Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Darrisaw, O'Neill questionable; TNF's Sam Schwartzstein joins! (Part 2)

Episode Date: October 23, 2025

Matthew Coller talks about the surprising news that Christian Darrisaw and Brian O'Neill are both questionable for Thursday's game and Andrew Van Ginkel is out. Thursday Night Football's Sam Schwartzstein checks in with an analytical preview and Guilty as Charged podcaster Steven Haglund gives a position vs. position analysis. The Purple Insider podcast is brought to you by FanDuel. Also, check out our sponsor HIMS at https://hims.com/purpleinsider Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See https://pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

This episode of Purple Insider is presented by Fandul. Northern Prizes, just want to see McCarthy play good or bad. Absolutely. I mean, finding out what you have is so interesting in football. And I haven't written off the idea that the Vikings can get hot with McCarthy and turn a corner and be a good team. I mean, I've just continued to bring up that Broncos team from last year. but it's the same kind of circumstance. It's an inexperienced quarterback, a lot of talent on the roster, a good coach,

and the quarterback finds it, and they play really well, and they get hot down the stretch, and they make the playoffs. It happens in the NFL pretty often, where we don't know all the answers to the test after six weeks and after, you know, a three-and-three record. Like, that happens a lot in the NFL where things turn one way or the other. And when you're talking about a different quarterback, it can always turn in in one way or the other. But I think what the problem with a lot of folks had just from an entertainment standpoint

and an intrigue standpoint and the finding out part was the possibility even that Carson Wentz could play well enough to be the starting quarterback and that it could become a locker room thing and everything else. Like he would have to throw for 500 yards for that. I mean, I think that after the Philly game, everybody was. like, all right, we're on the same page. Like, this guy can beat the bad teams. He's going to lose probably to a lot of the good teams and end up eight, nine,

and that's the ceiling for this. And then that's a backup quarterback. Good job, Carson. But there was no magic surprise. Whoa, it's Sam Darnold again. He's going to win 14 games. And the Philadelphia loss, you know, may have benefited them in that way. Because if Carson Wentz pulls off some crazy, like, let's say,

they get a stop and wence pulls off some crazy last second touchdown 50 yard touchdown to t j hawkinson or something and then we're all going like wait uh if you beat the chargers do you you would have to stay with wents until the wheels came off philadelphia loo the loss to philadelphia made it very easy to go back to mccarthy regardless of what happens against the los angeles chargers so you're right that that means that you're going to get to see him. And I think everyone feels a lot better about that, even if it goes downhill, even if he doesn't play well, it's like, well, at least you saw it and you understand what you have there.

And now you can go forward as a franchise until you see enough J.J. McCarthy, then you're just going to feel like you're in purgatory. And that is the hardest place to be in the NFL is just another team in the league. this was my point about the Arizona Cardinals. I think I said this after the post game. I said it feels like this team is kind of like the Arizona Cardinals. You're just another team in the league. Like nobody's really talking about you.

Nobody's really thinking about you. You're not really a contender. You're not terrible, but you're just another team in the league. That's how they feel if Carson Wentz is your starter. If J.J. McCarthy is a starter. You're one of the more interesting teams because of the amount of talent. because of the coach and quarterback connection, because it's a first rounder.

So there's a big gap there. And also there's a world where you can actually be a contender. Marauder says Fandulh, Herbert blows up 255, will hit that easily 20% trust. That's the Fandul question of the day there. And yeah, look, I mean, you could have Justin Herbert throw for over 255 and still lose the game because he's playing from behind.

I tend to feel the same way. that the way the secondary has played so far against Rogers, against Hertz, does not give me a ton of confidence. But one stat that I was looking up is just pass rush win rates. And you'd be very surprised at, like, and I think I brought this up maybe last night about Grenard, but Jonathan Allen has had a good pass rush win rate. Like they are getting opportunities,

but there's just not a lot of dropbacks to go around. And there hasn't been that one kind of breakthrough. you also are playing a quarterback in Rogers who got rid of it quick, quarterback and Pennix who got rid of it quick, um, quarterback running quarterbacks that they faced, Dylan Gabriel, they just didn't allow to do anything.

So there hasn't been a quarterback like, uh, Herber who is going to stand in there and throw the football, which means opportunities to actually get sacks. So, uh, you know, that, that I think there,

that there is a chance. Northern Pride is 50-50 on 255.5 on fan do for Justin Herbert name says couldn't contain the Eagles felt like they were hyper focused on keeping Barclay and the quarterback shelved who honestly knows still don't even know what the team's identity or their weak points. Yeah, I mean, I think that we can identify some of the weak points. I mean, yes, you're right that they did put a lot of guys in the box, which they don't always do. And they really wanted to make sure that Saquan Barkley was not going to light them up. that game. I mean, I think also Judkins' performance, the Kenneth Gainwell game that will never

forget, that probably got in their head a little bit. I'm sure that it would when you're talking about such dominant run performances against them. Then, hey, here comes Sequin Barclay. But it's not like they forgot about the wide receivers. They just couldn't cover them. And that would be, and the same thing with D.K. Metcalf, they didn't forget about D.K. They just couldn't stop him. And that's where, okay, this team's got a bunch of weapons. Can they actually stop them? can they prove to anyone that they could cover? Because when you go around the secondary, Okuda has been so far anytime on the field, somebody, the opposing team is going to target right away.

Rogers was amazing in that one game. The rest of the way has just been okay. I can pull up Rogers overall statistics this season because, I mean, that was a really tough game. 29.3 pff grade deserved in that game. So his grades outside of the 99, the insane two touchdown, have been 52, 60, 51, 69, which is not all that great. Overall, that's a lot of average type of play from Isaiah Rogers, who has been a backup for a lot of his career. And maybe we saw some of the reason for that in the game.

Now, I think with corners, it's so up and down, and that's, that is the nature of the beast. but I don't think the teams are going to be terrified of throwing his way. They've just avoided throwing at Byron Murphy. Theo Jackson hasn't gotten a lot of opportunities to make plays, but also hasn't shut people down. And using Josh Mattelis as a deep safety was a difficult thing for them to do. So there's just a lot of, I don't want to even say weakness, but areas where you could see a team's not being afraid to attack in the secondary

and matchups that they can win. That is the way I might put it, is that when you have Ladd McConkey and he's a slot guy or Keenan Allen's a slot guy and they're running short area stuff, if you end up with Mattelis against him, that's a tough matchup. If you end up with a Quentin Johnston having to be tackled by Isaiah Rogers with the ball in his hands, it's just a tough matchup. So their weapons have the edge here. And that's why I probably would say that the confidence isn't that high that they can keep Herbert down. to me, it's all about sacks, strip sacks, and interceptions to, if they want to win this game. RJ says such a 50-50 game, it's scary. Well, yeah, I mean, and that's, you know, the Chargers on Fandul favored by three and a half,

which is basically a coin flip when you consider the road part of it, if they're still factoring that in. Marauder says could take 20 to 30 games. I assume you mean to figure out who J.J. McCarthy is. See, I don't think so. I don't think it will take 20 to 30. games for us to have a really good sense of it. Now, somebody like Sam Darnold played 50 games and nobody knew how good he was, but here's why I don't think it will take as many to figure out with J.J. McCarthy. This team is good. They have the best receivers. They have a good

offensive line when it's healthy. They have a coach who won 14 games with Sam Darnold last year and whose quarterbacks have performed traditionally at a pretty high level and comes from the best system for quarterbacks in McVe. And I know that, you know, there's nitpicks and critiques and everything else. But my gosh, you saw how many receivers were open last week, right? That's what usually makes it hard. So evaluating Cam Ward, good luck. Cam Ward.

