Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Bye week bonus: Putting five Vikings subjects under the numbers microscope

Episode Date: December 3, 2023

Matthew Coller takes you through five subjects that we put under the spotlight with the numbers, from TJ Hockenson's improvement during the year to the offensive line to Danielle Hunter's contract possibilities to Harrison Smith and Josh Metellus's usage Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey everybody, welcome to a bonus episode here of Purple Insider. Hopefully you are enjoying your day watching football and having a stress-free NFL Sunday while you listen to this. So during the bye week, I decided to make a little bit of a series on YouTube of five different things to put under the microscope with statistics that are interesting topics to me. So Harrison Smith's usage, the offensive line, Daniil Hunter's situation, and really dive deep into those statistically. So I made it a YouTube series, but I would not want to leave all of you great audio listeners out of this party. So I've got five different subjects that I've touched on from about eight to 10 minutes,

and I'm going to bring them to you back to back to back here now going forward. So again, hopefully you enjoyed your bye week and you're ready for the lead up to Vikings Raiders. And again, hey, don't forget that I'll be out there in Las Vegas at Circa. So if you want to go check that out, CircaLasVegas.com. Should be an interesting week out at TCO Performance Center. Until then, enjoy the stats focus for five different subjects that stuck out to me at the bottom. I wanted to start out the series with TJ Hawkinson because at the beginning of the year,

TJ Hawkinson had a pretty rough start. Even by his own admission, there were a few drops that were quite frustrating, including a drop at the end of the game against the Chargers that cost the Vikings a touchdown that would have won them a game. And instead it bounced off his hands, ended up as an interception. The Vikings got a tough loss there and a lot of fingers correctly at the time pointed at Hawkinson. And when he got off to that tough start, there were questions of, wait, did they sign the wrong guy to a big contract? Or maybe he should have participated in preseason more often. I don't really buy that, considering he came here last year midseason

and played really well right off of another team. So I think that it was more of randomness and a little bit of bad luck for Hawkinson at the beginning of the year. But since that time, he has become one of the Vikings' most valuable players, and arguably, since the beginning of the year, the best tight end in the entire NFL as a receiver. And we'll look at what some of the other numbers say about Hawkinson's performance. But this year, Hawkinson has elevated himself even beyond what he was for the Vikings last year. And a major part of that has been that Justin Jefferson was out for seven games.

So let's take a look at some of the numbers to start out. So here is from Pro Football Focus, TJ Hawkinson and how he stacks up with the other six best tight ends in the league. And this is out of the most targeted tight end. So we removed the tiny sample size. Somebody has one good game or a handful of targets as tight end number two or whatever. This is his peers and how he matches up by the grades against the other best tight ends in the league. And as you can see by receiving grade, Travis Kelsey is number one, uh, not just because he's Taylor Swift's boyfriend, but, uh, but he's very good at football. In fact, one of the best to ever play and Patrick Mahomes main target with a lot of struggling receivers in Kansas City. But still, TJ Hawkinson has been targeted

19 more times and has 10 more catches than Travis Kelsey so far this year. And despite the drops, is considered to be the third best pass catching tight end only behind Kelsey and George Kittle. And those guys are the cream of the crop, the premier players at their position. As far as overall PFF grade, Mark Andrews is a shade higher, but that still puts TJ Hawkinson in elite company. So last year he graded pretty well, but this year he's taken a major step forward. And when you look at those targets compared to the other tight ends, even the ones that have played 12 games like McBride and like commit, you're talking about almost double the amount of targets from those guys. That's not

often you see at this point in the year, 80 receptions from a tight end, but that's what TJ Hawkinson has done. And even though some of it is volume receptions, we'll look at that in a minute, his yards per, only one yard behind Travis Kelsey, not on the same level as far as going downfield as George Kittle, but right in the mix with the other top tight ends. Now, as far as where they've been throwing the ball, and this is again from Pro Football Focus, where they've been throwing the ball to CJ Hawkinson, something really stands out to me because each area of the field is graded by PFF that he has been extremely, extremely good on underneath stuff over the middle of the field.

