Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Is Brian Murphy's belief in the Vikings shaken by the loss to the Packers?

Episode Date: January 3, 2023

Matthew Coller gets together with Brian Murphy to talk about what went wrong in Green Bay and whether the 2022 Vikings' biggest believer has lost some love for the Vikings after that loss. Plus Matthew answers questions about Chris Reed stepping in at center, the backup tackle situation, Justin Jefferson's workload and more... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Purple Insider is presented by Liquid Death, delicious water that's bringing death to plastic. Learn more at liquiddeath.com slash insider. Welcome to another episode of Purple Insider. Matthew Collard here. It is a Monday morning, Murph. And as I was driving home from Lambeau Field last night, there was one thing I kept thinking about, and that's I wanted to hear Brian Murphy's reaction to that. Because, Murph, you have ridden the wave.

You have told fans, look, you know, there's going to be ups and downs but it's a fun season let's just enjoy it and see what happens but your faith sir is being tested by the football gods with a 41 to 17 and 17 is giving them a lot of credit 41 to 17 win What say you this morning, Murph? The Vikings aren't tempting us or teasing us. They're insulting us right now. They're insulting us because this was an all three phases meltdown, which generally their three losses tend to be. I mean, let's be honest. there's no like one play, one moment, one mistake, one drop, one missed call. When the Vikings lose, they disintegrate. And that was, yesterday was, but what feels different about yesterday, and look, I'm not, I am not throwing in the towel on this team saying don't even bother from here on out. I think the way it's trending, maybe number three,

their number three seed, which they've fallen into because of San Francisco's victory over Oakland probably puts them on a collision course with the New York giants at home, which may not feel all that terrible at this point. I mean, there's still an outside shot they get number two. We'll get into all of that. But what I feel like is different about this is now you've got some tangible X's and O's problems here, namely the offensive line. You could not pick a worse time for an already somewhat suspect, question marked, you know, Kirk Cousins how many

more hits can he take but he seems to be thriving offensive line to fall apart and that is right now you had you are down to your number three center you're done down to your number two right tackle you lose an all pro or a pro bowler in Brian O'Neill uh and it wasn't just the the um the fact that you're down to your third string center. It's that Chris Reed clearly had no idea what he was doing at any given moment yesterday, to no fault of his. Look, the guy's never played center in the NFL, certainly not under those circumstances where you've got nuanced snap counts and you've got a loud stadium and you've got a fired up team that you're playing against, that is the worst situation you could enter the cauldron, as it were. So the question

marks that are going to come out this week outside of that into the postseason is how viable is your offensive line right now? Those are not questions you want to be asking between week 17 and week 18. So what concerns me schematically is that they're going to have some serious patchwork to do that may not hold up, especially if you do end up facing a tough defensive team like the San Francisco 49ers or the Philadelphia Eagles deeper into the playoffs. And also, I just did a little bit of number crunching because why not? They have lost their four games by a 139 to 50 margin which is an average of 35 to 13 so the vikings certainly know how to entertain with beautiful comebacks and scintillating last minute uh excitement but they also know how to get smoked and they've been

smoked by some decent teams here uh and they have not shown themselves to necessarily have the metal it takes to really really take on a high quality opponent and come out with a respectable showing and that's something they have to atone for the uh you know i look at it as the season being essentially over uh right now and i don't know what's going to happen in Chicago, but unless San Francisco loses to Arizona, the Vikings are set with the number three seed. So we're kind of done playing this whole thing. And Chicago is a tanking team that honestly wants to lose in this game and they should sit Justin Fields. I don't think they're going to, but there is no reason to play him. They should just lose and they get either, I think they're going to, but there is no reason to play him. They should just lose

and they get either, I think they have an outside chance at the number one pick overall. So there's like a difference for them if they lose in a positive way for the long term. So that team wants nothing to do with this game. The Vikings don't control their own fate with this game. So it just means absolutely nothing to me. So when you look at the games since Buffalo, since we declared them to be a Super Bowl contender because they came back and beat Buffalo, they are four and three with three double digit losses and two of them in which they allowed over 40 points. And their wins are by one touchdown against New England, five points against the New York Jets,

and three points against the Colts, and three points against the Giants. That's your resume over the last seven weeks. And the amount that that Green Bay swings how your resume looks for the final seven weeks of the season is a lot. I mean, had they beaten the Packers, thrown the ball to Justin Jefferson all over the field

and had a grand old time at Lambeau and everybody went back happy and they were putting chains on naked Kirk on the flight home or whatever, we'd be saying five and two over the last number of games, beating a Packers team that was desperate and playing much better football. I think everyone would have felt like, oh, here comes, you know, the number two seed if you just win in Chicago and all is good. But it just unraveled and it unraveled so quickly and so spectacularly yesterday. And then they really had no counterpunch because this is not the Indianapolis Colts, it's hard to look at that totality of the second half of the season and say,

oh yes, this is a team that should go deep in the playoffs. Because I think that you have to look at it that the most recent seven games matter a lot more than what happened way back in week one or something like that. Well, and certainly where their health is at, as we touched upon with the offensive line too. But as you mentioned, this Bears game, I mean, we're not going to learn anything in the next week. The only thing we're going to learn is what time they play and what opponent they play. And it's very much looking like the New York Giants sometime on the weekend of the 13th, 14th, and 15th. So that's about all we're going to see. I don't know where, you know, this is going to be, we talked about challenges that O'Connell has, Kevin O'Connell has had over the years. I think

he really, I don't want to say there's doubt creeping into that locker room because they're never going to admit that. They're never going to convey that. But I think there's got to be a sense of who the hell are we really? I just look at the Jefferson drama that played out yesterday as a little bit of a snapshot. and the production, and the excitement value, and the tenacity, and the aggression, and sort of the desire that Justin Jefferson has to want to be not just the best player on the field, but the greatest Vikings receiver ever, and among the top elite receivers ever in NFL history. All attainable, all desirable, all laudable for him putting out there and putting it on the table. But he's also shown some moments of some immaturity as well. And I think that's something that may have played out a bit more on a grander stage yesterday. Look, he knows this.

Everybody knows this. There's no teams that are going to allow him to put up 180 yards anymore. They're not going to just kind of forget about Justin Jefferson on the field or let him loose. He's going to be targeted. And he got targeted pretty good by a star cornerback who laid it all out during the week. Alexander last week in the lead-up to the game basically taunted him and said, look, it was a fluke in week one.

