Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - From the archives: The Vikings' Hall of Very Good

Episode Date: July 9, 2024

After the tragedy of Khyree Jackson's death, Matthew Coller is taking a break from talking training camp previews. So we bring you a discussion from the archives with Brian Murphy about the best Vikings players who aren't in the Hall of Fame Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

🎵 Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of Purple Insider. A couple of years ago, I got together with Brian Murphy and talked about the Vikings Hall of Very Good. Who would we nominate? Players that will not make the Hall of Fame or are not currently in the Hall of Fame, but are very much deserving of all-time recognition within Viking land. And so we each made teams and nominations of Hall of Very Good teams. And I wanted to bring you that conversation again, because it's really fun, you know, off-season discussion. But also I wanted to wait a couple of days.

If you heard the podcast from the last few days, I wanted to wait a little bit before we got right back into the hardcore training camp previews. I felt that it just wasn't there for this week considering Kyrie Jackson and the tragedy that happened to the Minnesota Vikings. So I want to bring you some from the archives discussions. I know a lot of you listen to the podcast on your way to work and things like that. So I still wanted to bring you something for this week, but later in the week, we'll start to get into those discussions and how the Vikings organization is impacted and so forth by what's happened and what's going to come in training camp. But wanted to give that a few days, just felt it was appropriate before we dive into all that. So thanks everybody for listening as always. And we'll talk to you soon.

For Purple Insider, the website version, I created a Vikings Hall of Very Good because I was having a conversation with another journalist about just how many Vikings players are borderline Hall of Famers or actually belong in the Hall of Fame and have not gotten in. Jim Marshall is the best example, and of course, he is on our Hall of Very Good team. But at almost every position, there's somebody who either has a case or whose career was cut a little bit short and they never got to really make that case so I showed you the list if you want to see the entire hall of very good it is on purpleinsider.com but Brian I gave you the homework assignment to pick out a couple

of players that stuck out to you on the hall of very good for the Vikings that we could discuss so tell me who is the first person on your list. Well, I get, I don't think, we're not necessarily going chronological, but I, as you already mentioned him, I mean, Jim Marshall. For longevity's sake, for iconic stature's sake, any human being that can play, correct me on the number, but I believe it's 270 consecutive games in the National Football League, starting in 1961 and retiring in 1979. How that man is not just symbolically already put up in a bust in Canton is beyond me. Not to mention the fact that he was an anchor presence on arguably one of the greatest defensive lines in the history of the league,

certainly the best nickname of all time, the Purple People Eaters. But for a man to play with, you know, the helmets of 1961 compared to the helmets of 2020 are a little bit like, you know, newspaper compared to what aerodynamic NASA generated Kevlar or something today. And he still seems to have his faculties as well, at least in recent interviews that I've seen too. And he's not all that bitter about it. He knows he has a case,

his teammates and contemporaries all know that he has seen too. And he's not all that bitter about it. He knows he has a case. His teammates and contemporaries all know that he has a case. His knurled knuckles probably make a case and I wouldn't want any. Jim Marshalls and Carl Eller are the two guys that I've met over the years, just in passing at various functions. Nothing, maybe a phone call interview here or there, no, nothing on a first name basis with either one of those gentlemen. But they are men that still today, they just have a, there's a presence about them, I think, and there's a sense of, I think they know the value and the impact that they had on the league. But they also just, they have a menacing presence to them.

Alan Page is a little bit more of a kind of a softy at heart, playing his tuba for the joggers. And of course, he became a Supreme Court justice. I just feel like these two guys, and particularly Marshall, it's a cliche, but we hear it all the time. They could line up and play again today. And I just feel every time I see two guys, and particularly Marshall, it's a cliche, but we hear it all the time. They could line up and play again today. And I just feel every time I see those guys that if they did,

I think they would still thrive. Well, the thing about Jim Marshall is when you have great teams, someone always gets left out of the party. And with the Buffalo Bills, where I grew up, it was Kent Hall, their center. You get Andre Reid, Jim Kelly, Thurman Thomas, Bruce Smith, they go all into the Hall of Fame easily. And Kent Hall, their center, was the centerpiece of the offense. He was the one that was calling out signals and things like that in a no-huddle offense and was a dominant player at the time. But no one is going to give him the credit that he deserved because the other stars outshined him. And Jim Marshall has a little bit of that same issue with Alan Page and Carl Eller. And I guess I don't fully understand why he is left out of that with,

