Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - EMERGENCY PODCAST: RAMS TRADE FOR MYLES GARRETT

Episode Date: June 1, 2026

Matthew Coller talks with Sam Bruchhaus of SumerSports about a trade between the Los Angeles Rams and Cleveland Browns sending Myles Garrett to L.A. and Jared Verse goes to the Browns. How does this impact the Vikings??!?! The Purple Insider podcast is brought to you by FanDuel. Also, check out our sponsor HIMS at https://hims.com/purpleinsider Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See https://pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hey, everybody, welcome to an emergency episode of Purple Insider presented by Fandul. Normally, we would not have an emergency podcast for anything to do with any other teams than the Vikings. But this, this needed an emergency podcast. Matthew Collar here with Sam Brookhouse of Sumer Sports because we were going to record a podcast talking about the Vikings, the front office, Nolan Teasley's higher. And then this a bomb dropped on the NFL that the Los Angeles. Rams have acquired Miles Garrett from the Cleveland Browns in exchange for Jared verse and a first round draft pick going back to Cleveland. So we're going to react to this through a Minnesota

Vikings lens. We will definitely get Sam with you talking about Nolan Teasley and his plans and whether this has any sort of impact on how he might plan out this season and next season. And I just want to note from our friends at Fandul that the odds have already changed that the Rams are now the favorite to win the Super Bowl at plus 550 on Fandu. Wow. So Mr. Brookhouse, why don't you just jump right in with your reaction to the Rams going full freaking

Rams? Well, look, I didn't know the Fandall. I'm not to be, you know, a great partner here for our excellent partners at Fandall, but like I didn't know that information.

And the way we talk about these types of players is that, other than quarterbacks, there's very, maybe four to five players a year who can really tilt a win total massively, who can even really tilt, you know, like a line for an individual game massively. And either the markets are, you know, trying to take advantage of a great news period or, which is probably, and I would consider this, Michael Parsons, maybe some subset of Will Anderson, Aidan Hutchinson, et cetera, and maybe some subset of Jamar Chase, Justin Jefferson, and some of those other wide receivers, that shows how cataclysmic mountain moving of a move this really is. And also, for what it's worth, it shows the difference between even a Pro Bowl caliber,

you know, yearly candidate in Jared Verse and a consistent defensive player of the year candidate in Miles Garrett. So that data point, an initial reaction, that data point just kind of blew me away. I didn't know that because that indicates, you know, things like positional value when it comes to defensive ends. It indicates the difference between the top players in the league and just the best players in the league. And it indicates more generally with, you know, quite respect to the Vikings in general, I think what the Rams think about their quarterback situation right now.

Because if you're adding all these other expensive players and you just extended Matthew Stafford for one year and $55 million, it indicates that they feel little to no stability in their quarterback position and they want to optimize now for what they had. I mean, when you look at the time that they won the Super Bowl in 2021, they made a very similar move to this going out and getting Jalen Ramsey from a bad franchise at the time that he was trying to get his way out of there. And they gave up a lot of draft capital to do so. They messed up their salary cap to do so. But this is what full Rams really means. It's all in. It's chips to the middle of the table.

and to give away someone like Jared Verse, who is on the younger side and another first round draft pick, it really says, like, this is the end of Matthew Stafford. And I know he did get an extension, but you're only probably talking about maybe 2007 for Matthew Stafford. There's only so much longer this guy could go into his career, especially when he is perpetually banged up in some way or another. And that goes back many, many years. I think that what the Rams have done probably as well as any team, in the NFL over the last decade is truly understood their windows. And this wouldn't have been a move that I think you make even like two years ago for them

as they were still putting the pieces back together after the roster. As we all expected when they went all in, they won the Super Bowl, it immediately fell apart. And they had to slowly build it back up through the draft, through getting a player like Devante Adams, through hitting on some guys that they didn't necessarily expect to be great, like Puka Nakua or Cam Curl, you know, guys like that who are not first round draft picks. And they hit on a bunch of those picks and decided, all right, we've got the MVP quarterback. He's going into his last couple of years here. Now we're really going to go for it with Miles Garrett.

Now, they had Aaron Donald. We knew of his impact. With Miles Garrett, not a lot of people have even watched him play football for the last few years because why would you? but just pulling up his PFF stat page over 80 quarterback pressures, three seasons in a row for Miles Garrett, consistent defensive MVP. But I think there is a little bit of a question. Like the initial dialogue that I've seen from people on Twitter reacting to this is, well, how much of an impact is it really over Jared Verse, who is an excellent player?

