Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - How can Kevin O'Connell boost the Vikings' offense?

Episode Date: February 10, 2022

Matthew Coller and Jeremiah Sirles open the show with Jeremiah talking about Kevin O'Connell being hired rather than Jim Harbaugh. Then they discuss what O'Connell what can do for the Vikings' offense to improve from the Zimmer era. Plus what Super Bowl was Jeremiah's all-time favorite? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Folks, before we get into the show, I wanted to tell you that you can save 15% at SodaStick.com by using the promo code PURPLEINSIDER at checkout. That's S-O-T-A-S-T-I-C-K.com for your Minnesota sports-inspired hats, hoodies, shirts. Use the promo code PURPLEINSIDER at SodaStick.com. Welcome to another episode of Purple Insider. Matthew Collar here and for Tuesday morning left guard on, let's see, Wednesday afternoon, Jeremiah Searles. Jeremiah, you have to start out. Now, yesterday on the show, I opened the show with a statement about my hairline because it had been insulted on the internet, and you and I are looking at each other.

There's some space there, but I'm not going to get into it again. It's not that bad, okay? That's the whole thing. But you also have a retraction slash apology to begin the show with. So I guess we're really owning up. You know what? Accountability is big. Yeah.

And that's what we're doing here. So please go ahead to start the show. Yeah. So I have to sincerely apologize to all our loyal listeners out there on Tuesday morning, whatever day left guard at purple insider of my excitement for Jim Harbaugh. I think that I put the cart before the horse. I think I drank the Kool-Aid a little bit too much of the Harbaugh train and it all collapsed into a million pieces. And we went with white bread, Kevin O'Connell, which I'm totally fine with. But I still, as a content creator, would have loved the Jim Harbaugh angle. But as a football guy, O'Connell was probably the right choice.

So I apologize for my mock press conference and don't cancel me. So last week, right before Kevin O'Connell was named the coach and it was uh reported that jim harbaugh wasn't getting it i mean just several hours before we did the entire show on what it's going to be like when jim harbaugh coaches the vikings including as you mentioned a mock press conference which you nailed i mean you did a tremendous job and yet like four hours later it was all blown to smithereens and meant nothing which is so par for the course for us i mean i that couldn't be more par for the course for the way that we do podcasts we'll do a podcast on about what the offensive line looks like and

then they'll like trade for one two like literally minutes after it's posted so you know what we do the people's work of trying to get decisions made quickly so we just throw pods out there so this is what happens though when you talk about football all the time is sometimes you just get it hilariously wrong i mean for example when you announced that the vikings had a good offensive line in week two good to average i believe is how i described that we can go back and check the tape but i think i said good to average. We put out a clip of it. I put out a video. I was like, Jeremiah announces that he thinks the Vikings have a good offensive line.

It might've been like week four. It was, they were playing early start. Yeah, it got worse. Well, I mean, for me,

the Rams are in the super bowl and I never thought it would work. So, you know, that, that happens all the time. And there's lots of other wrong things. Like here, here's another thing that I've just been driving everyone crazy with on the internet is when people and our friend Brad Spielberger does, he comes on the show.

Brad is incredibly smart and he's the best, but he tweeted out, oh, this year's quarterback draft. It's going to be just like 2013. And here comes me flying out of nowhere. No, do not. You say that that is not allowed. That is not allowed. And here's, and here's what I said. The league thought that Blake Bortles was a better quarterback prospect than Teddy Bridgewater, Derek Carr, and Jimmy Garoppolo, not by a little, but by a mile, no one has any idea what they're doing.

It's always kind of a fun thing to track what's happening and what's going to happen next. So what were we supposed to do? It looked like Jim Harbaugh was coming here. John Bacon said that he was. Old cousin of old Kevin Bacon there just dancing his way to Jim Harbaugh. Yes, we were wrong, but I have to agree with our guy I don't I don't love the quarterbacks in this draft I watched a lot of them being at the senior bowls that I went to I was at the PA game I was at the shrine bowl I watched all the senior bowl practices like

