Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - 2020 expectations for Kirk Cousins

Episode Date: June 24, 2020

If Kirk Cousins is the 13th best QB in the NFL, will that be enough? Can he handle offensive shootouts? How should his supporting cast impact expectations?  Plus Hot Routez returns with Manny's brilliant production abilities on display. What would you trade for Jamal Adams? Who is the most comparable QB to Dak Prescott? Which teams are definitely better or worse than they were last year?  Read Matthew Coller's work at PurpleInsider.substack.com And fill out the Bluewire survey  https://forms.office.com/Pages/ResponsePage.aspx?id=BugBBZdAw0aNFUvtuGkgyhnTao1hdWxOjJwTA2fwHGJUN0hUNEhaSExWN0RRRFdCV1ZOTkdHR1IwOCQlQCN0PWcu Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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reach for the beer that is made to chill. Get Coors Light in the new look delivered straight to your door with Drizway or Instacart, Coors Brewing Company, Golden Colorado, and as always, celebrate. Hey there. Because you're listening to this podcast, we at Blue Wire want you to know this. Golden, Colorado, and a pair of AirPods. We appreciate you, hope you're staying safe, and want you to enjoy this podcast. Hello, welcome into another episode of Purple Insider. Matthew Collar here with you and joining me, my former teammate at Score North and one of my favorites to co-host with and get together with some hot routes, which we will do and debut a new intro. It is Manny Hill.

What is going on, Manny? Always good to be on the air with you. No matter what the capacity, it's always, you are by far and away, and I mean this with all sincerity. I'm not just saying this because I'm on air with you, but you are by far and away my favorite person to talk football with on the planet. Like, because it's so much fun because we're both sort of like, we're both right around the same age,

and we both are like obsessed with like mid to late 90s football. I can just like all of those things back from those days because it's just like one of the coolest eras ever of nfl football for so many different reasons that we both have sort of this this affection for that era of football so i always enjoy stuff like this with you well thank you manny and we'll try not to turn this entirely into why the 1994, 96, and 98 seasons are the best in NFL history. We won't quite go there, but we're going to touch on a little 90s when we get to hot routes in a couple of minutes. I also want to tell you that I watched just recently the NFL yearbook for the Miami Dolphins in 1996. And what a wild ride that was.

So you would appreciate that one. Look that one up. Dan Marino is starting to fade. Jimmy Johnson is taking over. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar is the running back. So I will save our obsession with 90s football for another day and get into expectations with Kirk. But I'm suggesting people go look at any of those 90s NFL yearbooks

from NFL films. They are so good. So, Manny, I wrote the other day on my website, Suggesting people go look at any of those 90s NFL yearbooks from NFL films. They are so good. So, Manny, I wrote the other day on my website, purpleinsider.com, about reasonable expectations for Kirk. So I want to just open this up to you, to wherever your mind goes, when I say what is a reasonable expectation for the year 2020 for Kirk Cousins? Go. is a reasonable expectation for the year 2020 for Kirk Cousins' go? Well, I think definitely a reasonable expectation is that he's going to continue the play that he showed last year, right?

I mean, it's, you know, Kirk is at an age where he's not exactly a spring chicken, but he's in his early 30s. We know that, especially in recent years with quarterbacks, that quarterbacks can play at a really high level as they get into their late 30s. And even in the case of like a Tom Brady and Drew Brees into their 40s, they can still play at a pretty high level. So Kirk should be more different in that, you know, I think a lot of the good play that we saw from him last year, albeit we saw a lot of it against some pretty bad teams,

but we know Kirk is capable of performing at a pretty high level. And he had a good year last year, and I think reasonable expectations for him to pick up right where he left off last year. The question, though, is going to be what is the departure of Stefan Diggs? What kind of effect is that going to have on his production? I mean, obviously you're going to get Adam Thielen back for a full season if he's healthy, which they didn't have last year. But I think a reasonable expectation for Kirk Cousins is that he's going to pick up where he left off last year

and hopefully get even better. His average season since he took over as a full-time starter in Washington in 2015 through 2019, average season is about 4,300 yards passing, 28 touchdowns, 11 interceptions, 7.7 yards per attempt, and a 99.6 quarterback rating. And even for good measure, I looked this up too, average by PFF ranking is the 13th best quarterback in the league and by ESPN's QBR the 11th best quarterback in the league. If he has those numbers with the defensive changes that they've had,

and I'm going to throw out just the word uncertainty at the running back position. I still fully believe, and I'll say this every single podcast until it happens or doesn't happen, that Delvin Cook will sign a contract extension. But if Cousins is the 13th best quarterback in the NFL, considering that other parts of this Vikings team are more in flux and not as solidified as they have been over the past couple of years, is that good enough to have them be legitimate contenders in the NFC? Not in the playoffs. I think it's good enough for the playoffs, but to be real contenders in the NFC if he's the 13th best quarterback in the NFL.

