Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Dillon Gabriel starts vs. Vikings, another O-line injury????? (Part 1)

Episode Date: October 2, 2025

Matthew Coller talks with Vikings fans about the Browns' choice to start Dillon Gabriel and Michael Jurgens missing practice. JJ McCarthy isn't practicing, what's next? The Purple Insider podcast is brought to you by FanDuel. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See https://pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hey, everybody, welcome to another episode of Purple Inside or Matthew Collar here, still stateside as the Vikings are practicing over in London. And yes, I do have some fomo and some jealousy a bit for my cohorts that are over there. But this allows me to be here doing my thing chatting with you guys as I always do, especially. on Wednesday night. So I need your questions. I need your thoughts. I need your comments. And as always the show presented by a fan duel here. But this is a let's have a conversation tonight because there's not a ton of huge updates regarding the Minnesota Vikings. One about the offensive line that's going to make you roll your eyes and about J.J. McCarthy. And at the top of the list for news items is that Dylan Gabriel is going to start against the Minnesota Vikings. So we'll

all into that, but I want to know what is on your mind. It's been a little bit of a rocky ride so far through the first four weeks of this season. And the Vikings have this one more game before they hit the by week. Clearly they need to be three and two coming out of this game against Cleveland. But what is that going to look like? What is Sunday's game going to look like with Dylan Gabriel starting against this Vikings defense that has had some issues at times and been unbelievable. at other times and this offense that also has really struggled to get going in ways that we

haven't seen even when Nick Mullins or Josh Dobbs. I guess the end of the Josh Jobs era was the last time that we saw the Vikings offense struggle like this, which has led to the Fandu question of the day. I checked the over under for this game and it actually went down with Dylan Gabriel's starting. So it went down to 35 and a half points. I cannot remember the last time I've seen 35 and a half points for the over under for a game. So they are not expecting a huge output of scoring in this game between the Vikings and the Browns. So tell me this for the Fandul question of the day, how many points do the Vikings need to score to win this game with the over under being 35 and a half.

So Dylan Gabriel, let's talk about him first. I'm intrigued by Dylan Gabriel. I am horrified by the rest of the Cleveland Browns offense. When you look at the way that they have played so far this year, they are the third worst pass blocking unit in the entire NFL by PFF. Their receiving grade is dead last in the league by PFF with Joe Flacco in there. And I'm sure that Flacco was. part of the problem as much as the wide receivers, but if you look at their numbers, it is not so

great. So Harold Fannin's an interesting young player, went to Bowling Green, I believe, caught a million passes there. David and Joku is pretty good. Jerry Judy's had his moments in the league, but aside from that, it has been a horror show and tons of drops, 11 drops so far this year for the Cleveland Brown's offense, four of them from Jerry Judy, who just as become a very mid wide receiver that was supposed to be in that Justin Jefferson class, the runaway, right? That was him. And the runaway, he was supposed to be like the runaway best receiver in a great receiving class, the route running brilliant specialist, but it's been hands that have been an issue for him. So he's just sort of just a guy, but they need him to

be the number one wide receiver. Cedric Tillman is averaging less than 10 yards per catch there. Isaiah Bond, the rookie from Texas, I think, seven catches. I mean, they just have not gotten much in their passing game. So Dylan Gabriel takes over a group that can throw to the tight end, I guess. And when it comes to their blocking, what a horror show that is. If you think the Vikings offensive line has been bad, some of these grades are mind-blowing, including this is crazy. This is absolutely crazy.

Cornelis, and I know they played the Packers, so they have Michael Pars. and this is not easy also played aiden hutchinson but cornelius lucas their tackle has allowed 28 quarterback pressures so far this year that's crazy uh so i think i don't know if they're going to start cam robinson they just traded for him but to give up 28 pressures in four games is absolutely wild uh if you give up five in a game that's really bad like you you need as a tackle five or six in a game is an atrocious afternoon. This is averaging almost six per game so far this season. I mean, that's a lot.

So I don't think Cornelius Lucas, I think he's the reason that they traded for Cam Robinson. But good luck to Dylan Gabriel. So he's entering a situation that is clearly one of the worst in the league. But he also has my interest. I know that he's small, but he's got an arm that's pretty strong. And he is an accurate quarterback from what I saw in college and the pre-season. season. I think he's going to struggle a ton with what Brian Flores is going to throw at him

coverage-wise and trying to pick apart different coverages and make adjustments. This is not Aaron Rogers at the line of scrimmage, my friends. This is going to be a kid who's never played before. He's going to have a lot of struggles there. I think he's a pretty good athlete. He could throw on the move and something that he does quite well. And that if you're going to be an undersized quarterback, you absolutely have to do is he throws with anticipation, meaning he throws before guys are out of their breaks. He throws wide receivers into areas. You saw him do this a ton when he was in college. I watched a little bit of them in the preseason. He just has that whatever it is, circuited in his brain where he knows that he's got to get the ball out

early. And he also probably knows at this point that he's not going to be able to see everything perfectly at his height and has to throw to areas, has to be locked into the offense. And I think there's a lot of proof in the fact that Dylan Gabriel is QB2 for this team. If the world had their way, you can absolutely bet that Shadur Sanders would be the starting quarterback of the Cleveland Browns. If the hype machine on the internet was making a vote, it would be 99 to 1% because everybody wants to see Shadur Sanders. So the fact that he beat him out and seemingly handily in training camp and preseason with the whole world and possibly their ownership, which may have nudged them to draft Shadur Sanders.