He's a good receiver, but that's not par for the course. And I think he was in Jefferson's head from moment one. And you can argue whether he should have gotten a taunting call for grittying in front of him. I thought it was kind of a bold move. If you're talking about a clash of egos, I mean, let's one up each other. He didn't get the flag. Jefferson several times in the broadcast was spotted stomping around, you know, slamming officials in the back with helmets. And, you know, it got to the point where the game got out of hand so much and he had like one catch for 15 yards and was pretty much shut down. You could almost see him on the bench. You know, you could almost hear the gears turning in his head. Yeah, this was one of those days. I'm going to have these as a receiver. So how am I going to respond to that? So I think it's going to be important to

kind of keep him a little bit more in check. That's a job for O'Connell as well. You can't be losing it like that. You can't be, you know, the best player on the roster behaving the worst on the field for the world to see, because you're going to have days where you're draped over the top and you're going to have a physical corner who's going to be jack john you in the in the press on the field and with every incompletion so i'd like to see uh you know how he responds you know look he can put up any kind of numbers he wants against the bears maybe it'll make him feel a little bit better but i'm just seeing you, when we've talked about all these cracks throughout the season, and I've never tried to be dismissive of them, but they're obvious cracks and they're obvious faults. And then when you do, when the Vikings do run into some really

adverse situations early in a game, two good teams, you can't turn that around, especially huge momentum shifts that 105-yard kickoff return for a touchdown, let's say, or a pick six or a strip sack on third or fourth down. Cousins had four turnovers yesterday. So these are the kinds of, you know, you block a punt on the first Green Bay possession, you get it down to the two, and you can't get it into the end zone. In fact, and you lose one of your key offensive linemen in the process. You can, you know, when these kinds of serious momentum shifts happen in a game against a good opponent, the Vikings had a really hard time of kind of turning that around. So lots of things to talk about, lots of things to dissect again. I feel fine for their first round situation, but it looks

pretty daunting that they're going to be able to put a complete performance together and face San Francisco or Philadelphia or Dallas in that second or third round and really get anywhere. Yeah, I think with Jefferson, I'm guessing that he spent the entire week thinking about how he was going to try to roast Jair Alexander. And when it didn't work out that way, it was the wrong reaction. And we used to look at what Stefan Diggs did on the sideline, things like that. And I would say, like, that's not really helping when you're getting that did on the sideline, things like that. And I would say like, that's not really helping when you're getting that upset on the sideline. And with Jefferson, you know, I think that what this team needs is someone else to beat somebody if that's how they're going to

play. And after the game, O'Connell and Jefferson both said like, oh, well, they didn't play us any differently when it comes to me than some other teams. But that's, in my mind, that's just not true. Like most teams don't have a Jair Alexander that they can put press man on you every single play and be able to actually hang. And there was sometimes where he was open and I'm sure that was part of his frustration is the ball didn't get there for a lot of different reasons and part of it was probably just the amount of pressure or the confusion with snap counts or whatever it might be uh kirk cousins was definitely having one of those games where you just can't explain why everything is so off but it was so off and that's part of it too but jefferson just can't react that way i mean this is sort of like one of the things that has separated him in a lot of ways.

When we've talked about receivers of the past, whether it's Randy Moss or Diggs, it's been like, well, you know, Jefferson sort of carries himself a little differently, but there have been times even throughout the season where early in the year when there was that Detroit game and so forth, where he starts getting upset if he's not getting the football. And I totally understand that. And I'm not saying like Devo or anything else. It's just that he is getting his Devo on. That's what good receivers do. Yeah, right, right, right. I mean, every one of them and they should have a giant ego and they should believe that they are unstoppable and there's nothing wrong with that. All I'm saying is that when that happened early in the game, it was sort of like he's kind of panicking early on, where this game is still a football game when he's pulling off the helmet and everything else,

and I just thought that that's been sort of a defining feature of this team is that they haven't been panicky, that when things have gone wrong throughout games, I it was going all wrong in Buffalo they were down by 17 points it was snowing it was like you know they were getting after the quarterback and Kirk overthrew KJ Osborne for a pick and it was just like oh man this is going to be hideous and Buffalo's going to put up 50 on them they rally together and they're down by the most points anyone's ever come back from, and they rally together. That's supposed to be who you are. And then on this very big stage when you got Nansen Romo and you got Aaron Rodgers is over there

and the Packers are at home and their field is an ice rink and they're fighting for that playoff spot and everything else, this is kind of a big moment for you to go put the dagger in that team. And it just felt like there was a little more panic, like the Schlotman gets hurt and everybody's looking around. What do we do? We don't have an answer here. And I mean, I don't blame Chris Reed.

The guy's never played center before. That's a bad break. At the same time, though, like even O'Connell seemed to panic right away where he like called a run right behind Chris Reed, who just came in the game. That was the next call up and then kicks the field goal, which I understood because of what had just happened at the same time, though. Like that's something in the NFL you just aren't doing these days with the way team score is kicking a 23 yard field goal, especially with found money at the one-yard line. So there was kind of like from everybody this, uh-oh, like here we go type of feeling. And then once O'Neal pulls up lame on that interception,

and I was watching him run when he got hurt. It's hard to miss a guy who's 6'7 jumping around like that. And when he went down, I was like, oh, that looks like calf or Achilles or something that might keep him out. And everybody knows how important he is too. And it just seemed like what this game did was it whittled away at all of the sort of pillars of things that they can hang on to. They can hang on to that. No one's can stop Jefferson. They can hang on to that. They never panic. They can hang on to that they never panic. They can hang on to that at least they're healthy. And then they had these key injuries. And that's what makes this one different than just a one-off bad game. Yeah, I got to admit, you know, on the broadcast as well, when I was watching Darnell Savage go down the sideline for his pick six, on the bottom of the

screen, you could see O'Neal, number 75, very clearly. It's the old, he looked like he got sniped from Appleton. I mean, he went down in a heap. And I could only concentrate on that because I knew the pick six was happening, right? That's bad. That's a disaster. That's not looking good. And then all of a sudden, you see Brian O'Neal look like he literally got shot is what it looked like.

And they never got back to that coming to the broadcast for a while. They never showed the replay. They never got it. But I just remember thinking, this is awful. This is even worse because now they're down. Their best offensive lineman just went down. And as you said, it looked like one of those, here comes the cart, here comes the spatula. We may never see Brian O'Neill again. Let's just hope they can save the leg. I mean, that's what it felt like because at that moment, I'm not trying to cheapen, you know, what these offensive linemen go through. Obviously it's a miserable life in the trenches.

So it just had that vibe of, boy, this could be, this is a foundational problem now. That's what I'm getting at with the offensive line. This is a foundational problem. This is not something that gets fixed between week 17 and week 18. This is not something where you can pick up a guy on the street. This is, you know, this, these are now systemic issues. And it erodes a little bit at the confidence.

