Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Diving deep on Mike Zimmer's past and future with Tyler Dunne

Episode Date: November 30, 2020

Matthew Coller connects with former Bleacher Report long-form author Tyler Dunne, who has launched GoLongTD.substack.com and one of his first articles was a deep dive on Vikings coach Mike Zimmer. How has Zimmer's hard style frustrated people who have played for him and coached with him? Yet he's been such an effective coach so what does it mean for the future? Is he the right coaching match for Kirk Cousins? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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I'm Grant Wall, and this is American Prodigy, ready to do, from Blue Wire Podcast. Hello, welcome to another episode of Purple Insider. Matthew Collar here, along with Tyler Dunn, formerly of Bleacher Report and now GoLongTD.com. Tyler Dunn has launched. He has become part of Substack Nation, GoLong, which you do exactly that. I love it. It's like a wordplay because you write in-depth, long-form features with the best of them, Tyler. And I'm very happy for you.

You've gone in this direction. You have joined me here and working for yourself nation or whatever we want to call it. Love it. You know, it's, it's liberating in a lot of ways. It's a feeling you can't really describe, man. I got to thank you. I'm going to blow a lot of smoke in this, in this whole conversation we have up, you know, what, cause you've been awesome. You reached out to me. You're the one that got me onto Substack, me thinking this way and it's been awesome I've been loving it you know I obviously have always loved doing long form stories and I think that there's a niche here I think that there's a bright future for everything we got going on so thanks for

having me well and one of your first just so happens to be about the Minnesota Vikings. So that was good timing for you and allowed me to easier tell Vikings fans that they should sign up. Because also, I mean, they'll probably remember your piece, which I think Vikings fans loved, on the Green Bay Packers from your time at Bleacher Report as well. And we've really seen the Mike McCarthy thing play out in Dallas. So that is gol long TD Tyler done. Go long TD touchdown, right? Cool. Dotcom go long TD.

Make sure you go there, sign up and check out his work. And we have to get into this piece on Mike Zimmer that you wrote, because I don't think anyone has gone on the national media stage as in depth on Mike Zimmer and what it's been like to be around Mike Zimmer for the last few years, but also the success that he's had, the way he's been able to get the most out of his team, with also rubbing a lot of people the wrong way. So I think we should begin with just where Mike Zimmer stands right now

because coming into this season, we weren't sure when we got to July whether he would have a contract extension. And when you looked at his win-loss record, you would say, well, this is one of the best coaches in the NFL by win-loss record, so why would his coaching status be anything even on the table? And yet, they came pretty close to that trade to Dallas if they had lost to the New Orleans Saints. So I wonder, as you were researching this story over a long period of time, of course, of you gathering different anecdotes on the record, off the record from people, how you came away with kind of where he stands now

and this progress of him being a very good coach for a lot of his time here in Minnesota, but also always seeming to teeter on the edge with his job status. Yeah, you know, and he has a great summary there. I think that perspective is so important when it comes to Mike Zimmer and the Minnesota Vikings. I mean, as all of your listeners, all of your readers know, I mean, this franchise was in a really bad spot pre-Zimmer. I mean, you can even go back 5, 10, 15 years before that. You're talking love boats. You're talking the stadium collapsing. You're talking Brett Favre's body parts breaking the internet.

Uh-huh. Yep. An image many of us will never get back, unfortunately. They needed a Mike Zimmer. They needed somebody to come in, ball up the fist, bang the table, be the judge, jury, and executioner for this franchise. I think that everybody can be in agreement on that, right? Like they needed a Mike Zimmer type to once and for all legitimately take on the Green Bay Packers

because from Brett Favre to Aaron Rodgers, obviously they tormented them. And I think that in a lot of ways initially players gravitated to Mike Zimmer that's what they wanted as we wrote I mean Chad Greenway said that offseason you know he was a little ticked off they wanted him to take a pay cut he's 31 and I think a lot of guys in that position would you know give him the bird get out of dodge he stuck around and a lot of guys kind of took that approach you know they they gravitated toward a coach who was just going to fumigate the building and bring discipline. And they won. They won a lot of games.