33 for 39 quarterbacks throwing him the ball in between zero and 10 yards for 312 yards, a touchdown and a 97 quarterback rate. The only interception was that play against the chargers, but also something stuck out too, that he's been going down the field with 11 catches between 10 and 20 yards. And that was something that I wasn't sure we were going to see a whole lot from TJ Hawkinson in Detroit. He had more of been all underneath yards after catch lots of choice routes as we've seen from him. But since Jefferson has been out, he has been more of a deep threat and you could see the two receptions one for a touchdown 50 yards when the ball is traveling over 20 yards to TJ Hawkinson. And this is the area I think he's been used more and has shown

more of his value. It doesn't mean that every area of the field has been successful over the middle and the intermediate, just four for 12 passing in his way with two touchdowns, but every other part of the field, Hawkinson has been very effective. And when we look at some additional numbers from TJ Hawkinson this year, he is second in the percentage of snaps where he is playing in line as a tight end. So this was something that we talked about in the beginning of the season is where is TJ Hawkinson going to line up? Is he going to be outside? Is he going to be more in the slot? And he's actually played more of a traditional tight end role, which I think makes

some of the receiving more impressive because you can have the other receivers lined up at their positions and Hawkinson in if you need them to block. But most of the time, of course, he's going out. But from that spot, getting more matchups against linebackers, finding more space in the middle of the field, it's nice to have that other element of it. And 48% of the time he's lining up somewhere else. But you can see how the league is really turned into move tight ends that tight ends are lining up all over the field. And to have someone coming from a traditional role and having success, I think is a bit of an edge, or at least it's notable that he's been used in more of a traditional way than we would have

expected. He also leads all tight ends in first downs. That one doesn't really require a big explanation, but getting past the sticks for a tight end is pretty important when a lot of the passes are underneath to those guys. And oftentimes when you look at the numbers for tight ends that have a lot of receptions, it's five, six, seven yards. And on third down, they're just the check down and so forth. But that hasn't really been the case with TJ Hawkinson, although he was a half a yard short from converting a fourth down against the Chicago Bears. Vikings quarterbacks have nearly 109 quarterback rating when they're targeting TJ Hawkinson.

Again, this is a stat where most tight ends have high quarterback ratings when targeted. So it's not exactly like a receiver because there's fewer balls that are going down field, fewer interceptions, but still that is very effective when you're completing almost 80% of the passes his way and at the volume that you're using TJ Hawkinson. And when it comes to his run blocking, he has never been really known for that. And he's been dealing with injuries yet. According to PFF, he's been average and an average TJ Hawkinson at run blocking is a pretty good TJ Hawkinson.

And by the way, when the Vikings went out and paid Josh Oliver, there were some questions. Is this a good idea to invest money in a number two tight end? While Oliver has not been that big of a threat in the passing game, he is ranked number one in run blocking. So he has done the job that he was brought here to do. And TJ Hawkinson, even though he has turned it around, is still second in drops and 14th of 15 tight ends with at least 50 targets on contested catches. And if there's anything that separates someone like Travis Kelsey from TJ Hawkinson or George Kittle, but especially Kelsey, it's that ability to go up and get it when there is a contested

catch. And there were a few of those against the bears on Monday night football and numerous ones that we've seen throughout the year where Hawkinson is not necessarily the softest hands receiver. It's not Tony Gonzalez. He mostly is a guy that gets open more than your average receiver and can move once he gets the ball in his hands. So overall, TJ Hawkinson has had a very, very good season. And when they needed him the most, he has been there to help them go five and

two during the absence of Justin Jefferson. And we continue our series looking in depth inside the numbers at different Vikings players and topics at the bi-week. And here's one we really have to dive into. Daniil Hunter. Going into this offseason, we were very unclear about Daniil Hunter and whether he would come back. In fact, it came down to even in training camp where there are reports and rumors that he might get traded. Instead, the Vikings worked out a contract for him for this year, but beyond this year, very hard to say. And oh, by the way, Daniil Hunter has been fantastic. So I think it is a clear consensus from all Vikings fans that they would prefer

