Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Analyzing mocks with Chris Trapasso and reaching our draft breaking point

Episode Date: April 19, 2023

Matthew Coller and Chris Trapasso study three mocks with very different ideas for the Vikings and talk about the philosophy of deciding on a quarterback in the draft. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hello and welcome to another episode of Purple Insider, Matthew Collar here along with CBS Sports Draft Analyst Chris Trapasso. And we are only nine, eight sleeps away from the NFL draft. Chris, we are almost there. We are two shows away for you and I before we have the, I guess, the Super Bowl of the NFL offseason. How are you feeling? You feeling, we talked about confidence last time. More confident, less confident. Feel like you know everything. Feel like you know nothing. How are you feeling? You feeling, we talked about confidence last time. More confident, less confident. Feel like you know everything. Feel like you know nothing. How are you? I feel like I know nothing, that's for sure. Even though I've watched over 300 prospects, it's kind of a weird, kind of like a paradox. Like I've watched all these guys, but I'm like, I don't know where they're going to go. I don't know if they're going to necessarily be good or

not. I have an educated guess, maybe more than the public, hopefully. But actually today, even though I just told you off air that I'm in the camp of the draft should be like the first or second week of April instead of like the third or fourth week, I felt good today. I think because we're zeroing in on one week away, we're starting to get those, maybe not final mock drafts, but second to last mocks, some more substantial rumors that seem to have more legs than just kind of throwing stuff at the wall right after the combine. So I felt good. I felt that reinvigorated feeling like, holy crap, the draft is almost here. Finally, I feel the fatigue from our listeners of, Hey, are they going to take a quarterback? Like you could kind of tell

like, all right, we can really need something to happen here. And I am with all those people. And I've always been with you on that take that gets probably time two weeks ago. Now, the NFL, they know how to do everything. They get the draft type and then they're like, hey, you want the schedule? I bet you do. And then they're like, let me just throw in a little minicamp just to spruce things up for you. A little rookie minicamp, all those things. do and then like let me just throw in a little mini camp just to spruce things up for you a

little rookie mini camp all those things and then they give you six weeks off in the summer and it is training camp pedal to the metals the nfl knows how to never take its foot off the gas but i do wish that we had a little less speculation like leading up to it two three weeks earlier i think every team's probably ready to go by now. Although I did see these, I never pay any attention to who visits who, because I've never found there's any correlation. But I did think it was kind of interesting that Hendon Hooker, this man has racked up so many frequent flyer miles. He's going and visiting all these teams.

And he was visiting the New York Giants. It's like, who has Hendon Hooker not visited? But it did make me think and i've got a bunch of mocks i want to talk about in the most absurd fashion we possibly can but it did make me think about how many teams in the league that even we think have quarterback situations that are fairly settled that still don't so when it comes to the conversation about where some of these guys going to go that aren't the top two or three you know the New York Giants are one I never would have thought oh they gave Daniel Jones

a bunch of money it's like but what if he drops to whatever and I think that's what I think is carrying the most intrigue about this draft is is there somebody in here who's going to surprise us with these quarterbacks yeah i think there usually is and to your point to kind of extend it it's i think we have to look at and i've kind of just noticed this over the years you probably have too matt teams that have like an established veteran even if they just signed him like the giants did if that quarterback was not originally obtained by that current regime and he's a little older let let's say Ryan Tannehill in Tennessee, that on the surface you would say, hey, yeah, I mean, they got Ryan Tannehill.

He's like a top 20 quarterback, maybe at times top half of the league quarterback. No connection to the current GM, Ran Carthen. They drafted Malik Willis last year in the third round. They could be that quote unquote surprise team. And really at this point, I don't know if they would be that much of a surprise so if you look back last 10 to 20 years there's usually a team or two that sniffs around the quarterback market and ultimately picks one because of that not hey they have only a rookie and a you know entrenched journeyman as their quarterback two and three but a lot of times these new front offices are

already looking ahead to the next season or who the next quarterback will be knowing that they're just not that happy with the long-term solution that's already on the roster right i mean i'm kind of reminded and this is a funny like draft story of brian braum being picked by the packers after aaron rogers and there's a famous clip that goes around every year of Todd McShay saying, you know what? I think they just picked their real franchise quarterback because they're not buying this Rodgers guy. Brian Brom is there.

He's their real guy. And he played what? A little bit for Atlanta or something. A little bit for the Bills too. Buffalo. Yeah, that's right. I think he started like a week 17. He started a blowout like where they got crushed by the falcons i think he completed like five passes

oh it was against atlanta i was trying to remember atlanta yeah if he was playing for atlanta or buffalo because i do have that in my mind um yeah it's silly the games that we remember for no reason like that but there was some and i remember there was some hype of like well could brian braum if he has a good game in this final game be considered and then he was horrendous uh so but you know once upon a time they weren't sure so they drafted brian freaking braum in the second round and i just wonder like is there a surprising detroit lions pick a quarterback here? Is the like, just, I know that I didn't prep this question with you, but like off the top of your head,

is there a team that would make you go like, Oh, okay. Like the Los Angeles Rams, if they have any draft picks left or the Denver Broncos or something, you know, somebody even kind of a mid round, but if it's high, it's like second or third, then you could go like, Oh, wow. They picked tendon hooker. I'm surprised by that. I don't know if there's one in your mind, but Detroit is definitely up there for me where if they, they have what two first round picks, if they spent one of them on a quarterback, you'd go, Oh, okay. Detroit. I see what you're doing. Yeah. You gave a lot of the good options