I mean, my God, that guy has nothing. Terrible coaching. Terrible weapons. Tyler Lockett was their big signing. and Kelvin Ridley, these washed guys, I mean, how are you supposed to figure out if Cam Ward can play? That's really hard to do.

Even Bryce Young a couple years ago, how are you supposed to you just had nothing? How are you supposed to figure out if Bryce Young could play in year one when he's got nothing around him? That was the Sam Darnold thing, that no receivers, bad offensive coordinator, they fire the coach.

Like, what? How do we even know? Here, none of that's true. None of those things are true. all the opportunities are there and that's where when you look around and jalen hurts is an example jalen hertz first time starting he was not amazing but i think you could tell oh oh there's something here and i'll say that for jordan love too i remember jordan love they lost a game to the atlanta falcons i think he fumbled a snap or something really dumb but he played

with command of the game and i remember doing a podcast talking about it and being like I don't know. Like, I think that he can at least play. And he added some bad moments in that first year, but there's a level of does he look like he can at least play? And then the rest might come along. Bow Nix was the same way last year. That's, I just keep going back to that.

But thinking about first impressions of quarterbacks and how often it's usually just right what the smell test was if they were playing for a good team. Gosh, Justin Herbert's smell test immediately was really good. he wasn't even playing for a good team um go through yeah matt stafford had bad teams forever that was a harder one to figure out joe burrow you know that joe borough you know that joe burrow is a good example i mean he had t higgins and he had jemar chase uh in his second year and you could see it right away in 2021 that he knew what he was doing and he had good weapons and a system that came kind of from that los angeles and then okay it looks like it's supposed to look um so no we don't we still don't

know on a lot of quarterbacks overall like the the shades i mean and daniel jones proves that but daniel jones another another guy that when he had one good team around him he went to the playoffs one a playoff game and at least you knew that that was there uh with daniel jones so you i mean that wasn't his first year starting but even in his first year he showed some signs jones it's not like he's just always been terrible there's a reason that kOC wanted him here um so usually you have a good circumstance and you see some signs that the guy can be good, then we know right away that there's something, something there, even if it's not the entire picture with a quarterback, which takes a lifetime sometimes, because I always thought that Matthew Stafford

was just pretty good, but not great, and tried to play way too much hero ball and through way too many bad picks and took way too many bad sacks. I did a big analysis piece analytically, break it down. Kirk versus Stafford and the high end, of course, of Stafford was higher, but Kirk was more consistent. It was like, I don't know, I think they're in the same bucket. And then he goes to L.A. And he makes big improvements. I mean, he played so much more in system. Actually, when he's got less athleticism, he's been better. And then he's got Cooper Cup. He gets Pooka Nacua. He's got McVeigh. And now, I mean, he's, he's, I think, probably going to go to the Hall of Fame, Matthew Stafford, or at least there's

a real discussion about it and things change, circumstances, but not just that, but also players change, players grow, players improve. Sam Darnold looks way better than he did. I watched that tape of him going four and two for Carolina, and he looks way better than he looked then. So guys get better. So to your point, I mean, sometimes it's not even 20 or 30 games. Sometimes it is 50 games until we really, really truly know and we see the whole picture, but at least get a sense when you have a really good team. That's kind of the point. KFT says many quarterbacks have been given up on before they had a chance to prove it.

Mayfield and Darnold are two recent quarterbacks before they took a step toward showing out. So those two examples, hey, by the way, I mean, you talk about giving up on, like someone like Sam Darnold, Carolina traded a second round pick for Sam Darnold. Like, they saw he had even shown in his time in New York enough flashes for a team to believe that he could still be that guy. Now, Mayfield, you're right. Cleveland gave up on him. But again, he took them to 11 wins.

He was within one or two throws of beating the Kansas City Chiefs in a playoff game. It's not that usually if they eventually become something, there were at least signs somewhere along the way. Gino Smith was maybe the example of someone who was absolutely atrocious and showed no sign and then got better. But in the last few years, that looks more like a pop-up season for 2022 than the reality with Gino Smith. But there's very few examples of someone who just has no success whatsoever in a good circumstance and then turns out to be really good. Usually And Jared Goff's second year was kind of my example for what McCarthy could be, which is, yeah, there's limitations to this scheme, but he also is able to function and operate it with a good circumstance. Goff was only a second year player when he led a number one offense in 2017 for the Rams.

So usually when you have a good situation, then you can properly evaluate, you can properly evaluate what that guy is going to be. not to say that we know the whole picture, but at least what the Vikings need to know is those three outcomes. Are you really looking for another quarterback? Like, uh-oh, this has gone way wrong. Go find somebody else. Are you considering a quarterback competition because there were ups and downs, so you got to have a backup plan?

Or are you locked-ed-ed set? Max Brosmer could be the backup. I don't care who the backup is. He's the dude going forward, going into next year. You need to know that. And at least you'll have a percentage of that through 10 games. That's my point. Folks, are you overwhelmed by the number of different options for hair loss?

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Uncommon goods, we're all out of the ordinary. Either way, I mean, we all want to start seeing them. So even if you say it's going to take. you know a hundred games like well let's uh let's start let's do you got to start somewhere you got to start with game three before you can get to whenever uh you get to the complete story so uh anyway uh well let's see uh get yourself an insulated coozy and it will stay cold well normally i just drink it so fast that it doesn't really matter to tell you the truth it's usually still cold by the time i'm finished if it's a can if it's a bottle it's

a little longer. LDR believer Herbert about 280 yards, Vikings defense levels out and starts to get some turnovers. That's, I think the regression part of it, getting turnovers. They just have not gotten any or sacks. That's pretty unusual for a team with this much talent. That should start to happen. So I agree. That was answering that Fandulul question of the day, 255. Herbert's over under. And what are the chances the Vikings are able to keep him under? Adrian said, don't know why the Vikings would trade away Blackman, if he isn't a CB2-3 needed him for some death. Same goes for Phillips. I don't agree on Phillips.

I think that Jalen Redmond has been better than Harrison Phillips. It's really that they were missing Cashman. They were missing Mattelis playing in the box. They were missing, and they were playing Javon Hargrave too much. But Levi Drake Rodriguez and Jalen Redmond have just been just as good. I think Redman has been better than we ever really saw from Harrison Phillips. As much respect as I have for Phillips is a great run stopper. Redman is getting in the backfield and making plays.

So there's a reason that they did that. That I'm not so concerned about. With Blackman, if you look at how he's played in Indianapolis, numbers-wise, it hasn't really been very good. It's part of a great defense. I think the overlooked one is campaign. I think if we're going to say, hey, that was a guy that you should. should not have let go. It's buying him. I don't think it's Blackman. I think the problem with Blackman

is that they didn't replace him, is that they thought, well, Jeff Okuda had a good camp. He's a physical guy. We'll use him instead. And they also probably expected Harrison Smith to be 100% and then have Mattel is playing his typical role. But that didn't happen either. But Fabian Moreau is the only guy brought in after cut downs and all that. That's where, and look, if you're again, if you're redoing it. It's probably, if you were going to trade away the equivalent of a fourth round pick for somebody, a corner would have made more sense than what they got out of Adam Thielen for that. And I think Thelan will still make some plays for this team as they go forward and is good for J.J. McCarthy. And I think that trade has a chance to look much better down the

road as he rotates in as a wide receiver, especially if someone gets hurt, but not getting another corner and saying, I think Okuda is going to be fine. That one right there is the one rather than while getting rid of Blackman. But he hasn't played that well. And I saw him in camp and I totally understood it. It just didn't look like the same guy. But Bynum, I think, was a unique player. Intelligence.