If he's the 13th best, I mean, I don't know if that's going to be enough. Last year, he ended up, at least with PFF rankings, he ended up somewhere in the top eight or something like that. It depended on whether you included Ryan Tannehill as having enough throws, whether he was fifth or sixth, I think, for his passing grade. So, yeah, he was way up there in terms of the quarterback grades from PFF last year. But he's been as low as 20th in his career.

Yeah. See, and I think that's where you have to wonder, like, which Kirk Cousins are we going to get? I mean, it's, you know, and obviously the departure of Stephon Diggs is going to have, I think, something to do with that. And that's where you then look at, okay, what sort of strides does Irv Smith make, you know, as he goes into his second year?

Is Kyle Rudolph still going to be a very productive target as he's a year older now? You know, Dalvin Cook, you know, will the Vikings get the Dalvin Cook situation resolved? What sort of effect will a rookie like Justin Jefferson have? I know you and I are both pretty high on Justin Jefferson, but we also see that sometimes it takes rookie wide receivers a little bit of time to step in and make a huge impact right away. So what they can get out of Justin Jefferson as a rookie, I think, will depend on,

will determine how Kirk plays as well. And we know, from what we saw last year, that Kirk is capable of being a top seven or eight quarterback in this league because he was one of the better quarterbacks in the NFL, certainly in the top third. But if he regresses back because, you know, because he was one of the better quarterbacks in the NFL, certainly in the top third. But if he regresses back because, you know,

Stephon Diggs is gone and, you know, this injury to this guy happens and, you know, there's an injury on the offensive line and he regresses back to, you know, sort of that 13 to 17 range as far as rankings among the league, I mean, then you're probably looking at an 8-8 or 7-9 type of season for the Vikings, right? Yeah, no, that's right. If he ends up being just okay, we're probably looking at much more of a 2018 season.

But here's the X factor to me, Manny, is the Gary Kubiak element to this. In 2018, you've got John DiFilippo, who clearly was not thinking in terms of his quarterback strengths as much as he should have. I have the stat in my article that DiFilippo used play action only 20% of the time on Cousins dropbacks, and Kubiak bumped that up to over 30% last year, which was one of the top in the entire league.

And he also had Cousins throwing the ball down the field. That was one of the issues with DeFilippo is that he was trying to have Cousins throw quick when that's his best strength is actually getting the ball down the field. So even though there are a lot of things in flux, and I think we agree that Cousins is every bit of his circumstance. One major part of his circumstance is an offensive coordinator who has such a long history of setting up his quarterbacks for success. Yeah, and I think that's why we've seen Mike Zimmer, you know, have this great relationship with Jerry Trubiak. At least that's what we've seen Mike Zimmer have in terms of just sort of this infatuation

with the system that Gary wants to run and the running game and all of that and the play-action passing and Kirk's ability to get the ball down the field. I mean, that's going to be a big part of what he can do really well, and I think with the weapons that this team has, even with the departure of Diggs, who was the primary reason for why Kirk was able to get the ball down the field so well last year,

that's where a guy like Justin Jefferson comes into play. I mean, Justin Jefferson can be that weapon, even as a rookie, that allows Kirk to push the ball down the field, it's only going to help him. And obviously that can open up things for Dalvin Cook in the running game too. Right.

And I also think with Jefferson giving easy opportunities to Cousins that last year they created a lot of screen passes for big yardage and he averaged eight yards a pass when throwing behind the line of scrimmage. So there's a Dalvin Cook effect, but also just a scheme effect of giving him a lot of easy screens that was something pat schirmer was great with with case keenum and i think that that can carry over now you mentioned you know some of the teams that they played i looked into the schedule from last year and they faced the 30th 27 26 24 23, and 22nd ranked defenses last year. So that certainly helped.

And of course, Cousins lit up most of them. But I'm thinking about the quarterback schedule that he's going to face, Manny. And I think it's fair to expect that his yardage totals and touchdown totals should go up, even if he plays exactly the same, just because it's hard to predict the defense being as good. And if you look at the quarterback schedule that he's hard to predict the defense being as good. And if you look at the quarterback schedule that he's playing against, a lot of quarterbacks who could put a lot of points up, especially if Tannehill is good again.

I mean, you're facing Deshaun Watson, who's still going to be good at football, even though he doesn't have DeAndre Hopkins. If Phillip Rivers finds it in Indianapolis or playing indoors or whatever with an offensive line, you could see Indianapolis being a pretty formidable offense. So there's going to be, I think, a lot of situations here where Cousins has to throw the ball 40 times, and that's always been talked about as what you don't want from Cousins. You want him to be efficient and have to throw it 25 times

but not carry everything on the offense. How do you think that potential shootout offensive battles could impact how well Kirk Cousins plays this year? Well, I mean, you add in, you know, they got a trip to Seattle on the schedule as well. I think Dallas comes to town too with that Eric Ariel attack with that Tascot. So there's going to be a lot of opportunities, I think, if you will, for the