Malik Willis probably in my opinion is the most starter ready I think with what I saw at the senior bowl like he proved it but but you know, Kenny Pickett, baby hand, Kevvy, Kenny Pickett, apparently, because that's a huge deal. So dumb. But I mean, he's probably number two, but I think that after you get on, like from those two guys, I don't, I don't really know how much trust I have in this class. I think that there's both truth in that none of these prospects make you feel super secure about it. None of them have historic statistics in college or are like Trevor Lawrence level or Andrew Luck level where you feel like, gosh, the guy checks every single box. But then I think about all the

prospects who have been drafted that didn't check every single box that may have been on similar levels like how is malik willis much different than trey lance for example and i don't know if trey lance is going to be good but would you take trey lance right now if you're the vikings yeah because he's super fast and throws it super hard and i don't know like i i had a former director of player personnel on the show and he was talking about how he scouted quarterbacks he's like well i look if they throw it real hard and if they're fast and uh if they're pretty smart like that's kind of all you can really do right i mean there's there's not there's no secret to figuring out which one of these guys is going to work but if we're looking at these

prospects in comparison to other shortcomings Carson Wentz had shortcomings his he was in the MVP race one time like there's nobody that you're going to analyze in this draft where you're like oh they're perfect so it's a guarantee but even guys who have been guarantees in the past have not turned out to be what people thought they were going to be I mean Jamarcus Russell right I mean, the guy, we all anointed him the next Dante Culpepper before he even stepped foot in the NFL, sitting on a knee, launching at 55 yards through the uprights, right? I mean, you're right.

There is no exact science to the draft, which is what makes good GMs and good owners and good head coaches elite when they draft well. But I think that if you're a first-time gm or a first-time head coach and you basically are intertwining your fate with the first round quarterback which i know you've said do it because if it doesn't work i just do it again but there is a little bit where you you kind of twist your fate with them and you kind of go into this thing together that's where i look at this and go man is there someone that you're willing to give the keys to the car to as a 22, 23-year-old kid of the franchise?

And, man, that's going to be a tough sell for anyone where I think that what we laid out even last week where it was like, hey, maybe don't draft a guy super high, but kind of get the Gardner Minshew plug in and then maybe double down again for next year is an option. I just think that when you draft a quarterback in the first round, like you just kind of, that's your identity of who you are as a decision maker kind of for the rest of your time in the NFL. No, that's true. Yeah. Right. And especially if the guy that you didn't pick turns out to be great, right.

Mitch Trubisky and Deshaun Watson and Patrick Mahomes. Like if you make that mistake that carries with you even though I would defend it anyway 100 because who was who knew like there were reasons to think that Watson and Mahomes would not be great they turned out to be great but I would defend any core any GM and coach who said we're going to draft a guy high and see what we've got here and and Chicago might end up being a good example is they draft Trubisky. It's a total bus fire. It basically rips the franchise down and gets everyone fired. Well, that's not great, but they drafted another guy.

And if he turns out to be good, you'll never remember or care that it happened. And there's a thing for me that's about perceived risk versus real risk. Like your perceived risk is, oh, if we draft Malik Willis and he stinks, then like we waste a couple of years of our franchise. But is it less risky than to put all of your money into a quarterback who's proven over a long period of time that with his contract and his skills, he can't get you like which one is more risky, right? Like both of them are risky. Both of them could get you fired. One guy just got two people fired.

Like the only no risk type of thing is if you are the Kansas city chiefs with Patrick Mahomes, like if you already have the guy and he's your elite starting quarterback for the next decade, then you have no risk at that position. There are 25 teams plus at any given time who are all risking their futures on a quarterback. And if you get stuck in the middle, you get fired. Or if you draft the wrong guy and are bad, you get fired. Either way, fired.

Yeah, I think, I mean, shoot, half of that 25 groups that you said probably have no choice but to just ride it out with the guy that they have because of the cap hit right and you've seen it over and over again everyone's trying to copy the formula i think i saw you tweet about today like rookies on rookie contracts is how you win super bowls because you build other superstars around them so everyone's trying to get to that point and get to that formula but i feel like it kind of goes in waves of years of how good and talented the draft class of how much guys are willing to offload to then go and draft that first rounder. I mean, you talk about the Vikings. I don't know if they're in that position. I mean, a lot will depend on obviously the Kirk Cousins situation of what position are we actually in to draft?

Are we going first round quarterback or are we trying to build around Cousins? Like that's going to be the question between now and the last weekend in april up there in vikingville right so uh i was making the point about derrick carr where someone was saying like oh if you draft derrick carr if you're the team that drafted a prospect who turns out to be derrick carr then you failed because he's only the 12th best quarterback in the league well that i mean that's not true at all like derrick carr's team won 12 games and if he doesn't get hurt they might go to the super bowl that year no he has not turned out to be one of the truly best quarterbacks in the league in part because they signed him to a contract extension and were run by manatees I mean just like completely clueless people doing insane things that's a South Park joke but uh yeah but uh like it and here's the thing i'm looking at

