Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Brian Murphy expects the Vikings to beat the Lions and win the NFC crown

Episode Date: December 30, 2024

Matthew Coller and Brian Murphy talk about the Vikings win over the Green Bay Packers and the biggest Vikings-Lions game in....well... ever Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

🎵 🎵 Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of Purple Insider. Matthew Collar here and it is time for Monday Morning Murph with Brian Murphy to react to the Vikings 27-25 win over the Green Bay Packers. And I guess it had to go this way, Murph. If you're going to have a magical season, if it's going to be one of those true standout years for the Minnesota Vikings that everybody remembers for the rest of their existence as a football fan, you gotta have

the signature win against the Green Bay Packers. And not only did the Vikings get it, but they also got the signature performance of Sam Darnold's career. Almost 400 yards passing, three touchdowns. And when the game on the line, the moment we'll remember, is Kevin O'Connell saying, should I just try to run the clock out with my running back? Absolutely not. I am going to lean on the shoulders of sam darnold and after the game they raise him up literally on their shoulders in the locker room

spray him with the water bottles he's cracking jokes in the press conference for the first time all year what a time to be alive mr murphy yeah and i and and it's not even over yet. And you talk about the signature wins that you're right. The ceiling just keeps getting higher, both for the team and also for Darnold as well. It's still not the biggest game. And that is obviously coming up in Detroit. And that's going to portend to more bigger games and more bigger opportunities on bigger stages for this team to thrive. I figured once they beat Seattle that they were going to run the table. I'm not any less convinced of that today.

It's interesting now that it's almost as if the Lions are playing their final exhibition game today in San Francisco because there's nothing at stake for them other than really staying healthy and not putting themselves in a bad situation for next week. So I don't know how they're going to manage their roster tonight or their level of play and performance. The Vikings are still going to get them on a short week. It is, you know, you want to see great performances and how players and teams respond in big moments. And it's been fun to watch Darnold, Kevin O'Connell, and the rest of the team kind of respond incrementally. They sort of played the disrespect card, but not to the point of exhaustion.

But it has been a slow and steady progression up to the top of the NFC heap. And as we stand here this morning, they are on top of the NFC heap. There are no qualifications right now, and it's right in front of them. It's been fun to watch them rise to the occasion because there's always been a sense of but for, and this is Sam Darnold, and there are leaks here. And if they can, when they find themselves up against elite competition, what's that going? They've answered every question, knocked down every barrier. And the manner in which they won last night was another classic. Bend but don't break defensively.

Put the ball in the hands of your quarterback and don't just hand it off, but go out and get two critical first downs by using your feet, by having the trust. I mean, I think they threw five of the last six plays were passes. And I know you've been, you know, kind of pounding that just play it safe, play it safe, play it safe. They've almost kind of reached the realm of the Detroit Lions in that this is their identity now. It's going to be hard to get away and play conservatively because you've set such a high bar of aggressive play that's paid off. It's why we watch the games.

It's why you want it. It's the best of the unscripted entertainment. And we've got a doozy. And boy, the NFL couldn't ask for a better way to finish the regular season the next Sunday night. The way that I've looked at it throughout this year is that when they've had leads like this, they have had trouble completely putting away teams, which they had trouble putting away the green Bay Packers and the drive twice

twice. And the drive before the final drive that closes it out, they throw a couple of times and incomplete passes and don't run enough clock off of, uh, on the Packers. And then you give them a chance to bring it within two points. And that's where with O'Connell,

I respect and appreciate and think it's the better way to go to put it on the shoulders of your quarterback. That's how all the great teams win. I also think being aggressive is the way of football in 2024. And the analytics have pointed that way for many years and I've agreed with it, but there's also times where you go, if you just run three times here, I don't think they have any chance to win this game whatsoever because they simply will not have enough clock to do it in. And instead two incompletions stopping the clock. That's where I thought there was a miscue there. But as far as using Sam Darnold, the way that Kevin O'Connell has trusting him, believing in him, always leaning into Darnold,

it has paid off time and time and time again. And I think it's the number one reason that they're here. We could talk about the defense and how good it was for most of that game last night. That's another major reason they're here, and Brian Flores and all that, which, look, if people are giving Ron Rivera head coaching interviews and not Brian Flores, I don't know what kind of world we're living in, but that's just a sidebar. just that he said hey I buy into our quarterback and then he's played it safe and punted or whatever that to me has galvanized the entire team around Sam Darnold when it all starts with the head coach in that message from day one right and you can hear it in every comment even from

defensive players so I think Blake Cashman yesterday was saying that's what you want out of your head coach is to to trust your players to make – not only put them in positions to play, but challenge them to put into positions to play. I think there was some chatter that Brian Flores was telling his defensive backs, get your hamstrings ready because we're going to go a little more man-to-man here. And I don't think the Packers were ready for that early on. And that contributed a lot to where the Vikings had love flustered, and they had their offense kind of scuffling.

