Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Is Jeremiah Sirles buying the Vikings as a 12 win team?

Episode Date: July 3, 2025

Matthew Coller is joined by former Vikings lineman Jeremiah Sirles to discuss the Vikings' prospects for the 2025 season and whether he's buying them as a 12-win team.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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The entire Oracle trilogy is available on Audible. Listen now on Audible. Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of Purple Insider. insider Matthew collar here and look who is back. It is not only Jeremiah Searles, but Jeremiah Searles fresh off a lawn mowing, showing off the pipes. I can never explain to people how big NFL players actually are, but I think they might have just got a sense for it looking at your arms and you've been out of the league for a few years, but, uh, Jeremiah, how we been, what's going on, man? I'm good, man.

If they want to see how big they just got to go watch our live podcast. Did where I sat next to you that one time and made you look and you're not a small human, you're, you're decently sized human and you just look like a shrimp next to me, but that's okay. Cause I'm a large human, but I'm great. Cause I love the 4th of July. It's one of my favorite holidays ever. You just get to sit outside, smoke a bunch of meats, eat a bunch of food, and blow stuff

up. Celebrate America, dude. I'm here for it. But no, it's been good. I've been traveling quite a bit. So running a gun with recruiting and agency stuff and NIL and NFL and everything in between. So it's been a fun eventful summer so far. Yeah.

You know what I've really enjoyed doing during this time is just pulling back a little bit and looking at the big picture of the league and getting ready for this season with the Vikings and turning things over to JJ McCarthy. I don't think I've ever enjoyed the off season conversations as much as this year, because I feel like so many Vikings fans are locked in, in late June and early July, because that's just where the excitement level is for this season coming off what happened last year.

And then McCarthy represents something even bigger to this fan base than just, Hey, he's the next quarterback who could potentially win, but he's also the next quarterback who could be here for a long time, which they have not had very often. So here's what I wanna do. We have played many times on this show, Talk Me Into, but a listener suggested, hey, why not try playing Talk Me Out Of? So that's what we're gonna do today.

We're gonna fire back and forth with topics, starting with Viking stuff and then on to Semenefel stuff, Talk Me Out Of, and the rules are simple. You gotta talk the other person out of something, even if you don't believe what you're saying. I'm gonna start with this. I, after mini camp and OTAs upped my expected win total for the Minnesota Vikings from 10,

when the schedule came out to 11, because JJ McCarthy looks pretty darn good out there as QB one. Talk me out of moving it up to 12. If I see a couple of good weeks of training camps, let's just say training camp starts out well. Talk me out of moving it up to 12 wins. Yeah. Well, the way that that happens is pretty simple. JJ McCarthy plays like a rookie at times, right? And that's, that's going to happen every now and then with just how you just haven't seen everything in the NFL yet. Right.

And my concern would be that the way you don't get to 12 is somewhere around week four, defensive coordinators figure something out that rattles JJ McCarthy. And how quickly can he spin and develop, or how quickly can KOC try and get his rookie-scale quarterback to fix those things? Right, I think back to when everyone decided, OK, Patrick Mahomes, it's not going to be too deep anymore, right? You're going to have to dink and dunk us apart,

or we're going to double-team Jefferson, or, you know, a couple injuries on the outside. Right, those are really the things that, from the McCarthy side, on the offensive side, that would limit us from getting to that 12 win mark. The thing on the defensive side, the secondary could really blow up at any second. That's my one clarion kind of looking at this secondary and going, okay, you're one mate, two injuries away from being like in a Oville and not feeling

very confident about every single week. And then you just have to hope that the great pass rush then becomes the great pass defense on the back end, which do work hand in hand. But if you start getting defensive corners and safeties that are dinged, and they're not playing where they need to be, they'll just start trying to dink and dunk this team because they can't let that pass rush and let Brian Flores get to where he wants to go. Right? So if Jajam. McCarthy plays like a rookie and has a five, six game skid there where they go three and three or two and four, right? Which again, I'm not entirely sure it's gonna happen, but I'm talking you out of this, right? They go two and four here because he has a skid where he throws four interceptions or

something like that, then that's where you're looking more at that 10 to 11 win, maybe even nine win mark if you do have that skid kind of mid season. So I think that you have done a good job of this, of talking me out of going too crazy if he starts training camp really well, because in also they do have a difficult schedule and if you don't come out of the gate and win a couple of games, then there's this really difficult run in the middle of the season where you might win one, lose one, win one, lose one. And even if you're playing well, that could still happen just based purely on the teams that you're playing. And when we look back at first year starting quarterbacks, because I don't like calling

him a rookie with all the experience that he has, you know that when you've been in an NFL facility for an entire year, you are not a rookie anymore. Even if you didn't get on the field too much, but at the same time Inconsistency does plague young quarterbacks And even if we look at the best seasons from young quarterbacks in recent memory You could go into their game log and circle a four game or a five game stretch Where I you know, I just kind of hit the skids there or defenses figured something out, or he played a bunch of good defenses or whatever it might be. Uh, maybe he just was a young guy and was inconsistent a little bit. I think that there will be some of

that with JJ McCarthy and it really does come down to KOC, the supporting cast, the defense to probably win some games that they shouldn't necessarily win based on the quarterback play, Jordan Mason, Aaron Jones, make a play on defense, get a pick six, things like that, that they have been able to do. I mean, you look at Jacksonville last year and how badly the quarterback played, but the defense bailed them out and they got enough in the running game

to get a win. You're probably going to need a few more of those this year in order to get to 12. And I also think the division strength in general would also prevent you. I mean, this is a division that you could win with 11 games. And last year, I think just distorted our view. 11 games is good enough to compete for a super bowl. It's a great season, but you know, they went 14 and it's like, well, you got to get back there.

