Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Brian Murphy is still confident in the Vikings after Lions loss

Episode Date: October 22, 2024

Matthew Coller and Brian Murphy discuss the Vikings' close loss and then Matthew answers fan question 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 once again for Monday Morning Murph, the first Monday Morning Murph show breaking down a loss this season as the Minnesota Vikings dropped to 5-1 after losing late to the Detroit Lions. So Murph, you were in the house yesterday at U.S. Bank Stadium. Quite the atmosphere there. The fans were jacked up. I was tracking the decibel levels, which reached ever so slightly higher than the Texans game, but did not matter so much to Mr. Jared Goff, who stood in there time after time and completed big passes against the Vikings. I want you to give me your big picture takeaway, and then we will break it down item by item. So how did you walk out of that building yesterday? I walked out superbly entertained. I walked out reminding myself why it's sometimes good to be inside stadiums

to kind of get a feel for the energy and the vibe. And as we talked about leading up to the week and, and I've been kind of contemplating since I can't remember a Vikings Lions game with, with stakes that high emotions that I matchups that close. And when you come away looking at the statistics, we're so almost identical from a total yardage standpoint, running game, quarterback play, turnovers, penalties. It was as an evenly matched game as you could have hoped for in mid-October. There were things to nitpick for the Vikings, things to nitpick for the Lions. I think what ultimately made the difference was this is a battle-tested

Lions team that has already arrived, whereas the Vikings are ascending. And you had a veteran quarterback, Jared Goff, who's playing at the highest level probably that he has his entire career, at least statistically. And he walked into that cauldron of chaos and he wasn't going to be rattled, maybe as C.J. Stroud was a month ago. And that's, I think, the difference. I think it was Goff made more plays. The Lions high octane offense made just a little bit more key plays than the Vikings vaunted defense. And what you got was a, again, a wildly entertaining two-point game that I don't think really changes the trajectories of either team. If anything, it really sets up that week 18 matchup at Ford Field as really maybe the most anticipated game on the Vikings schedule from here on out,

not sleeping on the Packers, of course, but I just feel like these do look like the two best teams still in the NFC North and arguably in the NFC. Yeah, I think in the NFC for sure, but going back to Jared Goff and what he did to the Vikings for a minute, was your takeaway that Goff did a tremendous job and their offense did a tremendous job or that the Vikings were to blame for not covering, not getting home, not playing the same level of defense? Because I think that there's definitely with a team like this, a chicken and egg type of effect. The players in the locker room pinned it on themselves. They said, we just didn't make the plays. And I thought it was interesting that Cam Bynum said that nothing that the Lions threw out there really shocked them.

They just didn't execute. And they had zero pass breakups outside of a defensive tackle. I mean, they did get pressures from Jonathan Grenard, but the blitzes really didn't get home. The coverage wasn't really on point in this game, but at the same time, they have an elite receiver, a top-notch quarterback, one of the best running backs that I've seen in person, and Jameer Gibbs as he continued to just annihilate this defense. But how did you kind of divvy that up as you were watching? I'd answer yes and yes. I think the Lions outplayed the Vikings, and I think the Vikings left too many plays on the field defensively. And both things can be true. And I think that's where a veteran quarterback makes the ultimate difference. And let's not sleep on the Lions' offensive line, one of the best in the NFL, and they were without a starter as well, but experienced, tough.

You know, in some ways, the Vikings were manhandled at the line of scrimmage defensively, and that extra split second where the edge rush didn't get there, that extra split second where Jared Goff with alligator blood in his veins is going to stand in the pocket and deliver a strike either underneath or downfield as somebody gets open, I think that was the margin of difference. Could the Vikings have played tighter coverage? Yes. Cam Bynum, I'm sure, wants that tackle back, that open field missed tackle on Gibbs. But boy, let's not forget that Gibbs is also a burner who made a nice move, and that's what he's paid to do too. So it really was just a really evenly played game. There were mistakes.

I mean, the Vikings committed a lot of penalties again, and they've been doing that all season, but so did the Lions. You could argue that without Dan Campbell being insanely aggressive on the first series and attempting a fake punt at his own 33-yard line, maybe the Lions win this game handily as opposed to it being as close as it was. If you really want to boil it down, it really comes to that period in the second quarter and early into the third when Detroit's offense really did dominate. I mean, they had four touchdown drives that really carved up the Vikings' defense. I mean, there were a lot of big plays in the running game, short passing downfield, third down conversions.

That's what kept the Vikings backpedaling. I was impressed how they came back out of halftime and with Sam Darnold. They didn't curl up in a ball when they were down 21-10 or 28-17. They made a huge play on defense to actually get themselves into the lead again. But again, I think the margin of victory was you had a battle-tested veteran quarterback who did just a little bit more. Yeah. And I think with Brian Flores, it's tough because if you are a guy who has a certain type of scheme and mentality, you don't want to completely go away from that with your defense

when you are facing any given team, right? Like you want to do the best thing that you do against the other team. That's very good. But in the case of the blitz, it was not effective at all. In fact, Steve Palazzolo, formerly of PFF tweeted out that golf went 14 for 16 with something like 159 yards passing when the Vikings blitz, it seemed like they picked it up so well. He picked it up so well and knew exactly where to go with the football. And they did get to golf more than he usually gets sacked, but they didn't, I don't think pressure him time and time and time again. And he understood exactly where the short passes were. That was also schemed up extremely well. And I think what the Vikings believed was,

okay, they're going to have to use their running back and pass protection. And they said, no, that's okay. We'll run some receivers in pass protection at times, or we'll just leave a free runner and leave it to Jared Goff and leak out Jameer Gibbs. And on a number of occasions, and I believe this happened on the last drive

where they said, we're going to send some pressure. We'll force to stay in and the Lions went no that's okay we'll just leak him out and give him the football and he'll run for 16 yards and make a huge play that ultimately got them in field goal position at the end of the game it was a matter of the quarterback the offensive line the play caller but I don't know that I really want to second guess Brian Flores sending blitzes because this team is built on an aggressive mindset to do that. And at one point, Jared Goff fumbles, the ball bounces back to him, and you sort of wonder, would it have been different if this happened or that happened on a couple of plays, but I think the Lions just understand that different, which meant that it was the same results from them. So I don't know if I really want to question that because I also want