I mean, the Packers have been putting up 30 points a game and arguably playing as well as anybody in the league over the last six to eight weeks. This was not the Packers team the Vikings faced in Lambeau in September with Gimpy Jordan Love. Yeah, to see the, you know, look, you don't go 14-2 and not have a galvanized locker room, but there are times when there are maybe some cracks or some fissures or, you know, there's some issues that are going on and you wonder, well, when is the coach going to address that or how is the coach going to address that? I mean, I even go back to just, you know, the Aaron Jones fumbling a little bit. I mean, he, you know, O'Connell was true to his word that, you know, we're going to address that? I mean, I even go back to just the, you know, the Aaron Jones fumbling a little bit. I mean, he, you know, O'Connell was true to his word that, you know,

we're going to have to start kind of dinging players for these kinds of mistakes, whether it's penalties or fumbles. And he did sit Jones, I think for a series or two in one game. So, I mean, I think there's, you know, and that backs up your credibility. I mean, you can't, can't be a paper tiger in public and then not follow through on certain things behind the scenes because everybody takes note of that. So when you've got veterans who are cherishing every moment, and there's a lot of veterans on this team that realize you don't get to this stage very often. I mean, I think Harrison Smith is a perfect example of that. I mean, he's, this is probably his second greatest team season that he's had. And he's been in the league for 12 years.

So these are rare moments. And I think there's an appreciation of the moment. And there's no sense that there's going to be any settling. Look, if they go in Detroit and lose, I think it's going to be disappointing. I think the Vikings actually should be favored at this point. It's not just a, well, they're going up against the best team in the league on the road. What do you expect? It'll be valued.

We'll take care of business. No, the stakes are really, really high right now, because if you're this close to, never mind the division title, I mean, that's all hang your banner. But what it really means is you're going to get a week off. You're going to get a week off a veteran team that's banged up, and you're going to let everybody else knife fight in front of you, and you're going to have everybody come through U.S. Bank Stadium, which again, not that there was any doubts of that, but if there was any question about how difficult it is to play at U.S. Bank Stadium, yesterday was a prime example of that. So at this point, it's not just good

enough to challenge the Lions. I think to make this a successful regular season, they have to finish with that 15th victory and secure opportunities to really, really make hay in the playoffs. And I think the way you've seen all these other teams like Philadelphia, I mean, they're still chopping wood and they're still there, but Green Bay playing really well. You know, Tampa and LA are playing really well and peaking at various times right now too. But if you look throughout the season, I mean, the Vikings have been really the standard bearer, and it's really taken a long time for the rest of the NFL to catch up, and I think they're there right now.

So the point about Green Bay in winning this game and what it means is that Green Bay is a very good team. And when you compare them across the board, numbers wise to the Vikings, if you were looking at point differential, if you were looking at how many sacks they had or how many turnovers they caused, you were looking at two pretty close teams and the final score ends up close, but the Vikings outplayed them very significantly throughout this game. And maybe if the field goal kicker just does the job there, it never ends up getting that close. Or if Darnold doesn't throw that one interception that gives them the ball in Vikings territory.

There was a number of things that allowed Green Bay to make it look a little bit closer than it actually was. This was a blowout for the vast majority of the game, and that's against a team that is considered a Super Bowl contender themselves. And it eliminated the entire discussion that happened throughout the year of, well, they only beat Tennessee by this many. They only beat the Colts by that many. They should have beat this other team. They only, whatever happened in Chicago with the overtime. 12 to seven in Jacksonville.

