Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Brian Murphy is relieved and impressed by Vikings' win over Giants

Episode Date: September 9, 2024

Matthew Coller and Brian Murphy dive into the Vikings' big win over the Giants, why it was so important to the future schedule and what Brian was most impressed by Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

🎵 Hey everybody, welcome inside a hotel at the Newark Airport. Matthew Collar here. I have not taken off yet to head back to Minnesota, but joining me back in the home state is Brian Murphy for another episode of Monday Morning Murph. And Murph, I just got done reading your column, and I thought that you used the right word to say that Vikings fans should be relieved that they were able to beat the New York Giants. Of course, impressed in the way that they did it, but also relieved to now go into the tougher part

of the schedule with a win, because the other side of that would have been really not fun. Tell me what you're feeling morning after the Minnesota Vikings destroyed the New York Giants. Yeah. And the reason I felt relief is, is because a, I didn't want to, you know, the next 16 weeks to be a greased uphill climb, which it very well could have been if the Vikings lost yesterday. And not only if they lost yesterday, but if Darnold looked bad, he threw a bunch of picks. If the defense kind of face-planted, similar to what they did in the playoff game

a couple of years ago to Jones and the Giants, there was clearly a lot at stake for Darnold. We all know that. A lot at stake for Brian Flores in the defense. A lot at stake for Kevin O'Connell. It's rare that week one games feel must win, but given the recent history with this team, which hasn't always gotten off to a great start, 2022 being the outlier there, you're right. I mean, they're in the meat grinder now because you've got two games. I mean, clearly you don't have to explain what the 49ers are. You've got Houston's ascending. I know things look a little different in Green Bay, but that's still a pretty talented team, and it's always tough to go to Lambeau, always tough to go to London.

Then you've got the Lions, and you've got the LA Rams. I mean, this could have been 0-5, 1-6 very quickly. It could still be 1-6, but I think the way that, you know, the Vikings showed a lot of resilience because they weren't, you know, infallible. They were sloppy and they could get away with it against New York. But I thought they really put to rest a lot of the early season, like, well, what is this going to mean? And can we put enough on the shoulders of Sam Darnold, the offensive line, and Brian Flores to rescue the team. Well, there's a long way to go before they're going to be rescued, but at the very least,

they have momentum, they have confidence, and there's, at least for a week, not going to be anything nagging, maybe other than Jordan Addison's injury. Yeah, I think it's a great question of how much do you take from this to try to project what is going to happen going forward? Because I think a lot of the things that they did in this game are things that they can do in the future. I mean, when you look at the way Sam Darnold played, he was not asked to sit back there and throw 45 passes. The way Aaron Jones ran is the way Aaron Jones has run for his entire career. This is why you go acquire Aaron Jones, right? And pay him a bunch of money. And on the defensive side, this was something that we had talked about throughout the offseason that because there was so much attention to the quarterback position, it was easy to forget that Jonathan Grenard got $20 million because he's really good at football. And Andrew Van Ginkle has been the most under-the-radar great player for years.

He's been a really good player, and Brian Flores knew this. And also to see all of Brian Flores' personnel guys now, Stephon Gilmore, who he knows, Andrew Van Ginkle, who he knows, the draft pick that he's in part responsible for in Dallas Turner getting a big sack yesterday. It all kind of coming together on that side. But I think that it's fair to say it was the New York Giants. It was a quarterback. I saw the craziest that maybe I've ever seen in my life that Daniel Jones has more pick sixes than touchdowns in signing his contract extension. More pick sixes than touchdowns since signing his contract extension. More pick sixes than touchdowns

since signing a $40 million contract extension. That is insane, Murph. So this is someone that has really, really struggled and not Brock Purdy, not CJ Stroud. And we'll see what happens with the Green Bay Packers. But how much do you take from that and say it can carry over to the coming weeks, which will be more difficult? Well, it certainly can carry over and it's easy to say, yes, this is against the Giants. So take it with a grain of salt. Sure. But it could be the flip side of that coin is they could have come in flat. They could have come in unprepared.