Brian Flores to keep playing this way. I don't think that there are many teams that are going to be able to handle it as well as Detroit did. Right. And it's not always just the pressure that Flores brings. It's the threat of the pressure that makes an opponent panic, not panic, but at least adjust on the fly at the line of scrimmage or put an hour fastball from six, you know, six feet away and take it in for a score. That opportunity didn't really present itself yesterday. You know, the chess match was great and it was a great build up to it. I think both of these guys are, you know, polishing their resumes for a head coaching job next season and maybe, you know, redefining what it means to value and vet and evaluate, if you will, an offensive or defensive quarter coordinator. It may be time to overpay one of these two guys to keep them in place, even though both, I think, have aspirations to be head coaches, certainly for Flores again, too. It was just a fun game to watch. It was a fun,

interesting, because there were plenty of big mistakes, big plays, big momentum swings. It wasn't really a pretty game by any means, certainly in the first half. Again, a lot of penalties. But it was, you know, kind of two heavyweights just throwing haymakers at each other. And the Lions connected on a couple more. And, you know, it would have been really fascinating to see if the Vikings didn't get penalized on that very, very last play. If, you know, Will Reichert would have gone out there and attempted a 65 and change yard field goal, I have no doubt that he would have made it in that situation. And boy, what would we be talking about this morning? It should not be forgotten that he's had a phenomenal rookie

season and that's going to come in so handy. I mean, when you can just bomb 57 yarders as if they're 30 yarders without even a blink of the eye, that's going to bode well down the road. But yeah, I'm really looking forward to the Week 18 rematch. Interesting stat, I think it was from the AP last night. So these teams have been playing each other since 1961, and it's been completely lopsided. 80 wins out of 126 games for the Vikings, a 635 winning percentage. To put that into perspective in baseball terms, to have a 635 winning percentage, you'd have to win 103 games in a regular season. That means you're a monster team. So it's completely been one-sided.

That said, for the first time since JFfk was in the white house the lions have won four straight in the series so i'm not saying it's totally flipped um but in this short window um you know it's the lions world in the nfc north right now everybody's got to come get them well i think the same thing is this was a game to decide who we believe the best team in the NFC is and it is the Detroit Lions and the Vikings are still second I would say I'm impressed by what Green Bay was able to do against the Houston Texans they pulled out a late victory there and they really slowed down CJ Stroud so they actually have a defense now which was not the case in the last couple of seasons and then you go through the rest of the NFC and you go, uh, Philly, I guess.

I mean, the way that San Francisco lost Brandon, I, you got hurt. It looks like he's going to be out for the year. That team has just had so many injuries. Seattle is still kind of hovering around, but I'm not sure how scary they are because they seem to be kind of a boom or bust on a weekly basis. These are the teams, the Detroit Lions and the Minnesota Vikings, who have been the most consistently excellent. And they were largely consistently excellent against each other yesterday, as you mentioned, that really close box score. But I do want to go back to the end of the game because my big overall takeaway is what a game.

You won't forget that one if you were there with how exciting it was but also that after Kevin O'Connell was talking about the sort of self-inflicted things that they did that caused them to lose and when we go back toward the very end of the game and you look at that sequence where if they get four yards on third down, the game might end up being over. There's just over four minutes there, maybe one more first down sprint out to the right. Darnold overthrows, Justin Jefferson looked like Jefferson was open, but also may have been some confusion with Jordan Addison. I think that that was also a difference in this game. Murph is that there were just these small things that ended up adding up.

And maybe this is also because we talk about the Vikings all the time, that we're paying more close attention. And on Detroit's side, they would have their own complaints. But I don't, is it play call there? Is it execution? Is it once again trusting Sam Darnold in a spot where you maybe should have just handed the ball to Aaron Jones. But that, that sequence really stuck out to me because over the last couple of years, there's just been with O'Connell in charge too many times where you can put a team away and they let the team still exist. And I felt like that happened

in green Bay. I felt like that happened in Green Bay. I felt like that happened with the Jets. And I think the last couple of weeks we were saying, if you keep playing with fire, someone is going to burn you. And the Detroit Lions are the type of team that is going to burn you when you give them that extra chance. Oh, I agree. There's a pattern there.

And, you know, O'Connell's been paying a lot of lip service to it, but it's one thing to say we're going to look inward and clean it up. Well, you've been saying that for six, seven weeks now. And again, the penalties, a lot of penalties, a lot of holding penalties, and you can justify some holding penalties to keep your quarterback alive. But there's a lot of sloppy, just grabbing instead of blocking. The pre-snap penalties. You know, there was a play, I can't remember when exactly it was, where Darnold just spiked the ball. I mean, essentially, let's get out of this. It's a mess. You mentioned that, yeah, they had a chance with four plus minutes left to put the game away.

Darnold rolls out and he overthrows Justin Jefferson. And yes, that would have picked up a first down. It keeps the option alive to run out the clock. Now, you know, Jared Goff, the way he's been playing, he would have made that completion just because of the way he's been playing. So I'm not going to put this on Sam Darnold because actually I was quite impressed with how he responded in the second half. Because lest anyone forget, this is the first time the Vikings have actually trailed for any meaningful minutes in any game since, you know, the early moments of week one against New York in the Meadowlands when they were down 3-0. I mean, they were down 21-10.

