Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Eric Eager of SumerSports evaluates the Vikings' direction and future

Episode Date: August 3, 2023

Matthew Coller talks with Eric Eager of the SumerSports Show about how Kwesi Adofo-Mensah has handled the Minnesota Vikings' offseason. Is their use of void years on some contracts manageable? Are they working in a four-year window to win? Why Eric believes they should trade for Trey Lance Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of Purple Insider. Matthew Collar here and joining me, returning to the show, Eric Eager of the Sumer Sports Show, which has become a must-listen on my summer evening jogs between you and Thomas Dimitrov. You also have the rest of the team that is jumping in on the podcast as well. I like to listen to Tej Seth, who's come on this show. And we were just going to record like normal, you know, off the air,

post it to the podcast feed. But then, Eric, you demanded that we go live on YouTube. So here we are, live to the world to talk about the Vikings' direction. How is your beginning to kind of football season ish going for you yeah I mean look like going live always like makes um risk makes the mind sharper as I like to say so we're we're just uh yeah it's a good time I mean uh we have football tonight we get to see Zach Wilson we get get to see Kellen Mann, Vikings legend Kellen Mann of 2021 draft fame. We still have CFL going on.

So it's and WNBA, our favorite sport besides football. You know, so the you know, there's magic in the air right now. Yeah. And funny because our hometown, Minnesota Lynx, we compared them to the Vikings in a podcast not too long ago. And we were talking about how they were going to the bottom to try to draft one of these elite prospects that are coming out. And yet Cheryl Reeve has been just too darn good at coaching for the links to go to the bottom. So guess who else is doing a competitive rebuild? It's the Minnesota links, except for the difference between the Lynx and the Vikings,

is that the Lynx can still get a great free agent. Seems like Skylar Diggins-Smith not too happy based on her tweets. So she might end up with a new team. Jewel Lloyd is a superstar free agent, Kalia Copper. And there's a point here that in the WNBA, if you are a competitive rebuild team, you can sign a free agent superstar like, you know, New York did or like the Aces did. Whereas in the NFL, everything is so centralized around the quarterback position for the timeline of your team that it's quite different. And the Lynx already have their superstars. They have Nafisa Collier and Diamond Miller.

So they have had those draft picks that have turned out to be great sort of in the way that the vikings have like a derisaw justin jefferson they have stars in place uh but that that's the big difference is the quarterback position is is so much a major part of this vikings discussion about their direction but's, let's not quite get there yet. Let me pull back and just get your reaction to what they did with Daniil Hunter. Because I think that even though in the actual standings, that might be worth a half a game, uh, Daniil Hunter over a year, last year, he was phenomenal and they finished 27th and defense. There's only so much one guy can do for a defense.

But I thought that move was as much about what it said about where they are and what their plan is as it did giving Brian Flores one really good pass rush. Yeah, it's weird, right? Because I think that now that you're in it, right? And, you know, we always talk about these contracts. And it's funny because you look at the differences between what some teams get to do and what other teams get to do. You know, there are teams like Kansas City who are trying to decide similarly with Chris Jones and what to do with his contract. And that's a team whose ownership is, I mean, they're bottom third in spending most years, right?

And they don't get to do some of the stuff the Vikings get to do. And you get to the Vikings where, you know, they have much different expectations. Like they're probably, you know, the win total in Vegas is a dead eight and a half, even after 13 win season last year. And yet, like, you get to the middle of kind of this, this training camp period. And you're like, ah, you know,

Detroit doesn't look like they're going to hit the, hit the division out of the park, Green Bay, Chicago, they're kind of middling. Okay, let's go for it here. And then, and what the Wills allow the Vikings to do is to prorate stuff into the future. You know, the future, you know, enough where, you know, they can kind of make these decisions and have a two-way go. So they go from 18 to about 10 in cap space with this Hunter deal. And there's this 10 in cap space.

Like, I know there's somebody in the comments that's asking about Dalton Reisner. Like, if they want to go with, like like a Dalton Reisner, they can. But if they don't, they can just like roll that money over. And it's because this ownership team, and I don't think that many people like understand this, this ownership group is okay with putting money up front for the Vikings. And Kweisi Adapomensa appears adept at kind of being able to sort of push it out into the future where dead cap is not great, but dead cap next year is worth less in today's dollars than it is this

year. And so, you know, he's kind of done a good job of like, you know, basically pushing, you know, dollars to now that he can, that he can forego into the future if there's no opportunities. And, you know, I think Hunter was just one example of that. Yeah. I mean, as far as the way that Kweisi Adafomenta has handled this entire competitive rebuild, it's very clear that from the very outset when he was hired, this was everybody's plan that Kevin O'Connell didn't come here to lose. He had just won the Super Bowl with the Los Angeles Rams, that the Wilfs believe they had a good football team and they have the best wide receiver on earth.

