Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Is the price to trade going up or down as we approach the draft?

Episode Date: April 5, 2024

Matthew Coller opens up the mailbag to answer your Vikings questions in this FansOnly episode. Do the Vikings have a favorite QB prospect? Is Justin Jefferson's contract extension holding up the team's plans for trading up? Do late rising QBs pan out? https://surfshark.deals/PURPLEINSIDER Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

hey everybody welcome to another episode of purple insider matthew collar here and this is another fans only episode where i answer all fan questions that have been emailed to me over at purpleinsider.com. Just go to the contact us, shoot me an email, or you can hit me up on Twitter at Matthew Collar. Fire me a DM with your question and we'll get it into the show. Lots to talk about leading up to the NFL draft. So get your questions in and I will make sure that I answer them here on the show. So let's not waste any time. Kick it right off with an email that came from John, who said, I haven't heard any other rumors that we are doing private workouts with May or any

quarterback besides McCarthy. Would it be safe to assume that we like McCarthy more or is it more due diligence? So there was a report that they were meeting with Michael Penix, but the thing about all draft related reports and items is that the teams don't announce what they're doing all the time. In fact, almost never do they announce what they're doing. So the Vikings are very, very likely to meet with every one of these quarterbacks that could potentially be drafted in the first round. And maybe some

quarterbacks, even though we don't expect like Spencer Rattler, we could see that happening potentially. Uh, but they don't have to tell anybody that they're doing it when, where, how, what type of workout they're putting the guy through. So it's only if a reporter finds out, which often happens through the agent telling someone or a team, I guess, letting an insider know that they're doing their due diligence. But if the Vikings aren't doing that, then you're not finding out. But this is a process that Kevin O'Connell talked about at the owners meetings that is extremely, extremely important to him. And this is why when the Vikings don't show up at somebody's pro day, then we see, oh, well, they weren't at this guy's pro

day. But O'Connell said, don't look into that at all because the pro days just are not that important to Kevin O'Connell in comparison to these private workouts that I almost guarantee you every one of these quarterbacks, probably outside of Caleb Williams, they will go, they will put that guy through a workout. They'll get in a whiteboard with him. They'll look at film. Kevin O'Connell will sit down with these guys. And he talked about that process, what he's looking for, what it means to him to be able to sit in a room and simulate what it's going to be like to work with these quarterbacks as they make the decision of, do you want to try to trade it all for Drake May? Are you comfortable with trading two firsts for J.J. McCarthy?

Or would you rather stick and pick at 11 because you really fell in love with Bo Nix or Michael Pennix? All those things are potentially on the table, but Kevin O'Connell can't decide which his favorite option is without spending that sit down time with these quarterbacks and to take things that they look at on film and at the whiteboard and then take them out into a field and do a little bit of a workout. And you saw from the Gruden camp, which I think was a very good simulation of what this is really like. And if you haven't seen those, go back and watch them on YouTube where John Gruden would take the guy out onto the field

and give him a play call. And then they'd have to go into a huddle with a couple of receivers, give the play call, go through what they were supposed to do with the read. And just for him to get a sense of what they were like to work with and how quickly they could put it in their mind and then take it out to the field. I mean, that is a huge part of playing quarterback in the NFL is just to be able to see something on paper and then see it on the field and be able to translate it. So they're going to do that with everyone that they could potentially draft, not just McCarthy. And look, we don't really know for sure if McCarthy is

someone that they would love. It's just everybody putting the dots together of, Hey, the Vikings need a quarterback, a hundred 100% they need a quarterback. So look at the quarterbacks in this draft class. Can you actually get your hands on Drake May? It's not clear that they're going to be able to. And McCarthy has a lot of momentum coming out of winning a national championship, the way that he handled the NFL combine, all those things have played into his hype and his rise throughout this time. So we're really looking at it as there's a top four, and then there's a second tier of two other quarterbacks that may not turn out to be right on draft night, but if it is right, then the Vikings have to land one of those four.