His, I mean, not just the character gets made a lot out of. And he's A plus when it comes to that. But football intelligence and also had a lot more toughness than I think people gave him credit for because of his size, downhill tackler, playmaker in the second secondary. And I think that even though, you know, Theo Jackson will make some plays eventually that the drop off there has been more than we thought. Safety has been a position that we often think, oh, you just get another guy. And this has been a team. Just get another guy. But maybe Bynum was not just another guy. I think he was well above average. So I don't look at it like those two. I look at it like Bynum. Let's see. Let's see. Ahmed has anyone asked KOC if JJ was 100% healthy right now if he would be starting, wonder if KOC would give a straight answer. Well, the answer is clearly, I mean, clearly yes after Philadelphia. And I mean, he more or less said it when it came to what he said on, well, not Friday. What day was that? Tuesday. Yeah.

Normally that would be a Friday, but Tuesday. What he said on Tuesday was just that he'll, I mean, he's strongly insinuated it. So I can't say for 100% sure that he'll be back or that he would be the starter if he's 100% healthy. But he did say, if it was a Sunday game, he would be ready to go, which sounds to me like that. I think that's a fair way to interpret it. And what Kevin O'Connell had to do here was leave the door, at least open a crack that Carson Wentz was just amazing. And when I talk about how nobody knows anything when it comes to quarterbacks, it's true. They didn't know how Carson Wentz was really going to play when he got in there. And then his first game against Cincinnati's pretty awesome. And you're like,

Well, I don't know, maybe. I mean, when Sam Darnold did it last year, maybe. So if Carson Wentz had beaten Philadelphia and then went out to L.A. and dominated and he wasn't banged up in five different ways, they would have stuck with him. I'm sure. They would have just said, hey, we're going to roll with the veteran and he gives us the best chance to win. So they didn't want to commit to McCarthy coming back if there was a chance whence was going to be great.

And yeah, I think it's fair to say that if they were fully locked in, 1,000% on J.J. McCarthy, then they wouldn't have even left that door open. They would have said, yeah, McCarthy's our guy when he comes back. But after only playing two games, how can you even say that? So, you know, this is where once Wentz shows you that he's not the guy who's going to shockingly take you to the Super Bowl, then, okay, go back to J.J. McCarthy and carry on with the plan. Adrian says, what is West Phillips role as the offensive coordinator since he's not calling plays?

So while Kevin O'Connell didn't call plays for the Rams either, keep that in mind. And there's quite a few offensive coordinators that don't. Well, one thing is the game plan. The head coach does not have time because he is managing every aspect of a franchise to sit in his office and create an entire game plan by himself. So the offensive coordinator, along with the other position coaches and the coordinator leads these meetings, they get together and they put together the game plan. So they're looking at what plays they think will work for next week, the breakdowns of their players and what schemes they think they want to use against the other team. They've watched tape on the other team and they've taken a ton of notes and they've looked at the data and that's like what they're doing every day. These position coaches and Phillips is the one who's leading that discussion.

of how are we going to attack the next team and put together this game plan. So then they put together all the plays. Let's just call it 100 because I don't know how many plays they go into with a game. Matt Nagy said something like goes into 300. I remember that. Like, I don't know, man. That's a lot. Anyway, let's just call it 100.

So they put together 100 plays that are going to be on the play sheet for the next game based on what they've seen from each one of their positions. How do you want the offensive line to block effectively? the run coordinator, what he think is going to work schematically, the past game coordinator along with Josh McCown and what they're going to, what they think will work as far as concepts. And then they put it together and then they present it to the head coach. And the head coach goes through it.

This is just my understanding of generally. Like I'm not saying that they've brought me in the room, like generally with what offensive coordinators will do. And so then they bring it together. The head coach goes over. the game plan. All right. Here's what, here's my ideas. Here's your ideas. This is Tuesday. Every Tuesday. This is a full day long process. So it's not just like, uh, a coach, here's a couple plays. Like this is a very meticulous thing. They work sometimes into the night, uh, going through

it and picking apart every detail. And then they decide on the play sheet and what they're going to teach the players when they come in on Wednesday as the next game plan. That's my understanding of the process. So West Phillips is, is leading that. just the way Kevin O'Connell was. And it's the right-hand man to the coordinators or to the other coaches is the coordinators. So, you know, Brian Flores, it's a little different. You know, he's with his group is putting together the plays and meeting with players, but he's only covering that one side of the ball where the head coach is going through both sides.

So that's at least my feeling on it. Again, they haven't brought me into these meetings, but just that's, That's usually in general how that works. And even the play calling at the end of the day, like in the head coach's headset, they are talking through the entire game, whether it's the office of coordinator or the quarterback's coach, they're in his headset saying sometimes, hey, this is what I see. We should do this. This play is what we should use here because I saw this.

They have Ben Ellifson is a coach up in the box where he's taking notes of every cover that they faced. He told me this when I did a story on him last year, that that's one of his jobs on game day is he has to see the defensive coverages. I think that's what he said. And he writes it down for what coverage the opposing team played for every play. And then they look at it of like, oh, okay,

they've played this against our plays. And it's basically like real time charting. It's not so easy to do. You've got to have a lot of experience for that. But that feedback is then sent down to the coach when they're looking at certain plays. All right, here's what we're facing and it's just pure chaos. So, yeah, I mean, there's, there's a lot going on with the offensive coordinator. Andrew, what's Purple Insider analysis of the Timberwolves, Blazers. Oh, okay. Well, it would be

listen to Dane Moore, really good friend of mine, Dane Moore, NBA podcast. Great, great, great, great analysis. John Krasinski, we know does a great job over there. Jace Frederick, a good friend of mine so great media over there follow them they know more than i do links i can do uh wolves uh i don't know anthony edwards good how about that i'm i'm not your wolves expert but we they got some good media over there uh med says uh hindsight 20 20 but having cam scataboo on this team uh he's so fun to why well yeah like i think scataboo is probably a guy who a lot of people overthought a little bit but then at the same time don't you draft a running back like that in the fourth round. Like, you only draft Jemir Gibbs or B. John Robinson in the first.

And even then, that's pretty, you got to hit on it. And you got to have the right circumstance. Because if you draft Ashton Genty and you can't block for him, it's going to be pretty bad. So yeah, I guess if they had had a bunch of draft picks, maybe that would have worked out. Adrian playing Hargrave too much. Why are the Vikings paying that much money then? Well, he's making $15 million a year. The top defensive tackles are making $10 million more than him. So that's kind of rotational money in free agency for somebody like Javon Hargrave, rotational pass rusher type of money. I mean, Milton Williams made $26 million and he played 500 snaps last year. Like it's a position pass rushing DT that gets paid a lot of money. And

the reason you do it is you overpay for guys around your rookie quarterback contract. Like we've been over that. You overpay to make sure you get them and you don't worry that much about the implications of how much they're being paid because you have this cheat code at the quarterback position, and you can do that. That's the model to do it. Now, has he been good enough would be the question? And the answer is, no, he has not been good enough so far to justify. I thought he was really good against the Browns. He was really good against the Bears. And they need him to get after the passer. But if he only plays 20 to 25 snaps per game and it's all pass rush, I'm good with that for 15 mil.