I mean, we all know the playoff catastrophes that have happened, but he won 60% of his games. I just think, and this was what was told to me from people, you know, in and around the team, at some point that message just becomes white noise. If you're going to drive a team that hard, day in, day out, his mentor is Bill Parcells, as we all know, eventually if you're not getting the results, and then you're paying a quarterback 84 mil guaranteed, and you're looking over to this guy, why aren't you paying that guy?

Why aren't you giving this guy 84 mil? Kirk Cousins? That message is going to kind of, you know, get a little fainter and fainter and fainter and go away. And so in a weird way, you know, back to your point, you know, they could have this past offseason, and I remember at the combine getting a sense for this and then through free agency, they easily could have just let Kirk Cousins be a lame duck, let Rick Spielman be a lame duck, let Mike Zimmer be a lame duck, and just kind of coast through this year, hit reset, start over, and they went for it. I mean, when you're extending Kirk Cousins and you're giving these extensions out and you're giving Dalvin Cook that money, you're finding a solution for Stephon Diggs.

I mean, I guess you could say they're kind of playing the middle ground and maybe they are, but they're trying to win when they didn't have to. They could have reset. I think that, yeah, it's a team, it's a head coach at a crossroads, but in a weird way. And you saw this against Carolina. I mean, I know they're five and six and maybe folks aren't ready to get optimistic out there yet. I think you're seeing a lot of those young players who aren't jaded yet. A lot of those young guys that it's not way noise yet. This is the first time they're hearing this from Mike Zimmer.

BC Johnson saying he showed up late to, you know, two meetings. He's getting his ass chewed out by Mike Zimmer. And, you know, this is baptism by the coach. It resonates to guys like that in their first or second year. So maybe this new window has kind of opened up and this new wave of players, granted they have to be good, do respond to Mike Zimmer, and they do win. I don't know what's going to happen next. I mean, I wish I could have had some declarative finish,

like this team is going in the tank or this team is going to win the Super Bowl next year. I don't know where it's going to go. All I know is it's really compelling. Well, we certainly learned against Carolina that you never really do know what's going to happen with this team, that every game has been a roller coaster. They should have beat Seattle, then they didn't. They should have beat Tennessee, and they didn't. They should have beat Dallas, and they didn't.

There have been these close games. But then there's also losses that they absolutely earned. They blew double-digit leads. They lose atlanta a team that had zero wins at the time when they came into u.s bank stadium and so it's in a a very interesting position in terms of the roller coaster of this season which i think everyone kind of is just riding along knowing that they're not there yet but i think that you make a great point there about how the roster that was tired of Mike Zimmer is gone almost everyone I mean you have Eric Hendricks you have Adam Thielen Harrison Smith but that's kind of it for guys Anthony Harris who are around Mike Zimmer for

a really long time and now everybody else is is the new blood Justin Jefferson is the new blood of this team Jeff Gladney the same thing who is learning a little bit of the hard way at times about how hard Mike Zimmer can be on players. And I think that there is an element of just any time a coach is there for a long time until the roster turns over, they will eventually get a little weary of that. But the thing with Zimmer is, if you kind of zoom in a little bit on the seasons that haven't gone that well, he has made them more tumultuous. He has done that.

Like it hasn't just been, oh, well, they're sort of tired of him being mean to them at practice. It's, you know, you not only fire John D. Filippo, but you also toss him under a bus and then you pick up his carcass and heave it under some other sort of oncoming object. I mean, just things like that. The Norv Turner deciding to just walk away in the middle of the season. That there have been a lot of these, whether it's comments from him through the media or just behind the scenes of people who have been manipulated by him in different ways because he is so hard on everyone, that it's made seasons that were tough even tougher. And think about a team that goes 10-6 and is in the playoffs in New Orleans ready to play them, and people at the stadium in New Orleans are talking about, yeah, if they lose this game, he's done.

After going 10-6, I mean, it just tells you what kind of environment it got to at one point. And even though they've hit the reset button, you know that that can happen again. That's exactly it. I mean, he just seems to make it harder than it needs to be. And the folks that I talked to really pointed to that spring into summer, into the fall, out of the miracle, which everybody should buy your book, right? I mean, hey, that's – Making of a miracle. Go to Amazon. Get it.