So I, okay, I am talked out of it. I would need to see, what would you, what kind of start to the season would you need to see before if I said 12, you wouldn't feel like I was being silly. Four and one. Yeah. I think you need to be four and one going into week six.

Right. And not having that first loss be week one, right? That that's, it's crazy. If you look at the stats that go back, like the win and loss column of week one, like can predict playoffs. It's not, and it's, it's a weird thing because that game, either springboards confidence or flames doubt, right? Like it's one of the two things where you come out of training camp, everyone

feels super good about their team, Right? Hey, we have all our guys healthy. We feel good. We go out. You go out week one and you lose a tough one or maybe you get smacked in the face and you lose by double digits and you're kind of looking around going, are we as good as we thought we were? Or maybe was that a good team? Or, you know, I think about like the Bengals last year, right? They go out week one. Everyone's like Super Bowl contenders. They're gonna win it all. They drop the game to the Patriots and then they kind of never got themselves back on track, right? That week one and going into

that is so important. But yeah, you've got to get to week six at that four and one mark feeling pretty good going, okay, four and one. Now we can try and go, even if we go two wins, one loss here, moving forward, we're going to feel pretty good about where we're at the end of the season. Well, and those are the most winnable games on the schedule outside of when they play like the giants at the end of the year, because you start out with a game against Chicago, which we're going to say the Vikings should win, even if Chicago has won the off season for the 14th straight year, that is a game that

the Vikings should win. And then if you can beat Atlanta, Cincinnati, maybe there's a loss mixed in there, but Aaron Rodgers in Pittsburgh, it's not the scariest thing in another country. And then Cleveland, I think four and one isn't the craziest expectation to set, but if they don't get to that point, then you're probably getting into a little more roller coaster type season, then you're going to start out hot and then ride that hot start as you go forward. Where would you like me to begin for talk you out of? Let me see.

Talk me out of the fact that the Minnesota Vikings will be the top three, a top three defense this year in the national football league. Ooh, talk you out of a top three defense. All right. Well, I think that in order for that to happen for them, not okay. I mean, top three is always very, very high. Um, it probably starts with the opposing quarterback list. The opposing quarterback list features Jaylen Hertz, Jaden Daniels, Joe

burrow, Lamar Jackson. This is a pretty tough run. And we don't even talk about the fact that the Vikings have to go to Dallas because we've all just written off Dallas and decided that they're awful. They had the number one offense in the NFL in 2023 with Zack Prescott. So it's not like the Cowboys are just some complete joke. And even the team like the Giants, they've got Malik neighbors. They, you know, that coach Russell Wilson.

Right. Well, I mean, but Russell Wilson can hit a few deep shots and you can win a game. And so even the bad games outside of Cleveland, I mean, you could see Aaron Rodgers getting hot in a game in Dublin. I think it's a very, very hard quarterback schedule to be talking about being in the top three. Now, the secondary is something that gets talked about a lot because it's kind of the only major question mark. But we could also look at that front defensive front and say, are they going to stop the run the way that they did last year?

Because as much as Jerry Tillery and Jonathan Buller, like those guys are not household names or anything. They really did the job. I mean, they were able to stick guards, move bodies, get lanes for linebackers to come in and they're playing a bunch of teams that can run the football extremely well. So I think if you dropped from say, what were they like number one, number two, somewhere in there in run defense and running quarterbacks are going to cause problems for this too. If you dropped to like the 15th best run team, then you know, maybe you're, you're having tougher times with Detroit, for example, and you've got to play

Saquon Barkley and Derek Henry this year. Like there's a lot of talent that you're going to have to face. I think they could be even better of a defense overall or just as good as they were last year, but they're not playing the AFC South, which they played great against Joe Flacco. They played mostly great against Will Levis outside of giving up like a 99 yard touchdown, but mostly great against teams like that. Those teams just don't really exist on the schedule. So I think that they will be good, but mostly great against teams like that. Those teams just don't really exist on the schedule. So I think that they will be good, but there are some kind of defined areas

that you could circle that could be a little problematic based on who they're actually going against. Are you talked out of it? Folks, for weeks now, I've been using Tempo Meals to cut down on the amount of times that I go out for fast food. And as you guys know for me, that is quite an accomplishment, but it's worked.

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My brain is so much about defense in this league. It's just about who you go against. You're not gonna contain all those guys for 60 minutes. It just doesn't happen. They get paid a lot of money too. Lamar Jackson's gonna break one. Derek Henry's gonna break one. It's just a matter of time.

But I do think on paper, they're much more talented than they were last year. The defense, the Vikings defense on paper, right? But they're older. The lot of the guys that are on paper that look good, I've missed a lot of games in the last few years. So it's just one of those things that you look at it going, okay, if everyone could stay healthy, this is a, this is easily a top five defense, but are they all going to stay healthy? Cause they're all a little bit older than what we would like for a defensive

front. So we'll see. Yeah. And even if you think about like last year and how many snaps Jonathan Grenard and Andrew Van Ginkle had to play to be in a top five defense, by the way, I don't know if you can hear. Okay. You can. There is, there is a little bit of construction going on around the house. Is that, uh, how, how loud is that? Is that what that was the loudest one? The other that's the first time I've heard it.

