Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Greenroom chat talking N'Keal Harry, Vikings Super Bowl path and offensive line questions

Episode Date: July 10, 2021

Matthew Coller hosts weekly chats with Vikings fans on the Greenroom app (formerly known as the LockerRoom app). Here's his Friday night discussion in which Matthew takes questions from fans about whether the Vikings should be interested in N'Keal Harry, why the offensive line and wide receiver are the most interesting positions at training camp and how Vikings fans can talk themselves into this team being a Super Bowl contender. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey everybody, welcome into Purple Insider, Matthew Collar here as always. Wanted to bring you our green room room chat which used to be the locker room chats if you remember from draft time from this weekend because i felt like it was a pretty fun one with vikings fans and if you want to join usually do these friday saturday night sometime around then each week and all you have to do is get the green room app and then follow me on there and you can jump on in. And usually we have some pretty fun chats. It's usually once or twice a week that we do them.

So feel free to join. This one had a lot of good discussions of Nikhil Harry, whether the Vikings could actually win the Super Bowl, what the biggest storylines at camp are going to be as we start to write our camp previews. So off we go here's what i want to know from you guys as i'm brainstorming storylines and ideas for training camp we're going to go through position by position and we're going to pull out the biggest storyline of each position and then write a bunch about it as a preview. And we're going to talk about literally every player on the roster, even guys we've never heard of that are camp bodies in these previews. So I want to know from you guys, biggest storylines from camp that you

need me to write about and any other questions that you've got, Of course. I'm always happy to answer. So I'm going to try to be better at when I read your comments. I actually read them out loud. So if I post them on the podcast feed, people can understand what I'm talking about instead of just reacting directly. So I'm going to try to be better about that tonight. Okay, Scott, you're talking about Nikhil Harry. Is he worth a sixth or a seventh pick? I think Nikhil Harry is their Laquan Treadwell.

So maybe ask yourself, would Laquan Treadwell have been worth a sixth or a seventh round pick? And I mean, I would probably say that anybody that's drafted high is always worth that because you never know. This has been a Chief's strategy for a while like didn't they pick up taco charlton or something i mean teams do this all the time where it's a former first round pick and they go out and they trade nothing for him and the guy doesn't work out and then we all move on with our lives that's probably nikhil harry and i saw something about how nikhil harry didn't get enough contested catch opportunities or something it all sort of sounds Treadwell-ish the guy can't get open he can't

separate and therefore he just doesn't get the football thrown his way I just don't think he's a very good fit for Kirk Cousins maybe if you had a guy that a quarterback that was willing to throw it into coverage a bunch of times, but that's just not Kirk Cousins. We saw him when Laquan Treadwell was here that he really wouldn't go his way. And then when he did, he would do it at the worst time. So I'm going to say no on Nikhil Harry. They probably is not worth a sixth or a seventh. Jameis Winston would be a much better fit, Scott. I agree with Nikhil Harry. So, Nick, you're saying all eyes are going to be on the offensive line.

And I totally agree. I think that in previous years, we had a lot to look at as far as camp battles or it was new coordinators that was always a thing and that is a thing this year although they're keeping very much the same offense with akubiak but can they get these rookie offensive linemen to play is the biggest question i think by far run away. I'm not even sure what second best is because if we're to the second preseason game and Rashad Hill is still starting and not Christian Derrissaw

or Dakota Dozier is still starting and not Wyatt Davis, I mean, it's going to be legitimate panic mode, don't you think? I mean, that they drafted these guys to replace Riley Reif and to improve on Dakota Dozier. And if you downgrade from Riley Reif and still have Dakota Dozier, you are not better on the offensive line. And Ezra Cleveland is once again being asked to change positions. And it seems plausible that that could happen with both of those guys because Rashad Hill is a proven professional, and there's a decent bar for Christian Derrissaw to have to reach and get over in order to get that starting job over Rashad Hill.