We don't know that for sure. But I think that judging for previous quarterback decisions, that's possible that the Browns did that, the coaching staff saying we'd rather have this other kid, who was drafted higher, that's true, be the guy. I think it at least says something about what he's done behind the scenes. All of that said, what the Vikings did to Jake Browning is what they should do to Dylan Gabriel only probably even worse. Can it be worse? Maybe. I guess Jake didn't fumble the ball all those times. So that wasn't Jake Browning's fault. But it should be like that. It should be

constant pressure, constant confusion, quarterback scrambling for his life most of the time and making big mistakes that turn into turnovers. We've seen that many, many times from inexperienced quarterbacks playing against the Minnesota Vikings. This is not any type of test, really. for this Vikings defense other than can you write your name at the top of the SATs to pass can you do the bare minimum against a rookie quarterback and get the ball a couple times and hold them down and you'll be fine with the amount of talent on this defense, the confusion on this defense. Last week you could say that a good amount of it was the game plan for Pittsburgh. A good amount of it was Aaron Rogers and a good amount of it was the fact that they got to play from ahead because the Vikings let them for the entire. day. That should not happen against the Cleveland Browns, but there's the you never know factor. I mean, the New York Giants played Jackson Dart and the Chargers kind of had no idea what to expect in that game. And Jackson Dart kind of looked like, you know, a rookie was playing and a running

offense and they ran Dart a lot and certainly ran him into a lot of hits a lot. But they played an offense that wasn't really expected. It wasn't really on tape and it surprised the Chargers. Not that Dart had this incredible day, but it seemed to throw them off a little bit. And he was able to lead some scoring drives. Is there some of that because Gabriel is new and he's young and he's got a live arm and we don't know what to expect.

Whereas with Joe Flacco, I mean, you knew what to expect. Joe was mega-cooked, could not move at all, wasn't seeing it down the field, was lowering his eyes and taking hits, turning the ball over constantly. He was not in a position as Joe Flacco 2025, somehow still in the NFL, to deal with what they have going on up front. It's possible that the Vikings did get the worst side of this.

I mean, you would think that just logically speaking, a third round draft pick kid coming in for the first time in London, the least ideal place to start against the Minnesota Vikings defense, that would be kind of an automatic and it should be and it should be a very simple test to pass at the same time there is there is intrigue there is something that we don't know here and I saw shader Sanders reaction to that today which was to mime at the media which I think tells you

everything you need to know about why one guy is starting and the other isn't because one acted professionally this offseason the other got speeding tickets and went viral a bunch of times so I think they made the right choice for who is QB2. And Sanders just keeps showing everybody that he's exactly what all the critics thought that he was. And apparently he was responding to something Rex Ryan said, which again, QB3 responding to the haters is just not something that's going to get you very far in the NFL. But maybe we will see Shadur Sanders, depending on the way that this goes,

if it's going badly for Cleveland, that it's all together possible that, Sanders could make his debut and we'll see if his vocal cords work if he ends up getting out there. But just with the Vikings playing against the Browns here, you get the sense of why the NFL spent some time around Shadur Sanders and said, you know, I don't think he's going to be a first round draft pick because of nonsense like this. And him spouting off about how he's better than other quarterbacks in the league just a week ago. Just, hey, just be everything everybody said. Like, if you were going to prove everybody wrong, this is not the way. And yet here he is.

Would you ever see Max Brosmer do stuff like this? Absolutely not. I can tell you that. So not surprising that it's Dylan Gabriel and not Shradur Sanders. Let me get to a couple other things. J.J. McCarthy is still not practicing today, which I guess makes you wonder, like, how far along is this injury? Trying to judge how serious the injury was, the fact that he was able to.

finish the game. But then they said they want him to be 100% before they put him out there to practice. I am surprised that still he hasn't been able to get out in practice. Does this, if he doesn't practice this week, are we talking about for sure that he's 100% coming off of the by week? You would think so. You would think so with this kind of injury. But maybe we'll see him practice over the next two days and be the backup on Sunday.

or maybe it will still be Max Brosmer. I guess we don't really know. I still would think that after the bye week, you've got a long, long time there before you have to play again against the Philadelphia Eagles. I would like to see McCarthy be the starting quarterback, no matter what.

He was your QB1 over Aaron Rogers in the off season. He was your QB1 over Sam Darnold, who is playing great football right now, and he should still be your QB1 despite a bad game against the Atlanta. a Falcons. He needs more sample size to even really know. And if Carson Wentz doesn't have a great game or he has a great game, it doesn't really matter to me because it's beating the Cleveland Browns. It should be a preseason game for you against Cleveland. That's what it should be. I'm not

saying nothing is a guarantee when you're playing a backup quarterback and you just lost to a mediocre Pittsburgh team and you got sacked as many times as you did. But this should be the easiest game on your schedule. I made the golf course analogy before where, you know, when you go to the 18 holes, and it's like the hardest hole on the course and the easiest hole on the course, what's the easiest is number. They put 18, I think, right? So this would be 18. Like, this is the easiest game that you're going to play. This is the easiest hole on the course. This is a 150 yard straight on with no sand and no water par three with a big flat green. Like, that's, That's what this game is.

That doesn't mean you still can't hit it in the woods, though, because they still have Miles Garrett, they still have Malik Collins, they still have a lot of talent on the defensive side. But this is one where you should win. And regardless of how you win, J.J. McCarthy should be the guy who starts when they come back. I would have felt differently had Carson Wentz put up 40 points on the Steelers and they rolled and they were headed to four and one and they were coming back.

I would have said, look, you got to win. At four and one, he's playing great. Let him go until the wheels come off and let's see what happens. And maybe it's one of those seasons. But losing that game shifted my take on that. That I think you have to go back to J.J. McCarthy, even if Wentz has a really good day against Cleveland. But McCarthy's got to be 100% healthy. And if this lingers in any way past this week, if we still hear about him missing practice going into Philadelphia,

then you've really got to ask some questions about like, Man, this is another injury that he's going to be having to deal with for a while. I don't suspect that's going to be the case, the way that Kevin O'Connell has talked about it, but we shall see as he gets back to practice. Maybe tomorrow, maybe Friday O'Connell hinted at that potential. The other offensive line injury, Michael Jurgens did not practice today. We will also have to see, does he practice Thursday? Does he practice Friday?

If not, you could be looking at Blake Brandel at center and possibly Joe Huber at guard, along with Will Fries, Justin's school, and then Christian Dara saw. That is one heck of a patchwork offensive line. If Juergens is not up to full strength, and even if he is back, he's still dealing with an injury that forced him to miss practice. You don't want your center missing any practice when he's got to be on the same page as your quarterback. And if he's missing practice, that means that that hamstring injury is fairly serious, at least could be a problem in the game. And again, you are playing one of the best defensive lines in the entire NFL.