And that matters that you're going to win a lot of games just based on having a good passing game. And so they decide to try to thread this needle. And I thought it was sort of a seminal moment for Kweisi Adafomensa to mention in his press conference that he knows that it's harder to go from the middle to the top, which you have studied multiple times throughout your career, whether it's PFF or Sumer Sports website, that it's just, it's harder to go from the middle to the top than it is

from the bottom to the top. And we all know why that is. You draft, you know, Joe Burrow, and then you go from the worst team in the league two years later to in the Super Bowl. But as far as it's kind of like an individual player where you grade them based on what they were asked to do. Like, was someone used correctly based on what the expectations were? How did they perform? So we expect Daniel Hunter to get 10 sacks. And if he gets six, then we're unhappy. If he gets 14, it's great. I think the same thing could be said of the general manager

of this team where we have to evaluate quesia da fomenta based on what he was asked to do as the gm he was asked to competitive rebuild and as of this moment i think that that's going very well for them they didn't get overly nostalgic they didn't get to the gates of cutting adam thielen and then be like ah you, maybe we should just run him back for one more year. And oh, here's some more money to put in your pocket, which is what they've really done before when players would sort of say, I'll actually leave. They'd be like, no, no, no, Anthony Barr, come on back. You want to be here. We love you. Plus we're desperate to try to win. And I think that it's resulted in a roster that has some young superstars in Derrissaw and Jefferson and a lot of players that are question marks, but you can see it and also a team that could potentially win the division. So you're kind of checking all of the boxes of what they were trying to do. Yeah. And I think, I think the points that you made is, is a very sound one, which is people act like this was a Dopelman's idea to do the competitive rebuild.

But this in reality is from ownership. And I know there's some there's a question in the chat about like when an owner is willing to give you that kind of money. You know how how long you know what's the differences like if you're Cincinnati, you're going to be bad for a decent amount because they're not willing to sort of they pay what's called pay as you go and so there's not an opportunity to sort of smooth out a lot of the issues that you have with the thing like you know marcus davenport it's a one-year deal then hunters a one-year deal but they're effectively you know like five-year deals if you spread out the money over a few years hunters in hunters case it's three years and you know i i think that they've given and and so to give you know this i'll give the will some credit to give the the the mandate to be a competitive rebuild you have to give the the general manager those tools and they have given those tools they are willing to sort of go up front with some of the money and you know maybe know, maybe this was something, and we know that Boyd years, for example, were not an instrument that

many teams were using back when Rick Spielman was the general manager. But I think that that could have been how they would have been able to win with Cousins. I think it's fairly clear, like, unless a long shot happens, they're not going to have won with Kirk Cousins. Like, they've had, you know, two playoff appearances, one playoff win. They're not winning the Super Bowl this year. And maybe that could have been something that they did back when he first joined, if they had used that instrument of void years and being able to smooth money over multiple years. Because the hallmark of the Cousins contract is how short it was and short contracts. If they aren't, you aren't able to tack on like years in the future.

They're just so onerous that you can't add to the team when you have, you know, issues. Now what they've done here with, with this, you know, basically being able to avoid out and smooth out is they've added to the team in places that really needed it, right? They needed a cornerback to be able to run Brian Fl flores system they go get brian murphy um you know obviously they needed pass rushers to replace the darius smith and they needed hunter in because again if hunter wasn't going to come back this year like this this defense could have been the worst in the nfl um and then you know somebody's talking about dalton reisner here like if you know

evan ingram or ezrara Cleveland were to falter, like this is a guy with starting experience in the NFL, very good pedigree from college who they can just bring in. Those are not things that this team was able to do. I mean, you know, frankly, like what was it, 2020, 2019? They almost had to cut Riley Reif just to get under the salary cap to do some things like, you know, trade Brianna and Gakwe and stuff. So I think that they, he's certainly done a good job with this,

but he's also been given the instruments and the tools to be able to do this competitive rebuild. And I think, you know, as long as they continue to give him this freedom, as long as one year they come up and, you know, next year when you look at the dead money on this, on team salary cap you have Hunter at 15 million dead if he were to avoid cousins at 8 28 and a half if he were to avoid Dalvin cook at three already if he were to avoid Marcus Davenport 6.8 if he were to avoid Etc Etc like you're you're going up to huge percentages of the cap but if you're an ownership group that says that's fine we're just going to give you the because to prorate money you need money up front from an owner and so they if

they're going to continue to say okay cool you can continue to sign people give them these upfront bonuses and prorate them over you know significant number of years like that dead money becomes less of a problem it becomes less of a kicking the can down the road situation, because as long as you have ownerships promise that you're going to continue to invest in this football team, like they can continue to do that. Look at the Eagles, the Eagles top,

like 10 to 12 players. You look at their paragraph five contracts. They're all like $1 million. They're all league minimum because every single one of those players, they just give them upfront money prorated over five years. And if they, if they bought them out, they bought give them upfront money, prorated over five years. And if they bottom out, they bottom out. But as the Eagles have shown, they bottomed out for one year and they're back in the Super Bowl just two years later. Like, I think that Adapo Mensah is kind of using that.

And when you look at his lineage as far as in the NFL, it's Andrew Barry, Andrew Barry through Philly. Like, there's a lot of that kind of finance culture there where they where they're basically, you know, spreading money out to when money is less valuable in the future. And so Adopaments has done a good job, but I would also say ownership, even though I think some of us are kind of frustrated that they haven't done a rebuild specifically at quarterback ownership has at least put their money where their mouth is with this mandate that he continues to be competitive. So that was all a little bit complicated. So let me just try to get to the brass tacks of what you're saying is I have looked that dead cap and void years as the devil in previous years as a scourge that ruins your life

in the future. And what you're saying is that if you sort of continue to do this, you can push and push and push that money down the road and have it not destroy you in the future. But I think that like next year is sort of a good example of where if Kirk leaves and that huge $28 million dead cap hits them. And if Hunter leaves, and I think it's what, like 17, this is a massive issue for them, but it could be in the same year that you are drafting a rookie quarterback, which would mean that you're not really, when you draft a rookie quarterback, thinking about going all in and winning the Superbowl anyway. And so what Kweisi Adafo-Mensa mentioned in the other day in his press conference was that when he initially got here, he was looking at a

three-year time horizon. I think it's become a four-year time horizon for them and not three, because if it was, I think that the three-year was be mediocre in the first year, tear it all down now, and then rebuild it the next year. But then they won 13 games. And even though I give them a lot of credit for not bringing back all the players who won all those 13 games, in fact, they let 18 Pro Bowls walk out the door in total between all those guys, which I thought was very wise of them, like bringing back all those old players and then having them win eight games because they're washed and expensive is not a good strategy. So I think that he saw the future that they needed to move on from those guys. But I also think that it changes maybe where they stand, knowing that next year might have to be the year where they do bring in a rookie, start the rookie right away.