They could have they could have resurrected Jones as they did in the wildcard playoff. And the only reason Jones got that large contract was because of the performance he had, at least showing glimpses, dicing and slicing up Ed Donatel's defense in January of 2023 at U.S. Bank Stadium. So it would have been convenient if the Vikings had not really arrived or showed up and met the challenge of putting down an inferior opponent. And that can be almost as challenging to get yourself up mentally. Just in reading the coverage and getting a sense of things leading up to this game, you felt like the Vikings knew they were going to go in there and win, or at least felt like they should have been expected to win.

And so the way they went about doing it, and it wasn't easy early. I mean, that C.J. Hamm fumble, you know, how many times have the Vikings fumbled on their opening drive in the last couple of years to really, you know, put the game uphill, but also put mentally the game uphill, and that's something that obviously O'Connell's been stressing for weeks and months and years, as every coach does, the turnovers, the costly turnovers. Not only were they able to respond to that and hold New York to a field goal at that point, but then they marched 99 yards down the field shortly after that. And, you know, you see Sam Darnold finding Justin Jefferson down the field. You see Jalen Naylor stepping up when Addison goes down and you get a sense of what Aaron Jones can do, and it doesn't necessarily have to be 120 yards, but it could be key runs, powerful runs, keep the chains moving.

I felt like I hadn't watched a lot of Sam Darnold much because I'm not that deep in the weeds on watching the Jets and the Panthers. I have no idea what his reps were like in San Francisco behind Purdy, but what I saw was a big arm and an ability to really put a ball where it needs to be down the field, not just within the 10-yard window that we often saw Cousins default to. So it doesn't necessarily mean he's on the road to redemption. He's at least near it. And it looks like, you know, you can tell the team's rallying around him. You can tell that there's a sense of, you know, Darnold's talented. Darnold's in a good

spot. You know, that storyline could really take hold here in the next couple of weeks if he delivers a pivotal victory against some playoff contenders. So that's obviously the next step. How's Darnold going to respond to San Francisco? How's he going to respond to going up head-to-head with C.J. Stroud and Aaron Rodgers in the coming weeks and Jared Goff? So that's what I'm going to be wondering is, is this all he's going to do, which may not be enough against quality opponents?

Can he take that next step and throw for 303 touchdowns? Can he be trusted to do that? That'll be interesting to watch. Yeah, I liked the way that Kevin O'Connell phrased it in the video that they put out of him handing out game balls where he said, you know, people are going to be talking about Sam Darnold soon, and that has to show up in the next two to three weeks. I guess really, I mean, you go even farther out in the schedule that they're facing tough opponents in the entire first half of the season, but that really starts at home with the next two games. And if you can

win one of the next two games and go to Lambeau field at two and one, and maybe Jordan loves not playing, or maybe it's half of Jordan Love with his usual mobility if he's got the MCL sprain that that's something with his footwork and how he torques off his back foot things like that that I think is really tough to do if he's got a leg injury that would be a great spot if you could just get one out of the next two and you have to have similar performances from Sam Darnold but when you do get ahead the way they do and you have to have similar performances from Sam Darnold. But when you do get ahead the way they do and you do get a defensive touchdown, then Sam Darnold doesn't have to do too much.

And this is how they have to play, is even though he's much more talented than Case Keenum was, there's a similar theory there of if you can kind of stay ahead of the game and not give up a touchdown there when they fumble and make it 3-0. And then so you get a touchdown and you're playing from ahead for the entire day it's a heck of a lot easier for Sam Darnold decision making wise than it is to just set him back there and you even saw

a little bit of still getting the offense under his feet where he was you know letting the clock run down maybe not getting the call in quite as fast as he needed to and having to call a couple of timeouts makes no difference in this game but in a game against San Francisco it might make a little more of a difference so there's still a learning curve going on for Sam Darnold but I think that what this was was a true blueprint of running the ball playing on defense getting a defensive score contributing, including Kevin O'Connell, making life pretty easy for him with that Jalen Naylor touchdown. The Giants were baffled in the secondary.