there. I would go with probably just choose another team the Tampa Bay Buccaneers I mean they signed Baker Mayfield they have Kyle Trask Blaine Gabbert I just saw signed with the Chiefs yesterday which is crazy that he's still in the league and it's just a sign that if you're a first round pick that travels with you forever like you will get a lot of opportunities in the NFL if you are a first rounder, even if you were a huge bust like Blaine Gabbert was. So I would say Tampa Bay Buccaneers that in maybe a few mocks, you'll see Hendon Hooker or if Will Levis falls there. But that would be a team that seems to be rebuilding. They signed Baker Mayfield beyond Denver, which is a very good one to just kind of, you know, like fill into this surprise team that doesn't have a clear need right now,

but could feel like they will have one in the future Detroit, certainly, but I'll go with the Buccaneers. And they're kind of in that sweet spot. If one of the top four falls or if they just love Hendon hooker at 19 overall, even like what it, I mean, just what if now there's been these rumors that Arizona is going to trade down. They want to trade down. That makes so much sense. But what if, but what if, what if Arizona totally not buying into Kyler Murray, he's got the injury and they just said, you know what,

give us Anthony Richardson and we're going to trade Kyler Murray almost in the same way that they drafted Kyler Murray and traded away Josh Rosen. It is a new regime. And if they thought, I mean, they don't tell us beforehand. We're just assuming that they're going to stick with Kyler Murray. Would it be the most insane thing? I mean, this sort of is like our discussion of Detroit taking a quarterback last year, but I don't think it's the most insane thing. You just paid the guy so much money and he's just been kind of so-so.

No, I don't think that would be crazy. I think we need to brace for any possibilities in the draft and what's funny about that comment would it be the craziest thing I think the craziest thing was Tyson Alu Alu going what number 10 overall when Mel Kuyper like kind of pre-internet days or where we could watch film of these players and there was PFF like Mel K Kuyper didn't even know who he was. That was probably the craziest thing that happened inside the first round or really in any part of any NFL draft that I can recall, maybe way back in the 70s or 80s or something else bigger. But no, I think the Cardinals with a new GM, a new head coach,

a defensive-minded head coach that has no connections to the air raid system, the Cliff Kingsbury system. That was a big reason why Kyler Murray was that number one overall pick in 2019. That would not be crazy. And I think, honestly, if you look at the Cardinals roster and we've talked about it, it is very bad. And if they could say, hey, we could get our quarterback here at three, then trade Kyler Murray to get a bunch of draft picks, get that contract off the books, take the dead cap for a season.

It wouldn't be the worst way for a new GM to kind of begin his era as the GM there in Arizona. One other thing, I think it was with the same pick, 2014 when Blake Bortles was picked number 14 overall. That was really surprising. That was the Johnny Manziel, Teddy Bridgewater draft. And Bortles was kind of like, oh, maybe he could go in the first round. And people kind of warmed to him late in the process because he was a pretty good athlete, could run around a little bit.

And it was like there was, I mean, if I'm forgetting a huge rumor, certainly let me know. But I don't remember there being any ties from the Jaguars to Blake Bortles. And then, bam bam at number three overall he was a selection so I like that idea because I think it presents an obscure thought that could certainly happen early in the draft on Thursday you know I think about how much everything has changed about the draft industry since 2014 because I remember talking with our mutual friend Joe Biscaglia that year about how like you know beware the late rising quarterback right the guy you've never heard of and then two weeks before

the draft all of a sudden everyone's talking about this ryan tannehill who's turned out to be okay and good quarterback in the nfl or but he wasn't early in his career he was pretty bad for miami and then you know you're blake bordles you're playing gabber i never heard of these guys in my life and then all of a sudden you know one week before Mel Kuyper's talking them up but there is no such thing anymore because we just have such a flood of opinions analysis reporting all of those things in the draft industry it's it's remarkable that we can't really miss anything in fact I, I think even saying like, I'm sure there's someone out there who's also saying Arizona should probably

draft a quarterback. We can't even be unique in like, Hey, what's the most ridiculous team that could do it. Somebody's probably mocked it because everyone's mocked everything by this point. But that is a kind of a remarkable thing, just to think back only a few years and how, you know, you would watch Mel kuiper and todd mcshay on tv there's a handful of draft analysts who are really doing it but now uh there's so much more competition in that space but yeah we have reached the point though where we're so close

we're like what if arizona takes a qb and uh the other thing too i also think about though for making that point how many teams have been at the top in recent years where we've said the exact same thing. Hey, what if you guys maybe just picked a quarterback and last year, notwithstanding because there weren't any, but like, Hey, Washington, I know you love chase young, but shouldn't you just take like Justin Herbert because you're totally screwed at quarterback. And so, you know, like post Kirk, Washington has never been able to find a quarterback in part because they thought that they needed the edge rusher because he was a better prospect than Tua or a better prospect. And then they're just chasing their tails for

years. So in a situation like this, it's like, if your organization isn't entirely all in on your quarterback, and this goes for Jared Goff too, with Detroit and almost anybody that you should consider taking one of these guys at the top if you have one of those picks and that even goes for Seattle like would you be surprised if Seattle said hey we got Geno Smith but Anthony Richardson is surprisingly available so let's take him yeah I haven't done like specific research on this topic but it's a really good one and it circles back to really something that we've talked about for years now. And it's even kind of runs counter to my thought that, Hey, I don't think Hedden hooker is a first round caliber prospect,

but that the position is so valuable. But I was going to say that, that it, I don't know this for sure, but it does seem like a lot of that Washington chase young scenario. We look back upon it four years later and we're like, why did they not pick a quarterback? Why did they think picking Devin White or picking Devin Bush or trading up for Devin Bush at the time was the right decision when they should have gone quarterback or they should have looked at that position or trading back and picking Patrick Sertan, things like that, where it's almost like we look back and of course there's not five all pro quarterbacks in every draft class, but there are, it feels like it's littered with these stories of, yeah, this team