Yeah, right. Exactly. And I think that that took all that and said, okay, forget about that. And what they did against Seattle last week, in my mind was every bit as impressive because you had to go there. It's in the rain, you get down late in the game and you have to have your quarterback come back. So that's back-to-back weeks against playoff teams they also beat the falcons who wow were really close to beating washington and earning their spot in the playoffs this whole idea of while they haven't beaten anybody was never really right anyway because there's only a handful of great teams in the NFL this year but they just beat another one of them handily at U.S. Bank Stadium and the way that Jordan Love looked

through three quarters of that game really speaks to how difficult it is to play there I think it also speaks to how good Jared Goff is that he never has any problems and us bank stadium, but there has never been a wider gap for one game than to have home field advantage versus having to go on the road and play against the Tampa Bay or play against an Atlanta. It's completely unfair. I have no idea who designed this system or why you would ever do it this way. But the reality is we go win the game in Detroit. And that's the point. And I think proving that they could do it against green Bay. And then now the version of Detroit that they're facing is not the version

that they faced before the offenses, but certainly not the defense. I mean, Sunday night football in this game has been moved. If you haven't heard, Sunday night football, and this game has been moved, if you haven't heard, to Sunday night football, and some of us had stupidly booked flights already and had to change those flights. You could have seen that coming a mile away, though.

I understand that. I understand that. But I did change the booking, so we're flying out to Ford Field. But the point just being that wherever your confidence was that they could win the last two games, the way they played this game against Green Bay should significantly up that confidence that they could do it against Detroit. I love the manner in which the Vikings have won all of their games.

I mean, I'm not going to go through all 14, but there, it, it, it always, it always felt like they were able to create an opportunity to win or take advantage of something that happens. I mean, so much of that happens in games with momentum, momentum changes and turnovers, bad penalties, missed penalties, opportunities that come and go. How do you respond to those? I just have this image of Tennessee's coach melting down on the sideline because he got hosed on a call in the end zone. I mean, that's why you're, you know, three and 12 or whatever

you're, and you're going to be drafting number two, because teams fall apart in those situations. The Vikings have really, whether they're challenged in a game by getting out to a big lead, which was their MO early in the season and bludgeoning opponents to the point where no matter what comeback they had, they just had either no more time, no more plays, no more energy, creating that magical turnover on defense with two minutes left. Having Darnold come up with big third down conversions to a variety of different receivers. Responding, you know, you have to go into Jacksonville. Your quarterback's playing awful. You've got a kicker you just signed off the street,

and he has to make all four field goals to walk out with a win. I mean, you can just – every little – every victory they've had has not been sort of a facsimile of another one. It's been a variety of different things that have happened and shifted during a game that they've been able to respond to. And even just their two losses. I mean, we've talked about it. It was two losses in a span of four days. I mean, it was a real quick bam.

You go down a tough one against Detroit. You go out to L.A. You lose your left tackle. You get screwed on a call that was missed in the end zone on a face mask. And all of a sudden you're 5-2 and now the rest of the league is breathing down on you. They have done nothing but just continue their ascension from there. They've looked at every bit of adversity during a game or during the course of a season with injuries and whatnot

and really not slowed at all. And it's been, again, that's coaching. I mean, that's coaching and buy-in, and that doesn't happen if players are starting to look at their own individual performances and whether or not they're getting enough time to burnish their careers or questions about clock management or personnel or play calling. I mean, just look at Chicago and how a franchise can melt down with those kinds of errors at a high level. This has been impressive to watch. And again, this is only KLC's third season. And I'm sure the Wilfs, who like to slow

play their contract negotiations, had better have the Brinks truck ready to back up for their young head coach, along with their quarterback decision that they have to make. But they should not be having Lane Duck and Kevin O'Connell in the same sentence for much longer. That's just my a little bit of advice for those who pay attention to these higher level things. This is going to matter at some point. I just find it, you know, there's really just you can nitpick and we have been all year, but the fact that we're actually chasing perfection now is kind of what the standard is. And the standard is, well, you should have, you know, not gone three and out and given the ball back to Jordan Love during all that momentum. And Darnold's probably poorest decision in two months or six weeks with that one interception as well.