They're Carolina or something, and they're hoping, hey, if we win eight or nine games, we're pretty good. But we're hoping to see that this quarterback can be the future of our franchise. And I also think what they've done here is that every rookie quarterback drops into a different situation. So if you are, you know, player X and you are dropped in, let's say you're Josh Rosen, and I don't think he would have made it under many circumstances just because of how he is. But he drops into the Arizona Cardinals cardinals one of the worst organizations probably in pro sports a horrendous tanking awful team with a bad clueless coach and just it's they fire their

office of coordinator by like the third week or something i mean total total wreck never had a chance from really the start with this it's a former nfl quarterback coach who clearly and people saw in the documentary communicates extremely well with his quarterback. It's the best receiver on earth. Potentially if they extend TJ Hawkinson, it's a top five tight end in the league. It's a top three left tackle in the league. It's a top three right tackle in the league. Like this sounds pretty good for, for the next quarterback. I guess the question I have though, and what is lingering is, will it be the rookie quarterback or will it be, Oh, you won too many games and couldn't draft the rookie quarterback

or will it be, Oh, Kirk won too many games. And then the Wolf said, actually, we love Kirk. We watched the documentary on a loop and now he's our favorite player ever. So you have to resign him and keep him forever. Yeah. I mean, that's a, that's a really player ever. So you have to resign him and keep him forever. Yeah, I mean, that's a that's a really good question. I think that I think that they're open to all possibilities. It's now part of this is kind of like the the hot dog suit meme where there's a large part of me that says, like, right now, their best option is probably to give Kirk one more year after this one because you know at 23 last year they don't draft for this this past season they draft Levis right or they don't draft Levis so they clearly didn't have a good eval on him they don't they go Jaron Hall in round six but for the most part there's not a there's not the second quarterback you know

there's not a quarterback where if they void out Kirk Kirk Cousins then there's like this guy that's kind of come you know it's at least there's a Sam Howell waiting in the wings I know Howell wasn't that highly drafted but like if they are thinking about okay we need to be competitive if they go let's say they go seven and ten right I think that's a reasonable like that's within the error balance um they're gonna be picking what like 12th and so no drake may no caleb williams you might have an opportunity at bo nicks or or uh joe milton or something like that that could be an option there but because they've passed on kenny pickett they passed on everybody else in that 2022 draft probably rightly and because they weren't

they didn't they didn't have enough draft picks because they went after hawkinson and uh who's a ross blacklock and um who's the wider uh the wide jalen rager yeah jalen rager they like they used draft picks last year so they didn't have the ammunition to go up and get a quarterback this year when you know and who knows if they could have gotten up to four to get anthony richardson or whatever but like because things have panned out the way they have and because of some of the decisions they've made they put themselves in a position where a 36 year old kurt cousins may be their best option next year given where they are you don't want if you're qu Adapamensa, and especially now you're Kevin O'Connell. Kevin O'Connell is supposed to win football games. It's up to Kwesi to give them a,

if they want a tank, it's up to Kwesi to give them a rostered tank, right? And so from their perspective, if they win too many games next year, it might just be another situation to your point where you said, oh shoot, Cousins might be their best option. And then then you know one one thing that they did that was kind of sneaky and i know somebody in the in the comments is talking about void years being a little bit uh void years being a little bit um weird but if you give cousins an extension beyond this year it is capped off at 40 million per because of the paragraph fives they put in the in the void years that he has so if they if they do extend them it's going to be for a modest amount for what cousins has agreed to and it will take that 28-5

and split it over a number of different years as opposed to all being a lump sum on the on the dead cap this year so there's and i know i've been i've been pretty anti-cousins i've been right because they haven't won a damn thing with him at quarterback. But there might be a situation where next year they're thinking again, like, okay, even if they're going to draft the quarterback of the future, the quarterback of the present is still Cousins. And I think that they put themselves in a corner where that might be maybe their best option, even though two years ago it certainly would not have been their best option,

given everything else that was available to them well the most competitive rebuildy thing would have been to draft a quarterback this year and they were just not able to do that because they all went in the top four and then they didn't buy into will levis now which i actually don't hate? I think Will Levis, I think Will, I think their eval on Will Levis was probably correct. Well, and I also think that at that moment, you don't have to take a quarterback you don't love, but what you did was paint yourself into a corner where you probably do have to take a quarterback just to take one. I remember when the Buffalo Bills did this with EJ Manuel, where it was the worst quarterback year, just horrible. It was Manuel, Ryan Nassib, Mike Glennon, and Gino turned out to be the best