Vikings to be in some high scoring games. And I think that's where Mike Zimmer's defense, however he's going to do it, because like you mentioned, there's a lot of changes on the defense. There's a lot of positions where you're kind of wondering what are they going to look like on that side of the ball. And if Mike Zimmer's defense struggles, if Kirk Cousins is in a situation where he has to throw for 450 yards time and time and time again, I just don't know if he's – we've seen him do it on occasion. I just don't know if he's going to be able to do that if it's required of him five or six or seven times to do this year. I just don't know if he's going to be able to do that that often. And when you look at this schedule, it looks like there's

going to be some times where that's going to have to be the case, where the Vikings are just going to have to say, Kirk, our defense just doesn't have it today because, oh, Russell Wilson's on the other side of the field. We need you to match that. We need you to be able to step up on the road even and be able to put up some good numbers and lead this team to victory. I mean, we saw last year, for as good a year as Kirk had last year, a lot of those successful games that he had were against bad teams

where they were able to jump up early and then sort of control things with the running game late. And there was no real threat of, you know, Daniel Jones, you know, leading any sort of comeback with the New York Giants or anything like that in the game from the Meadowlands. So there's going to be times where Kirk is just going to have to sort of, you know, guess for lack of a better term, put the team on his back and lead them to victory.

And that's how this team is going to be able to get to the playoffs. But he has to do it. I mean, you and I, we've talked about this several times. Kirk's going to have to go out and do it on occasion. I mean, that's going to be the difference between them being, you know, a 9-7, 10-6 type of team that maybe gets into the playoffs and potentially a team that can win the division and make some noise in the postseason.

Right, and what's funny about Kirk Cousins now, that he's just played enough games where we have a full sample size of Kirk Cousins, and you can point to almost any type of circumstance and say, oh, he had that before. So what's he look like with a straight-up bad team? All right, well, 2017 in Washington, that's a bad team. They lost their top receivers, their offensive line was injured, and he's a 7-9 quarterback whose numbers will dip when he's playing for a bad team,

as most quarterbacks will. What's he look like with a great offense? 2016 Washington puts up huge numbers but doesn't get him into the playoffs because they had a poor defense and he lost a big game, as he does at times throughout his career. But then last year, what's he look like with a great running game, with the exact right situation and a very, very good defense? They struggled at times, but they finished fifth in points against.

Well, then he can win a playoff game in that type of circumstance. And I think that we're looking much more toward a 2015 or 2016 Washington team here, where the defense has some issues and Cousins will have to put up those big numbers and in both of those seasons one he gets them into the playoffs the other one they come just short in the final week of the season I think that's what we're looking at here only now there will be seven playoff teams so you've got a much better chance to get yourself into the postseason uh question for you, Manny. Would you like to do some hot routes? I am ready, and I have been ready since you told me the other day that we're going to

do hot routes. I am ready to rock and roll. I love the questions that you presented to me. Let's do it. Let's do some hot routes. All right, so people who don't realize this, Manny is not just good on the air, but a brilliant producer of stuff. And so you have created a Hot Routs intro, and I'm so happy about it.

So let's hear that, and then let's get into it. There's news in the NFL today, and it's time to break it down in the only way we know how. Hot Rod style. Earl! Johnny! With our spin on football headlines with a mix of frozen tundras. Let's be a cold weather team.

Neck rolls. Hell yeah! I do! Boom! And grass game jerseys. The good old-fashioned gut was probably the biggest difference in the game. Okay, Manny, that is amazing, and we're going to use it every show that we ever do Hot Routes for the rest of my life. That is tremendous, tremendous work, Manny. Thank you.

So let's get started here. First question of Hot Routes, where we around the nfl and look at some different story lines and put our own spin and often a viking spin on these story lines so the first one here jamal adams has made it pretty clear that he does not want to play for the new york jets he's requested a trade of course they don't have to do that um and it's you know it's kind of amazing that the jets have been so bad i'm not even sure people realize how good Jamal Adams has been. He's a two-time All-Pro. It also kind of tells you how quarterback is the reason that you win or lose.

Even if you have one of the best defensive players in the league, you still can go 7-9. Two-part question here. If you're the Vikings, what would you trade for Jamal Adams? And second part is, any other non-quarterback on a rookie contract you would take before him? Okay, so I was thinking about this, and if I'm the Vikings and I want to make a trade for Jamal Adams, how amazing would a defensive backfield be with Jamal Adams and Anthony Harris

in the same defensive backfield as your two safeties. It would be very, very good. Yes. Very, very good. How freaking incredible would that be? So I was thinking, could you persuade the New York Jets to take Harrison Smith in a second-round pick for Jamal Adams? And the interesting part about that is you would essentially be trading Harrison Smith for his younger self, is what I look at with Jamal Adams. I mean, just a naturally really smart player who has the explosiveness, the ball skills, all those things, can blitz, can shut down the run himself in the box, which is exactly

what Harrison Smith has been, except for Harrison Smith is getting into his 30s now and eventually he'll start to fade you would be getting Jamal Adams through all of his prime years to go along with Anthony Harris now did you consider looking at it the other way around Manny instead of Harrison Smith but rather Anthony Harris and putting Harrison Smith and Jamal Adams in the same defensive backfield. I thought about that too, and maybe even because Anthony Harris is a few years younger than Harrison Smith, you could probably maybe go with a lower draft pick to include with Anthony Harris going to the Jets as well.