But that doesn't matter because then they respond. And they respond by putting the ball in the hands of their superstar. Justin Jefferson was not relevant again early on until he was relevant. And they're going to, you know, you're going to talk about the cam, you know, you talk about the rollouts and the bootlegs to ham and cam acres that kind of sealed the deal. Well, in between was also a very difficult catch, pitch and catch to Jefferson on the sideline that made that second and long, third and short. And again, if you have an elite player playing at an elite level with a partner who's also playing at elite level that can be there when you need him, Jefferson was a factor, even though Naylor may have had more production because Jefferson drew that pass interference,

he drew the coverage, and he came to life when need be. And it's, it's been fascinating to watch because you just wonder, you know, this isn't every, every time there's, you know, it looks like a lead is slipping and they're leaking oil. Somebody somewhere comes up with something and that starts with Flores and O'Connell calling the right plays and crucial moments when teams are tired and defenses are tired. I mean, what else can you say? I mean, if you're not buying in, I don't know why you're watching. Well, the O'Connell point, I think he's just ascended to this group of NFL coaches

that you never fire, which is Sean McVay, John Harbaugh, Mike Tomlin, Andy Reid, this group that no matter what you know, you're going into a season. If you go through adversity, whatever your roster is, you're going to be in the mix because you have one of the best coaches in the NFL. And we even saw that last year where they were close to the playoffs, even with Josh Dobbs and with Nick Mullins,

and they barely lost some games at the end. And I remember thinking when they nearly beat Detroit at US Bank Stadium last year what a coaching job that was to be right there one throw let out in front of Justin Jefferson and you're beating Detroit at U.S. Bank Stadium with Nick Mullins when they're running out you know their their super team over there and with Sam Darnold that's sort of superimposed the Nick Mullins now of knowing the offense and making decisions and throwing deep and being aggressive only with a guy who has the physical talent to do

it. And that's where I've been so impressed with Sam Darnold is that he's built and built and built and built on Kevin O'Connell's offense. And now you could see his confidence to where he's not just trying to force the ball to Jefferson, which I thought he was at times. And I thought that caused the interceptions in Jacksonville, but now he pulls the ball back in when it looked like he was going to throw to Jefferson and then fires it to Jalen Naylor. That to me is seeing the entire field playing with anticipation, seeing who, whatever receiver the read is taking him to.

And I like your point about how it's taken everybody. And, and, you know, I used to watch those NFL films, season recaps with the John Facenda's and the great big, the Jeff K big voice guy thing. And one of the things that they would always do in those,

and it's always stuck with me is they would highlight players that weren't just the stars in games that they stood out and made some sort of big play for these great teams. And we've got a dozen of them here to talk about. I mean, even from this game, Jalen Naylor had not really been a part of this offense in weeks because Hockinson came back and Addison is playing at a high level, but then all of a sudden he's there on the spot to make the biggest plays, some of the biggest plays of the entire season. He had a catch where he had to go up and get it. He's got the touchdown reception.

C.J. Hamm, their Walter Payton Man of the Year nominee who has grinded with this franchise year after year after year after year. He's played every special teams. He's slammed into linebackers. He's done the pass protection, all the dirty work, and then he's the guy that's wide open for a 13-yard gain to help put that team on ice. And you can't say enough how incredible it is the Cam Akers can do what he's done

because he had both Achilles tear in the previous two seasons or separated by basically one game. Joe, you want to talk about an opportunity to walk away at that point. And he had been a second-round draft pick and everything, and he fought his way back. And this is a guy that Kevin O'Connell has loved and believed in, and he corrected our friend Dane Mizutani yesterday when Dane said, hey, Kevin, you talked about how much you like Cam Akers.

And he said, not like, I love Cam Akers. And you can see why, because the guy has played with so much heart and that goes across the roster where it's a different person. It's Theo Jackson stepping up last week and making a key play. And it's been somebody different each week. One week it's Van Ginkle with an interception. The next week it's Grenard with a key sack. Jerry Tillery getting his hands in.

Yes. There's been a few times where jerry tillery has stepped up and made some plays to me that is the sign of a true special team is when you can look up and down the roster and point to almost every single guy and talk about their special contributions throughout the season and it's and if you're valued you feel valued, and this just goes to any job, if you feel valued within your organization or with your managers, you're going to do more than what you need to do. You're going to lift up. You're going to collaborate. You're going to make your teammate look better. You're going to make a play because you're going to block downfield because no one

else is going to necessarily see that, but it might get us five more yards. I think that starts from the top. Clearly, O'Connell sets that tone, but I think it's important to note, too, Justin Jefferson and the leadership that he encompasses. We all know about Diva receivers, and we all know how one snide remark one cryptic tweet about being forsaken or not being appreciated or why am i not getting more action why is this you know any whiff of that and the team can go off the rails the locker room in particular i mean you know if justin jefferson

in early november made some kind of remark whether it was leaked or on the record, that he's, where am I at in this offense? I mean, that would have chewed up, sucked the oxygen out of the room for a long time. But he's smart enough to know that if he's drawing all of this attention from other defensive backs, it's not only freeing up other players to make plays, but at some point they're going to, if Addison and Hawkinson and Naylor and Johnny Munt and C.J. Hamm are all making plays, they're eventually going to have to drift away from Jefferson, and I think he knows that. He's smart enough to know the long game here.