This is going to be a big challenge for the Vikings here. Although I would be kind of interested, I guess, to see if Blake Brandl can snap the ball. Juergens was okay against Cincinnati. It's Cincinnati. They're clearly one of the worst teams in the NFL as far as a defense and a defensive line. But I don't know. I mean, maybe I'm acting like the guy who always wants the backup, backup backup quarterback or backup lineman or, hey, isn't there somebody better on the bench? But at least Brandel, you know, has played a lot in the NFL.

Maybe he could be a halfway decent center. I don't know. But it's going to be really difficult to get them. What's the opposite of discombobulated? Because that's what they've been on the offensive line. Bobulated? Like, get together on the same page. How can you even do that?

with all the travel and the distractions of London and the scheduling and all that stuff and you get a couple of practices and then you've got to just throw this group out there when it comes to running the outside zone stuff for example against Cincinnati when they had most of their line they looked awesome in doing that but when you run outside zone everybody has to be on the same page you can't just be like hey everybody run that way and block. Like, it's one of those things that has to be really synced up. Well, how are you going to do that with so many guys out? So then maybe they're looking at easier run type of stuff for the guys to do blocking wise, but that's not the strength of your running back, Jordan Mason. If you don't get

ahead of the sticks, then you're on third down. And I'm just looking at this data today about the Vikings and sacks. I'm trying to parse apart why the Vikings take so many sacks under KOC. And one of the main reasons is third downs that they throw on third down so often, whether it's sometimes it's third and short and they throw, but it's, they are one of the top teams of the league since KOC got here, top three or four in terms of total passes on third down, which is when the opposing defense, that's also because they haven't run effectively during KOC's time, the opposing defense can run anything they want. And I found an interesting stat that they've been sad.

when the opposing team blitz is on third down. This is from true media. When they blitz on the third down, they get sacked 15% of the time, the Vikings do. When the opposing team blitz is on third down. And that is what? It's a quarterback stat. It's an O-line stat.

It's a lot of things. It's a KOC stat. But it tells a story there that if they are playing from behind the sticks, they're going to have to throw a lot. And that leaves you open to big negative plays, which they've had a lot of. this year on third downs. Ten of their 18 sacks have come on third down so far this year.

Bottom line, they really could use Michael Juergens. If Jurgens is in, if he can get up to 100% health by this game, he's worked with Carson Wentz, at least since Wentz got here as the backup when McCarthy was starting. They were working together in practice. Brandl has been a starting lineman before. You're trying to survive Justin's school on that side. Actually, I'm curious if I got to look this up. If Miles Garrett has how much he is lined up on the offense's right side, this is why we love having all the data here because he had barely ever this year. Only seven times has he lined up on the opposite side. He's been the right defensive end the entire time. So him versus Derisaw is, you know, heavyweight prize fighters there. But at least he likes

to be on that spot. And he's not a guy that moves back. and forth too often. So just in school, maybe can breathe a little easier going into this game. Still, I mean, it's a patchwork offensive line if Jurgens is in there with three backups. It's not the worst thing maybe I've ever seen. I think school is probably a little safer over there on the right side. But if Jurgens is out, and now you're talking about undrafted free agent, it's never played before and has got to take on a nasty interior D-line, that could be tough sledding for this Vikings offense. So they need. need Michael Juergens to get back to full health.

So that's where we're at right now with the sort of news items there. And now we can have a conversation and have a chat about what we think the Vikings need to do to beat the Browns, the bigger picture here of this team being two and two at this point. If they get a win here, you're three and two at the biweek, which is not a catastrophe, but it's also not a success where I felt that they need to be. four and one to really survive, to really survive the tough stretch at the same time. I wrote about this a little yesterday over at purple insider dot football, feel free to

sign up, that the path kind of got easier with some of the bad things that have befallen teams that they're going to play against, including even the Green Bay Packers, although I did watch back somebody clipped together all the reps of Micah Parsons against the Dallas Cowboys because he graded extremely high by PFF and wow did he deserve that grade. But the Packers still gave up 40 points in that game because of their coverage. And that was something that we talked about when they acquired Michael Parsons was he is as great as it comes in the NFL. But they still have coverage issues there with Green Bay and the Chargers have line issues. And Lamar Jackson is banged up and the Ravens defense has been horrible and et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, right?

so there might be an open door if you get to three and two to win half of those games and then get to the point where it's a little bit lighter at the end of the season and then you have your big games at the end and you've got a shot but that's a long time to go from now but there is a path that has sort of opened up with some things happening to those teams that we kind of looked at as invincible and now they don't look quite as invincible after a few weeks of, you know, the NFL being the NFL. So questions, thoughts and comments, reminder that a Fandul question of the day is the over under for the game is a hilarious 35.5 points.

I guess you could toss in whether you take the over or under. How many points do the Vikings need to win this game? My answer for that is I'm going to say 17. I think that they need 17 points to win this football game against the Cleveland Browns. I just would be very, very surprised if they could find a way to score more than 17 points. So let me go all the way back to some of your answers there, which is Mr. Mayer's got 16, Zuma Kev, 17, Mama's got 21, KMAX 17, Trona guys got three. I think they might need more than three, but I'm not 100% sure about that.

Can you imagine if this is, well, the London fans have gotten, wiser, but the early London games, people used to talk about how they would love when there was punts, because it's guys kicking the ball. And that's what they were looking for over there. So there might be a lot of that. Ryan Wright might have a day. Will Reicherd, uh, field goals are in the news these days with the K balls. So, uh, there might, yeah, there might be, um, some, uh, some serious kicking going on in

this game. And we did see a three, oh game before with the Vikings and the Raiders, uh, So let's start with C.Bakes 27 says with C.J. Ham slated to return, excited to see him at center this week. That's good. That's good. You know, I don't think it's the craziest thing in a game like this to have Josh Oliver and C.J. Ham on the field at the same time because they need all the blocking help that they can get. And this was a really smart thing that Kevin O'Connell did in the past. And I wrote a story about this. I talked with Jerome Felton for it. Johnny Stanton, a couple of former fullbacks, and they loved this, that Kevin O'Connell used C.J. Ham on third downs, on obvious passing downs, as a blocker, as a pure blocker. And he was really terrific at it. It's one of those things where I know some people kind of, C.J. Ham, you know, he's still on the roster. But he was excellent at it. If you go back to the San Francisco game in 2023 that they won and shocked San Francisco, he had four.