So maybe you go Anthony Harris and like a third or fourth round pick or something like that and still be able to get the deal done. It'd be very interesting. Yeah. You know, I think that you're having to give up one of those two to open that position, obviously.

And then it's, what do they want after that? Because if you're the Jets, you're just not giving up Jamal Adams because you don't have to, you can let him play out this entire thing, but you can just keep franchise tagging him. This is how the CBA works, and this is why the players get upset, is if you want to keep somebody around, you can absolutely do that, no matter what they do in terms of demanding a trade,

unless Jamal Adams said, I will never play for the Jets again, and then Jamal Adams is going to be out a lot of money if they decide to play hardball with him. Any other non-quarterback on a rookie contract you would take before Jamal Adams? I was thinking when I first saw the question, the guy that came to my mind right away, and he's still technically on his rookie contract only for one more season, I think, is Jalen Ramsey popped in my mind right away. Just because of the way the league is right now, you need to have at least one really good cornerback,

at least one at league level cornerback to help you. And if there's a guy that's not a quarterback that I would take maybe ahead of Jamal Adams at this point. He's still on rookie deal. It would probably be Jalen Ramsey. The question with that is you've only got one season left on the rookie contract with Jalen Ramsey before you have to pay him, so that's going to be an interesting part of it. But if there is one other guy, it would probably be him.

Yeah, I mean, you could try to go hot take with somebody from this year's draft class like Jeff Okuda or Chase Young if you were looking on the defensive side I think I'm going to go a little bit off the board here with the guy that I would pick but I was so impressed with him especially considering the quarterback play that this guy got from last year is Terry McLaurin from Washington he was mind-blowingly good for someone who played with a washed case Keenum and with Dwayne Haskins who had no idea what he was doing but all the advanced numbers point to Terry McLaurin being a superstar so if Haskins takes a step forward even a little McLaurin is already a top-notch

route runner explosive big play threat that's exactly what I want to start with. If I believe, which I do, that offense is the way to win, I think I'm probably going with that guy. Another one that might be mentioned is similar to Jalen Ramsey, George Kittle, in that he's still on his rookie deal, but it won't be for much longer, but still would be in that conversation for being the best player on a rookie deal at this moment. And you could throw in some other ones that haven't been signed yet, like Marshawn Lattimore I don't think has a second contract yet. Elvin Kamara is another one who's a very versatile player if you want to go

with him. So lots of potential options for young players. Next hot route question here for you, Manny. Thomas Dimitrov, the GM of the Atlanta Falcons, said that they have high expectations and they have definitely gotten better this offseason. I want you to give me three teams that you think have definitely gotten better and three that have definitely gotten worse.

Well, first, for gotten better, I mean, Tampa Bay, the first, like, obvious one. Right. I mean, you had Tom Brady and Rob Gronkowski, arguably the greatest quarterback and greatest team of all time to your roster then yeah you're you're definitely gotten better um i thought about dallas too just because they changed head coaches like i think once you get jason garrett out of your head coaching office but your team and just replace him with a guy like

mike mccarthy who certainly has a much better resume and has a little bit more success head coaching office, and just replace him with a guy like Mike McCarthy, who certainly has a much better resume and has a little bit more success in his past. I think that instantly makes you better. Now, how much better, we'll see. But I do think Dallas has definitely gotten better just by changing coaches. Another team I was thinking about you called is Arizona. Yes. I mean, You get DeAndre

Hopkins. You get a weapon for Tyler Murray. You instantly made your franchise player better just by trading for one of the best wide receivers in the NFL. I think Arizona definitely made themselves better just by that one move alone.

I'll go with Tampa, Dallas, and Arizona as three teams that have gotten better. Gotten worse. Definitely Jacksonville. I'm going to say Jacksonville has gotten worse just because of the guys that they've turned away and because they've decided to retain your guy, Doug Malone. Ah, yes.

Coach of all time, Doug Malone. Uh-huh, yep. That's, I think, right there in itself. It simply means that he's gotten worse just by that in itself. I also think Houston has gotten worse, and I feel bad for Deshaun Watson because they traded away his top target, and they really haven't done much of anything else to sort of try and replace him. And they really haven't done anything to get better either.

And then the third team I was thinking about is, I think New England has obviously gotten worse. I mean, it kind of goes hand-in-hand with Tampa Bay having gotten better. I mean, New England, you lose Tom Brady. I mean, you know, Rob Gronkowski was gone already anyway. But they haven't really done anything to improve their offense. You've let the quarterback walk.