I mean, if you're asking Jonathan Allen to play 50 snaps at 21 mil, and it's not at the level that you were looking for, I think that's a different story. But Redmond has forced their hand. Sometimes the backup is just better. Like, he is just good. That guy has been a beast. So, yeah, I mean, yeah, you're going to reduce the number of snaps for the veteran player because the younger player has been awesome.

Norse force is pace in the doghouse. I think that there was, there's some realities of Ivan Pace that have really shown themselves this year, that when you have Harrison Phillips and Jonathan Bullard and their jobs are to just hold guys in place with their size and strength, then Ivan Pace can shoot gaps and he could just hit guys and kind of be a Wolverine. And that's all they really need him to do. But when you're playing a little bit different, I don't think that that fits for him. I also think that he's never really been the best terms of identifying things coverage-wise.

Not a guy that they could give the green dot to. They had to do that in 23. It didn't work out that great. And also, like, this is a credit to Eric Wilson. I think Wilson's been good. So they just decided to go with the better player. That's really all it is is they just went with the better player. And then they want Mattelis in the box as well.

But unfortunately for Ivan Pace, you know, that, ends up with him being, as you said, in the doghouse. Lenny says, has anyone else lost interest in the season with Carson Wentz a quarterback? Well, that's the point of my going to school for the last day with a test is that, yes, I mean, I've felt that from Vikings fans for the, since the minute that he got in. And my numbers would suggest that, too, by the way, in terms of live viewers, although there's a lot of you right now, so I appreciate that.

But in terms of viewership and in terms of readership and all that. I mean, it's purgatory. It feels like you're kind of going nowhere spinning your wheels as long as a 30 plus year old journeyman backup is your quarterback. And that's why I think O'Connell's comments were basically, hey, there's light at the end of the tunnel here in J.J. McCarthy is very likely to come back. So yes, I think a lot of people feel that way, but this is also a huge game. So you can feel that way. Yes, okay, lost interest don't want to watch Carson Went, but dude, you need this game. If you want J.J. McCarthy to get back at a time where he's got a position to go chase the

playoffs, you really got to win this. Because if you fall behind, it's going to be really, really tough for him to, I mean, to ask J.J. McCarthy to go, let's see, if he plays 10 games the rest of the way and win seven of them or something to get in the playoffs, that would be, that's too much. You want to be in a position where you could say, hey, even if you go five and five, you got a chance. D.L. Vikings need to quit the used quarterback bin. Well, they, they can't because JJ McCann, they did. They did.

They don't need, they did how they did quit it. That's what they did. He's not, he's not healthy. I mean, I don't, I've seen this a lot. Like, what are they thinking with Carson Wentz? You're like, what were they, who were they supposed to play? Joel Montana? Like, JJ, if JJ was healthy, he would be the quarterback.

They have not benched JJ for Carson Went. that never happened. The people want to say that, but it never happened. And there was always that little crack of a door open that Wentz could just be great and lead them to the top of the division. But that wasn't ever really very likely either. David says the Vikings need to trade for Buda Baker. Look, I love Buda Baker, huge fan for that.

They don't, they should not trade for anybody. They should not this team right now. You can't give up future draft capital. you're 500, just can't be doing that. Zoomer says we could trade Thielen back to the Panthers if we lose to the Chargers. Well, that's right. That trade will feel like if this falls apart, that trade will feel like a massive failure.

I agree. And I shouldn't say massive. I mean, it wasn't that much, but it will feel like an L. If, if it, if, even if he's an occasional difference maker and ends up with 15 catches and a couple of touchdowns and he's already converted a. few third downs those are good plays for them that's okay that's okay to trade something for but if the season goes down the well and you end up talking about well look that there's just nothing left here and they're going to win seven games then yeah it's then that trade was very bad uh adrian to the vikis

have a developmental problem seems like only a few mid to late round picks have contributed to the team the last couple years um well let's see got um jaylin redmond is one of those guys that's been impressive. Josh Mattelis has developed under this team. Theo Jackson hasn't been amazing, but another development story. Cam Bynum was a development story. Ivan Pace was until recently.

You know, I don't know. I mean, how many teams have guys that are late round and undrafted free agents that have seven, eight starters that are great impact players? I mean, look at the Eagles, who are their best players, Barkley, Carter, Brown, Smith, anything in common with these guys? I mean, you look at Detroit and sometimes I just am like, am I taking crazy pills here, guys? How did they get all these

great draft picks? Well, Terry and Arnold hasn't been any good. And there's been a few other of their draft picks that are non-impact players, but a crazy thing, they tanked and had a million picks. So you kind of have to do it one way or the other. If you're going to build a team, you have to choose a path. Either you're going to tank and get a a million draft picks, which maybe was suggested by the Purple Insider podcast years ago when Quasey and Kevin O'Connell got here, but that's not the Wilf's way. So the other way to do it is you're drafting 23rd, you're drafting 26th, you're drafting 17th. Well, you're not getting Jemir Gibbs usually there.

You're not getting Pena Soule there. You're not getting, you know, Jalen Carter even dropped a little, but the guy was an unbelievable talent. You're not getting Devante Smith. So what you have to do is you have to go get outside talent a lot of times and then hope to develop a few. with those players, which I think they have. I think there's a handful of guys on the team that are contributing from the late

round picks, but if you think that there's going to be 10 stars that get developed from that, it's, you know, it's just not likely. Northern Pride, do you think we make any trades before the deadline? I mean, it's possible that they could do that, but I wouldn't advise it. I think if anything, if they lose this game, trade Jalen Naylor to the highest bidder if you can and let him spread his wings. That's something that they should, you know, probably do because that means your shot at making the playoffs. You'll probably be about a, you know, I don't know, 10% chance already

right now the chances are not high and making the playoffs. If they win, I think you just ride it out. So, Douglas, everyone loves compics, but it would have made more sense to have added younger free agents, if they would have cost us extra picks like Milton Williams instead of Hargrave and Allen. Yeah, I think with Milton Williams, they were interested, but the price just went past where they wanted to go. I think if you redid that deal, I haven't looked at how good, well, let's take a look. How good has Milton Williams been? Let's see. I mean, the Patriots obviously have played well. I have not checked on Milton Williams. Also, don't know, did he want to sign here or not? Let's see. Milton Williams right now has

a 62.0 PFF grade, 71.8 pass rush, 19 quarterback pressures. That's pretty good. Certainly not worth $26 million. It's pretty good, but there's probably a reason he was a rotational guy for Philly. I mean, that's just okay numbers right there. Is that, like, is that, I don't know, like, I know, comparing it to Allen, I think that's fine. Yeah, that maybe Milton Williams would have been the better pick. The issue with saying that they needed to get younger free agents is that they're just they there's not if you a team has a young player who's awesome they keep them unless something's really wrong with them so it's not like there's just guys everywhere who you can sign that it's not mad in like everybody doesn't hit free agency

so yeah you could say milton williams i don't think he's lived up to his contract so far versus what they paid for the other guys but i mean look alan hasn't hasn't lived up to the 21 million either. He needs to get some pressure, some sacks. This is a great game to start. He played really well against Philly, I thought. But no, I mean, I understand that. The whole theory was if you take 10 shots on veteran players who are much cheaper than they would normally be, Ryan Kelly, Aaron Jones, you know, just because of their injury history and their age, if you take 10 shots, well, if you hit on seven of them, if you hit on either Allen or Hargrave, and they're great, and they're close to their peak version.