Now, Vers has not been great at actually getting sacks, but he has been really great in terms of creating pressures, and he is a powerhouse, was a home run draft pick for the Los Angeles Rams. And now the fact that they spun him for Miles Garrett is pretty impressive. But giving up another first round pick as well, how much better do we think this truly makes the Los Angeles Rams defense? That's an excellent question. I'm trying to think of a way to quantify it as well, because what we do know is, number one, sacks are the most destructive force. for defenses. And moreover, you can get them pretty consistently year over year over year with guys

who get consistent pressure. Now, is there weird years where sack conversion ratios for defensive ends don't look fantastic? I think a guy's like Grenard for a great example, a Vikings example. I think of Josh Heinz Allen is another guy who is like this. Yes. So like in my head, I think there's a true and quantifiable difference between Jared verse and Miles Garrett. The same way that with some of the Cowboys Eddressers or the quality Cowboys players that they had, there was a difference between Micah Parsons and those guys and the reason why they have to go then make a trade for Q Williams. And in my head, like if I had to put a spot on it, I'd say on a game by game basis,

it'll be about a quarter of a point, maybe slightly less in terms of the spread, which is getting a little technical here. But that's a big difference. Like that's a difference that you would make a bet on or not on as a result. And so I do think that there is an actual quantifiable difference. But I think there's a team building element here as well, which is I don't think the Rams were as happy with Jared versus progression as they thought they might be. I thought that it was a level, it was a kind of a plateau from year one to year two.

now that's a very, very high plateau, all things considered. But I do think it was a plateau. And I think they're sitting there saying to themselves, we're already operating on a one, maybe two-year calendar here because of our quarterback situation. And if we're going to take the quarterback out of this scenario, we're working on maybe a five-year calendar. And let's add a player who we know for at least the next three years

is going to be probably the best player, in the league at his position and very key, a player who on a team that has immensely struggled at the quarterback position has basically been the cornerstone of a top five to top 10 defense for the entirety of his career. And so when you're trying to build on those two timelines, it's one of the few moves that actually makes sense for both. Number one, you're adding a quantifiable point difference to your team, a team that already has added Trent McDuffie who probably isn't quite in that makes a full difference in a team

spread zone but is pretty close for a cornerback and a one year deal for Matthew Stafford, which is the grand majority of that change. And then also saying, okay, year three, year four, if we don't have Stafford, we probably need to make sure we are on the Seahawks plan or the or the, I mean, even to a certain degree, the Vikings plan where we can maintain competitiveness through the quality of our defense, and what is the only way to have a consistent quality defense to have a top two to three edge rusher? Yeah, I think when it comes to sacks that it is a skill,

and we've seen over long periods of time, some players like Jadavian Clowny comes to mind for me, who are extremely inconsistent when it comes to their sacks. And then we've seen other guys who don't necessarily have the highest pressure rates, and that would be like a T.J. Watt that's not always at the top there, but consistently is finding a way to get sacks and, you know, forcing fumbles and things like that. Miles Garrett is the most complete package of any player in the entire NFL when it comes to that. When it comes to the pressures and the sacks.

And I also think another thing is, too, that quick pressures matter a lot is we can look at a pressure's number and say, well, Jared versus number from last year is actually not that different than Miles Garrett when it comes to just the pure number of pressures they create. but did you create those pressures by destroying an offensive lineman instantly and then getting a sack? Or did you slowly push them back into the quarterback to where, yes, it did disrupt the quarterback, which is the definition of a pressure. So he had to move off his spot, but you weren't taking him down in the backfield and you weren't getting to him instantly. So that quarterback had a better chance. It's not to be down on Jared Verst in any way.

I mean, I think that he is a younger, still rising player. was drafted a little bit on the older side, so maybe the ceiling isn't quite as high as, like, getting way, way better. But there is a massive difference between this person could reasonably get you 15 to 20 sacks. And I don't know how many, half of his pressures coming within two and a half seconds, which is just disrupting everything. And I think that also there's an element of trickle down to this where when you now go play them, there are one-on-ones across the board.

And it is hardly just Jaredverse. It's Byron Young who had 64 pressures last year. Kobe Turner who had 55, Brandon Fisk, Braden Fiske, who had 42. Puna Ford was still a good player for them last year. Like you can get all these one-on-one matchups because there is no world where you can go into a football game thinking, yeah, we'll just have our left tackle play against Miles Garrett. Because a lot of times what we see, Sam, is we'll see the bad left tackles or right tackles will get help. and the good ones will just handle it on their own. This is a guy that even if Christian Darrasaw is going up against him or Trent Williams,

you're still going to need to help with Miles Garrett. So I think that there is a difference there. There is one thing that does come to mind a little bit for me, because you mentioned year over year with Cleveland and how good their defense has been. It is a rarity in the NFL to have consistent year over year. But I feel like the thing that travels the best is probably going to be, defensive lineman like this. Like when you go through the delinement, their pressure rates are usually pretty sticky from year to year. Yes. And on sumersports.com last year, we did a deep dive into

