But I want to switch to the other side of the ball because the Colts defensive roster has always been fascinating to me. Of course, you know, there's the secondary and Vikings fans. We are very familiar with Xavier Rhodes and his strengths and weaknesses, but the defensive line, I kind of want to talk about, there's no Kamoko Ture this year, but you still have DeForest Buckner and, you know, you still have a couple of guys along that defensive line that can generate pressure. And the Vikings have never been that good at offensive line. The line did okay against the Packers,

but there's still plenty of weak spots, especially on the interior. But you said that DeForest Buckner didn't have the best game against Jacksonville. So I guess, do we still expect him to be as disruptive as he was for San Francisco? I still expect so. Hopefully it was just a bad week for Buckner, where he couldn't generate consistent pressure, probably still getting used to the defense with a shortened training camp. He also sat out a few practices during training camp due to a hand injury,

so hopefully just him catching up to speed a little bit. We saw Buckner get a couple good pressures. I think he had four tackles in the game, one tackle for loss as well. He flashed here and there, but it wasn't consistent. Hopefully moving forward it's a lot more consistent because the Colts are paying him like an all-pro defensive tackle in the league, which he was last year in San Francisco. But I think, like you mentioned, Buckner should be in for a huge week against his Vikings

offensive interior because he matches up perfectly against them. I think I remember the last time the 49ers played the Vikings, Buckner had a field day against them. And that could be right for doing a repeat here in Indianapolis because whether it be Buckner or it be Justin Houston on the outside, who had two sacks on Sunday, Danico Autry as well had a sack too. I think those two players could be prime for it if Buckner doesn't break out. Autry, who had a couple sacks.

Houston is always poised for a huge game as well on the outside. They could really bring some pressure. And if Buckner's able to get that interior pressure consistently, I think they're going to consistently win that trench battle in the front against defensive line versus offensive line. And that could really be a bad sort of trend for Kirk Cousins if they want to get going and catch that rhythm. Because if Buckner does get going early on,

it could be a long day for the Vikings. Yeah, I feel like both teams are kind of primed to hold a lead if they get one. And so whoever kind of gets out the gate quickly, it's going to be difficult to stem that tie. But let's talk about the elephant in the room, which is Xavier Rhodes and Adam Thielen. Of course, I have watched Adam Thielen beat the crap out of Xavier Rhodes in camp a whole bunch. I've watched Diggs do it too. Although he, of course, he's not here anymore. But I guess,

do you still feel like you have something in Xavier Rhodes? We are all very like sensitive about it. So seeing him get beat once for that one touchdown or give up a couple of catches, we're like, aha, we knew it. See, he's trash. But for you guys, I feel like it's a different perspective. What are the expectations you have for Xavier Rhodes this year? Is it that he can be, I mean, he didn't shadow against Jacksonville. He played sides. So it's not that he's going to be the shadowing number one corner, but is he the number one corner or is he just the right one? Rakisen's the left one. And I I guess how does that characterize the secondary? I think the expectation was this year was for Rhodes to kind of step into that Pierre

Desir role we saw last year, be the veteran leader of that cornerback group, take on the primary assignment when need be. We also saw Rakia Sin kind of share that load a little bit last year when Desir was injured. But very worrisome signs for the Colts defense, I imagine, seeing Xavier Rhodes on Sunday. He looked like you mentioned, Luke, last year in Minnesota getting torched consistently it was not a good look for Rhodes whether it be Keelan Cole, LaVisca Chanel it wasn't it wasn't a great day for Xavier Rhodes he allowed that touchdown late the game uh leading touchdown for the Jaguars Minshew hit Keelan Cole wide open in the end zone on a busted coverage from Xavier Rhodes hopefully like like Buckner

just getting some rust off just a new system he's trying to get acclimated to, but not a good sign in week one for Rhodes. And if this continues against Minnesota, if this continues another couple weeks here, the Colts might be in trouble as far as cornerbacks go, because Marvell Tell, he opted out of the season before it started due to COVID-19 concerns. Of course, Kenny Moore is your nickel corner, one of the more underrated ones in the NFL, but that puts a lot of pressure on Rakia Sen to really be a legit number one corner, and he hasn't been consistent enough to be that just yet so if Rhodes keeps struggling Luke I could see the Colts maybe making a mid-season trade for a corner because it could be really desperation time Rhodes kind of shows what he was in 2019 that continues

in the 2020 for this Colts team because they put a lot of expectations on Rhodes that if he got into the zone system reunited with Jonathan Gannon his his former coach in Minnesota, he could kind of maybe get back to that form a little bit. But so far, it hasn't been a good result. And against Adam Thielen on Sunday, if he's matched up primarily against him, I think it could be a really rough sailing for Xavier Rhodes against Adam Thielen. Colts fans, rockauto.com is the place to go if you want to save money on your next car purchase.