derrick carr's uh draft profile he's like a second round draft pick type of prospect there's all sorts of criticism he look at this first thing lacks ideal height and has guess what baby that's the first criticism his uh could stand to improve as a deep passer tries to do too much and forces throws this is from nfl.com occasionally throws off balance unnecessary and sales some throws there's all sorts of criticism for quarterbacks who have turned out to be good enough that on a rookie contract could take you to the super bowl so i don't want to say this every day over and over again until i fall down and die but like i will go through every one of the nfl.com ranked billy price higher higher as a prospect the bust center draft pick than josh allen

i rest my case nobody has any idea what they're talking about. That's it. Yeah, no, I completely agree. Just like the combine list came out today. Right. And, and you look on it and you're like, Hmm,

that guy, Hmm, that guy didn't get invited, but it's like, you know, it's just, it's such a, the,

I think the NFL does it strictly, strictly for the reason like they're involved with fans. Right. Like I literally think that these profiles get written up by these big galaxy brain draft analytic guys but nobody knows what conversations are had in those war rooms nobody which is why that like todd mcshay and those guys are 90 wrong and then they hit like two or three at the right like i told you i knew it but it's like no you didn't because every team is looking completely different than what you think they're looking for, like his needs list on the draft thing.

This team needs this. It's like, well, maybe they don't need that. You don't know. So you're exactly right. There is no exact science to the draft. And I think that because the NFL has involved the fans so much in the draft that the fans almost kind of put pressure on the organizations a lot more than they should.

I mean, not that the GMs, but like owners probably feel that pressure a little bit more from the fans than they have in the past, because how involved they all are throughout the entire process. And I think that the thirst for draft information, which is different than than the other thing. I think that there are some tremendous draft analysts and reporters who provide a lot of information and it's super interesting to study and talk about and debate. That's different from if you're a team making a decision, thinking that you can predict which quarterback is going to be good and which isn't. This was the Mac Jones point last year. It was a lot of people after I said, maybe the Vikings should have just taken Mac Jones said taken mac jones said no no i don't want him he's not the right kind of quarterback that i want and they're like well we don't really know though so if he's drafted in the first round he could be

good and then he was immediately good and then other guys weren't i'm looking at this i i could just do this for days and i swear i have something else to talk about. Sam Darnold was the top quarterback prospect from NFL.com in 2018. Here's what I wanted to ask you, though. So I was looking into this in some of the numbers last night about Kevin O'Connell and what he could do for a quarterback. Because I think that either way, there are improvements to be made on what Mike Zimmer and Kubiaks were doing to now. So here's my question for you. If all of a sudden Kevin O'Connell called you up tomorrow and said, hey, Searles, I know I'm prepping for the Super Bowl, but real quick, can you be my OC?

I know that this is a surprise and you've never coached before, but if a McCown can do it, then you can. You're in. Tell me what you would do if you were designing your own offense. I'm just going to leave that as a broad question for you. Yeah. I mean, so the offense that I would install, so to put it, is a kind of a hybrid of what Dallas does with a little bit of what Tennessee does, right? I think that there's always a need for a lineup in 21 personnel, 22 personnel, and have that mentality of running downhill. But based off of what the offense have become in the NFL and how throwing the

ball is basically a necessity at this point, I really liked the, some of the Dallas schemes of their RPOs and their outside inside zone out of their sub packages. So I'm building a team that relies a lot on 11 personnel. So I need to find me an absolute monster at tight end. Right. I need Irv is not necessarily my as Jeremiah Searles OC, my ideal tight end. I want a guy that can line up much like Schultz is for Dallas, right? He can

line up in line. He can block. He can be in the wing. He can come back and block. You can send him out on a deep cross or deep post, and he can run by safeties. That's more my ideal tight end. I build a lot out of 11 personnel, and then I also go a lot out of 12 personnel. Those are the two personnels that I'm absolutely living in all day long because 12 personnel puts the most pressure on any defense. If you have two really good tight ends based off the fact that you make them run base or do you make them run sub? And then you basically just choose between if that defense runs base, we're throwing the football. Check to it. Hey, that defense isn't sub. We're checking to run in the football. You make them wrong and you can do that with the ability of those two tight ends.