So you're going to look at McCarthy closely and say, is he worth trying to get ourself into that top four? Or would it be better to get the second tier, second tier prospect, only not have to spend all the draft capital? These are decisions that can only be made if Kevin O'Connell sits down with these quarterbacks. So no, I don't think that it is an indicator just what's been reported of who they might like. I think that they'll sit down with everybody. And I also believe that Kevin O'Connell will not tell anybody. I'm not even

sure that by the end of this, Kevin O'Connell's family is going to know who he wants to be his quarterback because that's what teams do. I remember that with Mac Jones, that everyone in the world assumed that the 49ers were in on Mac Jones. And there was a story after that draft that John Lynch and Kyle Shanahan were the only people in the entire organization who knew that they were targeting Trey Lance at the top of that draft. It did not turn out to be a great decision for the 49ers, but they were the only ones who knew. And that's why you didn't see any reports about it. So that's draft season for you, but I promise you the Vikings are going to do their diligence with every one of these quarterbacks before they make their decision,

which is probably the reason why we have not gotten this trade up yet. If it's going to happen and it still could take all the way until draft night, we'll find out. But yeah, I don't think that there's any way looking at mock drafts or looking at reports or looking at who they visited with to figure out what the Vikings plan actually is inside their heads. We can only put it together using our logic. And with that said, if it is McCarthy, you can see why that would be a very good fit with Kevin O'Connell though. Next question from Andrew.

Does the timing of the JJ contract have anything to do with the Vikings when the Vikings will pull the trigger on a trade up in the draft? No, I don't believe so at all. I don't think that the draft or the quarterback situation is related to Justin Jefferson really at all. I mean, with Justin Jefferson, if we think about players as independent contractors who are trying to negotiate the best thing for them, then we can kind of reduce some of the noise around a contract negotiation like Justin Jefferson and focus on what it really comes down to. What it really comes down to with Justin Jefferson is the CBA and the fact that they have two

franchise tags in their pocket that they can use. That's really important here to the Minnesota Vikings and their negotiating power. The fact that we all know he's going to be the highest paid receiver, that he's going to be a major reason why the next guy can succeed at quarterback. That's also a part of this too, that Justin Jefferson had a good relationship with Kirk Cousins, but Kirk Cousins is certainly not the only person under the sun who can heave a pigskin in the general direction of Justin Jefferson. And I'm sure he realizes that, but it really comes down to the money and the years and how they're going to put together and

structure this contract that would be holding it up from last year. And there's things like new money. How much money would you get over if we franchise tagged you, which usually is kind of a starting point to the negotiation. How much is fully guaranteed, which is a huge part. How many years you're looking at? Are you looking at a three, four or five year contract? Does Jefferson want the shorter deal like DK Metcalf? Does he want a longer deal to give the team a little more flexibility? I mean, with his salary cap, where they can reduce some of his cap numbers, which we saw someone like Patrick Mahomes do in his deal. I mean, there are so many different ways that you can set up a contract that it takes a lot of discussion between his side and the

Viking side to actually get to that point. But at the end of the day, Justin Jefferson has to realize that it's so much more favorable for him to get the guaranteed money up front, get the signing bonus, get that huge chunk of cash in his pocket right now, rather than trying to play this thing out. So this isn't any different really than any other negotiation that we've seen from top players though, where a lot of times coming out of their rookie contract, it takes time. It takes all the way deep into August, into early September before they can agree on a deal because there are so many details to be worked out of just even the general structure of a contract that's going to be this massive. That's really what the holdup is. Also, just in the cadence of how offseasons work, sometimes you will see in March or April or February that there is a contract extension.

It does happen. But for the Vikings, traditionally, the way that it's gone is they go through the free agency, they go through the draft, and this is unless there is a deadline to get an extension done before a certain trigger date. They'll go through on a rookie contract all the way through the beginning of August or just before training camp. And that's when they'll work out the deal. So the negotiating will be happening and getting started in the summer around mini camp. But normally, I mean, we saw this with Delvin Cook where it went right before the season when Stefan Diggs signed his deal. It was a couple weeks into camp. Xavier Rhodes, same thing, couple weeks into camp.