I'm not going to get 10 catches in the first half. I may get five all game, but four of them are going to either draw a long pass interference pick up a first down extend a drive or free up uh you know draw some more coverage so that jalen naylor i'm sure there's not a defensive coordinator coordinator in the nfl that says we got to stop jalen naylor today so the fact that they have those options, and it all goes back to Darnold's trust in all of them, his ability to find them in different spots in the field if he can step out of pressure. And hey, let's not forget the offensive line that is giving Sam Darnold the time. It's not just to stand back in the pocket like Kirk Cousins.

He's going to steal a first down, or he's going to make a play with his legs, or he's going to step out of his sack. There's been a lot of times where I've kind of noticed just visually, I can think of this is where Cousins would spin into a sack. Darnold will spin out of it and throw the ball away. And that kind of stuff adds up over the course of the game. Instead of third and 22, it's still second and nine. And those are the things that I think of when I watch Darnold and him progress. I mean, he's athletic, he's not fast, but he's not afraid to get out of the trash and make something happen, either downfield with his arm and allow somebody else to get open or run to the sticks. And that's an element that they didn't have with Cousins. They've had it with Bridgewater

for a bit. They've had, you knowwater for a bit they've had you know Keenan was a you know impresario but they never really had somebody with the full package of downfield passing vision uh and ability to kind of step away from traffic as opposed to just panic I think it's uh navigating the pocket the pocket presence has been way better than i ever expected from darnold and i know he's taking some sacks and he kind of laughed last night and said you know i tend to hold on to the ball a little bit longer and i think that he does that to let reeds progress because he knows if he stays with it one click longer that he might have a chance to get somebody open and you saw that on multiple occasions the j Jordan Addison touchdown. I don't know that that's the first route he's supposed to look at, but he hangs with it.

He moves in the pocket and then throws a perfect pass to Jordan Addison. This is high level stuff that he is doing inside the pocket. And the offensive line, I thought had a very good game considering who they were going up against, that there were a lot of plays where he didn't have to do all a lot and was able to drop back and find his guys. And that's another good sign for this team going forward because in recent weeks going out to Seattle, we were asking like, ah, where's this offensive line at? Are they allowing too much pressure? Are they not getting enough push in the run game? Which I didn't think they ran the ball great, but they ran it enough with Aaron Jones to just keep Green Bay honest on some of those play actions

that matter so much to this team. Let me ask you this, though. You mentioned Case Keenum 2017. This team also had a recent 13-win season in 2022, though this is quite a bit different. I think we all know that. 2009, Brett Favre, 1998. We've reached that discussion of where this season has gone.

Give me your kind of compare and contrast of the feeling of the 2024 Vikings. And we're not done with it. And they need to win that 15th game. We all agree on that. But when you've reached 14, there's only a handful of seasons in NFL history where teams have reached 14. So compare that to the other seasons where we've seen the Vikings raised to this level. It feels to me this is the most complete and balanced team that they've had among those elite teams. I wasn't here yet in 1998, but I've read about it, know enough about it to know that that was clearly a one-dimensional offensive juggernaut that was, you know, averaging 400 yards a game

and was bludgeoning people to death with their downfield passing attack. The defense was average at best. And by the time it got to the NFC championship game, it was torn and tattered and was down to nothing. And that was a lot of the reason they lost in overtime. There were many reasons they lost that game in overtime, including Gary Anderson's kick, but the wearing down of that defense was a huge factor. I look at the, the 09 team is, it was really Favre's team. I mean, it was a veteran team, but it was really far's team i mean it was a veteran team but it was really the far magic and the far factor that made them uh a more elite different team but i didn't feel like you know brad childress was in over his head even when he was winning uh denny green i think uh by 98 was still trying to get rid of some of his postseason demons um he wasn't a very well-liked