Daniil Hunter stay on the team, but there is a pretty key factor in a salary cap league. And that is how much Daniil Hunter will cost to resign. So let's take a look under the microscope at Daniil Hunter in his season so far and what it might take to be able to extend him into the future. So we need to start off with Daniil Hunter leads the league in sacks. That's pretty good. 13 and a half sacks. He has really gelled extremely well with Brian Flores' defense. It's moved him around a little more than it has in the past, and he's found a lot of ways to get to the quarterback despite a ton of attention. And you can see the double teams go toward Daniil Hunter, especially since Marcus Davenport has barely played this year, that the Vikings have really relied on him for the vast majority of their

pass rush. Now, I mentioned that they reworked the contract and one key detail is that they cannot franchise tag him. So he is becoming a free agent if he is not extended before the start of free agency, there is no button they could push to keep him around for one more year. Now, why are we here is a good thing to ask, right? Daniil Hunter's always been great, but in 2000 and 2021, he suffered injuries and only played a handful of games between those two seasons. But over the last two years, he's played every game, 29 games for Daniil Hunter, every game of the Kevin O'Connell era since he has been injured. And that has to speak well for his future.

But that was certainly something that if you were taking over as a front office, you would have major questions about because it was a neck injury and then a torn pec. And you start to wonder, will he fall off at some point or will he get re-injured again? And so far, 29 games in, that has not been the case. So how do we figure out how much it's going to cost for Daniil Hunter? Here's the challenge. As I was looking through for comparable contracts, I ran into two different types of deals for really good pass rushers. And I can't quite figure out where Daniil Hunter falls because his production is so good.

But normally when you have these elite pass rushers, they sign their mega deals right after their rookie contract. So here's three examples. Nick Bosa signed for five years, 170 with 88 million fully guaranteed, but he signed at age 26. So 88 million is the most fully guaranteed ever given to a pass rusher. And San Francisco is assuming that they're getting the rest of his prime through the next five years. We look at TJ Watt. He was 27, a little bit older, a four-year deal for 80 million fully guaranteed, 112 and Joey Bosa five years 135 78 million

fully guaranteed that's the most important number is that fully guaranteed and he was 26 so would Daniil Hunter be looking at four or five years upwards of over 100 million dollars in the range of 80 to 90 million guaranteed because his production with sacks is right in the same ballpark as a Nick Bosa and TJ Watt and Joey Bosa when he's healthy. But rushers that are older do not get these deals. And for the first time we can finally say about Daniel Hunter. Yes, he is older. For the longest time, it felt like we were saying, do you know that Daniil Hunter is younger than this player or that player? Well, not the case anymore. And when I looked at older contracts for players who are still great and still very

productive, they were much more reasonable if we're talking about extending Daniil Hunter. Vaughn Miller, for example, six years, $120 million, which sounds like a lot, but only $51 million guaranteed. So that is $30-something million guaranteed less than the top of the market because he is on the older side. Demarcus Lawrence is a comparable player to Daniil Hunter. Three years, $40 million with $30 million guaranteed. Now, if Daniil Hunter was willing to sign in the ballpark of three years for $40 million and Demarcus Lawrence is 31, so a little bit older than Hunter,

I mean, sign me up today right away. I think we'd already have an extension if that was the case. And Hassan Reddick, a very, very productive pass rusher, he signed for three years, 45 million with also 30 guaranteed at age 28. I think the truth is somewhere in the middle. I think that Daniil Hunter will want more years than three and more guaranteed money by a lot than what DeMarcus Lawrence and Hassan Reddick got. But it's very hard to make an argument for a player who's older and has an injury history that he should be getting somewhere in the ballpark of guaranteed money that TJ Watt or Nick Bosa got. So can they work out something in the middle? the Vaughn Miller contract is probably the closest to that, but six years, it was very clearly Buffalo going all in, which that has not worked out for them going all in on Vaughn Miller and giving him a six-year deal that they could spread out

with the Vikings do that. They almost never go past five. So would they go to four years, something like $50 million guaranteed, try to get him in that range of a hundred million, or is that money that they're not going to want to spend on Daniil Hunter, even despite his production, because you're trying to estimate what it's going to be into the future. So if you are on Hunter's side and you're saying we deserve the Joey Bosa, TJ Watt, because look at our sex production. And if you're on the Viking side saying, no, actually, you're more like DeMarcus Lawrence,

who got three years, 40 million. That is a wide gap. So can they find somewhere in the middle of those two types of contracts? And there's a lot of X factors here involved in this decision for both Hunter and the Vikings, because he has to decide he's coming back as well. Sometimes we act like it's the front office. You either bring him back or you don't, but the player might have different plans, right? And that goes under an X factor as well.