And then also at the quarterback position, my first question would be, well, who's the quarterback? Is it Kirk Cousins or are we going in a different direction? Because you can't run Dallas' offense with Kirk Cousins. You just can't. That's just not how it's built. I mean, Dallas, Buffalo, Kansas City have the ability to create and escape because if you run a true RPO and it's covered,

you need to be able to escape it a little bit and create, which is what makes Mahomes and those guys magic because half the time it's just backyard football, and that's just so hard for defenses to cover. And so I'm taking a hybrid of that, but also I still will always, because of the offensive line, we have the mentality of you need a downhill running game. C.J. Hamm is absolutely on my team he's on my roster having a fullback is important because you can

see it it's a trend going up in my opinion of in the nfl for successful running teams so you know it's that combination kind of that spread pro style that you're starting to see more and more teams go to cincinnati runs it a lot um and that would that would be how I built this offense to be able to throw it to really run it in 11 personnel. But then when you line up in 21 or 22, you know, we're coming right downhill and then you take the deep play action shots. So those numbers refer to the number of running backs and tight ends. Yes. Personnel grouping. First on all the football. Sorry. Sorry. Football. I got into it. 11 is when you have three wide

receivers one running back one tight end and uh 12 is when you have two tight ends and uh 21 would be two running backs or whatever running back in a fullback just to clarify that two backs well so you know one thing that i think that john d filippo struggled with in 2018 was figuring out what the identity was supposed to be like he wanted to run 11 personnel wanted to throw first and then run second and i think that we see success in all of these different ways if it's done with a few different elements i mean one is usually it does take a good offensive line i will i will acknowledge this after watching vikings football for the last uh how many years where there has never been a good offensive line that I've

covered. But you know, I think that having extra receivers is something that all of these teams do that Cincinnati looked at their situation. They said, you know, Burroughs about to take that big next step. Let's sign Riley reef who got hurt and isn't playing in this game,

but let's sign a guy who's a veteran and get us a receiver who could play right away pen might be great like two three years from now uh really truly great based on his skills but they kind of needed somebody to step right in and they said oh yeah we have boyd and higgins not enough not enough and i think that's part of it too is if you're switching to using more 11 personnel which i think they will under kevin o'connell like that is super important to me is to draft another receiver to sign another receiver that's not dd westbrook or kendall right or something that they kind of you know melding what you're saying with the with the personnel um so there's this balance that i think is tough between though having your your personalityding what you're saying with the, with the personnel. So there's this balance that I think is tough between though,

having your, your personality of what you want to be. And then like trying to do too much. Because I think that what the Vikings became recently was way too much. We know exactly what our personality is run and then boot action. It's like, okay, well the other team knows too. And you started to see on tape, like, Oh, these linebackers are running to exactly where your crossers are going is because they've seen that a hundred times.

And I think that's a really tough balance for an offensive mind. Yeah, I completely agree. You, I think the one thing that I would really like to see from them and I'm taking my OC hat off, put it back on Kevin. I want to see them when they find an identity to stick to it right don't don't waver in how the well this week to that week because I felt like that happened a lot and maybe not this year more last year I think more 2020 I felt like week to week was more like what am I watching like is this a downhill running football team are you going to throw it 50 times like it

just kind of was all over the map where if you're going to install a new offense stick with it through the thick and the thin stick with it through the the ups and the downs and you might not have all the pieces to put it out there right away but if you just continue to work at it the more the pieces will come and so i think that if these guys want to install that 11 personnel i think the emergence of kj osborne last year was huge and maybe them not having to feel like they need to reach for a first round receiver right like they think they have a guy that maybe that second round third round receiver area where you could grab a guy that's going to develop maybe one year to be great right like he just needs kind of that one year I think of a guy like AJ Brown right he came

in as a rookie was okay but then he was a freaking monster after that and so that's where you could look there but just stay with it just stay the course of whatever you're going to be whatever you plant your dna in this offense is just stay with it and the pieces build around it over time it's obviously not going to look polished right away but you just kind of got to wear it and just go with it and then eventually it all kind of starts to come together year two year three year four how hard is it as a player really to learn a new offensive system it really all depends on how much of a change it is now the biggest thing for offensive linemen in particular is if you were i'm not 100 what the vikings were if they were word based or number

based so what i mean by that is when i was there for uh, it was key right, key left, gone right, gone left, act two, act five. All our protections were words. Then I get to Buffalo, and everything's now numbers, 64, 65, 72, 78. And so that can be a little bit of time-consuming. As far as the actual schemes, there's not a ton that changes from team to team inside zone is inside zone power is power like yeah you'll have different motions in different ways that hey we're gonna window dress this we might start in two by two but we're gonna end in three by one and just you have to be

able to process all that really quickly but you as a professional and especially with some of the guys that are a little bit older on this team and even the guys that are younger, it's the middle of the road guys that it's hard on. Yours is three through five, I think. But if you're like a year two guy and you really only had one year in the old system, that's not really ingrained in you yet. This is going to be your true first full offseason. I'm thinking a guy like Derrissaw, right?

