Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Aaron Jones is back! Harrison Smith maybe?!? Murray visiting Vikings (Part 2)

Episode Date: March 11, 2026

Matthew Coller talks about a huge day in Vikings land with Aaron Jones returning, Harrison Smith possibly coming back and Kyler Murray and Jonathan Greenard rumors intensifying. The Purple Insider podcast is brought to you by FanDuel. Also, check out our sponsor HIMS at https://hims.com/purpleinsider Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See https://pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

This episode of Purple Insider is presented by Fandul. Bradley says, I still believe they will trade Grenard once the draft starts. That could be. Justin Cool with Brandl at center. Dude is a huge person. He is a huge person. He's six foot seven. In terms of the Grenard stuff, they don't have to do it now.

They could, though, want to do it sooner than later because, well, we should look at this. at some point the best remaining free agents now that more guys are off the board. There are still free agents that they could spend on, at least to fill out certain parts of the roster. It looks like you're going to have mostly the same roster that you had last year, which does kind of say something, getting a new quarterback and bringing back basically the entire same roster is they think they had a good team last year and they think they didn't get the good enough quarterback play.

And if they mostly do all the same stuff, then they will be. be a lot better and I can't totally disagree with their logic on that. But as far as trading Grenard at the draft, I think you'd rather do it now to create as much cap space as you can. On draft night, someone might get a little bit antsy and decide to trade a first. We have seen that a few times. I still think that they're going to have a tough time getting a first, knowing that he wants a new contract is probably a little bit of an incentive for teams to push the price down.

I'm like, hey, we're not going to give you a first because he needs a new contract. If he had a favorable contract, maybe we would, that kind of thing. Those negotiations will be interesting, but I just have to imagine that now that Crosby looks like he's staying with the Raiders and Hendrickson is in Baltimore, there's nobody left available to trade for. As far as Brandel at Center, I'm okay with it. The numbers were not bad. They were also not great.

But the numbers really got dragged down by his one game against Jalen Carter, where, Yeah. That was his second game ever as a center and he's facing the best player in the entire NFL. That didn't go too good. But I think with a year of development, maybe it's his best spot. He did have that crazy snap over Carson Wentz's head. He's going to have a whole year to practice snapping. And if he's doing it with Kyler Murray, you can make your jokes. Don't snap it too high for Kyler but he would have a year to work on that. And when we go through and you look at like someone like Luke Fortner, you look at his career and you go, okay, last year he was. fine, if not pretty good in pass protection, but previously didn't, didn't have a great track record.

And Cade Mays has had some injuries and his numbers are not crazy different from Brandel. So go outside the building or keep the guy that knows the system very well that is, I think that's probably the better option, even if it's not the sexy one. Brian says Murray is the best option. And I will spoil my article title for tomorrow. which I've already written just in case they get Kyler Murray today, which is the same exact as thing as you just said. It's the best option. That's, I mean, even if you're the person that's still loading up the comment section with

Kyler's bad, Kyler's bad, Kyler's bad. All right. Well, if the Vikings tell you, we have to get another starting quarterback because we don't feel confident in JJ McCarthy, which is what they're telling you by being in the middle of the quarterback search now. and having Kyler Murray fly here for a physical. They're making it pretty loud and clear that they believe after a year with JJ McCarthy

that they need a different starting quarterback. Who would you suggest then? That's the trouble with every time it comes back to, well, I don't think Kyler's any good, I don't think Kyler's any good, I don't think Kyler's any good, all those comments that are basically the same thing over and over and over and over again. He's short, he plays video games,

he doesn't throw deep, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. Like the same three or four things, right? Who would you like then? I mean, 37-year-old Kirk Cousins, 43-year-old Aaron Rogers, these are better options than a 28-year-old for 1.3 million. By the way, those guys are going to be, I'm not even kidding, 10 times more expensive because you're only paying $1 million. Those guys are going to want more money, $10, $15 million at least for Rogers or cousins

to make it respectable for them. You've already lost out on Gino Smith. He's a jet. You've already lost out on Malik Willis. if they ever wanted those guys. Tua, not that he was ever coming here. And I don't know why that anyone would even ever bring that up, but it was brought up.

He goes to Atlanta. Who is it that you want? I mean, Mariotta stayed in Washington. There aren't quarterbacks left, my friends. There's nobody left. Derek Carr, there's nobody left. Derek Carr didn't even play football last year. I mean,

Justin, knock on what I think Brandl is good due to his durability and his hugeness. Yeah, his hugeness is a factor. Durability, though, I like that point. You're right. Brandel has not had many injuries over his career. I like that he's just very experienced. He's very experienced and he is,

FARV is such a good answer, by the way. Farv is such a good. Who do you want? You want FARV. That's the problem. Although, what was the deal with Farv when he got here? Was he in his peak? Was he in his prime?

Was he coming off his best year ever? I don't remember that being the case. And everybody who shows up here has had success. I mean, except for Donovan McNabb, I guess. That was a bad supporting cast and a bad decision and a guy who was totally done with football and had played horribly. So I guess that's your example. But I don't think that matches up with a 28-year-old Kyler Murray who was coming off of a decent five games in 2025 before his own team benched him to tank. and then a 2024 that was pretty good.

So I think that's quite different. Chris says excited to see what Kyler can do, did not see enough from JJ last year to think he can improve as much as he needs in one year. So, and again, with the short stuff, they measure the players, by the way, at the combine. He's 5.10 something. It's not 5'8. When it comes to McCarthy, this will always be my stance.

that patience is good. When they signed Sam Darnold, a lot of people were mad. I remember that. I remember the day they signed him. There was a lot of folks who were saying, why would they sign this guy? Start JJ. Get him in there right away.

Everybody wants to be patient until they're asked to be patient. I'll always say that. And teams are this way too. Everybody knows it's the right thing to be patient with quarterbacks and only play them when they're really ready. And yet even the team, even the Vikings. They didn't do that. They went right to JJ and they tried to push the needle with him.

And it did not work out. Little news here that Dallas Goddard, let's see, not listed as a free agent, by the league, his void date has been pushed back. So it looks like they're going to negotiate the Eagles with Dallas Goddard. Okay. Interesting. I'm making sure to keep much better tabs on what is going on than I did last night when I

caught up a little bit too much with the chat and missed major news for like 20 minutes. But as far as McCarthy goes, his best path to improvement and becoming a good quarterback is to have time to develop. And I think that if you accept that, then if you accept all the history to that, then you can see why it makes a lot of sense to have, if you're going to keep, if you're going to keep Hawkinson, you're going to keep Jones and you're going to keep Wilson, and what was the mistake you made last year? You have this really good roster with all these veteran players and you ran out a quarterback that nobody knew if he could play or not.

That was the mistake you made last year. And there's so many fans who are saying, you know what you should do is make that mistake again? That's what you should do with no other option, no other plan. And look, Kyler Murray, I think is a really excellent quarterback, not the best in the league, not perfect, but I think he's a very good starting quarterback in the NFL. J.J. McCarthy beats him out and plays better than him, then wow, that means you've got

quite a jump. And look, and we don't know if Murray's going to sign or not. And I'll probably, you know, kind of keep talking here with you guys for another half hour or so. And then we'll shut it down and see if we need to turn it back on if there's definitive news on Kyler Murray. It looks like it's trending that way. But with J.J. McCarthy, I mean, if he beats him out, you could just trade him. You can keep his backup. You can do whatever you want. So the option is there. I mean, if he's, if he's as good as a lot of people seem to still think he is, then why couldn't he beat out Kyler Murray?

Why would you be worried about that? If you think that he's ready and he's there, it's clear that they don't because they're bringing in a starting quarterback, but if he's a top 15 quarterback, then they'd rather have him be the starter, right? If there's a tie between them, if they are dead tied after training camp, let's say they don't love how Murray's fitting. they're closer to tide, then they would go with J.J. McCarthy because he's the guy that they wanted to go with. They didn't want to do this.