one nine years later or whatever, but they were getting rid of Ryan Fitzpatrick. They had no other choice. They had to draft somebody. So they just picked the guy that they thought was the best. And weirdly, he was probably like the second best to Gino Smith of all those quarterbacks, but it, you know, it didn't matter because it wasn't a good year for those prospects. And they have put themselves in that position. The thing about bringing back Kirk for another year, next year, if you were going to try to do that and eventually that bringing up Alex Smith will pay off for us. But the problem is that Kirk's, if Kirk wins 11 games this year, he is going to the free agent market. And he is saying, pay Kirk all the money. Kirk's the winner now, folks,

give Kirk the cash. That's what he's saying. That's what his agent is saying. He's not saying, let me come back on a one-year short-term deal for the Vikings. Absolutely not. He's going to come back and say, because that's what happened with them this year they wanted to do a short-term band-aid deal with cousins the same way they just did with hunter and cousin said no i'm worth more than that i want i want a big money multi-year deal that is what i'm worth based on the market and so i don't think that there's a realistic scenario that he wins that many games throws for 4500 yards at 35 touchdowns to Justin Jefferson and then says oh no I'll take small money to stay here that's not the way Kirk Cousins has ever done

business so I think that they will be left out in the cold there but I also don't think they should be afraid of that because it hasn't got I mean 11 wins is okay but it's you know if it's a first round out again contender with this quarterback it's right that's what I mean yeah 11 wins is okay, but if it's a first round out again – You're not a Super Bowl contender with this quarterback. Right, that's what I mean. Yeah, and last year was cute and fun and like everybody – but make no mistake, last year Cousins threw the most interceptions he's ever thrown as a Viking, if I'm not mistaken. He had his worst yards per attempt for multiple years.

There were a middle-of-the-pack team in terms of efficiency. Now, when you watch the documentary and you just watch the games, yeah, he was tough as hell. He took a lot of hits. He bought it. I think, and again, I don't want to be, like, Kirk is a good quarterback. I'm not going to ding him. But, like, last year, and Quasey's thinking this too, right? Last year, it was not like Steve Young was playing quarterback for the Vikings.

It was a middle of the pack quarterback who was struggling from an efficiency standpoint until they got him a second option in the passing game. Like there's the other part of this is like, he's never played without digs, Thielen Jefferson. And then last year when it was just Jefferson and a washed up Adam Thielen and an okay, KJ Osborne and no real tight end threat, they got him a second threat.

And then the offense funny, like got good again. But I And then the offense, funny, like got good again. But I think when everybody looks at Kirk, it's like, he's not impervious to, he's not impervious to these situations. And, and I think that that's good. That's part of the calculus too. It's like, we're, you know, you won 13 games, but we're not going to pretend that you were the re like the whole reason he was a very good contributor and i think when if you're a vikings fan you look at last season i think what you look at actually is saying look when cousins was younger and the team was better why didn't the head coach do everything possible to because like kevin o'connell like i was watching the the documentary and it's the washington game And their offense was horrible in that game.

They scored 20 points, and Kirk threw an interception. It was not a great game. And yet, at the end, Kevin O'Connell was like, there's one reason we're 6-1, and it's because of this quarterback who made a couple good throws in the game. And you know Mike Zimmer would have been like, we won despite our quarterback. He would have said that to guys like you in the press conference.

And it's like, I don't know if that matters a ton, but I know that when this team was actually good in 2018 and 19, having a coach that bought into the quarterback probably would have been worth a couple of playoff wins and maybe been a Super Bowl contender. And now you have a coach who's punching much above his weight class for a team that's not very good. And that's how they won games last year. It just I think like when I as an observer of this team, it's just unsettling that they finally figured out the formula,

which is to encourage the guy and to give him, you know, to give him some some weapons and run the offense as though you want him to succeed, as opposed to you. You didn't want him in the first place. You want him to fail. And I think that that's the frustrating part because then it muddies the water to actually have a realistic evaluation of what he is and how he's going to contribute to the team in the future. Because I agree with you. When I look at this team, you have too many premium position players to truly be bad. And yet that's the reason you should put a young quarterback into that role because he can have success because you have both tackle spots manned up you have a center who's improving both guards are kind of whatever but then you have great weapons in the on the outside like somebody a young quarterback could come in and succeed there because of all

the reasons cousins succeeded last year well and that's exactly the line of thinking that I have is if it is even an okay, good, decent quarterback draft pick, that person is going to be elevated. I mean, when we look at Kirk Cousins career, this man, there's a reason why he's so religious because he has been blessed by all the receivers and the tight ends and the offensive mind. You go through it. This guy had Shanahan, McVay, Deshaun Jackson, Pierre Garcon, two great tight ends, great offensive line in Washington. He comes here, he's got digs and his coach won't throw it to digs. Never understand that. But the thing is that you can't go back and replay. Yes. Jefferson. Yeah. Like, yes. Yes. Right. and replay the future. The Vansky, Kubiak, guys who have done the finals. Yeah, like the Vansky rings in Coach of the Year.