It's his first true offseason to have all of OTAs and all of training camp to get ingrained in it versus a guy like Brian O'Neill that was in that system basically his entire time he kind of has to wipe the system completely clean and not carry anything over which is really hard to do and but versus a vet that's been on eight different teams he's like oh just another playbook like time to learn so it's not extremely difficult but it really I think the defensive side might be a little bit harder because, man, they've been 4-3 over cover two for freaking ever. And now that might be completely different.

Well, the good thing is they don't have any of the players that were there. I mean, they're clearing out the entire defense. And I wanted to get to that because there's a report that the Vikings are most interested in hiring Ed Donatell, who comes from the Vic Fangio shrubbery. So Fangio's defense is just very different from Mike Zimmer's, but I do think there's some similar concepts like Fangio wanting to play two deep safeties. What you see with the Rams when they were with Brandon Staley is they were basically using like one linebacker. A lot of times they were playing a lot of dime, which is sort of the modern way to do this.

Even the way the teams are approaching playing against Kansas city is we're going to drop everybody back. We're going to rush three a lot of times, and then we're going to make you play Tom Brady ball where you just dump it underneath. And I think in the second half of that Bengals game, Mahomes got a little antsy, not wanting to necessarily do that, and that cost them.

But I think that modern defenses are really starting to do that, where they're taking more linebackers off the field. There's also no such thing as 3-4 anymore. People are saying, like, oh, are they switching to 3-4? Like, well, I mean, sort of. It's under. It's just under. No one has four linebackers also. That does not exist. explain the Fangio thing yeah so the Fangio thing for me so he runs an under defense

which is different than what Mike Zimmer Mike Zimmer runs an over defense okay real quickly that's based off how the front is set so let's say that the tight end is to the right of the offensive side right so the strength is to our right that would say that the tight end is to the right of the offensive side, right? So the strength is to our right. That would mean that the defensive tackle to the right of the center is going to be a three technique, which is an outside shoulder of the guard. And then there's gonna be either a six or a nine technique, which is the outside shoulder or head up on the tight end. So then you have a nose to the left, which is right on the center. And then you have a five technique outside the left tackle, right? So it kind kind of it's still that four down look under essentially just kind of

flips the whole thing now the three technique goes weak so now there'd be a three technique to the left of the center you'd have the nose to the right of the center the strength then a five technique and then the sam linebacker actually walks up on the ball this can very very simply you just move everyone over a gap and it's three four right but this is the theme that they go to it's under because then you still have three linebackers and four d linemen now what they'll do a lot of times is that dn might be a von miller or uh leonard floyd that stands up so it kind of looks like a three four because it's a stand-up linebacker but it's really just a brush defensive end and so that's the defense he likes to run you saw the success he had with it with Bradley Chubb and Vaughn Miller and really this

defense is predicated off your edge rushers though I mean and under defense you have to have a really really good nose guard and you have to have two really good edge rushers and then after that you kind of build through but like you said we have three linebackers that we played a lot. I mean, we may turn to a one linebacker dime, two linebackers at most type. I mean, I think I counted it when the Rams were playing. Reeder, whatever's Reed, I think Reed's the linebacker number 51, played every snap. And I didn't see another linebacker the entire time,

the entire rest of the game. Now, that helps when you have an all-world defensive line in front of you but at the same time like that is the norm of because of like i just said when i was installing my offense people want to run 11 personnel and you mismatch when you have two linebackers on running backs going out in routes when you're in 11 personnel with two linebackers and like you said if you want to play too deep sweet we'll just dink it dunk down to clyde edwards a layer or jerick mckinnon or whoever it is that's just going to go run faster than these linebackers because he's a running back this is actually why I think San Francisco kind of owned Los Angeles until the fourth quarter of that game and really in recent years is because they play with a fullback they have a tight end who could do all

these different things and that's tough when you don't have linebackers and the Vikings I don't know what they're going to do with Tyler Conklin. I would guess he leaves in free agency, but if they wanted to still have two good tight ends, I thought that there were some mismatches at times with teams who wanted to play defense this way. When they had Kyle Rudolph and Irv Smith having a versatility to say, no,

we're actually going to go with our big people and you try to stop it with your one linebacker. This worked against the Packers sometimes because they were doing a similar type of thing when Mike Patton was their defensive coordinator. Remember though, the great outside linebackers from three, fours back in the day, like Kevin Green, Lamar Lathan. Those guys were great. Derek Thomas, the all-timer. Well, I mean, the thing, the thing with the three, four is it was built to stop the run like everyone thinks it's like well you only have three down linemen it's like yeah but you have every gap covered you have five guys on the line of scrimmage like the three four was designed to stop the wishbone and eye formation because you're fanning old