We saw Rashad win that job in 2018, and Brian O'Neill was not ready. But the difference win that job in 2018 and Brian O'Neill was not ready. But the difference between Derrissaw and Brian O'Neill is Brian O'Neill was not physically ready to start at that time. Whereas Christian Derrissaw is physically ready in terms of his size and his physique. He doesn't need to gain weight. He's gargantuan. It would entirely be, does he know the offense and can he handle the technique and if he's not there yet by week one and that's a little bit concerning because you're you're talking about um getting out of the gate with okay cincinnati's not that dangerous they signed what trey hendrickson this year but okay that's it's not super scary but then you get into

arizona's got some pass rushers you You got J.J. Watt there. And not too far into the season, you're facing guys like Miles Garrett. T.J. Watt is on the schedule. You want the guy who is the most talented blocker at that point and not Rashad Hill, even though I have an immense amount of respect for Rashad. Austin, you're saying that you wonder about what it's like for the few players that feel comfortable with their long-term tenure with the team to have a QB front office and coach all feel like it's year to year.

That's an interesting point because how many players are actually on this roster that would you say are 100% sure to be here in 2022? Let me think. Justin Jefferson, the rookies, Brian O'Neill, Eric Hendricks, can't be 100% sure about Harrison Smith until he signs that extension. Is that it? I mean, Cameron Dantzler maybe? I mean, that's kind of incredible to think about with this roster, how much change we could be looking at. Adam Thielen is probably a

Viking for life type of guy. Irv Smith is going to be here a long time. But aside from that, even like Delvin Cook is going to be here at least through 2022. After that, who knows with running backs and where they end up going. But I would say that everybody being on this kind of 2021 and then we'll see. I mean, Delvin Tomlinson will be here 2022. Daniel Hunter is likely to be here. But if he doesn't have a good season, his contract is set up for the Vikings to walk away from him if he's having that issue so if you are like you said Justin Jefferson or one of those key pieces that's going to be here a long time there isn't a whole lot of comfort and I wonder I mean I guess you could say that that could be a good or bad thing depending

on how you want to look at it because it could be a good thing in that everybody's playing for their jobs uh and everybody including the coach and the quarterback and the offensive coordinator and i mean everybody is playing for their future with this season i mean there's a lot that comes down to it in the season and it's a little bit of why last year was so weird is because last year it felt like no matter what happens here everybody is safe and they're going to get another chance to to come back from this so even when cousins was one in five and uh leading the league in interceptions and struggling and and zimmer's defense is falling apart you still never felt like they're actually going to move on from either one of those guys. Whereas if it happens this year,

they will move on from those guys. Do I think that Zimmer and Kubiak are realizing they can't go forward with undersized linemen? I do think that based on Zimmer's comments and his edict to the scouting department, that they have to get bigger offensive linemen and they have done that I mean Ezra Cleveland is bigger Christian Derrissaw is bigger Wyatt Davis is bigger but if you have guys who are inexperienced and have rookie moments at three of the positions and then Garrett Bradbury, if he doesn't take a step forward, I think he could, but if he doesn't, we could be talking about the exact same stuff, even though they have made a concerted effort.

And even though I would bet on the Vikings in 2022, having a very good offensive line based on where they've drafted all of these guys, that they have a great chance to grow together and be very good. But in 2021, trying to make all of those pieces fit and everybody be on the same page as rookies, second year guy moving positions, and then the only one that you really trust being Brian O'Neill, I mean, that sounds like a lot like the last couple of years, that they just have had no continuity on the offensive line. They will have it it in the future but they really don't have it right now and even if they've

realized that they needed bigger offensive linemen who could pass protect better it's a little bit too little too late i mean we watched tom compton we watched josh klein we watched dakota dozier we watched pat elfline i mean all of these guys were just subpar, and they seem to focus so much on, well, we're going to do this zone running thing and forget that third down passing is pretty darn important, and you need your quarterback. Oh, Drew Samia, my gosh. And you need your quarterback to be in a clean pocket. And it seemed like they just put so much focus on these are the type of offensive linemen that Gary Kubiak wants. So these are who we're going to roll with. And they sort of missed the forest through the trees with who their quarterback is.