They were down 28-17. The clock was ticking. It was an opportunity to see how they would actually respond, and I liked how they responded. But if you think you're going to say Sam Darnold, go out there and outplay Jared Goff and win us this game, you're overreaching at least six games into the Darnold experiment. Maybe toward the end of the season with a little bit more of a track record, maybe you can say that. Maybe in week 18, he does have to go out and outplay Jared Goff. But right now, that's not his job. It was the defense's job and Brian Flores' job to outplay and out scheme Ben Johnson and the Lions offense. And that didn't happen. So all that said, yes, I think there are

issues that O'Connell needs to address. And these are on him as the head coach because it's a top down. And now they got a short week to prepare, which, you know, for the Rams on Thursday, which is good and bad in some ways. They can, you know, they always say, let's flush this and get right back at it. Doesn't necessarily allow you a lot of time to drill on fundamentals if that is an ongoing issue. But, you know, again, another learning opportunity. How are they going to respond to a defeat? Playing Thursday night is never easy. Playing on the road Thursday night is never easy. Traveling west to play on the road on Thursday night is never easy. And it's easy to look beyond

and say, well, you got the mini bye because the schedule from here on out is pretty marshmallow soft beyond the division matchups. So again, another opportunity to see how the Vikings respond to a tough but admirable defeat. But yes, penalties and confusion, unforced errors need to be addressed because those are going to plague you at the worst possible times than it did yesterday. That's a great point. And as we grow on a sample size now of Kevin O'Connell, we've got two and a half years or almost two and a half years of him coaching football. And in all of those, the pre-snap stuff, the calls not getting in, having to burn timeouts when it looks like, why are they calling a timeout right now? And the answer is just because the call's not in or somebody's not lined up correctly, or there's not the right number of players on the

field. And I would have to look across the league to see how it compares to other teams throwing away their timeouts, but it feels like it's too many. And in a big game like this, it is too many. You can't have any of those things. You can't have a wide receiver lining up, not on the line of scrimmage, which happened. And I don't know if that's coaching or just the player not checking with the referee or the referee being nitpicky. I don't know. But when it comes to, you know, delay of games and things like that, they just seem to happen way too often. There were another couple sequences too, that were frustrating when you look back at the game where they get into scoring

territory call. It wasn't quite the red zone, but they're on Detroit side of the field and they've got a chance down 28 to 20 to potentially score a touchdown there and maybe tie the game. And they run out a trick play to start the, what they're on first down. And this is another three year thing. There hasn't been a single trick play that Kevin O'Connell has used in his entire time coaching the Minnesota Vikings that has worked. And I thought that they had disappeared after Ty Chandler looked like he was going to throw a pass a couple of weeks ago in a game that all they needed was a field goal to put away. And they wanted to do something crazy risky.

At that point in the game, Darnold had just hit a 51-yard pass and then scrambled for a first down, or there was a penalty that gave them a first down, but it was a good scramble. And then you're running a wide receiver pass. I just cannot wrap my head around that. And then the next two plays are a little bit out of phase. Something isn't quite right. Darnold ends up bailing from the pocket, tries to scramble twice,

gets taken down, and they have to kick the field goal i think that when we talk about the little things and we talk about having this now analysis through a championship type of lens i mean one is just can i beg strongly enough not to run any more trick plays um but also just a feel for the game thing sometimes i just go do we have horse blinders on and we're just calling plays here because a trick play under a certain circumstance would make sense your quarterback just hit a bomb the guy's been rolling why are you putting the ball in the hands of your receiver to throw it there and then the quarterback comes back in because the play failed now you got to pass twice and it just threw everything off there i didn't really understand that and that's the And then the quarterback comes back in because the play failed. Now you've got to pass twice.

And it just threw everything off there. I didn't really understand that. And that's the kind of minuscule feel for the game stuff that we talk about, running a pass play to Aaron Jones against Green Bay that ends up getting picked off. There's just been one of these each week that, again, kind of came back to bite him here. Yeah, I mean, feel for the game. That's a great way to put it you're right i i think it was nailer that he hit at midfield like practically on his own on his goal line i mean that was a rocket throw at a key moment now the building's rocking you're feeling good about yourselves why are you trying you know if you're trying to go for the jugular it do it legitimately because uh not only that but you're, you know, if you're trying to go for the jugular, do it legitimately.

Because not only that, but you're also, you know, you put the ball in Jefferson's hands to try to make a pass. He's not a quarterback. And when the play broke down, he literally panicked. And now you've got a panicked wide receiver with the ball in his hands, who, by the way, if I'm correct about NFL rules, is not afforded the same protections as a quarterback. He's in the middle of the field running around trying to look for somebody to throw the ball to, about to get murdered or make a monumental mistake. Don't put Jefferson in that kind of position. You know, trick plays are great if you're down two touchdowns and you're not

getting anything going and you want to spark something. How about we just have a universal rule? If you want to try out the trick plays, do it in garbage time when you got a 20-point lead, never mind the feelings of the opposing team. If you really want to work on these things and you want to perfect these things, do it when the risk is low. But if the risk is high, you're right. All it did was just ground that potential scoring drive down to the nub. And it just, it reeks of, I'm the smartest guy in the room and I'm going to outsmart Dan Campbell and the Lions right here because I suddenly found them vulnerable. Well, Kevin O'Connell, you don't have any playoff victories. You're not knocking on the Super Bowl door yet as a head coach.

I don't think you're in a position to really be that aggressive. And by the way, if you want any lessons on insanely aggressive mistakes, just look across the field at Campbell. Now, he can afford to do that because of the cachet he has, but if the Vikings won that game yesterday, he might be getting barbecued for the fake punt. Now, I know it's in the Lions' DNA to zig when everybody thinks they should zag, but how about that for a lesson in humility, and how about just taking that with a grain of salt? Look, if you're committing 12 penalties a game, half of them pre-snap, burning your timeouts because you can't get plays in on time, I don't know if you should be reaching into the bags of tricks.

I think you should just clean up what you should be doing fundamentally. Save the trick plays for when you're desperate for momentum and points or when you've got your boot on the throat of an opponent and you can actually figure out if these things are going to work or not. Again, nevermind their feelings. I also think that if you're good at them, you can do them. If there was any sort of track record and with Detroit, this is where I would defend the fake punt. And I didn't like it. I don't think that's the point in the game or on the field to do that because you're just giving points to the other team if it fails.