just passed, like you mentioned on Justin Herbert or on the chance of rolling the dice on Justin Fields and seeing what you get with him or Deshaun Watson and Patrick Mahomes and Josh Allen, because they wanted that top level corner or they wanted that number one safety. And you're like, what are you guys doing? Quarterback is so much more valuable that even if your safety is really good, what is that doing for your team? The Chase Young one is interesting and we certainly don't need to dive into it deep. But yeah, like the commanders at the time, it was like, Oh, they're definitely going to pick chase young. But now it's like, why did they not do more thorough research on the quarterbacks and maybe

strongly consider one? And, and maybe they did. Maybe Daniel Snyder now former owner of the commanders was like, no, we're picking chase young. That's it. It seems like something he would have done. But to your point, it does seem like when in doubt, especially if you're picking early in the first round in the top 10 you probably need a quarterback there's not a lot of top 10 teams that are like we're set we have the next 15 years franchise quarterback oh but by the way we're picking inside the top seven yeah and this cut sort of brings up an interesting point about where the vikings are at because it really stuck out to

me that Kevin O'Connell and Kwezi Adafo-Mensah were talking about how there needs to be complete agreement and complete buy-in. And I think that in theory, it makes so much sense for us to say, oh yeah, of course, like they should have drafted a quarterback. But also if your organization is not on the same page with doing that with any of the quarterbacks, you are just asking for people not to get along. You're asking it for it to be a mess in the front office and you're asking for people to get fired. So if let's say for example,

now there were downsides to Justin Herbert. Anyone who tells you that there weren't as lying. There were people who study quarterbacks, the smartest people in the world who watched his tape and went like, I just don't see it. And I mean, that's not even to mention Josh Allen, but Justin Herbert as well. And so if let's say your ownership, I don't even want to put it on Daniel Snyder, but just any ownership. It's like, I don't know.

My favorite draft analyst on TV is saying the guy's not that good. And you have some scouts who are like, I don't know, man, the guy's not that accurate or doesn't execute his offense that well or isn't a baller at the end of games, which was definitely a problem for him in college, things like that. How do you as the GM just say, look, guys, we're drafting a quarterback because it's the best value play? That's hard, especially if your head coach is not all in. This is where with the Vikings, why I came away feeling like they totally get it that they need a quarterback

to draft this year but I don't know if they're going to get around to complete like I'm on the same page as you we're all sort of in this together with someone like Hendon Hooker where there's a lot of debates around that player yeah and I think that's maybe, I mean, I don't think I'm like that far out in saying this, that because what you just mentioned seems like it happens a lot more than it probably should in the NFL, but it's why I'm such a big proponent to have like a very stringent quantitative system where of course there's subjectivity to it, where scout your gm your director of college scouting goes out there and watches film and then grades certain aspects of a player how you view that player or how you view it um what's important to that player for the fit for your team for the vikings whatever but then at that point it really should be like

hey we have hendon hooker graded at a 77 and we have, you know, 15 guys way in front of him. We are not just going to just, when we get on the clock, I'll go, Oh, what do you guys think? I don't know. Well, I like him. Well, I don't, it's not a fun thing to do, I assume. So I think we always hear GMs and coaches say, Hey, we stuck to our board.

But what you just described, I think happens a lot where like years later after guys are fired or they're on different teams, you'll say, oh, well, three of us really like this Justin Herbert guy, but our one GM really liked Tua. And so he was the GM. So he ultimately pulled the trigger. I think that leads to bad drafting and there's way too much murkiness when that goes on. And it, again, is not really true to what a lot of these GMs say ultimately after the draft or after every single pick that he was the highest graded player on our board. When I think a lot of that infighting goes on, like on the clock when the picks need to be sent in. Yeah. One of my favorites was the Matt Nagy actually loved Patrick Mahomes.

Okay. Well, you know okay i mean and there's i mean the number of people who have come out saying oh no we had mahomes graded very high we were just about to draft like okay i remember all the mahomes you know can't play like that in the nfl and that doesn't have good footwork and everything else but i think the lesson here is though that no matter who you draft there's always going to be a reason to hate them. Like Bryce Young, your reason to hate him. He's tiny. How about C.J. Stroud? He's not dynamic or not as dynamic as someone like Patrick Mahomes or Anthony Richardson. He doesn't know how to throw a check down. Just kind of wild. Like, you know, Will Levis, he's super inaccurate and drinks coffee with mayo in it.

Needs, you know, bananas that are unpeeled. And like every one of these guys, Hennon Hooker is, you know, he remembers before, you know, I don't know. I was going to say before rock music was invented or something. You know what I mean? Like it's like all the, there's just every single quarterback is going to have a problem. So how do you overlook that?

How do you get everyone on the same page? Feels like that's not actually something you're ever going to be able to do. I think it's really to me, tell me if you agree with this, because then we're going to look at these mocks and some of them have quarterbacks, but I think it's Kevin O'Connell. I don't really care about anyone else. I truly don't. I want Kweisi Adafo-Mensah to tell Kevin O'Connell, here's the analytics.

I want the scouts to tell Kevin O'Connell, here's our opinions. But if he says, I want to draft this quarterback, who's going to be working with him every single day of every single year? Who is the guy coming over to the sideline and talking about his problems and seeing defense. Who is in his headset? Like there's one dude who needs to buy in, in my opinion. The whole idea that you need consensus on all of these things, I just don't think it's that important. I think it's all about whether you can get the head coach to buy. Yeah, that is absolutely spot on. And I think when you're a team like the Vikings with a former quarterback,

former NFL quarterback, head coach, who just had a great season with Kirk cousins leading a, a very good offense. You know, the pieces that you have, there's not going to be a lot of moving parts like, Oh, the offensive line needs to be rebuilt.