So you're OK. So there, yeah, there is a little construction going on right outside the house. And I thought that we could avoid it, but maybe a little bit in the background. So I apologize for that. But just, you know, when you talk about those guys both having career seasons, Byron Murphy, Jr. career season, Blake Cashman career season. Like a lot of those things coming together all at once are hard to repeat. But if there is a regression defeater, I think it exists in two guys.

If they are the best possible versions of themselves. And that would be Dallas Turner and Isaiah Rogers. Because Isaiah Rogers looked to me in minicamp like a very clear starting caliber NFL corner who just has never really got his opportunity and missed a year from a gambling thing. But he was on the team that won the Superbowl last year and played almost 500 snaps. So we're not talking about somebody who's never done it before, but if he elevates in his first chance, the same way that even Granada is first chance to be a thousand snap player or Van Ginkle in the role that he was in or Blake Cashman last year, Brian Flores has this really great ability, I think to

identify guys who are on the rise. Josh Mattelis would be another one who have developed over a couple of years. And if Turner goes from, Hey, like this guy's not getting in the game that much too. Oh yeah. First round pick. Whoa. You've got a completely different defense. I think if Dallas Turner takes that big step. Yeah. I mean, we pointed to him last year in the playoff run that if they were going to make a

deep, if they were going to make a long Superbowl run, he was going to have to be a difference maker and a big contributor. And we never really saw him take that, that jump. There was flashes, but the consistency was never there. This is a huge year for him. Yeah. And he feels the pressure too, I'm sure. Right.

Your first round pick, you feel that need to contribute that need to, Hey, I'm the guy I need to be a guy. And if you can get him in there, I mean, the pass rush is going to be lethal with Dallas and Gernard and Van Ginkle and Hargrave and, and, um, Jonathan Allen. Right. Those guys are all known for being able to get to the password, right? Get to the quarterback and it's a pass first league. There's no secret playing Joe Burrow.

What do you want to do? You don't want him to throw to T Higgins and Jamar Chase. You want him scrambling around and checking it down to one of his running backs or his tight end. So that's going to be really important because those pass rushers have to show up every single game in order to help the secondary that there is question marks about. OK, let me give you one more Vikings one. If you have more, we can go from there. Talk me out of the Vikings having a top five

graded offensive. Oh, I knew you were going to make me do this by pro football focus. Talk me out of it because right now, right now I'm looking at it, looking around the league and going, I think they could do it. I mean, I'm going to preface this with, I don't agree with anything I'm about to say. Okay. Well, so you think that they can. Okay. All right. But you got to talk me out. I got to talk you out of it. So here's what happens. Christian Derrissot is not ready to go week one. Right? He's not ready to go week one. He's still working his way back from that injury. We want him to be

100% healthy, not worth rushing him back early, get him back week four or five, right? So we run out there with Justin Skool, right? Who I believe is the backup swing tackle right now, or my guy, Logan Brown, TBD. Right? So we have to go out there with a new left tackle to start the season. Right? We go through, everything's going well. We're trying to run the ball. We're not really running the ball well.

The way that I think that this falls apart is if JJ McCarthy hits his skid and the offensive line also is not in congruency with run blocking right now. And it's kind of just stuck in neutral, right? The offense can't generate push with the run from the offensive line. McCarthy's not really finding receivers, so he's holding the ball a little longer. So we're giving up some more pressures. We're giving up some more sacks, right? He's rolling out of the pocket, and now there's a holding penalty, right? Those type of things will compound on themselves over the course of the year as we move forward.

Also, back to the age thing, Brian Kelly's missed a lot of football games in the last couple years. He comes out and gets hurt week seven. And now we've got a new center that's got to go in there. Maybe Michael Juergens has to come in for his first time starting ever. And now he's there with a rookie scale quarterback, right? I'm going to call it a rookie. The rookie scale quarterback, right? New center.

And the line never starts the five guys for an extended period of time. Right? I think that's how you not become a top five graded PFF line is if there's shuffling amongst guys, whether it's Darasaw missing a few games here, Kelly missing a few games here, fries missing a few games. O'Neill, right? Like if everyone just kind of doesn't feel that congruency of, hey, all five guys stay healthy and roll, that's when

you're going to look at and go, okay, it's not a top five grade PFF grade offensive line because there just hasn't been consistency throughout the players within the playing. I was going to start that with pretty much Ryan Kelly. I think if Ryan Kelly plays 14 games, they could be a top five offensive line. If Ryan Kelly plays nine games, it's going to be really difficult because even though I saw some positive signs on Michael Juergens last year in training camp, and then the fact that he was active on game day, I mean, that means that they trust you enough

to be out there if they need you. And for a seventh rounder to be that guy who's active over a veteran player like Dan Feeney, it shows you something about how they feel about him. At the same time, he's not going to be Ryan Kelly right away when he's never played in the NFL either. And Kelly at his best is a really prolific player. I mean, one of the best pass blockers, I think one of the smartest guys, you get a really good

sense for his leadership capabilities. And I think for JJ McCarthy, people who played baseball might connect with this or love baseball. When certain pitchers throw to certain catchers, they just feel a level of comfort. And this used to be if you're old, like Greg Maddux used to have his catcher that would always catch for him, Eddie Perez. And I think he just felt really comfortable with that guy being his catcher and a center quarterback. That's the same sort of thing where it's like you see the defense the same way and you know the language that you two communicate with and then you throw in somebody else and it's okay.