I guess it is just because Page and Eller were considered the better players and Pro Bowls, but we'll get into this probably later, that there are some Vikings players who have six Pro Bowls who haven't gotten a sniff of the Hall of Fame. But I think that that's probably it, is that Jim Marshall doesn't have those Pro Bowls. And what other metric do we really have to look back? We do not have Jim Marshall's pro football focus grades to go back and be like, well, you know, he averaged an 87 grade for seasons 1964 through 1972 or something. We just don't have as many metrics to tell us how good he actually was. But shouldn't all of that be trumped by the 270 consecutive games? I just look at it as a, you know, I don't know what Favre's streak had.

Favre had a great streak as well. But when you're talking about a guy that plays in the trenches and also played in an era where, you know, felonies were not only allowed but kind of encouraged to be committed at that time on the defensive line, I don't understand how that is not sort of that, well, this puts him over the top. Why hasn't the veterans committee been able to find a spot for him as well? Anybody that to me has played in the, in this sport,

especially in that era would have to respect and marvel at the fact that this was a man who never missed a game. Not in a five or 10 year career, but in a 19 year career. And that tells you something too about this. I'll make a hockey comparison that you could usually figure out a lot about hockey by just looking at the minutes that a guy plays. If some defenseman is playing 24 minutes, he's probably pretty good, unless your team is awful and someone just has to play. But some defenseman is playing 24 minutes, he's probably pretty good, unless your team is awful and someone just has to play. But usually, if you're playing that much, and the

same would go for Jim Marshall, if you are playing to the point where you can get 270 games and you're not a kicker, then that must say how good you were at your peak to still be playing late, late into your career and being as good as you were. Pro football reference has a metric called approximate value that tries to isolate a player's value within his team. So it's kind of a, the best way I can describe it is kind of a wins above replacement type of stat that they invented. And he is fourth in team history. Carl Eller is number one. And he's among some of the best players of all time. Now, it is a cumulative stat. So Eli Manning's number is pretty good, too, with approximate value because he played for so long.

And maybe that's what it is, is that Jim Marshall didn't have the peak years, possibly, that some of these other guys did. But he has the longevity. I totally agree with your case, though, and I think he should absolutely be in the Hall of Fame. And then just, you know, when you think about the legendary early teams of the National Football League, it's one of the top five things that comes up is Purple People Eaters defensive line.

So to not have someone who is a part of that, a major, major part of that in the Hall of Fame is a mistake. And I don't know why he hasn't been able to get in yet. Who is next? And he was with the Vikings from day one as well. They had to endure a lot of awful slash mediocre slash under the radar seasons until Eller and Page. And who was the fourth guy? Gary? Not, yeah, not Gary uh who's the fourth guy on the line was it Larson Gary Larson yes yeah not Ron Gary Gary Larson but these guys weren't drafted or acquired until later in the 60s I mean Marshall was sort of a one-man crew for

five or six years when the Vikings were pretty god-awful uh And not only that, there's a handful of guys that probably don't need too much work on a bronze bust. I mean, they're literally born chiseled. And Jim Marshall is one of those guys that I think was born to be a hall of fame bust. When you just look at, I can just see him on the sideline in the snow with his headgear on and his cape and actually peering through a quarterback. I mean like, you know, like peering through the guy's soul. Those are the kinds of images when you think of the beautiful John Facenda and the beautiful NFL films, glory machine, you know, you could see Jim Marshall battling in the cold November mud of Lambeau

field. I mean that, you know, so I, I view him more as a, almost like he was born to be in canton beyond his playing ability his longevity but his just his features and his sort of his visual jim marshall speaks hall of fame so that's but to me i don't i any other stat out there the man played 270 consecutive games. Nobody's going to come near that. Yeah, he is the defining, he's the defining member of the Hall of Very Good for the Minnesota Vikings. Yeah, I would say that. That's a, should that be a proud card to carry, though?

Yes. I mean, what was it? Who was the guy in baseball? Was it Ron Santo, who was the best player to not get it? And eventually they put him in after he had passed away, which, you know, why bother? You, you would almost rather. He lost two legs to diabetes and died. And then they put him in. You would, you would much rather be not in.