linemen out you got no double teams really at all like and so that's why you're starting to see the disappearance of the three four because you're seeing the disappearance of like you said the fullbacks and the 13 personnel and 22 like that's all kind of becoming more of a change up versus when it used to be the norm which is now you're looking for the edge rushers to be able to pressure the quarterback and can you get there in half a second instead of one because of the rpl action and it all relies to on whether you have good corners and safeties. I mean, because you're playing them a lot, you're playing multiples of them. So you, you need depth at that position, but also, I mean, when Fangio's defense was

incredible with Chicago, I mean, they had a really good secondary and that's a major part. As we talk about rebuilding this team where the Vikings have a huge decision at quarterback. They've got some huge decisions with other veterans, Daniel Hunter, and if they want to do anything with anybody else. This, to me, says Eric Hendricks absolutely has to be a part of this. Not that I ever thought he was going to be moved anywhere, but absolutely. If he's going to be the one linebacker on the field then that's the type of guy you want but aside from that i mean if you can't shut anybody down like there's a reason that denver was drafting patrick sertain right with their

first pick if you can't shut people down with jaylen ramsey i mean you're just not going to be as good and that was the same thing with the Chargers when Brandon Staley went over there. Like they don't have that guy. So they weren't as good as the Rams were before, even though they do have a good defensive line. But it's interesting. It'll be a change. I mean, as we're looking for things that will just be different with Kevin O'Connell, it'll be quite the defensive system change from what we've seen in years past. So I want to ask you about this big game that is

happening, the Super Bowl. But let me ask you the first question before we get into this game. What is your favorite Super Bowl ever? Oh, my favorite Super Bowl ever. That's a tough one. You know know I honestly think it was when Elway won his second one because my dad I'm from Colorado dad was a diehard Broncos fan and I can remember us being at a Super Bowl party and dad running outside and like this cul-de-sac that we were at just like screaming at the sky how happy he was and going to the parade i got to go to the parade and sit on dad's shoulders and watch shannon sharp and john elway and ed mccaffrey and these guys hosting the lombardi and it's just a vivid memory for me it's not as much the game i honestly i think they

beat the falcons or the rams i don't know which one it was killed right and so like i don't necessarily remember the actual game but like the memory of that Superbowl for me was super, super fun. Yeah. I had some, uh, some tough breaks early on in childhood. Um, but as a kid, I thought that the bills went to the Superbowl every year because they did when I was growing up from age five to nine, they went to every single Superbowl. And so when they didn't go to one, I think in, what was it? Maybe 95 is like, come on.

But they're like going, right? I think they lost to the Jaguars in the playoffs. But like they're still in it, right? They're going. So there was a little bit of a tough break there. Yeah, I think the one that might be my favorite was when the Giants beat the Patriots when they were 17 and 0. Just because every Super Bowl, I want to get a helmet catch.

It was. Yes. I want the underdog to win all the time. But at that time, I really wanted it to happen because and this is like deep in the woods. But there were several times through the 17 or 16 and 0 season from the Patriots where they probably should have lost, but it felt like they got a call. And I know this is more of like your teenager type of opinion, but it felt like they got a call or something where the league wanted them to

be undefeated. And so here comes the giants. They're just not a really particularly great team in the regular season. Everyone's talking about how great Brady is and all, you know, he threw 50 touchdowns to Randy Moss that year. And so it just was like one of these great, totally unexpected, amazing football game with all time great plays that came down to the very end with an underdog walking off with the Super Bowl victory.

I mean, games that are front to back, just super tense the whole way through and then end with somebody coming up with a crazy play, I think those are the best ones. I agree. And the problem is usually those are all more conference championship games than the Super Bowl, in my opinion.

My dad always says his favorite weekend of football year is Championship Sunday, and then the Super Bowl can either be fun or the Super Boar, as he likes to call it. Classic dad. Classic dad joke. And I am actually rather concerned that this one might be a Super Boar. I really am.