this, both on the Sumersports show, which you can find on YouTube. And we'd love, we'd love you to subscribe while also doing a written piece as well. And there's really two positions that are sticky in the NFL. It's the wide receiver position and the defensive end position or the edge rusher position. Why do you think they're the two highest paid non-quarterback positions? Because there is, you know, it's more likely than not if a player is not injured and gets a total, you know, a good number of snaps year over year, especially when they're a veteran or, you know, on their second contract, that they're going to have the same amount of pressures each year. And the reason why that is is because there's a lot of one-on-ones. The defensive coordinator gets to decide how they

want to use them. It's kind of a chess piece. And then the third element is that teams pass a lot. So you're getting rep and evaluation and observation time after time after time. And that brings me kind of to the thesis of why I think the Rams made this move, which is if you were to start blank with a team and we said we were randomly assigning quarterbacks and you can't choose, there's maybe four or five players who you would select first. And it's really tough to say, that Miles Garrett would not be on the top of that list for a one year period, for a three year period, and maybe even despite his age for a five-year period, all things considered, it's probably Miles Garrett, it's probably Michael Parsons,

it's probably Justin Jefferson, Jamar Chase, and not looking at the off-the-field stuff, probably Pooka Nakuwa, and maybe after another year, Jackson Smith and Jigba. The most consistent of all those players and most healthy of all those players is Miles Garrett. Folks, if you find yourself hunting search engines for different hairstyles that might cover up your receding hairline, or if you're studying every actor and athlete you see of a certain age to see how they're handling their hair loss, well, maybe it's time to get yourself a solution instead of obsessing over what's happening on your dome. I present you with that solution. It's called Hymns.

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Featured products include compound drug products, which the FDA does not approve or verify for safety effectiveness or quality. Prescription required, see website for full details, restrictions, and important safety information. Right, yeah, that's something that doesn't get factored a whole heck of a lot, is that he hasn't had much of an injury history for his career. And the other thing is, too, that when we look at just how players age in general, what positions, it feels like even with edge rushers when they do age, it's pretty gracefully at the all-time great level.

Like even Bruce Smith, that comes to mind, of course, from like 20 years ago. But even he was continuing, and Reggie White were continuing to get sacks laid into their careers. And I think that if you're a middling type player, an average type edge rusher, that, yeah, you fall off one step and you are going way down. But if you talk about Miles Garrett, even within the next two years, even if he drifts backwards a little bit, you're still talking about one of the top 10 players in the entire NFL, which would make this work for them.

So I think that on every single level, it makes sense for the Rams really going specifically toward building your timeline around your MVP caliber quarterback. But there are a couple questions that I have about this. I mean, giving up a first round pick and with a bunch of contracts coming up, are you kind of looking at maybe having to rebuild this thing and where eventually, not this year or next year, those are your two big swing, like last chance with Matthew Stafford type of attempts to win one more Super Bowl with him before it's time. But, you know, when you do look at the longer term, you gave up a younger player,

you gave up another first round draft pick, you gave up another draft pick to get Trent McDuffie. this type of approach does have consequences if it doesn't work out. And the one move that doesn't really seem to fit with any of this timeline-wise is drafting Ty Simpson. Ty Simpson was by most people's measure, much more of a second-round type draft pick or a late first-round type of talent. And they go all in with him, a very high draft pick with 13th overall to take him, as opposed to a lot of other talent that was still remaining in the draft.

most specifically, you mentioned Puka Nakua and some of his issues off the field, but Devante Adams' hamstrings are just meat at this point. So even though Adams is still a really great receiver, he's never healthy for an entire season. It now strikes me as pretty odd that they wouldn't draft Mackay Lemon. I mean, are they planning on just running three tight ends all the time? I know they did that last year with a lot of a ton of success, actually, but it seemed to me like that would have made so much sense to draft the top wide receiver to even more enhance your quarterback. Is this like an apology move to Matthew Stafford? Like, sorry, we drafted the quarterback of the future, but we will go get you Miles Garrett

on the defensive side. Man, that's an excellent question. And I'm, I'm trying to hypothesize and structure this. Has the rest of, at the time that I read, the rest of the draft picks had not come out? Is that still the case? Let me check right now. Shefter just tweeted something that's like the full trade. So hang on one moment.

Yeah. So while you do that, let's talk about the first round pick, though, because there's a couple positions that you really want to spend the first round pick on, which is number one, the quarterback position. Number two, the wide receiver position. Number three, edge rushers to a certain degree and tackles. And I think in their view, like let's take the Rams view, not the analytical view here. they address the quarterback position and really they've now addressed the eddressing position,

which I think they feel very strong about. This could be also a sign that they're not actually going to extend or, you know, restructure or try to figure out something with the rest of those defensive linemen and that they'd just rather spend that money on a top tier player. So I think they feel good about the defensive line. The offensive line, there's a lot of contracts coming up, but I think for the most part, they feel vaguely comfortable with it. And that brings up the wider seat position.