But let's run through the different X factors with Daniil Hunter. Number one, the Vikings don't have different X factors with Daniil Hunter. Number one, the Vikings don't have an immediate replacement for Daniil Hunter. DJ Wanham has been very good. It's clear with Marcus Davenport, his injury issues, that does not look like a long-term thing at all. So where do you find the next pass rusher? Do you have to draft one in the first round, develop them over several years? Can you sign anyone in free agency that's as good as Daniil Hunter? That's hard to do. And if Daniil Hunter is a free agent, like he's your guy, right?

Will they sign Kirk Cousins back is a big factor here because that's a lot of cap space. You can't dedicate 30, 40 million of cap space to Kirk Cousins and then another 20 to 30 on Daniil Hunter. If you're going to extend Jefferson, extend Christian Derrissaw, now you've got some cap troubles. It feels like either one, but not both could happen. Does Hunter hold a grudge? He doesn't seem like it. It seems like he's perfectly happy to show up and sack the quarterback. But this has been going on for years with his contract issues after he originally signed following the 2017 season. And it's got to be frustrating at some point. It's got to feel like this team didn't buy into me fully at some point. And year after year, he continues to prove

that he is still able to be one of the best quarterback pass rushers in the league. And yet they would not sign on the dotted line, which did lead to a little bit of discomfort at the beginning of training camp. How long is the deal is another X factor. The Vikings can't want to go past three years because when you look at past rushers, even throughout history, you can definitely find some that went late into their careers who were wonderful. Bruce Smith, Reggie White, Julius Peppers. But even if you look recently in Vikings history, go to Everson Griffin, go to Jared Allen.

There's a lot of past rushers who by the time they were 31 or 32 years old, they were no longer in the elite category. Now, Daniel Hunter is special when it comes to his size, his strength, and Jared Allen was more of a quick twitch player. Whereas Daniel Hunter uses his strength. Maybe that will lengthen his career. But if you're the Vikings, it is a lot of money to put down. You have to take all of that into account that past 31, 32 years old, it's very hard to predict with a pass rusher. And are the injuries still relevant? That matters quite a bit as well. If you feel like it's still a possibility that the neck injury could crop up and then you sign someone to a massive contract and they can't play,

that's going to be a big hit. And that's something front offices are always wary of. So it's not as simple as just saying, Hey, Daniel Hunter's been great. Sign them. There's a lot of other factors that go into it. Tried to cover some here at the

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Download GameTime today. Last minute tickets, lowest price guaranteed. We're going to look at Josh Metellus. Now, after being drafted the sixth round, Josh Metellus mostly bounced around. He was a special teams player, got into the defense a little bit last year, but this year, suddenly during training camp, we started to notice something. There's Josh Metellus on the field. There's Josh Metellus on the field again. And wow, he's really lining up just about everywhere. But sometimes the things that happen during the preseason and the training camp do not always happen during the regular season. Well, with Josh Metellus, it has surpassed all expectations,

and he has become one of the key members of a Vikings defense that has had a massive turnaround from last year. He is a major product of Brian Flores looking at the skill sets of his players and finding a role, even if it's a pretty unique one. So let's put this one under the microscope and have a look at some of the numbers with Josh Metellus becoming the hybrid star of the Vikings. We start out with his usage, which has been everywhere all the time. Josh Metellus has played 143 snaps on the defensive line, 255 as a box safety or kind of a linebacker-ish role, 283 as a nickel corner, 38 as a free safety, and 18 snaps even at outside corner, probably when there was man coverage and someone motioned and he had to go with them.

But Metellus has been all over the field. And one of the things that everyone has talked about with Metellus, even from the beginning of his career, was his high IQ, his high football intelligence. And even going back to last year, they talked about on special teams that he was the guy that could teach the entire special teams unit. And he picked up on Flores' defense really quickly and seemed to identify with a lot of different roles, whether it was the nickel corner, which we did not expect him to necessarily play very much. Or if it's been somebody who's going after the passer or playing a role in run defense, he's just, he's just been everywhere so far on this defense. And it takes a lot of understanding of how all the moving parts work, but that is played

in Josh Metellus' favor. Now, that's not to take away from his physical skills because he has also been a very aggressive tackler, an effective pass rusher. We've seen him do pretty much everything there is to do on the field. And here's the numbers taking a look at how he is impacting all the phases of his job on defense. He leads all safeties in the NFL with 20 quarterback pressures. And we could also look at how he compares to linebackers because it's almost the same role. But there are other safeties around the league who play similarly, which we'll get to in just a second.