He's wide open. Anybody can pitch and catch that touchdown. You don't need special arm talent. Not always saying to Sam Darnold, be special, be special. There were bootlegs and checkdowns and short throws to the running backs that created things for him. I thought there was a lot of things that they did to help him out. But I was curious from your perspective, Murph, who would you give the game ball to for this? Who were you most impressed by? Because you could go all over the roster and talk about, well, this guy had a good game. That guy had a good game. Who were you saying at the end of that, hey, that was the thing

that put them over the top against the Giants? Well, I think you've got to go to Justin Jefferson, not because of his big numbers, clearly not because of his big numbers. But, you know, he basically told, you know, I read some of the postgame quotes. You know, he told Darnold, you know, it doesn't matter if I'm double teamed. You've got to realize I'm going to go up there and make a play. And I think it was a 44, 45 yard, you know, the first catch he had down the left side. I think

it served notice a bit that, hey, you can't forget about Justin Jefferson, even if it's mid to late second quarter and he hasn't had a touch yet, but also, you know, just the threat of Justin Jefferson and what that can do to a secondary. And, you know, on fourth and two, it would have been convenient to just maybe hand the ball Aaron Jones at fourth and goal at the two. But instead, you know, Darnold recognizes that he's got the greatest receiver in the league, matched up one-on-one with no help at the goal line. Boom.

There's a bullet right there. And there's Justin Jefferson. I'm not saying another receiver couldn't have made that play, but the fact that, you know, you have a quarterback recognizing a mismatch like that somehow the Giants, you know, lost track of Justin Jefferson at the goal line. And I, what, so it's, it's weird to say Justin Jefferson should get, you know, the game ball, but as you said, because it was such a diverse and dynamic performance on both sides of the ball and special teams too, that, you know, these are the things that are going to separate you. If you're, if you're playing good team ball, you still have a superstar

and you still have an ability to stretch the field and come up with an amazing play, keep a drive alive, get a score down, you know, in a tight red zone situation. Where else would you rather deliver the ball? I feel like it's, you know, and then defensively, I mean, what else can you say about Van Winkle's play? I mean, that was just an amazing single-handed, literally single-handed interception to read that play. Jones completely didn't expect him to be in that spot.

He's trying to throw a bubble screen and maybe, you know, relieve some pressure. And, you know, it was the Vikings would have won that game clearly without that play. But that was an exclamation point, a punctuation kind of play that also shows that, yes, if the Vikings can get a defensive score and they can keep opposing quarterbacks guessing, if Brian Flores can keep them guessing. And look what they did against Jones. They didn't even have to blitz much. I mean, the broadcast pointed it out. I mean, there was a ton of four-man fronts that had Jones with happy feet and seeing ghosts. Again, is that going to happen with Brock Purdy? Is that going to happen with Aaron Rodgers?

Is that going to happen with maybe Caleb Williams down the road? Is it going to happen with Jared Goff? Probably not. I just feel like the Vikings, they did what they had to do, but they did it in a way that can inspire confidence going forward. It was sloppy, but it wasn't as if you felt like they were on the verge of collapsing at any time. I can't remember the last time there was that much of a relaxing second half

to watch, especially on the road, and not have to worry about what kind of play their quarterback's going to make with two and a half minutes left. That was legitimately, truthfully, the biggest margin of Kevin O'Connell's career as a head coach, which is crazy to think about because they had a 13-win season mixed in there. And yet that- Yeah, every win was a point and a half that year. I mean, how crazy is that? Uh, I, you know, I like your point about Justin Jefferson because a lot of times box scores can fool us where you look at a box score and you go, wow, this guy threw for this many yards.

This guy had this many receiving yards. Well, how many points did they put up? Was it a winning situation that they were playing in? And we used to get into this all the time in the past about certain yardages and quarterback ratings and everything else that would get put up. And with Justin Jefferson, I was thinking about this the other day and talking about it with Manny Hill about Mike Evans last year and how Mike Evans only had 79 catches, but he went over a thousand yards and they ended up making the playoffs. And I think for Justin Jefferson, and by the way, he was jacked after the game. If you look at my video on Twitter, I was standing two feet from him in a very crowded, small locker room. He was extremely

excited about that result yesterday. So I don't think he only cares about whether he gets 2000 yards or not. But the thing is with Justin Jefferson, those catches matter so much. They were such huge plays in the game. When he throws it and he catches the 44-yarder, and my gosh, it was a beautiful throw. I mean, that right there, the confidence in Sam Darnold just seemed to shoot up after that. He seemed so comfortable after that.