So like the wide receiver position right now is the one that they are going to be the least likely to be able to address at all. Now, is that good for a rookie quarterback like talking about Ty Simpson? I think that the move to not get a wide receiver in really any form or format of the draft or the trades or etc. is probably more detrimental to Ty Simpson's development than it necessarily is to Matthew Stafford. And so I think that's the kind of interesting element I'm playing with in my mind here is that obviously there must have been some demand

that they saw for Ty Simpson early on in the draft. Maybe that was the Cardinals, maybe that was someone else. Is there a way that they could have pulled off, you know, drafting Mackay Lemon or drafting, you know, another wide receiver at that position and then getting Ty Simpson, perhaps, But then maybe you don't have the draft capital to go and get a Miles Garrett. So I do think all things considered, if you take what the Rams seem to believe,

it makes sense what they are trying to do. Now, analytically, does it make sense to reach on a player for 25 to 40 picks in the first round? No, that's probably not going to go your way. Does it make sense to only have one wide receiver who can maintain target share that you think can be healthy? And moreover, are we sure that Pooka Nakua can be healthy? No. Does it make sense to bet on that your 13 personnel package is going to just shred teams moving forward? Probably not. And I think the one that is, you know, we feel a little bit better about is, is Matt Stafford going to be good next year? I think it probably is, but you're dealing with injury, you're dealing with risk and you're dealing with age,

which are three things that you really get a little sticky on. That puts you in a position where to try to negate that, you have to spend all this capital to go get my money. So I do think all things considered, it is a considered and smart move even with the draft capital unless it's like some crazy number of second round picks. But there is kind of a situation that they put themselves in long term where you have to have one of the best players in the league. And so I'm actually substantially more worried about the impact on Ty Simpson than the impact on the one year.

Yeah. I mean, I guess for me, I'll give you the full trade here. As Schaefter just tweeted this out, it's obviously Miles Garrett to the Rams for Jared Verse, the 2027 first round draft pick that was initially reported, but also 28 second and a 2029 third. So still a fair amount of draft capital heading out over the next couple of seasons where it's hard to figure out is you've created a two-year situation for yourself here with this. And then Ty Simpson, I guess, is supposed to take over.

And that's not totally destructive amounts of draft capital two years. it's one second, it's one third, like you can, you know, make up for that. And the Rams found a way to do it the first time after they traded a bunch of stuff for veteran players. But I also think that wide receiver is one of the positions that translates to the NFL the fastest. So if you were to draft McKay Lemon and maybe they had something about him that they didn't necessarily like, I don't know. But if you were to draft him and put him in at the wide receiver three position, I mean, then you're talking about a pretty smooth transition into the NFL and probably. probably someone has the talent if it works out to play up a spot when, not if Devante Adams gets banged up.

And that's where it comes down to, so we mentioned off the bat here that the Rams are clearly now the favorites run away. The next best team. So they are plus 550. The next best two teams are the Ravens and Bills at plus 1,000. And then the Seahawks to repeat at plus 1100. So those odds are now really favoring the Los Angeles Rams after this that on the, offensive side, that feels like where it could be more risky for them.

Usually if a quarterback has an MVP season, it's very hard to repeat that MVP season. Stafford has had down years, not every year, of course, because he's a, you know, great player. But even I would say last year, 2004, he was through the regular season just okay. And then this year it exploded. They had answers, as you said, with using bigger personnel and they ran the football extremely effectively and, you know, so forth, played good defense. But there's so many examples also of all-in teams. That's why there is the comment that Kwayce Adolfo mentioned,

Mentsa mentioned that I reference the full Rams because oftentimes if you do push chips into the middle of the table like this and it doesn't work out because somebody gets hurt or whatever else. I mean, if Matthew Stafford gets hurt, then Ty Simpson is not ready to go lead a Super Bowl winning team. he's thrown like 500 passes or something in his college career. So I do think that this comes along with a fair amount of risk for the Los Angeles Rams. But I want to spin this to a Vikings perspective.

Number one, the Vikings do not play the Los Angeles Rams this year. So that's nice. They also don't play the Cleveland Browns. Because that's nice because Jared Verse has absolutely destroyed them when they have played against Jared Verse. but I think that it should have at least some element of impact on the Vikings, knowing where another team stands for their timeline. Like that team has two years left of being a behemoth of the NFC, and they will eventually get back to being good.