Mike says, could we use Grinard to trade for a starting center? The reason that that's unlikely is because teams with starting centers don't ever want to let them go. And unfortunately, for the Ravens, they had to let Linderbom go because the franchise tag was so big. And he got 27 million. The bills didn't want to let McGovern go. He's, he's, he's okay. He's good, but he's not flawless. And they signed him to a huge contract. I don't know if there's a team who's going to say, here's our starting center.

Because backup centers, the drop-off between good starters are just, it's enormous. It's an enormous drop-off. Bradley is Hopkins still out there as a free agent? Yes, I don't know if Hopkins can still play. I don't know what he did last year. I don't think it was much. But sure, one-year deal to come back and play with Kyler.

He's been supportive of Kyler. RGK, maybe Jackson at center and sign a veteran guard. I wouldn't, Donovan Jackson looks so good in his spot. I don't want to move him. I think that he'd be good at it, but I don't think that they would want to move him. Grinard for a draft capital, yes, would be the option here, I think. Minnesota, everything says we want Aaron Rogers. I think you might be the only one.

as much as Aaron Rogers can still throw the ball, and I think it would be an interesting experience. We saw with Pittsburgh last year what the ceiling of that is. The ceiling of Aaron Rogers is first round out, and then you look around and go, okay, well, what's next? What are you supposed to do after that? What are you supposed to do if Aaron Rogers goes eight and nine? I mean, they barely got in the playoffs on the last day of the season

because of a missed field goal. If you miss the, if you go 9 and 8 or 8 and 9 with Aaron Rogers, which is probably the best you could do and you miss the playoffs on a, I don't want to say missed field goal because it's Will Reichard on a punt block, then you look around and go,

what was it all for, right? With, at least with Kyler Murray, there's a chance that it clicks. And there's a ceiling that's there. And also there's a chance that it clicks with him in the organization. and he stays here as your starting quarterback if you don't believe in J.J. McCarthy.

There are a lot more benefits there. Granard and a third for Jalen Carter. I don't, I mean, it's been out there that they might be interested in trading him, but Schefter said that there's no chance. Then draft Caleb Banks. I'm skeptical on Caleb Banks. Guys, that size are, for sure, unique specimens and usually have a floor that's pretty high just because they're so big.

But it feels like he should have been throwing people into the quarterback and getting sacks a lot more and TFL's a lot more for his size. That's what makes me kind of question it. Josh said we should reset. Dallas got a super duper star that will make them competitive for three years. Dallas? Oh, do you mean by it when they drafted like Micah Parsons for a reset? Signed Dorch.

I wouldn't mind him signing Dorch. They might do that. Marvin Harrison, Jr. is terrible. He did not play very well, yeah. Josh says sick of what Justin Jefferson, sick of worrying about what Justin Jefferson thinks. Truth is, the Vikings window is closed. I mean, I don't think it's,

they wouldn't be signing all these players if they thought the window was closed. They still have a lot of talent on this team that won nine games despite horrible quarterback play. I wouldn't go that far. I care what Justin Jefferson thinks. I definitely care what Justin Jefferson thinks. because this is somebody who's one of the greatest receivers

in terms of the start to career ever. I don't think there is a tendency sometimes when a fan base will get frustrated that certain people will just want every person gone just because it will feel better than what you're looking at now. Like you're tired of looking at these people, get the hell out of here. Sometimes teams fire coaches for that reason.

Not that they're a bad coach or not that it was going in the wrong direction. I'm just tired of looking at you. I just need something different. I don't think that's a good way to make decisions. Justin Jefferson, what you want from him is to drive success with your next quarterback into the playoffs, get him a playoff win, have him thrive and succeed, and then sign him to a new contract extension that pretty much makes him a Viking for life.

That's what you want out of Justin Jefferson. You could say all day long in a comment section, oh, well, they should just get rid of him. I don't care what he thinks, whatever. and then when he goes to another team and wins a Super Bowl or has the greatest offensive season in history like Randy Moss or wins an NBA championship with Boston, then you'll say, oh, stupid Vikings, how could you let that guy go? You don't want Justin Jefferson gone. You want Justin Jefferson to be a Viking for life and be Larry Fitzgerald.

And someday, when the right circumstances align, they will win with Justin Jefferson in the playoffs. And then you'll be happy. I don't know. That's just, we went through this with all the bad arguments for trading him a couple years ago. It was just, you know, he's not, they should get draft picks. He's not worth it. And he's worth it. But not if the guy who's throwing the football wings it over his head all the time.

And then he's not. Enemy cap. If love falls to nine in the draft, what would it cost to trade up with the chiefs? So I use the draft chart, the Jimmy Johnson draft value chart to figure this out. And I came up with number 18, a second and a fourth. But, I mean, I don't know if that's the price that they would accept. But I think if you're Kansas City and you need more draft capital and more players, then you would accept that.

I think if you're the Vikings, that's too much. If you're giving up, I mean, a 18, a second, and a fourth is a lot. Even if you dipped into the following year. Skull's Shadow says Murray has wanted out of Arizona for a few years. Now he made it happen and has a chance to ball out. He needs to be a student of the game, though. See, when it comes to, when it comes to Murray in his last couple years, everything that I've heard is that he got along very well with Jonathan Gannon and Drew Petzing.

And they thought after 2024 that they were building something there. And they go two and three to start the season. He gets a foot injury. And then their ownership decides and their leadership decides, we're just going to tank to try to get a higher draft pick. And they just leave Kyler Murray on the bench. If you followed that story, clearly ready to come back, but they thought, well, look at our division.

And it's the right move, by the way, look at our division. We're not going to compete in this division. We're not going to beat Seattle. We're not going to beat San Francisco. We're not going to beat the Rams. We might as well just lose. And so they stuck with Bresset. But if you're Murray, yeah, look around.

I mean, how often has that team been a top flight organization? The answer is zero years in its freaking history. Folks, you may have noticed by all of my old football references that I have reached the age where my friends and I are complaining about hairlines. as much as we talk about football these days. But here's the thing. Why be down on yourself or frustrated when there are answers? Maybe back in my favorite era of football, the 90s,

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See website for details, restrictions and important safety information. Lenny, how did Kyler Murray grade out by PFF? I can show you that. Let me go to the bigger screen. Let's go. Oh, we can just go to quarterback. play here. This is the, the bit that I've been watching back. So you had a 72.2 overall grade. And if you look at game by game, and I've watched the first four games, New Orleans, Carolina,

San Francisco, Seattle, and then Tennessee. The Tennessee game is one of the stupidest football games I've ever seen in my life. But he was very good against New Orleans. Didn't have to do a lot. They were ahead early in the game, just don't screw it up kind of situation. Carolina, he was excellent. San Francisco is a crazy game because he ends up with 159 yards, but these three drops were all just miserable, miserable drops. And that's why, and I know this goes for JJ McCarthy too, but for adjusted completion percentage, McCarthy even adjusted for drops was still 37th in the league last year.

So that didn't change that much. But we know that we know this about McCarthy. You were a couple drops away from it looking a heck of a lot better. But with Kyler Murray, these drops, against San Francisco and Seattle, we're absolutely brutal in those games. But he ends up with an okay grade. When we look at his history, early on, 2020 and 2021, these right here, 82.8 and 84, these are top 10 type of grades for quarterbacks near 4,000 yards passing.

We know about his running. And then you have the team fall apart in 2022. He did not play well. His grades dropped. The team was bad. He tore his ACL. Then he comes back from the. the ACL tear, they're rebuilding. He plays okay, 70 grade. And in 2024, 82.1 grade was the 12th best

in the league. He had 11 more or is this, yeah, 11 more big time throws than turnover worthy plays. He had a 93.5 quarterback rating. I mean, these are good NFL starting quarterback numbers. They're not perfect. They are not Mahomes. They're not Allen. They're not Jackson. But are they that far away from somebody like Kirk, With wheels? Um, no. Bob says, do you think the Vikings will draft a running back? I do, Bob.