And the guy known as the best player not in, then be put in posthumously, I think. Probably right. So for Jim Marshall, I mean, having that designation that everyone who comes up and meets you says, man, you should be in the Hall of Fame. You would kind of take that in a way. I'm sure he'd rather be in the Hall, honestly. But it's not a bad place to be.

Right. Right. When you are considered like the reason to make a Hall of very good team is Jim Marshall. All right. Who's the next player on your list, Brian? Percy Harvin. Percy Harvin is one of the few people that I've covered or watched where you wanted to make sure you were there when you saw him touch the ball. There's hockey players that are like that when the puck is on his stick. There's pitchers and hitters. You want to see those certain confrontations, but the buzz that you would sense either in the dome or even on the road

when he went back for a kickoff, no matter what time of the game, a part of the game it was, it was one of those type things where you don't know what you're going to see. He, and again, I didn't look up any of the numbers, but he's got to have a half dozen kickoff returns, five, a hundred yard, over a hundred yards. Right. And I know there was one, I can't remember who it was against. He actually ran it back. I think 103 or 104 yards and didn't get a touchdown, which is also an NFL record. I believe the longest kick return without a score. And I do believe the Vikings got stuffed at the goal line several times. Of course they did. So they settled for a field goal after Harvin ran for 104 yards.

But he was the kind of guy that could steal momentum. And he was, you know, a lot of people viewed him as sort of a miscreant and a little bit of a distraction or selfish player. I never got that sense from Harvin. I got the sense that Harvin didn't like to play the game, the media game, or also he wasn't going to, you know, when Harvin spoke, and it wasn't often, it was an event, and he had something to say, which I respected him for as well. I think he was misunderstood by a lot of teammates, certainly by a lot of fans. But I don't know. In the last 15 or 20 years, it would be hard to argue that there was a better pure athlete on the Vikings than Percy Harvin. And the way they were able to utilize him in that offense in the early days of these hybrid

offenses, I don't think they ever figured out how to use him. And of course, he couldn't stay on the field because of health reasons as well. But he's just one of those few players where, you know, you did literally move to the edge of your seat when that kickoff was in the air and you saw him settling underneath it because you didn't know what you were going to see through the air as i can make two comparisons one is when i was growing up eric metcalf was that way that anytime eric metcalf was getting the football you thought this guy is going to go for a touchdown and now it's tyree kill everyone uses the ty. He's the most explosive, fastest player in the league. You can give him the ball out of the backfield.

You can run him deep. You can put him back for a kick or a punt return. And if you remember, the Vikings punter was so afraid of Tyree Kill being back for a return that he kicked it out of bounds for like 20 yards that set up the game-winning field goal for Kansas City this year. Well, it's the same sort of feeling for Percy Harvin. And I went back and watched every Percy Harvin touchdown. And thank you to whoever the YouTuber was that put it together.

And what stuck out to me, Brian, was not just the kick returns, which he had five for touchdown. And almost every one of them comes out of the end zone. And he just blows people away. There are only a handful of players in history that I can remember making everyone else on the field look slow, like Randy Moss, Barry Sanders, and Percy Harvin belongs in not quite their ballpark, but that same feeling of, is everybody else in slow motion? Because this guy is

just running away from everybody. There's the 40-yard dash fast, and then there's football fast, and he is one of the all-time football fast people. But in his compilation of all of his touchdowns, two things stuck out to me. One, every one of them is from 30 yards or beyond, whether it's a deep pass from somebody or if it's just a screen pass that he takes for a 30 or 40 or 50-yard touchdown. And the other thing was, I didn't realize this, they used to hand it off to him at the goal line sometimes, and he would run over people. So it wasn't just that he was incredibly fast, but he was strong and he could break tackles like a running back. And I agree with you that the more modern offenses have gotten, I think if they had used him like

they do with some of these hybrid type of offensive weapon players, now Christian McCaffrey or Tyreek Hill, he would have been a mega star. Do you think he's an underachiever? I think he was a victim of circumstance, that his injuries were a problem. Maybe the offenses, maybe the quarterbacks were a problem for Percy Harvin, aside from obviously playing with Brett Favre. But who else are we talking about that was getting Percy Harvin the ball? And then just timing. Timing and circumstance is huge when it comes to whether you become a Hall of Famer or not. There are only a handful of guys maybe ever who would have been a Hall of Famer for anybody. Randy Moss is probably a Hall of Famer for just about anybody. But even then, he ends up