I hate the bye week. I know we're not doing hate to see it, but I hate the bye week between conference championship and the Super Bowl. Because that playoff magic and that playoff momentum and that run like you talk about for an underdog kind of gets stifled when all of a sudden it's like okay here's 14 days chill out like i just hate it because you usually see the better teams like they're able to regroup and everything versus this like other bangles that are just running hot right just red hot can't miss and then it's kind of like they give them time to cool down i just i i don't like it well but you got to watch the pro bowl i unwatchable unwatchable dude the only thing that got hit in that pro ball was alvin camara hitting someone else oh too soon too soon oh sorry don't go to dray's you know what i saw

someone i saw there's always something on the internet somebody is always saying the stupidest thing ever but like somebody's saying that the nfl should have known if you put these players in vegas that someone was going to get in trouble and it was like as if they can't go to vegas otherwise like this is the first time they've all been to vegas actually nfl players they've never traveled to anywhere where you could party never never once ever. They're just like you. They stay in Nebraska with all their kids and dogs and they have a quiet life.

Never, never go to Vegas. What a, what a take. So the, the issue. Yeah. The issue I have with this one is when you go position by position at

quarterback, the Bengals are better. They're not better by seven worlds. They're better by a little. And when you go everywhere else the rams have the best offensive line they're the best defensive line which usually is a huge deal in a single game they've got the best corner on the field they have the best two receivers on the field i mean jamar chase is really good but odell beckham and cooper cup like at very least they're

even in weapons i mean the bangles have a better running back. Does that do something for you? I mean, it's just, I feel like it's so much stronger roster wise for the Rams and probably coaching wise with McVay going into his second one, not his first time there that I just have a tough time seeing the Bengals winning. I kind of, I mean, I hope it's one of those tight games and it'd be really cool if the Bengals won with Joe Burrow. It's just, it's hard It's just hard to see with this matchup. Yeah, I completely agree. I think that, first of all, the Joe Burrow magic has been really, really magical, but he's one hit away from that team having no shot.

And as much as he's gotten beat up, I mean, sacked nine times against the Titans, and then he was sacked another four times against the chiefs or something like that. And you look at those D lines and you're like, yeah, those are pretty good D lines, but they kind of both don't even come close to what the Rams have at defensive line when you go across the board. And, you know, Riley reef getting hurt was a big deal. You know, he was actually playing pretty well for them and they bring in,

I think prices who's over there at right tackle for them now who's average he's a decent player but you know the thing that i've noticed is a lot of these blitzes isn't necessarily not excuse me a lot of these sacks aren't necessarily guys just getting beat up one-on-ones but they're kind of schematic sacks you know guys are gaming them up guys are blitzing and where the holes are and joe burrow as great as he is he's still a young quarterback. And I can really see the Rams dialing up some really difficult pressures, some exotic looks, some things that confuse this offensive line, confuse Burrow, maybe try and make him think a little more about the blitz pickup and the route concepts.

And I think that's going to be the main storyline in this game is how do they get to Burrow? Because they just rushed forward. Yeah, Aaron Donald's going to win his fair share. gonna see leonard floyd win a fair share like you're gonna see it but i really think the difference will be when they come after him and get home right and there's only like so much of that you can take i mean against tennessee they get sacked nine times they didn't score a whole lot in that game and tennessee just played worse and ryan tannahill threw a of interceptions and there's been kind of, what did Mike Zimmer

say once about Case Keenum? A horseshoe around his neck sounded like he wanted to say a horseshoe somewhere else. But that's kind of been Joe Burrow. And that's not to say that he's lucky or that he's not amazing, or you wouldn't take him as one of the five first draft picks of, and if someone said you can have any player in the league, but things have gone his way. I mean, people have tweeted out a couple of interceptions that got dropped one in the Kansas city game. And sometimes when there's the Cinderella team, there's also like, well, that, that eventually wears out. I totally agree with you with the week before, by the way. There was, I think there was a year back in the day, in the 90s, where they didn't do this, where they didn't have the two weeks,

and it's just marvelous. But then, here's the thing. Once it's over, you'll be like, where's my football? But you're just delaying the inevitable. I just, again, it's just about momentum playoffs is so much about momentum and it feels like this just kind of kills everything. Yeah, no, I feel the same way. So do you have a love to see it? Hate to see it. Yeah. My, uh, my love to see it is bye-bye Tom Brady. I love you, Tommy boy.

You've been fun to watch my entire life, but I am so excited about this young quarterback group that's in the AFC right now, specifically, that I do think it's a little bit time of the passing of the torch in that guard of the greatest of all time kind of riding out. And I know it wasn't off into the sunset, but what a hell of a run for his couple years in Tampa. So that's kind of my love to see is him finally actually moving on.