It's going to be an awesome signing, right? But they also, when a team keeps their own guys, we never give them credit either. Like, Byron Murphy has been pretty good this year, gave up the touchdown to AJ Brown. He's been pretty good. They've stayed away from him. I think they're trying to target other people than Byron Murphy, but, you know, they get him to stay. That's a younger free agent into his prime, but we just don't count him because he was already on the team. will fries was 27 years old that's a pretty younger free agent they extended derisaw that's a younger

guy who didn't hit free agency um you know grenard in his prime cashman in his prime so i don't know like i think that when they do sign you know some of the older players that that becomes kind of the target of the discussion but they've definitely kept or signed a lot of guys in their prime lenny can we get trade value out of older veterans like alan only if they lose this game what even think about it, but I, I just don't think that this ownership ever wants to be the one that's just selling parts. I don't think that they ever really want to be that way. Andrews says, Justin School seems to be the preferred as the backup swing over Walter Rouse. Is he really that bad? Or do they just want to keep him on the sidelines until he

can develop? I do think that, yes, the development part is some of it. But I've liked the way Rouse has looked, even going back to his first training camp as a pass protector, I think he's got more physical talent than just in school. I think a lot of times in the NFL, this is just how it is. It's, hey, this is the veteran. We brought him in to be our swing guy. We're going to trust him. But when Rouse has been out there, he's looked better. I would, I would prefer to play Rouse. But I don't, I also don't know what Chris Cooper knows as far as how much of the offense he could get down. I think school is a decent run blocker. I don't know. Either way, it's not great.

Let's see. Dane says thoughts on Turner, Dallas Turner. Yeah, I think so far Dallas Turner goes under that same category. Like, have you noticed that it's just a trend that every one of these guys has not performed as far as their pressures and sacks at the level we would have expected? And I think I've, I think I brought this up, but I can pull it up again if pro. football reference doesn't melt my computer, but it's the Vikings just haven't faced many passes. So it's hard to get, let me see, can we get defense here? Be patient if this freezes because this website is insane. But let me look, total pass attempts, trying to do this

quick before it melts down. Okay, so the Vikings have faced 161 pass attempts this year. So guys like Dallas Turner, Jonathan Grenard, Jonathan Allen, they've only had 161 chances to rush the passer along with 16 sacks, so call it 177. The Seattle Seahawks have faced 276 passes. So that is like three games worth of passes, three games worth of dropbacks that Seattle has had to go after the passer that the Vikings haven't had because these teams are running a lot. So 14 pressures on 100 pass rush snaps, that's not a bad production rate. I think that he's been good in terms of getting into the backfield and making some plays as far as a tackler against the run.

He has six run stops. That's not bad for him. But I also think that he has not shown a lot of signs of, whoa, that is a totally different player than last year. That's what I think you were looking for from him so far. I just think that opportunity needs to happen, dropbacks, ability to chase the passer. And it might be this week. It might be tomorrow because I think that the Chargers will drop back a lot, which, again, if you're just jumping in here before I get to Stephen Haglund,

there's a great guest to break down the matchups in this game. Justin Herbert's over under 255.5 yards, the confidence that the Vikings can hold him underneath that number that is the fan dual question of the day. So I am going to, and yes, Adrian, you know, I understand that they did, well, I don't know if you can call it. You can't call second round picks mid. That's not. That's a, that's second round picks are starters.

Everson Griffin took many years to develop. DeNeil Hunter and Stefan Diggs are like all time outliers. I get what you're saying. But also you need a lot of draft picks to have that happen in order to have that happen. You need more draft picks. You can't trade second round picks for T.J. Hawkinson. Like, I get it.

I get it. They've, the reality is that they've built a roster that is certainly good enough to win. And with good quarterback play, not even elite quarterback play this year, we would be talking about a four and two or five and one football team. The reason that this team is not good is not because they effed up every single part of building the roster. Like I feel like gets suggested sometimes. And it's not because they've messed up every single draft pick, which isn't true. but gets suggested sometimes.

It's because they have been playing a backup quarterback for four games. And I know that it's just hard to accept. And because the starting quarterback in his first two games didn't play well either. It's hard to accept when the most obvious answer is right there. It's got to be that everybody, the play caller messed up, the drafting messed up, the team building messed up. I don't know. They messed up the audio system in the stadium.

It's got to be every other explanation. If you don't get good enough quarterback play, it's like all these same. people won 14 games last year with good quarterback play. It's not that hard, my friends. So they will need that against the Chargers. Stephen Hagland of Guilty as Charge had a chance to join me a little earlier and want to bring you that conversation. He is great at breaking down the Chargers. So this will be your last look at Vikings Chargers preview before we have the game. And then tomorrow night, I'll be out there. Dame Isatani and I will have that

podcast fired up. It'll be certainly after dark after we've gone down to the locker room and all that stuff. So if you're staying up with us, I hope to see you all then from L.A. But until then, thanks everybody. And here's Stephen Hagelin. All right. We welcome into the show, Stephen Hagland of the Guilty as Charged podcast. Love that name. And this is going to be our hardcore matchup preview here with Stephen. I think a great place to start, my friend, would be the offensive line of the chargers versus the Vikings pass rush. It's fascinating that the Vikings have faced so few actual passing plays that when you look at their numbers for sacks and pressures, like what happened from last year, but what's happened is the Vikings have played from behind so

much, other teams are running. And then in Philadelphia's case, when you throw 79-yard touchdowns, not a lot of opportunities to rush the passer. But some of these players that I'm looking at playing for the Chargers offensive line. I'm going to tell you the truth, man, you've gotten to the point where I was like, Bobby Hart is in the league still. So, uh, how tragic is it for the Chargers offensive line? Yeah, it's, uh, it's pretty tragic. Uh, it started the season very optimistic, particularly at offensive tackle with Rashad Slater and Joe Alt. And, you know, they signed Mackay Beckton and free agency and some question marks at left guard and center and, and those remain, right? But, uh, The thought process from the Charters is obviously, like, we have these two elite offensive tackles.

Let's bring in Mackay Beckton, and those three will kind of carry us through the day. Roshan Slater ruptures his Patel attendant in about five practices after he signs his, you know, contract extension. So they start the season with their backup, right tackle, you know, move Joe Alt to left tackle. Three games into the season, the right tackle gets hurt. Next week after that, Joe Alt gets hurt. Next week after that, the backup who came in for, you know, for Joe Alt gets hurt. So they're on offensive tackle five and six right now.

I think Joe Alt might be back this week. If he is, it obviously changes this conversation and the calculus quite a bit. But he's still dealing with the high ankle sprain. This would be his, if he does miss this game, it would be his fourth game missed. So, you know, I think that could be a little optimistic sign for him returning this week,

depending on how you feel about like Thursday night games. But, Trey Pipkins, who is the starting right tackle now with that, Roshan Slater, will not play tonight. So they'll have some backup right tackle and potentially a fifth left tackle of the season. So it's not been fun. Daniel Popper, who I know you had on earlier this week, tweeted out, that Justin Herbert has been hit like 20 more times than second place. And so it's been, it's been tough.

They have trailed a lot. So opposite of the Vikings here, so the teams have been getting a lot of, obvious passing situations, and it's not, you know, conducive to a fifth string offensive tackle playing football and protecting Justin Herbert. Right. Absolutely. And how do you think that they're going to deal with the blitz of the Vikings? Now, I'm not sure if the Vikings will blitz as much as they usually do. The last time they faced the charges, I think they blitzed every single play and live too regretted because Justin Herbert is actually really good at getting rid of the football quickly, especially with underneath routes.

Keenan Allen gets open, Ladd-McConkie short area is very successful. Now a tight end in Aranda Gadsden, who I think is really good at that. So I don't know if they will blitz, but it really is in the nature of Brian Flores. It's sort of like the don't do it meme, like don't say it. Like don't say it. I'm going to say it. Like don't blitz, don't blitz. Okay, we're going to blitz.