Right. He had one bad offensive coordinator like his whole life, and just John DeFilippo. And even then, at the beginning of that year, when DeFilippo was leaning more into Kirk Cousins as the center of the offense, they were having some good moments. But I think that Zimmer couldn't stand the variance of it, which is what Kevin

O'Connell decided he was just going to lean into with cousins where it's the great games and the bad games but he's okay with that because he's just going to keep pushing the pass button I think if you take Kevin O'Connell put him on the 2018 Vikings they're probably a legit Super Bowl contender throughout that season but as we go forward i also think that kevin o'connell and quacey should believe in o'connell and believe in what they have here that it is a setup where we've seen baker mayfield take a team into the playoffs and one drive away from beating kansas city one chad henny throw away from beating kansas city and and going on what to the afc championship and we've seen carson wentz havez have an MVP season we saw

yes and and Jalen Hurts elevates from a quarterback that I think was like a fifth tier or something and Mike Sandoz ratings last year to now is considered an elite quarterback as they get you know AJ Brown I just think that there's like a few impervious quarterbacks to their circumstances but everybody else, like the difference, the way I look at it is the difference between number 12 quarterback in the league, which is probably Kirk to number three is massive.

Like the difference between him and Josh Allen is just worlds. The difference between him and the 24th best quarterback is probably not that much. And that we've seen Ryan Tannehill succeed with a great situation and win the entire AFC and win 12, 13 games. I mean, I look at that as if they were to draft a quarterback next year and have the roster they've built with the defensive pieces. And I also think that this, this might be a stretch, but I also think the league is not hiring Brian Flores to be a head coach again. And that's not his fault. That's just because of whatever, you know,

how the owners are. There's the defense is not going to be good enough this year for him to make a case anyway. So he's going to be around for a while. Right. So you have a proven defensive mind at the defensive coordinator that could be here for a while, young pieces on defense, this great setup on offense. Like you can see it coming together if you just find the right person but i think the biggest fear though is if you end up in

a spot where you're trying to like andy dalton this thing for a couple of years because you can't end up getting that guy but i also feel like if you're afraid of that you're just going to end up staying where you are forever yeah and and cinc And Cincinnati is a good example of, you know, a reef talked about in the comments here. It's like they're a great example of what could happen if you're cheap and you try to go the Dalton route. It flames out really fast. And they're two and 14 adults last year with Cincinnati because the roster around him doesn't go. I don't think that'll happen in Minnesota, but I think, yeah, I mean, they should be considering the future. I mean, people are going to get upset about this.

And I know people will mock this because he's currently third string with San Francisco. But, you know, and this is another comment in the chat here is like, that's a perfect like by-law situation on a guy like Trey Lance, right? Like if they go, if they're literally worried about, okay, Kirk leaves,

we get a $28.5 million dead cap charge with him leaving. We roll snake eyes in the draft. What the hell is going to happen? We got to pick up somebody like Jared Stenum or whatever. That's what they're worried about. Trey Lance is a hedge against that, right? And I think what would it cost to get Trey Lance would be so much less than a panic trade to move up to get the last good quarterback prospect of next year's draft. If Trey Lance costs a third, that's really in line with the Jalen Reg or the Ross Blacklock type trades that he's done before.

And again, it hedges. If Trey Lance comes in, he's garbage. Then that might just be another point in the path of saying, okay, look, it's just not going to get better than Kirk around here. Let's ride the Kirk Cousins train until the wheels fall off. Or it's just, it shows like how much more important it is to go up and get a guy who's actually legit in maybe free agency or something like that. I know the Vikings have tried that before. They have the aforementioned instruments that we have now with void years and a lot of money from the ownership to help them out. If they were to go out and get, you know, some,

some quarterback who's on the trade block next year. I think that the, I think weirdly Trey Lance opens up a lot of possibilities, and I think it widens the set of – the space of things that are possible for Minnesota, right? I mean, there is an outside chance that Kirk Cousins just simply, you know, fails this year because of his age and because of, you know, some of the things around him that the schedule maybe is a little bit harder or whatever. And having some guy like trey lance in the background and actually like

developing him with a coach that believes in him like there's there are reports out of san francisco that shanahan wanted mac jones and and they got they got bullied into taking trey lance instead like if trey lance were to come here and be bought into that could also be you know again a by low candidate we're talking about a general manager here who has all the finance earmarks like the prorating money you know using the time value of money you buying low to me that's that's one move that they could make that would really demonstrate that they kind of understand where they are in in the kind of you know time period of the current nfl the nfc that's you's profoundly winnable, but with a roster that is kind of middling at best. So if they were to trade a third round pick for Trey Lance at the end of training camp

and he sat behind Kirk and they evaluated him for a year and decided, do we want this guy to be the future or is he just not good and we don't like him and he doesn't know football and whatever else, don't hate that. Don't hate that. It does kind of reek of Josh Rosen to the dolphins or Sam Darnold to Carolina. And I don't think that there's a whole lot of history. And I know every situation is different. This guy's barely played any football, like in his life. Um, the few opportunities he had, he's just gotten hurt. Um, but I don't think there's

a lot of history to suggest that someone who busts out so quickly is going to have much of a chance. I think there is a paint by numbers approach. Take every swing that you can. But I also was going to ask you about the idea. And I know that we're in the middle of training camp. So talking about this is kind of weird because there's excitement about the current team. But think about this scenario, though. San Francisco traded up three draft picks was it to

get trey lance and they still have a super bowl contender and i i think that there's sometimes an idea that first round picks are just so important and you can't ever give them away or whatever but i think the teams that trade them for really good players also like have it pay off pretty often, not maybe Jamal Adams, but like, you know, just thinking about an AJ Brown trade for example. And I also think that if you trade up a couple of draft picks for your quarterback, it doesn't have to ruin your future