I do. And the question is really where? Uh, the idea of trading up is not my favorite because I don't think this team is in a position where they really should be spending big draft capital to go get one player, even if he's great. And I think that Jeremiah Love is a great prospect. Second round though, Judarian Price is the guy that. I would circle who might be the only second round caliber.

You have two third round draft picks. You're probably looking at Jonah Coleman there from Washington or Emmett Johnson from Nebraska. I did notice this. I was writing about the back field yesterday and, you know, they bring back Aaron Jones. I'm going on the assumption that they're getting rid of Aaron Jones. So I'm writing about the backfield. Like, what do they do now? And there's only five in a mock draft database does a consensus big board thing.

And there's only five running backs in the top 100 on the consensus big board. So you better get your guy if you're going to do it. So I do think they'll draft one in the first three rounds. But it's a thin market for the draft. Last year was the time they needed to pick a running back. What's this? Can we sign a free agent GM or just give Rob the job? Well, Rob's got the job as of right now.

And we'll see where that goes. is not going to be resolved till after the draft, though. That's what Mark Wilf said. So there's, that's going to happen. But once they start looking, we'll, we'll get an idea of what their thought process is, or if they want to give Rob Brissonski the job. I think this offseason is kind of interesting. And at the owner's meetings, we'll hear from Rob, if not sooner than that,

when they make some deals official. Maybe if they sign Kyler Murray, then Rob will speak. I'm sure Kevin O'Connell will. But the owner's meetings is more of a time to really get a chance to sit down with those guys. so we'll kind of get a sense with Mark Wilf, especially where the team is at with the general manager situation. Because we don't know, are they going to just, you know, give it to Rob, which I think is a good idea and somebody that the Wilf's trust to be honest with them and evaluate everything

inside that building. And I think with Rob in charge, you wouldn't have the power struggle stuff that they've dealt with with the last two regimes. But also bringing someone in from the outside to evaluate everything and everyone, I don't think that's a bad idea either. Viking Suns Tigers says, I live in Arizona and I know Murray better than most of you and the dude is good. He got stuck with bad coaching and he whined about it.

Well, Cliff Kingsbury, I don't think history has been that kind to. They were good in Washington with him as the OC, but I'm not sure Cliff was really ready for that, came right from college. That is a fair point, though. If you go, all right, let's look at all the boxes and check them off. like the the offensive line i'm not sure about i wasn't i didn't think they were terrible for him last year but they've been terrible at times before uh the coaching has been mediocre at best for kailer murray during his career i think that's being polite early on but totally mediocre

the weapons other than dandre hopkins have just been uh below average if not crazy below average recently and he's had some times where that's impacted him a lot because he's not a quarterback that's going to elevate everybody. He's not going to take bad players and suddenly make them into superstars. I'm not sure that there's more than five quarterbacks in the league who could do that. I mean, it's Burrow and it's Allen. But this is why you see so many quarterbacks fluctuate up and down is because of circumstances. Most quarterbacks blow wherever the wind goes if they meet a certain threshold.

McCarthy just didn't meet the threshold last year, and I don't know if he can. Marty says, wonder how Jefferson feels about it. I would assume that Justin Jefferson would be on board with whatever the team does, regardless, just because that's how Jefferson has operated. But when you look back at the numbers from DeAndre Hopkins or even McBride and how often he pumped the ball to his top target is a lot. There's a lot of plays that they run in Arizona because the thing about, the NFL is there's only so many concepts that work in the NFL passing-wise because defenses are so good, zone defenses are so good. It's not like you can just run this one or

two things like Madden over and over and it works, but there's a number of things that are used for every single offense. When you watch tape, you see them over and over again for every offense because they work and they're difficult on defenses. Arizona ran stuff that the Vikings run and he found his top receiver more so early in his career. But even, with Harrison, he found him. He dropped the ball a bunch. I mean, there's, in his five games this year, there's just egregious drops for Marvin Harrison,

Jr. And he doesn't separate at all, which Justin Jefferson clearly does. And the contested catch element of it, there are times where he's going to give his top receiver a chance. But if you're Jefferson, accuracy and timing, the one thing I really have thought stood out with Murray, is that when he plays in rhythm, he is super accurate. He is very, very accurate.

I mean, if you're talking about like Jefferson running one of those inside and then break out or outside and breaking in and you need timing, you need footwork, Murray can absolutely do that. There's a number of plays where he is putting it right dead in the hands on time with his top wide receivers. I also think with Jefferson that he wants J.J. McCarthy to succeed. He wants to help. but he's looking at, I mean, those numbers last year speak for themselves.

If you have a starting quarterback who could play within your offense, you're going to get twice what you did last year. Joseph says can name 10 against us in 2021. Oh, the memorable plays. Yes, there were a bunch of them. There was definitely a bunch of them. SWAT, Minnesota hasn't done crap this offseason other than cornerback. What are we doing?

You are right. They have not done crap. Well, they have kept their players. So that's one thing that they did say at the combine that they wanted to keep the core. And they have stuck to that. And they've kept the core together. They've kept Jones. They've kept Hawkinson.

This is why to me that keeping Jonathan Grenard, even if it's on his contract currently, should be something they strongly consider if they're keeping these other guys. That's one thing. Keeping Eric Wilson, that's like signing someone. It's just not as exciting. but if I had to guess why it's been so slow, I would say that's because they don't have a quarterback situation resolved. And until they do have something with the quarterback situation resolved, they can't go out

and promise money to other players because they're dealing with such thin margins. I mean, they just had to move a bunch of money around, cutting guys, redoing contracts. So they've already had to make these moves. and if you have to do that and you're dealing with razor thin margins because now, I mean, the salary cap matters. You've got to be cap compliant now, now that the league year has started. You can't just go, you know, 50 million under the cap and hey, we'll restructure it later. That's not how it works now.

Now you've got to be cap compliant. So, or at least there is a date you have to be. I thought that it was the first date of the league year. Someone could correct me if I've got that wrong. But you do have to eventually be cap compliant. And when it comes to the money that you might. have to throw around if Kyler Murray said no because there was no guarantee that he was going to be here for $1.3 million. If he says, you know what, guys, actually, I'm going to go to Pittsburgh.

Thanks for giving me a physical. Then you're going, what do you do now? You need money for Derek Carr. You need money for Aaron Rogers. You need money for Kirk Cousins. They're not coming here for $1 million. They're at least going to get a reasonable, respectable contract. Forrest has watched Kyler at the Raiders a couple years ago, yeah. I mean, there is a a bunch of different games where he's very, very good. I don't think you have to go even that far. The Carolina game this year is really good. There's ones in 2024 that are really good.

And, you know, having your doubts on Kyler Murray versus saying things that are, like, I think unfair or two different things. If you say, well, he's short. Look, he's been short his whole life and he won the Heisman and he's had three different seasons where he's a top 12. quarterback. I just don't think that's really worth talking about. This isn't a draft pick. We're not debating a draft pick. Well, can he do it in the NFL? Like, we're not having that discussion. We know he can do it in the NFL. We've seen it. If your argument is that you'd

rather just see J.J.J. McCarthy, okay, fine, but on your couch, that's much easier to say than if you're Justin Jefferson and your career and your numbers and your success is on the line. Or if you're Kevin O'Connell and your success is on the line. And all the other. front office people and coaches whose careers sit in the right arm or the legs of a quarterback, they can't view it that way. Well, let's just roll the dice. Let's just see what happens. I mean, that to me is very much a viewpoint of why I have no consequences.

So why don't I just find out? And I mean, all right. Like, if that's how you're viewing it is that through your own eyes, okay. Like maybe you can make an argument for that. let's just see if there's something there with JJ. You'd rather see more games and really, really know by the end of next year. Okay, that's a fair enough take. But if you put yourself in the shoes of the decision makers, you can't do that.