TJ Hawkinson last year. I mean, I could think of a ton of these off the top of my head that usually happen in training camp at some point. So that's my expectation with Justin Jefferson. I don't think it's connected at all to this thing that's happening with the quarterback situation. I guess if the Vikings somehow came away with no rookie quarterback at all to this thing that's happening with the quarterback situation. I guess if the Vikings somehow came away with no rookie quarterback at all, maybe there would be some more trepidation

on Justin Jefferson's part, but I really don't think that it's connected as far as with the trade up. I think once the Vikings acquired that 23rd pick, we saw their plan. They revealed their plan to us that they want to trade up. They want to try to get to the very top of the draft. They didn't really hide that at the owner's meetings. This is what they want. And they're going to try to focus on the quarterback decision now and then turn their focus as an organization to Jefferson as we get throughout the summer. So it is going to take us all just kind of being patient and working our way through. And Hey, look, maybe it'll be funny. Some of the ailments that Justin Jefferson might come down with, like it was last year with Hawkinson, but remember TJ Hawkinson, a lot of

Vikings fans were getting worked up over Hawkinson. He's not worth it, whatever. Then they worked out the deal. We saw the structure of the deal. He played great. Everybody moved on. I would expect the same thing happens with Justin Jefferson. And if I'm wrong, then we'll talk about it when we get there. But just going off of history, that's how it's almost always gone. This question comes from T.A. Shelvis. Says, do you know if a four-point field goal has ever been proposed in the past, maybe a plus 65 yarder? I don't believe that it's ever actually been proposed

by a competition committee that it's ever been discussed. But just for you, T.A., I decided to Google this and look up if it's ever been a discussion anywhere. And it turns out that, and I didn't remember this because maybe I never saw one, that NFL Europe had a four-point field goal. And I discovered this from an article in the Washington Post by a writer named Bob Levy from 2003. And you guys are really going to enjoy the, this article because I went through this and thought, yeah, football was in a bit of a different spot 20 years ago with the way we were

talking about it. So Bob Levy, Washington post 2003 decided to propose in one of the nation's largest newspapers, a four point field goal. This is the only place I can ever find anyone saying that the NFL should do this, but he wrote the awful truth. Pro football has become a stone cold bore. Imagine that imagine pro football being a stone cold bore. Uh, NFL athletes do next to nothing to vault you out of your chair, says Bob Levy. And later on in the article, he comes up with a solution. He says, here comes the cure-all for the no-fun league, a four-point field goal. NFL Europe already offers it and has since the league opened for business in 1991.

If a place kick travels more than 50 yards over there, a team gets one more point than if a place kick doesn't. That means four-point field goal is possible anytime the ball is on the opponent's 34 or 35. Wow. I mean, with kickers now, they'd be just banging home every time a team got to the 35-yard line, 50-yard field goals. And so it has been proposed by this writer who was very bored

with the NFL way back in 2003, but that's the only time that I've ever heard of it. You're right that we would have to do 65 plus at this point. I don't need that. I have never thought that I needed that at any point. It's the same with the four point shot in basketball. Don't need that. I think that the NFL, now that they've fixed the kickoffs is pretty close to perfect if they copy. And maybe some of you actually saw this, the UFL brilliant, absolutely brilliant. And by the way, the kickoff came from the XFL. So these leagues are always being used as test cases, but the genius of the UFL, and this was used in the XFL as well. They give us on TV, the referees talking with the reviewers and they do instant reviews in a snap. So they will review something. They'll go up to

Dean Blandino, who is in the review center. He's got all these TV screens. He takes a look at it. He tells them back on the field. We play on. It's great. The reason to watch the UFL is for one, a center caught a 50 yard touchdown. I mean, that's a reason to watch. There's a lot of great stories. It's good football. I enjoy it, but it's check this out. You have to check out this replay system that they have that the NFL will absolutely have to implement at some point very soon. So that's the change I want. I don't need the four point field goal, but I, that to me is just going too far. It would be interesting only for the schematic of, do you actually try a four-point field goal if you are in that range?