or five plays where they were sending guys or Nick Bosa got past his guy and Ham was able to step up and help. And it was enormous for Kirk Cousins in that game. And Cousins played great. They actually do need that. Jordan Mason is, I think, serviceable at pass protection, probably not great. Aaron Jones is okay, but he's not a guy you want. I know he's out, but he's not a guy you want protecting all the time. Xavier Scott, I'm really impressed with Xavier Scott. I think he's a dude. I think he could be like for those old. old school people, amp Lee style, David Palmer, like one of those players out of the backfield that sneaks out, plays wide receiver running back. It's kind of a cool role. If I had him on Madden in

2005, I would have loved using him, but he's not somebody you want standing in there trying to pass protect. So that actually could matter that C.J. Ham is coming back if Kevin O'Connell decides to use him in that role, though I don't think he will be playing center. Mr. Mayor, I have not. done one of the international games. The 2017, we didn't budget for that when I worked in radio. And then just as long as I've been doing this, there is, I've had to learn over the years how to do the accounting part of this job and the business spreadsheet part of this job. And one of the things you have to kind of add up as much as I want to go is, does it make sense business-wise. Like, is the revenue that I might earn from being over there and being on the

spot does it sort of match up with the cost? And you think about it this way, like, I'm going to go to the plan is, and this depends on how the season goes a little bit, whether it'll be worth it. But the plan is to go to Dallas, to go to Seattle, the NFC North games, go to Ford Field, go to L.A. All those combined would be one of these trips. So it just didn't quite, it just didn't quite gel. I did send Jonathan Harrison over there. It was his dream to go over to London. I think when did we do that? 2001, I think. Jonathan is the producer of this show and does all the behind the scene stuff, all the thumbnails. Like Jonathan worked so hard. And so I kind of concocted a way to get him over there. He wanted to go to a soccer game. He's a huge soccer guy. So we did figure that

out once, but I have not, I have not done it myself. And I do have very serious fomo. See, Bakes says with these two offenses, we might get a repeat of the, I love that you call it the Oakland game. And I agree with still calling them Oakland. Zoom or Kev, Joe Flacco gives the Browns the best chance to win this game. I don't, I don't know about that. I think that Joe Flacco did an amazing finesse job on the Cleveland Browns here by knowing he would be good enough to win the job over the quarterbacks that they had. But I don't think he really wanted to play football this year from, from what. what I've seen. I mean, Flacko has been as bad as, like, he's been bad during his career,

but as bad as any quarterback has ever been. He's averaging 5.1 yards per attempt, two touchdowns, six picks. I mean, wow. And he's been sacked nine times a 60.3 quarterback rating. That, that would be bad in any era. That would be bad in 1972. That's how horrible he has been. I think they actually have a better chance to win with Dylan Gabriel, there's just that possibility that the kids got something to him and he plays even okay football. If he went 17 for 28 with 220 yards, that would be way better than anything that Joe Flacco has brought them. I don't think that's going to happen. I don't think he's going to be good in this game. I think he's going to come out of it, maybe preferring to play for the Oregon Ducks where they just have great players in the

games are much easier. At the same time, Flacco is bringing nothing to the table, not even giving them a chance to score any points. So I think that Gabriel does actually give them a better chance to win, not that I think he's actually going to do that. Mr. Mayor says, we know the Browns can rush the passer.

How are they against the run? How effective can Mason be with this line? Yeah, that's the question because when you ask about how effective they are against the run, I can look that up. They're number one. They are the number one graded by PFF, number one graded by PFF team against the run. Detroit was able to run against them somewhat last week. Let me pull up how that turned out.

How did Detroit run against them last week? Yeah, pretty good by the numbers. 15 carries for 91 yards for Jemir Gibbs. He needed almost four and a half yards per carry after contact in order to, that's a lot, four and a half yards per carry after contact. That's four and a half yards per carry is an average per carry for anybody in the league. He had to do it after contact. So he had to be special in order to get a good day against Cleo.

And they wore down to it. It was terrible. And Joe Flacco was getting sacked every play. What did Flacco do in this game? He threw two interceptions, 16 for 34 passing. Oh, my goodness. Somehow had four big time throws still. He must have just been, I, that, I, wow.

Okay, so I haven't watched this game back because why, but I'm going to have to take a look now at how he ended up with four big time throws, two interceptions and 16 for 34. I haven't gotten to that point yet. I've just sort of finished up analyzing what happened against the Steelers, which again, Purple Insider. Dot football did a whole film breakdown with all the data as well over there. But wow, that is a horrendous game for him. see bakes if you are in matt lafleur's shoes against dallas do you settle for the tie or take one more chance to win if i'm in his shoes and i have to say that it's much harder than it is sitting in a press box sitting in your house playing your madden but if i'm in his shoes there's no way i manage that last

drive like that he just let the clock run and run and run and run on him and then looked up and he admitted to this and was just like oh the game's almost over uh so he kind of lost lost his mind, got lost in the game at the end there. And we see this happened from a lot of coaches over the years where you go, what happened there? And it's just, I don't know. It got away from him and he lost control of the clock and they almost screwed it up. I would have taken the tie, though.

Yeah, I would have taken the tie in that situation because it's, if you were two yards away, okay, maybe I go for the win and just say, whatever, if we lose this one. But in an NFC North, that a half a point there could end up getting you a tiebreaker or you're giving you a slight edge over the Detroit lines. They already have a win over the lines. They had to factor that in.

Like you already have a win over the lion. So you've got a tie break there. This might give you one more extra push. If you end up with the same number of wins, then, you know, there you go. I think you have to take that. You have to take just half. They also might come up. I guess you can look at it the other way too, that you almost, you might also end up

half a win short of winning the division as well. But from where they were on the field, I don't think you can go for it there to try to win because the chances are just not that great. Stephanie says, is he better than Cooper Rush was supposed to be? If we're talking about Dylan Gabriel or Joe Flacko, I assume we're talking about Dylan Gabriel.