Well, this isn't quite the same. He knows what he's supposed to do, but it's not in that fluency that is gained from Ryan Kelly for such a long period of time. I think there is how we'll be fine as far as his recovery. The fact that he was out there in mini camp was really big step just to get him doing anything and taking warmups and so forth. I mean, that's stuff that a lot of times on an ACL tear, you might not see until midway through camp that a guy actually gets back out there. But there's another elephant in the room too, which is that we've already decided Donovan Jackson is like a really good left guard.

We don't know that. I mean, I think his athleticism, his intelligence, his work ethic, it's all on display in college and there's a good chance that he's a good left guard. But the learning curve is very steep for guys at that position. And if Darasaw doesn't start the season and his first couple of games are with somebody who can't help him out that much, then you know, you could get behind the eight ball a little bit and not end up where you want to end up overall though. I mean, I think if they are healthy, they are that unit.

I think Jackson will fit in really well. Like if I'm guessing, I think so. But there's definitely a world where this does not come together the way they thought it was going to. Yeah. I mean, so much about that rookies development is who's he playing next to, right? Is he playing next to one of the top five best left tackles in the NFL and one of the most veteran centers in the NFL?

Or is he playing next to a first time starter in Michael Juergens and a career backup swing tackle in Justin Skool? Right? There's just, that's a hard place to be as a center. Cause you, as a rookie, cause everyone kind of looks to you like, dude, you're the first rounder since you were the one out here kicking ass, right? Like I'm just trying to survive. I'm just trying to make it here.

I just don't want to get cut. Like you're not getting cut. I'm not getting, I'm the one's going to get cut. Right. And so that's a tough place for me versus if he can be out there and Kelly and CD can just settle him down. Hey, we got you. We're good.

We'll make sure we're lined up. We'll make sure the call is right. We'll make sure everyone's going where we need to be. Hey, if we slide left, get your butt out here and help me. Right. Those are just the type of calming things as a rookie. That'll be important to him. But I agree with you. The linchpin to this entire offensive line is Ryan Kelly.

Someone the other day, not to get off topic too much here, but someone the other day asked me about my welcome to the NFL as a reporter moment. And you can relate to that, which was in Chicago 2016, when we're thinking this Vikings team's gonna just go to the Superbowl, it's so good. And then the offensive coordinator's quitting, the head coach's eye is popping out and they're losing to a, I think maybe one in five, Jake Butler led team.

And I'm like, what is this football team that I have signed up to cover? What was, what was yours like to connect this to kind of Donovan Jackson? Like what was your, Oh man, I am in the national football league kind of moment. It was probably my, it was definitely my rookie year in practice when I got spun on by Dwight Freeney. And I was just kind of like, that was awesome yet terrifying all at the same time. Right. It was just one of those things where in practice, you know, you're like, okay,

he's going to spin, he's going to spin and then he wouldn't spin and you're okay, he's going to spin, he's going to spin and then he bull rush. He pushed and then all of a sudden you're like, okay, he's going to bull rush. And all of a sudden I remember he spun, he came down, he caught my inside hand perfectly with that elbow, like dead in the whole arm, cleared my shoulder with his hip and just right by the quarterback. And I was like, that was awesome. Like that was so freaking cool. Right. But then you're like, man, he does that. That was, I need to get

my game up because I don't know how to stop that. Like I had no way of stopping that. Like he had me cook. And I can remember having those type of moments like, Holy cow, these dudes are just a different breed. Like I'd never seen something like that before. And he was on the tail end of his career. Right, like I had never seen something like that before in my life. Just the technician and the way he set me up during practice and

then played me like a fiddle. Like it was a true, these are professionals and tacticians as pass rushers. When the guy goes into the Hall of Fame, he murdered me once in practice. That's pretty cool. That's been on Fridays. He had no touch Fridays. Don't touch him. Right. So he would literally pass rush. Don't touch me. And you're like, okay. And you just kind of said, yes, Mr. Freedy, right? You just sat and you're okay. The coach girls, sir, I'll

throw your hands like he doesn't want me to touch him. I don't, I don't know. It's Dwight. Freedy. You tell him. Very cool. So, uh, all Well, let's go around the league a little bit here. What would you like me to talk you out of in the National Football League for 2025? Talk me out of why the Carolina Panthers won't win the division. I think that that one. So Carolina is a team that I have been placing some bets on myself. I don't gamble, but just, you know, in terms of predictions and, you know, Dave

Canalis, I think Coach of the Year is one that I put in my bold predictions. Bryce Young showed a lot of signs last year and I think that they're doing some things right that are corrected from incompetence. In the couple of years previously, they spent a lot of money. They built up their defense a lot better than what it was last year. And what people don't talk about maybe enough with Carolina is that they actually have a really good offensive line and that started to show up last year for them. So I do think that they're good. And I do think that they are, or they're going to be good. They're going to be better.

But when you look at Tampa Bay, that team is still pretty stacked. I mean, who did Tampa Bay really lose this off season? They add another wide receiver in the draft. Baker Mayfield has taken that next step to being in the Kirk Cousins hall of fame of 10th best quarterback in the NFL who can get you 10 or 11 wins. And I think that that team is still very much the one to beat in that division. And Atlanta is a little more funky to me because you could definitely see a world where Michael Pennex Jr.