And as you mentioned, too, the adversity, you know, they didn't get, they didn't catch a break. And a lot, if you look at, you know, the Buffalo game, the Indianapolis game comes to mind immediately. They got some breaks. I mean, they got hosed on a couple of situations, officiating-wise against Indianapolis. But, you, but Josh Allen fumbled in his own end zone. I mean, we'll take that to the grave as a once-in-a-hundred-year flood type event. They didn't

really have that with Green Bay. I mean, they had things go wrong badly, but they didn't have that really either major play turnover, fourth-down conversion, special teams play. They had it early with the block punt, but they didn't really cash in. And then they lose their linemen and then they lose their confidence. It's almost like they might've been better off going three and out Green Bay to start off. But it just, you didn't have that, you know, and then you get Joseph coming in and he misses from, was it 46? And I don't know what the next one was. Just trying to get points, just trying to get a little bit of momentum, a little bit of positive vibes, and he can't come through.

And you got Mason Crosby hitting from 58 for a career long. So you just had all of these things stack up, and you're like, well, that escape hatch they normally get, it did not come, and it didn't come at the time when they really needed it. And that usually is a big player or a marginal player coming up with a big-time play at the right time. That did not happen yesterday. So the seeds were sowed very early on that this was going to be a long and ugly afternoon. And let's not forget, too, Green Bay's playing for a lot.

I mean, Aaron Rodgers, you know, just based on his interviews, I think this guy stared into the abyss and realized, A, I may be losing my skill set. B, nobody likes me anymore. Maybe I should shut my mouth and take a different tone. And C, I really like playing this game at a high level in Green Bay. Let's have some fun. We're 4-8, but I think we can still do things. He kind of laid down that marker and look, now they're 8-8. What we said a few weeks ago is you wouldn't want to face the Lions in the postseason. I wouldn't want to face the Green Bay Packers and a surging Aaron Rodgers right now. So all of these things are stacking up. And suddenly, you know, it's like the fairy tale for the Vikings doesn't, you know,

the one thing going for them is that they have a nothing game to play. So they can probably work on a few things schematically, maybe build up some confidence against the Bears because, like you said, I think they stopped playing in the first quarter yesterday in Detroit. So this is a game where it may not matter as far as your record and standing and seeding goes. You're going to play before San Francisco and Arizona do anyway, so you're not going to know exactly what's at stake.

But if anything, it can allow them to take a breath and reset as opposed to having a must-win game or playing an opponent like Detroit that has a must-win game to get in. This actually may not be a bad, bad opportunity to kind of just get well quick against a Bears team that really has been mailing it in for a while. Folks, if your New Year's resolution was to treat yourself a little bit better, I've got a suggestion. Death. That is liquid death, actually, because it's a delicious mountain water that comes in a tall boy can.

And I am telling you, it just tastes different. It's ice cold and much better than water that tastes like a plastic bottle. In fact, Liquid Death hated plastic bottles so much that was what inspired their name. They also give a portion of profits to end plastic because cans are so much easier to recycle. So if you want to give it a try, nudge along that New Year's resolution, maybe put the soda aside and give Liquid Death a try. Go to Hy-Vee, Target, Whole Foods, wherever you get your groceries, or go to liquiddeath.com slash insider. That is liquiddeath.com slash insider and find out where you can get Liquid Death today. Right, yeah, and I guess there's two minds there there's one where you might say play everybody

so you can flush the last one and have your last impression going into the playoffs that you bludgeon the bears by 40 points or you can say don't play your starters so you can make sure you're 100 healthy and nobody else comes up with a random calf injury that was totally unpredictable. And I would personally point to the Brian O'Neill injury as my exact evidence of why you shouldn't play the starters. And you should just assume that San Francisco is going to beat the Arizona Cardinals who, by the way, lost to Atlanta with their backup quarterback. And Arizona's playing their fourth string. I mean, San Francisco's beating Arizona. So you're going there with really nothing to play for.

But I mean, anybody else comes up with a calf injury, that's not the best turf in the world, by the way, in Chicago. In fact, usually it's awful in Chicago. One more person gets hurt and I mean, all of a sudden, you're completely lost, I think, in the playoffs. But I think you bring up a great point, though, that what they've always gone back to is when the other team seems like they're just about to put them away in one of these games where they get behind, that somebody steps up and rises to the challenge or even in the close

games, like against the Giants where it was like all right it's Justin Jefferson time taking over this game and can you rely on that all the time of course not but you expected when the Packers started to pull away for them to have that one drive that gets them back and I think that if there is a random event that sort of turned the game it was probably the tip pass that went for an interception where Jefferson fell down. And that is totally random. That's not Kirk Cousins' fault or anything. He was open enough to throw the ball to, and it just got tipped. But then they allowed them to go down and score a touchdown. And this is where I think maybe the biggest fear comes in is that in a game where your offense wasn't moving the ball,

they needed the defense to kind of, you know, hold strong for a couple of more drives. And they just can't really rely on that. And once Rodgers started to look a little bit confident and they started to run the ball with Aaron Jones, it was just it was just over like they're just going to move the ball on you. And I don't know how you feel about this, Mur Murph but I just feel like this defense is just tired they just look tired like this is another reason to play all the backups but they're they're you know putting in Josh Metellus they're putting in you know Brian Asamoah from time to time but it looks like a defense that if the other team starts to run the ball even a little bit like it'll just gain

momentum pretty quickly or if they hit a little bit, it'll just gain momentum pretty quickly. Or if they hit a couple of passes, it'll gain momentum really quickly against them. So they almost need three and outs because if the other team starts to move the ball, they're just scoring. And it's just hard to project a lot of these things to the playoffs and say, yeah, if you're going to face some of the top offenses in the league, if you're going – of course the Giants are, but then after that, if you're going to face San Francisco, if you're going to face Philadelphia

or however this thing could work out, and your defense just looks completely gassed because they've been on the field for 80 plays a game so many times this year, it's just hard to believe in that. I think that this game just made it so much harder to talk yourself into it. Yeah. And you mentioned, you know, look, they've been awful against the run for most of the year, but certainly lately and look, yeah, maybe the Giants are a favorable matchup,

but they also got Saquon Barkley too. And Daniel Jones isn't that he put up 300 plus just a couple of weeks ago on you in a game that, you know, you needed a 61 yard field goal to win. So, you know, maybe the Giants in theory match up the best against them, but they're not going to be a walkover. And if they've got a strong running attack, and as you mentioned, I do agree, I think the Vikings are tired on defense. And I, that would have been predictable going into the year. I mean, they basically have a very aging, experienced, gutsy, smart defense with Patrick Peterson and Harrison Smith and Zedaria Smith.