I'm sure if Sean McVe sticks around past Matthew Stafford, but we don't know that. Like he could go be a broadcaster and be on the, you know, the Bill Cower plan of just, you know, talking on TV for the next 30 years. or whatever and just, you know, take his Super Bowl rings and go home. I don't think that this necessarily changes anything about where the Vikings are, except in one small way, which would be if you were the Vikings and you're looking at the trade market, which apparently is kind of robust right now since we're expecting an AJ Brown trade,

here goes Miles Garrett. I mean, who else, you know, could potentially be on the market. I think if you were sort of mulling that over with your new general manager as he's getting on board it and you're saying, hey, we've been talking about maybe this very interesting move to make one more big trade with this group. I don't know that you do it now. I mean, I know that one player and one move shouldn't necessarily change another franchise's entire plans, but the Rams, and I would also say this mostly for the Seahawks, are head and shoulders above everyone else. Everyone else is hoping and praying for seven different things to go right to be a Super Bowl contender, whereas the

Rams and the Seahawks are walking in as the kings of the NFC? I, in football, there's always going to be an immense amount of variance. And there's always going to be unexpected things to happen. And so I think particularly when you're in a situation like the Vikings are, where they had the year from heck last year and they still maintained a level of competitiveness. And now we are going into a draft in theory that has a lot of good quarterbacks in it. again, in theory. And they're sitting there with Kyle Murray and JJ McCarthy.

So like that's top of mind, obviously as a general manager at all times until you have it locked down. In terms of the trade market, I think that, man, that's a tough question. I think that they, there may be a case that you can be more of a seller than a buyer, but I don't really want to sell Justin Jefferson right now,

especially when I have a young quarterback. And do, and this kind of goes more into the evaluation of the team building what they're trying to do. Like, they cashed in on, on Gernard and were able to get, I think all things considered looking at the trade of Miles Garrett of a pretty good return as a result. And so I think that the buyer market for them, as you mentioned, is probably limited. and it's more about building through the draft. And all that considered, I think that is why they ended up making the move that they did to go with Nolan Teasley,

who by all reporting and my discussions with folks in and out of the organization, he was the guy who was really moving the operations when it came to the scouting operation along as John Schneider was the kind of head of state a little bit more. And that Teasley was really the operational guy who was interfacing with the scouts every day, putting forth the insights and the information for the decision makers to make

and providing obviously a detailed recommendation as well. By my understanding from who I talked to, that is what was going on. And I think that particularly is going to be the way forward more so than the trade market for the Vikings. Yeah, I totally agree. And I was thinking about in making the connection here between the Vikings and this gigantic move

by the Los Angeles Rams to acquire Miles Garrett is you go back a couple of years. They trade Jared Gough for Matthew Stafford. And you look at Matthew Stafford's personal record. You looked at his statistics and you looked at his win loss record and so forth. And you would have said, are you sure that you really want to go full Rams, that you want to go all in and make all these crazy moves and everything else around this quarterback who's been pretty flawed throughout his career. But also, this is a.

Tyler Murray Point, played for a really, really pathetic and bad franchise for many years. And, you know, one of his biggest falloffs is with Matt Patricia, who had no idea what he was doing as a head coach of an NFL team. And the Rams pick him up. And I remember my own skepticism. Like, I don't know. I've seen Stafford play a bunch of times. I mean, I think he's good, but I don't know if I really see this.

And then you start to understand in the national football conference right now, it is a roster building contest between all these teams where there is just a lot of really good quarterbacks. And I think that what Stafford proves is if you can have continuity at the quarterback position, I think it's worth its weight in gold right now. Like there's teams that are chasing their tails a little bit. There's teams that are trying to take swings in the draft. And look, the Vikings, of course, should have drafted J.J. McCarthy when they did. We all agreed on that. You know, you could go back at time and say, well, it would have been better if they just had Sam Darnold, right? And then stuck with him and drafted somebody else with the 10th overall

pick. But at the time, we all agreed. It's time to draft the quarterback. But I think we're seeing a little bit of a shift here, Sam, to a lot of teams being able to build around these bigger contracts because the salary cap keeps going up, the levers that teams can pull. Like, here's the Rams giving an extension to Matthew Stafford. And then a few days later, they go and get Miles Garrett. I think that the, I always used to push back against the salary cap isn't real people. But it feels like it's kind of not as much at this moment if you don't want it to be. Like if you're willing to make a short-term sacrifice, this is a point about being able to sign Kyler Murray to an extension if he plays well here and if you like him and if he likes you

and if he gets along with Justin Jefferson will get a lot of pushback if they don't win the Super Bowl, which I, you know, today don't feel like they're going to with the Rams getting Miles Garrett. But I think that there is a message here, which is that you can have that quarterback and that if they are of a certain level, then it's all about what you can do around them, which I think should influence the next way that Nolan Teasley manages the Minnesota Vikings. Yeah, there's a bunch of interesting comments that you made. but the first is I want to say, hey, look, maybe the Saints knew what they were doing back in the day, which like, and I want to time box that because they did it to the inth degree. They went to the logical conclusion of how far you can push that.