But he has rushed the passer regularly and has been very effective in doing so. And he is in the top 25 out of 68 regular starting safeties by PFF in run defense, tackling and pass rushing. So making an impact, whether then look the way that the Vikings have turned around their run defense, it's been Josh Metellus in part playing a big role there because they haven't often had two or almost never three linebackers on the field. So that has often been his role. And he's been an above average run defender, which you would not expect from a safety. If they're even halfway decent at that, then it's a plus. He is also though the most targeted safety in the NFL, but only 21st in yards per catch allowed, which 9.8 yards and has the third lowest depth of target.

So even though there are a lot of throws going his way, and I think a good example of this would be what we saw against Chicago, a lot of screen passes, a lot of quick throws, a lot of underneath stuff. The average depth of target on throws that target Josh Metellus is only four yards. So it's not like he's getting roasted deep down the seam all that often. It's mostly been underneath stuff in which has allowed him to make tackles and kill drives and not allow explosive plays. And that's where we have to make sure we're looking at all the numbers, not just the number of targets that he has actually faced. He is also 12th most in snaps of all safeties, which would have been totally shocking going into the season. He didn't even have 300 snaps on defense last year.

Now he has 737. And even Brian Flores has admitted at times that at the beginning of the year, you're just looking for a role, seeing what guys can do. And he's been so impressed by Metellus that he's put him on the field more and more and more as the weeks have gone by. And as far as comparable usage, everybody likes to bring up that the Vikings could have drafted Kyle Hamilton. Well, they have their own version in Josh Mattelis with very similar usage also to Kyle Duggar and Jordan Poyer of the Bills, another very effective player. So Josh Mattelis has

emerged throughout this year as being one of the centerpieces of the Vikings defense. That was something that I don't think anybody really saw coming even as training camp was going on. There's another part too that has to be talked about with Metellus. He signed a contract extension before the season. So he was set to hit free agency after this year and the Vikings were able to identify what he was going to mean to this defense even before the season, lock him up to a contract extension. So he will be a Viking over multiple years. And that brings an extra layer of what his value is, how many snaps he's taking, and then the amount of money that

they're going to have to pay him. Might have to restructure that one at some point if Metellus continues to play as well as he has. He's also one of the better stories of this team, having come from at the lowest end of the roster, was even cut in his first year, and then had the practice squad, and then back to the roster, worked his way through special teams. And we've seen that as a theme throughout the defense is a lot of the guys who have played these key roles, they're not necessarily guys who were drafted the highest. And yes, a lot of people would bring up that they did draft a safety with a first round

pick and they have drafted other corners with high draft picks that have not worked out recently, but we've seen an undrafted free agent in Ivan Pace Jr. step up. We've also seen a Caleb Evans have a pretty good season as a fourth round pick and Metellus become this key player. And we're also looking at who can be a part of this for a long period of time. And Josh Metellus falls very much into that category as a player on the rise who is making a consistent impact on this defense and also can be there for years to come and play this type of role, regardless even of who the defensive coordinator is, there should be a role there. And he's playing very much in the style, maybe not quite the level of a Harrison Smith when he was an all pro, but in the style

of what Harrison Smith has done. So if Harrison Smith does retire in the next year or two, Josh Metellus could take his position as well. So kind of a now and later success story for the Vikings. Folks, I hope you've enjoyed listening to us talk about prize picks this year, but if you've missed it, here's how it works. You go to prizepicks.com and it is simple. You pick either more or less between two and six players stat projections, and that's it. Now you're playing. So if it's X number of yards for a quarterback, you just decide, are they going to throw for more or less than that number of yards? But it works with lots of different options, receiving yards, touchdowns, even field goals,