Takes that big next step. He's got the weapons to do it. It's got a running game. I think their offensive line is still decent, even though they lost Drew Dorman. They have a McVay connected coach who probably didn't do half of the stuff that he could have last year because Kirk cousins could run a bootleg so that they can take a big step forward. They've invested a

lot in their defense. I mean, they traded up from the second round. They traded this massive haul to get a pierce. So I think Carolina has got it a little tougher than maybe it would have been last year where that division was super down bad and the saints are just a disaster. But, but I think it's going to be a real race between those three teams. That could be one where it's coming down to the final week of the season and it's, you know, Carolina needs to win their last two games or something to get back in the playoffs. We just see this all the time. It actually reminds me of the, uh, the lions where they tanked in 2021 and then 2022, they start out one in six. I was like, ah, Dan Campbell, why don't

you go bite an ankle somewhere else? And then the light came on for them. And I think that kind of happened a little bit in Carolina at the end of last year. So I like them. I like your former Carolina Panthers for this year. I'm just not sure that they can quite beat the more mature teams right now. I, I liked the Panthers a lot. I mean, I remember watching them towards the end of the year. Last year, they took Kansas city right to the wire. They should have beat them, right? Every game towards the end of the year just felt like they took Kansas City right to the wire. They should have beat them, right? Every game towards the end of the year just felt like they were one play away from, from really winning that game. And I feel like they learned a lot from those games.

And I really, I really do think that Carolina has a chance to go out and if not win that division, be a wild card team in the NFC to make the, to make the playoffs, which is they have young talent everywhere, Xavier Leggett looks like he's going to take a big step on that piece there too. And I love their offensive line. They're physical. They get after guys. So super interesting to see what's going to happen in Carolina this year.

Okay. Talk me out of thinking you mentioned Kansas city thinking that Kansas cities run on top is done for now. Not that they're done forever or not that the homes is cooked or anything like that. There's still a great football team. But when we look at Buffalo, when we look at where Baltimore is at some other teams on the rise, like the Los Angeles chargers of Los Angeles, talk me into

them, not being that team that gets away with everything again this year and ends up much short of expectations that they've set over the last five years. Yeah. The biggest thing is the division. The AFC West now has four hall of fame coaches in it, right? Jim Harbaugh is probably the last on the list to get in, but he's still probably going to get in.

Pete Carroll's a hundred percent getting in. Sean Payton's getting in and Andy Reid's a hundred percent get in. Pete Carroll's 100% getting in. Sean Payton's getting in. And Andy Reid's 100% getting in. So just whoever can survive the gauntlet of the AFC West is going to just come out battered and bruised and limp their way into the playoffs. Like, oh, congratulations, you made it through. The other piece is there's just no way on God's greener they can get as lucky as they did last year. It just, it can't happen again. Like you can't have the blocked field goal at the end of the game against the Broncos to win that game. You can't have the dropped touchdown.

You can't have just everything that happened last year where you just were watching and going, is there a higher power at work here? Who did they sacrifice outside of Kansas City Stadium today to make that happen? I just feel like that stuff is going to come down because if you look at the one score games that they won last year, I mean, they easily could have been a 500 tee. And Travis Kelsey is getting older. He's really getting there. And so they're going to have to come back.

Rashid Rice is coming off that other injury. Xavier Worthy. I mean, they have the weapons and they have the talent to do it. They lose Joe Tooney, which I think is gonna really hurt. He was a very, very solid left guard for them. They're gonna have a new left guard and Kingsley Samantuiya, I think is how you say his name. He's gonna go in there the second round pick out of BYU. Right. And so you're just kind of looking there is some moving parts. Also, the

Chris Jones contract is gonna start hurting soon. The Patrick Mahomes contract is gonna start hurting. You're gonna have to start paying some of these younger guys, right? George Karloftis is going to come up to get paid again here soon. So I think that the thing that's going to derail them is the fact that they have really talented players that are all going to have to get paid. And then you, you lose certain pieces to your team. Like all of a sudden, can you afford to keep Drew Tranquil? Can you afford to keep some of these role players? Like, how do you, what do you do with Leo Chanel? Right? There's just so many of those things. And so

when that all starts culminating together, it's hard to keep the core group of guys that were on this Super Bowl dynasty team together forever. They started getting picked apart, going to different teams. You kind of have to start over at one point. I don't think it's going to be a start over for them as like, oh my gosh, they went nine and eight and finished the season third in the division, right? But for them, it's going to be, can we get to double digit wins and find a way to piece games together when the Broncos are on the rise,

the Chargers are on the rise? I don't know, I can't say that necessarily about the Raiders yet. Time will tell with Pete Carroll and Geno Smith, but they have a serviceable coaching quarterback to get, too. It's going to be really fascinating to watch because I think even if they make it through the AFC West, they're going to run into a Buffalo who's got no, no, no

one's going to challenge them in their division, right? You're going to run into Baltimore who's same thing, going to have to kind of beat their way through, but the Bengals, if they can put their lives together, they can figure it out. Like they're going to find a way into the playoffs. And I think they're going to be more beat up than the rest of the AFC. So I'm half talked in and half not talked in because you make very valid points about the Kansas city chiefs.