And, you know, Danielle Hunter's got some miles on him now. But you and Eric Hendricks, I mean, but you're right. I mean, these guys are just beat down. And it's not even just the physical demands of the position of being out there more than your offense. It's the mental demands. I mean, they've had to come up with some major, major, huge stops on third and fourth down, stopping drives, coming up with key, key turnovers at the right moment. You know, adrenaline is a great thing. but after 17 weeks, they are beat down. And I don't know how much confidence fans have in Ed Donatel.

I mean, you know, yesterday on the same drive, they had 10 guys on the field for a play and then 12 guys on the field for a play in a matter of like two minutes of real time. How that happens in the 17th game of the season is beyond me as well. They are, I still like the players stepping up at the right moment. Look, at this point, that's who they're going to be on defense. They're 30th, 31st, 37th, whatever they are, they're awful in almost every category. We've been saying that all season. So we know if they're going to win at any point, I think 36-33 is sort of my go-to. I always feel like that's a good winning score for the Vikings. That's probably what it's going to have to be.

And you're going to need something to happen on special teams, special as well. So that's who they are. So fretting about them, I think you can fret about the, the energy level and sort of the physical nature of where physical and mental gas tanks and how much they're going to have left for a post-season run. But I don't think anybody right now feels like there's going to be a run. I think there will be maybe a moment at home against the giants, how they look and how they perform there again, confidence and adrenaline can count

for a lot. Maybe San Francisco gets upset. Maybe Dallas gets upset. Maybe, you know, Philadelphia looks suddenly vulnerable. You know, things can shift awfully quickly in the playoff tournament, as it were. But the way they're constructed, you know, we're just going to waste a lot of energy and oxygen because we know who they are. We've known who they are for weeks, if not months. And now you're looking at injuries. Now you're looking at teams have found ways to stifle Jefferson, maybe get in his head offensive line problems. Cousins have been taking pressure all year. How many more hits

can he take? Because at a certain point, there may come a hit where he doesn't get up. I saw that in Washington. I was in the seats, and I remember feeling that he took a huge hit in Washington, and he wasn't getting up. And I thought, wow, the bubble's finally burst. So it has it. It's a high wire act all the way around. So I guess my advice again, Dr. Murphy, from his chair of psychology here to all you folks is don't get upset about the things that you know are already a mess. Just hope and think that maybe magic will happen again, because the only way they're going to go anywhere is through magic. It's not going to be through sheer will and manpower and depth and great schemes and great coaching. The Vikings are an emotional team. It's going to end badly or it's going to continue on lovely. Is there any argument, or maybe you could try to make one, for this being an overreaction to this game?

No, because I think it's a collective overreaction to the entire season. I don't think it's necessarily this game that we're losing it over. Everything that happened yesterday reinforced the doubts that are very legitimate and out there, and that is they don't have the depth. They don't have the defense. You know, TJ Hawkinson had been ascending throughout. He struggled yesterday with the ball, struggled with his footing. I know a lot of players did.

Dalvin Cook was also a non-factor, of course, falling behind early. You know, your running game isn't going to necessarily be a factor. I don't know what happened to Adam Thielen. I think the miles may have caught up to him. K.J. Osborne had a moment or two yesterday. But I don't think there's anything to overreact to because we've been sort of reacting strongly to their faults all year long. And again, I come down to the four losses by an average of 35 to 13. And all of those teams, Philadelphia, Dallas, Detroit, and Green Bay are either going to the playoffs or fighting to go to the playoffs as we speak. So that in itself tells you what you, what you know about this team,

which is they can come up with some magic and do some incredible things. But they can also be humbled and humbled hard by teams that have their own talent levels and missions. You know, this isn't just, you know, nobody's going to part the sea for the Vikings to do their magic. They have to work hard and earn their opportunities to put themselves in positions to pull games out. But if anything, yesterday reinforced the fact that this is a flawed team, maybe not fatally, but certainly flawed, and their depth and their aging defense, it's not a recipe for success. But that doesn't mean they can't, you know, grab another horseshoe or two in January and

make things happen. So I would be cautiously optimistic going into the first round of the playoffs if they somehow win there and head into the lion's den of San Francisco, Dallas, or Philadelphia, you know, have a bottle at hand and just maybe enjoy the entertainment value of it. But I wouldn't be booking any tickets to Glendale. Well, that was inspiring. Are you a – by the way. You wanted an honest assessment and you wanted, you know, a no-frills diagnosis.

I think that's where we're at yeah they really they really broke you yesterday murph they really did you had been you just you'd been the guy like you'd been carrying the torch but uh green bay it's just different uh i want you to guess real quick how many 100 yard rushing games delvin cook has this year i'm gonna say none maybe two two two is right who arizona and uh buffalo he had the 81 yard touchdown yes okay well that makes it so really the arizona game was the only traditional standard 100 yard performance against an awful team like six months ago whenever that game was yeah that That's one of the reasons that maybe I just shouldn't do this now, but you don't sign running backs to huge long contracts. Anyway,

are you a New Year's resolution guy, Murph? A little bit for myself personally. Yeah. Okay. You got a good one? Yeah. I got to lose weight. That's a novel idea, isn't it? How original. From a very original personality and writer comes, I've got to lose weight. Yeah, I got to drink less, work out more, and eat better. Said 600 billion people on the planet. I'm a one day at a time guy. I assess every day. Every day is my New Year's resolution.

If I want to change something, I just change it. I don't decide on January 1st. So anyway. Thanks for letting me be vulnerable. Every day is my New Year's resolution. If I want to change something, I just change it. I don't decide on January 1st. So anyway. Thanks for letting me be vulnerable. Well, what is there? What is there to change? Look at me.

Look at me. Look at me in the face. Is there anything to change here? Yeah. Well, I salute you for getting in the car at Lambeau and turning around and coming home last night. Yeah. It's quite a decision. I was going to stay in Appleton, and I was just like, forget this.

I'm going home. I don't want to stay in Wisconsin more than I have to. And I'm the negative Nelly. You were so put off, you wanted to get home as soon as you could. We're allowed to take pot shots at Wisconsin. That's like what you do. I agree, yeah. That means even though neither of you or I are. Especially Green Bay, Wisconsin.