Do we have the receiver group? Do we have the tight end? Like they have the things in place. So it's really just plugging in another quarterback, which we've talked about a lot. I think I wouldn't say that it should just be Kevin O'Connell overruling it. And I'm, I don't think that's exactly like what you were getting at. I think at the beginning of the pre-draft process that the scouts,

Kweisi and Kevin O'Connell needed and probably did all get together and say, what things do we value most? And I think that more so than anything else, not the adage of, hey, Matt and Chris could watch the same guy and see different things. No, we would see the same things, but you would value something more than I value and vice versa. So as long as everyone's on the same page, and I think this is why a lot of times when a GM and a head coach are kind of quarreling, it leads to a lot of bad drafting, a lot of bad roster management because they're just not seeing eye to eye. But if Kweisi and Kevin O'Connell, who appear to have a pretty good rapport together,

if they got together and said, all right, I need a quarterback that's great on the play-action bootleg, blah, blah, blah, whatever the case may be, send out the scouts to find these type of players or have them use this rubric to grade these players. Then I think at that point you're set up, if you're the Vikings or really any team, to say, all right, we are going to make a pretty close to consensus opinion or choice if we do pick a quarterback. And I think what's good for Vikings fans and the Vikings as a whole,

having an analytics-based GM, I feel like he would be very much for that stance of not doing the whole murky, back-and-forth, subjective thoughts while we're on the clock. I think the Vikings probably have a pretty sophisticated system in place to decide whether or not to pick any player, specifically a quarterback, and Kevin O'Connell is probably weighing heavily on that decision have you seen um when the Sacramento Kings win they light the beam so it's a beam what is that yeah uh they shoot a beam of light into the air when the team wins which in previous years didn't happen very often but recently it does uh so they have this big button so as soon as they win there's like this big button and whoever was the star of the game comes over

and he hammers the button. I want that button to be the light the quarterback beam button. And Kevin O'Connell is the guy that decides whether he's pushing it or not. And so I want everybody else to bring him all of their information. So here's what your scouts see here because he can't scout every single quarterback the way that scouts could. But here's the sc scouts see here because he can't scout every single

quarterback the way that scouts could, but here's the scouts. Here's your personal interview with him and our sports psychology guy, our GM, our scouts on the cognition test. Here's all that information. Here you go. I'm submitting it to you. You want to light the beam or not? That's what I want him to be the one to decide whether he's pushing the button it's not like oh do you want to do it i guess i would would you do it would you do it would you do it that kind of thing i want it to be that he shouldn't care if quacey is against it he shouldn't care if his scouts are against it if he takes all the information and decides that it's the right thing to do then he should do it and if it goes wrong then he'll have to own it but at very least,

you're never going to have the head coach being like, you guys told me this and you guys agreed on that. And that turned out not to be true or whatever, like make it his call because he's the guy that has to work with it. I don't know if that's how it's actually working because they're always going to say in public, oh yes, we're all on the same page and just about everything. I don't know that you can even decide on pizza toppings for about 10 people, much less getting an entire organization on the same page about

a quarterback of which we all have a million opinions. Speaking of which, I got five mocks. I've pulled them out from the internet. It was amazing. It was so hard to find any mocks on the internet. It was just like, I spent hours and hours deep diving has anyone mocked the draft and i found just five on the whole internet one from

cbssports.com by the way uh from your buddy ryan wilson so let's start with kuiper mcshay they did a dual mock kind of like we did they maybe stole the idea from us uh and they have joey porter jr going to the vikings them passing on hendon hooker and then taking uh colby wood in a defensive tackle in the third round let's not worry too much about that but i think a home run non-quarterback scenario joey porter jr out of penn state your take on the Kuyper-McShay mock. I didn't think that those two could actually get together. I mean, talk about two people agreeing on something to do a dual mock. I'm kind of surprised that they were able to kind of pull that off

for the sake of content during draft season. Maybe that's the only reason why. Yes, it would be a home run. I have Joey Porter as my number two corner. I feel like we talked about him even before he worked out at the combine that he just looks like that Brian Flores type uh corner he's got 34 inch arms which is offensive tackle length that's kind of been my go-to saying with Joey Porter all offseason um is he like Darrell Revis in man coverage no but I think

his high level flashes are good enough that Brian Flores should feel good about being able to get the most out of him. If you look back when Xavier Howard was coming out of Baylor, I think 20, 15, 2016, uh, that was the kind of same type of scouting report that he had very high highs and he might be an all pro, but at times he looks like an undrafted free agent. And certainly with Brian Flores, he rose to that level of being this premier takeaway type corner on the outside. I get similar vibes with Joey Porter.

And obviously I don't have it in front of me of who is still available, but it would be very hard for, you know, someone who's in my top 10 to still be on the board at 23. That would be a better selection in terms of talent, in terms of value and just need with this Vikings team in the first round. So the Kuyper McShay, uh, Illuminati or whatever here, uh, they did not pick Quinton Johnson before Johnston before the Vikings. So that would be one guy. But aside from that, they've got several wide receivers coming off the Vikings. So that would be one guy. But aside from that, they've got several wide receivers coming off the board. Nolan Smith is off the board in this situation. Kalijah can't see. So a lot of it makes sense. I think that there'll be people,

if they draft a corner who will be like, no, stop drafting corners. But I do think when we're talking about Joey Porter, he is of a different ilk than the other corners that they've recently drafted. Andrew Booth Jr. was a second-round draft pick with some serious injury issues. Jeff Gladney was, I think, 30th, 31st, somewhere in that range. Mike Hughes was in the 30s. You were not getting more of a premium player. Now, I know 23rd, but he is being considered by kind of the draft analysis world as more of a top 15 pick. And I think if you compare him,

relative athletic scores, combined performance, performance in college, length, speed, all those things, I don't think there's any comparison to anyone the Vikings have drafted recently at that position. No, definitely not. I mean, Mike Hughes was smaller. Andrew Booth was decent size, but the injuries kind of made him a little scarier. Jeff Gladney was super twitchy, but he was smaller, lighter. Joey Porter is your, like, Xavier Rhodes slash, like I said, Xavier Howard type big, physical, and athletic, not stiff, outside cornerback number one.