because you can spend more if you've got that guy. So even if the Vikings were drafting 18th, 20th, 22nd, and they traded several first round picks up to get their next quarterback after that, I don't think that's a bad outcome considering that what are you trying to get in the first round? You're trying to get your Christian Derrissaw, your Justin Jefferson, your TJ Hawkinson. Well, you've got those guys and you can rebuild on defense through free agency, which we've seen many teams do. I think that's a better option, but also it is brought up in the comments. And I have brought this up on the show as well, that there's this

a lingering idea in my mind that Kyler Murray is going to be out of Arizona. And I also like this idea. This is something that we are arguing about on the sidelines of training camp and stuff like what if Kyler Murray became available at some point as well like would that be a good idea for the Vikings I like those two ideas more than hey let's trade a third for this guy and one of the things I just want to say real quick about Kyler Murray is let me know how you felt week 13 of 2021 about Kyler Murray. Is it the same as you feel now because his team was garbage? And I don't think that he is a guy who transcends that, but I also think that given the best receiver in the NFL and Jordan Addison looks good and Hawkinson is probably

going to be here, right? Like this is, this is something that could elevate. And the coaching. My God, the coaching. The worst coaching in the NFL for like four years with this guy, with Cliff Kingsbury. So anyway, I think also it's funny because the first comment is that he's not a leader. It's so funny because we said that about Kirk Cousins two years ago. And then last year, he's on the Netflix doc looking like the best leader. Whether you're a leader or not is entirely whether your team is winning 90 of the time but anyway so not to get nerdy on this the cardinals really got unlucky when murray got hurt because his cap number this year is like 16 million like they were still in the kind of you know build around a cheap quarterback next

year murray's cap number is 51.8 million and 35 million of it is guaranteed paragraph five which is that's that stuff like so the way the trades work is like all prorated money stays with the trading team and everything else after that, whether it be paragraph five roster bonus, all that, that goes with the, so what was, for example, when Deshaun Watson was traded from Houston, like the Texans kind of lucked out because they win a lot of like guaranteed P5 on that contract. And so essentially when Houston traded Deshaun Watson,

Houston got a lot of money back out of escrow money that they had to commit to them. But the other team Cleveland had to end up paying and they ended up paying a lot more. So if the Vikings were to trade for Murray, they would need roughly, I think it's going to be about $36, $37 million in cap space just to execute the trade in 2024. But it's not a bad thought. I mean, I actually don't think that Murray plays a down this year because if you're Arizona, you want to either – I mean, you're hoping Houston sucks so that you get two top picks.

But their win total in Vegas market is four and a half. They're very much either going to have Murray and a bounty of picks for the team that trades for Caleb Williams, or they're going to have Caleb Williams and a bunch of assets from a team that wants to trade for Kyler Murray. They're in a good position here, and the Vikings could be that team. There's weapons. I think Murray could have success here. And again, what's the hallmark of Kevin O'Connell?

Kevin O'Connell took an imperfect quarterback last year and encouraged him and bought into him. And Kyler Murray is a very good prospect, very good arm, very good athleticism, but an imperfect quarterback. And I think instead of throwing things out in the media like, oh, he likes to play video games too much or, oh, he doesn't work hard, I think a guy like O'Connell will probably encourage him and actually get the best out of him. I don't hate that idea. I just think that it's speculative, right? Because you've got to wait until next year to do this thing, right? Whereas I think Trey Lance is sort of more of a, if you're getting fidgety about the future of this team

and you don't necessarily want to get in a situation where the music turns off and you're without a chair. I think that Lance is the one where that gives you an out. You could also trade for Lance and then trade for Murray next year if Lance doesn't work out. That can also be a situation. And the other part is, you could also be sellers at the deadline this year too, if you're not that good and you don't want to buy into Kirk. Last year, there were buyers at the deadline this year too. If you're not that good and you don't want to buy into Kirk last year, there were buyers at the deadline. And so when we got into the draft this year,

the Vikings didn't have that many picks. You could be sellers too. There's a lot of options there. I don't think that Murray and Lance are mutually exclusive here. Well, and I was also thinking about how you can't trade for Trey Lance today because the camp vibes are good. The team actually looks pretty good at this moment.

And it's not always predictive what they look like early in camp. Usually as it goes on, it's going to tell you more and more about what they're going to be. But the way that Jordan Addison is stepping up right away and showing that he's a first round talent, you know, if they did add adults and riseisner, an offensive lineman, you'd feel a little more confident. I think that the aggression of the defense is really intriguing.

Young cornerbacks seem to be playing, at least Makai Blackman stepping up to get first-team reps. And so you're kind of getting excited about where the team is at. And if you were to trade for Trey Lance at this moment, it would take all the wind out of the sails of this year, which does matter to all these people. I mean, for us, we're like, what about next year's draft? But like Kevin O'Connell's not thinking about next year's draft. Like they're trying to win. You would alienate a lot of people, but if you started the season and you could see this based

on the schedule, if you have one bad loss early in the season and you end up starting two and four, two and five, something like that. And it looks far away. And let's say Kirk, you know, hits that Joe Flacco age thing and just falls off. Then if you do it, there's really no downside to that. If San Francisco is not using him, they're ready to move on. Then you could trade for him, play him toward the end of the season, see what you've got. Like there is a scenario where that works. It just doesn't work for right now, which is what I wanted to ask you about. It's funny because we've spent all this time talking about the future. It's the biggest thing that's, I think, on everybody's mind as we're going into a competitive rebuild season is, well, what happens after this, depending on a bunch of different scenarios?