Let's do it. You know, I mean, after that play, I mean, we all remember where we were, right? right i mean hey that's making of a miracle go to amazon get it let's do it you know i mean after that play i mean we all remember where we were right i remember sitting in the press box for some playoff game maybe it was pittsburgh or whatever and as you look up you can just picture stefan diggs crossing the goal line holding that pose and you think in that moment like oh my god he's going to be a hero a celebrity immortal, immortalized in Minneapolis forever and ever and ever. Build the statue now. And there's a reason it gets to the point it got to where he isn't on the Minnesota Vikings anymore.

He's clearly unhappy. And no, it doesn't really have a lot as much to do with Kirk Cousins as it does the system, the offense, Mike Zimmer, a head coach who didn't really want to just sit down with him and work it out and say, we're going to get you the ball. It was, no, this is our offense. We're going to run the ball. And I think that that season after the miracle is when it became, in the opinions of many, just antiquated, blah, bland. They were doing a lot of really good things for a while.

They were 5-3-1. You know what I mean? Like, they missed all these kicks. You had that Everson Griffin situation before Buffalo. I don't know. Maybe they lose that game anyways. But they were in a good spot offensively playing a modernized way, throwing it all over the place with a defense that was number one the year

before. And then, nope, finally Mike Zimmer says, nope, we're not doing that anymore. I'm sick of it DiFilippo gone that way of thinking gone you can even backtrack to the spring when he's you know mucking up plays on purpose so they'll never run RPOs and and just kind of be in a pain and yeah like Delvin Cook probably is the best running back in football he's worth every penny and you can win that way can you win a Super Bowl that way can you win with Mike Zimmer that way um I don't know I don't know I I maybe there is a balance I mean Kirk Cousins looks great you know against Carolina obviously but

I think at that point if this thing does kind of bottom out you know say they they lose the rest of their games or gets to the point where the coach has to go to the gym. That year is really the turning point, I feel like. I mean, they were a legit Super Bowl contender, and they just didn't get over the hump. Yeah, I think the stage was set a little bit for that in 2016 in a way because it was so tumultuous toward the end. So when it happened again, it was like, really? I mean, are we really? And again, it was like an eight-win season.

This is not a complete disaster, and yet it felt like it through the whole way and I remember there's so many moments from this that I remember as you bring it up one of them is there was a game against the Jets where it was bad weather and they kept throwing and that was where it seemed to set Mike Zimmer off and then he couldn't get away from that in his mind even though I think that a big part of it was they played a number one defense for the Bears or whatever they were, top five, a couple of times, and the Bears made life really difficult for that offense. So then after losing a key game against the Bears, it sold your field, national TV.

I think that that really raised the frustration. And then after Kirk Cousins just didn't play well against Seattle and this is what Kirk Cousins will do to you as well because he is such a roller coaster that when it goes down you start looking around for people to blame like what is going on here the reality is it could just be Kirk being Kirk now that's not to say that I think they had the right offense for Kirk Cousins with John D Filippo I don't think they did. I think that the play action, deep pass offense, the Kubiak, the Shanahan, I think the Stefanski, I think those are a better fit, and statistically it plays out that way.

But I think also that Zimmer exacerbated the problem and made it worse than trying to find a solution. And I agree. The Diggs thing, it was very noticeable that when Diggs wrote a Players' Tribune article to say goodbye to all of his Vikings friends, he thanked Kirk Cousins, said, that's my quarterback. I love Kirk Cousins. And that, I have heard from behind the scenes, is true, that he didn't have a problem with

Cousins. It was really with exactly what you said, the system, the head coach, the fact that there wasn't communication there that I think frustrated him. And now, well, he's landed in a place where they throw him the ball every time and it's good for him. With Zimmer, here's one of the things I've always thought, Tyler, is the guy is absolutely a genius when it comes to defense. He is great at teaching people exactly what they're supposed to do. We see players consistently grow. We see guys come from nowhere like Anthony Harrison become good players. But one thing that's missing between him and Parcells is the ability to have a little heart for a guy too.