I don't think Jared Skidham is going to lead anybody to the playoffs. I know Bill Belichick is still coaching the team, but you make those significant changes like that. And they lost some guys on defense too, which I think is not going to help them much either. Yeah, I definitely think Jacksonville, Houston, and Maryland have actually gotten worse. Before we get back to the conversation, I want to remind you to go to

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That's SOTASTICK, S-O-T-A-s-t-i-c-k.com original minnesota sports inspired goods code purple insider for free shipping okay a lot of the same picks so i'm gonna change up my answers a little bit i'm going to say for definitely got better the cleveland browns definitely got better by not having freddie kitchens as their head coach. And from their head coach now to their front office, they seem to be back on the page they were before they hired John Dorsey, who did a lot of good things, made a lot of good moves for them. But they were not on the same page, it seemed. And then hiring somebody who was only a running back coach before

and telling him to be a head coach. A very foolish move from that team. First one ever, actually. First foolish move by the Browns that I can remember. But they've righted a wrong here by hiring Kevin Stefanski, and I think that he's going to get them in a much better direction, get Baker Mayfield running more play action, things like that, that will help boost his game back to where it was as a rookie. So I think they are definitely better. Now, there's a little bit of galaxy brain that you could use with Jacksonville

and say they're definitely better because they could tank and get Trevor Lawrence, but I'm not going to go there. I'm just going to go straight up like who's more talented, win-loss record type of who's definitely better. Arizona was on my list. I want to say also Detroit has definitely gotten better because we overlooked a lot of the moves that they made in the off season to add talent to their defense. And if

Matt Stafford is healthy, then they can be definitely better. But especially with the moves that they made on the defensive side, the signings that they made, they will not lose 12 games this year. They will not go three, 12 and one again for the Detroit Lions so I'm going to say that they are definitely better the third one I'm struggling a little bit with because I wanted to go like should I go like Jetson Adam Gase now I don't trust them there's a case for it but I don't trust them I will say the Miami Dolphins for the same reason as Detroit where they were so far down last year and they add to uh he might not, but the rest of the roster is pretty good. I mean, they make some big signings on the defensive side

that should have their defense jump way up. Last year, they allowed almost 500 points on defense. That is not going to happen again for the Miami Dolphins. And they would be, if you are a gambling person, a good low-key pick to win their division because still not sold on Josh Allen, still not sold on Sam Darnold. So wouldn't it be a great story, Manny, if Ryan Fitzpatrick took the Miami Dolphins to the playoffs and went 10-6 or something like that, and one year after everyone was talking about them being the worst team in the league,

he's in the postseason in his final year of his career or something? That would be fantastic. And, of course, like the opportunity he finally gets to be in the playoffs and shine on that stage would be the game where he throws like six interceptions. Oh, yes. Blown out by like four touchdowns, right? Yes. Yep.

Yep. The gotten worse is hard to pick different ones than you picked because you lose Tom Brady, you're worse. I'm going to say San Francisco is worse, that they lost the Forrest Buckner to a trade and then Debo Samuel got hurt putting him behind for his offseason. He's supposed to still be able to play. But I think just like natural regression, too, of you go 13-3, you go to the Super Bowl, you're probably not quite as good

as you were when you went to the Super Bowl, but that one's a little bit of a stretch. You could definitely argue that Chicago has gotten worse by bringing in a quarterback who's either just as bad or possibly worse than Mitch Trubisky in Nick Foles. The whole rest of his career outside of that one playoff run points toward this guy isn't really very good, except for that in the one year with Philadelphia. And a team that got worse by not getting any better is the New York Giants. I just don't think that they got any better at all,

and it will be pretty much on Daniel Jones to make, like if he takes a big step forward forward to make them a better team. So do you disagree with any of those? I do not. They all sound good to me. All right, next question for you then, Manny. Zach Taylor says that Joe Burrow, Zach Taylor is the head coach of the Bengals, if you didn't know that.

Like, what percentage of the population knows the head coach of the Bengals? I'm going to say pretty low. He said that Joe Burrow has been as advertised this offseason. Okay. That does not make really a whole lot of sense. I guess it's just something you say. I want you to give me your pitch, an advertisement as well, because he's been as advertised, for a 2020 rookie to be as advertised.

So who will it be? Make your pitch, Manny. Well, I mean, did you see the workout video that Chase Young put out on social media yesterday? Scary. Scary. Disturbing. This guy is as good as advertised, if not better than a few-collar. I mean, did you see the cone drills that he was running on the beach?

Did you see the punching he was doing into the focus mitts? I mean, all of the weight training and all of that stuff. Chase Young is ready to go. He is as good as advertised and look no further than the workout video that he posted yesterday and also i mean generally there is a learning curve for players at that position but you're talking about somebody who is of a freakish nature that should be able to jump right in right away when you are an NFL body and you can be dominant. That's a really good one. I was thinking about Isaiah Simmons for Arizona,

and maybe people will get tired of me saying how much I'm high on Arizona. Clearly you are as well, with Kyler Murray next step, DeAndre Hopkins, all that. But their defense has kind of subtly added a bunch of talent and should be taking steps forward. And Isaiah Simmons is a really, really fascinating player to me. He is the modern linebacker of somebody who could play safety if you need him to. He could play in the box. He can rush the passer. He could do everything you want.