Because I think there are other quarterbacks who are mobile, who are escape artists, who can make plays on the run and move that would have been I'm not saying okay because look an offensive line that bad can be troublesome for anybody but who would have been able to survive it better than Kirk Cousins and I think that that was kind of an oversight post 2017 that they just didn't really seem to spot until maybe too late. Are the Wilfs okay blowing it up and having a 4-13 year in order to become great, or would they rather stay in the middling range? That's a really good question, Austin, and it's something that I think about a lot. I think the fan base right now would probably be okay a lot of fans with a down year I think if it ultimately meant that you got farther along I think but when you spend so much

money to get back into the playoffs I think they would much rather see this team get into the playoffs and be competitive and then have a chance to go forward with what they have and resign some of the players they signed and things like that. I think that that's, if they had only those two choices for this year, I think that's the one they would choose since that's the goal that they set out was we're going to improve by a lot and spend 40 million dollars. Like they didn't set out with the goal of just sort of, you know, oh, we're going to be great or we're going to be terrible.

I think they set out the goal of we need to get back into the playoffs and they kind of have this. We'll get into the playoffs and we'll see kind of mentality, which, you know, doesn't really generally come to fruition unless we go back maybe like a decade. What's going on, Kenny? What's up, buddy? Hey, how's it going? So the Vikings, no one, no Viking fan right now is probably thinking, oh, hey, we're going to win the Super Bowl this year. But I'm going to lay out the case for why we could. Because right now we're going to have the best defense since we've had since 2017 one year deals aside i mean that's a lot of veterans you know sheldon richardson

patrick peterson you know we're going to have a lot of good players and there's no reason to think that kurt cousin who yeah but there's no reason to think that he couldn't have his Jared Goff, his Jimmy Garoppolo, his Carson Wentz season. You know, I mean, this could with how weak with how weak the NFC is, this could actually turn out to be a season. OK, you're breaking up a little there, Kenny. So thank you for jumping on. And even your kids don't agree with you. No, I'm just I'm just kidding. So here's the way I look at that. and then i'll answer a few more questions here the way i look

at that is this the the vikings should not be thinking it's okay if they start out really bad and they can just sort of tank and everything else in a year like this, because the NFC is so wide open that they should have an opportunity to be really good. And winning the Super Bowl, you can never, unless you have Tom Brady or Patrick Mahomes, you can never really put that as a thing that you see as like the goal from day one. So if you have Aaron Rodgers, okay, first day of training camp, the goal is the Super Bowl, right? Okay, for this team, it's get into the playoffs and then see what happens is always kind of the goal when you have Kirk Cousins. Can you have a Jared Goff or Jimmy Garoppolo year? Yes, that's possible. The question for me is, is his team strong enough? And yeah,

Joe Flacco did win a Super Bowl, but that was kind of a long time ago now, right? I mean, that used to be the thing that people would talk about is like, oh, well, you know, Eli won a couple of Super Bowls and he wasn't the number one quarterback and neither was Joe Flacco. But in recent years, it's really been the best passing games. I guess if you were trying to use a Kirk Cousins comparison, maybe you would use Matt Ryan. Like if their offense really came together and Justin Jefferson is dominant and Adam Thielen is great and all those things that, you know, it can all come together and you win a couple of playoff games. And sure. Yeah.