Cooper Rush is, well, I think you're probably connecting this with the Cooper Rush game from 2021. Cooper Rush is a good quarterback. He's won a lot of games in his career. He's going to start likely for the Ravens if Lamar Jackson's banged up. If Cooper Rush was starting this game, I would say don't underestimate him. He can make plays. With Dylan Gabriel, you just have no idea what you're going to get with him at all. I mean, I have no idea. I've watched a lot of him in college. I liked him as a prospect in a draft that I didn't like a lot of the quarterbacks. And I was like, okay, this kid can play a little bit, even if he's short. So I'm kind of like a Gabriel guy, I suppose.

I think that he has got some talent to him. But Cooper Rush has been around for so long. That's the thing that is going to be tough for Dylan Gabriel is that he's got no experience. And it's a strange environment. And it's a weird week where they've got to travel over to a team that's already been there waiting for him and had time to game plan and all that sort of stuff. he is in as big of a disadvantage and then with personnel as any

quarterback making their first start ever. George says get ready for dump off screen, short passing. I swear for his defense is a cheat code or the cheat code is in the dump off to the flat, which is always open for five to seven yards. Yeah, so it has been, it has been. However, in the big games that we think about for what you're talking about,

those quick passes into the flat checks over middle, underneath stuff. Who's usually a quarterback when that happens? Jared Goff, Matthew Stafford, right? I mean, it's been Aaron Rogers last week. It's usually been good quarterbacks. Justin Herbert, the time in 2023 that he threw like 48 passes and completed 40 of them. It's not often that it has been poor quarterbacks who have taken advantage of this defense.

Jake Browning, I guess, did it in the fourth quarter of a game. in Cincinnati in 2020, but I can't think of too many other times where quarterbacks that were inexperienced or not that great had gone against Flores' defense or guys who had never seen it before and then just did great against it instantly. But I don't disagree with what you're saying. I mean, they have Fanon and Injoku. Those two guys can play. And I imagine that that's what they're going to try to take advantage of.

Ivan Pace, I think, has had a really tough start to this season. And if you're looking for an edge, potentially, you've got these two tight ends. Fannin is a good player. He was somebody that I saw one night during Maction randomly, and they put his stats on the screen. I thought it was a joke. Like his college stats were so insane. And he's transferred a little bit over that to the NFL.

So you're right about that, George, that they could and will use a lot of quick stuff underneath and try to attack the middle. That's where you maybe miss Andrew Van Ginkle a little bit because he was so good at deception, dropping back into these throwing lanes, kind of fooling quarterbacks into where he was going to be.

And as much as Dallas Turner is trying to emulate his role, I haven't seen it look. He's dropped back into coverage a good amount, but I haven't seen it look like Van Ginkle with the pre-snap stuff where quarterbacks are just totally surprised when they drop back. And that actually could have played a role

in Aaron Rogers being so successful last week is the fact that Van Ginkle, who has incredible football instincts, and understands so well what other teams are trying to do, what they're seeing, how they're going to attack, that he's really good at getting his hands on those underneath passes. You're totally right about what Cleveland strategy is going to be. Now, whether the Viking strategy is going to be similar that I don't know,

because no matter who's been playing offensive line, we've rarely seen that outside of the opening script. And that would be my suggestion for Kevin O'Connell this week is, the opening scripts are great, and they get the ball out of Wentz's hands fast, but you got to stick with that stuff. And don't be afraid to go back to the same ideas because it seemed like last week, as soon as they got behind, that all of a sudden they went back to kind of the old way of doing it with Sam Darnold, which was looking downfield a lot,

and we didn't see the ball come out very quickly. And Carson Wentz, he's still going to try to make some plays from time to time, and that's where you get into a lot of trouble. So the Vikings need to follow that as well. Let's see. Mr. Mayor, we need to talk about ties. Why are people so crazy hating them? I would get rid of the regular season overtime and 15 ties a year.

Look, as a person who watched hockey from a very, very young age, when there used to be ties, I'm okay with ties. If the two teams scored the same number of points, then we all go home. Like, I don't know. I just, the whole world plays soccer. They're okay with ties. we just have this thing in American sports where we cannot tolerate a tie. And I even thought that for baseball where extra endings is great.

But if they wanted to call it a tie after 12, okay, that's fine. I'd rather have that than some screwy catcher pitching out there or whatever. Or a guy being put on second base. I'd rather just call it a tie. And I feel the same way here where I think it would create some really entertaining endings to games with teams scrambling and panicking, especially as the season went on. and you needed to win that the endings would be really fun. I don't need them to all line up at the two-yard line and try to throw it in

and then have that determine a game. And I didn't need, I probably didn't need both teams to score, at least in the regular season. I understood that in the playoffs where you can't have Brett Farve and Josh Allen sitting on the sideline, not getting a chance to touch the ball. I get that part of it. And in the playoffs, they play till someone's eliminated. In the NFL, it would be ludicrous, probably.

to just keep playing and playing and playing. You're talking about already risking guys getting hurt, but then it just gets insane after a while. I'm okay. I'm okay with ties. I don't need ties to go away. So, Zumer Kev says, my friend is a Browns fan.

Wow. I am sorry for your friend. My uncle is a Browns fan. And, you know, I don't understand how anyone has stuck through this. That's loyal. That's real true. loyalty. I saw the photo of the jersey with all the quarterbacks on it and it's actually filled up. I think this is 43 starting quarterbacks since they came back into the league.

And for Christmas in 1999, I got a Tim Couch jersey. So that's still somewhere in a box in my house that I've kept it with me because I think it's funny. Like, yeah, when the Browns came back, I was so excited that they were coming back into the league and my uncle was a big fan of them and he was excited. And I thought like, this is great. They got this young quarterback. And I'm, I'm, going to follow this team and I asked my parents for the jersey. They got it for me and that did not work out very well. Kelly Holcomb had that one playoff game and that was it. The Brown's history is amazing. And I could see why there are so many old school Browns fans because in the 80s, what an incredible run of tragedies of times that they got so close. You know, the

Bryant-Sipe interception, the Ernest Biner fumble, Bernie Cozhar was such a fun player. But since they've come back, it's been a rough ride. Josh Cribs was cool as heck. They had Jeff Garcia, Trent Dillford. It's, I mean, Seneca Wallace, it's just been so random. And now Dylan Gabriel. Anyway, Zuma Kev said he was talking about Dylan Gabriel looking good before the benching. I wouldn't put it past them to beat the Vikings.