You can't just say, well, hey, this guy who only played 10 games in two years. Out of a possible 34, he's played 10, he's been injured five different times in two years. and he didn't even finish two of the games at the end of the year when he was playing better. And he's inaccurate and he didn't really know the offense enough. And they had eight-fold starts in a game with him at quarterback. And he showed flashes and you like him as a kid. But you cannot ask all these people. Aaron Jones just came back.

Aaron Jones is 31 years old. This might be it for him. T.J. Hawkinson is a veteran player. Blake Cashman. If Harrison Smith comes back, if Harrison Smith comes back, you're going to put these guys last years of their careers or their primes all on the shoulders of someone who was the 35th best quarterback in the NFL last year or whatever you want to put it. I mean, because I would add his passing was probably more like bottom five, but his rushing

was useful. So he added some value there. But like, that's who you're going to put it on just because you're hoping that he takes a next step, that is not something that this team is going to do. And if you're the ownership of the Wilf's and you want to win every year and you want to be in the playoffs, they're not going to say, just put it all on the guy who didn't prove it last year when he had his opportunity. So if you don't like the idea and we all accept that someone else has to at least be a part of a competition, but Gino's off the board and Malik is off the board

and there's been no indication Derek Carr is actually coming out of retirement. Who is it then? It's just hard to prove to me that Aaron Rogers would be better. I mean, Jimmy Garoppolo is in the chat. Jimmy Garoppolo? What? I mean, Kirk, okay, if you want to make a Kirk argument, fine. I mean, we saw Kirk at his absolute best and they won seven games, one year,

eight games another year, two other years, actually. And that was when he was in his prime. But all right, fine. Like, if you want to say Kirk, because you know he's only here for one year, I mean, okay, I guess. I don't see in any world that Kirk projecting forward would be a better quarterback than Kyler Murray, who's been around the same range as Kirk for his entire career, but is 28 years old. The last time Jimmy Garapolo played, Devante Adams looked like he wanted to quit football. And you want him to throw the ball to Justin?

Garapolo was good, like, seven years ago. Yeah, and Charles, you're right. 1.3 million is, is really the point. Jimmy Garoppolo is the craziest. Who's worse? John David Booty, Christian Ponder, Jaron Hall, Kellyn Monde, or J.J. McCarthy. It's hard to play quarterback, Bob.

It's very hard to play quarterback. I don't recall ever seeing John David Booty play in a real game, so I don't know about that. Young cringe, man, imagine if Kyler signs with Pittsburgh, Aaron Rogers retires and Kirk signs with Arizona. What do the Vikings do next? I don't know. I think they would, I think they would have to call New Orleans and Derek Carr and be like,

bro, are you, be you serious about doing this? Let's, let's figure something out. And they might have to give draft capital to New Orleans. At that point, I still think Derrick Carr, if he played anything like old Derrick Carr, I still think he could be pretty good. But that one's kind of a tougher sell because he's had the injury. he literally retired. So that one's not too exciting of an option.

I think it's still possible, but it's definitely not an exciting option. I think that's the last real option out there. Oh, Flacco. Sorry, Joe Flacco. That would probably be the guy. Yep, it would probably be the guy. A guitar person hasn't Kyler been injured too.

Kyler had one injury specifically that kept him out for the second half of one year and then the first half of another year, that was an ACL. Last year, he did have a foot injury that kept him out, but they blatantly benched him to lose games on purpose. It was, I mean, Jonathan Gannon actually at one point said, yeah, Kyler's going to come back in like a week or two, and then he never came back because they were losing every game and they were in the best division in football.

So is the faithful says I think Murray is worth at least two more wins, and there'll be 11 and 6th in the playoffs. they are running back basically the entire team, and they might actually have an easier schedule for next year. If I'm not mistaken, don't they play the NFC South? That seems pretty open to winning some games there. I mean, but skepticism is fine. Like, this is an available quarterback.

Like, skepticism is perfectly fine when it comes to Kyler Murray because he has not proven that he can go win a Super Bowl. It's the, the issue is just, uh, so you could see. say skeptical of what he can be, skeptical of the ceiling that you've talked about, skeptical of whether he could play within the structure of the offense or skeptical of whether he'll turn down too many throws and frustrate Jefferson or what all those things are very reasonable. Under pressure, if he is sometimes under pressure, he just runs right into sacks.

100% he does. And makes some catastrophic mistakes sometimes under pressure. He doesn't finish drives that well. There were a lot of times they were in the red zone where they didn't. finished drives with Arizona. All those are reasonable criticisms. The problem is, I'm trying to think of a metaphor. Like if you, here you go, if you went to the store and you were looking at the meat section,

sorry to the vegetarians out there, and you were looking at, all right, man, uh, let's, they don't really have, there's no New York strip. And there's no rib eye. It's all gone. Everybody bought it up already. And they paid, you know, big dollars for those rib-eyes. We got some sirloin here. Okay.

It's still, it's still a good for my cookout. It's not the best thing ever, but I need to get something for the cookout. I don't have my other choice. So I'm going to take what's on the shelf. And this is the best one on the shelf. That's how I look at Kyler Murray. It's the best on the shelf. And could you say, let's just stick with this.

Could you spruce it up? Could you cook it perfectly? could you spice it up and have it be great for your party for your cookout? Absolutely, you could. And the Vikings have done that many times. Oh, five days after the newly. Thank you. I thought it wasn't exactly on the day that you have to be cap compliant.

Thank you for that. I appreciate that. Thank you. Five days after. We're still in our long snapper window. Welcome back, Andrew DePaula, one of the best, if not the best. Forrest, Mike Washington would be a phenomenal addition. I agree.

That's the explosiveness we're talking about. Ex-Gamerers Addison trades feels very unlikely. Feels very unlikely that they would trade Jordan Addison now that they've decided to keep pretty much everybody. Dusty, thank you so much for the super chat. Really appreciate that. Just got here, want to say, I don't think signing Kyler will be the end of McCarthy in Minnesota. think he will be good for JJ to not be in the spotlight for development. I've said that all long.

I agree with you. I think the best thing for him in his career is to develop. And it's pretty clear that they looks like that too. KFT, I respect that you've shown up every single day with the same arguments against Kyler Murray. I appreciate the dedication. But also, we've addressed that issue of why he's available pretty repeatedly, which is the Arizona Cardinals are totally tanking.

They are completely going to the bottom, as they should. Why would they keep a Kyler Murray as their quarterback who can win them eight games with a bad team like he did in 2024 when they want to get Arch Manning? They want to draft a quarterback. They want to totally, look who they're playing at quarterback guys. Jacoby Brissette went 1 and 11 and then they signed Gardner Minshu. Like they don't want to be, they don't want to be a serious team. They want to tank and totally fully and completely rebuild. It wouldn't make any sense to keep Kyler Murray there.

It would be like keeping a prisoner. And then he would be good enough where you'd win a few games that you don't want to win. That's why he's available. It's really, it's entirely circumstance. If he was playing, if Kyler Murray belonged to a good football team, he would not be available. A good football team that was trying to win. He would not be available. He's too good.

He's only available because of. of this certain situation with one of the worst franchises in football. And we all know that. We all know that. So, I mean, the bad arguments over and over and over again, it doesn't really change my opinion, man. Yeah, I did see that Kyler is scheduled to come to Minnesota for a physical, which feels like this is, you're not doing that for fun.

Feels like this is that we're really closing in on a reality of Kyler Murray as becoming a Minnesota Viking, but it's not over as we learned. As we learned last night, it's not over until it's over. If you're just joining, welcome, welcome. We can circle back to some of the biggest storylines of the day, a big audience here. So continue to answer questions and comments. But the the Fandual question of the day is that over on Fandul, the Vikings are plus 600 to win the division. What will they be if they sign Kyler Murray? What will they be? Will they still be last?