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microscope from a statistical perspective at the bye week. And in this case, we're looking at five players along the offensive line. Now, for many years, the offensive line has been an issue for the Vikings. They have routinely ranked toward the bottom of the NFL in pass blocking. We've seen over the years, Kirk Cousins struggling under pressure, particularly interior pressure. But this year, something has been very different, very, very different when it comes to where pro football focus has ranked the Vikings offensive line and what we've seen from a pressure perspective on Vikings quarterbacks. So how good are they? According to PFF, they're really, really good. Let's take a

look at the numbers. In fact, PFF has the Vikings as the number one pass blocking team in the entire NFL. That's right. Just ahead of the Philadelphia Eagles in PFF pass blocking grade. And the last time that the Vikings were even in the top 15 was 2013. So you watch an entire era, an entire decade of football without a top 15 pass blocking offensive line until this very year. And of course, the sad irony is that Kirk Cousins got hurt in the one year where he wasn't facing anywhere near as much pressure as he was in the past. In 2017, the Vikings were much closer

to average. They ranked 17th by PFF in that year where Case Keenum was very special and was not facing pressure as often, but they had injuries. They replaced guards with cheaper placements. They drafted guards and tried to throw them in there. And then now they have had this offensive line come together from draft picks and then the addition of Dalton Reisner, which we'll get to in just a second. Also, PFF, not out of their minds, because ESPN also ranks the Vikings number two in pass rush win rate as an offensive line. So when opposing pass rushers trying to get past these Vikings offensive linemen, the Vikings offensive linemen second best in the NFL, and 29 quarterbacks were under pressure at a higher rate than Kirk Cousins when he was playing.

Now, Josh Dobbs' numbers are a little different because Dobbs holds onto the ball more often, tries to escape, tries to run away, and technically will be under pressure even if the offensive line does well and grades well. Now, they had a tough night against the Chicago Bears, and that is factored in to these numbers. So even the best pass-blocking offensive line can still have a tough day.

But when Cousins was in there getting the ball out of his hands on time, this team was protecting him as well as he has ever been protected as quarterback of the Minnesota Vikings. Now, why are they so much better? What happened along the way for this team to finally have a great offensive line? Well, let's start with this. Detroit and Philadelphia are the only other teams with two top 25 graded tackles. Last time I checked, offensive tackle, pretty big deal.

And the Vikings have the second best pass blocking left tackle in the league, Christian Derrissaw, a guy who has become so reliable that we barely ever talk about how he has also emerged as now a consistent superstar player in the league. And number two is just ahead, just ahead in pass blocking grade of the great Trent Williams out in San Francisco. So that's the level of play that the Vikings have gotten this year from Christian Derrissaw. Now Dalton Reisner and Ed Ingram, they rank more in the middle of the league, 25th and 38th out of 56. But the thing is, there's no weak link here that last year, what they were looking at is the guards ranking in the bottom of the league, including 56th from Ed Ingram last year and

45th from Ezra Cleveland. So they're much more closer to average, which you can survive average offensive line play. If you have the worst in terms of pressures allowed, then that's going to be a much bigger problem than it has been so far this year. have the worst in terms of pressures allowed, then that's going to be a much bigger problem than it has been so far this year. There have been moments where there's been some frustration at the guard position, but for the most part, average play is good play at a position that is so hard to find in the NFL with good guards. The other thing is too, Garrett Bradbury has really come along. Two years ago, he was benched and he ranked dead last in pass blocking grade.

Just two years ago, he improved last year and he has continued on that path this year after a slow start because of the back injury, but he's come back. He's been solid. That's middle of the league, which again, if you're in the average range, you're not having a massive impact the way that someone like Jason Kelsey again, if you're in the average range, you're not having a massive impact the way that someone like Jason Kelsey would, but you're still doing your job effectively. And that is what Garrett Bradbury has done over the last two years since Kevin O'Connell took over. They have also been a healthy offensive line. Now go ahead and knock on wood here as the Vikings go

down the stretch, but they've only had 427 snaps combined by backups, Austin Schlotman and Dan Questenberry. And both of them were actually pretty decent, especially Schlotman taking over. He graded fairly well when he was in for Garrett Bradbury. So all those factors together, the lack of a weak link, a leak play at the tackle position and good health have all come together for the Vikings to a weak link, a leak play at the tackle position, and good health have all come together for the Vikings to have a good offensive line. What about the run blocking though? I know you were about to ask it. I know you were about to say, hey now, they haven't been good at run blocking. Well, this is where PFF would disagree with that. They ranked the Vikings