If you've got the ball at what, the 48-yard line, do you run out your kicker for a 67-yarder to see if you can get four points? That to me is going a little too far indoor football-ish, but I don't think we'll ever see it. It would be interesting for maybe like a preseason game to try it, but I don't know, man. I can't get on board with the four-point field goal. RW asks, how about calling the Giants and offering 11 and 23 to get six? Takes your greatest threat off the table, and if they say no, we can assume that they want a quarterback. Hey, you're playing 3d

chess RW. I really appreciate that. That's a, that's an interesting plan. The only issue is if you get to six, then Denver can maybe get to four. If they decide to give everything that they have to the Arizona Cardinals, if the Cardinals are actually going to move. Now, one thing is that the Cardinals and Chargers might not be interested in moving because when you look at the caliber of wide receiver that's there, and remember, DeAndre Hopkins and Keenan Allen both used to play for Arizona and the Chargers, and those guys no longer do. So they don't have the superstar wide receivers. This draft has two guys that are

considered next level franchise caliber type of receiver prospects. They may want to stick and pick. We've kind of gone on the assumption that Arizona would be more willing to move out of that spot or the chargers more willing to move out of that spot because they're not looking at quarterbacks. But if they're moving all the way down to 11 or 12 where the Broncos are or 13 where the Raiders are, you're not getting one of those top players. And so if you think that they're going to stick and pick, then the Giants do become a potential team to look at if they're not going to draft a quarterback and you know the Giants just need players and so this is a scenario that we have not really talked about or considered at all because of the fact that the Giants have been connected to the quarterback class as well and

that they've been viewed as a pretty big threat but when I was looking at their roster yesterday, I was doing a piece on ranking the supporting casts and looking at their roster and whole buddy, it's ugly. It is ugly. I mean, they, they got a couple of wide receivers who you would love to have as wide receiver three, and that's about as good as it gets. Darren Waller always plays half the season. Their offensive line has pretty much one guy to work with. The defense needs a lot of work. They just lost one of their top players in free agency. This is a team that needs two first round draft picks. So I haven't considered that, but maybe we shouldn't count out the Giants as a potential option if the Vikings believe

that the other two teams are going to stay at their spots and pick at four and five, because if you make that deal to trade up to number six and then Denver gets to number four and then four quarterbacks go off the board and you're going, uh, Dallas Turner, I guess. I mean, that, that would be the biggest fear in that instance is that you would get up to six, assuming that the other two teams were going to stick and pick, and then you end up losing out on the quarterbacks because of that. And then I don't know what they do in that spot. Do you just pick Michael Penix there because you have to, and then you tell everybody that he was always a first round top 10 pick on your

board? I honestly don't know. So that would be the biggest concern there. But if you're doing it for intel purposes to try to find out if they want the quarterback at number six, that's pretty clever. I gotta say, that's some pretty clever. That's, hey, look, Kevin O'Connell's dad was in the FBI. You're playing some FBI games there with the New York Giants.

But to me, you got to go a little higher if you can. And that's why it may be based on this whole decision. It may be based on how much intel they have and what they believe that other teams are going to do, whether they can trade up to three, four or five or even potentially six. And that's why there's so many scenarios on the table when it comes to this, but much respect for your three-dimensional chess there. Hey, U.S. cellular customers, I've got good news. So don't hit that skip forward button just yet. I'm talking about their special customer event, Us Days. What's Us Days? It means exclusive offers just for their customers, just to say thanks, like up to $1,200 to upgrade to any new phone. No, I didn't misread that.

That's up to $1,200 off. They must really like you all. Us Days at cellular exclusive offers just for you just to say thanks right now us cellular customers get up to twelve hundred dollars to upgrade to any new phone terms apply all right uh sam h says what would the vikings do oh so this is actually kind of related to what we were just talking about. What would the Vikings do if they traded up to five and then someone jumped in front of them at four to take the quarterback they wanted? Do they trade down in that scenario? That would be wild.

So they're thinking Arizona is going to stay. They've already traded their first couple of draft picks. They get to number five. And then suddenly on draft night, it goes quarterback, quarterback, quarterback. Arizona at the last minute says, you know what? Actually, Denver's given us the house. They're giving us Pat Sertan at cornerback. And they're also giving us multiple three first round draft picks.