Like they tried rushing three one time against Jalen Hertz. And then they were like, nope, we're not doing that anymore. That didn't work back to blitzing the heck out of him, which didn't really work all that well. But how equipped are they to handle that when you have, even if Joe Alt is back, you're still dealing with backup offensive linemen. Yeah, I think from a just like a pure philosophical standpoint, Greg Roman wants to protect with five as much as he possibly can. And he'll chip a lot.

You know, Trey Pipkins was getting a lot of chip help in the first few weeks. and Joe Alde obviously leave on an island. They played the Dolphins a couple of weeks ago and, you know, different kind of schematic world. But Anthony Weaver comes from the weak Martindell mindset. He's not that far behind from buying Flores and blitz rate so far this season. And essentially what they did is they put their blocking tight end.

His name is Tucker Fisk. And they essentially camped him right next to Bobby Hart and said, we're going to protect with six all game long. We'll do some other Max Protects situations with seven blockers, eight blockers. at times. But we're always going to have six. And it worked. That was the least

amount of pressure that Herbert had faced all season since week two when Trey Pippins got hurt. And then obviously the Broncos are a different beast in week three. So I would expect we see some kind of similar plan this week. If the Vikings stick to their

DNA here, I think we'll see Tucker Fis just kind of stick next to whoever's playing right tackle. They'll protect with six. They'll chip. If Joe All plays obviously you can tinker with this a little bit but if you're dealing with austin deculus at left tackle who they traded for on cut down day by the way they will chip on that side and they'll double team on bobby hard side and they'll kind of try and wad it up as much as they can so it's not Greg roman knows that this is not a situation where we can just do

our usual protect with five kind of situation we have to protect with six and and we saw them do that against the dolphins with tucker face somebody i'm really interested in in this conversation of just getting the ball out quickly because blitz are no blitz. They're probably not going to be able to take on Jonathan Grenard, Jonathan Allen, Javon Hargrave, emerging Jalen Redmond, and even we're seeing some signs from Dallas Turner. We'll see if Andrew Van Ginkle has a chance to come back.

That would be a huge addition. There's a lot of names there that can rush the passer. Yeah. And then Blake Cashman is back, who is an excellent blitzer. They use Eric Wilson. Like they have a lot of dudes that can get after the quarterback. but Quinton Johnson, to me, was somebody that when he was coming out in the draft,

that's when Jordan Addison was taken, but I was looking at both of those guys as potential fits, took a ton of criticism. Johnson did over the first few years, had some issues with the mitts, but it feels like has settled into a role here. To me, this is a guy that the Vikings should be concerned about because of his ability to make plays after the catch. So if you can get the ball out, if you get it to Keenan Allen, you will tackle. Keenan Allen. He's not going to run for 500 yards. He will fall. You will not tackle it. He will fall. That's how you stay in the league for this long

and get a chance to play the team you smoke every single time for Keenan Allen. But Quentin Johnston, he's got youthful legs. I think we've seen this in recent weeks, especially against D.K. Metcalf, the Viking secondary has not been all world when it comes to tackling. Where is Quentin Johnston in terms of this offense and what kind of weapon has he become? yeah he's um i would say he's their designer touch guy he is the guy that they want to get vertically

and horizontally um and they know that his athletic profile is is the strength of his game he's gotten a lot better off of the line of scrimmage um he's gotten a lot better you know creating separation at the top of routes um and he deserves a lot of credit for that the the hands so to speak have not really been tested as much you know we haven't really seen that kind of performance from him yet um but last season against the ravens there were as a game where he dropped the past he dropped a past three different times and the charges were driving down 10 and it was like third and third and seven third and eight and Justin Herbert hit quentin johnson on a crossing route that could have gone for like 40 yards and he dropped it and fans of the stadium this is a home

game fans actively were booing him and it was a really like sad situation and the the confidence just festered and festered and festered and then in the playoff game he was just essentially a non-factor against derrick stingly and granted that's derrick stingly but um we we had real questions of are they going to have to cut this guy in training camp are they going to have to you know bench him for tray harris who they drafted in the second round uh at that time they had mike williams like what what exactly is quentin johnston's role going to be and credit to him he has worked his tail off you know as a wide receiver and he over the first four games he was their most productive receiver and then he also got injured himself he only missed the one game but so he's

back now he's healthy he leads the team in targets leads the team in yards he's been extremely productive and um actually you know in the first four games he was the the first chargers pass catcher to go over 70 yards in four straight games since antonio gates in like 2012 so he's he's playing really really well the confidence is just at a much higher rate and and herbert trusts him at a much higher rate. So, you know, he's their primary vertical receiver, their primary, you know, design touch guy. They'll do jet sweeps with him, stuff like that. When it matters, they haven't really gone to him on third downs, but, you know, they want to get him the ball early first down touches. Let's get him in the red zone. He's that kind of weapon for them right now.

When you said since I was hoping I could throw out some sort of like early 80s West Chandler reference or John Jefferson, but okay, since the era of Antonio Gates, but I think that this is something the Vikings should be really terrified about is the number of weapons that can make plays and that can maintain possession. The 21 play drive, like that's not something that the Vikings want to face is the other team wearing down their defense because then you can run the ball against them as we saw from teams like the Browns and teams like the Steelers. Not so much last week, Philadelphia has lost their ability to run the ball.

but we have seen it earlier in the season that's where you know i'm very curious about beckton here because he was someone that you know we talked about they ultimately go with will fries just doesn't look like he's fit in with los angeles as much as he did with philadelphia where he was the perfect mauler type uh does this just speak to how much it matters who you play next to when it comes to the offensive line or is he just been disappointing I think who he plays next to is definitely a part of it, but the Chargers started the season doing a lot of the usual Greg Roman gap scheme stuff. And then they lost Najee Harris.

And they figured out pretty quick, hey, let's get this Omarin Hampton guy out on the edges. And so they've kind of pivoted the entire identity of their run game to, you know, crack toss, play calls, counters. They wanted to get Omar and Hampton on the edges as much as possible. and they're still doing that with Kamani Vidal not so much this past week because they were trailing 20 to 3 right out the gate eventually So they're playing to the strength of their running backs

And so Mackayette Beckton is just not really The kind of athlete that you want to go out on perimeter blocks right now Like he is very much a let's move forward kind of blocker I will say up until this past week I think he has improved quite a lot as a pass protector. He allowed seven pressures against DeForest Buckner, which was not great, but that's a, that's DeForest Buckner. I guess he can do that from time to time. But up until last Sunday, he had, he was top 15 in the league in pass blocking efficiency rating. And so I think it's,

it's been a mixed bag, I would say. The run blocking is not really fit to his identity, I would say, as a player. But for the most part, as a past protector, he's, he's looked a lot better than he did in Philadelphia, which was his first year playing guard as well. I also think with that, Bucknerstead. It really speaks to the game script and how it goes. Yeah. Just making such a difference because if you're asking. They drop back 60 times on Sunday against the Colts. Right. So seven pressures even is not that many in comparison to how many dropbacks you're talking about. But, you know, I think that's where the Vikings want them to have to live is

from behind in the dropback game and make Justin Herber try to push the ball down the field to score quickly. But the Vikings haven't been able to play that game either so far. this year. When I used to cover Kirk Cousins, what people would say to me when I would come on their podcast as their guest to preview the game, they'd be like, how do you feel about Kirk? And my answer was like, it's been in the league like nine years. Like, I don't know. How do you feel about Kirk? And now I feel like I'm being that guy about Justin Herbert. I think that Justin Herbert being as talented as he is, like raw talent, makes people think, oh, the rest of the team can just fall apart and you're fine because he should just do everything, right? And I don't know if