with a quarterback right off the bat who could throw it 60 yards to him in Randall Cunningham, and then gets another one in Dante Culpepper, who could also throw it 60 or 70 yards down the field to Randy Moss. So that helps him in being that player. Percy Harvin didn't have that, anybody to hit him 60 yards down the field, and then did not have the creativity on offense or the health to continue to play for a really long time. I think if he had even just been healthy, he showed up in Buffalo my last year there before I moved to Minnesota and he stepped on the field and blew everybody away. Even in his, a little bit of older years after all of the injuries, goes out to Seattle, doesn't play for a full season. They kick it off to him in the Super Bowl.

He runs it back for a touchdown. I mean, it's just like this guy did legendary things and just ended up with the health issues. And it kind of reminds you of a lot of the great Vikings of all time, including Culpepper, where you wonder if he didn't get hurt, how good would he have been? Ever hear of test driving a phone network?

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U.S. Cellular, built for us. Terms apply. Visit uscellular.com slash try us. That's uscellular.com slash try us. Well, and when you think about some of Harvin's issues too, he's talked since a little bit about some of the mental health issues that he dealt with and also the marijuana use. We used to criminalize players for marijuana use until now we have realized, including the NFL has realized that a lot of players use it for pain management as opposed to using some of the other synthetic drugs that can be more problematic for you.

And I think with Percy Harvin, he was using it in large part to deal with some mental health issues that now are not looked at with the same stigma that they would have been when Percy Harvin first came into the league. I think now if you go to your front office and you say, hey, I'm having some problems, can I get some help? They will bend over backwards to try to help you. That's not to say that the world is perfect in that regard at all, and the NFL has just started to come around on this. We saw it with what Everson Griffin was dealing with,

how they embraced Everson Griffin to come back into the locker room and come back onto the team. And they re-signed him for last year and so forth. They didn't treat him like he was different because he had dealt with something like this. And I think that Percy Harvin, it would have been the same case in 2020 that if he were dealing with problems like that, they would have worked really hard to find him a solution as opposed to, like you said, looking at him like he was aloof or he didn't care or whatever it might be to actually get the guy some help and that could have you know aside there's certain injuries that you know

there's nothing you can do about but aside from that all the personality issues I think would have been dealt with a lot better now than they were then. You know, you segued to something. You mentioned Randall Cunningham, because he was number three on the list that you had sent me, that I find a fascinating, you know, for in the history of the Minnesota Vikings, he was here about a half hour. But that half hour, in the context of what this franchise has accomplished or almost could have accomplished but didn't quite accomplish, Randall Cunningham's 1998 season in marriage with Randy Moss has to go down as one of those great, burned brightly for such a short period of time

and oh, what might have been. We can go down the litany of things that happened in the 98 championship NFC championship game, but the numbers that he put up the way he helped introduce Randy Moss to the football world. Um, when people look at Randall Cunningham's career, I don't think anybody even remembers the hiccup here in Minnesota, but the people here in Minnesota remember the impact that he had coming in off the bench for an injured Brad Johnson and literally helping change the way the game is played. I think that counts for as much as what he did in Philadelphia and how he changed the game when the game wasn't ready for somebody

like Randall Cunningham in the late 80s. What he did here in 1998, I'm not sure fans necessarily appreciate because I think they think of Randy Moss, they think of 15-1. They don't realize how it was Brad Johnson's team. And Randall Cunningham was as forgotten a figure in the NFL as anybody at that point. I mean, he was a relic. And he came back and had arguably one of his best statistical seasons. Yeah, really. I mean, as a passer, by far his statistical season. And when he did it at that time, it was a top three season in NFL

history when he did it. Like now I think it still is a top 10 season, even since Peyton Manning and Tom Brady and everybody has come into the league when it comes to his quarterback rating. But at that time, you're talking about one of the best seasons by a quarterback in NFL history. And I put Randall Cunningham in the category of Hall of very good for the entire NFL. And so I wanted to put him on this list, even though he's not considered a Viking. And there are other guys who have been, you know, Vikings briefly that I did not put on the list because I didn't really

consider them a Viking, but this one is very, very different. You're talking about a player who, like you said, was way ahead of his time in terms of a running quarterback, who again, with today's game, he probably performs even better as a passer with the Eagles. They always wanted to throw it deep down the field all the time back then. When I was looking up some of the numbers for Hall of Very Good, I mean, Anthony Carter averages like 16 yards a catch. If you average 16 yards a catch in the NFL today, that means you are considered a deep threat. That used to be everybody was averaging that much and they would only complete 48% of their passes, right? Unless you played for