Could it be really good? Could it be really bad? Could it be in the middle which it usually is and vegas thinks it's going to be but let's talk about the four teams in the division and how they've all chosen different timelines here because detroit tanked chicago tanked and now you're starting to see the upswing i was reading our friend courtney cronin on Justin Fields is looking pretty good with DJ Moore out there. And then you have the Packers who don't know what they have at quarterback and are kind of in that middle spot as well. And I'll believe that the Packers defense is going to be elite when I see it, because every off season they're elite to everyone, but then they aren't when they actually play the game. So we'll find out on that.

But I'd love to hear your opinion about the timelines of all of those teams, because I think it's kind of like you ever see those graphics where it's like, here's how far Wayne Gretzky is ahead and it goes through his career,

like when here comes Jager and then Gretzky, you know what I'm talking about? Those line graphs. That's what it feels like with the rebuilding and racing to be actual Super Bowl contenders. Where do you think everyone kind of stands and where the Vikings stand in that race? Yeah, I think Detroit's the favorite.

I would not bet them if I could bet at market price. I just think they're too overvalued in the markets there. But I do think they're about a 50-50 shot to win the maybe maybe a little less than 50 50 shot to win the division um they're favored on the marketplace for the first time since 1992 uh back when it was the nfc central they had not won the division since 1993 when it was also the nfc central um fun fact the falcons the saints uh the panthers have all won the NFC West more recently than Detroit has won any division, which is kind of insane. So it's been a long time coming. And so I don't, you know, I think that they took a little bit too myopic of a view this offseason, drafting a running back, drafting a linebacker, because last season they failed in large part because Deandre swift failed uh you know to capitalize

on what was a great offensive line and they could not stop a nosebleed as a defense um they lost the carolina game or they lost the carolina game in the second half of the season um you know they gave up like 300 yards rushing they gave up a similar amount seattle in the game that cost them the tiebreaker um and so on and so forth. And that, you know, so yeah, I mean, they very much said like, look, we're going to win this year. We're sicker than tired of this nonsense. They went out and kind of did some Bengals-y things, which was sign a bunch of kind of good but not great defensive backs

and said, look, defensive back is a weakling system, as we all know. And so when you bring in Emmanuel Mosley, chauncey gardner johnson um cam sutton into a secondary you can be more resilient to some of the passing games in the nfl and so i like what they're doing relative to this year and i think they should be the favorite in in the in the division they're really good at both offensive and defensive line so i i'm i'm a fan of where they are. But again, their view is very much short-term. And the way that they've acted is very clear. Green Bay, to me, it's kind of a no-man's land.

They went back to kind of their roots this year and took a premium position player that is not expected to start right away in Lucas Van Ness in the first round. They gave Jordan Love a small vote of confidence for that contract, but they still declined technically his fifth-year option. A lot of really sharp bettors that I know, like Green Bay, they were 5-1 to win it. So just for those that don't bet, 5-1 means an implied of 16.6% in the market. So there were a lot of people that saw that number and said, that's way too low. We're going to buy into that. Matt LaFleur is a three-time 13-win coach,

and he was a 13-win coach when Aaron Rodgers was not good enough to win MVP back in 2019. So I think the Packers are kind of where the Vikings are and kind of no man's land where they could go either way and no one would be surprised. And then I think Chicago, I mean, look, one analytics staff in the league was one of my best friends said to me, he's like, look, it's very easy to look good as a GM when they don't expect

you to win. And so far, Ryan Poles has not been expected to win. And he's killed it, right? He's, you know, I was hoping that they would trade for Brian Burns, but they traded for DJ Moore, which to me was almost as good. They still have to do, they still have to spend some money to get to the spending floor this season but they're they're doing they're hitting all the right notes to the point where if justin fields doesn't hit they have carolina's pick in their own pick to go up and get one of the great quarterbacks and if he does hit then they have all

the you know the the capital to build around field so i think that the bears are promising issue with the bears is i don't think they're going to win anything this year. Last year they had 20 sacks the whole season. And name me one edge player on the Bears. You really can't. So I think the Bears are still a year away. I think Green Bay and Minnesota, I'd be surprised if they were both bad or they were both good.

I think one's going to be bad, one's going to be bad, one's going to be good, and it's a coin flip as to which one is. And I think Detroit is the favorite, and they should be. And their, I think, window is actually fairly short because of Jared Goff, because Ben Johnson, after this season, in all likelihood, will be the head coach of some other team, as probably Aaron Glen will if he hits on the promise of some of his players. So the window's short for Detroit.

It's vibes for the Vikings backers and it's low. It's quite a bit longer and there's a leash there for Chicago. So what if I told you 30 for 30 music that an NFC North team was representing in the Superbowl in 2026, which team is it? Chicago. in the super bowl in 2026 which team is it um chicago yeah it's funny though about ryan poles because i agree and i've said this about quacey it's easier to tear down than it is to build up by a lot all of us could cut adam thielen but it's the drafting developing quarterback, all that stuff, putting

together rosters a lot harder than it is. And if he makes a chase Claypool trades like that, it's not going to be as good as you think. But I mean, I tend to agree though, because of the cap space and everything else and fields has already shown something, but if he shows a lot this year, passing the ball, it's pretty scary. But i also think the vikings could be in that discussion if they just hit on the right player correct oh yeah i mean the thing is is like let's talk graphs like the the lions are going to have in the next so you're talking about like the lions in the next four years are going to have one bite at the apple at a young quarterback drafted high at most right if that's if golf's you know know, at one, at one point, the wheels fall off