I wouldn't put it past them only because Miles Garrett plays for the other team and they beat the Packers. So you can't say that it's impossible. I mean, the Packers gave that game away by throwing a horrific interception, but you could see the Vikings doing that. That's the only scenario where they lose is if they turn the ball over three or four times and you get strip sacked, you get bad interceptions. It's kind of what happened last week. You get two bad interceptions where you're moving the ball and looking to score.

And then you have sacks all over the play. Like, that could happen again. And they might not need a high amount of points. to beat the Vikings if Dylan Gabriel is even halfway competent. But there are some things I like about him. And I think if he was six foot two, he would have been a first round draft pick this year, just with his talent.

Kerpluppy says, I don't see how we score a touchdown against this defense. Are we going to see an 0 and 3 or 3. Oh, yeah, Raiders versus Vikings game. Yeah, the Josh Dobbs. I wouldn't be surprised at the same time, like if the Vikings get turnovers. So this defense is great,

but against Detroit, the game ends 34 to 10. against Baltimore, it was maybe 41 to 13 or something. So because they are so inept offensively, you get a lot of bites at the apple. And if you get turnovers from Dylan Gabriel, you get a strip sack, you get an interception. You're going to have a chance to score some points. I do think Will Reichert better swing the leg and be ready to kick quite a few times. But the idea with this offensive line that they can move the ball and move the ball and move the ball, that it does seem like a tough task that's where what i would like kevin o'connell to do in this game

is display some patience let's say you throw three passes run three times in your first drive and the farthest the the the passes travel is five yards down the field it's an underneath pass to t j hawkinson which just disappeared out of last week's playbook and i know he had the one ball that maybe he could have caught behind him but where is t j hawkinson the best and i know he was chipping people bring that up but he wasn't chipping as much as you think and he so where is the the little dunk in the middle of a zone over the middle of the field that gets you six yards it's okay to get a six yard pass that's moving the ball in the right way the play that they ran a little swing pass to jefferson it's okay to use that i think what o'connell did last week was he saw and

when you watch the tape it's kind of incredible you he saw all these holes in the Pittsburgh zone and was just, I think, slobbering at how open he could get some of these receivers with the way they were playing. They were playing their safeties way back. They were sometimes playing single high, which you know, if you play a single high safety against the Vikings, you get shredded every single time because it leaves Jefferson open.

So I think that he was seeing those defenses and being like, yes, the looks are there. Let's hit these explosives. But what wasn't factored in is that they couldn't block it and Wentz couldn't get it out. And this week, I think you have to take a little bit of a different approach of you're not going to have time to throw those balls. So no matter what it looks like coverage wise, you can't do that. And this might be a game where at Miles Price, Ty Felton, like get them in the game, run them an end around, run them a screen, get the ball in their hands, use Xavier Scott again. It's okay to win a game where you have to throw 30 times to get 200 yards because you're not pushing it down the field. that the win still counts if you do it that way, and they might have to.

But we've really never seen them commit to a game like that. I can't, I mean, I can't remember one. Maybe Kirk committed himself to games like that at times. But I, as far as play calling goes, can't remember too many times that that has actually happened. Adam says prediction the Vikings trade for Kirk Cousins over the buy week. I don't think that that's going to happen. I don't think there's, there's no scenario that I could think of where they would do that unless, unless McCarthy's ankle is really bad and Carson Wentz got hurt, then I think they

would maybe go for the season saving type of swing. But if you're Atlanta, I don't know if you want to give up, Kirk, at this point, you're already into the season. The checks are already paid. And if Pennix goes down, you've got a backup quarterback with a ton of experience. Maybe you'd rather just have that with the rate that quarterbacks get hurt of just this second option just in case rather than trading him away. If I were them, I would be like, you know, what, what's a sixth round pick or whatever? We'd rather just have a backup who could come in and win us a couple of games if Pennix gets hurt.

So I'm not sure that they would want to do that. But I really can't think of a scenario. How about this? The only scenario would be if Wence were to, let's say Wendz plays fine and they win the game, but he gets hurt. And McCarthy is boarding the plane back to America and tweaks. his high ankle sprain and he's going to be out six more weeks, I would still actually rather have them just start Max Brosmer and have Desmond Ritter be the bad. So I really actually can't. I tried

there, but I actually can't come up with a scenario where that would make any sense because Max Brosmer knows the offense and he might actually be good at football. So I mean, some of you last week were like, why aren't they playing Max Brosmer? Like, I don't want him in this situation just yet. But one thing he does really well is get rid of the football. That's, that's really no. how well he gets rid of the football. Let's see. Mr. Mayor says I wasn't watching the Giants game closely, but every time I looked at the screen,

it seemed like Dart was making an awesome play. It was a fun game. It was a fun game. I was red zoning it, so I didn't see every play, but I saw a lot of the drives and highlights and stuff. And he was, I mean, Sam Monson compared it to a Tim Tebow win. And I think that's a perfect description.

He was making some plays. he was running he was taking hits he's bouncing back up he's playing with fire yeah i mean the giants this is a crazy thing about the new york giants is that they got rid of saquan barclay they got absolutely slaughtered by everybody but i think that their front office has actually handled a lot of things the right way uh even jackson dart not starting week one i would advocate i don't love the idea of russell wilson being there but i would still advocate them getting dart in after seeing a few weeks of how this goes and getting a little extra experience before he was thrown into the fire. It's probably still going to be a rough ride without Malik neighbors.

But think about the players they've drafted high. That D-line was insane in that game. Abdul Carter is a freak. Like tanking last year for Abdul Carter, tanking the year before for Malik neighbors, who will come back next year, be great, drafting a quarterback. They've signed some defensive players. They've got Brian Burns, who's still good. I think that they've handled a lot of things actually well, and they just need that quarterback position to come together. Adam says the Adam Thielen trade is going to go down as one of the worst trades in Vikings history. I don't know if that's possible to put that in there.

We know what's number one, but beyond that, like what are the worst Vikings trades is trading away Randy Moss in that conversation. I know he didn't work out for the Raiders, but he sure did for the New England Patriots and drafting Troy Williamson. I think that's pretty bad. That goes up there. I personally think trading a fifth round pick for a kicker slash punter who didn't make the team, trading a fourth for Chris Herndon.