And then for Kevin O'Connell to say, I trust you to score here. I'm not going to settle for three. Score me a touchdown, throw it to the best player in the world. And for Jefferson, get open off the line of scrimmage, make the play, the trust between those two. It's two plays really that he makes in the game, but they're huge plays to get them into scoring position and then to end up scoring. So even though he doesn't end up with 13 receptions for 198 yards, he plays a huge role in winning the game. I would probably give mine to Aaron Jones. I just thought the way they were able to play off of the run was really excellent. And when's the last time we saw a

running back get two handoffs in a row and one went for 12 and the other one went for 19. I mean, at least 2021, but maybe even before that with Delvin Cook because he was starting to have the injuries pile up. To be able to just do nothing and get 30-something yards from Aaron Jones on back-to-back plays, and then you get to the end of the game and you're just trying to run the clock out, handoff, first down. Just like that's special stuff. At the goal line, do nothing, Sam Darnold.

Hand off to Aaron Jones. Touchdown on a play where most of the running backs that we've seen in recent years get caught in the backfield. Such a big difference maker. And I think, Murph, my takeaway here was not to overreact too much, but when you look at the overall roster strength, I think this is the strongest from, from not even talking about Sam Darnold, but players two through 53 is the strongest team we've seen in Minnesota since 2019.

There is talent all over the field for this team. So when you talk about the opponents that they're going up against, I don't look at it now after actually seeing them on the field as who, man, they should be huge underdogs to this team or this team or that team. I think as long as they play in this fashion, that they can play with anyone. That doesn't mean they should be favored against the 49ers, but they can play with the 49ers. Sure. I mean, it definitely inspired confidence. And what's interesting too is, I know this has been pointed out as well. It is a revamped roster, but it's got a roster with some cross currents and some very, you know, you wonder about some of these guys playing on one year deals and you wonder about how they're going to mesh with,

you know, ascending players, developing players. You know, you got somebody like Harrison Smith still there on the back end, kind of dispensing wisdom and just setting a tone back there. On both sides of the ball, you have various levels of experience, but if it can all mesh together and, you know, they seem to kind of play off of each other a little bit, especially on the defensive side. I mean, it was something to watch Flores, you know, stalking up and down the sidelines.

You know he was fired up. I mean, he had interviewed for the Giants job that Nable got a couple of years ago. And he, you know, Brooklyn native, you know, and I think you could sense that he knows he recognizes the opportunity that he has as a top tier defensive coordinator who, but for litigation, pending litigation against the National Football League, would be very likely in a head coaching position as we speak. He may be in another 13 months or 10 months. You might be seeing him on the sideline matching up against O'Connell. But what I like is where you've got a variety of different backgrounds, a variety of different skill sets and experience levels that seem to be coming together and kind of galvanizing around Flores. I mean, you could almost make the argument that Flores is a co-head coach this season, mainly because of how the team is put together, mainly because we don't know what the ceiling is for Sam Darnold. It may not be much higher than it was yesterday. So we know that if

there's going to be any hope for the Vikings to win nine-plus games and compete in this knife fight of a division, it's going to rest a lot on the defensive side of the ball. So it's almost like, I mean, it seems like Flores and at least O'Connell get along really well, as opposed to like Buddy Ryan and Mike Dick. And now look, I'm not comparing the Viking 2024 Vikings to the 85 bears. I'm talking about the dynamic of having almost two co-head coaches and seeing how that kind of fueled each

side of the ball to to kind of almost beat each other and then you know the like the bears go off and win 15 games and have one of the most dominant seasons ever i'm just saying that it'll be interesting to see how how much attention how much more confidence and how much more aggressive uh flores gets as he kind of builds his second tier resume here for a head coaching position. But again, they didn't dial up a ton of pressure yesterday. I think that was more indicative of the quarterback they were facing and maybe the offensive line that's going to change in the coming weeks. But it was fun to see him having fun. Folks, U.S. Cellular noticed that the way we use our phones has gotten ironic.

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Visit uscellular.com slash built for us to get started. I just also think that it's a matter of when you have Jonathan Grenard and Andrew Van Ginkle and Dallas Turner and Jahad Ward, who I want to think of all that many teams that have it, but it reminds me a little bit of Philadelphia 2017, where they were bringing Derek Barnett and Brandon Graham. And there was several other guys coming off with, you know, lots of pass rush from lots of different places. And also they were able to rotate on the interior defensive line as opposed to last year where they just had to play the same two guys over and over again. But with Tillery, Bullard, with Harrison Phillips, these guys didn't have to play 80% of the snaps, which was important for them as well. So they have just much more depth than they had in the past. And when you go through the roster, Murph, when we talk about how good the defense can be, well, we know what Flores can do, but they don't have anyone who's unproven that's on the field. Even Ivan Pace, who was phenomenal yesterday, all over the place making plays, but he's now a second-year player.