And the Vikings, I'm sure, were prepared for the trick play from Detroit because they've done it so often. But where I would defend it is that they often work for that team. They ran a reverse flea flicker thing that went for whatever number yard gain against the Dallas Cowboys to Sam Laporta down the sideline. And they've had a bunch of them over the years, the fake punts, the reverses, the all sorts of stuff where they've come up with explosive plays. The Vikings don't have that track record. And also when you have, just can't say enough when you have Aaron Jones

and Justin Jefferson having good days, just lean on them. And they did to some extent at times throughout the game, but I still didn't think that the ball got to number 18 as much as it potentially could have. And in a situation like that, you have first down, you're in scoring position, Aaron Jones is on your football team, just use him. And he was already playing 75% of the snaps or whatever it was anyway. So you might as well just give him the ball. And I think at the end of the day, he ends up with six and a half yards per carry. I have a tough time thinking that it's not a good idea to give him the football in that type of situation. And that's a small thing, but it ends up making potentially a difference in the game. So those are the things that I feel like when we get to bigger games,

when we get to the week 17 and week 18, I don't know that we're going to see progress because they've just happened over and over again, the kind of feel for the play calling and stuff like that, keeping teams around in games. But I'm curious to see if it is different at some point or if those things come back to haunt them. Just on Darnold. Just dust them off in Jacksonville or Tennessee. Yeah, right. That's when you use your trick play or maybe just put them in the box

and shoot it to the sun. How about that? But when it comes to Darnold I thought it was interesting to see people debating Sam Darnold's performance because overall when you look at the stat line it's tremendous I thought that he did a pretty good job of decision making finding open guys underneath laying it up for grabs when he was supposed to but there's the big miss cue of the interception. There's the big miss on third and four. And I get, I was struggling to kind of evaluate his game because I liked the game plan for the most part. And I liked the underneath passing and I liked getting the ball to Addison and Jefferson a little bit more, but I still need to see way more Jordan Addison.

And I also wonder how much TJ Hawkinson would have made that game differently. I don't know if you felt the same way. Well, yeah, TJ Hawkinson is going to dramatically change. I think the Vikings offense, I mean, I think it's going to, you know, give them obviously another offensive tool and weapon, but it's going to keep a defense, keeping an eye on another superstar player, which could open up more opportunities for Jefferson and Naylor hands down. And really, Darnold just has not been able to enjoy that escape valve and that Pro Bowl talent. So yeah, no question. That can only help. I like the fact that the expectations are rising for Darnold, and you're now like, okay, well, you need to make that third down and four completion with four minutes left to Jefferson because that's what elite quarterbacks do, and you're on a 5-0 team, and that puts you in a position to end the game. He misfired.

On the interception, I can't remember who was open on the left. There was somebody wide open clearly. Yeah, I mean, down there, I mean, that would have been a huge play. As soon as the ball came out of his hands, you saw the Lions' safety break, and you just thought either it's going to go over his head or it's going to be an interception. And you can almost smell it coming. Darnold didn't smell it coming. So, you know, that's a play.

And those are two throws that, one, he doesn't need to make and make a better decision, and the other one that he needs to complete. But his accuracy was excellent. He found Jefferson in the end zone. The play to Naylor, again, the arm strength is there. He actually showed some mobility at times, too, that, again, is a little sneaky. But what are your expectations for Sam Darnold after six games? I mean, six weeks ago, we would have not put him in the statistical or leadership category that he clearly is in with the Vikings, which only begs the question, where is his ceiling? And what should we expect his ceiling to be?

I think it should be a little bit higher, but it's not Jared Goff's ceiling. And you can't really go out there and expect Sam Darnold to outplay Jared Goff, to outplay, you know, the elite, you know, Patrick Mahomes, you know, Josh Allen. Not that they face them, but I'm just saying you can't say Sam Darnold needs to match these guys or outplay them. Sam Darnold needs to do just enough to get the ball to Jefferson, not make any mistakes, continue to progress, increase his confidence, and then increase the coaching staff's confidence in how much to unleash him. So it's still baby steps here. And I think people may be getting a little bit greedy. All of that said, those are two throws he needs to either not make

or make better. Yeah, I think there's always a difference between when we look back at the game and saying this really mattered. And with those two throws, those really mattered to versus the bigger picture, the bigger statement on Sam Darnold and even the bigger statement on that game. Overall, there are going to be, I'm sure when we go back on tape, there are going to be throws. Ah, that was there or that wasn't there. There was one on third and 17 where he actually had Jefferson open on a play that was looked

like it was designed to go there and he ends up checking it short. But I'm not too upset with that if he's checking it short and protecting the football because last week or two weeks ago, we criticized him for third and 15, whipping it down the field and throwing an interception, so he kind of can't have it both ways. But he game-managed, I thought, very well in this game, and he pushed the ball down the field. There was a 33 yarder to nailer

the 51 yarder was to actually to addison i just checked that i thought it was but still explosive plays to his wide receivers the long touchdown down the sideline this is what you're looking for from sam darnold but i think that we all know that the complete team is going to have to show up week in and week out in order for them to win. And if they're going to beat a good team like Detroit, you can't have your defense mostly run off the field. You're just not going to win too many of those games when that happens. You need to have the defense play like they did in the first half of Green Bay or most of the game against the Jets or against the Texans. That's just how it's going to have to go if they're going to end up winning the conference

or winning the division. And I think we know that. But what percentage of games would this football team win if Sam Darnold plays like that? I want to say like 90% that they would, if Sam Darnold just plays like that, that they would win 90% of their games against the rest of the NFL. It's just that in the 10% is the presumptive NFC favorite to go to the Superbowl because their roster is a super duper stacked. Just the last thing Murph,

because it is a quick turnaround, your thoughts on the Vikings having to get into a little air bus and go across the country, myself included. I'm not on their airbus, but I'll fly out there as well for this football game. I kind of can't wait to turn this around really quickly. Yesterday made me want more football, so I'll get that. But nervous or confident? Which side of that would you be? Oh, I feel pretty confident. I don't think the Rams are really that much of a threat. I think what's really going to challenge the Vikings is, as you mentioned, the logistics of it all, although they are coming off a buy and they've

already gone to London. So, you know, LA isn't Thailand. I mean, it's only three and a half hours away. And the Rams are also on a quick quick turnaround as well so uh or did they have a buy yesterday i could be uh sort of both i mean they played they played the raiders they played the raiders so you can all right right so they didn't really play yeah yeah you know i i don't i just feel like you know the vikings have their own issues to clean up they may not have a lot of time to do that but the flip side is you know if you're coming off a loss that you feel like you should have in a game you feel like you should have won, it's always better to just get right back on the horse.