that's completely fair to Justin Herbert, but how have you felt in general about his overall performance so far this year? Yeah, it's, it's really tough to evaluate, like, because after the first three games, he was tied for second in MVP odds at that time. And, you know, I think Greg Roman gets a lot of flack and right now it's it's there's not a lot of good vibes around Greg Roman but they came into the season and they were doing four receiver sets like he's never done before and he was just herbert was you know doing design runs like we've never seen before and the offense was humming and the first three games looked fantastic and then you lose all your offensive tackles and it's kind of like well what can you what can you do here um i think with herbert like you see so many insane

throws on a weekly basis that that's the only reason why the chargers are still afloat right now um and when you're getting hit as often as he is getting hit um i think that staff from daniel popper was 62 times i believe um he's only been sacks 20 times despite getting hit 62 times and i yeah like you of all the quarterbacks who have getting who could get hit that often you know you're probably talking about like 45 sacks at this point in time um so he his ability to escape pressure and not turn the ball over and mitigate everything that's going on in front of him is still next level. The arm talent is still insane. He had to throw to Keenan Allen on Sunday where his progression is one to two to the left. Pressure comes like instantly. So he rolls out

and is getting, you know, DeForest Buckner is already around his ankles. And he throws a cover two whole shot to Keenan Allen like 30 yards down the field. And it's just like toe tap, beautiful grab. And Keenan Allen gets up and he's like, where did that come from? Like I was not supposed to supposed to get the football today. So he's still insanely talented. It's just the circumstances right now are so bad. And the charters cannot stop the run at all right now. The run defense is so bad.

Like I feel like I'm watching Brandon Staley coach defense again right now. So the circumstances are horrible around him. They have great pass catchers, like you mentioned. That part has stayed healthy and true. But he just is asked to do so much heavy. lifting to keep this team afloat that it's really hard to evaluate, you know, where he's at in terms of the hierarchy. But I think generally speaking, you're talking about a top six or seven quarterback depending on how you feel about playoff success and all that. You know, I think we also

came from a world even recently where the quarterbacks, if you're good, then you would just win all the games. And look, Mahomes was in the Super Bowl last year. So you have kind of these two or three guys that have just been good almost no matter what last year Josh Allen wins MVP with I'm not even sure who is number one wide receiver was Khalil Shakir I guess maybe a tight end I mean if you can win MVP playing like that then you're going to say well why doesn't everyone just do it that way a Buffalo does have a great offensive line by the way which I think helped Josh Allen be as good as he is and Lamar Jackson is kind of run around and scramble and do all those things.

But I even feel like where we've gone in the last maybe year or two, it's harder to do that, especially this year in the environment where defenses have taken over. And we're seeing a lot of defensive battle type of games. And even Mahomes before he got his receivers back wasn't really playing at the highest elite 50 touchdown level of Mahomes. We've seen Allen struggle against the Atlanta Falcons. We've seen Lamar not have perfect games.

It just hasn't been that kind of year in the NFL where there's been just, hey, if you're a great quarterback, you're just going to steamroll everyone. So I think that what's happening to Herbert is kind of something that's going on all around the league as defenses have gotten stronger and stronger. You mentioned the defensive side of the ball and the run game. Now, the Vikings have this trouble where they don't like to stick with the run. It's also hard to stick with the run when you're playing from behind, which they have been. And, you know, everybody screams at the top of the mountain top, the top of the top of

mountains run the ball, KOC, but you're down 14 to 3 because you threw a pick 6 and when were they supposed to do that? So it's it's a tough thing to evaluate. I'm sure you deal with this as well. Why is the Chargers defense so bad though? Because this is a thing. If you let the Vikings run against you and they can play action off of that, KOC's play action game is really terrific. We've seen it over the years with Kirk. We've seen it with Sam Donald, who I think led the league in quarterback rating on play action last year or was maybe second or third with golf, with Herbert. Why can't the Chargers stop the run? And is this something that you guys are talking about with the Vikings and Jordan Mason? Like you said, the numbers that

the Vikings have rushing running the football, I think are not indicative of like, like the Colts were very obviously a bad matchup for the Chargers. This one's not so obvious when you look at the numbers because of how infrequently they are running the football. The talent is definitely there. And if Aaron Jones gets back, then that obviously adds to the equation here. The struggles on defense, I think, are part health-related. Obviously, Kalimak got injured in week two against the Raiders, and that has changed a lot.

You know, they lost DeShon Hand, who was their starting, like, three-technique, you know, kind of defensive tackle. And his replacement is not really, he's almost exclusively like a DPR-designated pass-ruster type. So when he gets on the field, Justin E. Boyby is his name. And teams can run the football when he's on the field like the Colts did. It doesn't look great. To me, the most concerning thing has been the play of Deion Henley and Derwin James, who the Chargers defense is not, it's not loaded with stars.

You know, they kind of built the roster with, hey, we have a linebacker who we think is special. We have a safety who is special. We have two edge rushers who we really trust in Tully Tui Poloto, including. wheel mac and then we're just going to get as many depth pieces as we can their safety room is really deep the corner room is really deep they they had a deep defensive tackle room now they've got another injury there and when you build the roster this way you need your stars to play like stars and dan henley had a great first two weeks looked like he was taking that leap and then he was dealing with this illness where he played against the broncos with 101 degree fever and like credit

to him for playing through it. He said after the game, he lost like 15 pounds. And ever since he's gotten sick, he just, he doesn't look like himself. And, you know, I guess it's kind of understandable, but the instincts are not there. The just the speed is not there. He's missing a lot more tackles right now. I think he's got eight mistackles on the season. All of last year, he had 10. So he's, he's not really doing the usual day on Henley stuff. Last year against the Raiders, like he absolutely blanketed Brock Bowers in one-on-one coverage like four or five times this past week Tyler Warren got he cooked him like three or four different times in that game so he's not playing well and Derwin James is also not playing well he also is missing a lot of tackles he's getting washed out

of a few plays he's taking himself out of plays so when you are dealing with you know these two star players who are in kind of a funk individually and you don't really have other players who can really elevate and take pressure off of them, this is what has become of the Chargers defense the last few weeks. So a lot of Chargers fans are, this defense is terrible and they want Jesse Mentor fired, which is crazy to me because I think he's awesome. They just need their stars to play like stars. And that really is the main thing with his defense. And, you know, Kilomac returned from injury last week. He only played 12 snaps. He says that he's going to be at full capacity this week. We'll see. The Chargers usually like to kind of ramp their players up a little

bit. But if Khalil can come back, be Khalil. If Derwin and Deion can get back to who they've been, then the defense will look a lot better. And they just obviously traded for Odafei Owe. But they need their stars to play like stars. And right now their stars are playing like rotational players. Well, and from a Vikings side, when you have an edge here and the offensive line has gotten back to closest to 100% that it's been all season, this is where the Vikings, if they can't take advantage, then maybe they just can't run the ball ever in the rest of our lifetimes, as long as KOC is the coach. This should be a big factor for them, especially if Aaron Jones is active and even participates in this game a little, like they just opened his window, but

could he just rotate in a little bit with Jordan Mason? But the Vikings have sort of not had the offensive line together to be able to dominate someone on the line. And for two weeks in a row, they're going to have the same five starters, which is a miracle compared to how it's gone. So I think that's a major factor here. The last thing, obviously for matchups here, unless you want to get into the kickers, which, hey, Vikings are kicking the heck out of the ball, two franchises that have had tragic misses from kickers.