But the reality is, is if you have five to ten pro bowlers on your team, you don't want to let them go. Like it's difficult to let those players go. And moreover, we've seen this with the chiefs in particular, the bills to a certain degree. like people say that having a quarterback on a massive deal inhibits your ability to, you know, add other players. But what it also does if you believe that they can play five to 10 years is allow you to restructure every year to add those players to a team or a franchise who has by far the most important element to win, which is a good quarterback. And so I think there's two kind of methods of operation here, or I guess in theory three method of methods. of methods of operation that you should team build. And ironically, we've seen Nolan Teasley be in the Seahawks organization for pretty much all

three of those. Number one is you draft a really, really good quarterback. You have them on a rookie deal. You extend them and you start trying to use that extension to move other places. We saw the Seahawks do that with Russell Wilson. Then you have another option where, okay, well, we don't really like that quarterback. It's not working out for us. How do we go in piecemeal it?

We've seen them basically do this twice. I'm going to consider it as once, though. The Gino Smith move where they had them in the building, and you invest in that Phoenix quarterback in today's cap dollars would be a 10 to $30 million contract per year. So one of the lower paid starters, but definitely above, well above the backups. And you build everywhere else in case you can figure out where that quarterback comes from. That's option two.

We've seen Nolan Teasley do that. And I think that's going to be the plot. with Kyler Murray, with J.J. McCarthy moving forward. And then the final one is the Sam Darnold element. And I consider kind of Matt Stafford in this group, too, obviously to the end degree, where it's like, we think we know this quarterback is good. Now, are there flaws? Is there a reason he's on the open market? Yes. But we're going to go get it because option two, we believe we have the team or the team of the coaching to succeed. We've seen Nolan Cheesley do that as well. And so packaging up those three, I think solidly everyone would consider the Vikings right now to be in the Phoenix

quarterback method where Kyler Murray couldn't make it work in Arizona despite being the rookie of the year. And J.J. McCarthy couldn't make it work last year. But we're going to try to build long term through the draft, through free agency, and build a quality team so that if any of these guys pop, we extend them there. We have that clap flexibility as a result. We'll start paying other people substantially more money. You're already paying Justin Jefferson a ton of money right now. That's kind of the only guy off the top of my head that I can think of that you're utilizing as that kind of tent pull that DeMario Davis or Cameron Jordan were for years where they kept restructuring them with the Saints. And that is the method of operation. And when we really break it down,

we talked about this last week when we were talking about the five general manager candidates. The only person who's done all three of those was probably Nolan Teasley. It's interesting because I just wrote about this today. Now it feels even more relevant that the Vikings have this tendency to be won and done. They have a tendency to do the Rams type of thing. But the Rams got away with it in 2021. They were a dropped interception away from not getting away with it. But what the Vikings have done is in 2017, you go to the NFC championship and then you're like,

we got to go nuts. We got to spend the most money on bringing in Kirk Cousins. Don't forget they did that with Shell. and Richardson and then a couple things go wrong. The new OC hire doesn't work. The schedule is harder. There's a couple injuries. And all of a sudden you're going, uh-oh, like what do we do now?

Then they restructured everything out to Wazoo, lost a bunch of talent, had to go through this whole thing, right? And even when you look at 2022, I remember being in favor of these things generally. So I can call myself a little bit hypocritical here. But I think with a little hindsight on it, you can see it when you get Patrick Peterson back and Zadarius Smith and you go out and trade for T.J. Hawkinson and so forth, like these are a lot of really good players and you've got a chance, but if it doesn't work out, you're going to get hit with big dead cap hits and you're going to have to go back down,

but they don't want to go all the way down to the bottom, right? And you kind of get stuck in this up and down and up and down. And it even happened in 2004, where they overreact to 2024. They overreact to Darnold's play at the end of the season. but they also overreacted to how good their team was, and they go, all we need is these $35 million worth of defensive tackles when probably not, right? Like they're in free agency for a reason. All we need to do is bring back every player at top dollar in free agency.

And I like Byron Murphy a lot. And I like Aaron Jones a lot. But like dollars to donuts, these are not the smartest moves to make. So what I'd like to see from Nolan Teasley, as you see another team sort of almost announcing, this is the end of the run for us, folks. We are really going for it is to aim for patience, which could be hard for us. It could be hard for Vikings fans who are like,

dude, I would like a Super Bowl right the frick now because we've been waiting for so long and everything else. But I think that the patient build is the only way that the Vikings can get to a point where then you are the team making this move. If you make it this year and you, you don't win the Super Bowl, if you don't compete for the Super Bowl because the Rams and Seahawks are just too good, then you're going to be kind of stuck again for the future where I think that you should be looking several years out saying, all right, a lot of these pieces will go

in 2027. So if you get quarterback stability should be their hope and dream, then build everything around that over another year or two to the point where then you're in that spot where you are making the big June 1st trade for the win now player. Because a lot of times, they've sort of jumped the gun on that and not really had the horses to do moves like that, but yet they've done it anyway because they've been desperate to chase a loss from the previous season. And let's not forget, like the Rams are putting up the flag right now. And obviously, they've done it twice now. The screw them picks strategy is what they've detailed.