And again, these aren't the 2021 Rams or the 2020 version of the Rams. I mean, this is kind of a backpedaling version. Sean McVay's a great coach. I wouldn't sleep on him. But it's not the worst opponent to face on a quick turnaround. So I don't feel terribly, you know, worrisome that they're going to overlook the Rams. They're just in a bad position right now. And look, I think it was interesting just to watch from the team standpoint,

O'Connell's standpoint, and Darnold's standpoint, how they played from behind. And I thought they played fairly well from behind. Didn't ultimately win, but the way Detroit was playing and the momentum that they had, especially the way the defense was really getting steamrolled, that game could have gotten ugly quickly. And they came up with a big play at the end to take a fleeting lead, and we didn't even get into the two-point conversion or whatnot but all being said I just I thought they afforded themselves pretty well in an unfamiliar territory of playing from behind so I think they're in a pretty good position going out on a short week regardless

of West Coast or not and then keep an eye on whether or not Hawkinson is going to come back or they feel like a mini buy will help them more and they can bring them back. October or November 3rd, I guess is their next home game. After that will be very interesting to watch. Does cam acres get more work with Aaron Jones having to do so much to be on the field against Detroit? Does Hawkinson come back? Do we see a new right guard?

Because it was another very difficult day for the much maligned uh right guard yesterday a lot of pressure up the middle so there will be some just general roster things to keep an eye on here who do they elevate who do they not elevate uh the way i look at it is uh you should be much more on the confident side way way more on the confident side, especially because the Rams don't block very well. But if they don't beat the Rams, then we will raise maybe more questions about this team. But I'm not ready to do that after a extremely close loss to a tremendous football team. Brian Murphy is great to see in the press box yesterday. Murph, I usually don't see you dressed up. It's only golf gear that I ever usually see

and I'm not covering a game for a while at the stadium, but great to have you there. And as always, great to pod. We're going to stick to our Monday schedule though. So Thursday night, Dane and I will do the pod from inside the stadium and then it'll still be Monday morning Murph with you then. So thanks for your time.

And I look forward to that conversation. All right. Don't get too crazy on the sunset strip. Oh yeah. It's a big concern. Hold on. Let me silence my phone real quick. So I can tell you that us days are back at U S cellular again, exclusive offers just for for customers just to say thanks. Right now, you'll get $1,200 off any phone plus $400 off any tablet. Amazing, right? Yeah, but my family is so excited about their new devices that they keep texting me during the show. They're all about us days deals like $1,200 off any phone and plus $400 off any tablet.

Terms apply. Visit uscellular.com for details. So is the confidence shaken? Is the confidence strong? How are you guys feeling? Also curious about any other questions, thoughts, inquiries, and so forth that is on your minds and how you're reacting a day later because trust me as i'm doing the post game show i'm watching the comment section fly by and it

can be you'll never believe this a tad uh reactionary but by monday night everybody's had a time to cool off and say all right okay now let me really think about where the Vikings stand and they've got another game on Thursday night. So you'll be right back at it. Another couple of news items today, Blake Cashman did not practice for the Vikings. I thought that was a huge factor in why they struggled so much against the Lions, not saying that they win the game, not saying they shut them out or anything like that. But the Lions offense was cooking so much through Jameer Gibbs and the underneath passing game. That's where Blake Cashman lives and has made life so difficult.

The other thing is too, that when you're talking about all those changes at the line of scrimmage that we've discussed time and time again, A lot of it starts with Blake Cashman, so his status for Thursday will be important for that game. Kevin O'Connell did not sound the most hopeful that Cashman was going to play, but said that he was positive about the idea that he would play against the Indianapolis Colts in the following week after he gets a little break for the turf toe and so forth and should be able to come back at that point. So I'm not certain that we will see Blake Cashman on Thursday night. And when it comes to TJ Hawkinson, Dalton Reisner, there was no real update on whether

those players are going to be elevated. Kevin O'Connell gets absolutely nothing out of telling us whether they are going to be elevated. Kevin O'Connell gets absolutely nothing out of telling us whether they are going to be elevated for this Thursday's game. I'm sure he would like it to be a surprise when TJ Hawkinson walks out onto that field, but I could very much see it. The way that Johnny Munt played as tight end one, I think has been admirable,

but he had a tough outing against the Detroit Lions TJ Hawkinson seems like he's chomping at the bit and is ready to go we'll be on definitely Hawkinson watch on Thursday as far as Reisner at right guard that's something I still wouldn't be shocked if Reisner goes in and ends up starting it was not the worst day for Ed Ingram. Actually, Garrett Bradbury struggled more on the postgame. I talked about the interior pressure and kind of assumed that it was the right guard, but PFF gave more pressure credit to Garrett Bradbury in the game than Ingram, but I'm not sure that that changes anything about that dynamic with the sample size as big as it is from Ed Ingram for his career.

And the other real news item is just that the Vikings game was flexed against the Indianapolis Colts and kind of like, oh, okay, I guess the Eagles were supposed to play the Jaguars, which was not that different of a matchup. I mean, Indianapolis does have a winning record and the Vikings deserve a little more national TV buzz. I think as a five and one team, I'm sure that they want to kind of get their hands on the Sam Darnold story a little bit there. And Anthony Richardson is a player that still has a lot of intrigue, I think, because he's a young quarterback and they found a way to win, even though he played a really, really poorly. He's just the guy I they found a way to win, even though he played really,

really poorly. He's just a guy I think that needs so much more work actually playing in games. And I think the Vikings should be favored significantly in that one by the time we get there and they'll be coming off of an extra long break. So that's one that we should be writing in as, hey, the Vikings should win this game. But now it has a little added flavor to it. I was surprised, though, on the interwebs today when the Vikings announced that the game was being flexed, that there were some people that were unhappy.

They were like, I don't want that game flexed. I don't want to see it put on to Sunday night football. So I'm curious your guys' thoughts there. Do you not like flexed games? Do you not like flexed games do you not like the the national tv games how do you feel about national tv games with your team in it are you just wounded from many times the Vikings have had the letdown game on national tv or do you like it do you like the energy personally I love it I mean I love going to the stadium at nighttime and just having the extra juice to the game.