And Arizona, being suddenly a creative creative franchise they're going to find really good ways to use isaiah simmons manny and i think he's going to be as advertised yeah and you know when you look at that division it's a chunk division the defending nfc champions in there you have you know seattle obviously being always going to be a factor with Russell Wilson, but I don't know how good the Rams are going to be. This is an opportunity for Arizona, I think, to at least

make a jump. Maybe not win that division because of Seattle and San Francisco being at the top, but Arizona's going to have a chance to make some noise and if they can get some contributions from the rookies and if Kyler Murray can take that next step, then he's going to have an extra huge weapon to throw to now.

So you've got to think that that's going to happen. You've got to think Cliff Kingsbury is going to improve as a head coach just going into his second year and having another offseason, albeit sort of a different offseason than what we're used to for everybody. But, yeah, I mean, this is going to be a chance for Arizona, I think. If things come together right for them, they're going to be right there in the conversation, I think, for the playoff spot at least,

especially with the extra playoff team that we're going to have as a field now. And that's another reason San Francisco got worse is that everyone else behind them, except for the Rams, got better. But the Rams are a 9-7 team last year, so even if they're the same, they're still fairly competitive, and they have Jalen Ramsey for a whole season now. It's a really, really tough division. So they got worse, even though they didn't really do anything to get significantly worse. Next question.

Giants, they are going to let their fans skip 2020 if they want to with their season tickets, and they will not be penalized. Now, my guess is that we don't see a whole heck of a lot of fans in the stands in any NFL stadium this year anyway, but at least they told fans, hey, if you want to opt out for this year, you can still keep the seat that you have. So let's say everything was normal manny and there was no coronavirus um but you still had this option to skip 2020 right on to 2021 and for the old madden players simulate season go right through it uh which team

would you simulate the season to get to 2021 with or this was an easy one for me. If I'm a fan of the Jacksonville Jaguars, right now I'm saying, you know what? Just go 1-15 in 2020, get the number one overall pick, and take Trevor Lawrence. I don't have to watch a single game that you play in 2020. I obviously don't have to watch a single game that you play in 2020. I obviously

don't have to attend any games. I don't have to pay a damn wake of attention to anything you do in 2020. Just go 1-15 and take Trevor Lawrence number one overall in the 2021 draft, and I'll be back. That's what I'm saying right now. Before we get back to the conversation, I want to remind you that there is no shortage of action going on right now at our exclusive partners at betonline.ag. Sports are slowly making their way back, and BetOnline is leading the way with the best odds and lines for all UFC,

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Yep, that is a great pick, and that would have been my number one as well. And you can look at their draft last year for all these players, Caleb on Chason, CJ Henderson, LaVisca Chenault, for those guys to get a year of development on a bad team and jump forward to 2021. There's some that I struggled with because I just, I want to go with, give me the answer to the biggest question for a team. I need to simulate 2020 so at least I know, and then we can move forward.

And that would be, I think of the Jets for this. I don't need to see any more of Adam Gase. So we simulate the season and we know Adam Gase gets fired. But I'll at least have the answer for a team that I don't think is a legitimate contender of whether Sam Darnold is the quarterback or not. So maybe I can't sim the season because I need to get that answer. But I kind of want to just fast forward to know and then decide where that franchise is going to go after.

And I would put the Dolphins in this category. I know we just talked about them, but Dolphins and Bengals, anybody who drafted a first-round quarterback, the Los Angeles Chargers, not a big believer in what Justin Herbert could do, but we're still talking about a first-round quarterback. To see those guys in the second year where rookies really start to take their big steps forward, I think those are the types of teams that want to simulate through. The Cincinnati Bengals have good receivers if A.J. Green plays,

a very, very poor offensive line, but a good running back in the backfield. Joe Burrow with those players and a little bit of development could be pretty darn good, but he's just going to need this first year of it being a complete disaster and them going I don't know if they go 4 and 12 or or 5 and 11 I think you've done okay if you're the Cincinnati Bengals so that's a team that I think wants to simulate to the next season and I it's weird to say I'm really excited about the Dolphins but you and I both watched Tua's entire college career, and I think he's got something special there.

The injury concerns are certainly legit, but I can't wait to see him as the starter. So if he sits the full year, then simulate me forward and let me know when Tua's starting. Is there any reason whatsoever to play Tua in 2020? I just don't – I don't see any reason to play him at all. I guess unless, you know, you get sort of a similar situation that Kansas City had with Patrick Mahomes in his rookie year

where he – the whole year and then you let him, I guess, take a meaningless, you know, week 17 game or something like that. Maybe that's where we could see Tua. But other than that, I mean, him coming out that year, and I know that he's been cleared and all of his recovery and all that stuff has gone, you know, real. I know he's like way ahead of schedule, I guess, and all of that stuff. But I just don't, with where the Dolphins are right now,

I don't see any reason to play to him in 2020. And you just let him sit behind as a backup and learn. And it can only help him be ready for 2021 because that's when we really got to see him take the necessary strides and the necessary steps to move forward and be our franchise quarterback, right? Yep. I was going to bring up the Week 17 scenario is the only reason to play him. If you're out of the playoffs or you're locked into a playoff spot, then play him.