So I think after losing Patrick Peterson this off season, it makes sense. And again, because of the impact, the presence that we heard so much about from Kevin O'Connell and from Kwesi at the combine of Brian Flores on this defense, it, I could see if you're just afar as a Vikings fan and you just think, Oh, look, 10 years, they picked so many corners, new GM, new head coach. Like, yeah, they know about the history with Rick Spielman and that regime, but they can't change their draft because Rick Spielman and Mike Zimmer picked a lot of corners in the first round. Trey Waynes was another one who was smaller,

speedy, fast guy was not that big time, like check the box physically and athletically with length. So a lot of the corners that that regime picked were way different than Joey Porter Jr. And you're right. Not just me, but a lot of other people in the industry that I'm in view Joey Porter higher than number 23 overall, especially after what he did at the combine. You know, I was thinking about this about corners and just how uh and i was curious about trey waynes and how big he came out of the draft and i'm really amazed at his arm length and hand size were as small as anyone that you're ever going to find to ever come out like he ran a four three but his hand size was eight and a quarter which is maybe like mine and 31 inch arms.

You might have longer ones than that. So that's kind of interesting that he, he did not check those boxes. And just a real quick, before we get to some of these other picks that people have made for the Vikings. And there are a lot of different ones. I think that you should draft corners in the first round.

If they're an absolute freak, insane built in a lab or wait till later, or don't pick one at all where wide receivers, I feel totally different. I feel like, Oh no, just get one. If they do one thing good, they'll be fine. I just think that these, these positions kind of have like nuances to them like that. So draft Joey Porter jr. Or Deontay Banks, who's an absolute freak or just like, don't do it. Don't get average. Don't get small because you could probably find guys who can repeat that. Do you have a thought on Colby Wooden? I have no knowledge of Colby Wooden. I actually really, really like him. I don't have it up right now and I don't want our

recording to lag or anything to look at my actual scouting grade books, big board. I'm pretty sure I have him at like graded in the second or third round. He's one of those like six, three to 85, like truly inside out rushers. If the Vikings were to draft him or really whatever team that drafts him, if they use him like as a defensive end, he's going to be kind of, if they use them as maybe a quote unquote base defensive end on first down and then second and third downs, which to me are the passing downs today,

inside, he can be a really useful player. And I think that is a type of piece that the Vikings don't really have. They have Kiaris Tonga. They have Harrison Phillips. They have the big, bulky run stuffers to get a little bit more juice. He's kind of like Dean Lowry, who they signed from the Packers that he can be that kind of three, four defensive end,

but you actually in nickel situations would love to use Colby wooden, who does have juice up the field uses his hands really well. That would be a nice addition to the defense in the third round for the Vikings. I just think they need somebody who can not just push the pocket, but actually get to the quarterback and make some plays. Your guy, Ryan Wilson, CBS Sports, has Jordan Addison to the Vikings, which of course we have mocked and gets an A plus. Now I'll give you all of his picks here. Garrett Williams from Syracuse in the third round. I have also draft simmed that one. Kim Jones, a linebacker from Indiana. Jake Hayner from Fresno State, the quarterback. Interesting. And Gerard Clark,

a defensive lineman from Coastal Carolina. Go Chanticleers. But intrigue there. I mean, I think we've talked a lot about Jordan Addison. We both like that. I have not heard your take on Garrett Williams. Torny CL, people would be mad about that, but a interesting player, maybe some man coverage skills. Do you have a thought on Jake Hainer? I know we always are so dismissive of the mid round quarterbacks. People seem to like this guy though. Well, I did write an article and I took a long time on this early in the pre-draft process.

It was kind of the low hanging fruit where an editor said, let's do a piece of who could be the next Brock Purdy and I kind of pushed back and said look Brock Purdy was the most uh product of the environment quarterback I think I've ever seen in my life but he was a rookie he did make some good throws I mean he didn't wasn't deer in headlights I picked Jay Kaner because he feels similar to Brock Purdy for a few important reasons that Brock Purdy despite being small and I don't want to go down the racial side but the fact that he was white he was sneaky athletic he could elude pressure at Iowa State and I wrote that in my scouting report we saw it a little bit with the San Francisco 49ers I feel similarly about Jay

Kaner that he's not it's not going to be Anthony Richardson. He's not even going to be Will Levis running the football, but he has enough juice in his feet to do the occasional improvisation inside the pocket to free himself. Very productive, multiple-year starter. I think for those mid-rounders, you want a lot of experience unless you're just picking a super project at 6'6", 250 with a rocket arm. I wouldn't be super enthused though, because of what you mentioned that I'm just not, I mean,

I think we're both not very jazzed about the fifth round quarterback when you have probably other needs at this point, but he is one of my favorites. If you're like, Hey, we are going to leave this draft with a mid round or, you know, mid to late day three quarterback. I like Jay Kaner from Fresno state. Uh, do you think that, uh, Brock Purdy had a high motor? Was he gritty? Was he classy? I didn't, I didn't write that. I, but I didn't, I didn't write all those things, but I did write like, and maybe it was like me showing some of my like bias that I, I guess I have that. I was like, I watched the film and Iowa state and I'm like, Oh, this guy's like making these big 12 defenders miss like routinely and making plays outside the pocket. You just don't expect that from an undersized white quarterback at Iowa state. He did that.