And everything that I've learned about Parcells, it just seems like he always had that in him. Where with Zimmer, whether it's his assistant coaches or his players, if it's hard all the time and there's never that put your arm around a guy, Zimmer claims that he does it. But I don't ever hear people say that he does it. You know, you'll have players who say I would die for Bill Parcells. I don't really hear that with, with Mike Zimmer after he's done coaching them. And I think that that's the missing thing. Reminds me, you ever see the movie, There Will Be Blood? Reminds me of that. Like it reminds me of this, this kind of just ruthless guy who just would do anything he could and leave any dead body behind.

And I think that that's what's missing with Zimmer. You're right. And I know I think it was maybe Chad Greenway. He does say this is a coach that will love you up at times. And, you know, current players, I mean, the last thing you're going to hear from, you know, a current player is, oh, my God, the guy is the worst person on the face of the universe. They're going to be supportive of their boss. But, yeah, what I was told is exactly what you just said, that his tendency in front

of the team to call players selfish. And not just that. It's one thing to call a player selfish when he is selfish or does something. But I think he would pick some weird fights. You know what I mean? He'd pick fights with players that everybody kind of knew busted their butt to get to this point, you know, undrafted to stardom and just, what are you doing here?

You're going to make this guy the example? And I think that that turned some players off at different moments these last few years. And you're right, you don't really hear players just gushing about Mike Zimmer they do Gary Kubiak I mean people love Gary Kubiak around the NFL you don't hear it about Mike Zimmer and I think that is telling um who knows I mean I think look the guys I talked to Terrence Newman his voice matters I mean he almost played his whole career with Mike Zimmer, Cincy, Dallas, Minnesota. I mean, he's kind of an edgy guy himself.

You just love talking to Terrence Newman, being around Terrence Newman. I think that they're almost kind of like they have some kind of connection that way. But he says there's a value to it. It's going to harden you. It's going to prepare you for those moments and that you're only going to really appreciate it maybe years down the line in life outside of football. So maybe this is something, you know, a lot of these players that feel slighted or ticked off by

something Mike Zimmer said or did to appreciate down the road. But I do think you got to love some guys up. You know, I do think there has to be that element to him. I mean, maybe the coach who's done it better than anybody is Mike Tomlin. I mean, he's kind of a standard. I mean, Chad Greenway said when he's a 34-year-old defensive coordinator, he is not a player's coach. I mean, he is just ripping guys that are older than him. And he's still in the NFL.

He's finding that balance. Guys run through a wall for Mike Tomlin. I don't know. Greenway says Zimmer is having that same effect, but you don't really get that sentence. Make sure you go to SodaStick.com to get your original Minnesota sports-inspired goods, and they have a huge deal from Black Friday through Cyber Monday, 20% off the entire SodaStick website.

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I haven't gotten that sense from other people either. And that's not to say that it wasn't true for Chad Greenway. His experience obviously might be different but I think that when you talk to a lot of people off the record that they'll sort of tell you yeah it's that hard all the time and when you don't have that other balance like that's kind of it's sort of like the Bobby Knight type of thing and maybe maybe players do feel that way but they also feel like why did you say why did you they also feel like, why did you say, why did you say this about me? Or why did you say something in the media about me for a guy who will tell us over and over how much he can't stand the media. He certainly has manipulated a lot of people through the media.

I mean, everybody knows who's a Vikings fan, the example with Anthony Barr, but there have been many other, many other times through that. And then there's also the assistant coach element where at the NFL combine Zimmer said about Kevin Stefanski basically called him disloyal for wanting to become an offensive coordinator and I know that that hurt feelings and made a lot of people go hey come on Kevin Stefanski has worked his way up from the dirt to be you know a guy who is like ready to be an offensive coordinator and you won't let him go and another example is somebody like why why are you picking that fight? You know? Right. Right. I mean, it's Kevin Stefanski.