Bill Walsh. So with Cunningham, he was often using that arm and throwing it down the field, or he was just taking off and running. Now you've been able to design a lot shorter passes, quicker completions and things like that that would have helped Cunningham. So I wonder what his numbers would have been had he come into the league now. But a revolutionary quarterback who maybe is a little short of the counting numbers and he had some injuries mixed in there to be a Hall of Famer. I tend to think that he should be, but that 98 season to come off the bench and to just start hucking it deep to Randy Moss and have the games that they put up together. I mean, it does go down in all time great Vikings history that even if you just, even if he didn't have that past with the Eagles, I might still put them on this list just for

that. I mean, with Culpepper, I also put him as the other Hall of Very Good quarterback. He really only had two good seasons, but they were so good that I think that's kind of how I would define a Hall of Very Good is either our Jim Marshall that played for a long time, but was not considered the best player in the league, or somebody who briefly was the best player in the league. And for that year, Cunningham was the NFL's best quarterback. And he deserved the recognition that he got. I think it was kind of a, you know, I wasn't here yet. So I was only, I was watching it from afar, but I seem to remember the narrative being Randall Cunningham was underappreciated in Philadelphia, both by fans and by the league in general. And what he was able to, you know,

and he kind of transformed himself from, you know, a hard partying guy to, you know, a Christian based, you know, father and sort of, you know, by the time he got to Denny Green and the Vikings in 98, he was a different player and a different person. And you, I think you appreciated his raw talent a little bit more. He was more of a drop-back guy that year. A, he had age working against him,

but he didn't need to run around and make things happen when you had Chris Carter, Randy Moss, Jake Reed, let's not forget him, and you had Robert Smith running for 1,200, 1,500 yards out of the backfield as well. He had plenty of tools around him. He didn't have to make it happen for him. But I got the impression that that season there was a general appreciation around the league for really how good of a passer he was and a thrower. I mean, this is a guy that could throw the ball 80 yards in the air

from a dead stop, you know, not necessarily even on the run. You know, you see a lot of those highlights of him rolling out, chucking it down the field. But from a pure dropback standpoint, Moss allowed him to, I think, rehabilitate, maybe not rehabilitate, but maybe reinforce his reputation as not just a scrambling black quarterback, but a solid dropback quarterback who reinvented himself along the way. It was kind of an interesting story. It's too bad he didn't get a chance to do it in the Super Bowl, or at least get to the Super Bowl and kind of show what

he could have done. Again, we could go down the litany. You know, every NFC Championship game loss for the Vikings, there's 15 things that went wrong in that particular game to bring you to a certain point. That was one of those games that had a laundry list of mistakes, including him getting sacked and fumbling at the end of the first half as well. I just remember him, it was a redemption story as well as a coming out story for Moss, and it was kind of neat to see those a coming out story for Moss. And it was kind

of neat to see those two reconnect for that one moment in time. You know, I think it's a great point though, because when Randall Cunningham's at his peak, you would only have seen Randall Cunningham a handful of times if you're an NFL fan, not in Philadelphia. And you would think of him, the perception would be, this is a running quarterback. You see the NFL films highlights and he's running around doing crazy things. But when I wrote a piece a few months ago about how Cunningham belongs in the Hall of Fame, I went back and looked at some of his best passing games. And certainly he was not Joe Montana when it came to the accuracy all the time. But his pure passing, you could see how it happened.