And that's going to be whatever is tied to less need. The reason why they're in this position is because of the draft. they flipped their defense in two years to completely underpaid young players and just basically nailed every defensive draft pick to where last year most the players on the team were drafted or picked up for peanuts and for the agency and they're rolling out one of the cheapest defenses that is a top five defense. That's the reason why they're in this position.

It's not because of all these trades and cap stuff. And so I think when you look at what the Seahawks have done in particular and with the understanding that Tisley was running that scouting operation is that they take a lot of draft picks. The Vikings are going to turn into a draft first team, a build through the draft team. And so while we're saying that that's the patient kind of way, especially given that he was added on after the draft, which I actually think does give him a bit of leeway to understand this team and understand like kind of build, rebuild. the systems to the way that he wants them. Like, that's the way that you get in a position where you can trade for a Miles Garrett or even that you can get in a position to trade for Matthew Stafford years ago or Jalen

Ramsey years ago. It's by having a system that has won through the draft that then you can take advantage of it using the other tools. And I think that is the commitment that in particular a commitment to Nolan Teasley makes, given what we know right now. This is a tremendous point. And where I think Seattle and the Los Angeles Rams have done an extremely, extremely good job is identifying talent in the middle of the draft. Because at the top of the draft, I mean, you're taking the players that everybody knows are good.

So there is, yeah, there's an edge there if you could be the team that makes the smartest first round draft picks. But a lot of times it's, well, you're only going to have like three or four options. If you're a team like the Rams, you're going to take this guy or that guy because those are the only first round caliber players. when you get into the second, third, fourth rounds, there's starters to be had. And even, you know, day three is much more dart throws. But these teams have been able to find productive players. And I've always thought this, Sam, and I think this should really be a focus of the Minnesota Vikings. Because this is not now just a, hey, how can they take from the Seahawks?

But how can you be the darling of a day like June 1st, 2026? Because you are the team that's excited to talk about how you're really going for the Super Bowl and making that serious move. and it makes sense, not, hey, you still got a bunch of weaknesses and question marks, but you're going for it, which we kind of see a lot in the NFL. But the reason the Rams are here is because they were able to stockpile after that whole bleep them picks. They were able to stockpile enough picks, enough draft capital, hit on enough draft picks to be in position to make moves like this, which is exactly why you fire

quasi, Adafo Menza and hire No one Teasley, because I think that. that we are seeing a little bit of a shift in a very, and this is why you're a great guest to have on this, a very data-driven universe and also an arms race of who can evaluate better. And Nolan Tisley, by the way, I've seen him presented to some people as like, well, he's just the true scout background. But if you look up his actual role with the Seattle Seahawks,

a part of that was being the liaison to the analytics group. So he was working directly with their analytics people and bringing that information to the table in those meetings with John Schneider. So this is someone who is searching for all data points, whether it's scouting or through the analytics world. It's just that he has a traditional background. And that's why, you know, I always kind of push back.

Well, he was a scout. So obviously it's going to be all about scouting and screw those numbers. That is not the case for Seattle. And it's not the case for Nolan Tisley. But, you know, I think that when we are in this world now of everyone has a race to get all these resources, you can get as many scouts as you want, you can get as much data as you want, who uses that information better to make decisions is going to have success. And that also includes your connection with the coaching staff as well.

And no one has done this better than the franchise we're talking about today in the Rams and the franchise the Vikings just hired someone from in the Seattle Seahawks. 100%. And I think this is an investment in an organizational character. And I think that's the difference from, from, you know, the guys coming from the Broncos. And even if you look across the league, the James Gladstone's of the world and some of them, and even Coetia dofa Mintsa, like the hot shot kind of hires would have worked out in the past and some and didn't in others.

And so you look at what this is a true investment in. This is a guy who was able to build a team for Pete Carroll, who is a legacy coach who has been everywhere. He's won in college. He was previously an NFL coach. and he brought in a system and things that he wanted to do, and they were able to win with that. And then you bring in a hot shot coach,

a scheme-based coordinator who wins with scheme, and they were able to build a winner with that as well. And so the level of organizational structure that you need at a high level, I think is the true investment of what is going on with the Vikings right now. All right. So let me ask you one more question because you've got to run. And I'm actually going to do a live show tonight, folks, at 7 o'clock. so we can react to this.