But I will forever be on the side of draft a guy no matter where, if it's number one overall or if it's number 30 overall or whatever. Draft him, sit him an entire season, and then go forward, that you'll never regret it. And I know that there's always this rush, well, they're on rookie contracts and so forth. Right, but if the guy's not going to be able to get you anywhere, there's a better chance that your rookie quarterback

ends up losing all confidence from getting his ass beat for an entire season with a very poor team. The only situation where I'd say for a rookie you want to throw that guy in is if you had a great team and then you drafted someone high. Like Philadelphia when they drafted Wentz. All right, you have a really good team. You have a really good offensive line. You can protect him.

So put him in. Let him learn on the fly. But with, I think Miami can be a lot better, but their offensive line is still not ready to protect someone like that. And I prefer Ryan Fitzpatrick get rid of the ball quickly and then continue them building their offensive line, getting Austin Jackson a year of playing time so where he's ready to go. And then you put Tua into that situation,

especially since we know that he does have a tendency to get himself hurt and so forth. So yeah, no real good argument for that. All right, final hot route, man. This has been super fun. Dak Prescott and the Cowboys are still battling over his contract. He signed his franchise tender, but the Cowboys can rescind the franchise tag if they want to, and then it gets really hairy. Would you rather have Dak or Kirk Cousins part one and I

want comparable quarterbacks to Dak from the 90s 2000s and the 2010s okay well the first part um I'd rather have Dak or Kirk I you know and I don't mean this with any disrespect to Kirk Cousins but I think it's it's a pretty easy answer for me and and it's Dak Prescott. And for me it's because I think that Dak has a little bit more of a – there's a little bit more of sort of this baller mentality, I think, that Dak has, the ability to sort of turn nothing into something. And when a play breaks down, Dak has the ability to sort of escape a pass rush and sort of make something happen.

Escaping outside of the pocket and things like that. Dak is also what, three or four years younger, I think, as well, and there's still some room potentially for him to get even better as he's probably not even into his prime yet.

So yeah, I would definitely go with Dak over Kirk. And again, you know, Kirk's fine. Kirk is good. But I think when you're just concerned with the circumstances, Dak gets the edge for me. Comparable QBs. Now this is fun. So from the 90s there were two guys that came to mind

and I want to second guy because the first guy that came to mind. And I want to remind you of the second guy because the first guy that came to mind in the 90s was really strong. I want to use him as a comparison because, one, he had a couple of years where he was good and he was playing on a bad team, but he really wasn't able to put together a long stretch,

a five- or six-year stretch of being really, really good. But he had a couple of nice seasons. And that guy is, if you remember, mid-'90s, like 1995, 1996, Jeff Blake. Jeff Blake. There's a shout-out to a guy. Jeff Blake, great arm, man. He was fun to watch for like two years. Yeah, and unfortunately for him, I mean,

he was just playing on some bad Bengals teams that didn't really have strong running games, and they couldn't really stop anybody on the defensive side. He had some weapons. You know, remember Carl Pickens and Darnay Scott were two really good wide receivers that he had back at that time. But they were so bad on defense, they just couldn't stop anybody. So they were always sort of like a 6-10 to 8-8 type of team. But then you look at Jeff Blake's numbers, and he was always like,

for that little two- or three-year stretch, he was always throwing close to 30 touchdowns, and he would throw for 3,500 to 4,000 yards which was really good at that time um so yeah Jeff came to mind I didn't want to you know I came over the second name because I didn't want to do like the typical oh well let's just compare one black quarterback to another right um so I thought another guy that came to my mind was Mark Brunel. Like late 90s Jacksonville Jaguars, Mark Brunel. And it's sort of the same type of thing where he kind of had, you know,

Brunel had a little bit of that baller mentality where he could, you know, get the playbook down. He had the ability to escape and get out of the park and make things happen. He was pretty accurate down the field. The Jaguars just seemed to, they never got to a Super Bowl, obviously, but they always seemed to be in the playoff hunt every single time in those late 90s. Those late 90s Jaguars teams were really, really good at the time, confident, those receivers and everything.

And Mark Brunel was right there at the forefront of it. So he changed my mind. 2000s, two more guys changed my mind, Steve McNair and Matt Hasselbeck. And then 2010s, I mean, it's kind of funny because, you know, he's in the question, but I thought about Kirk Cousins, too, you know, in that, you know, the numbers are always going to be really good. He's got to be able to, you know, he has the ability to lead them to the playoffs.

You know, he does have the ability to push the ball down the field, but the only difference is that, you know, again, the edge that I gave Dak over Kirk of just being a little bit younger and being able to sort of make some other plays on his own when things break down and things don't go right. You know, that could still sort of make things happen, which Kirk doesn't always have the history of doing.