The Vikings always put on a pretty incredible show. They add on to their normal pregame stuff when it comes to those night games. And there's just so much energy in the building that I think it's been really fun over the years. But I also could understand where some people would be like, can I just have my normal Sunday? I don't really want to stay up until,

you know, whatever at night and be stressed when I go to bed or something like that. So do you like that? It was flexed or would you have preferred that it just stayed as a, a noon game? So before I popped on, got a couple of questions here, I'll run through questions,

comments, thoughts, feelings for the next about 25 minutes, and then Manny Hill will be ready to pick that schedule. So JP said, Kevin O'Connell shows that he won't adapt. We all know his long developing routes work, but the execution isn't happening. Why not at least bring in some short passes

and let to Jordan Addison or run more? Yeah, I think that they did that yesterday. I really do. They threw a lot more underneath passes with not huge success in terms of yards after catch, which I think is a little bit of the problem with throwing short all the time without TJ Hawkinson, which is that there's just not anybody who gets the ball and is Percy Harvin out there. And he's just going to dodge a bunch of tacklers or Cordero Patterson, even Justin Jefferson, as marvelous as he is at everything yards after catch.

I don't see him as actually being all that special in that area. not in the same way that a Tyreek Hill is where he's special is at the catch point, creating separation, the route running down the field and kind of the same is true for Jordan Addison. Brandon Powell is a little more of that player because he's a punt returner, but they haven't used him almost at all as a wide receiver this year. And Jalen Naylor is really quick. I'd like to see him get the ball a little bit more in those situations. But yesterday they, I thought, brought it in a little bit more,

reined it in, and then only occasionally took their shots and it ended up working out. I think that Darnold only threw something like three passes that were over 20 yards down the field. Another comment here from IShotU99. Every time a question is asked about Turner,

the coaches are praising his work ethic and eagerness to continue learning instead of his on-field performance. Is that usually a bad sign? No, I don't think so with Dallas Turner. I think that he, because of his draft status, kind of like people would ask about Louis seen all the time is always going to be a big discussion. How much they gave up for him is always going to be a big discussion, but this is a unique situation. It's not often that you draft someone at a position where you have two of the best players in the NFL yesterday, the edge rushers, Jonathan Grenard, Andrew Van Ginkle were just phenomenal. They were the best defensive players on the field. Grenard got nine pressures, which might be the

highest he's ever had in his career. Van Ginkle had two sacks. You're not taking those guys off the field too often. Patrick Jones has been playing well so far. Jihad Ward has his own kind of unique interior rushing role. So they tried to put Dallas Turner at an inside linebacker spot on a couple of plays. Didn't work. And they said, okay, that's not really something we can do here. We got to go back to our other guys. He hasn't really had a lot of opportunity to just be on the edge and rush and rush and

rush and rush. I think that because they like what they see off the field, they're trying to get him onto the field more often. And he's doing things that he usually would not have been doing at Alabama. And this is a very, as Kevin O'Connell put it, a high IQ type of defense that requires experience. I mean, this is why it's worked so far, save for yesterday, is the experience. And I think that is why it's worked so far, save for yesterday, is the experience.

And I think that is both a strength and a shortcoming at times. It's not something you can just plug and play anybody in. And maybe that was a little bit of the part without Blake Cashman. But we also just have to let players develop. With rookies, everybody wants them to get drafted and change the franchise immediately. But you look at maybe a Rashawn Gary, for example, took him a couple of years, eventually became a great player. I can't judge Dallas Turner when the guys that are playing ahead of him are so good. And I, okay, you could say, well, why did they draft him then? Well,

I mean, number one, you can move Ben Ginkle around a little bit. That could be part of it, the thought process. But it's also that Van Ginkle's on a two-year contract. You're probably looking at developing Dallas Turner this year, using him a little bit more off the edge and continuing to develop him until his second and third year, and then looking to have him take the reins there after that. I think they would have liked him to be a little more of a rotational player, but they just don't take those guys off the field. Van Ginkle and Grenard, when they're that good, they honestly just don't take them off the field. So I am far from ready to judge anything with Dallas Turner, other than to say what they tried yesterday. It's probably not in his skillset to be able to do right now in the NFL. And maybe over the next

two years, he trains to be the next Andrew Van Ginkle type, but I would like to see him get more pure edge rush types of rushes. And maybe we'll see that as the season goes along, but I just think, I mean, we're six games into his career. I don't want to, and if he was a starter or had an opportunity to start and he was doing nothing or they weren't putting him in, this would be very different. He's sitting behind two Pro Bowl caliber type of players. So I don't know. I just want to give that a lot more time for Dallas Turner. But, you know, I think that as emphatically as they have talked about him and they're trying to get him onto the field, I wouldn't say, oh man, what a bad sign the way the coaches talk about him. Jason asked, the Vikings lost that game more than the Lions won it. Offense had a chance to put it away and failed. Uh, I, you know, in my experience covering, uh, all sports, the fans of one team always think that their team blew it, the losing team.

Um, and the fans of the winning team always think their team won it and never think the other team gave it away. It's just how it works. If you are on Detroit side and they had lost the game, they would have said they gave it away because of the fumble. They would have said they gave it away because of five, six, seven other things that they did throughout the game. They would have maybe blamed the referees for some of the calls or whatever. I understand what you're saying. The Vikings missed an opportunity to potentially put the game away. The game is not over if they get a first down on third and four, but they missed that opportunity for sure on whatever happened on that rollout, which Kevin O'Connell sort of explained today on third and four.

I kind of would have liked to have seen them run the ball there or go a little shorter as opposed to running a route that's five, six, seven, however long, what was it? 10 yards more than they needed. I would have preferred something a little bit just go to the sticks you just need a first down there you don't have to make this more difficult than it needs to be asking your quarterback to roll out asking him to throw toward the sideline asking him to throw it more yards down the field than you need to this is a Hawkinson thing as well I mean that, that's third down and four. Hawkinson get five

is kind of a pretty obvious thing that they should be able to improve on going forward. So I thought in multiple occasions, not having him was pretty problematic for them. And the two point conversion, I don't know. I mean, yeah, they failed and it's different if they don't fail. I also thought that was a great play by Brian Branch and maybe we didn't give him enough credit in the moment for an incredible play. But I just know that always and forever, every team that loses, the fans think our team blew it. And you have to give the Detroit Lions a ton of credit

for winning that football game by moving the ball on offense over and over and over and over again. That was really what won the game, I thought, was their consistency in creating first downs, long drives, keeping the Vikings defense on the field, and blocking it up for Jared Goff. And then he made play after play, converted third downs. The running back was hard to stop i mean it was just a well-played game where it came down to whoever lost the game we would be saying wow man they let that one slip away that was a good game uh the pollock 34 says i don't know why everyone is so disappointed with the loss we had a competitive afternoon with one of the best teams in the league. Yeah. I mean, I think that the other side of it

though is would have felt so big for the franchise and for the, where they stand right now to be six and Oh, would have really been exceptional. It would have been, Whoa, this is 2009 caliber, 1998 caliber. And now you have to not slam on the brakes, not even really press them down. Maybe just touch them. Maybe just touch the brakes a little bit because, all right, somebody else is the best team in the NFC. Now you're probably the second best team in the NFC. And as Jason mentioned, you had a chance to win a game against the best team.