But then there's this guy who wears one five and just seems to always make it happen. And here's the thing too, about Andy Reed. If we go back a couple of years when they had Tyree kill there and they're throwing bombs down the field, just lighten everybody up, total game changer. And then defenses start to figure it out a little bit. They get an answer. And then what does Andy Reed do? All right, now we're going to go quick pass. And now we're going to go underneath. We're going to have 11 play drives. We're going to grind you out with the homes and his fantasy stats aren't going to be as good,

but he's going to win just as much. That type of adjustment tells me that they can make another one from where they were last year. And we should not underrate that Rashi rice was missed for the entire season. At the end of 2023, that guy was looking like kind of the next great yards after catch type of receiver, the next Debo Samuel type wide receiver, add that with Xavier Worthy and all of a sudden it's not Juju Smith Schuster anymore. It's two highly drafted, highly talented wide receivers that I think they're going to figure out some ways to deal with what they faced last year. When they got to the Super Bowl, it's like, we're talking about them as yeah, you know, I mean, they just weren't that great last year. They had a lot of signs of weaknesses. They were in the super bowl, right? Like the place,

the Vikings haven't been since the seventies. And we talk about that team as if they were just kind of mid. Uh, so I'm not fully into the idea that they're toast, but I went bold prediction that the chargers would win that division because I think they got a lot better during the off season. And it could be one of those things where their division just beats the absolute crap out of each other. And maybe they do have to win it with 10 or 11 games on the final week or something like that.

But it is a lot tougher. And if they mess around like they did last year in a lot of those games, they will not win because I think the teams that they're facing are going to be quite a bit better. Where do you want to go next? Talk me, talk me out of, trying to think of what, what quarterback I want to hear. Talk me out of why Jane Daniels won't win MVP next year. So this was in my bold predictions list that he would win MVP. So I don't. I did not know that, but I am happy now. I do not fully believe this, of course.

I mean, just to start out not playing the game. I mean, I think the guy is the just the real thing. Yeah, I think that's, you know it when you see it. And you could see it from space with him last year. But if he's not going to win MVP, it will be for a couple of reasons. I mean, number one is that defenses are good at their jobs. They know what they're doing. These defensive coordinators, they know how to find ways to counter punch against almost any quarterback. The only guys that we've never really seen that with are like Lamar Jackson,

except in the playoffs, Josh Allen, but even Mahomes, like finding ways to slow them down a little bit more. We've even seen Burrow frustrated at times throughout his career. So they're very knowledgeable at different answers and different ways to figure things out. And people sort of made fun of the cliff cliff, like cliff Kingsbury falling off because Daniels was so good at the end of the year, like, Oh, I guess that was a Kyler Murray thing. But is he going to adapt? You know this, if you don't grow from year to year as an offense,

if you roll out the same thing, then yeah, they're going to figure you out. So there might be an adjustment period based on that. The other thing is too, they are putting a lot of eggs in the basket of Debo Samuel, who has not been all that good for a couple of years. I mean, when, when was Debo Samuel's last like really great year? Was that like 2021? Was he all pro in 21? Could it, could be? That's a while. That's a while with Debo Samuel. He's been injured a lot. He's been frustrated a lot. And that yeah, I mean, he's always been a thick boy, but you know, like,

it doesn't look maybe doesn't have the same burst that he used to. Right. And I feel like he's always questionable for every single game. So then like who's next on their list for, oh, oh, well, if Debo isn't doing it, then it's this guy. The one thing they kind of developed last year that they lost some of these guys to free agency is they kind of had four dudes who would catch like 30 passes. Diami Brown was one of them. That other guy who I can't pronounce his name, like they just kind of had, Oh, that guy's today. That guy's today. And they also relied on Zach Ertz a lot. Who is he older than

you? Like Zach or he is right. Oh yeah. He is. I mean, so they're kind of making a lot of bets there on players who have had injury histories, who are a little bit older. So even as great as Daniel's might be, getting to an MVP level means having the maximum Debo Samuel, the maximum Zach Ertz. And it's very possible that he doesn't get that. Yeah. I mean, I think he's, he's primed to be the next great one.

If he can put it all together. I mean, the way that he can throw the football compared to when Lamar Jackson came into the league, I think is night and day, right? I think Lamar has developed tremendously as a thrower since he's become into the NFL, but the, the deep shots, the precision, the on the run throws that I think is night and day, right? I think Lamar's developed tremendously as a thrower since he's become into the NFL. But the deep shots, the precision, the on-the-run throws that Jayden Daniels had last year paired with that athleticism is an absolute lethal combo. And also the reason, I mean, main reason I think maybe not is because he's got an also pretty tough division too, right? I mean, like you said, the Cowboys aren't what they, what they have been, but they've still got, I mean, they still have Micah Parsons.

He's still there. It's going to be chasing you down. Right. They still have guys. I mean, the Eagles are still extremely scary up front and they're going to find ways to try and hurt you. So, and then the Giants, the Giants defensive front on paper looks like a top 10 defensive front, right?

Abdul Carter, Kavon Thibodeau, Brian Burns, right? Dexter Lawrence. You're like, yeah, those are pretty good players if, uh, oh yeah. And Abdul Carter that we drafted in the first round. So you started looking at that. I mean, there's going to be a lot of defensive fronts. He's going to face this year that are going to be super, super talented. All right.

Talk me out of, and this is where it gets tricky with the talk me out of game. I think we've mostly navigated it fine, but this one you might struggle with. Talk me out of thinking that Caleb Williams doesn't take the next step. So this is like a double negative. But if you follow along, you're talking me out of Caleb Williams, not taking the next step and still kind of being his problematic, but also exciting Caleb Williams. So you're talking me into him taking the next

step if those are for those following it. He's going to take the next step, right? That is what my argument is. Yeah. So Caleb Williams takes the next step for two reasons. Number one, Ben Johnson, Ben Johnson, clearly number one. I mean, when Jared Goff showed up to Detroit, all of us were kind of like, Oh, it's golf going to Detroit to die. Like we're all quarterbacks would go to die at Cleveland, Detroit. And all of us, no one ever thought he was going to be able to do what he did with Jared Goff in that offense and turn it around the way he did. You look at what Caleb Williams did last year.