coach both in the locker room and publicly. And then when you look at the Zimmer, that was a defensive-led team that was flying around and making plays and making life miserable for opposing teams. And then Keenum was sort of the wild card of the whole thing because you just had no idea what he was capable of, what he was going to do. And clearly the miracle was a once-in lifetime play. If that doesn't happen, we're probably talking about 2017 like we were 2022. Fun along the way, but ultimately couldn't get it done at home. So I feel like, you know, for obvious reasons, this is the best team they've had in the modern era. I mean, since the 98 club, like I feel like this is a better team. It's better coached. It's more balanced. You don't

know if it's going to win offensively. You don't know if it's going to win defensively. You don't know if it's going to be their field goal kicker, which a couple of hiccups yesterday, but at the end of the day, it's a pretty complete team and it's extremely well coached. And it seems pretty together in the locker room. There isn't a, you you know far was a prima donna all the way through uh it sam darnold is one of the guys so i i would say that that's what makes this team most special to me is that it's playing for each other and playing together and it continues to get better. It's not bludgeoning teams. It's not blowing out teams. It's handling teams and it's handling what other teams give them and it's adjusting and winning games with whatever is presented with them. And that's an interesting recipe. And it's been fun

to watch because each game in each week has been completely different 2022 was you know miracles and stuff you won't see for a long time but it felt tenuous this this despite what people felt after Jacksonville I never really felt this was that tenuous no because the defense in 2022 was absolutely horrendous and when you're giving up 400 plus a game every single game, then you just probably can't do it in the playoffs. Whereas this is a top 10 offense and a top 10 defense. And I don't think that they're flawless. I've never thought that they were flawless, but no team is. Yeah, that's the point.

But right now in this league, I mean, maybe in 1998 or, you know, you go back to some of that with the way, even in the nineties, San Francisco or Dallas or Buffalo, those teams were so much better than everyone else. That doesn't happen these days. There's a salary cap. The there's 32 teams, the talent gets spread out so much more. So you're always going to be able to look at your own team's roster or games and go, ah, you know, they don't have this or they need a better guard or whatever else. Interesting how when you have a quarterback who can navigate the pocket, that guard position is less talked about anyway. But you know, when they have pass rushers, the corners

have stepped up the secondary, the way that they've galvanized the coaching. It's like every single one of the big picture boxes. And most importantly, the quarterback play they've galvanized, the coaching. It's like every single one of the big picture boxes, and most importantly, the quarterback play, have been checked off. And there's a fundamental truth about this team that I think has always won in the NFL, which is weapons. The more you can have, the better you're going to be. And they believed in that. And it can't be overstated that they went and drafted Jordan Addison when they needed

corners, but they said, no, we need our quarterback to play better. They went and traded a second round pick for TJ Hawkinson and brought him in. And he's been absolutely enormous for this team. And then even when they needed a backup running back, they go get acres. When they need a left tackle they find cam robinson for almost nothing and he's been a huge part of this team they haven't lost since he got here i mean it's it's been a remarkable job of putting the pieces together around the quarterback to make sure that position has the best chance to succeed and here we see sam darnold maximizing every bit

of his talent so i think that's the the number one thing that has made them this good, is how much they can put around the quarterback. That is similar to past years in Vikings history. It's similar to Keenum having Thielen and Diggs. It's similar to Cunningham having three deep. That's been a motif throughout Vikings history. Even Anthony Carter going back and Wade Wilson throwing up passes against the San Francisco 49ers. But on the defensive side, it's not quite as good of

a defense as 2017. That was number one across the board, but it is really, really well coached on defense. And I think you're right. I think if you're talking about where, where they are the most solid, that's this team. And it almost reminds me, I don't know, I'm trying to think of comps that aren't the Vikings, like the Jim Harbaugh San Francisco 49ers with Alex Smith where they went 13-3, where they had everything. They had the line. They had the defense.

They had the weapons. I don't know. What they put around Russell Wilson the first time, it's that type of complete team. Yeah, I go back to, I mean, to me, one of the teams I admired most, you know, when I was a kid or whatnot, were the 49ers of the 80s and early 90s. And I would say that 89-90 stretch when they toggled between Bill Walsh and George Seifert, that's probably as complete a football team as you would

see both defense, because they were monsters on defense. Everybody knows Montana Rice, but they had a brilliant off, you know, they played physical. They were the kind of team, and I kind of feel like this with the Vikings too. I'm not comparing them to the 89-49ers, but what I'm saying is, I don't feel like, granted, they need to win Sunday and secure all the things we talked about. But if for some reason they don't, yeah, it'll be a challenge to go on the road. But I feel like this is a team that can win anywhere against anybody in any conditions. I wouldn't say that about maybe the 2017 team or even the 09 team. I felt like would have been better off playing that NFC championship game at home for obvious reasons. But I feel like, you know, the Vikings walked into Seattle last week, hostile environment, rain, came out with a win.