He's gotten along with everybody from Brad Childress to Mike Tice to, you know, on down the line to Les Frazier. And he was a guy that they kept around and Zimmer was, he was kind of ruthless in his commentary there for a guy that, and even when Zimmer was asked at the combine about Stefanski becoming the head coach of the Browns he just he wasn't even willing to say anything about it really and it's like what what I mean I get it you want to keep and here's what I think drives it Tyler this is my this is my

theory here that much like in there will be blood um I I think that Zimmer always feels very slighted by the fact that he did not get to be a head coach earlier in his career when he felt he deserved it. And I think that he also is so desperate to win, to be like Parcells, to get his Super Bowl, to prove to everyone that he's the best coach, that he kind of misses things on the periphery. Like he has the horse blinders on and when things go wrong i think he gets so upset that it's going wrong that it turns out in other places as opposed to you know maybe finding a balance with that and i don't think that it's ever going to change but i do wonder about you know okay the rest of this year if things go down will they come back up you know next year when there are expectations again and how that gets handled if it's if it's a tough start this year they went one in five and they

went well you know covid a bunch of new players all those sorts of things but even then there were a couple comments where you went you're really toeing the line already about you know kind of pointing the blame toward other people so i think it will be really interesting as as he goes along here but the the assistant former assistant coaches is something you touched on kind of quite a bit about just being ruthless totally I mean totally ruthless and I think there was always a lot of confusion like especially on the offensive staff like you you know you're calling plays like to specifically blow up what we're trying to do and we're trying to get something accomplished when you got the script in hand like what does that account it doesn't accomplish anything and then you know telling telling coaches you know what what are we're a drop back team now

what the heck and change it to this change it to that and they'll change something in practice and then why are you doing that and it was just kind of strange I mean everybody should be on the same page my god in the spring like you you haven't even had a training camp practice yet and you're already having these issues like that shouldn't exist I mean and it speaks to a certain personality it speaks to a certain head coach to be that rough around the edges that early in that whatever was that 2018 season yeah um you're gonna have issues and I think that there were a lot of people on that staff and on that roster very early on that realized, whoa, this is bad.

This is very, very bad. And it's going to end very poorly. Right when all of us are saying this is a team, it's going to win the Super Bowl. You pair Kirk Cousins with that defense, look out. But I don't know. I mean, you know, one thing we could talk about a lot too is just like the the philosophy behind hiring you know a defensive minded head coach i mean here in buffalo okay sean mcdermott he ended the drought great he made the playoffs again great like

is sean mcdermott the type of coach that is going to be able to keep up with an Andy Reid intellectually on offense in key moments ever? I know it's his mentor, but I don't think so. You bring in a great offensive coordinator like Brian Dayball, great. The play calling is amazing this year. You're going to lose Dayball, and then you're going to start over with another offensive coordinator. There's just a zillion reasons why you should always just hire a head coach who thinks offensively and is thinking through that lens. I get it.

I mean, Mike Zimmer might be one of the best defensive coaches ever, but he clearly just can't get on the same page with his offensive coaches. I mean, everything I hear is that him and Kubiak have a pretty good relationship, but he's been through so many, and I just think you need a head coach at the top who can read offense, and I don't know if McDermott here can at all. I mean, he tried a Nathan Peterman out to start twice. I mean, give me a break, and I don't know if Mike Zimmerman in Minnesota can. It's always going to kind of be there. And this is part of the Kirk Cousins combination that I've always felt that they were just a bad combo for head coach and quarterback.

And they are very much two ships passing in the night. I mean, you don't see conversations on the sideline between Kirk Cousins and his head coach in press conferences. They don't say anything about each other. When you ask Zimmer, hey, Kirk Cousins just led a game-winning drive against the Panthers. Yeah, he was accurate. The first day where Cousins is introduced as the quarterback of the team, Zimmer says, well, you know, he's good in bootlegs or whatever. Like that was one of his first comments, not like this is a huge moment for our franchise or anything else to bring this guy in.

He's like, well, you know, he's accurate. He's good in the bootlegs. He's like, what? I mean, you know, he just looked like he was not having a good time at all at that press conference, knowing he was going to lose defensive players because of it. And you're right that the sole focus being on that side of the ball, the defensive side, I think it's also impacted how they spent their money.