Whether it be getting a new fuel pump assembly, new tires, an oil change, Rock Auto is the place to go to save you countless amounts of money compared to the competition. We'll see you next time. Quickly see all the parts available for your vehicle and choose the brand specification and price you prefer. And best-of-all prices at rockauto.com are always reliably low and the same professionals as dealers and selfers. So why spend twice as much money when you can get the same parts for even cheaper at Rock Auto? Go to rockauto.com right now and see all the parts available for your car or truck. Write Locked On in their How-To-Be-Buy box and they'll be sending you. They have a main selection, reliably low prices, and all the parts your car will ever need. Write Locked On, once more, L-O-C-K-A-D-O-N in the How-To-Be-Buy box. Send them to rockauto.com and Lock on Colts send you over there yeah and if you play sides again if the Colts play sides again and just stick roads on the right and just say you know

whoever you put out there is who you put out there the Vikings would have the option to have Thielen versus roads as much as they want or against Justin as much as they want could even move them into the slot but I doubt they do that because it feels like that's where the secondary is the strongest. Though that'll be Kenny Moore will probably get a lot of rookie snaps against Justin Jefferson. But hey, let's move on to some predictions.

The way I like to do it is using the betting lines, but if you want to do scores, we could do that as well. Yeah, I'm actually looking at DraftKings right now, looking at the over-under and the point spread. The Colts are fair at minus three, pretty much a pick-em on the road for Minnesota and Indianapolis. Over-under as well as 48.5, Luke.

Before we get into our prediction, do you think – who do you think covers that? Do you think the Vikings cover that plus three spread? And do you think it gets over-under of that? Because honestly, I think we're in for a shootout here. Yeah, I like the idea of a shootout um i i yeah i would probably take the over i didn't bet it i did bet vikings plus three just because i feel like vegas is still overvaluing home field advantage in a season with no fans so i actually bet vikings plus three i do think that they can uh they can at least cover the spread um but i feel really good actually about the Vikings

in this matchup. I think a team that likes to throw to its running backs as a key part of its offense, the Vikings match up really, really well against that because of their linebackers. And a team that feels like it's going to try to leverage the linebackers more than it leverages the cornerbacks plays right into the Vikings' hands. So I feel pretty good about the Vikings in this one in the way that they match up. But I think overall quality, the two teams are really close. So the other thing is it's a Philip Rivers game and Philip Rivers games tend to devolve into chaos. So I always just take the points. Yeah, that's not, I would definitely go with you on that. I would definitely go over here. I think it's going to be a really fun game to watch on Sunday, whether it be the Vikings

or the Colts winning. I'm going to go with the Colts winning just barely. I'm going 30-27. I'm going to go a little spicy here and say overtime that the Colts win in overtime 30-27. I think it's going to be very close throughout. I think Dalvin Cook and the Vikings offense are going to be cooking throughout as well. I think the expectations

of the Colts side of things, of course, Phillip Rivers will try to get going against this young secondary. I think Jonathan Taylor-Factors are the Colts side of things. Of course, Phillip Rivers will try to get going against this young secondary. But I think Jonathan Taylor, in his first career NFL start, if they can establish the run early and kind of dominate the trenches, this Colts offensive line versus the Vikings defensive line, I could really see the Colts trying to bleed the clock a little bit and really have a nice balance between rush and pass because we saw last week that against the Jaguars,

Rivers threw 46 times and they only ran it 24 times. That type of balance will not give you much wins in the NFL with Rivers at quarterback. So I think Jonathan Taylor's poised for a big game if they're able to establish that run early. So I'm going to go the Colts barely cover it, minus three spread. I'm going to go 30-27 Luke. The Colts win with a Rodrigo, hot rod, blank and ship.

Field going overtime. Ooh, redemption for the kid. I like it. So we both picked our own teams. That's the for the kid. I like it. So we both picked our own teams. That's the way God intended. I guess so. I think, really honestly, Luke, either way, this is a pick-em game for me.

Yeah, it's a close one, and not in a particularly encouraging way for either of our teams. But hey, Evan, thank you so much for hanging out, doing this crossover. Yeah, absolutely, Luke. Always enjoy talking with you. I'm looking forward to watching the game on Sunday.

Best of luck.