Will they move above the Chicago Bears? Very uninspiring free agency period for the Chicago Bears, I think. And we didn't talk much about the Packer signing Javon Hargrave, but it feels like they finally move the needle in the plus direction. Charles says either JJ steps up and beats out a quarterback that started 17 games last year or Kyler is better than anything we had last year, and that's a win-win. I mean, that's the thing about the McCarthy thing. You can, you can bang your chest over and over and say, you know, Murray's no good.

Murray's no good. Murray's no good. I mean, it's just there's a lot of evidence of him actually playing football at a very high level that suggests that you're not correct. And there's a lot of NFL people who voted with Mike Sando that would say you're not correct. And there's a lot of PFF grades and everything else that would say you're not correct. But you can do that if you want to. If you don't believe he's any good and you believe J.J.

McCarthy is great, then you shouldn't be concerned about them signing a $1 million dollar quarterback. Then you should assume if you think, if you really think J.J. McCarthy is going to be great, then you should assume he's going to beat out Kyler Murray. And regardless of whether I think it's true or not, the early message that they're clearly putting out there is that they want it to be a competition. I think that's something you say and not actually do. It wasn't really a competition in 2024 when Sam Darnold took every single first team rep,

the entire preseason, but it could be. It might be. We might see OTAs mini camp. We might see split. I don't know. It depends on, I guess, how well J.J. McCarthy comes back, throwing the football and performing in practice. And then we'll see where it goes from there.

But if you really think, because Kyler is, it's a high bar. It's a guy who's been a top 15 quarterback multiple times at his career. But if you think McCarthy's going to be better than that, then he should beat out. Kyle, if you think he's going to run the offense better and in better rhythm in timing, passing, probably not. But if you think that, then he should be, you should be fine with this. Then you should be looking at Kyler as the highest level backup in the entire NFL by 50 miles. That's how you should be looking at it. If you really think that, I don't think you really think that. I think that you have no other answers and you're just sort of hoping that they end up with

JJ starting because that's what you want to see. And I continue. to go back to, I think it's better for McCarthy that he doesn't start. Hydratic? I feel like if Addison were to get traded, it'd be at the deadline if we stink and the season is a wash. That's a good point. I like that point. Because if you're not going to pick up his fifth year option and you're not going to pay him, then you would consider trading him. Why would you do it right now? I know that he had the incident at the casino and last year and every single day you wake up and scroll Twitter and go, So where's Jordan Addison right now?

Is he all right? And I'm sure that Kevin O'Connell can't sleep at night wondering if he's going to get a phone call 4 a.m. about Jordan Addison. At the same time, he's playing on a one year $4 million contract essentially right now. And if that is what he is doing, then that is a very good value for the Minnesota Vikings. One year, $4 million. dollars. If there was some other troubled wide receiver who was going to be signed for one year, four million dollars, you'd say, well, that's fine. That's a good deal. And it also allows you to see

how it plays out with him off the field. And I think we've probably reached the point where it's always going to be an issue, but people do grow up, people do mature. Chris Carter could certainly speak to this that he had issues early in his career and turned it around and turned out to be a Hall of Famer. so they really like Jordan Addison and they have had a lot of patience with him. I expect that to continue. But if they still end up with more issues, then maybe I just think someone would have to come in with a huge, huge offer for them to make a trade. Especially if they were to, especially since they already lost Jalen Naylor to a big contract with Vegas. If they were able to bring back Naylor at a small price, then maybe you'd think about it, but I don't think so.

Blow fish is, you don't have to make the decision right now on the fifth year option with Jordan Addison. So you can wait until this year and see how that plays out. Drew with Kyler Murray, the Vikings will be plus 250 to win the division. I like that. I don't think they'd be the favorite. But when you compare the histories, let's just quick, let's just quick compare the histories of the quarterbacks in the NFC North

if Kyler Murray arrives. Caleb Williams has had his ups and downs and turned a corner last year as a leader and his ability to run the offense, but not really as a thrower, still has his moments up and down, still has his shortcomings. Kyler Murray has had a similar type of run, except for he's a more accurate quarterback. He's less risk-taking than Caleb Williams, but more accurate. I mean, right now you put him on a similar plane, probably. The playmaking for them is both fantastic.

Caleb throwing on the run is better than Kyler Murray. You'd probably put them fairly close. I know Bears fans would have a huge meltdown if you said, that to them, but they'd also probably not consider how good Kyler Murray has been at times in his career. Jared Goff. What a great example, Jared Goff, of a guy who had success early with the Los Angeles Rams and then struggled with the Rams, went to the Lions, had a tough season with a bad and tanking lion. This sounds very similar. Then the Lions put some great receivers, running backs, coaching with Ben Johnson around him. And what? He's led top five offense.

That's a number one overall pick who people thought was done and who made all their comments and made fun of Jared Gough for getting traded for Matthew Stafford and all that sort of stuff. Stafford when he was with the Lions. We've seen all sorts of Baker Mayfield with the Browns, all sorts of number one overall draft pick caliber quarterbacks, Sam Darnold included. But these guys actually had some success and then dwindled. I mean, the same thing, if you could say, well, why are they getting rid of them? It's like, well, Los Angeles had a top five offense for several years and then got rid of Jared Gough and then he went to Detroit and had top five offenses and was a catchaway from Josh Reynolds from going to the Super Bowl.

I don't know. This happens pretty often, actually. There's a lot of history of guys who have been just like this. Coach says, any thoughts on Alec Lewis's comments on McCarthy and his maturity or lack thereof? So when it comes to maturity, I think we think of someone lacking maturity as being like petulant or driving 140 miles an hour. It doesn't have to mean that. Maturity can also mean the mental maturity to deal with the ups and downs and the pressure

of being an NFL quarterback. It can mean the ability, the maturity to handle an entire NFL playbook and not have to have it dumbed down. It means a lot of different things. The maturity to not let your emotions take over in the highs and low. of a game. And I think that that was one of his biggest issues, that when things would go down, they would snowball for J.J. McCarthy. And we saw that in the Ravens game. We saw that in the Bears game. He eventually led a drive that got them to the lead. But I mean, it snowballed on him

in the middle of that game. And even when things were going well, what you often see from veteran quarterbacks, when things are going well, pump their fist, go to the sideline, get back on the Microsoft surface and they're looking at the defense and moving on. They're not getting 15-yard taunting penalties after a nine-yard run, then costing their team a chance to score a touchdown. They're not grittying into the end zone when their coaches told them not to. And I would advise go back and look at an interview that Eli Manning did with John Gruden. If you want to see about how most of these starting quarterbacks have to be very coachable,

he talked about how Ben McAdoo changed his entire footwork after he had won two Super Bowls. And he said, well, that's, that's what our offense was. That's, he's doing it for a reason because he's the coach. So that's what I did. That's a two-time Super Bowl champion. And you have McCarthy saying, I'll dance if I want to dance, basically. I mean, that to me is immaturity. It doesn't mean bad person.

It doesn't mean he doesn't mean he's not competitive. It doesn't mean he's not trying. But it just means that he's not a veteran pro who knows. knows how to lead a team yet. And I think it needs time. And it didn't, it looked like someone who was kind of a college type quarterback or a high school type quarterback with the way that he carried himself at times. That's not, that doesn't, that doesn't mean he's a bad person. It just means that this takes time for some people. There are some guys who come in who are a little more ready and a lot of them have played more football. Fernando Mendoza has played a lot of football and he's older and he's

going to come in. He's going to look more mature than J.J. McCarthy. And McCarthy missing that year, I also thought it really hurt him. I think it really, really hurt him. I'm just going to call you Nord, N-J-O-R-D. KOC will be gone at the Vikings don't want a playoff game this year. I think Mike Tomlin will head coach with Flores. We're getting too far down the road, but the pressure on KOC is real. And when he said at the Combine, it might have been a little bit of a moment of too much honesty from KOC.

that he might take back. But at the Combine, when he said to us, those of us who sat down with KOC and Rob Bersinski, and he said, you know, the timeline is different from when we drafted J.J. McCarthy. I mean, I think that refers to a lot of things. I think it refers to a lot of veteran players. But I also think it refers to himself as well.