I mean, that can happen it definitely can happen and with the nfc being the way that it is there's no one except for the bucks that you look at and say oh my gosh they're so much better than the vikings it couldn't happen on the other side of the coin the question would be is this team better than other iterations of the vikings that they ran out there with Kirk Cousins? Is it better than 2018 roster? Is it better than 2019 roster? And I would be hard pressed to say that it's better. I would say maybe on par or similar, but I can't say that it's vastly better. So you have to kind of hope that the circumstances play out better and that Cousins does have his sort of Matt Ryan breakout year, although Ryan in his prime is better than Cousins,

but like, you know, that kind of thing. And you could sort of talk yourself into the fact that it's a different NFC team almost every year. And, you know, maybe at some point Tom Brady slips a little bit. So that's the way that you talk yourself into a Superbowl for the Vikings. But also like we're not even in training camp yet. So let me get a feel for the team first and then we can talk about that. But is there a path? Is it possible? Yeah, of course it is. It's always possible. I would never go into a season unless a team had tanked and was playing, you know, Tyrod Taylor, a quarterback or something, unless it was, unless it was some completely incompetent quarterback. I would never

tell you it's impossible because I watched Case Keenum get close to the Superbowl. So it can, it can happen. Scott, good question. Is it, is there actually actually source any real sourcing that the vikings would move on if mike zimmer didn't win in 2019 they i was told that they were going to if the game in new orleans went the wrong way that they were going to make a change kevin stefanski was going to be the coach that's what i was told in 2019. Now, would they have actually pulled the trigger? I don't know. We'll never know.

But the rumors about trading Zimmer to Dallas were absolutely real. And so that to me says, plus the length of the contract extension says, yes, they would move on. There hasn't recently been that in part because I mean, the Wilfs just don't have a lot out there. Their ownership is not always talking with media or always leaking things out about what their plans are. So they can be a little hard to predict. But I do think that it's when you add up the amount of time that Mike Zimmer has had, the amount of money that they've spent to give him everything he could have

asked for this year, then yeah, I think that there's a realistic possibility that they would, considering that there was already pressure on him and they did not sign him to a five-year extension. They signed him to a three-year extension. That is significant in my mind too. Matt, Harrison Smith on All Things Covered, that's Patrick Peterson's podcast, was cool. Yeah, that podcast is really a must listen. And I actually had Bryant McFadden, the co-host of that show, on my show. And that was great to talk with him.

Patrick Peterson's actually a good podcaster. But what was notable about Harrison Smith's appearance is he kind of said that he wants to be a Viking for life, but he also kind of hedged. And I will be really interested to see if they actually get that contract extension done with Harrison Smith. Because there was a like, yeah, I want to be a Viking for life and so forth. But he didn't come straight out and say, oh, yeah, that's that's getting done. We're going to be all set. So that was interesting to me. Scott, your biggest off season concern, wide receiver, 17 games, they're gambling that Thielen or Jefferson don't miss time. I strongly agree. And I feel like we've

talked about it every time we've done a chat, but I kind of can't figure out why they have been unable to bring in another wide receiver. Now, part of it might be that no one wants to come to Minnesota to be wide receiver three. Think about Kendall Wright came here. His career was over. Jordan Taylor came here. His career was over. Tajay Sharp came here. He's somewhere, but he went from a role player on a good Tennessee team to nothing. And if you're the agent for a wide receiver and you got a few teams calling, why are you picking Minnesota when you know that they're not going to throw to wide receiver three and they haven't for a really long time? You know, we talked about how good Jerry's right was. I think Jerry's right had like 17

catches or something in 2017. Like even a guy who was effective and helpful in that role barely got the football. So, so i wonder if that plays into it um for the reason that they are unable to bring in another wide receiver but you would think that they could have drafted one with maybe a third round pick they decided to wait till the fifth so that's a decision that will be questioned if amir smitharsak can't win that wide receiver three job. So that's like, in terms of our camp storylines of kind of where we started with this conversation, that is way up there for me is, are they going to ultimately end up regretting doing nothing as of this moment to upgrade that wide receiver three position? Because when you look at the free

agent list there were a dozen guys who would have been a decent fit there's still a couple guys out there right now who would be a decent fit for wide receiver three but maybe they would have to convince that player yes we're actually going to throw you the football and not tank your career i mean even aldrick robinson josh dachson, like those guys basically never played again after coming to the Vikings for a cup of coffee. And that's not really the position that any player wants to be in is where they just feel like they're not getting the ball. But in previous years, Kyle Rudolph and Irv Smith could sort of act as wide receiver three.