They went all in because they want JJ McCarthy. And now the Vikings are stuck holding the bag at number five. And if we look after that though, you know, you got the giants who could draft the quarterback, then you've still got, you know, another couple of teams that are around that could take a QB, including the Raiders. So if you were going to trade back out of that position, who's going to move up is a question. Maybe somebody wants one of the wide receivers and you can slide back. So that would be, man, that would be crazy. You're, you're going up thinking you're getting the quarterback. Then you're going, uh, uh, oh,

uh, like that, uh, Jif where the baby kind of runs into the room and then gets scared and turns around. Like that would be the Vikings version in the draft running into the room. Oh, and now we're running back out back to the whatever number pick. Maybe you're moving back to like what? Seven, eight, nine, 10. Well, you know, 10 with the jets might be an interesting one to trade back with if they want a wide receiver to give Aaron Rogers right away. That would be a chaotic scenario but i don't think it's the worst thing of all time if they still end up with multiple players because that's as we're laying out the scenarios here the ones that are acceptable are going all the way up for drake may trading enough to get jj mccarthy but not so much that you ruin your life.

And then also if you get two players in the first round, if you get a quarterback, but then also end up with, uh, you know, another defensive player, a cornerback, a defensive tackle and so forth. I mean, we haven't really talked as much about the cornerback class, but I've looked at, you know, Terry and Arnold or Kool-Aid McKinstry, uh, you know, Quinion Mitchell is a guy that maybe is going a little too high for the Vikings to get, but if they landed two players, that's still a favorable situation. Even if it looks really goofy as you're proposing, I doubt that it will. I think by the time you get there, you're going to have a good sense of what everybody else is doing, what the offer is that they're going to have to top. And look, if Arizona's not taking

the Vikings offer with two first rounders this year, then how is Denver getting ahead of that? That's why you trade for number 23 is that you're really saying this is going to be us or nobody with the best offer to trade up. But that is a chaos scenario for sure. Casey Vikings fan here. Could you do an analysis specifically on quarterbacks that rise up the draft board in the weeks before the draft and how many come close to living up to the hype? My instinct is that they don't. So I asked an analytics expert on this, Tej Seth, who works for Sumer Sports. He's come on the show a number of times and he had done some work on this unsurprisingly. And yet your instinct is largely correct on the broader spectrum, on the all draft picks ever from the last whatever number of years that have gone to the combine,

come out of the combine with way better draft stock than they went in, like J.J. McCarthy, because I know what you're getting at here with J.J. McCarthy and his sudden rise up the board, because even going into the NFL combine using the site grinding the mocks or mock draft database, both do kind of the same thing. They will show where consensus boards had these players. And you can see it's very clear shoots right up to the top. So I started looking through, I just went quarterback by quarterback to try to find similar rises to the top with this position specifically, because one of the things that makes it noisy on the broader spectrum is wide receivers who show up and run an amazing 40 and then suddenly get overdrafted.

And that goes for defensive ends that have a great combine linebackers that get overrated because of their ceiling and so forth. And quarterbacks are just kind of a different animal when it comes to the evaluation, because so much less of it is just pure athleticism and more is all the other stuff. The tape is so important. The accuracy, the throwing technique, and now we have quarterbacks who are doing even less. So a guy going to the combine and doing everything, JJ McCarthy was getting credit for this from

draft analysts and even Rick Spielman was getting credit for this from draft analysts and even Rick Spielman on his podcast for just doing it for even just showing up. So that's going to change the evaluation in the future. But what I found was very little connection with recent quarterbacks, sudden rises or falls and the success rate. So someone like Kenny Pickett, for example, was a borderline second round draft pick. And by before the draft, he was being mocked as high as in the top six or seven. And, you know, he ends up being taken number 20, but he did have a sudden rise from being kind of a borderline first round to second round pick to being considered a first round pick. He didn't

work out, but there are a few other guys that had a similar rise. One was Joe Burrow. Joe Burrow was a potential first round prospect in the off season before his final year at LSU and then became a consensus obvious number one pick. It's turned out to be a tremendous quarterback. Josh Allen was another one that was maybe a mid-first round pick throughout Wyoming's season, especially since he didn't play that well. He ends up going at the top and had a sudden rise in the mock drafts before. Turns out to be great.