I've been working on an article of what the Vikings can do with their new cap space. So I'll just type it away, look down at the phone. What? Like Miles Garrett. Are you kidding? I mean, I thought that was going to be kicked around for a while and then not end up going anywhere. And yet here we are having an emergency podcast in the middle of the day. But how about this?

So I mentioned the the fan dual odds plus 550 for the Rams. I mean, I imagine that what happened in the days following the Miles Garrett acquisition is that continued to kind of push toward Green Bay last year. Sam, knowing that this is a little bit of a, I'm going to borrow this from golf discussion. When Tiger Woods was Tiger Woods at his absolute peak, the conversation in sports radio would always be, all right, there's a big upcoming tournament.

Do you want Tiger Woods or the field? People would make their bets with each other entirely on Tiger Woods of the field. Rams or the field, Mr. Brookhouse. I'm taking the field and that's a true data scientist pick there's just way too much variance and the way that I paused it using kind of both my player experience

and my data science experience is that we can predict about eight games of wins and I think the Rams probably are as solidly close to about eight games of wins than maybe any team we've seen recently given that they have four all pros for certified all pros on their team and probably more if you include Karen Williams and Byron Young and Kobe Turner and all these other guys,

Quentin Lake, et cetera. Once you get past eight, you need a little luck. You need some fuel goals to go in. The reason why we're talking about the Rams making all these moves anyway is because their special teams sucked last year. You need special teams and you need injuries to go your way. There's a world in which Matthew Stafford gets hurt game three. So I have to go with the field on that. Not a fun pick.

I wish I could just bang the table. and say Rams, but I got to take the field. All right. You know what? We have a thing on the show, milkshake bets. We'll have a milkshake bet that I will go with the Rams and I will ride with the Rams all the way.

And if they do not win the Super Bowl, so I'll take Rams, you take the field. This is probably, if you just go position by position, the best football team we've seen in a really long time. I think now that Miles Garrett is there, the Philadelphia Eagles,

when they won the Super Bowl, top to bottom are really, really stacked. I just, I mean, would you go just through, we've seen San Francisco be really stacked? I don't know that Kansas City, I mean, outside of the quarterback position, I don't know that Kansas City was ever like this. This feels like a throwback to when there were teams that stayed together for a long time, like the 49ers or Cowboys, where every single position you could go pro bowl or star. Like, can you think of a better top to bottom football team than this? I mean, I can't, honestly.

I mean, to that point, exactly what you just said. If you go depth chart position by depth chart positioning, you look at can this guy make a pro bowl? I'm thinking of the Eagles teams where it's like Jalen Hertz probably can. A.J. Brown and Devante Smith probably can. Every offensive lineman probably can. Two defensive linemen. Yeah. And then maybe you start getting those safeties.

I think of the Saints teams, which to the point, never even won a Super Bowl where you have Drew Brees, Camara, Mike Thomas, three all pros. Cam Jordan, DeMario Davis, Marshawn Lattimore, three all pros. Terran Armstead, in any given year could be in the Pro Bowl. Eric McCoy, any given year, you could be in the Pro Bowl. Malcolm Jenkins, etc. In any given year, could be in the Pro Bowl. Like, that's really it.

I'm trying to think of like mid-2000s, maybe. Even the Patriots won it in different ways to a certain degree. Like, there's really not a detailed list other than going back to the 90s and basically 2018 and up where you can really identify a team that preseason you felt like had a bunch of all pros on their team. There might be a Steelers team in there. That's what I was thinking as well. Yeah, I was thinking about that just from their defense where they just had greatness all

over the field on their defense, maybe a Ravens team in there with Joe Flacko. But these are hard to find. And the Rams are now doing it for a second time this decade. It's very, very impressive team building. And the reason the Vikings hire Nolan Teasley is because he went to. battle with that and one from a front office perspective and that's what the Vikings need to do. Two or three or however many times you want to look at it. Right.

Yeah. Multiple times. Sam Brookhouse, Sumer Sports Show. I'm sure you guys are going to have a big reaction. You and the Lindsay Rhodes, great stuff there. And I'm glad that we were able to do this after the move happened, which has been a bad stretch for me at times where I'll record a podcast and then a move will happen. And I'm like, oh, great.

Now, I have a podcast that's irrelevant. Thanks, NFL. But this timing worked out extremely well for us. So I appreciate you coming on. You got to run. I got to run. But seven o'clock tonight, everybody, I will be back to do another live show. We're going to focus on the Vikings cap space that they get, whether Harrison Smith is going to come back now that the Vikings can afford him,

what they can do with that cap space, how much more they can make. Nolan Teasley's first moves and we'll get your reactions to all of this as well. So make sure you join then. But thank you, Mr. Brookhouse. And thanks everybody for a lot of you actually popping in in the middle of the day to react to some crazy stuff with the NFL, which never lets us sleep. So Mr. Brookhouse, you want to close us out? Football.