And I like Tyler Conklin, but if Justin Jefferson or Adam Thielen missed time, Tyler Conklin is not really a replacement for a wide receiver in the same way that Irv Smith is. Zimmer doesn't want to pass first offense though. That's true, Nick. And that's exactly what I mean is that the whole league kind of knows and all the players kind of know that this is not an offense where you go to bump up your passing numbers. And I think that might impact who wants to sign here, but of course money talks. So if they had been willing to outbid some teams for some guys that signed at very reasonable prices, uh, they could have Kenny. Can we admit

that Kirk cousins is better than Jared Goff and Joe Flacco? No, I wouldn't say he's better than Joe Flacco when Joe Flacco was at his best. Could we, have we ever seen Kirk Cousins play the way Joe Flacco did in those playoffs against good teams? Definitely not. So I'm not going to go there. Now, Joe Flacco wasn't a consistently great quarterback, especially after he won the Super Bowl, but Kirk has never played like Joe Flacco played in that playoffs. And with Jared Goff, yeah, I think he's a better quarterback than Jared Goff.

I'll agree with you there. Can you build a roster like Jared Goff had when he went to the Super Bowl? Do you have one right now? I don't think so. I think the Rams had a top three offensive line that year when they went to the Super Bowl. They do not have the Vikings don't have that now unless something goes extremely right. Nick, who would my short

list of coaches be? I have not thought about this at all because I feel like I'm not ready to think about firing the coach when we're not even to training camp yet. But I can tell you this though, when a defensive coach gets fired, who loves to run the ball, the next thing that's happening is they're hiring an offensive coach who loves to pass the ball. So if that, you know, if things get really ugly early in the season and we actually start having that discussion, that's where you're looking. You're looking at who are the offensive coaches. I mean, would they be the team to hire Eric Biennemi or, like you said, Brian Dable or something like that?

You know, the Vikings can offer a very good situation for whoever is coming here. The quarterback is a little bit unknown in the future, but you get Justin Jefferson, you get Delvin Cook cook you get an offensive line that's been drafted high like those are things that you want if you are a new coach it's just i just can't get into like that brain space of let's think about coaching candidates yet right but i can say there are certainly reasons to think it would be an offensive coach i don don't really buy into exactly that coaches off of certain coaching trees can't win, aren't good. If they worked for this guy, they won't succeed.

The Belichick thing has been very notable because he's Belichick that they failed. But at the same time, like Brian Flores has done a great job and he worked for Belichick and Mike Vrabel has done a great job and he played for Belichick. And I don't know, I think it's really a person to person type of thing that Matt Patricia was just horrible his job and it didn't work out. But, you know, Doug Peterson just got fired, but won a Super Bowl with Philadelphia. He comes from Andyy reed there have been other coaches that haven't worked out who came from andy reed and i guess depending on who you ask brad childress would fall into that category uh derrick that is true that the vikings

could get a camp cut wide receiver from another team and i guess i would say they have been doing that and they have been trying that. That was Josh Doxson. That was Aldrick Robinson. It's really not a great model to try to bring in somebody last minute and throw them in and hope that they're going to contribute for you. If they're going to sign somebody, it should be pretty soon, I would think, that they would want to get them in before training camp so they could at least start camp.

And even now they're starting from behind if that's the case. It's just they always seem to sign somebody, whether it's a guy a little bit farther down the list like a Jordan Taylor or if it's someone that, you know, has had a history like Kendall Wright. But they have not done that this year and and almost to every other thing that they've done they sort of have followed this is how we do things like right i mean loading up the defense they've even drafted a lot of offensive linemen lately like they've sort of gone by the book vikings philosophy on a lot of things i think this offseason uh and not addressing wide receiver three is one of them but usually they at least get somebody to compete hey everyone summer is here

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Original Minnesota sports inspired goods. Code Purple Insider for free shipping. Larry Fitzgerald. I'll tell you this, Charlie. I wouldn't mind it if you look at the other receivers who are out there i don't think larry fitzgerald has a whole lot left in the tank i think he averaged less than eight yards of reception last year but he will catch everything you throw at him and when you look at the rest of the list you've got two guys who would be really great almost anywhere, Danny Amendola and Golden Tate.