Right, yeah. Neither of us are originally from Minnesota, but like that's, that's when you know you got your stripes is when you can take jabs at Wisconsin and Ohio. So I would have wept for Ohio state the other night if I wasn't laughing so loudly. That's right. Okay. Well, I wish you the best of luck. Get some, you know, do some curls,

take a little, get a little treadmill or something going on. And we will talk after the Bears game, but it's, you know, we're really going to be discussing how things played out in the playoff race and what we thought of our final impressions. So happy new year to you Murph. And we will talk soon. Sounds good. All right. As we always do after Brian Murphy, let's take a look at some fans only questions before we wrap up the show. All right. This one comes from Matt. It seems that Delvin cook has worn down after 250 plus carries in each of his last four years. Are you worried about giving Justinin jefferson 200 targets per year do high reception wide receivers wear down like running backs jj has taken a lot of hits this year i do not worry

about that no i mean when you look at the history of wide receivers it is so much different than running backs these guys they do have an age curve but the age curve extends much longer and a lot of times even after you have aged to a certain point uh you're still pretty effective and that's what we've been talking about a little bit with adam thielen although uh there was no showing at all from adam thielen in green bay so just after i had kind of been defending his season as being okay for a possession wide receiver and on par with guys who make about the same as far as salary cap goes, then he has, I believe one catch. So that wasn't great timing on that. But if we look at some of the receivers who are all time, great players,

and you know, Justin Jefferson is right on that track to be an all time great player. You know, I'll just pick a couple of them in kind of random here. Tim Brown, there was a great player. I mean, he was good all the way until his mid to late thirties. He had a thousand yard season at age 35. So let me pull up another one, just not Jerry Rice because he's so much different than everybody else. How about Randy Moss? The most obvious one to compare. His last great season was 2009 at age 32.

So, you know, these guys, like they do, yeah, they all take some hits. You're always going to be a little concerned. Marvin Harrison, his last great season was age 34. So most of the time we're talking about guys getting into their early 30s to mid 30s before they start to wear down. Isaac Bruce, final thousand yard receiving season was age 34 as well. So that seems to be kind of the standard for these guys. Now, there have been receivers in the past that have had sort of a brief run with being all time great for a little while and then did not sustain it for many, many, many years. And I was thinking of someone like Herman Moore, if you go back and I know that ages me a little bit, but Herman Moore had a run of four seasons where he caught 400 passes over those four seasons, including 123 yards or

123 receptions for 1,686 yards in 1995. And then did not continue it much longer after that. He was done by the age of 30. And of course, you know, the name Calvin Johnson comes up here as well as a guy who only played eight years in the league, took a ton of hits, was a six-time pro bowler, three-time all pro and set the record for receiving yards in 2012. But he was done by the age of 30. Now, part of that was probably the Lions organization, but the injuries did pile up. But I don't think that it's similar to running backs really in any way

because running backs just get grinded down on every play. Like think about how many times a wide receiver would get hit hard. I mean, there's maybe once a game, twice a game. If you're getting the ball a lot, most of the time you're making a catch and then you're sort of just being dragged to the ground. There's a few times a game where you might hit the ground or hit somebody hard. But as far as running backs, it's almost every time you carry the ball, you have people piling up on you. I also think the other part of it is that someday Justin Jefferson won't have the same jolt that he has right now,

and he'll still be good. I mean, because receivers get more crafty as they go along, they learn more, they understand the go along, they learn more, they understand the game better. They become better route runners every year. So even if they slow down a little bit, they're still able to kind of make up for it with their knowledge of the game and everything else, um, and be effective. So when it comes to signing Jefferson to a long-term contract or anything else, I would say you don't start getting concerned until they're around the age of 30 plus, then how much money you want to give a guy after that, that becomes a question. And yeah, you're always worried when someone's taking big

hits, like you don't want to see that, but it is kind of part of the game, um, for wide receivers. And there's nothing he can really do about that. If people are taking shots at him, it's kind of always going to happen with the great wide receivers. And most of the time it does not take their toll as far as their performance in the same way. And it's definitely worth asking. And maybe this was what you were asking more than the whole historical thing was just about this year and about toward the end of seasons and whether those guys slow down. I don't think that that's the case, but I guess it would be a receiver to receiver basis. If receivers start to slow down toward the end of the year, it might

just be because defenses are focusing on them even more. I mean, I really don't know, but I've never really found that with wide receivers that if you give them 200 targets over a year that by the end of the season, they're beat up and slowed down. It would be a case-by-case basis because if it's somebody who's trying to play through an injury by the end of a season,

well, I mean, that happens for every single position, right? That by the end of the year, you've got guys playing with this, that, or the other thing that they're working really hard to get through, or they're missing practice during the week to try to heal up from. I've not gotten any indication with Jefferson that he's banged up at all, or that he's dealing with any sort of injury. But there might be something to getting worn down by the end of the year for every single position.

And maybe if you are relied upon that much, but I even look at what Devante Adams did against the 49ers. I mean, that guy is the whole passing game of the Raiders all season long. And he was still out there dominating. And just one week ago against theants, we saw Justin Jefferson, despite all of the workload he's had this year, still out there annihilating the New York Giants. I don't expect that to be the case. I think that receivers are just different in that way that they don't slow down if you continue to pump them the football throughout the year. I think the bigger issue is that when you don't have anyone else that

scares the other team, it just allows them to put so much focus on that one guy. And if they have one game plan that works, what's your counterpunch. And that's been the issue for the Vikings is that if they don't counterpunch, they just don't play well on offense really at all. And that's a lot of what happened against green Bay when they were were able to slow down Jefferson even a little, there wasn't someone else to step up and TJ Hawkinson has been that guy at times, but if he's not, if he doesn't have an ideal day, like I feel like he didn't against Green Bay,

they just do not have the type of weapons that we expected them to have when the season started the way the training camp looked you would have convinced me that kj osborne adam thielen were having really good training camps and would have been a huge part of the offense as opposed to both our kind of wide receiver threes and hockinson has been legit like i don't want to overreact to what happened in green bay but if you're asking a tight end to be that guy, one thing is that they don't create a lot of downfield plays. So it's a lot of dink and dunk.

It's a lot of underneath. And even though Hawkinson is fast, you're not running go balls and hitting 40-yard passes to him, whereas you expect that from other receivers. But it's basically, if they're not going downfield to Jefferson, they're not going downfield to Jefferson, they're not going downfield to anyone. And I don't know how to resolve that problem at this point, but in the playoffs, they will need someone else to be a deep threat weapon for them. And it's gotta be KJ Osborne because if it's not, then it's pretty much no one.