seventh in run blocking, but ESPN is a little less impressed when it comes to the win rate. And this might explain some things because even though the Vikings have had good blocking grades from some of their offensive linemen, what the win rate is going to tell you is when something went wrong. And what we know about run blocking is it usually takes all five or when Josh Oliver's in there or CJ Ham, all seven in order to block effectively up front. And so if one person makes a mistake on a play that can blow it up, we've seen that many times. So if PFF is giving tons of credit to Christian Derrissaw, but Dalton Reisner makes a mistake and he has been one of the worst graded in the entire league,

51st out of 56 in run blocking for Dalton Reisner. So you might get a decent grade out of the four linemen, but have one go wrong. And then that's where that win rate comes in from ESPN. But here's the thing. Alexander Madison has the sixth worst rush yards over expected per carry, which means that based on where the blocking is, we would expect Alexander Madison to get almost a half a yard more per carry than he has been getting so far this year. So the offensive line can't be doing their jobs. And then Madison doesn't find the right hole,

runs into the back of somebody, has happened a few times, gets tracked down when normally you wouldn't expect him to get tracked down or running back with a little more speed. And that's how you end up with the numbers not matching up what the run blocking is. And only three times has a Viking runner gone over 20 yards. I believe one of those was on the fake punt by Ty Chandler. So if you don't have explosive plays, you're not going to rack up as many yards on the ground and you're certainly not going to have a good yards per carry. Doesn't mean there hasn't been the opportunities there from the blocking.

So that's the point. So as you look at the total picture of the Minnesota Vikings offensive line, they have given this team more than a chance to win on a week-to-week basis. And the other thing is too, that we need to consider, it could be set up for quite a long time. Christian Derrissaw is very likely to get a contract extension. Brian O'Neill already has been extended. Bradbury extended last year. Ingram is on his rookie contract and Dalton Reisner, a free agent. If they like what they've seen from him, they could bring him back after having him in house

for this entire year. They could be set up here with a good offensive line for quite a long time. Whether that means bring back Kirk Cousins and let him play from a clean pocket or bring in a rookie and give him time to throw, I guess we'll find out. But we will know that this unit will no longer be the one that tortured you for so many years with pressure after pressure up the middle. So that's what we found out here by the bye week, five weeks more to go for this offensive line. And they will need to be good as they're going to face some very good pass

rushers down the stretch, starting with Max Crosby with the Vegas Raiders. And of course, we'll be covering it there. Purpleinsider.com, the Purple Insider podcast, and the newsletter as well. So check all that out and we'll catch you next time. Continuing the series where we put players under the microscope at the bi-week, take a closer look at some of the numbers, how they've been used, what their performances are, the ones that have stood out the most. And among those is Harrison Smith. The Vikings all pro safety has been back to his old shenanigans. If you remember last year, I'm sure you didn't forget. He was used

very differently than he was in the past. He was playing most often at a free safety position as the Vikings played in a completely different style of defense than Mike Zimmer had had in the past. And of course there are always criticisms of Mike Zimmer and his coaching while he was here. But one thing you can't criticize is how well Mike Zimmer used Harrison Smith and how effective he was during Zimmer's time here, including making an all pro multiple pro bowls and an argument that he was among the best baby top two or three safeties of the entire decade when Zimmer was in charge. So last year when he didn't have the same type of impact on the defense, there was a question of, well, has Harrison Smith started to drop off or was it just

how he was used? And I think now at the bye week, we have a pretty clear answer that his usage was just not a great fit last year. And this year under Brian Flores, it has been a much, much better fit. Let's have a look at some of the numbers. So how differently is he being used? So much that the head coach called it out in a press conference. Just the other day, Kevin O'Connell said, Harrison Smith, I think all Vikings fans were excited to see 22 down around the line of scrimmage, pressuring again, being part of some of those things as was I, which, you know, a real acknowledgement from Kevin O'Connell that last year was not the right way to use Harrison Smith for him to have the impact that he had during the