But there's plenty of examples of guys who, you know, even some who are expected to be drafted higher, like Justin Fields and Josh Rosen that dropped and they ended up being busts. I actually think that a drop from the expected is probably more of an indicator than a rise. So if someone, or put it this way, if the mocks have somebody in the top three, top five, and they're actually picked 20th or in the second round, like Will Levis, that's probably more of an indicator of a bust than it is if someone reaches on a quarterback because reaching on a quarterback just isn't a bad idea. It certainly happened with Daniel Jones

where the Giants reached, but there have been other examples of that where the mock drafts had somebody as not being quite as high, a team quote reached for the positional value. And the guy works out like it happens all the time. I don't think there's any real rhyme or reason to it when it comes to this position specifically. Now, if you told me that there was a wide receiver that maybe this is worthy from Texas, a wide receiver who was not really considered a first rounder that suddenly was after he ran an insane 40. Well, that's a different story for me than it is for quarterback. So yes, there is something to what you're saying. I think your instinct is generally overall correct, but with quarterbacks, I wouldn't be terrified of J.J. McCarthy just because he ends up having that sudden rise.

Brandon writes to ask with more reports coming out, seemingly like teams are almost begging for someone to bump up the price and trade with them. Maybe the price actually won't be that bad. I appreciate your optimism, but I'm guessing that the price is probably going to be pretty high. And, you know, the thing is we can use a lot of draft charts. We can use the Jimmy Johnson draft chart. You guys always hear about at draft time, or there's been other more analytical charts that have popped up through the years.

And we could say, oh, well, you know, if they only trade this and that, then, you know, they've got a good chance to get the other team to give them the number three overall pick or number four overall pick. But in this draft, there's just another part of it that makes this a lot harder, which is number one. The team at three also has a good case for drafting a quarterback, which means the price better absolutely blow them away in order for them to sacrifice that chance to take Jaden Daniels or to take Drake May. And then there's the other part of it. If you're Arizona, there is a quote generational wide receiver prospect. So again, if you want them to sacrifice taking that caliber of prospect at number four, then you better wow the Arizona Cardinals. And I think that every general manager is right to say, hey, we're open for business.

Come make a call and we'll see. Because all of them know that historically there have been a few of these trades and Herschel Walker is involved in this. But also, heck, the Trey Lance trade up seems pretty nuts at this point. And there have been others like Mike Ditka giving away his whole draft for Ricky Williams. Like this has happened in the past. So you always have to say, Hey, we're open for business. Feel free to give us a call and we'll talk potential trade.

But in this instance, with multiple teams talking about trading up and plenty of reason for the teams at the top to stay where they are, I just think that the price is going to be extremely high. The thing that the Vikings have going for them, though, with the price being very high, is that they can afford it. Being able to get the number 23 pick without giving up a whole heck of a lot for the future, that's really helpful to the Vikings case because then they can top anything else that other teams can put together.

So if you're the Broncos and you say, all right, three firsts, well, you got to wait for those three firsts. And you know what front offices don't love to do is wait, because that means that's drafting a player that's developing them, that's not getting them in their prime till usually year two, year three. So if you can get it right away, then that's just a lot more helpful. And the Vikings giving away those two picks to potentially move up also doesn't really crush them

because they have so many of the star talents that you'd be looking for on offense already in place. The best argument for the Patriots to move down is that they lack those things. KJ Osborne and Kendrick Bourne are their best wide receivers. That's not like having Justin Jefferson and Jordan Addison. So the Vikings are able to do this and not destroy their future because they have pieces in place. But if they make a trade, if they do pull it off,

it's probably going to be at an extreme cost that will make people clutch pearls. Oh no, the Vikings gave up how much for J.J. McCarthy? That's too much. And then if he becomes great, no one will ever mention it again. But I think that if I was guessing right now, I would probably say that we'll be more likely surprised that the price is so high rather than it is so low, but you never know. This one comes from Jens or maybe Jens, depending on where you're coming from. Everybody assumes

that the Vikings want to move up to get one of the top four quarterbacks, but what if they came away from the evaluation loving Pennix or Knicks? Well, this is always a difficult thing because when we see so many mock drafts and so many big boards that all have the same listing, the same order, sometimes it comes out exactly like that. And sometimes it completely doesn't, right? I mean, if you go back in history and even look at places like mock draft database or grinding the mocks that track what draft analysts thought of these players, well, sometimes you'll see that the order that they have them in is dead on. And think about the 2020 draft where the order was pretty well set. I mean, I think we understood that Burrow was going to go at the top, Tua, Herber, Jordan