He's been in the league for an entire season. There's not a single player that's starting, and Dallas Turner's mixing in, but there's not a single starting player who has not had a bunch of experience in the NFL. So what that means is that Brian Flores doesn't have to limit what he can do. If he decides this week we're rushing four, but next week we're blitzing like crazy this week, we're playing coverage X, but next week we're playing coverage. Why he can absolutely do that. And you saw Metellus play a ton of snaps again, all over the field in different locations. Last year, he's just figuring that role

out, but now he's locked into that role. And we were trying to project what can this defense really be? And the idea was if the corners play pretty well, this can be a really good defense. And they had a great start. Now that helps that they pressured. That helps that Daniel Jones didn't know what he was doing. It was taking sacks and was throwing inaccurate passes. It will be much more tested when they go up against Iuke, Samuel, George Kittle. And we're going to start to get the feel. And then, of course, with Nico Collins and Tank Dell and Stefan Diggs the week after,

we're going to see just how much the cornerback group can really hold up. But Stefan Gilmore played the whole game. And if that's a guy who's well above average in camp, we're talking about, well, is Andrew Booth jr. Going to make it? Nope. Traded. Is it Caleb Evans going to do? I don't know. Fabian Morrow has kind of been around or whatever. Fabian Morrow, who they signed where it looked like there was desperation to just get anybody wasn't even active yesterday because they're playing a guy who won defensive MVP. It's just this defense looks legit to me, like it's going to give them a chance to play with just about anybody from week to week. And I don't think that that's an overreaction just to one game against the bad team because it was it was an

85 bears level beat down for this one week so if you're a good defense that's what it should look like against teams that are bad yeah and that's what i was mentioning earlier like you know it's one thing to to go into a game favored and feel like you know you know that feel good about yourselves but when you lose an opportunity to feel good about yourselves but when you lose an opportunity to put down an inferior opponent when you lose an opportunity to you know maybe avenge a playoff loss from a couple of years ago but also kind of for week one week one is all about setting a tone week one is all about you know pivoting out of the preseason kind of finally getting a chance after eight months of discussion to see exactly what you might be able to accomplish during a season. Again, you have to take it

with a grain of salt because it was the Giants, but it could have been, you know, it's week one and it means it's your first time to really kind of make a first impression. And I thought the Vikings did as well as could be expected. I mean, I don't see any other scenario where you could have said that would have been better. Maybe just a few more offensive numbers. Again, Jordan Addison not rolling his other ankle up, and we're going to now have to be looking at that going forward week to week. But to come out of that, one thing I wanted to ask you I forgot about, too, is we didn't really even mention it yet, but the offensive line.

There was a lot of discussion about they were fine at the tackles, but the interior was going to be challenged in that. After watching Dexter Lawrence stuff a run on Garrett Bradbury, who must be seeing him in his nightmares, and then I think he overpowered Ed Ingram on the same drive for a sack. He ended up hitting Sam Darnold's arm on that interception. But he wasn't a game wrecker. He could have been a game wrecker. He wasn't a game wrecker. They found a way to neutralize him and man him up.

But I was wondering what you thought of, because there's always intrigue about the interior offensive line, which doesn't sound sexy, but that could have been a disastrous day. If, you know, following Lawrence's dominance and Ham's fumble, you could have easily seen this scripting into a 10 to six giants win. Yeah. I think that the game situation allowed it not to be wrecked by Dexter Lawrence, but he still played well enough to wreck it. I saw that he led the entire NFL in pressures in the first week. So, or at least so far, they're going to play a game on Monday night, but yeah, so he did exactly what his job was. It just sort of shows you that if you're playing from ahead and you can run the ball and you can hit a few big plays and you don't have