He would have games where he threw for 350 yards and four touchdowns and led comebacks with his arm and not his legs and things like that he was always capable of that and I think when they put him in the exact right situation like you mentioned with so many weapons around him and gave him this ability to just show off his arm he ends up with an all-time great season and that's the, you know, when you talk about what someone's ceiling is, to show that your ceiling is a passer at that age, after all that he had been through with his career, to show that your ceiling is a passer under perfect circumstances is one of the

great seasons of all time, it kind of makes you wonder about, you know, what it could have been had he even been more of a passer or if offenses had come along a little bit farther in the late 80s and early 90s. But it also is one of those very rare circumstances. I don't know. I can't think of almost any other example where a quarterback, maybe Rich Gannon would be like this, where somebody was thought of as being like kind of meh or, you know, had this shortcoming or that shortcoming and then proves it late in his career that he can be an MVP level player and for that season alone and for that story alone I wanted to include Randall Cunningham in the hall of very good for the Vikings. Do you think because we're both outsiders too I didn't have to endure as a fan the pain of that disappointing finish in the NFC Championship game or as a journalist sort of chronicle how devastating it was.

If I'm average Vikings fan and I'm listening to this podcast, has the pain of that worn off at least enough to appreciate what that season meant, how fun it was, how dominant it was, how shape-shifting it was. And then when you look back at the personalities that emerged from that team that came together at that time, is there enough of an appreciation for a 15-1, just dominating the league offensively? On the cusp of greatness, it ended painfully, but still there's value to look back on this season. Yeah, I think so. Should the Rams embrace it a little bit more?

When you get separated from it a little bit more, you look back and you say, no rookie wide receiver has ever done anything like this. No quarterback has ever been out of the league and then come back in and had one of the great seasons of all time. No receiving core, maybe in history, ever competes with Randy Moss, Chris Carter, and Jake Reed. And not only that, but they had a lot of good defensive players too. And to go 15-1 is truly, truly special. And you don't see it very often. How often do we see anybody go 15-1? There's one 16-0 team in the New England Patriots.

And then aside from that, I mean, maybe Peyton Manning was 14-2, 15-1. I mean, that's a once in franchise history type of season. And with Randall Cunningham at the head of it, that made it even more exciting. And then plus, you know, Randy Moss is one of the best players in the history of the game, one of the most exciting players in the history of the game. And his emergence there is something that's unforgettable. So I think that people do appreciate that and think more about Randy Moss's emergence and how great it was in the legendary games like on Thanksgiving Day or against the Packers than they do about Gary Anderson's kick.

But you'll never get rid of that. I mean, I could say from my experience in Buffalo that people have the greatest appreciation for the teams that lost four straight Super Bowls. At the time, it was just the worst. I mean, I was a little kid, but it was the worst. Like they're in the Super Bowl again against Dallas. I think they lead in the first half and then it falls apart. It turns into a complete bleep show.

And at the time, you know, people wanted Frank Reich to start over Jim Kelly and things like that. But now, you know, you get a few years separated and you just have a much greater appreciation for how difficult that actually was to achieve. Same thing with the 15-1 season. All right, who else is on your list? This is a random one because, you know,

people are going to think, well, really? You know, I'm surprised it was on your list, but it was intriguing enough for me to bring up. Ryan Longwell. And I bring up Ryan Longwell because, of course, Vikings fans are haunted by specialists and the lack of, or the general perception of the clutch, but not when it matters. And that's what Gary Anderson's probably going to have to take to the grave after being perfect in 1998. I bring up Longwell because he was such a nemesis with the Packers and had been the author of so many

painful last second defeats and even not with game-winning field goals, but just the constant reminder of what a steady, accurate, reliable kicker in awful conditions, usually at Lambeau, what that can do for the confidence of a team. So when he came to Minnesota, it was, it was as if they had signed a skilled player. Like they got Ryan Longwell, they've got a proven, hardened, reliable kicker. And it ended up being, he was basically Favre's bag man for a couple of years too. I mean, his value was even more pronounced just getting Favre in town. But I bring up Longwell because of the, like I said, the timing of his arrival, the reputation he had built in Green Bay, and he had been able to remind Vikings fans of what they were lacking. So I say Longwell because I think he was, you know, before Blair Walsh, I mean, he was a beacon of consistency and strength and stability.