Also though, you know, your team is at home and they put up a lot of yards and there are some mistakes there that kind of keep happening over and over again. The pre-snap type of stuff has been very frustrating. The waste of time out the interior pressure. It's kind of that we've got to the point where it's the same couple of critiques over and over again for this team.

And you wonder, is that going to be, at least on the offensive side, the defensive side that was new. But do you wonder, okay, can they really stop elite offenses? They're not going to see that many more the rest of this season, but you know that it looks like that or can look like that when you face an elite offense. So that might be a little concerning right there. And then when you talk about the offense, just not being able to finish those drives, just a little bit daylight dollar short on some things from being an elite offense.

They played very, very well yesterday. They really did did but there's just a couple of those plays that they leave on the table that the other team didn't and that's how you end up losing it so I think it's fair to look at it and say okay well we pretty definitively know because they didn't win that game that the Lions are still the team to beat. They weren't destroyed at all. They were, I think, overall outplayed. But when you look at the box score, it was really, really close on both sides. Both teams moved the ball, hit big plays, made exciting plays on defense with the interception by Detroit, with the fumble return for touchdown by the Vikings.

So it still feels pretty neck and neck. I mean, you have to give it to Detroit. They went to the NFC championship last year and were this close to going to the Super Bowl. That's where their expectations are set. They've proven they can do it. The Vikings are still trying to prove they can do it. Had they won the game, especially the way that they almost did with the defense making a a big play and Donald charging back in the second half. I think that as it was going on and as they got that, that touchdown,

there was maybe a little team of destiny feeling like, Oh man, this is just how it's going to go every week where this team's going to make a big play. And the guy makes the kick. Ah, okay. Well,

it's not going to be a perfect season everybody and you're still kind of going to be chasing behind somebody else for now in terms of how you're talked about six and oh would have been a little bit different that's the that i think is probably as far as you can go if you go any farther than that i don't know why if you're saying oh they were frauds or they're just not actually a good team. I don't know why you would go that far. Maxwell says, what do you make of KO's explanation for the third downplay that sailed over Jefferson? Sounded like somebody had a route detail wrong. And I'm guessing that person was Jordan Addison, that there's no way that's supposed to be the spacing. So I think Jefferson was in the right spot,

but had Addison been wherever he was supposed to be, then it's more of a clear look at it for Darnold. And the throw may have been more accurate. Had it been a clear look at it, as opposed to into a little bit of messiness in front of him. And that altered the throw enough to, for Jefferson to not be able to catch it. I thought outside of the 51 yard catch, it was a little bit of what's going on Jordan

Addison with this game. Can you align yourself up? And there, do you have the details, right? You know, I don't know. There was something a little bit off there with Jordan Addison in that game overall. And it just sounded like that wasn't where he was supposed to be on that play. At the same time, I've said this before, where when we go back, we can always say, well, you know, the guy was open. And if only Darnold had just, or if only they had run the right detail there and then they would have had the, but a lot of times that is a trend and we can maybe hint at the idea that some of this stuff

is a little too complicated or just, they didn't take the simple path when that was all that was needed on a third and four, there have been so many times third and short where it's overthinking, trying too hard to get a bigger play when you don't really need one, just move the sticks. This is the third and short thing where they've on third and fourth and two or less thrown twice as often as they've run the ball. It felt a little bit, why does it need to be convoluted? Why does it need to require a rollout sprint out kind of thing? And then you go, well, he was open. He could have made the pass. I know, but is that really what was necessary for

that play? And things have to kind of go right there. And one thing went wrong and then they don't end up converting and it ends up being very costly. kerpluppi i don't think any vikings fans should be distraught about the game we competed really well with a team that's being considered the best in the league uh yeah i i mean that's i think where most people stand right now which is that that was an exciting game that could have gone either way it didn't feel feel like, wow, massively outplayed. You don't belong in the same field as the Detroit Lions. No, they clearly did. They were able to move the ball well enough.

They made a big play on defense. They did pressure Jared Goff enough at times and got more sacks than most teams do against him. Got a few pressures, especially from Jonathan Grenard on him when a lot of teams usually don't. And he just made the plays under pressure. And their receivers made the catches that the Vikings didn't always make. And Darnold missed on a couple of throws.

Normally, that's a good enough game to win almost every time. It just wasn't on that day against that team. But I think you could also go through and say, you know, there are times where it just wasn't enough. And there's some of the details that they're not getting right. That might be a little bit short of the championship standard that we're holding them to in that game, but also in the Jets game and almost in the second half, two of the Green Bay game. And now that the sample has grown a little bit of playing less amazing

than they did over the first couple of weeks, you feel a little bit more rocky about where it's going than you would have a couple of weeks ago when they beat the Houston Texans and they just played almost perfect football game top to bottom. It hasn't been that since then. the defense has shown a few more cracks in the foundation at times when they've gotten worn down. Uh, one injury seemed to impact them quite a bit. So there's some little things to pick at where you'd say, is this, is this going to

matter? Is that going to matter? But overall you you shouldn't be saying let me drop them 43 spots in the power rankings or anything like that uh nathaniel says uh biggest wild card this year has been sam darnold just wait till next year when jj mccarthy who we all agree is better mentally as a full-time starter i'm okay so of course yes jj mccarthy is very likely to take over next year but i'm not adopting this just wait till next year. What? They're 5-1. What? What do you mean just wait till next year? No, this team is built right now to be one of the best teams in the NFC. Did you see San Francisco, what happened with them?