a golf and they get one shot, right? The Packers are going to get one shot at a young quarterback over the next four years. And that's if Jordan Love doesn't work out and they take a shot one of these next four years, the Vikings are going to probably have one and a half expected shots at a quarterback. And that's if they, and that's if they start this year and that guy doesn't work. And then the Bears are going to have two, right? They're going to have two because if Fields is him, then perfect. If he's not, then the next year they're going to. So to me, and there was a comment here in the chat,

it's only easier to go from bottom to top if you win the lottery. That's the point. The quarterback is everything in the NFL. You have to win the lottery to win consistently in the NFL. And the Bears are going to have two lottery tickets, two-ish lottery tickets, and I'm counting Fields as the next one if he's good. They're going to have two shots where every other team in the division

is going to have one. And so I think you have to pick them purely for that reason. Here's my issue with calling it a lottery. We've gone through this. Your chances are close to 50% that that player gets you a season. That quarterback gets you a season where you at least have a chance to be a legitimate Superbowl contender. So even Baker Mayfield, who is not good, gave them one chance during his rookie contract. So it's kind of 50-50 that you're going to have that. And then it's not – but the thing is also, hitting the lottery is like winning a billion dollars, though.

I mean, if you – so you have – let's say you have a 50% chance of it being good enough to be a legit contender for at least one year, maybe a 25% chance of more than one year, and maybe like an 8% chance of it becoming a Mahomes, Josh Allen, Joe Burrow. Well, would you rather have an 8% chance of hitting the lottery and it becoming a great quarterback over many years or run back the same situation over and over that hasn't worked? So I guess that's kind of how I look at that.

People want to talk about the Cousins type of quarterback as if it's somehow better than drafting a quarterback high and failing. But it's not. Like the Vikings – look, I don't mean to diss the Vikings franchise or anything, but they haven't been successful under Cousins. Making the playoffs 40% of years is not successful in a league that puts 14 in the playoffs every year. And where you're in a conference that's not particularly good.

I mean, if you just look at some of the, like you said, Baker. Baker's made the playoffs. Baker took the Browns to the playoffs just as many times as the Vikings the last three years. You know, Jacksonville, you know, they had the number one overall pick two consecutive years. And they've been in the playoffs as many times the last two years as the Minnesota Vikings.

Like, you go through the list, and I get the whole point of, like, you want to have the franchise guy. You go through the list, and I get the whole point of you want to have the franchise guy, and I get that. And I agree that if it's a Burrow, if it's a Josh Allen. But even short of that, teams have just as much success as the Vikings trotting out these first-round guys that end up being bust because of the structural advantage of having a quarterback on a rookie deal. And that guy might not be great.

But again, look at Philadelphia. They drafted a guy in round two, built around him, quarterback on a rookie deal and and that guy might not be great and and but again like you know like look at philadelphia they drafted a guy in round two built around him playoffs two consecutive years in a super bowl like these it's it's a structural advantage and i i you know the water's the water's warm okay let's wrap on this because you have a job uh at sumer sports and people should listen to your show oh hey by the way by the way, need to mention on the show, you and I are both going to be in Vegas later this month for to at circa. And they have the biggest pro football contest in Vegas. It's back again for a fifth year with 14 million and guaranteed prizes only at circus sports. You have to enter in Vegas,

but play from anywhere with two ways to win and no rake play the million pro football contests with quarterly payouts and 100% payback, Vegas, but play from anywhere with two ways to win and no rake play the million pro football contest with quarterly payouts and 100% payback. Pick a winner with a survivor contest. Select one team each week with no point spread. Get your share of 14 million in guaranteed prizes. Circa sports.com that's C I R C a sports.com. Yeah. I can't wait for that. You and I later in August. You're so much better at that than I am am, by the way, because they are also a sponsor of the Sumer Sports Show. They're here in Thomas Mischoff. So great job on that one.

Radio background. Yeah, I've done many. So anyway, let's wrap on this. Over or under, since we're talking Circus Sports, Minnesota Vikings 8.5? My model's shade under. I think we make the number about 7.9. So I would, I think at minus 110,

you probably would want to take Vikings under. I think if you want to bet the Vikings this year, do it in more long shot ways, NFC, division, all this stuff. Because if they're good, they're going to be good. You know, and I think O'Connellnell is a force multiplier if they end up hitting on a bunch of stuff i think they win the division but if you at the division prices are like two to one or higher so you're getting much better pay out there don't bet them over eight and a half that's dumb just just you know either either under on this team or long shot stuff like

division and you know nfc and that kind of thing I have them winning 10 and I haven't seen anything in camp to move me away from 10. That doesn't mean gamble on my advice. Okay. That just means you haven't, you haven't talked enough to Judd. Oh, this is two and a half wins.

That's where Judd's always at. Yeah. Yeah. They beat the bears twice and then they split with Detroit. One loss in soldier field. You always have to write that in. Eric eager, Sumer Sports Show is an absolute must listen.

You will become a smarter football analyst and fan every time you listen to you and Thomas Dmitrov talk. So thanks for your time, Eric. I love that we decided to just go live on this. It worked out great.

Thanks, everybody, for watching. Shout out to our friend Arif Hasan, who is watching and commenting throughout this. And we'll talk to you all again soon. Actually, later tonight, we'll be going live again after the night practice. So I'll be running home from TCO Performance Center to go live again. So if you're watching now, tune in later, probably like 930 or something like that.

So thanks, Eric. And we'll talk to you all again soon. Football. Football.