And he also, I think, reminded Vikings fans of what they were missing just over in Wisconsin. And then again, his impact in getting Favre into town, without Ryan Longwell, Brett Favre does not come to the Vikings. So that's why he stands out in my mind. And I also want to bring, you can follow up, but I wanted to throw something else out there for people to consider as well about Longwell. The legacy of Ryan Longwell is twofold. It's yes, flying down to get Brett is one. But the other part of it is that we all agree he makes the field goal in 09,9 right if they don't have the two and that's where I was gonna go go ahead we'll go with that in a second but I want to

circle back on that I mean even though it would have been a bomb you are inside of a dome and if you hand it off and get four yards or if you run a screen or if Favre takes off and runs or if he checks it down to Bernard Berrien or whatever and you get a couple yards or if theyavre takes off and runs, or if he checks it down to Bernard Berrien or whatever, and you get a couple yards, or if they just don't put, you know, too many men in the huddle. Ryan Longwell. Coming out of a timeout. Right, out of a timeout. He makes it. I mean, he is one of the great kickers of all time during that era. If you were over, and it's really changed because now you need to make like almost 90% of your kicks to be any good. But he was making about 85. And at that time, he's one of the best kickers ever who's ever played in the NFL. And he had the range to do it.

He had the consistency and the clutch factor to do it. I also wanted to, before you get to that point about 09, I will send you $50 out of my wallet if you can guess the number one kicker of all time in Vikings history in field goal percentage. In percentage? Yes, percentage. Of any seasons? The kicker would have had to play multiple seasons, put it that way.

Blair Walsh. It's not Blair Walsh. That I would not have bet $50 on. It's Kai Forbath. Kai Forbath? Yes. Who is sort of the bridge between Blair Walsh and wherever we're at today. Kai Forbath makes one of the great field goals in Vikings history. It gets totally forgotten about a 52-yarder in the divisional game against the New Orleans saints that then leads breeze down the field for new Orleans to take the lead. And then the Minneapolis miracle and so forth.

But I thought it was funny as I was looking it up, you know, cause everybody knows Fred Cox is the all time scoring leader for the Vikings. And he's like 20% accuracy. Yeah. 60. But yeah, I mean, it, it was just funny to look it up cause Cause that's why I decided to put Longwell on this list is because, you know,

he was one of the most accurate kickers in Vikings history, but he is just edged out by Kai Forbath. All right. Anyway, back, back to Longwell. Why do we think, why, why does, cause I think the prevailing opinion is the one that you expressed, that all the ifs of the waning moments of the 0-9 NFC championship game, they had driven to, I believe, the 30-yard line at one point. And then the penalty backed him up. I know it was going to be a 55-yard attempt if he was going to make it.

If Favre throws incomplete on his rollout instead of getting picked off by Porter, wasn't it Terry Porter? Yeah. It's going to be a 55-yard attempt. Everybody in town seems to think Longwell is going to bury that kick. I'm not saying he wouldn't. He was clearly, as you said, he had strong numbers. He's inside.

But he had never made a kick over 50 yards or 52 yards that season. Why was that? Why is it the prevailing wisdom that that's a gimme? Because it was a gimme for Gary Anderson in a dome from 30 yards, and he missed. Is this people's revisionist history? Like, they want to believe that he would have made it. Therefore, the painful interception isn't as painful well i think that there's and i'm getting dangerous here because

we're drilling into the psychology of viking i know and ryan longwell was different though because he was not raised in the psychological mind bleep that is the vikings he was a packer um now he went from i've got this up here, from 50 plus in his Viking career. So it's a little harder with Green Bay because you're talking about kicking 50 plus outside. So inside with the Vikings, 11 for 17 with a long of 55. That was as long as a Viking. So yeah, it would have been a bomb and it would not have been easy and it's a very tough circumstance but 11 for 17 and career 24 for 39 from 50 plus I mean he he can hammer it home from deep I think he makes it you think he makes it I think he makes I've ever talked to thinks he makes that kick uh which I he's a great

kicker I mean that's the thing is you look over this guy's career and it's remarkable how accurate he was, how great he was from deep and how consistent. I mean, we're in a world where kicking has never been more scientific and you have kids raised from seven years old to be kickers. And yet still they're all over the place. And even some proven kickers will have these big dips in their career. Not Ryan Longwell. Last guy on your list. Ahmad Rashad. And I bring that up because we are in the post-Last Dance era here

where I'm sure a lot of modern sports fans, younger sports fans, really only think of Ahmad Rashad as sort of Michael Jordan's buddy and the guy on NBC during NBA coverage. And maybe didn't he marry somebody from the Cosby show, that old stupid show from the 80s. But I don't think they realize what a game breaker he was during his career in Minnesota. And again, we're comparing eras, which is dangerous because early to mid-70s offensive passing, certainly in the NFC and certainly in the NFC Central with Bud Grant, nobody was stretching the field, right?