So that was a deviation from what you were asking. But I think as far as Jefferson and his target share and everything else, it wouldn't wear down a receiver like him until later in his career, not at 23 years old. All right. Next question comes from Justin fans. Only question was thinking if the Vikings acquired Zach Wilson and groomed him for a year under Kirk cousins, that could work and maybe not cost that much in draft capital or cap hit, perhaps higher upside and a better bet than other possible quarterback moves. I don't love the idea with Zach Wilson. I mean, for one, if a team is bailing on him before the end of his rookie contract,

there is a reason, and that reason is he is bad. And not only is he bad, but it also means he's a problem like i i think that they wouldn't bail on him before the end of his rookie contract if his character was there if they thought that he was given 110 and he was a great leader and he was great to have in the locker room and everything else he was somebody you wanted you're going to give that person way more leeway. And I think that about Sam Darnold, like Sam Darnold has always struck me as being a very like high character type

of quarterback that he was someone that his teammates always played for and wanted to be good. He just wasn't good. And that you've never heard anything about work ethic or any other issues. You never had like what some of the things that Zach Wilson said in public and people kept giving Sam Darnold lots of chances, I think in part because they thought that his character would catch up to his talent. And maybe we've even seen a hint of that in Carolina, but I don't think so.

More likely he's just a career type of backup. But with Zach Wilson, I mean, if you're going to have a backup quarterback, you want somebody who is enhancing your starter. And that's what Nick Mullins does. Like Nick Mullins is a good backup quarterback because you could put him in for a game or two if you had to, and he could potentially win. He's got enough talent to win and he's done it before, but he's really going to help your starting quarterback throughout the week. He's going to be on win and he's done it before, but he's really going to help your starting quarterback throughout the week. He's going to be on the prep or, you know, during practice, helping the defense and give

you competent reps for your defense to practice against. Like that's what you're usually looking for, for a backup quarterback, not somebody who's kind of entitled and also is proven to be totally incompetent as a quarterback. So those things would kind of keep me away from him. I also think that, you know, the idea that there's a ceiling there, like that might be true because he does have a lot of arm talent. But let's say that Kirk Cousins plays one more year and they have Zach Wilson as their backup.

And then they turn it over to Zach Wilson in 2024. Well, that's the fourth year of his rookie contract. So even if he's good, then he would have to be unbelievably great because even if he's good, then you're talking about having to pay him shortly after that. And you miss out on the entire advantage of having a quarterback on a rookie contract so in order for the Zach Wilson thing to make any sense he has to be amazing he can't just be okay because if he was really good and just really good while you made the trade you developed him now you got to pay him and then now you have the same problem that you had before as far as

building the roster strength if they're going to make a quarterback change at some point here soon, it has to be just drafting a quarterback because that is so valuable. And I just also see almost nothing with Zach Wilson that I would say I'd want to bet on. And think about, I mean, the New York Jets really put themselves out there for that draft pick. If they're ready to go now, I'm going to pass. Uh, they would know a lot more. I just, I'm just not interested in that. Um, let's see swerve and Mervin our next question from Twitter. Hey Matt, cranky Vikings fan here. You were talking about Rogers in this game about their game plan and taking what the Vikings gave them,

showing a willingness to dink and dunk down the field. And it got me thinking, why does it feel like the Vikings can't slash won't do that? Their entire game plan is Justin Jefferson ramming Delvin Cook into a wall over and over and forcing balls down the field to the sidelines into tight windows. Are defenses really giving them nothing? Are the Vikings either unwilling or incapable of taking what they're given it feels like the entire offense is a superstar forcing round pegs into square holes if it weren't for jj this offense would be historically awful yeah i don't know

about historically but it would be awful yeah it would be we were just talking about zach wilson like that now that's now that's an offense that's maybe historically awful. I don't know, but it would be bad. It would be a bad offense without Justin Jefferson. And there was a chart floating around Twitter with the and all the other ones were, you know, at the bottom. They do have, it's so funny about this kind of a dink and dunk offense overall. Like the average depth of target for Kirk cousins is pretty low for this season. And a lot of those short throws have gone toward TJ Hawkinson and recon recent weeks. And Adam Thielen cannot really go down the field at this point. Almost every other target that's not going toward Justin Jefferson has been short. The screen game, as you guys know, it showed a little signs of life here or there, but then petered out against Green Bay. But when I look at the average depth of target for the league,

Cousins has the 11th lowest. So he's throwing overall, a lot of short passes. I can even look up on pff.com just how many in terms of how far he's throwing it down the field, like how often the percentages. So he's only throwing 9% of his passes over 20 yards, which is pretty low for his career and almost 50% so 45% are between zero and nine yards through the air. And it's more than 50%. If you include behind the line of scrimmage, that's made up 13% of his passes. So if you do the quick math, almost 60% of his throws are going under 10 yards this year. I think why it feels like that, that part of their big part of their office is going downfield is because they've had so many downfield plays to just Justin Jefferson specifically, but almost no one else. I would be curious while I'm just looking at things that I feel like this

is, um, kind of what fans only become sometimes it's like, Matt looks up things to try to see if some of your guys' theories are right or not. But let's find out, which I'm very happy to do, by the way. That's not a complaint at all. Adam Thielen, 51% of Adam Thielen's targets have been below 10 yards and only 9% over 20 yards down the field. So that kind of tells the story there a little bit that they just have not been able to push it downfield to anyone else and 15 percent of justin jefferson's targets have gone 20 or more and 37 percent over between 10 and 19 so yeah that's it like that's the the that's the offense the offense is dink it to somebody else or push it down the field to justin, and those are your only two options. But I think why it really feels this way is every offense in the world would love to do what Green Bay did against the Vikings.

They would love to throw safe passes and run successfully over and over and over again. Every offense in the world. If you could give an offensive coordinator that chance, they would take it 100 times out of 100. The problem is that the Vikings have not run the ball successfully. Just looking at Delvin Cook in recent weeks, they have not, and really all year, they have not been able to put together a consistent rushing attack to the point where opponents are afraid of it. And that allows them to do kind of whatever they want. And so when you hear them talking about, well, hey, like, and even Jefferson in 2020,

to have opponents really afraid of the rushing attack. Now, I don't know if this is a schematic thing, if it's a play-calling thing, if it's an offensive line thing, or if it's a running back thing. It's very hard to separate those, but I'm going to pull this up right now. Again, Matt looks up stuff on Twitter, uh, or not on Twitter on, um, analytic sites. Let's see in terms of, yeah. Okay. So this, this confirms what I was thinking on pro football reference. It gives you the expected points added in the pass and in the run. And you guys have heard me reference that many times. The Vikings right now are 26th in the expected points added running the football.