Zimmer era. And what was really noticeable even from the beginning of training camp, was just how often he was blitzing and rushing and frustrating even his own team and the Vikings offense as he was doing all that blitzing. But also we know that Harrison Smith is one of the smartest and most instinctual players in the NFL. So putting him in the box just makes a lot more logical sense than it does playing him back in a two deep and letting him read route combinations. And the Vikings have clearly agreed with this. And let's take a look at just how much last year he rushed the passer only a grand total of 14 times, 14 snaps the entire season for Harrison Smith. Pretty criminal, honestly. But this year, it's been 70 so far. And unsurprisingly, he has made an impact three sacks so far this year versus none last year on those 14 pass rushes. He already has more snaps up in the box this year than he did all of last year and almost

four times as many on the defensive line. So if you take notice when he's on defense, you will see him creeping up to the edge rather often. And the most notable example of that was in Carolina when he gets the strip sack to put up a bow on that game against Bryce Young. Those are the types of plays that he is back to making. And this usage under Brian Flores is very similar to the Zimmer era, but it's actually even more extreme. In 2017, about six out of 10 snaps, he was up at the line

of scrimmage. This year, 64% at the line of scrimmage rather than playing back. And I'm certain that a lot of those playing back situations are in pure passing spots for the offense, but on a play to play basis on regular downs, Harrison Smith is up there causing problems, rushing, confusing the opposing quarterback. Oftentimes at his best, Smith will be up at the line of scrimmage. And at the last second, he'll drop back. He'll blitz from one side or he'll drop back and someone will blitz from the other. There's just been a lot of confusing looks and Harrison Smith is at the centerpiece of that. The one area that is different, and this does make sense, is that last year he had five interceptions. So far, he does not have any

interceptions. And look, if you're playing him deep and he still is incredibly talented and an all pro caliber player, he's going to find some way to impact the game. And that's how he did it last year with the interceptions, as opposed to this year, it's stopping the run, it's rushing after the passer and so forth. And as far as his overall performance goes, he is grading slightly higher this year than he was last year. And those interceptions would have pushed the grade up, but the overall impact on a play to play basis for Harrison Smith has been wildly different. Even if the PFF grade only says he's playing a little bit better than he was, he's much more involved in the run stopping, which has been a huge improvement

for the Vikings defense from last year. And he already has 10 more run stops than he had last year. So his involvement has been important there. But where I think it's the most important is what he can do from a communication standpoint and the instincts that he's allowed to play with at the line of scrimmage. And this works to a bigger trend of this defense, which is Brian Flores using players the right way. And whether

we saw that in Josh Metellus or finding a way to get a rookie in as an undrafted free agent linebacker, or even the step up that we've seen from Cam Bynum as well, who has been a big time playmaker for this defense. DJ Wanham has taken another step, but we generally connect that to young players, finding their skills, developing those skills and making plays. But I think what Harrison Smith shows you is a really good example of how even a veteran player, even one of the most talented players in the NFL can still be impacted by coaching and by scheme. And Smith is a good example of that. Now there's another part of Harrison Smith season that is worth bringing up is that if he makes another Pro Bowl, he already has six in his

career, that he would put himself in very rare air historically with Pro Bowls, and that could have an impact in how he's looked at for the Hall of Fame. Now, is it the best way to look at Pro Bowls for the Hall of Fame? Of course not. It's a flawed process for putting players in the Pro Bowl. In fact, when Harrison Smith was All-Pro in 2017, the first round of Pro Bowl voting did not have Harrison Smith in it. So that's how absurd the Pro Bowl voting can be at times. But at the end of the day, when they look at your resume to go into the hall of fame that is something that's going to be factored in uh and hopefully in the future as well as what is pff grade say which puts him in the upper echelon of tight ends dirt of safeties during his career so harrison smith's career may have been extended here by playing for brianores. He admitted going into the season that he did think about potentially retiring

and decided to come back in part because he was excited about playing for a more aggressive defense and what Brian Flores could bring to the table. It has paid off big time for him to have come back and big time for the Minnesota Vikings defense, which has had a massive turnaround from where it was last year. So that's another player under the spotlight here at the bi-week. Make sure you check out our longer form podcasts as well here on purple insider, and we will catch you next time.