They win in difficult places, in bad weather. They don't seem to get flustered by poor officiating or missed calls or bad luck or turnovers. Their home advantage is among the best. Nobody wants to ever go to Philly to play, but I don't feel like this team would really be rocked by going into Philadelphia. I don't think they'd be, they certainly wouldn't be overwhelmed by Tampa. I don't think they'd be overwhelmed in Atlanta. I just feel like this is a team that's equipped to win anywhere. What the home field advantage, I think what's more important to the Vikings even than home field advantage is getting the week off. I think that, you know, home field is obviously what you want, but the week off is going to be critical, especially for this defense.

I mean, this is a banged up team or a veteran team that has been banged up. It isn't as banged up as Detroit, and has really kind of avoided cataclysmic injuries this year, maybe Christian Derusaw being the worst of the bunch. And they still have one more monster game to get through. And you know Sunday night in that visiting locker room, win or lose, that team is going to have been spent and laid it all there. And if they have to turn

around and go to Tampa for a Saturday wildcard game that's going to be difficult so to me it's it's almost the week off is more valuable than than the home field but I just feel like this is a team that can that can compete against anybody in any conditions and win anywhere and if you don't believe that again I it must be a tough world you're living in because if you can't extract joy and hope out of this, if they earn their way into the number one seed, you need to suspend your cynicism a bit and lock in because I think this is as good a chance as ever

to end that drought. Let's finish on this question then. Give me a percentage difference between them going to the Super Bowl if they win against the Lions or if they lose against the Lions. So what would you give them percentage chance to go to the Super Bowl if they were to beat the Lions versus if they were not to beat them? Because I agree. I'll give you a second to think about it. I agree with your point that going on the road after a 14 win season with everything that they've put down so far this year, shouldn't terrify you. And if they're going on the road to Atlanta to play a rookie quarterback with Brian Flores, I would give them better chances.

If they're going to play Tampa Bay that's not an easy opponent but you should beat Tampa Bay you're a better team than them so there's nowhere they're going to go where you're going to say okay well clearly you're not the the better team no they they would be but that week off is enormous and it has been a hard road I mean they've played tough games tough teams lots of stress through these last few weeks, tough quarterbacks to go up against and having to go on the road right after playing Detroit. Not the easiest ask for a team that has had really, I mean, they had fewer home games this year. They had to go to London this year. Like they've just really had to go through a lot.

That's right. You don't even think of that. Yeah. They had three on the road, three in a row at home, three in had three in a row on the road, three in a row at home. They had to go to London. I'd say 85% they're going to the Super Bowl if they win Sunday, but I go 70% if they lose because I feel like this is still the best team that they've had. I think the rest would encourage them more. But as you said, they're not going to be intimidated going into Tampa or in Atlanta. And then you don't know how things shake out and they may end up getting a divisional game, but it just feels like they

need the week off more than they need the home game. But I'd say 80% if they win Sunday. It just feels like what else is there left to do other than wait for the Cavalry to come visit them at US Bank Stadium. So maybe they face Green Bay again. Maybe they face Detroit again. Maybe Philly rolls in, but I feel pretty confident that they are going to win Sunday because once they won in Seattle, I was convinced they're going to run the table. And after yesterday, I'm still convinced for obvious reasons. 80%. I would probably go more like 55% versus. I'm an optimist.

I know you're playing the hard numbers here, but. Maybe like 25. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, look, they, after beating these last two teams, it's very hard to say that anyone is better than them, but they need to prove that one more time against Detroit. And that would be part of the evaluation, though. Can they go to the Super Bowl?

Well, if you could beat the Packers, well, the Seahawks, Packers, and Lions back to back to back, and two of them on the road, then you are as strong as anybody in the entire NFL. Brian Murphy has been an extremely fun ride with you throughout this season, and that ride will not end anytime soon. So we will continue next week, 14-2 Minnesota Vikings. Thank you for your time, sir. Happy New Year, everyone.