to drop back over and over again, that you can avoid having him entirely destroy the game. But if this had been a close situation and you're having to throw on third down all the time or you're having to come back late in the game, then we probably would have noticed more some of those pressures that he was able to put up. And it would have we would have talked about a lot more that first drive that turned into a total disaster because he jumped on it immediately. It was just in my mind, it was more of a well, the way that the game played out, we didn't pay a lot of attention to it. But he absolutely demolished the interior line where it was much better in my mind was just the run game. The past game, we're still going to be talking about this. Ed Ingram had, I thought, a kind of a tough camp and Garrett Bradbury is who he is. He can't take on guys

that are 340 pounds and move like that. Newsflash, nobody can except for maybe Frank Ragnow in Detroit, which, oh my gosh, what an ending to that game last night, which we'll talk about in just a second. But I thought that they were able to get the push in the run game, and if they could do that, then they have to survive in the passing game. But they did a bunch of different things. They worked C.J. Hamm in on some third and longs to pass protect. It's going to be an issue at times, but it really depends on how you work around it and how you avoid situations that Sam Darnold can get killed in those spots. And mainly, I think it's really about those third and longs where they

seem to always put Kirk Cousins in third and longs and ask him to convert over and over again. And then you get strip sacks sometimes by great players who can rush the passer, but that's when they make all of their money. And it felt like the Vikings were just never in those spots during the game. So final word on that, because I do have two other things I want to ask you about that happened in the NFL. So a final word on the Vikings win. What's your biggest takeaway? That they don't need they can they can win with a diversified attack on either side of the ball. I mean, it doesn't necessarily have to be Kirk Cousins thrown for 350 and finding Jefferson for 150 of those in three scores. It doesn't have to be all on the defense.

It doesn't have to be all on, as you mentioned, Cousins' ability low percentage-wise to have to convert, you know, third and eight, third and nine, over and over again, where you feel like they're on the verge of something spectacular or something disastrous at any given moment. I mean, it was as stress-free a Vikings game as I've watched in a while. And it felt like they, you know, you could sense from after that 99-yard drive, you just had the sense that they knew that this was their day and this was going to be their opportunity to kind of maybe tamp down a little bit of the naysaying out in the national media. And I was also impressed, too, with how Darnold,

I never expected Darnold to do a whole, you know, you like that kind of Kirk Cousins answer, because he's got a lot to answer and atone for. And yesterday's performance isn't going to whitewash all of his career. But I think he was humble. He knows he's got a lot to fix. He knows the team has a lot to fix. I read his quotes. He seemed to say all the right things.

I think this is a guy that, boy, when you get chewed up and spit out by the NFL machine, I don't care how talented or how well compensated you are. It can only be a humiliating, humbling experience to come out the other end of that as like kind of a charred husk of a quarterback and have nobody have much confidence in you. And to be able to power through that, to kind of grind through the obvious narratives all offseason, answer all of those questions, and then to go out and perform above average, admirably, but also inspire confidence, that's as good of a start, I think, as Sam Darnold could hope for as well. And that could carry on for weeks.

I agree. And I just can't credit Kevin O'Connell enough for the way that he delicately danced between JJ McCarthy's our future quarterback. And I believe in Sam Darnold and those things are conflicting and yet they've worked. And I thought the entire team played like they believed in their quarterback yesterday. And we're going to go forward and see how that works out when there is a bad game, of which there inevitably will be bad games along the way. And if they can sustain that.

Now, my question for you is, were you paying attention at all to Atlanta yesterday? Just the highlights. But I believe there was a curious check down that sounded awfully familiar to people. A curious check down, an interception at the end of the game. But even more so, the film people have put some stuff out there that make Kirk Cousins look like the whole, I'm perfectly fine and recovered from my Achilles injury not look so true. And this we can't overstate when we evaluate this leadership group, the decision to move on, how hard that is to do, how important it was to do, how right it was to do and how risky it would have been. We talked about so many times, well, who's going to play quarterback if it's not Kirk and it's risky to draft a quarterback.

Look, all these quarterback busts, it's risky. It's more risky to pay a hundred million dollars guaranteed for a guy who is coming off an Achilles injury at 36 years old. And it's just one week and I'm sure he'll get better as it goes along and more comfortable there. But the way that he looked was very brittle and like he was trying to protect himself. And I don't blame him. And I'm curious to see what Aaron Rodgers looks like coming off a similar injury. But Rodgers had way longer to recover than Kirk did.