This was the equivalent, I think some will say, based on the math, that it was the equivalent of a fourth round draft pick for Adam Thielen. I mean, is it bad if it keeps going like this? Yes. If he plays 10 snaps a game and ends up with. 12 catches on the season. That's a, that's a pretty bad loss for what you expected it to be. I think that it will get going a little bit better.

I think he will be a bigger part of this team as we go forward and make some big catches and maybe still end up with 20, 25 receptions. If he has a few big catches along the way, then it's still a success to give up not that much for him. But as at this moment, there's no question about it. This was not how it was supposed to play out. he was supposed to step in for the first three games and produce for them. But also, I don't know if how much of that is Adam Thielen's fault.

The ball did not get to him. They didn't stay on the field. They didn't throw it. The quarterbacks held on to the ball. They took sacks. They had a lot of things going on in terms of context. But as of right now, no, Carolina is on the right side of that. But it's definitely not one of the worst trades ever.

I don't even think it matches up with some of the bad trades recently. The kicker slash punner one for as long as I've covered the team, that's the worst trade they've made. Hands down. A fifth round draft big. That's very similar fifth rounder for what they got for Thielen. For somebody who had never kicked before because they were panicking, because Dan Bailey, was it Dan Bailey was struggling in training camp?

I mean, that's ridiculous. So I wouldn't say that it's up there just yet. I think that's going to have to play out. They have only played four games. So there's a long way to go before we decide whether Adam Thiel and trade is not good. But it didn't do, it didn't do what it was supposed to do. That I agree with you. What it was supposed to do was get them through until Jordan Addison came back and it didn't.

How much of that is on him and how much of that was on the quarterback play and the offensive line and the way the games played out. It's kind of hard to figure out. he did have a nice first down catch the other day. And actually, it was a play that I'd love to see them run more, which is just a quick slant to Adam Thielen that gets them six yards. When I see that, I sort of just gesture like this, do this, like this thing that you just did, more of that, more of that, because that's going to get you first downs.

And if the only way that they were going to be able to use Adam Thielen was running deep routes or something, then that he wasn't the guy to go get. If you want him to be a possession receiver, treat him like a possession receiver. KFT says Gabriel against Flores, defense has the makings of a shutout. It does. Yeah, it does. I mean, when you just think about a young quarterback, no offensive line whatsoever, receivers very suspect, the defense is not 100% healthy,

but it's close enough to cause a lot of problems. It does have the makings of a very tough day for a quarterback who's never played before. that being said what is this as odds of gabriel lights us up are very very high those two comments were back to back and and those are the two Vikings fans on each shoulder right there is the one that thinks no matter what this team is going to win the next game and they're going to get back on track and then the other one that says oh a new quarterback starting against the Vikings that means they'll definitely win that's funny that those were back to back. but R.J. Gabriel, may God be with you.

I mean, it's his, how, like, I know, like, look, I respect Kevin Stefansky overall, just in general. I mean, I covered him here. I talked to him a number of times. He is a highly respected coach in football. But with this roster, I don't know what is supposed to happen there. It's really crazy that this same coach could win coach of the year. What, did he win twice coach of the year? Just, hey, if he.

You do anything with the Browns, your coach of the year. But he is in a tough spot. There is only so much you could do. And this is how I feel in some ways about the Vikings offense, where, of course, it's way more talented in the backfield, a tight end, a wide end. Well, the tight end might be on the Browns, but receiver weapons overall, much better.

Derisaw is still in this game. The Vikings have a lot more to work with. But the way the offensive line is, you really see, if you get to a certain level, If you get to Code Red with the offensive line, it's really hard to do anything. They have been in Code Red a few times this year. And the game we saw the closest to when they were 100% healthy, which they still weren't. They were still 80%.

But in that game, they were great against Cincinnati. And they protected Wentz and they ran the ball and everything. And this line was supposed to be good. And I think that it would have been. It's just sometimes you cannot control two concussions for the center coming back from ACL for Darisaw. I think Will Fries, we have to give him some credit for coming back from a major injury as well that he did practice. So we thought, oh, he should be fine, but I don't think he's been quite as explosive as I expected him to be based on what he had done for the Indianapolis. Colts

says it's just been a rough ride for both of these teams up front. Mr. Mayor, should we be a concern with J.J. McCarthy not practicing. Feel like I've seen a lot of quarterbacks play through high ankle sprains in real games. I don't want him to do that, but surely the practice field is okay. Yeah, that's, I mean, hard for me to say. When he was first injured, I had asked some people who have not evaluated him about this type of injury. And the feedback that I got back was, well, if he finished the game, then it shouldn't

be too bad. But at the same time, O'Connell has said before that he doesn't want him to be out there until he is 100% and the opportunity is there with the by week to allow him to get to back to 100%. And so not trying to push him out there at all

before this thing is ready to go. I'm a little surprised that he's not back out there practicing but if they don't want him doing anything in real practice that could set him back at all. So even if he's 94%, they're saying we're going to wait till tomorrow

because you're not playing this week. so you're not going to play potentially until you get back and play the Philadelphia Eagles. So you might as well not push it if even there's a little bit of ouchy. I mean, if he groans standing up, you're like, you're not practicing today, kid, because there's no, there's no reason to push it. I did think that he would be practicing by today. But O'Connell did suggest maybe Thursday, Friday, that he could get back practicing, and we'll see if that's it.

I don't know how much he's going to do because Brosmer will likely be the active backup quarterback. Again, I'm guessing would be the active backup quarterback and he would likely be running the scout team for this week if it's Brosmer. So there might be some limitations on what McCarthy could do. But you're right. You'd like to see you'd like to see him getting back on the practice field and at least, you know, making progress here. But there's going to be, if you look at the calendar between games of when they play Sunday morning and then the next time they play, it's a long time. I don't have the calendar app up right now, but it's a, it's a long time for him to heal back to 100%. Trone guy says high ankle sprains take a long time to fully heal. I think that that's the point, right?