Because Zimmer is the top dog in the franchise. And he makes the grocery list, and then the front office goes and gets the groceries, to use a Parcells-ism. And they spent money on players that they probably shouldn't have spent money on. He publicly pressured the front office to bring back Anthony Barr and try to bring back Everson Griffin this year. Like through the media said, I want Everson Griffin back, said I want Anthony Barr back. And so then it looks like if they don't do it, didn't get Everson back he went elsewhere but if they didn't do it with Anthony Barr well then they're kind of making a fool of him because he said how badly he wants him back and when you look at 2018 they were spending the the second or third most money on defense and like 20th on offense even with an expensive quarterback and

so I think that this has always been kind of kind of a messy type of combination between those two and then respond to that in just a second but I wanted to tell you the day you're describing where Zimmer kept blowing up their plays cousins threw the football into the road next to the practice facility he got so frustrated yep I remember that really really you remember that practice yep I remember the practice because he was so frustrated. He literally threw the ball into the road and it bounced off the road. And we're like, how's it going? It's just a total, like, I mean, you just have to figure out what you are.

Like, are you this defensive-minded team with a defensive-minded coach? And, yeah, we're going to go out there and win with Case Keenum, Teddy Bridgewater. Like we don't need to just go nuts with a historic contract, a quarterback, or if you're going to do that, like go all in with that. Like, or at least care, like you said, I mean, I didn't, I don't even remember that first press conference, but like, you think he'd be a little more excited to bring in a Kirk Cousins. It just seems to be an identity problem. And, you know, I guess one person that you probably know a lot more excited to bring in a Kirk Cousins. It just seems to be an identity problem. And, you know, I guess one person that you probably know a lot more about than I do,

he would kind of come up here and there through this reporting, Rick Spielman. And, you know, he's drafted really well at certain positions, but just that failure at quarterback since whenever he started, what was it, 06, 07, since he's been around there. If you can't get the quarterback right, nothing else matters, and they've got it wrong in just about every way you can draw up. 2020 has already reshaped how we work, and it's almost over. Businesses across the globe are challenged to be their most efficient, which means every hire is critical.

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That's BLUEWIRE, all one word, BetOnline, your online sportsbook experts. And somebody made a great observation to me that Rick Spielman loves kind of the corporate quarterback of Kirk Cousins, which is okay. There are a lot of quarterbacks like that. And Mike Zimmer loved the scrappy quarterback of Teddy Bridgewater, the guy who's kind of a winner and an underdog and wasn't drafted in the first round. I mean, neither was Kirk, but Kirk doesn't present himself like that, like Teddy does. And I always thought it was kind of interesting that the Houston Rockets did a study on this and found their scouts overrated players who were like them. So if you were a 6'7 shooting guard, you know, you'd love 6'7 shooting guards who kind of look like you. And I think there's, I do think there's

something to that. But what is kind of weird to me is that Cousins does not have that personality where he's a dog and he's going to just, you know, fight his way to victories. Even if he does, it doesn't ever really look like he's doing that. You know what I mean? Like aesthetically, he's not, oh, my God, he's been killed today and somehow he found a way to grid his way to a win. He doesn't have that and I think Zimmer wants somebody who's more grisly and there's just like a weird personality conflict

between those two guys totally can see it I mean yeah and Kurt Cousins himself you know obviously incredible arm obviously very talented but as Terrence Newman kind of said himself, like at some point it becomes a pattern to come up short in the big moments like he does again and again and again. It speaks to a certain mentality, an inability to rise. Now, I get it. He just had this game-winning drive against Carolina. That's great.

It's also Carolina and Teddy Bridgewater. I don't know how he missed that throw to DJ Moore. I mean, he said someone hit his arm because I felt the same way, but I don't know if that's true or not. I got to look at the tape, of course. Got to grind that all 22. Yeah, I was going to say that's their line is I got to look at the tape. That's what he said because they asked him after the game.

But I agree, that game was almost blown like 50 different times. Yeah. So it's not one that you should put on the mantle that you came back and beat Carolina. They're not good. Right, right. And it's not one that you should put on the mantle that you came back and beat Carolina. They're not good. Right, right. And it was a good moment for him. But, you know, the people that you talk to around Kirk Cousins say there is

something to that Monday night football record. Like I know we love to mock it and say, oh, you know, it doesn't mean anything. I think it does mean something, that when the lights are brighter and the pressure's highest, you come up short, and we've seen it again and again. And, yes, that was a huge win against the Saints. I mean, maybe it ends the discussion right there, but is your goal to beat the Saints in the wild card or is your goal to win a Super Bowl?