That is really bad. That's really bad. Uh, that they, they just have not had a good running game at all this year. And so if you want to play that way, if you want to take what the defense gives you, you have to be able to run the ball effectively. And they just have not done that. Um, you know, when you look at, I'm trying to look for a team at the top, most of the teams at the top have running quarterbacks. Cleveland would be an example of this, of a team that when they had Jacoby Brissett playing, they had to run a lot with Nick Chubb and then take the underneath stuff. You know, sometimes Kansas City and Buffalo can surprise teams that way. You know,

who's the great example of this is Dallas. Dallas is the best example. They have the two running backs. They have the great offensive line and they will just keep running at you until you make them stop. And then when you make them stop, they throw it effectively because they have a really good wide receiver. So I think that's why, I mean, I think it kind of comes down to you have a running back who's not as good as he used to be. And you have an offensive line that is just okay at run blocking. You have an offensive mind who's calling the plays that doesn't want to run the football. I mean, he's a former quarterback and he came here to throw the ball with Kirk Cousins and that's what he's doing. But that club is not in the bag. There's one club

in the bag, one and a half. It's like a driver and a putter and TJ Hawkinson and the underneath game is your putter and your driver is your long game to Justin Jefferson and you don't have any other clubs. And that's kind of how the Vikings have to live. All right. Next question from Scott is the three seed better than the two seed this year. The giants can be beat and whoever the seven seed is looks tough. Plus if the seven beats San Francisco and Minnesota wins, they will host their next game. I don't think there's any real argument that two is not better than three. I mean, because you'd host San Francisco in the second round, that's just such a big factor. Like you can't really throw that factor out because it's so,

it's so important. I mean, if San Francisco hosts the Detroit lions beats them by two touchdowns or something, and then you have to go to their place, that is not favorable at all. However, I see what you're saying.

And I don't entirely disagree because I think Detroit Detroit and Green Bay, matchup-wise, because of familiarity, having already played them twice, and having Green Bay play the way they just did against you, and Detroit play the way they just did against you, the better game by the Vikings, on the whole, was against the New York Giants. When you look at the Giants roster, I think that they are a pretty good team, but not a great team. And they have less scary players than those other ones. Like Amin Ra St. Brown and the weapons of the Detroit Lions are pretty scary. I mean, they can put up a lot of points and Aaron Rodgers. I don't care what his stats say. His stats say

he's had an okay year, not a great year. His PFF grade, same thing. QBR, same thing. Like it all says good, not great, but that's not the guy you want to face. You don't want to face the Detroit Lions who have the fourth best scoring offense in the league. You don't want to face a Green Bay Packers team that knows you that well, and that is just getting rolling with Aaron Rogers and their running game and their offensive line being healthy. Like those are just not, not good things for you. Uh, you'd rather go against Daniel Jones because Daniel Jones will probably throw you the football once like he did in the game at us bank stadium that Daniel Jones has an unbelievable ratio of turnover worthy

plays. I believe he has more than twice as many turnover worthy throws than big time throws. So he's only going to take the open stuff and he does not have the same level of weapons as Jared Goff, who also only takes the open stuff, but his guys are open a lot more. So as far as a first round matchup, yes, I agree with you. But as far as far as the bigger picture of making it all the way through the playoffs, that is pretty hard. And yeah, I mean, you'll be, if the Vikings win against the giants, you're rooting hard for the other team because you get to play at home at the same time. I feel like it all evens out because playing against two teams that just beat you recently or going out to play against San Francisco, like none of that's going to be

easy no matter what way it goes. But yeah, I mean, it's not the worst break in the world. No, it's not devastating. What happened against green Bay wouldn't have really even been that big of a deal in my mind if they had just lost normally. But this team refuses to lose normally. It would not have gotten the reaction that it did. Had they lost 27-24 on a final Mason Crosby field goal and dropped down to the three seed, we wouldn't have said, oh man, you know, throw in the towel for the rest of this season. No, that would not have been the case because no, it's not devastating to be three versus two. I agree with you there. Yeah. Because the giants are a little more beatable

than the Packers and lions in my mind. I'm with you on that point. And you look, you can't get to that second round without getting through the first, which was always my case for, you know, resting starters in this last game, which it does not look like they're going to do. Kevin O'Connell basically said, yeah, that's not something we're going to do in Chicago other than limiting some snap counts. So they're going to, they're going to go for it and try to give themselves any chance. And they're going to play at noon. San Francisco will play later. And so it won't be later in the evening until we're sure and locked into a playoff spot on Sunday. Next question here.

This from Jeff. What chance do you think that they rest most of the start? Hold on. There you go. Would love to see Cook get a rest and Chandler get some playing time. I, yeah, Jeff, I mean, I'm, I'm with you that I would rest the starters. I think Delvin Cook needs a break. I think Adam Thielen needs a break and I think Kirk Cousins needs a break.

I mean, the way that he's gotten beat up over this season it i just think it would be better for him if he didn't play in this game and maybe what they could do is try to get up a couple touchdowns and then put in nick mullins but it just doesn't sound like that's the plan it sounds like they're kind of going for having any chance that san francisco steps on their own feet and weirder things have happened I mean the Colts missing the playoffs last year after a meltdown against the Jaguars you never would have bet that in a million years Jared Stidham taking them to the brink like maybe they think hey it's the NFL you just never know and Arizona's going to try to play spoiler in that game and you're always a punt return and a fumble away from having it all go

wrong so you know i mean i i think i said it's like 95 chance but what is it really i mean maybe like 80 chance that that any nfl team beats another one so i don't know yeah i mean i i yeah i mean i keep i have flip-flopped so much on this and I almost have to apologize for the amount that I've just gone back and forth because there's a part of me that does want to be critical of playing the starters in this game because the chances are so low that San Francisco loses. And because of how badly some guys look like they just need a break. I mean, Zedaria Smith looks like the guy needs a

rest and I mean, Daniel Hunter has been playing great, but I'd rather have them at a hundred percent as opposed to 90 going into the last game. And I, and you see what happened to Brian O'Neill, which the update on him from Kevin O'Connell, when he called it significant, which kind of says to me that more likely than not, he won't be playing in the playoffs when you call it significant, or at least in the first round of the playoffs, you have one more of those things go wrong and it's going to be really tough. So, uh, but I, I appreciate the question. I, I think, I think I want to question it a little bit of playing the starters here. Um, but look, if Arizona pulls off a crazy

upset, then everyone can say, Hey, you know, they were right to do it and they got the two seed and everything else. So it, the NFL, you just really never know. Uh, let's see. Next question comes from, let me actually check. Uh, Oh, SB six, six, seven,78 on Twitter. Sorry, guys. Let me just go back between files. I didn't write down the name initially. Okay. Let's see.