It's the, the fully heal is the big part of it. KFT says KOC needs to lean on quick passing game and mix in deeper routes, but less than his normal game plan. And that's the test. That's the test. I think we all see it and we all know that that is what they need to do. but has it been consistently something they've done at any point with KOC? And this is why I've made in the past a comparison with him and Bruce Ariens, like the no risket, no biscuit, this is not, like, think about the opposite end of that is the way that Alex Smith played for Kansas City. Alex Smith won a ton of games with Kansas City and San Francisco by never risking anything.

He never turned the ball over. He took some sacks, but it wasn't that bad. but he would take those sacks where it's like, I'm, could I risk this pass or take a sack? I'll take a sack on third down. He wouldn't push it into traffic. Football outsiders once upon a time named a stat for throwing short of the sticks. After Alex Smith, they did it so often.

And they won a lot because they played a possession game. They won the turnover battle almost every game. You look at the chief's turnover plus minus during Alex Smith's time. And they won a lot that way. That's one extreme that you can. play. You can do that and try to win games that way. The other extreme is that you are always playing aggressively. And you can win that way as well. But you need to hit the right side of variance. And when you get sacked six times, you're not going to hit the right side of variance and

you throw two interceptions. That's really been what's gotten them this year. They got sacked. How many times McCarthy get sacked? Was it six in the game against Atlanta? And then you have two interceptions, right, two intercepts, two and then fumbles, like that you can't, you're not going to win that way if you have, I think I added this up with McCarthy's game against Atlanta. He dropped back like 27 times and 10 or 11 of the plays were either a sack of fumble or an interception. I mean, that's just, you're not going to win that way at the quarterback position, no matter what you're doing. So they do need to have Wentz kind of protected from himself and try to get the ball out of his hands as fast as possible.

But you get a three and out and then the other team moves the ball and then you get antsy and then you want to hit an explosive. And we've kind of seen that play out before with this team. DeMad says too many injuries. What the heck is going on? Well, I think that there's some of this where you could say, hey, you knew Ryan Kelly's history. You knew what had happened in the past and you still signed him. Even if it wasn't for a lot of money, you still.

didn't bring in a backup center who was a veteran, not that there's a million great backup centers out there, but you also cut Garrett Bradbury, who is a starting center in the league and maybe you didn't want to pay his money and that's fine and makes sense, but he's a starting caliber player that you could have had Ryan Kelly, he was under contract. So you could have had Ryan Kelly and then Bradbury is the backup and then Bradbury would be playing now. And as much as he's not an elite starter, he could still play in the league, right? And you can, I think, think, pin some of that on the way that that situation was handled. I personally was not that concerned about it because they had liked what they had seen

from Juergens. And if you add up, go through the PFF grades and pressures and everything from backup centers around the NFL, it's just who was it that you were going to get that was going to be this awesome backup center unless they had kept Bradbury on the roster. I understand why they didn't. That would be a lot to pay for a backup center. and they needed to allocate that elsewhere. But still, like, I get, I get some of that stuff.

But really, a lot of it is just total randomness. I think that you have to separate it into some categories of, like, which ones do you criticize, which one's not. Ryan Kelly still played 800-something snaps last year. Even getting banged up at times, he still played a lot over the last three years. This is a bad break for him. Aaron Jones, that's one where I think you could look at that, and say, that's kind of a lot of money to give Aaron Jones when this risk was there.

I think that they viewed him as very valuable to winning, and I think that they felt like they had a good plan for him physically, but the risk was there. And so some of these were, hey, you knew that that could be the case. And some of these, total, complete, random, bad luck. Donovan Jackson, never injured in college, as far as I know. He is playing great. He's a young guy. So first round draft pick and something happens to his wrist and he's out.

That's, I don't know. What are we supposed to do there? Brian O'Neill, who's been injured a few times through the years but has mostly been an Iron Man for them and he gets hurt on a field goal, it's total, that's total bad luck. That is just, hey, the world is out to get you this year when that happens. and other guys are even playing banged up as well. Like I think Josh Oliver's been playing pretty banged up. C.J. Ham is never injured and he's missing parts of the season.

Cashman is a fairly young player. He's had some injuries in the past, but he was healthy most of last year. He's chasing down Caleb Williams, the hamstring pulls. I don't know. Van Ginkle had an injury history, but that was with a foot. And then he gets a neck injury in camp. Again, these things, you can't really control them. You could say, well, some of these guys are older.

but there's also a lot of older guys in the NFL who know how to take care of their bodies and they're playing. I mean, Harrison Smith getting the health issue and then having to be out for a couple of games. And he only played 17 snaps in the last game. So he's not back up to 100%. That another just totally random thing. Sometimes you get super lucky and you keep everybody on the roster the entire time. And other times the football gods are, not not on your side so that's how it goes a reminder just as we're having the conversation the fan dual question of the day if you just popped in the over under actually went down today from 36 and a half to 35 and a half when dylan gabriel was announced as a starting

quarterback for the browns this is the point total between the browns and the vikings how many points of the vikings need to win this game the consensus has been somewhere between 17 and 21 a little bit 54 says 21. I think that's perfectly fair. Trona guy says Brandl's not very good as the center, hopefully, or a guard, hopefully he'll be better as a center. No, I mean, Blake Brandel is your typical backup offensive lineman, where if you get a handful of games, he can play, and he'll be okay. It's not going to help you. It's not going to move the needle. it's not going to be wow this guy was the answer all along but you can play your game and you don't have your season end because he goes out out there there's much much worse

linemen in the league than Blake Brandel I think right now he'd be starting for probably five or six teams if not more than that based on what he did last year because we've seen some truly horrific horrific offensive line play look at the Raiders there's a guy for Seattle that someone made a video clip of and it kind of looked like like Drew Samia or Dakota Dozier or those where you're going what in the world is happening here. Like that's what happens. There are linemen that are so bad that you can't figure out how they're even playing. That's not Brandel.

Brandel can play. So he's not a great guard, but he's also not a terrible guard. I think he's one of the better. I mean, if you're talking backups, he's probably elite for a backup guard. Center might be a tough task. Snapping the ball. He's never done it before. You're going to have to have Wentz do all the reads there.

That's the thing. If they can't get healthier at the offensive line position, it's not going to be an easy, easy transition back into playing quarterback for J.J. McCarthy. Chris says, what are your thoughts on how KOC has talked about McCarthy? It feels different than in the past. In the past, he was way more excited and confident. Now, not so much.