But save for that, the coverage unit for the Chargers, Are they struggling to sleep that Carson Wentz is starting this game or, no, I'm kidding, but it's been a wild ride with Carson Wentz. It's been wide open receivers, great catches, some competent performance and then some like, what happened? Yeah, right. So he has truly just been Carson Wentz. But how does the secondary stack up considering the Vikings number one and two wide receivers? I mean, obviously we're concerned about Justin Jefferson and Jordan Addison. The chargers don't have a star corner, but they have four corners that they really trust. I think Tarif still is their best corner.

He's got tremendous instincts in zone coverage. He hasn't gotten a ton of targets thrown his way this year. But he's got the ability to flip a game on its head from an interception standpoint. He's just really, really smart, great ball skills. And when he has been tested, he has performed well. don't think he's like a patrick or t and obviously nobody's patrick patrick's tan right but he's probably more on like the low end of a cb one kind of player but he's just really really solid not the best athlete so you can take advantage of him vertically at times um and then they they rotate

dante jackson cam hart and benjamin st juce which like he was not good in washington but he's actually looked really good in l a he's got a few pass breakups uh he had an interception last week against the dolphins that was really really nice so they they kind of view the other three outside of tariff still as kind of like a a matchup based you know system where if they have if they're facing a speedy receiver room they'll go with jackson and st juse because they're the faster guys um if they want if they're going up against the big receiving group they'll put st juice and cam hard out there because they're both six three and and like to get up and press and things like that. So they really are very flexible in the cornerback rotation. I'm very curious

how they actually go about matching up with, you know, a healthy Vikings receiver cast because they don't usually like double team a lot. They play a lot of match covered zone. And, you know, they haven't really faced anybody like Jefferson just quite yet. So does the gravity of him change things a little bit? Obviously, I would hope they don't just trust somebody one on one against him. And I think, you know, Jesse Minter will have a plan to make sure that Jefferson does not beat them as opposed to, you know, maybe they'll trust, you know, their coverage against Addison and Hawkinson and those guys. Jefferson mentioned today to us that he doesn't expect a lot of man coverage in this game that he expects that they've played mostly zone and that that's what's going

to happen. But against Justin Jefferson, sometimes defenses come with an entirely different plan. I don't know if you could do that with two walk-through practices getting ready for this. So it feels like a Justin Jefferson game. Also, the Vikings, I think in recent weeks have done a very good job of just getting Jefferson the ball quickly and then throwing deeper to Addison, who's getting more one-on-one coverage. And as you mentioned, that pull of Justin Jefferson. But I also think that this is a game where T.J. Hawkinson has been criticized a lot here for not having the same type of production that he had before his ACL injury.

And after seeing what Tyler Warren did against the Chargers defense, just looking at what, I mean, last week is a tough game to just say, you know, do that same thing as the Colts because the Colts run the ball like maniacs. But it seems to me like it's the underneath stuff that can be killer for the Chargers, not necessarily, hey, just go beat their corners one on one and you'll be fine. yeah i think with um the biggest issue with like how the linebackers and safeties are playing is that they are falling for a lot of the eye candy the teams are throwing at them and it you know it was it came to a head with tyler warren who's an awesome football player um but even against

the commanders it was a problem with zackertz a couple of times it was a problem with luke mccaffrey a couple of times it was a problem for darren waller a couple of times where you know the dolphins do this thing obviously where they they'll like jet sweep like fake jet sweep bubble screen and then they'll throw it like to the opposite corner and that's how darren waller got open a couple of times and so just like the misdirection that some of these creative offensive coordinators are throwing at the chargers the linebackers and the safeties are having a really tough time with it and i know the vikings don't motion at the snap a lot but they do a lot of like pre-snap motion and so just the kind of misdirection that other teams have thrown at them

has been more we're going to motion at the snap and you know we're going to fake a bubble screen this way or we're going to fake like a dagger concept this way and then we're going to come back the other way and give our best athlete a run after catch opportunity and it's almost always been working so they're falling for a lot of eye candy right now again that's was not a problem for the previous regime last year like they were so sound but that attention to detail of we just have to be on it with motion has been a bigger problem this year than it has been previously for this regime. The theme of this game is the Vikings and our coverage and fans are, it's not going that great. And Chargers with you guys, your coverage is, it's not going that great. So it's the not going

that great bowl. Somebody needs a win here to build on the momentum and then the Vikings trying to get through until J.J. McCarthy can get back on Fandul. The Chargers are three point favorites and the over under is 44 and a half, which seems like a pretty darn good over under. And, not a bad prediction. I have not made the official Purple Insider prediction, which everyone just waits and when will he give it to us? I think that the Vikings should win this game,

but they're not favored. So how are you feeling about three point favorites for the Chargers, 44 and a half over under? I'm stunned that the Chargers are favorites, honestly, given the way that the past few games have gone. I mean, they got blown out at home by the commanders and then they got blown out of home by the Colts. And obviously, the Colts are probably the best team in the AFC, I guess.

You know, you would maybe argue for the Chiefs, the Bills. But, you know, the commanders dealing with their own injuries and stuff like that. But, you know, the last two home games for the Charters have not looked good. And, you know, I'm kind of stunned that that's as not, it's not a huge number. But I do not believe the Charter should be favorites, is what I'm saying. If Joe Alt does not play this game, I think it will be ugly. and I think the Vikings could also potentially blow out the Chargers because I just, I do not trust Greg Roman

to have a great plan for the Brian Flores blitzes because that's who, that has always been Greg Roman's biggest struggles are whenever he plays Brian Flores. This game has terrified me from whenever the schedule came out. And that was when the Chargers had Joe Alt and Roshan Slater. So if Joe Alt plays, I feel a little bit better about it. I think the Chargers could keep it interesting, but until I see the offensive line protect Herbert at a higher level and until I see

the run defense actually show up, I'm not really picking the Chargers. And I know that a lot of Chargers fans criticize our show because we don't always pick the Chargers on our show. Like our job is to analyze the team. I don't know what you offer me. So until those two big glaring weaknesses stop being such a big glaring weaknesses, I'm kind I'm inclined to pick the other teams. And I think specifically with Flores and with Aaron Jones potentially coming back, it's going to be another long night for Justin Herbert and company.

Well, I'll tell you, when the schedule came out, I looked at this and said, L, like, there's no way they win this game. Well, because, you know, you're playing the Eagles at home and then you got to fly out there in the short week and everything. Like, this could be really hard. It's just a very different Chargers theme than I expected because my thought was, oh, well, with with Rishon Slater and Joe Alton, they add Beckton, like the, the beef is going to win this football game. And now the beef just really isn't there or is banged up. So, uh, well, we will see both, both of us, like not flying high on either one of these clubs. They, they need a win pretty bad.

Stephen Hagland, uh, the guilty as charge podcast. I'm really glad we can get together, man. I admire your work. I've followed you for a long time. I was on your show at one point. So I appreciate you taking the time, uh, to pop on. and do a hardcore preview here of Vikings and Chargers. Great job breaking it down.

Really appreciate it. Yeah, thanks, man. Appreciate it. You know, the Chargers and Vikings are always very similar. I feel like we're always like picking right next to each other and then draft. So always, always a fun game.

Always a fun team to talk about. And I appreciate you having me on tonight for sure. And we know a kicker will be involved in this game. We just don't know how. So all right, man. Thanks. Yeah,

have a good one.