Golden Tate has said he's interested in the Rams and the Titans, a couple teams, but he didn't name the Vikings. So if you're not going to get Golden Tate and you're not going to get Danny Amendola, and if by any chance Larry Fitzgerald said he wanted to finish his career in Minneapolis, I can't see it, but if by any chance that actually happened, then I would say, great, that that's a really cool storyline and he's better than all of the other people, even in his very, very old age, all the other people who are going to try for that job.

And can Larry Fitzgerald hold it down for a couple games if Adam Thielen got hurt? Like, probably, based on the way he played last year. I also wonder too, about just cliff Kingsbury in that offense. They, they seem to really lack some creativity there where they were running Deandre Hopkins on the same side over and over and lining up in the same

spot. I can't imagine that the Vikings are going to do that with Clint Kubiak. And I know that the Vikings aren't the most creative offense necessarily, but they're like with Gary Kubiak, it's like a very effective offense for getting receivers open. And it has been for Gary Kubiak's entire career. So if Larry Fitzgerald is running crossing routes and things like that, yeah, he can get open. He can catch the football.

He can make some plays still. I think he did enough of that last year. It's different than running out of the shotgun all the time and sort of asking him to get himself open and get himself separation, which I think Cliff Kingsbury and his offense asked guys to do. So that's a long way of answering. Sure. Why not? If that was the case, I don't think that's guys to do. So that's a long way of answering, sure, why not, if that was the case.

I don't think that's going to happen. I think Larry is going to just announce his retirement at some point here soon. But we'll see on that. So, all right, other questions about camp storylines and where we should kind of be taking our focus as we write these training camp previews because offensive line and wide receiver are at the very top of my list for sure you guys have nailed it for what i'm looking at uh nicholas do i think that mond will be qb2 by preseason game

one that's a great question i i want to say that i do not think by preseason game number one that he will be, but I think by preseason game number three, he will be. This is just a Vikings thing, and I don't blame them for this, but it's a Mike Zimmer thing. They really seem to make the rookies earn it as much as they possibly can. I mean, we've seen this from them bringing along numerous rookies slowly. Even last year, think about like Holton Hill starting at corner and Cam Dantzler and Jeff Gladney being the backups. Or I guess Dantzler did play in week one and Jeff Gladney was the backup. But in a lot of cases, they have not trusted rookies to do anything. And so are they going to trust

Kellen Mond to be their backup quarterback? I think there will be enough of a difference in talent from Kellen Mond to Jake Browning that once Mond understands the playbook, the details, I would imagine that Kellen Mond is working extremely hard during this break, or at least he should be. And according to his reputation, he probably will be. That Kellen Mond will be ready with the offense by the second or third preseason game. And maybe he'll start the third preseason game and end up being the backup. That would be my prediction. But I will tell you that Jake Browning, and I'm not saying that Jake Browning has any potential as a starter

or as a star or anything else. But when we watch Jake Browning at practice, he knows what he's doing. He throws the ball to the right place. It doesn't have a lot of juice on it, but he seems to be able to command an offense out there in practice, at least to the extent that the coaches would trust him to know where he's supposed to be, how to line up everybody, all that sort of stuff. And if Kellen Mond can't do that and can't catch up, then Browning is going to be the backup but I would guess that by regular season game number one Kellen Mond is the backup but maybe