How bad was the Chris Reid performance, especially since he was the backup for the game? It's not like the other two centers were hurt. He was the backup, and it was like he had no experience ever or any game plan knowledge i tend to put this on the front office and coaching you either didn't get a guy who was roster capable of being a backup and understanding the game plan or you didn't coach him up to understand the game plan what's your thoughts on this i've never seen a center performance so bad oh uh i think you're overreacting yep yep i think you're overreacting for one i have absolutely

seen center performances that bad not specifically like that where they couldn't get organized when it came to the snap uh but and then the cadence and all that but i also think you're talking about a player who is third on the depth chart for a reason and that reason is because he's never played center before ever in a game he took some practice reps there way back at the beginning of the season and that's it he's a career guard i mean you never expect to have to get to your number three center at that point and then you're asking him to come off the bench at the beginning of the game at Lambeau field of all places where it's incredibly loud. It's hostile. The field turf is not very good. I mean, I don't know what the expectation would be other than

that. It was going to be a rough ride once Austin Schlotman went down. I mean, if you get to the third lineman of any position in the NFL, I would love you to show me some team that has a third center who's good, who's going to perform just fine, or a fourth tackle. Like, I don't know. I almost think like Ole Udo is about as good as it gets for fourth tackles. And Chris Reed, I mean, yeah, that was a really, really tough spot for him. And all he could really do was just try his best. And overall, like with the way that he actually played in pass protection,

it wasn't completely nightmarish there. It wasn't great either. In the run blocking, it wasn't very good. I would not call it the worst I've ever seen, though. I mean, this team, even in recent years, now Bradbury has been much better this year, but there've been games where he graded a zero in past protection before in recent memory, that's worse than not getting the snap count, right? It went horribly for sure, but in no way is that like the worst thing I've ever seen. Drew Samia, I think is probably the worst offensive lineman I've ever seen where he just had no idea even where to go or what to do. It was a rough ride,

but there's only so many reps you get in practice. You don't get very many. So I would be surprised if Chris Reed took any, and they, they talked about this. Kirk Cousins said, you know, this week we're going to get together week we're gonna get together and we're gonna work through this and that kind of was an indication that they don't expect bradbury back this week and now it sounds like he might not even be back by the first round of the playoffs so that one might be a little more significant than they were kind of trying to let on but after a week of practice i think ch I think Chris Reed will be okay as a center because he's been in the league before, but that was as tough of a spot as you're ever going to find.

It's not even come in and play a quarter or something. It's come in and play the entire game with probably no practice. I would guess the way that Kirk Cousins talked and he defended Chris Reed, the way that he talked, it sounded to me like they would have had no practice reps together, which makes sense. I mean, because you are practicing with the ones and Austin Schlotman, maybe you take a couple snaps from that guy, but It was not a good showing at all. But I also think that we have to kind of be understanding when someone's never done it before. So anyway, there's that. And the second part of your question, let's see. When is it time to truly innovate? Try some speed, guys.

Speed plays with our fast players. Can a Wong Wu on a screen or a jet sweep? Not every play or drive, but once a game, Thielen should be a red zone player or a third wide receiver slot guy. Well, you can't put everybody in the slot. The second part of that KJ Osborne is a slot receiver. When you look at more of a skillset, he's not a like get off the line of scrimmage guy. Thielen has gone inside and outside for his career but you really need these guys to be interchangeable with Osborne doing more slot stuff I also think that

you know with the cut splits that they use and things like that where the or the condensed splits that kind of is a pseudo kind of way of having him out of the slot like it's not exactly putting him in the slot but it's ways to get him off the line of scrimmage i just don't think there's a lot that they can really change there at that point and i am with you as far as getting kenny wong on the field every once in a while um you have to trust him to want to do that and maybe they don't trust him to put the ball in his hands really at any point but possibly um even the speed that we saw from Jalen Naylor or Jalen Rager, we were feeling like they were going to start working in some more runs for Jalen Rager, who I'm going to

stick with this one the same way I did with Cordero Patterson. I think the guys are running back. I actually think that Jalen Rager would be kind of a dangerous sort of third down back, but they haven't really done much in that vein either as the jet sweeps and the pitches and stuff like that with any of these guys or a bubble screen. There hasn't been much of that, but I think from their perspective, when your offense has Hawkinson and, of course, Justin Jefferson, everything starts there.

And Delvin Cook, that everything starts there. And you might sprinkle those things in a little. It hasn't really been a lot, though. It has not been enough, in my opinion. And I would agree with you on that point. It just has not been enough of sprinkling some of those guys in. I don't think it's the difference between winning and losing, but to see Kenny Wong Wu get no touches all season long for somebody who can return kicks for touchdown and is one of the best returners in the league, I don't know. Yeah, I know. I agree

with you. I'm with you on that. All right. Last one at born too early on Twitter with O'Neal likely done for the year. Not 100% sure on that. Significant does sound bad, though. How big of an upgrade would it be to get back Blake Brandl from injury? He seemed to fill in fine when Derisaw is out. And Udo is well Udo. A little bit. A little bit.

Clearly, since Blake Brandl won the job, we always have to trust the coaches at times with stuff like this, because how would I know from watching a training camp practice if Blake Brandl is performing better than Ole Udo? I mean, right? Like, unless it's majorly different, that's going to be a hard thing to pick up on. But both of them are a liability. It's just the reality. Almost every. But both of them are a liability.

It's just the reality. Almost every backup tackle in the NFL is a liability. And when Blake Brandl was in, he graded pass blocking-wise a 55 over the games that he was in. And if he has to come in and play right tackle, then you're still talking about facing some really great rushers. Um, actually Blake Brandel in his games from week 10 to week 14 gave up seven sacks. So no, it's not an upgrade. No, I mean, Udo is probably the same or it's possible. He's a touch better cause he's a little more physically gifted, but he does like to hold all the time. But this is, this is a, this is crazy. It's a crazy stat. Blake Brandle was seventh in the league in sacks allowed, and he only played 181 pass blocking snaps. Most of these guys have played

six or 700. So someone like Jonah Williams has played 700 snaps. Yeah. I mean, sacks allowed isn't quite as telling as pressures, but that is not, not great. And he was giving up a lot of problems over there at left tackle. Anybody you have to play that's not Brian O'Neill is going to be a gargantuan drop-off from Brian O'Neill. That's just, just how it is. So, um, yeah, anyway, I appreciate the questions as always. Another interesting episode. It's like every week we swing back and forth between, hey, could this team really? And oh my gosh, it's been a real roller coaster

over the last handful of weeks here, hasn't it? We've gone from one of the biggest blowouts I've ever seen against Dallas to the biggest comeback anyone's ever seen to a 61-yard field goal to a blowout to who the heck knows what is next for them. So that is always how it is with this team. We'll have the full slate this week. Jeremiah Searles, Courtney Cronin is going to come on from ESPN. She will make a return to the show. Kevin Seifert has promised to make a return as well this week. So it'll be a good week.

We'll have some fun. We'll lead up to this. We'll talk playoff scenarios and all the things that are next for the Vikings. So thank you all for listening, and we'll talk to you later.