And I think if there was kind of anything that kind of helped him in this amazing environment in San Francisco that surprised people as a rookie, I think it was that. To your point, I mean, he's one of the smallest quarterbacks in the league and he ran a 4-8-4. So there was really no reason to think that there was something there. And yet he does have playmaking ability. The way I would put it is someone like Brock Purdy. This is just what I think his career is kind of going to be like i think he's like a case keenum i think he can have hot stretches if things go his way he can make some plays he could be fun but i don't think he's

going to be a like year in and year out could be all take exposed but if you look at case keenum i can grab you five game stretches of his career. Even when he was really young in the NFL, Oh my God, this guy's amazing. And then the next five games are not exactly the same. We just never saw the next five games from Brock Purdy. I feel the same way with Jake Hayner. If your top end is a case Keenum, that's great for a backup. Maybe you want that. But as far as a consistent year in and year out starter, let's talk about all the quarterbacks who actually are that and how many really look like the next Brock Purdy and so forth. But yeah, it is always a gem to listen to some of the draft analysis of more athletic than you think.

But I think in this case, you actually make a good argument. So anyway, OK, so Garrett Williams, though, the corner from Syracuse uh yay or nay I wouldn't pick him that early but it feels like I am kind of alone in that take that I think he's more of a day three guy and definitely the ACL kind of factors in there is man pretty good man coverage ability for being someone of a smaller corner and early in his career the ball production was definitely there there was before the season, like first round buzz for Garrett Williams. He wasn't quite as good down the field before the injury this season.

So people kind of felt, okay, maybe he's more of a day two guy. Then with the injury, it's kind of sunk his stock a little bit. Wasn't able to work out obviously before the draft. And I'm not saying that every single Brian Flores corner is going to be six, two with 34 inch arms but I

think he'll lean in that direction more so than the previous regime did yeah no I think that's true and I don't know like a third round corner is probably fine so I don't dislike it from that perspective but I also can just hear it if they draft a guy with a torn ACL. Like, really? Are you serious? You already got enough hurt corners, don't you? So let's move on to a USA Today mock, Will Levis as the Vikings pick. I don't think either one of us are super high on the Will Levis to Vikings concept. But at the same time, that would be pretty exciting.

Do we think Will Levis gets to 23? What is your opinion on that? You said this earlier, and I think it is the most intriguing element of the draft that in the next couple days, it seems like we might get one of those, which I think they're super lame. One of those like Adam Schefter, the Panthers will be picking Bryce Young. It's like, come on, just let us have something that's not instantaneous today. But anyway, I think after that, like no one knows, no one knows if the Cardinals are going to pick a QB. No one knows if the Texans are like bluffing and they're trying to get the Colts to trade up and who likes Anthony Richardson. And now

Will Levis passed CJ Stroud for the number two overall pick odds. Betting in Vegas, that will probably change from now until our next recording next week. So the quarterbacks, we really have no idea. I do believe, and I think you actually called this way early, one of them will fall very far into the first round. There are some thoughts that it could be Will Levis, but the fact that that actually happened like last week where that was kind of the conventional wisdom,

now this week it's kind of like, no, I think it's going to be Anthony Richardson. It's like, who's going to be next week? Is it going to be C.J. Stroud who's going to fall? I mean, no one really knows. So to answer your question, I think beyond just the intrigue and how fascinating that's going to be, I think there's a decent chance. And for as much as I've kind of poo-pooed the idea of I would not pick Hendon Hooker, I do not think there's upside for many reasons that we pointed out.

And I don't love Will Levis. He's clearly my quarterback four in this class, pretty sizable gap between him and the top three. I would much more advocate the pairing with him and the Vikings than I would with Hendon Hooker, because I think just being younger, having a stronger arm, having more capabilities in the design run game, although we don't really know how much Kevin O'Connell is going to utilize that with all the great surroundings that a young Vikings quarterback would have, I like Will Levis' chances to blossom and to maybe tap into all those strengths more so than Hendon Hooker or any other quarterback

that they could reasonably pick at 23 overall. If you're going to do it, do it. And then when you do it, tell the guy to throw it in the general direction of Justin Jefferson, and i'm giving him decent odds i right i just think you're giving anybody decent odds who you could put in that spot if they buy into it if o'connell buys into it then go for it and if not then don't and don't be afraid to pass if kevin o'connell doesn't because even though i will go back and probably hold it against you in future years you can't you just can't have your head coach, who's a former quarterback, not buying into that guy.

So, all right, two more. Wait, can I say one last thing? Yeah, go ahead. The one thing that I do think is important to mention does not mean that the Vikings will pick Will Levis, but there is a connection. I probably mentioned this guy in the past. Liam Cohn was the Kentucky offensive coordinator in 2021 when Will Levis kind of broke out, became this, hey, next year he could be a first round pick type player. He was the offensive coordinator at Kentucky and the quarterbacks coach. The year

before, guess where he was? In Los Angeles with Kevin O'Connell and the Rams. So I think if Will Levis gets to 23 and the Vikings don't pick him, he should be like a third-round pick because Kevin O'Connell will know every in and out of schematics, mental processing, everything when it comes to Will Levis from Liam Cohn, who I assume Kevin O'Connell knows pretty well, having been on the staff with him there in L.A. So that's a connection that maybe could tie Will Levis to Minnesota

or is ultimately the reason why they do not pick him if he's there at 23 overall. Reminds me of the Doug Marone's going to pick Ryan Nassib, right? Oh, I remember that one. Good. Yep, and he knew exactly what Ryan Nassib was. And then Ryan Nassib, and this is funny how things happen, had a great preseason game against the Bills, and people were like, oh, we should have drafted Ryan Nassib.

So anyway, that's how it goes. Didn't he only get the fifth round? Yes. I think he ultimately won the fifth round. We were talking about the first. First, yeah. That was a year where no one could figure it out either, just like last year.