Like, he's, we know this. There's a timeline for coaches in the NFL to win. And we're getting to the point where, I mean, you know, the pressure is ramped up on Kevin O'Connell. That's funny. Buckets. There's a better chance of Mahomes leaving the JJ beating out Murray.

Well, I don't think there's much of a chance of JJ beating out Kyler Murray either. But I'm saying that he's only a $1.3 million contract. And if J.J. McCarthy was phenomenal and took enormous steps forward and they thought, this is our franchise quarterback, then you've invested nothing in Kyler Murray. I think it's also a little bit of evidence that. the people who are saying they don't want Murray don't want someone who's actually better than McCarthy. Marauder, yeah, so the Harrison Smith thing, I talked about that early in the show.

We can talk about that now, too. So it's really a procedural thing that Harrison is being cut, just contract-wise and not taking up a roster spot. But my understanding is that he and the Vikings have been in contact and they are giving him all the time that he needs to make his decision. and if he wants to come back, he'll be a Viking. So, which we knew, we knew that. But in terms of what's out there today,

that needed to happen just from a salary cap and a roster perspective. Maurice says JJ got hurt in the 2024 offseason right before he was going to get starting reps. I was there. I was there at every practice, I know. And you're right, he was. But he was never part of a competition with Sam Darnold during that training camp. he was he he took i know that kosey said he was going to get some starting reps and that's very possible and and i was very very high on where j j mccarthy was at that time i was very impressed

with his progress and his development he was improving as a thrower i thought he was handling the moments out there pretty well the final drives and running the offense and all that sort of stuff i thought he was doing a very very good job and i get why they liked it so much that they decided to move on from Sam Darnold and roll with it from what they saw in 2024 camp. I mean, one thing is that's a long time back now. And he didn't make a lot of progress after that last year. When he actually got in, it kind of washes out anything you've seen in any practice is the real games that he's been in.

But the point is really that when they got Darnold, we wondered, are they going to split reps? And is it going to be a competition? And it was never at any point a competition. and Donald was not going to lose his job to J.J. McCarthy before 2024, before the start of the season. They were, they had their plan and they were going to go with it. And my point is when they say, oh, it's a competition with McCarthy and Murray, if Murray takes all the first team reps, then it's not a competition.

Isn't a high bar with Murray? I mean, I don't, what happened to, what happened to people's brains with Kyler Murray? Do they just melt out of your ear? I just, I don't understand. I don't understand. I mean, I really, my only theory is that people haven't watched them, but it really is kind of odd, the things that get said that just aren't really all that true. Is the Faithful says, I see the Bears stepping back without all the turnovers and Caleb getting picked off more.

The Packers have barely been sneaking into the playoffs at the seven seed in Detroit's regressing. The Vikings can win it. I mean, I think when you look at the entire Matt says, plus answering the Fandual question of the day, plus 300 to win the division. I think when you look at the entire division, that you see a lot of the same thing. Oh, I missed a super chat. Thank you so much, Randy.

Did McCarthy and his agent's comments about, oh, has he or his agent? I haven't seen any comments from J.G. McCarthy. If you have, let me know, but I haven't seen anything from him. I think he's just doing his work and we'll come back and try to win a quarterback competition. I got off track there for, oh, the division.

So when you look at the division and, you know, I'm always keeping an eye on the fan dual odds and the Vikings are plus 600, the Bears plus 340, the Packers plus 200, and the lions are plus 160. But when we look at the division, you can make an argument that every one of these teams, has flaws and also has a flawed quarterback. Jared Goff has been one of the most debated and criticized, I think over-criticized quarterbacks. And this is always,

this is like a Purple Insider Forever stance, by the way. With Kyler Murray, this is nothing new that I have always been of the mind that if you're propped up by your supporting cast, it's fine. I'll take it all day long. Brock Purdy, he's not any good. He's just got a good supporting cast. Okay, well, does he have to give the wins back? I mean, Sam Darnold last year, we had a good defense.

Okay, he's got to give the ring back? You want to be the team where people are saying, Kyler Murray's only good this year because of Justin Jefferson and he's got a good defense. Fantastic. That means that you won and people are mad about it. But, and also supporting casts, this is why when you look at those quarterback rankings year in and year out, guys are always going up and down.

There's like five quarterbacks to stay at the time. the rest are always going up and down. Why is that? Because they forget how to play? No, because circumstances are so much in the NFL. Jared Goff, why do you think Jared Goff fell off in Los Angeles? Why do you think that was? Go back and look at the offensive line rankings for the Rams in 2017 and 18 and then 19 and 20.

Very, very different. They fell off. The offensive line got older. It got hurt. and it wasn't the same anymore. And Jared Gough needs certain things. Most quarterbacks need certain things to succeed. Kyler Murray needs certain things to succeed,

and the Vikings can give him a lot of it. I don't know if they can give them all of it with the backfield currently, but they can give him some of it. Number one wide receiver, number two wide receiver. Jordan Addison would have been the best wide receiver in Arizona easily since DeAndre Hopkins. And I mean, like, it's not even close. I don't even know who's next.

Marvin Harrison Jr. has not been good. He could be in the future, but he has not been good. Jordan Addison would even... That's the Viking second best receiver. Jalen Naylor might have been the best receiver that they've had. And I'm, you know, they have a tight end. McBride is very good. But in terms of receivers, circumstances matter.

Drew Petsing, I have a lot of respect for. I know Drew, he coached here. I've interviewed him a number of times, but he was not of the experience. He didn't win a Super Bowl as an offense of course. coordinator like Kevin O'Connell did or win 14 games with a reclamation project quarterback like like O'Connell did or turned Kirk Cousins into a leader who was in total command of the offense like Kevin O'Connell did.

I don't know. I think these things are better than Cliff Kingsbury and Jonathan Gannon. Circumstances are a lot. And that goes for the whole division. That was kind of the point. Like Jared Gough, there's flaws there. You can get to Jared Gough. If you pressure him, he's going to fall apart.

Jordan Love, always up and down. You know, they make this joke in Green Bay about when it's a December, whatever, what's the car sale, Toyotathon or something that that's when Jordan Love actually remembers how to play football. He's up and down. He's got his hot runs look incredible. Every year, I bet, since Jordan Love's been in the league, someone said he's playing at an MVP level right now. But he doesn't play like an MVP level for a full season. He's got his shortcomings. And Caleb Williams, it's going to come down to how much he develops as a pure passer.

because if he doesn't, then he's still going to have a lot of inconsistency. And I agree with your point about the turnovers. The Bears can get better from last year, but losing Drew Dalman's a huge deal. And they were, they just intercepted every pass. Kevin Byers not coming back. Sean Wright's not coming back. Draft an Aussie punter is great. Scott, thank you very much for the compliment.

You know, when I started doing, oh, Oscar Chapman, yeah, he couldn't hold. That's, you're going to miss Ryan Wright, man. Great holder. they need a veteran. Recently, I've started doing, you know, longer conversations because there's a lot of excitement going on about the offseason and so forth. But just even going back to the season, Q&A's with you guys, I've really enjoyed it. It's really, really fun. I didn't do that a lot early in the show's history.

It was mostly just interviews. And it's been one of my favorite things. So you guys in the comments section make that possible. even if we disagree sometimes, I don't mind that at all. Sometimes I do get a little bit on the ornery side with some of the arguments, but, you know, that's football too if we didn't have a little intensity from time to time. 0671 Marines. It feels like every NFC North team is plus 500 to win the North.