And if the rumor is true that no one taught him how to watch film or no one watched film with them or any other, that nonsense, then Ben Johnson probably hit that right in the head and goes, OK, you want to watch film? You meet with me at 5 a.m. You stay till 6 p.m. with me and we're going to watch film and you're going to know everything that I know. And that's how you want this to be. And that's how you want us to do. Tell your dad to put that in his book, right? Move forward. Right. And so I think that's a big piece there is the mentorship from Ben Johnson to that offensive line group is legit. Legit. They go out and they get Joe Tooney. They go out and get Drew Dahlman. They go and get Jonah Jackson from LA. Darnell Wright on the right tackle side., they have a very, very solid offensive line

that he can rely on in the run game now. Because Ben Johnson is going to run the football. That's in his DNA, I think that's what he wants to do. And so he's gonna take that off of Caleb Williams' plate. He's gonna rely more on running the football and then let Caleb be exciting when he has to be, not out of necessity. And if Caleb can do those two things, rely

on his offensive line, take the mentorship from Ben Johnson, and lastly, just not be an emotional, like, narcissist player, he'll be just fine. But like that third part is one of those things where I don't know, can he be that person? Because I remember watching him cry in mama's arms in the, in the stadiums. And I remember the, the issues and the drama and all that. Can he put that in the box and shut the box and go, This is about ball? Or is it going to be about my painted fingernails? Is it going to be about my IG? Is it going to be my game day fit? Like, is that what it's about? Or is it about the ball? And I think if Ben Johnson can get him focused and go, Hey, take care of the ball, the rest will follow. He has enough God-given and natural talent to go out and be a great one,

but he's going to have to rely on a lot of people in his corner. And then he's going to have to take those next steps, not let the outside noise affect him. The thing. So I'm like half talked into this one too, because I think he will clearly take another step forward. The, all the experience that's been banked from last year. And if you even survive a year with Matt Eberfluss, 68 sacks or whatever, it was, it's got, it's gotta go up, right? It has to improve, but there's a Trevor Lawrence comparison that's just lived in my brain of, yeah, Trevor Lawrence had all the excuses of playing with urban Meyer and everything else in his first year. But he also showed some of the realities of Trevor Lawrence, that he's not a perfect quarterback. He's

not the next Andrew Luck. He's not the next Peyton Manning. He's just a really talented guy with some flaws. And I think the same thing goes for Caleb Williams, but the whole thing about not learning how to watch film. Okay. You know, sometimes guys come out 10 years later after they've had a good career and they're like, Oh man, when I was a rookie, that place was a mess. And you know, nobody taught me anything and I was really frustrated. But if you hear it in year two, where you're sort of airing the dirty laundry about like the previous regime, it was their fault. Reminds me of an old friend, EJ Manuel, way back in Buffalo. I'm sure you heard about him when you were there, but EJ was a great guy.

So I don't want to sound like this sounds personal, but after his first year with Doug Morrone as their coach, then Morrone actually did get fired. He just quit, which is anyway, that's a whole other story. But there was, there was this kind of like blame game that went on with, well, you know, it was the previous coach. He didn't do this right. He didn't do that right. And, and now you know, it was the previous coach. He didn't do this right. He didn't do that right. And, and now I can really be myself as a quarterback.

And I remember those training camp interviews of him talking about like, oh, the shackles are off now and I can really, you know, be who I want to be. As a quarterback, he ended up as QB three that year, uh, out of training camp. And it was just a lot of trying to talk himself into it and a lot of excuses to not admit some of the weaknesses that were there. And I think if you're going to be a great quarterback, you have to really live in reality to be a great quarterback.

You have to live in a world where you watch that tape and you go, this has to be better. This is on me. I need to do this better because if you just watch it and look for excuses, well, you're not going to get a whole heck of a lot out of it. But the infrastructure is better. The coach is better. Having an offensive minded coach to pair with him is better and we know how good Ben Johnson is at this. He'll he'll be better. They're going to win games. Is he going to be the guy that was promised? That is where I am not quite talked into.

Uh, here's what I want you to do. I want you to talk me out of. How do I want to, man, I'm so used to talk to me. I know you have to phrase them differently. Well, cause what I really want to, what I really want to touch on is some team that everyone hates and no one is talking about. And then like talk me into them, but I'm trying to reverse engineer how that has to be said.

Talk me out of thinking the Browns will be a tough opponent. I got it. I, okay. I'm with you. All right. Kevin Stefanski rallied the troops. He got them all into the, into the, into the, into the compound this year and said, Hey, doesn't matter anymore, boys. Deshaun Watson, no Deshaun Watson. We've got Kenny Pickett, Deshaun, or Shajur

Sanders, Dylan Kaver. We got our pick of the literate quarterback, man. We can do whatever we want. We have the freakiest freak in Miles Garrett on the other side. I think Cleveland this year, God, this is not easy. I think Cleveland is gonna be a tough opponent based off the fact that they have some veteran players that have been in that organization for a long time, understand how that organization is run, the culture that has been built. I think they've built a lot of grit and toughness over the last couple years,

battling through the nonsense. I think if they can find a serviceable quarterback out of one of those four of Kenny Pickett, Joe Flacco, Dylan Gabriel, Shider Sanders, if he can come out and be serviceable out of any of those, they'll figure it out. Could I name you one wide receiver off the Cleveland Browns right now? No, I cannot. So I apologize, but I do still think that they have been Joku, who's a fantastic tight end, who will be able to throw the ball to a lot. So he'll be able to stretch the defense down the middle. But other than that, that's about as much as I can give you for the Cleveland Browns. You did a bad job.