Let me ask you just before, because I think the last two mocks aren't that exciting, so I have a better question that's maybe really annoying for everyone listening. But last year we gave them a complete pass, not picking a quarterback. We were just like, ah, man,

I guess the class wasn't that good. Yeah. We forget though. There was an available first round quarterback. Kenny Pickett. Now, Kenny Pickett went into NFL games and won won them last year and he wasn't great and if you look at his stats you'd be like oh he threw a bunch of interception what are you talking

about but he went and did not look like a garbage nfl quarterback especially late especially late yeah that's right he started to look like he could play now that's not me saying he is but we gave them a total pass because they're just like ah whatever should we still after seeing a little bit of kenny pickett and it's not like uh rhetorical but also knowing where the vikings are with their quarterback situation they do not have an extension for kirk cousins right now they could have traded kirk cousins and we would have been talking about kenny pickett as the next quarterback of the Vikings. I don't like I don't know. But in comparison to talking about Hendon Hooker, Will Levis, Randos in the 2024 draft,

I just wonder if we maybe should sort of revisit that and be like, well, you did draft a safety and an injured corner and a guard. So because we were just kind of ripping on other teams who did this. Yeah, no, i think they should not get a pass and especially if they go through this draft and even if they pick like a jay caner in the fifth round if they essentially go through another draft class and don't pick like a real reasonable long-term answer at the quarterback spot i think they should be kind of scrutinized for that i think how often do you see see a new GM and a new head coach take a job

and then two drafts go by and they do not pick someone that they believe is the future at the quarterback spot? I mean, there's probably some past precedent for that, but it's extremely rare. And I think you'd just be turning up the temperature on your hot seat if you're the GM and the head coach if you're like yep we didn't like any of these quarterbacks because for there to be two draft classes in a row and certainly to get from 23 up into the top two or three would be

very expensive for the Vikings but from these two draft classes chances are there's going to be at least one or two or three guys who look pretty decent and again revisit the hey you have Justin Jefferson a great offensive line TJ Hawkinson a quarterback head coach it probably would have behooved them to ultimately go down the quarterback path if the Vikings are good next year they host a first round playoff game and they ultimately lose it I think the hot seat would be much hotter than we would expect for a, you know, GM with a record over 500 that has made the playoffs two years in a row. Because if Kenny Pickett or if Malik Willis starts with the Viking or with the Titans and ultimately looks pretty good or one of these rookies doesn't look terrible, it's like, what are you guys doing,

Vikings? You definitely know what you have with Kirk Cousins he still has trade value and you didn't even pick him so what were you doing kind of hanging on to this player when there were other options available at the game's most important position yeah I pick it is the only one and and this is like I totally understand when I'm talking out of both sides of my mouth one is theoretical and the other is practical so practically speaking you can't draft quarterback unless kevin o'connell wants that guy just just like end of story from a practical standpoint but from a theoretical standpoint we know the odds and how random it can be and if a guy is evaluated as a first round quarterback his odds are almost similar all the way across the first round and And so another team, a very successful team, looked at him and said, well, this guy is

a first round quarterback who we can put it. And they also had very good knowledge of him being a pit. It was like, OK, so did you guys miss something or did your coach not buy in or whatever? Or did you not anticipate needing another quarterback because you thought Kirk was going to be your guy? And then you ran into a brick wall with his contract situation, or did you just hate Kenny Pickett and not want to pick him because you didn't think there was a real high end there, which there may not be. So I think, you know, all those things are kind of interesting to talk about, but it sort of popped into my mind. Like we talk as if they

had no chance to draft a quarterback last year when they actually did. And the reason that I asked, oh, sorry, go ahead. I was just going to say, to kind of further that point, it would be sensible if Quasey or Kevin O'Connell, say after the draft, or maybe after Kenny Pickett looks like an ascending young quarterback, for them to kind of bring up the point that you just made that, Hey, look, we were picking so far down. There wasn't really a guy there. Well, if you keep Kirk cousins in, we certainly have talked about this, but I think it's important to, to reiterate that if they've kept Kirk cousins and they've maintained a pretty solid roster, they haven't torn it down.

They're like trying to be pretty good. So you're going to be picking in the 20s and there's not just all pro you know top tier checked all the boxes quarterback prospects sitting there at 23 in every draft so it's kind of like an oxymoron where it's like they really couldn't use that excuse because they're clearly trying to be pretty decent and when you're pretty decent you're not getting that you know one draft pick to pick your Justin Herbert you're gonna have to trade multiple picks it's gonna be expensive or you have to bottom out and get that top 10 pick you know it's sort of like if they don't draft one

this year this is an interesting point you bring up because if they don't draft this one year this year it's sort of like okay then when because if they do win 10 games and win the division, if Detroit's not quite as good as we think they're going to be and they'll host the home playoff game and you draft 20-something again, now you're having to give up your whole franchise, but also who's not drafting Caleb Williams or Drake May. So now you're talking about like, is it a Spencer Rattler? Is it somebody else in that ballpark?

Or is it no one, which it could be. It might only be a two quarterback draft, right? Or Drake may, might not be as good as we think, like a Sam Howell who was projected to be number one and then didn't come anywhere close. Like if not now, when it's sort of like scrolling through Tinder or something and being like, I don't know, she doesn't have the right eye color swipe. I don't know.

Her eyebrows are a little too thick swipe. Like you're going to have to date somebody if you ever want to find a wife yeah I've I was never on tinder I was uh engaged I think before tinder or I was definitely with my current wife and then was engaged like as tinder kind of took off but I certainly get that point and it's it's kind of bringing up what I mentioned earlier that it's rare to see a GM and a head coach go two or three drafts without picking a quarterback and I would say if there are any of those cases out there or just directly in the case of Kwesi he would probably look back and say we probably should have just picked the quarterback and just tried to make it

work I mean at I get it last year was different. It was kind of an unprecedentedly bad quarterback class, but it will get to the point where if it gets into year three and that conundrum occurs where it's like, Oh, it's really only a three quarterback draft and they're all going top 10. We either have to mortgage the future or we just can't pick one. They would have looked back and said, could we have maybe made it work with Kenny Pickett?