not preseason game number one uh Justin you just typed the word kicker and I love it because everybody knows exactly what you mean kicker is a major concern with the fact that they only have greg joseph and riley patterson like two guys that basically no one's heard of and you know sometimes those guys are great you bring them into competition they surprise you and then they're good kickers going forward but it is a little puzzling i think that they haven't brought in someone with a little bit more of a track record than Greg Joseph or Riley Patterson. Riley Patterson coming out of college, so he has no track record at all. And he, again, could be great and could win the job. But I feel like I'm going to stick to this prediction until I'm wrong. I guess I think that

they're going to wait until somebody gets cut because unlike wide receiver that was brought up a little earlier, um, you know, you can bring in a kicker whenever you can just bring him in on the last day of practice before the game. And then he can play and be fine. Kicking for this team is the same as kicking for any other team. unlike all the other positions i think they'll wait to see who gets cut after training camp pre-season and then they'll pick up somebody who's proven um then then we'll see uh is woods a shoe in at the other safety spot or could someone beat him out woods is set for the other safety spot something would have to go full catastrophe mode for Xavier Woods to not play there. And the things that they've said about him,

which of course is only minicamp, but we become read between the lines experts at times. The things that they've said about him, it seems they like how he's picking up on things. And even though he's not as big as someone like Anthony Harris or Anderson Dayhoe, that he has a good grasp of how Mike Zimmer wants to play. At least that's what's been said. But yeah, I mean, he's a veteran player. They signed him to come in and start. The only guy who could threaten him, but not is Cameron Bynum who I really

liked as a draft pick coming out I mean I think that's maybe one of their low-key best picks is Cameron Bynum that they have not picked somebody to play safety anywhere even fairly high in recent years but Mike Zimmer called him brilliant at one point, which I thought was an interesting comment and something to watch. But I would be very surprised if there's any real competition there unless Xavier Woods falls on his face.

Do we know if he found any good seafood in Minnesota yet? Yeah, you know, I think that what Kellen Mond maybe doesn't get about that is there's a difference between like seafood and lake food. So you have like your and I've had to discover this as well. So you have like your walleye kind of thing. And I have to tell you guys the truth. I just I just can't get into the taste of walleye.

I think you might have to grow up with it or something because I had never had it before. And I had it here and I was like, this actually tastes like being in a lake. So I'm not a huge fan of it myself. I think he's going to find out that seafood is in Maryland and New Orleans. Lake food is here and it's, I think, an acquired taste. Are Jason Hansen and what was it? Jason, Jason Elam. So Jason's able to kick. It is a remarkable that some franchises like franchise quarterbacks have

franchise kickers, Adam Benetary, Jason Elam, Jason Hanson, guys like that who kicked for the longest time. And here's the Vikings still having another kicking competition. I don't know if there was an argument to bring back Dan Bailey or not. I mean, when they cut him, they wanted him to take a pay cut.

But it's sort of funny how things have worked out with their salary cap, where there were things that they did earlier this offseason that looking at it sort of in the light of day, you could say maybe you didn't necessarily need to do that. Some of the things that they did with the cap because they've ended up with a big amount of cap space. Steven Gostkowski still out there. Yeah, there's guys like that. Zane Gonzalez, I think, might still be out there. There are guys who are proven kickers that I think that they should be looking into. Hey, everyone. I want to tell you about our friends at Scout Logistics. And I really do

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check out scoutlogistics.com or call 855-217-2688 extension 232 to connect with them directly to find out how Scout Logistics can minimize risk and overperform and go the extra mile for your company. The camp battle that I'm looking forward to and I think will be potentially very good in the secondary is like Brashad Breeland and Cameron Dantzler I think is a legitimate battle for who starts across from Patrick Peterson.

I think Mackenzie Alexander is probably locked in at cornerback. Nick, do we still think that they bring in another rush end? I do think that, but I mean, as we sit here and get closer and closer to camp and now the NFL, a lot of most teams are just off. So people are going to their cabins, and they're going on vacation, they're going to Cabo, whatever it is that they do, and taking vacation in these weeks between minicamp and training camp.