I would think when you pay somebody $84 million guaranteed, most ever, you'd want a Super Bowl. Yeah, and I think that just even his, like, presentation in general of how he looks when it goes bad. The way that he looks when it goes bad is skittish, timid, like maybe afraid, where he will check down to the fullback over and over again, things like that. That was the joke from last year was if he throws to C.J. Hammond the first drive, it's over.

You're not going to win the game. And what it really is, I think, is just his skill set. And it also has to do with the defenses that he's playing, what he's capable of doing. But the way that he looks in doing it, and he is not a guy who the whole team five years from now, if he's gone, will say, Man, that guy owned our locker room. There's just not that guy like the way they talked about Bridgewater it was almost like sub tweeting everybody it was like he was everybody everybody loved Teddy Bridgewater he was an amazing leader we could only believe in him and

you're like did you guys just lose a close game with Kirk or you know that kind of thing kind of thing. But I think as far as going forward, Tyler, this is going to be fascinating because Cousins is under contract. Very unlikely they go a different direction now. They've got Jacksonville coming up. They're going to win some games down the stretch here. But also, all the things we just talked about are not changing. They're going to stay the same. And my question to you then is, after everyone you talked to,

after everything you learned, can they win? Do you think that they could win? Against Jacksonville? Not against Jacksonville. I mean 2021, 2022 as they rebuild this team with great talents like Justin Jefferson and more draft picks and everything else. Like do you think that it is too fundamentally conflicting I don't want to say broken because it works to some extent but is it is it a situation where we're

always talking about nine and seven or is it a situation where they could get farther than that the way a lot of folks around the league describe it is no man's land you know that's the worst place to be I mean seven and nine to ten and six I think that's the worst place to be. I mean, 7-9 to 10-6. I think that's kind of where they are. I mean, I think that they had an opportunity, really, last spring when Kirk Cousins turns down that initial offer to say, all right, you got a contract, play into this year. And, all right, Mike Zimmer, Rick Spielman,

you've got contracts, play into this year. And then see how it goes. Like, there shouldn't have been this urgency. I guess, you know, professionally you don't want somebody to be a lame duck. I get it. But we've seen this song and dance before. I mean, they didn't – with Kirk especially, they didn't have to do that. And now, like you said, they're kind of stuck with –

I mean, I haven't even heard at quarterback that they were a little afraid to even bring in somebody to threaten Kirk Cousins this last offseason, which, you know, they didn't want to, like, bother him. You know, and they bring in a seventh-round pick. I mean, Green Bay's drafting Jordan Love, 26th overall with Aaron Rodgers. I think that that could have been a way to plan for the future, too. But they're going for it. To answer your question, I think that they'll be competitive with Mike Zimmer.

I think this is still a roster that's young that wants to fight for him. I think there's a lot of good promising young pieces to work with, and they're not like looking at Mike Zimmer and sick and tired of Mike Zimmer. I think that you see some fight. You saw it against Carolina. I think that's a good sign, but Kirk Cousins is going to be the quarterback still. To me, I don't see him taking down all of these other elite quarterbacks in the NFL anytime soon. I think he's a very good quarterback with a very good arm.

And you get into the playoffs, is he really going to win three games in a row? I just can't see that happening. I don't know. Because at some point he's going to play a tough defense. And I ran across this stat for everyone for this year for how he's playing. The Vikings are one of the bottom ten. So take them out. There's nine other teams in the bottom ten in terms of pass rating against the defense.

Vikings have played eight out of nine this year. And so that's kind of a big deal in terms of evaluating him. But I think they also want to be right about him and uh kirk will never be bad enough to get you fired he will not ever be good enough probably to drag you somewhere it's going to have to be a 2017 like season which you never do know there's a book about it if you know people want to know how that happened so there you go hey there we go um golongtv.substack.com the place to find you and your piece will the vikings finally rise under mike zimmer is absolutely terrific uh read it all the way through and your your information i think i mean from somebody who is not covering the team all the time you can

really tell how much effort you had to put into this to make sure you got it all right across the board. It matches up with the things that I've heard and you offer some new insight that I think even the listeners to the greatest Vikings podcast would not know. So Tyler, you're the best man. Follow him on Twitter at T-Y-D-U-N-N-E. And we will catch up again soon. Awesome, man.

Thank you, Matt. Really appreciate you having me on. This was awesome.