We might as well be plus 550 until we get a new punter, of course. It's an issue. It is an issue. But you're right, though, that when you look at all the teams, so Detroit, have they gotten a lot better? They're not getting Max Crosby, it looks like. Have they gotten a lot better? I don't think so, so far in the offseason. That doesn't mean they're not good.

I think they're still good, but they haven't gotten a lot better. Their defensive coordinator started out pretty well and then really struggled last year as the season went on, and their defense fell apart. Their offensive line, they're going to have to draft a rookie tackle probably. and they got a veteran center, but he's not Frank Reg now. That's going to be an issue for them. They lost David Montgomery and replaced him with Isaiah Pacheco, who has not been that good in recent years. They've got flaws.

They're a very good team with flaws. The Green Bay Packers just had to get rid of Rishon Gary. Micah Parsons is coming off in ACL. He might miss time into the season. Matt LaFleur is kind of the hot seat. They're trying to redo their offensive line, but there's not a lot of offensive line talent out there. They've lost Elton Jenkins.

That team hasn't gotten way better in free agency. They did sign J. Von Hargrave, but they haven't gotten a lot better. So I don't know that. And Chicago truly, I want to take a look at, let's take a look at, what is Chicago done in free agency? Let's take a look. I'm using the, the athletics tracker here. I've been using this a lot.

This is it. In terms of top 150, because they have. have a top 150 list of free agents that they're tracking. They have only signed Devin Bush, a linebacker, three years 30 million, and Kobe Bryant, three years, 40 million. And let's see what they have lost. They have lost Kevin Byard and Nashan Wright to contracts with the Patriots and the Jets, very reasonable contracts.

And it doesn't look like they're resigning Jaquan Brisker, who would be perfectly fine with me for the Minnesota Vikings. so they have not gained a lot of ground in free agency like I kind of thought that they would, which says to me that everybody is right around the same level if Kyler Murray is here. TSB, no one is done with McCarthy throwing him back to the wolves would not be good for him, getting Kyler would be a benefit to him. I'm in your camp, my friend. I am exactly in your camp.

I fully believe that quarterbacks should have time to develop. The rookie quarterback contract, well, we've been talking about it for years. And if it clicks, you get Drake May and you go to the Super Bowl or even Brock Purdy. And it's wonderful. Or you have Mahomes rookie contract or Allen's rookie contract. We're just incredible football for those guys. And even Lamar as well, won an MVP on his rookie contract. It's a great tool for teams to build around.

But it's also a scourge on quarterback development because you always feel like you have to put that guy in there. No longer can you say, you know what? We're going to develop him over time except for the Packers were able to do that with Jordan Love. And I think when you look at the resumes, and I know it's different, but the things that were said about Love and McCarthy coming out with the way that they throw the ball and how much they're going to need to develop touch on the football or decision making or things like that. There's similarities there. They're different. He's more of a physical specimen and throwing the football. And McCarthy's more of a playmaker.

it's a different college situation, but the same in terms of raw talent. And the Vikings plan was to develop him all along. This would be just sort of going back and correcting the mistake that they made last year. Grateful Dad, Miami is having a fire sale, is acquiring A-chan feasible. It was tossed out there, but I don't know if it is feasible. We shouldn't declare the backfield dead, though, with Aaron Jones coming back, because they did get Jordan Mason last year in a trade. So that's a fair enough point.

If they could get A-chan, that would be incredible. I don't know that they're going to do that now that they got Malik Willis. In terms of Fandul, a bit better than plus 600, maybe plus 500. Josh says half of Vikings fans are done with McCarthy. Well, when it comes to McCarthy and people being done with him, I saw today, Lewis Riddick said that if they go to Kyler, it's over for J.J. McCarthy. I don't know how you could say that with confidence. Is it, is it over? I mean, I, I want to quote the the animal house thing, but I don't want to have YouTube think I'm talking about different subjects,

but you can insert, if you know what I'm talking about with the animal house quote, was it over? Then say that to yourself. But we don't know a lot about how quarterbacks are going to perform. We truly don't. Like, quarterbacks are so much driven by circumstances. Quarterbacks are so much driven by luck sometimes and by fit with an offense. And we also never really know when the next step is going to happen. They're unpredictable. And that's what makes them so fascinating, right?

The best are always the best. And then everybody in between is bouncing up and down from year to year. based on which way the wind is blowing. And it's hard to pin down. And this is why when you look at anybody's quarterback rankings, go back and look at 2025. Maybe we can do this. Can we do this to make this point?

Let's try this. 2025 quarterback rankings. See if we can find an article about this. All right. February 11th. No, we don't want 2026. We want going into 2025. maybe we can find this.

I don't want the quarterback rankings for now. I want to find somebody's somebody's quarterback rankings going into the 2025 season. Can we do that? I keep finding 2026 quarterback rankings. Maybe I have to type in preseason 2025. Maybe we can do that. Preseason 2025 quarterback rankings.

I'm struggling with my Google search. Okay. That's ranking the backup quarterbacks. Come on. Okay, here we go. PFF rankings. Okay, there we go. All 32 quarterbacks. And this is from May 20th, 2025.

Let's take a look. Mahomes is first. Burrow, Jackson, Allen. That's easy. Jalen Hertz is the fifth best quarterback. That's a little high. Jaden Daniels, Matthew Stafford, who won MVP is seventh. Justin Herbert, Jared Gough.

This is all fair. Gino Smith, 10th. He turned out to be one of the worst quarterbacks in the NFL last year. Brock Purdy, okay, Jordan Love, Baker Mayfield, really struggled last year. C.J. Stroud. Hey, here's Kyler Murray, top 15 quarterback. But this one doesn't look great because Trevor Lawrence won 13 games and C.J. Stroud struggled all year long. Dak Prescott had a great year.

Here's Tua at number 18 and Bo Nix at number 19. This is how hard it is to predict quarterbacks. Bo Nix was not a top 10 quarterback, but got his team to the AFC championship probably goes to the Super Bowl if he stays healthy and Tua is now gone. Bryce Young, J.J. McCarthy. Oh, my. I did not, as you guys just saw, no. I think the point is made.

And for those audio listeners, J.J. McCarthy in this article is ranked 21st and Drake May 22nd. I think the point is made. I think the point is made about how we don't know what's going to happen with a quarterback. The top quarterbacks we do, but that article had J.J. McCarthy ranked 21st and Drake May 22nd. And I guarantee one of the reasons for that is the supporting cast in Minnesota and the presumption that McCarthy would be pretty solid and

the presumption that May would struggle. That's my point. You can't, you shouldn't be done with anyone unless you're really, really done because you never know what direction it could go. While we're doing this, let's go back and see if there's any updates on anything here. And we'll probably chat for a few more minutes and then we will wait. Been a really good discussion. We got a trade. The Cowboys are sending Solomon Thomas to the Titans. Okay.

He's kind of had a bounce around career, hasn't he? Titans have acquired a lot of players. Titans are a great point about your team can be doing a lot of stuff and it doesn't really move the needle or is not great. Oh, the Cowboys are trading Osa Odigizua, who is a really good player. to the 49ers. Odigizua was somebody that we discussed last year, as maybe the Vikings could sign as a free agent,

and he ended up returning to the Cowboys. That is an interesting trade. The 49ers very clearly trying to load up on some pass rush. Odigizua, two years, for a third round pick, ooh, that's not that much. I wonder, does that impact at all, Jonathan Grenard, different position. Maybe it does.

different position. He is a pass rusher, but an interior guy, but only a third round pick. The price tag is always part of it. Pending a physical is the joke that had to be made. And will probably be made by 100,000 journalists about the same stuff. So there you go. Okay, a trade in the NFL. As we wait to see if there is any news coming about Jonathan Grenard.