And I just thought yesterday underscored, especially as expensive defensive players were making plays for the Vikings that they couldn't afford in the past. It underscored how big and how franchise shifting into the future that was for the Vikings. And also if you're Atlanta, you look at how Tampa Bay played, you look at how New Orleans played. They got to be worried right away that that's not going to be what they paid for and one other thing too on draft night we all laughed at the falcons what are they doing drafting michael pennix and by week one it looks like a great decision by week one i mean it just that was

something i thought that was easy to see coming that they drafted a quarterback maybe because they were worried that this guy's achilles was not going to be a hundred percent and they might have just gotten themselves a Russell Wilson situation. But yeah, you mentioned all the risks that it would have been for the Vikings to bring him back coming off that injury at 36 years old. If you don't believe that, or if you, if you scoff at that, just look at the Falcons. They hed hedged they hedged immediately on draft night and as you mentioned I mean we may be seeing chatter about panics a lot sooner than we may be expected so will Kirk Cousins even be in the starting lineup December 8th when the Falcons visit U.S. Bank Stadium gee I hope so that that should be a uh a monstrous emotional day in that stadium. But I, yeah, it's so risky that the Falcons didn't even believe in their own scouting, it seemed like.

And I don't know if that's because they saw something when he got into town or if they were just going to hedge that way all along. That's a lot of money to hedge. So you're right. It's a painful, change is hard, change is painful, change is hard to sell. And I think what the Vikings find themselves in now is after losing their eventual franchise quarterback for the season, I would never want that to happen for McCarthy, either for his development or for the fan base. But in some ways, it maybe was a relief valve for Darnold because he doesn't have to have that question of McCarthy peering over his shoulder. And every time he throws short on third and five or overthrows on third and 16 or overthrows in the red zone, you know,

you're going to hear JJ chants from the crowd. So he doesn't have to really deal with that. So in some ways it really has set up kind of perfectly for Darnold to really redefine himself and do it in a way that endears himself to a fan base that maybe never saw it coming. I think more than anything, if, and no matter how this plays out, if the Vikings had signed cousins to the same deal and he came out and played like that and they lost like he did in Atlanta, do I just start something else insider at that point? I mean, it would feel so hopeless and no matter what happens after this, knowing what's down the road and knowing every week you show up at the

stadium, you're not sure what's going to happen. And you're not sure if this team actually can do it and how exciting that would be. If they did, there is a freshness to this team. So many fresh faces and Darnold that it, it's just a totally different feeling.

Okay, really quick. What a game for the Detroit Lions. Just what a game. What an ending for the Detroit Lions. Yeah, I only tuned in late in the fourth quarter. I was busy doing other things, actually writing for you, which I hope folks download and read week one Monday morning Murph column. But I was impressed because I thought,

all right, it looks like Stafford's going to do this. It looks like he's going to jam the knife in at Ford Field again. And I thought, you know, it was nice to see them tie it up with a rookie kicker. But I thought, oh, man, I don't know, overtime, Cooper Cupps looking good. Stafford's looking dialed in. And this,ed in. They need to score a touchdown. I didn't think they were going to do it on the first drive, and I didn't think they were going to do it with, what was it, nine straight running plays. They just marched the Rams, I mean marched them down the field into the end zone. So I thought it was interesting that it was a long way to go for the Lions, but it was an interesting way for them to win and also prevent

any kind of slippage because one loss to a contender on national television, you know, it puts a little bit of doubt into some folks that maybe that window did shut in San Francisco at the NFC Championship game. But after watching, you know, the Bears kind of do a little bit of what the Vikings did and, you know, not put the game in Caleb Williams' hands and somehow through special teams and great defensive play turn out a week one win. We know it's going to be an interesting three to six weeks in Green Bay with Jordan Love, but I really truly believe this is going to be a knife fight in the NFC North. I think it's going to be highly entertaining. And the Vikings, you know, actually served notice that,

hey, maybe you should pay attention to us for at least the near term. Monday morning, Murph. I got to go catch a flight. You got to do your job. So thank you for your time as always. As you mentioned, that column will be up over at purpleinsider.com. So great stuff, Murph. And we'll talk to you soon, man.

Thanks for your time. Travel safe.