One of their receivers is in the hospital with pneumonia. The other one is out for the season. So that's the maybe strongest team in the nfc coming into the season that is in peril uh atlanta got smashed yesterday washington's quarterback hurt his ribs so you know that seems pretty good but are are they great as jayden daniel's gonna get banged up throughout the season because he runs so much? The Eagles might have still a little bit in their Green Bay is going to be a tough team. But what's which what the Vikings just played this close with the Detroit Lions.

What are we doing next year? Huh? What? There's always this. You lose one game. Well, wait till next year. You don't have to do that. You do not have to do that today.

Uh, I don't think because they are right at the front of the race. We just didn't know whether it was Detroit one and Minnesota two or Minnesota one and Detroit two. We found that out. It's Minnesota number two right now, but only by a hair. And that can change as the season goes along

because the upcoming schedule, the Rams aren't that good. Indianapolis is a flex game on national TV, but are they scary to you? Especially with the quarterback against Brian Forrest's defense is Jacksonville scary to you is Tennessee scary to you they're playing Mason Rudolph now because Will Levis is banged up I mean this schedule Arizona should not frighten you at all at Seattle maybe a little but I mean Atlanta after the way that they played and the way that Kirk looked I just what are we talking about next year for I mean I definitely think in the long run, the expectation will be that JJ McCarthy is a better quarterback overall than Sam Darnold, because that's why you drafted top 10. That's why Sam Darnold only makes $10 million a year. And we do have to have some leeway with Sam Darnold at times because we

figured he's going to make some mistakes. He's going to have some breathtaking throws. It's the defense's job and everybody else's to pick up for that. But as far as next year, I'll worry about that in July of next year, when we walk out there for the first training camp and probably McCarthy's the quarterback, but I don't think you should be bailing on this season and saying, wait till next year. That's wild to me. They're five and one. Uh, Joe says, uh, what are your thoughts about a 70 yard field goal? Let him kick. Well, they couldn't let him kick from where they were after the five yard penalty. That was too far. That's just not going to happen. Seven. What was it? 73. That's not, he's not going to make that. Um, as Sebastian Janikowski, who one time was forced to kick a 76 yarder.

That's the ball is just going to run out of momentum, but 68, I would be interested. I still don't know that Will Reichert is going to make it from 68, but I was chatting with Kevin Seifert after the game and we were kind of talking about like, what's the odds of making a 68 yarder versus what's the odds of making a 68 yarder versus what's the odds of throwing a hail Mary. It's probably about the same. So let the kid kick. Yeah. Go for it from 68. Can he kick for the NFL record? I don't know. But that 58 yarder was really on point and a Reichard. I mean, I guess they do need to figure out what the actual limit is because it feels like the Lindsay Lowen thing, the limit does not exist.

That's what it has felt like so far with Will Riker trots out for a 58 yard or casually just chips it on through a what? So I would have loved to have seen a 68 yard kick. We were talking today. Like I rarely, I don't think I ever in my press box seat ever like stand up, uh, you know, for any reason, maybe the Minneapolis miracle I did, but I think I would stand up to watch that one. I was like, all right, let's see this.

Let's see this 68 yard kick. I don't think he would have made it, but maybe there's a 5% chance that he does. Uh, I shot you 99. Should Flores put more trust on our front four to put pressure on the quarterback and not have to rely on sending the blitz every time? Run blitzing also seems like a huge gamble that hurt them yesterday. So I think that he's actually done a good job this year

of rushing four more often. And against Detroit, It was almost like, let's see if they can stop it. Let's see if they can stop the blitz. Let's let's see if this great offensive line can really take us on. I thought Ben Johnson did an amazing job of adding extra pass protectors in there. And then Jared Goff against pressure was able to navigate so well, normally against pressure in his career. There has been issues for Jared Goff, but I think not all pressure is the same. He had to move a little, a couple of times and shuffle in the pocket. He did a good job of that, but it didn't feel like he was getting hit and hit and hit. And I think that most of Jonathan

Grenard's pressures were more of the hurry variety than the QB hit, which I think should be weighed a little bit differently because getting hit for a quarterback, not very fun. And they didn't do that too much. They sacked him, but I didn't think that every time he was letting the ball go,

he's getting smashed. It felt like it was more just moving off the spot, which is kind of how PFF describes their pressures, which is just if the quarterback, because of the rush, has to move, that's what you get a QB pressure for. And they were able to do that on a number of occasions with some of the blitzes and some of the straight-up rushes. But I tend to agree with you that Jonathan Grenard

and Andrew Van Ginkle are so good at this that they could lean a little bit more on that. I'm not sure that was the right approach to send as many blitzes as they did against Detroit. Well, I guess the results speak for themselves there. That Goff absolutely shredded the blitz. We don't know what he would have done if he wasn't blitzed on those same plays because when they didn't blitz, he also shredded them. He had excellent results if he wasn't blitzed on those same plays because when they didn't blitz he also shredded them he had excellent results when he didn't blitz too and i maybe the idea was just if you give jared golf time to throw he's going to tear you up and so they were hoping

to not give him time to throw they blocked it up pretty well and he ended up having a great day against them i don't have too much questions about what Flores does though, because when you look at the results against everybody, except for one team, that's the best in the league on offense, they've been great. That's the only team that's had a lot of success against them. It's pretty hard to get too much into,

Hey, you should actually be doing something else just because of the one game against the best team. Marley says Flores has to figure out something with the quick pass game, carving up his schemes and late game situations. He stops getting aggressive, which boggles my mind. They, in the last possession,

I think they did blitz, and that was what caused it if i'm not mistaken i usually do my film piece on tuesday so i'll have to go back and look at that but my impression of that play based on what kevin o'connell said is that they did send pressure and that was what ended up causing jameer gibbs to be so open with nobody around him, but I'll have to look back at it. There have been times where against Green Bay, they dropped back a lot of people and Jordan Love hit some deep throws there. They also didn't get home on the blitzes. And I think it's just, as we're watching the game, we're not counting the number of guys rushing. So if it feels like, oh, well, the quarterback had time there

and then someone was open down the field, they must not have sent pressure. But sometimes the other team just picks it up. That may have been the case there. Jacob says, I don't really care about the whole primetime thing, whatever. It's a regular season game. That's all just another football game. Well, come on, Jacob.

It's more fun, isn't it? I think so. I think it just ramps up the energy.