But Kirk was really kind of the closest comparison that I could think of as far as the decade is concerned. So, yeah, those are my guys. Yeah, so the one thing about trying to figure this one out is, yeah, those are my guys. touchdown since he came into the league, which has to kind of be factored in for me. And that's what would separate him a little bit from Kirk Cousins in my mind, is that he can have that running element and Cousins doesn't. Cousins, I think, is a more accurate quarterback. But they're right there in that range.

If you were drafting quarterbacks, just one through 32, you want to look at the middle range there, the 10 to 14, and you're probably going to find Dak Prescott and Kirk Cousins right next to each other. So I see that. Just going through some of yours, Steve McNair is definitely late Steve McNair, where he could still run, but only when he wanted to, and he wasn't a running quarterback anymore. But he was.

I think he became much more accurate than what dac is right now that he could really really throw the ball late in his career and started putting up huge passing numbers so he's sort of like dac is sort of a mix between like uh early steve mcnair in that he could be inconsistent with his accuracy and later steve mc McNair that doesn't run all the time but runs just enough so I like I like that pick uh quite a bit I went with some a little bit different ones I think but I tried to find athletes who sometimes um struggled with their accuracy and you know were winners and starters for a long time so I went Jim Harbaugh uh with with my 90s pick because early jim harbaugh in chicago wins a lot of games not always the flashiest stats certainly ran a lot and then a little

later jim harbaugh in indianapolis goes to the pro bowl has 100 quarterback rating like not the strongest arm uh very tough you know could run whenever you wanted him to would run over guys that sort of mentality that I think is shared. A really good leader in Jim Harbaugh and someone who's become a good coach. So I like that from sort of the mentality. Our buddy Rich Gannon came to mind, too, for someone who could run and then developed later. He was not the most accurate quarterback early in his career and had a lot of inconsistencies. But then later on in his career, he becomes more of a sniper.

And then Jake Plummer with Denver, where it's the right system. It's Kubiak. It's play actions. And he had the athleticism to go along with it and had a 13-3 season, I believe. So, you know, somebody who could do a lot of things but did did have some limitations in their game that kept them from being in a truly elite quarterback and his current comparison. I don't know. I was struggling quite a bit with this. Um, maybe, maybe like Ben Roethlisberger. Is that really weird? I mean, Roethlisberger is so fat and large that you go, well, he doesn't look anything like Ben Roethlisberger.

But when we think about putting up big yards, throwing it all over the place, but having some of these up-and-down moments late in Roethlisberger's career where he's a lot less consistent, but somebody who could still come up with, like you said, that baller mentality, a game-winning drive, kind of put the team on his back, That's the guy that I thought of. Maybe Carson Wentz would be in this category, too. Would you compare him to Carson Wentz? Yeah.

Yeah, I could see Carson Wentz, too. The Ben one, that's the one that I kind of struggled with, too, because I thought about him, too, when I evidently, you know, ultimately came up with Kirk Cousins just because I thought more about, you know, sort of the rankings and sort of where they form in relation to the rest of the league. But, yeah, I thought about Ben, too. And for Ben, it's just like I sort of shied away from that because then I was thinking like, OK, well, Ben Roethlisberger is very likely, like, going to the Hall of Fame. And I'm not sure Dak is, a Hall of Fame quarterback yet. So, like, that sort of popped up in my head,

and that's why I ended up sort of going away from Ben. But, yeah, I mean, when you think about, like, just the comparison of, you know, that extra ability to sort of when things, you know, when the pass protection breaks down, when everybody's covered down the field, or when you just need your guy to convert a third and seven in the fourth quarter, Dak has that sort of that fortitude to be able to make something happen. You know, and this has been with Jason Garrett as his head coach this entire time.

So you've got to think, you know, with a guy like Mike McCarthy stepping in with a little bit more credibility as a head coach, you've got to think that, you know, Dak's game is going to get taken to another level with that, too. But, yeah, that was probably the toughest comparison to find, I's deals from this past decade that we just left. All right, let me just make a joke here to end it, and I'm just saying it's just a joke. Don't unsubscribe or anything because I made this joke. But, hey, it is very Kirk Cousins-y to be one of the league's leading passers and go 8-8, right, like Prescott did last year?

Ayo, got him got him okay just kidding everyone um sort of manny uh you started this by complimenting me and saying that i was one of the favorite people in the world for you to talk football with well the same thing goes for you and your uh production ability is unmatched for people that i've been around just tremendous stuff with the hot routesoutes intro. And you're also one of my favorite people in Minnesota to hang out with, go to WNBA games with. Hopefully we can do that again soon sometime down the road

and things get back to normal. So I appreciate your time, and I hope that we can do this on a semi-regular basis, man. Anytime. You let me know when you want me on, and one way or another we'll find a way to make it happen, buddy. All right.

Sounds good. Manny Hill there. Follow him on Twitter. I assume it's MannyHill84. Is that right, Manny? I'm not looking it up. That is correct. All right.

Manny Hill 84. All right. Follow him on Twitter and appreciate all of you listening, as always, to Purple Insider.