Could we have traded up a little bit to get him or whatever the case may be? I think in general, like we mentioned when the commanders are picking Chase Young over Justin Herbert, GMs ultimately look back and say, okay, look, this guy wasn't perfect, but he was a pretty capable quarterback that in our environment, we probably could have made work and would have set our ceiling higher as an organization. Yeah. And I guess I don't bring this up to rip them for not picking Kenny Pickett. I don't know if Kenny Pickett is going to be good or not, but I think it is an interesting thought experiment, especially because if Kenny Pickett, let's say they had him in the building for a year and they knew like, nah, that ain't it. Well, you know, then you could think about somebody else after next year, because you would still have Kirk. You hang on to Kirk. You say, oh, we like the way he's developing. And then you just, you know, get somebody else later and never think about it

again. Now that ignores a lot. It ignores everybody's feelings on him. It ignores how bad it would look had they have drafted him in the first round and then never played him like a paxton lynch or something or whatever if it goes sideways there's just i think it's going to exist in a small place in my brain the same way mac jones still does and i know that you're not a huge fan of mac jones and i wouldn't say that i am either but that was never really point. The point was like a lot of teams with okay. Quarterbacks on rookie contracts have won. That's the point. If it's not on who I love the most, I love Bryce young and Trevor Lawrence the most, but you can't get them unless you're freaking horrible. So can you set up somebody else and

potentially win under the right circumstances and that circumstance is not paying 35 million on the cap to a kirk cousins right so that was it's a very convoluted discussion i think but yeah some points there this just dawned on me and i would not put this past the very smart very articulate analytics based gm it's almost like though the vikings are even though they they couldn't use that argument and say, hey, like we wanted someone, but we were just always picking later. The same time though, they're almost set up very well that if they win 10 games and host another playoff game and they lose it, yes, the temperature would be turned up a little bit on their hot seat,

but no one's going to like fire them and the fans aren't going to be calling for them to be let go back to back winning seasons, hosting a playoff game, winning the NFC North of a blah. But if things go horribly, they're like, okay, see you later, Kirk cousins. We are picking in the top 15. If things didn't go well, we still have Justin Jefferson. Who's crazy young. We have our young offensive line. Now we can either just let a quarterback fall to us in the 2024 draft or easily trade up, you know, trade a third and a fifth to move up a few selections to get that quarterback. So in a, I mean, I don't know if this is a galaxy brain theory,

but in a way they're kind of set up decently well. Now, if Kirk Cousins is good, but not good enough to win a Super Bowl, that's maybe the one option or one scenario that could kind of screw them over to be picking again in the mid twenties without that long-term solution on the roster. But I don't think most GMs in the league would be mad at saying, Hey, my first two years, we won double digit games and hosted a playoff game. We'll figure out the quarterback when we really need to. But again,

if things go South, then they're actually set up pretty well. Yeah. I mean mean i'm not again it's like not saying it was a travesty that they passed on kenny pickett last year because it could see yours you're two extreme scenarios they're very very good win the division okay great you've got a ton of goodwill built up it was really fun season everyone's excited about the future or oh my gosh it was the natural tank and they just fell off the entire face of the earth but whoops a great quarterback dropped into their lap those are good what's bad is if you go nine and eight and you miss the playoffs or you make the last seed and you lose in the first round so

you don't draft high and you don't have a great roster and you don't have answers and it wasn't that fun of a season and everyone thinks you're just purgatory forever which you are so that and if there is no other first round quarterbacks that really show up this is the sort of like here's a really good case here's a great case here's the worst case type of scenario if you had drafted a quarterback last year in kenny pickett the lone guy who was worthy of a first round pick then then you would really be quite clear. Either this was already the last year of Kirk Cousins, but off 13 wins, maybe you'd say we're going to run it back. Two years of development. We know who our quarterback is next year. And look, it might bust or it might be amazing or whatever, but at least you could have this really nice setup situation to go into the future. Two years with the guy behind the scenes,

all those things and then if he wasn't clear or if you play him and he stinks then you could draft another quarterback eventually after that like so yeah yeah it's there's not one route to this and quacey talked about that like there's plans there's a plan b through plan z there's all sorts of different plans for this but that would have been one of them is to say even though we're not fully fully bought in he's not the next Jim Kelly or something but he might be able to fit into this really well and win with a great roster so anyway the only thing I was going to say is the other two mocks that I had one had Quentin Johnston the other had Nolan Smith and I would give big thumbs up to either one of them if those are the guys you draft great edge rusher with crazy speed for Brian Flores receiver who's an absolute beast who you've

been banging the drum for yes yeah okay those those work for me I don't want to spend too much time on it because we've already gone past where we usually go but like the Vikings should have good options at 23 if they want to stay I think is one of the main takeaways from all the mocks yeah they should and I think it's it's weird that they won as many games as they did but at the same time it's like they kind of have a fair amount of needs and they're at different positions so if it's Joey Porter good if it's Jordan Addison if it's Quinton Johnson if it's an edge rusher which is kind of a sneaky need I think it would make a lot of sense. They probably will have at least two guys available at 23 that we've talked about at length that we both agree would be good selections there in the first round.

It became less sneaky after Daniil Hunter didn't show up for offseason activities, I think. So Chris Trapasso, CBS Sports draft analyst, and we are getting close, man. We are going to have one more show before the draft we are going to mock the ever-loving heck out of that show and then we will have our all-time epic uh breakdown of the draft after that and that will conclude our draft season again so we are getting very close appreciate you man this was very uh exciting and i like you know a little bit even though i'd rather be doing the draft like today that we went down some rabbit holes with this. So thanks for your time as always. Thanks, Matt.