I did. I'm sorry. There's no way I could spit it. They're a bad football club. That's a bad bad football club. That's a bad ball football club. I think the only way you get there is by pointing out the games in London and you never really know what's going to happen in London. And just to say that if Miles Garrett has an amazing game, you can always lose to them. I mean, they do have

some guys in the secondary. They do have it. So if McCarthy is going overseas playing in a weird environment and it gets sloppy and the field is slick and it's ugly, like it was against the jets, there's always a chance. I mean, they almost lost the game to the jets last year. They gave up that, almost gave up that lead and Rogers is driving to win the game. And that's a five win football team that fired its coach right after. So you can always have something go wrong in London. But I thought that we were too easy on each other

and wanted to give you a challenging one. So that's a tough one. Cause you look, like I said, I don't know one receiver on that roster. Like I was trying to find like weapons. Oh yeah. You have who came there and then, but they got rid of Chubb, right?

Chubb was no longer, he's a free agent. So I'm just trying to think of the weapons on that team. I'm like, there's just. None. Like that's not a scary football team by any stretch of the imagination. Okay. Let's, uh, let's wrap on this. Since that was a disaster for you. I know that was not good. That was not good. Let's just go with, uh,

I started off by just talking about the excitement level of this whole thing. What, what, what have you, what are you feeling as we get into to training camp about this team? Like what's the, what's not, not the analytical, not the X's and O's, but the you're a former Minnesota Viking. This is a pretty cool time. Like what's in your brain? My brain right now is looking at this roster and going, I think it's better than the 2017 roster, right? Looking at it going, OK, from top to bottom, from offensive weapons to pass rushers, I think you could put it up

and mirror the 2017 roster and go better, little worse, better, little worse, but it's not going to have these drastic yo-yos between the positions of it's not like, Oh, you have Linville, Joseph and Bullard, no offense, Bullard, right? But you can kind of go through and start comparing. It's like, you know, Everson Griffin. Well, you have Jonathan Grenard, right? Well, we had Adam Thielen. It's like, well, you've Justin Jefferson now. Like that's a pretty big pitch. You have Jordan Addison, Kyle Rudolph, TJ Hawkinson.

Right. And I think the offensive line across the board, and I love those boys. Like I think they're younger and they're a little bit more seasons and grizzled then, you know, Joe Berger, who was a career backup forever. Love him. He was a great player. He wasn't an all pro like Ryan Kelly was. Right.

You look at our tackles, we had Matt Khalil and he kind of got, he, him, he was a great player. He wasn't an all pro like Ryan Kelly was, right? You look at our tackles, we had Matt Kalil, and he kind of got, no, he was gone in 17. We had Mike Remmers, right? We had Mike Remmers, who, Carolina's trash, Vikings treasure, just like they picked up. And so you're just looking and going, there's just more talent, and a lot of positions on this roster.

And that's a super exciting place to be going into the season, because make make no mistake and everyone who listens to The show or watches the NFL talent wins football games, right? You can scheme you can do everything you put these guys in positions But it's the talent dude that go out there Daymending game out that win football games on a week to week basis and I think this roster is loaded with talent I think they have the sky's the limit for what they can do They've got a great head coach who's got a great culture set in the building. It's going to come down to one player and one player only. How does

your quarterback play? How does your young quarterback, how does your gunslinger, how does the guy who touches the ball on every single play, how does he make this offense go or stall or fall? And if he can do that, I mean, I think the sky's the limit for this team, which is super exciting to be as a Vikings fan because we're not here super often where we're going into a season going, this is a Superbowl team right now. Right now this, we have to prove it here. This team's got to show us here. We've got to see it from the D line in the first couple of weeks, whatever, like going in week one on paper, this is a Superbowl contending team, week zero.

And in the NFC until Jayaden Daniels does become that dude, it's been roster driven in the NFC. It's been quarterback driven in the AFC and roster driven in the NFC. Well, you have a top three roster in the entire NFC. And if sometimes we talk about quarterback as if it's totally separate or something from the supporting cast, which is preposterous because it's so much driven by the supporting cast as you

saw from case Keenum in 2017. But I mean, there's hundreds of examples in NFL history, whether it's recently with Purdy, with Garoppolo, with Jalen hurts, who I think is tremendous, but environment matters going back to Randall Cunningham in 98 or Kurt Warner or the many, many, many, again, it matters and you're not going to find a better one in the NFL than what JJ McCarthy is inheriting right now. So I think that the excitement from the fans and yourself is very much justified, but we got to wait 20 more days until we get to even training camp.

So I can't, it is our last, we don't have another month without football. You're right. Until February hall of fame game 31st of July. We have football every month until February. My friend, we have made it. We are back. And thank you NFL for not putting the Vikings in that game. Despite Jared Allen going in. I did not want that in my life. I need to ramp up those pre charges rookies report July 9th because they can report a week early. So they report July 9th, like literally an eight week training camp at old school and good night to your summer. So I hope you enjoy your Independence Day and the rest of your summer. You and I will definitely get together again during training camp. And then Tuesday

morning left guard will ride in the place where we had talked about for so many years. That's what's great about having all the banked podcasts from five years ago. And we're talking about, yeah, they need to draft a quarterback and build the roster around them and the offensive line and they need to draft linemen. And here we are with everything we ever asked for. Now they just got to go do it. Jeremiah Searles, you are the best, my friend. We will talk again very soon. Football, football.