But Ahmad Rashad was their playmaker. And Ahmad Rashad also made one of the great Hail Mary receptions of all time to beat the Cleveland Browns and the season finale in 80 or 81. I've seen the highlight of a bunch of times where, you know, he basically having run, I don't know, two or three downfield routes had no breath left at him somehow made the catch at the goal line, snuck in one of the great moments in Met Stadium history to win the Vikings, the division. But I'm just wondering, you know, because of his host playing entertainment career slash broadcasting career

slash, you know, MJ's henchman, so to speak, for NBC, if that many people realize how talented and he walked away from the game at a young age too, how good of a football player, good of a wide receiver Amandre Chai was. So he went to four straight Pro Bowls and he really didn't get opportunities early in his career either until he got to Minnesota. He had a couple other stops. One was definitely in Buffalo and I want to say maybe the jets, but he ends up in Minnesota after a couple of years of sort of bouncing around and then it just takes off. And I would say that that catch against Cleveland, when the Vikings play Cleveland, we all just get sucked into a black hole.

Right. Just like who's, who's yeah. Like, I don't know. I mean, who, who's freaky outside, weird, crazy cosmic forces are going to succeed when the Browns play the Vikings. But you know, I have to admit that I fall exactly into the category that you described. When I was growing up, Ahmad Rashad was NBA inside stuff. And I will admit to this that in 2017, now I was aware that he played in the NFL and that he had even, I think he played a preseason game with the Philadelphia 76ers too, so that he was this tremendous, tremendous athlete. I knew that from his past history

and times that it had come up, but it wasn't until 2017 when I was covering OTAs that they made the announcement that Randy Moss and Ahmad Rashad were going to be put in the team's ring of honor that I realized how good Ahmad Rashad was at football. Because he shows up at Winter Park. I was like, NBA Inside Stuff guy? Jordan's buddy? Why are you here? This is amazing. You know, like sign my NBA inside stuff shirt or whatever um and then you go back and look and oh okay I did not realize that he

made four straight Pro Bowls as a Minnesota Viking and was a really dynamic player and uh I had to include him on this list I guess for my own not really realizing, but also he's just on that borderline of guys who were great for a section of time but would have needed to be better for longer if they had wanted to make the actual Hall of Fame. Well, and again, he played two, you know, I think he transitioned with Tarkenden and Kramer. Kramer seemed to be, I mean, everybody knows Tarkenden was a renegade

with his legs, but I think Kramer was more the traditional downfield passer. If he'd have had a few more years with Kramer, he might have put up some more yards too. But then again, that Vikings team after 1980 pretty much fell apart for the next seven or eight years until the late 80s when Jerry Burns took over. That was sort of the – I think in the timeline of the franchise when you look at that game against Cleveland from that was pretty much the last hurrah of the 70s and their their teams from there from 1981 to 86 they were pretty much in the toilet and transitioning out of the Bud Grant era into

the Les Steckle era. I don't know how many more big seasons he might have had after that, but it was sort of an interesting exclamation point to put on there too. And then, you know, for anybody out there listening, I'm sure the diehards will know, but do you know what his real name is? I do not. Bobby Earl Moore. Oh.

It's not a bad football name if you think about it. No. That's kind of a name that goes on a Hall of fame bus, right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, it sounds like somebody from that era or somebody from the seventies. There's no Bobby Earl Moore who's playing in 2020 only pre 1980. And the three name, I mean, the three names, you know, you cause yeah, boy, if you could, if we could get a player like Bobby Earl Moore, we're going to win some games. That's right. Perfect way to end it, Brian. Well, if you want to see the entire list, then become a subscriber at Purple Insider. You go to purpleinsider.substack.com is where you can go right to sign up and see the entire list, the Vikings Hall of Very Good. And I put that together because it's June and we're trying to have as much fun as we can. So Brian, it was great to catch up with

you. I hope that we get a regular Vikings training camp and we get into a normal season and get things going. Nothing is normal these days, but that's my hope and that we can continue to catch up, man. This was fun. Yeah, it'd be great. I mean, these sports journalism muscles have kind of atrophied as I've entered the corporate world. So this was nice to kind of get back on the bike.