Him getting to announce it himself, first of all, because that was just ridiculous. But that's my love to see it. Yeah, that was an awkward situation because it was reported correctly. And everyone was like, oh, he's retiring. And then he's like, no, my social media team is not figuring out how we're going to announce this yet. That was very uncomfortable. That's an interesting one i mean i i i agree with you with brady that it's like not only him but rogers roethlisberger like it is just the dawning of a new era and think about like how much of our lives

have just been spent with these same quarterbacks dominating the league and now like uh dac prescott i guess in the nfc i mean the afc has some amazing ones uh i would i would say that um love to see it is the uh the vibe around what's going to happen here in the next few weeks for the Vikings. Like love to see all of us like learning together, what this new group is going to be. I have joked around about the hairline thing and people yelling at each other online about Kirk cousins. But I just think when you're hiring a new defensive coordinator with a new system, you're bringing in a new offensive mind.

He's going to hire an offensive coordinator. You have a roster to rebuild on defense. You have a quarterback decision to be made. Like last year, we were talking about them signing a nose tackle, which, look, much respect to nose tackles. But it's like, who are they going to get? Carl Lawson? Like, in comparison, it's just so much more interesting to discuss.

Yeah, and I think that that's what we talked about, right? Sometimes you just need to inject of energy into the entire state, into the entire organization, and with not Harbaugh, sadly, but Kevin coming in, I think that's going to be a really exciting time up in Minnesota. I'm really pumped to follow it as well. What's your hate to see it? Do you have a hate to see it?

My hate to see it just has to be, again, I'm going to go back to it. The fricking pro bowl, man. Like what, what is the point? Why just have the skill challenge,

throw some flags on these dudes, have fat man flag football. I don't care. Anything would be better than that atrocity that you trotted out there on the field the other day. I just, it was, it was so bad.

It was so bad. My hate to see it is that the USFL is launching again, and I just can't see it working. Hey, maybe you'll get some players there. But what I would love to see is football create sort of this WWE type of, now follow me here, type of weekly storyline battle of two teams that go to different places and play and become like an event kind of thing, as opposed to we're going to create a league with a bunch of stadiums with players we can't afford, and then we're going to fold within six months.

Now, the XFL, I thought, had some better ideas, but it was the same deal. Like if you play every week at whatever stadium, people are not showing up for like eight games of, of USFL football. If you had, how about this? If you had Cam Newton and Ben Roethlisberger start two teams and they traveled around and played in a football stadium every week, and then they documented it with like an hbo style documentary i think that'd be amazing there'd be so many great stories to tell people be like oh you know team roethlisberger and cam are coming like the big three has done this with basketball and they've had success with it there's there's other ideas that i think need to be worked on and i kind of hate to see football leagues continuing to launch and then fail, even though I will absolutely follow them.

Yeah, I mean, it sucks for the league. The problem is, and I tell this to people all the time, you watch college football for the passion and the energy per the team, right? You watch the NFL for the freak shows, right? Yeah, you have a lot of people that are excited about what's happening, but you want to see the Odell Beckham catches. You want to see those things. So the in-between those were like no freaks because they're in the NFL and not a lot

of passion and energy because they don't really care. You can't try and copy the NFL, which is why the XFL is great. They put their own twist on things, right? I mean, I think that if you want to be a successful intermediate league, you cannot try and just blueprint the NFL and repeat. You got to have your own twist to it repeat you got to have your own twist to it you got to have your own fun like you said make it fun and engaging for the fans and people will come but the usfl is not the blueprint i've seen for them i agree it's going to be really hard to keep it going it's like playing madden with every player rated 50 right like that's just you're not going to really get ahead and most of the games are like that where they're just like

14 to 12 yeah in these leagues and there's just not enough excitement but what the xfl did that was awesome is they implemented a new kickoff so they sort of broke football a little where they implemented new ideas and they took you behind the scenes and they created new ideas to look at refereeing where they would show you the referee going through the replay and what they were seeing and what they were saying to each other like that was worth watching just to see them kind of mess with football and see what it might look like but you know aside from that it's just hard to get the talent level that makes people want to come in the door um it's like watching much respect to d3 basketball my wife was a d3 basketball player but if you watch d3 basketball the center is 6-3

and the point guard is 5-10 and you're like well you know this is basketball so yeah well the other thing that was great is the the xfo was the players being mic'd up just dropping f-bombs on live tv like they couldn't hit the bleep button fast enough it was like and you tuned in almost just to see that right like what you expect you threw mics on these dudes they just scored yeah yeah like it was amazing yeah i thought it was a lot of fun unfortunately kovat kind of killed it but uh jeremiah great stuff the next time we talk will be the like sort of last time but you'll you'll drop in from time to time in the off season but we will have a super bowl to break down and maybe depending on our timing a kevin o'connell press conference let's go

not a mock press conference for a coach who's not real press conference yeah about that all right thanks for your time as always jeremy later