But there are still signings and things that are happening, and I wonder as we get really close and everybody sort of comes back to their facilities that we do see or we do hear rumblings of them trying to sign someone as another defensive end but when you look at the room right now and how deep it is you wonder who that would be or if they'd just be willing to cut ties with some guys that have been around and been developing if they were bringing in someone else. I would also say if they bring in someone else, that that means Steven Weatherly becomes on the cutting block.

They didn't pay Steven Weatherly a whole lot. He had zero sacks in nine games last year. He's not someone that I think is a starting defensive end. And so you've got him and DJ Wanham. DJ Wanham looked noticeably larger in minicamp. That doesn't mean he's noticeably better. And we'll find that out in training camp. He's a fourth round pick.

And there are a lot of their recent draft picks not named to Neil Hunter have not worked out. And Nick nick competition does sometimes breed success uh if the guys competing are good and what we saw last year is competition with a bunch of bad players is still bad um so uh yeah no i don't i don't think dj want him is going to be moving anywhere i think he's just going to compete for that job and potentially win the starting job out of camp and then they'll decide if they need steven weatherly or not but i think that they would be better off trying to bring in another rotational pass rusher and spending a few

million bucks and that's what's interesting about their salary cap situation is like when they have money they spend it and they have money um they kind of have a lot of money that they could spend and some of it will be used for brian o'neill but i don't know about all of it uh and they're going to keep some over but you know i i don't i don't know if they want uh scott sheldon richardson to play edge rusher very much yeah situationally every once in a while cleveland did use him that way but mike zimmer he just doesn't do stuff like that too often i mean you know one game he decided in the playoffs on a few plays to move everson griffin inside and it was successful against new orleans but we never saw it before or after so it's kind of like just one time usually with the defensive line on third down we

see stuff like that with the guys who line up over the guard like like b rob did uh or weatherly and adenabo did in 2019 but aside from that it's kind of this is the position you play and that's what you're going to do so i would i would not count Sheldon as part of the defensive end group at all. And I would think that, you know, if you get one more guy who's a veteran who can get after the passer, then your defensive line looks really good in all situations. Right now it looks okay. I would say pretty, pretty strong. I mean, I liked Delvin Tomlinson quite a bit as a player, but there's kind of one proven guy away from maybe having one of the better defensive lines in the league. And with enough cap space to bring in someone else, it just seems like too

obvious to do it, to try and get, I don't know if it's Melvin Ingram, but we're getting to the point where if Melvin Ingram wants to play instead of retiring or something that, you know, you could probably outbid other people for Melvin Ingram because he's just not going to get a ton of money at this point in the game. And we saw that last year, last year, the week or so before training camp or first week of training camp, there were more good deals struck than I ever remember. I mean, Logan Ryan was the one that stuck out to me the most, but a bunch of guys signed right before the season. And we could end up seeing that again.

That could be a trend that goes on for a while. So final questions before I sign off and go watch the links. Final questions. And I'll probably do another one of these maybe tomorrow, Sunday. Check in with you guys. Justin Houston, I like Justin Houston. I think he'd be a great situational rusher for them. I mean, that would be exactly the type of thing where you bring in a guy

for one job and he does that one job, and that would be Justin Houston. I think that's a good suggestion. Either one of those guys would be just in Houston I think that's a good suggestion either one of those guys Ingram Houston uh the Everson Griffin question gets brought up quite a bit I did a short podcast on that the other day there's a lot of factors there in whether you would bring Everson Griffin back but I think it's going to be somebody I don't think they're just going to go into camp with this roster so So, okay, guys. Well, great chat. Really enjoyed this one. And like I said, we'll do it again soon. And, yeah, this is fun.

We're getting there, guys. Only a few weeks away. I can't wait to start writing these camp previews and getting jacked up for the sort of there's like the first day of camp, the first preseason game, and then opening day are kind of like these countdown moments. Exactly right. So we'll be back again very soon for another chat. Always appreciate you guys joining, and we'll talk to you later. Thanks, fellas.