The only news today about Jonathan Grenard was that the Eagles are interested and I wouldn't really want to do that unless there's a first round pick involved. Ben, Jalen Redman, pay this man. They will. They will. They're going to get, they're going to get an extension done with him, I'm sure. But they picked up his option,

but they're going to get a deal done with him. Third and nerdy, completely fine with the Vikings trading Grenard to the Eagles as long as we get strong compensation, 2027 first plus a 20, I assume you mean you can't trade a 2023 third, so I assume you mean a 2024 third. Or no, what year is it now? 2026. Okay.

Yeah. I would definitely do that. Any first round pick involves, even if it's next year, I would do for Grenard. But I also think if you're bringing back everyone except for Allen and Hargrave, then why not? Son of Beavers, wonder if the cowboys are freeing up cap space for JG? Oh, yeah, that could be the case. certainly could be the case. Joseph Brandon Ayuk is wide receiver three.

Feels too risky to me. I think already when you have some issues with your own wide receiver, Jordan Addison, I'm not sure you want more of those issues. Anonymous KOC doesn't use running backs, so what's the point? Well, Anonymous. You ever heard of chicken and egg? Is it that he doesn't run the ball because they haven't had effective run games and running backs,

or is it because he doesn't want to run the ball? ball. I would guess that it is, the truth is in the middle there. Somewhere between the chicken and the egg, the truth is somewhere in the middle. It's, I think at times he's wanted to win games on the arm of the quarterback, which makes a lot of sense for 2004 when Sam Darnold was playing at the level he was playing. But I also think there were times last year where you just need to run the football, but not use running backs. I think if he had better ones and a more reliable run game that he would, I also think last year, and this is something that's under, under talked about because there's so many other issues, KOC has said several times on the record, and we're going to see if this actually comes to fruition or not.

He has said several different times on the record that last year, one of the things that he took away from getting to nine wins and also from Brian Flores and coaching together with him was that you have to win the game that's in front of you and not always try to win it the way you want to win it. So you want to win it with a dagger, long touchdown on third and one play action that makes you look great and puts up a bunch of stats. But sometimes you've just got to hand it off to Jordan Mason. Sometimes you got to just use your all-calibre punter, which I think Ryan Wright was deserving of that last year. And you have to play the field position game and let your defense win it for you if that's how that day is going. And I think there were games in the past that they either lost or almost lost because he didn't maybe always stick to that. But I think if you have a great backfield that you would use it more, I don't think that they've had that. Josh, O'Neill is near the age cliff.

We need to use a high pick on an offensive tackle. So my thing with O'Neill and the age cliff, he's going to be 31. I think tackles can be pretty good through their 30s. It's such a technical position. He's had some injuries, but not catastrophic. Came back fine from that Achilles a couple years ago. I think with a tackle you should draft one when you need one as opposed to spending third round draft picks. If you spend a second, you've got a chance to get a good tackle.

I think past the second round, teams just draft them so high. They go off the board almost instantly in every draft. They're so hard to find. I'm not sure that you want to do that right now and try to pick like a third rounder. I guess if you wanted to take a first rounder and not extend him, you could do that. Or a second rounder and not extend him, you could do that. But I'd be okay with just doing a contract extension with him and kick that down the road. Google harder, yes.

We found it. We found a quarterback ranking. Yes, you guys know what quote I was talking about. Young cringed says, I'm hesitant about the 2027 QB class, but I love the 2028 QB class. Every year, it's like that. It's next year or next year or next year, we don't really know until we actually get there. Scott says, I don't see Kyler not working out as a huge roadblock. Well, that's a major part of the whole of calculus anyway, is that if he doesn't work out,

it's not like, it's not like you're in for dead cap for 30 million or something. He's $1 million. Bradley, once Kyler is signed, they will open up the floodgates to sign more free agents. Oh, let's do that. That's a good point. And I think that's what they've been waiting for. but let's look at before we kind of call it call at a time at the moment and then we'll see what happens later on this evening.

Let's take a look at the remaining free agents now since we've had more movement. Where is my thing over here? Okay. So we've got a lot of the top guys have found their homes. So I'm going to scroll until we find guys who are available. Rashid Walker is the top one in the top 25 on the athletic. Jawan Jennings, I remain interested. If he continues to be a free agent after they get the quarterback situation settled,

I am interested in Joanne Jennings. I think he's a good wide receiver who can flex and be a number two. Goddard, his situation seems unclear like maybe he might stay in Philadelphia. Joey Bosa, I mean, Joey Bosa might be a guy that if you trade Jonathan Granard. I really think they need a veteran if they trade Jonathan Gernard. Calvin Austin, I'm interested in underneath type wide receiver. sometimes, 31 receptions. Yeah, 5-9.

162 is his listed weight. No way. He's got to be heavier than that. This is, Kyler Murray throwing to Calvin Austin would open up the door for a lot of jokes. But I'm interested as a number three wide receiver. Keenan Allen, I think, is probably done. Janavian Clowny is a no for me.

Diggs, Debo Samuel. Kevin Zitler, always out there, always good. Jaquan Brisker would be the top tariff. if Harrison Smith's not coming back, but today definitely opens the door for Harrison Smith to come back. If they're even talking about it, I like Deshawn Hand as a run stuffing five technique kind of guy would do that. Cameron Jordan is not likely to come here, but Steve Jordan's son coming to play for the Vikings for a year would be fun. Nick Cross signing today. That was one that surprised me off the board. Rashad White, I guess probably won't happen since the Vikings brought back Aaron Jones.

They must have not been as high on the Rashad White idea as me or he's got other play. plans. David and Joku, they don't need. Wyatt Teller just could use some depth in some certain areas. But there's a lot of these guys off the board. Jonah Williams played with Kyler in Arizona, swing tackle. Swing tackle. That could possibly work. They do need a swing tackle. Joanne Taylor. Yeah, a lot of names. Roger McCreery is interesting at corner. Yash Nyman is a good swing tackle. A lot of names have come off the board, though. And there's not a lot left. Sebastian Joseph day. But I also think that they're going to, Emmanuel Wilson could be interesting to. And that's kind of the list.

Leonard Floyd, if he still wants to play, Nick Scott from the Panthers could play safety, Xavier Woods. So that's, yeah, there's not a lot left on the free agent market. But they can add some players that, you know, have some depth. And this is only a top 150 list. There's other guys that could potentially be out there. Do not get Jonah Williams. Okay. a swing player. I mean, I guess, you know, I don't know. Yeah, Cam Jordan is as a five technique coming back to Minnesota. I would assume that he was, was he maybe born here when

Steve Jordan was here? I don't know. That would be kind of cool. They'll add some players, but it's not going to be huge moves. Retaining their guys seem to be their biggest thing. So here's what I'm going to do. I am going to call this a moment, not call it a day necessarily, but I think we covered a lot of the news and conversation for the middle of the day. A lot happened today. Harrison Smith still up in the air. Aaron Jones is coming back. Javon Hargrave is a Green Bay Packer. And there's a lot of movement toward Kyler Murray, but it's not official. So here's what I'm going to do. If Kyler Murray goes official tonight, right back here, okay, the minute it happens, the minute you see that tweet get fired out, bang, live on the air here to break it down.

if it does not happen tonight, then this will be the show and we'll wait and maybe tomorrow. I'll just get up early and see if it happens tomorrow. The minute it happens, I'm not leaving the house. I'm not going anywhere. I will be here and I will be ready to talk with you guys about it. Or if it falls through, well, then we're going to have even more to talk about if that happens. And what we've learned for sure is that you never really know. So if it happens five minutes from now, that it goes official, I'll be right back on the year.

But for now, I'm going to take a break. I need some food. I'm preparing myself for another several-hour live stream if they get Kyler tonight. So I need some food. I need to rest the voice for a bit. But I will be back whenever that happens. Just not sure when. So thanks everybody for jumping in in the middle of the day,

a little bit different timing. And we will talk again, very soon. I just don't know when. Be ready. Football.