Love was more of a late first round pick. And when it all kind of came to fruition, it wasn't that shocking. But there have been other times in recent history where it has been totally shocking that say in 2022, that there was only one first round draft pick in Kenny Pickett. And then, you know, all the other quarterbacks that have been mocked in the first round did not turn out to be actual first round picks. So it's very hit or miss how accurate the outside analysts are. And what I'm trying to get to is that JJ McCarthy may very well be a top four draft pick. And in the past, there have been a lot of hits from mock analysts and draft reporters.

But if he's not, I wouldn't be completely blown away. Or if the amount of interest in him is not as high as you think, and maybe he is available at number 11, or maybe they do like Pennix or Nix more than they would be willing to give up a ton to go up and get JJ McCarthy. Personally, for this particular draft, I don't think we're going to be shocked. That's my feeling right now in early April is I think that the outside world might have this one right about the order of these quarterbacks. But if there is somebody that's going to end up being overrated, it is McCarthy because his mock draft place at the end of the season was not where it is now.

And it's really only been the buzz that has pushed him up everybody's boards, but how did the NFL actually feel about him at the end of the season? And through this process is less clear, but I mean, the other guys, it would be very surprising if they fell. I don't know better than anybody else, but Drake may with his raw talent, Jaden Daniels with his speed and his floor because he's a great runner. It's just harder to see those guys being the one who drops. But again, you never really can figure that out. Even the fact that Justin Fields was drafted where he was taken, he was not expected to fall even into the middle of the first round. So it can be very unpredictable and the Vikings are not letting this information out.

So if they did trade to 23 to say, give them an option to move up their order of favorite things to do might be different than ours because our order of favorite Viking things to do is trade up to get Drake Mays is number one and then trade up less to get McCarthy has been number two on my list. But if they told me, Hey, we actually think Penix and McCarthy are equal. And we think we can wait till 11 and then draft another player at 23. That's a good outcome for them. It is. And that's part of how important this month is where O'Connell is meeting with these players because he's got to decide how much it would be worth to give up to go get JJ McCarthy or if it is preferable based on what he sees inside of those rooms to get Michael Penix. That's going to be the determining

factor. If you just watch those two guys play football this last year, Pennix would have been your easy pick, but there's a lot more to it than that. There's projectable skills, there's development, there's the processing and how Kevin O'Connell vibes with each guy that all are going to matter. But would I be tremendously shocked if the Vikings actually ended up liking Pennix more than McCarthy? No, I wouldn't. Would I be completely shocked if Penix is a third round pick? No, I wouldn't. That's, that is how wide the range of opinions on Michael Penix is. I have seen people who have him as QB six. They're not even considering him. I've seen people who are credible draft analysts who put in the

work who have him as QB two or QB three. It's really, it's really hard to figure out by just studying what the outside world says. So, uh, yes, you're right that we're assuming that it's a top four, but it might be that they only want to trade up for Drake may or Jaden Daniels, and then would prefer to, to draft at 11 and take penix or Knicks or even roll the dice. There's so many ways to go about this. I just imagine Kweisi Adafo Mensah's office having all the newspaper clippings and the yarn connecting them and all that, you know, that always sunny in Philadelphia thing with just, you know, or the, a beautiful mind is basically what it's going to look like inside of

his office because there's so many ways this can go. But what you're asking is, you know, we are making a lot of assumptions as we always have to do during draft season that may turn out to surprise us. Folks, if you don't know what a VPN is, you might actually need one and not even realize it. If you already know the positives, you also might not be using the right product. In either case, you want to check out Surfshark. VPNs keep your information safe and anyone who tries to track what you're doing online will not be able to do so if you are using Surfshark.

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location use surf shark vpn can't access that one website to buy limited edition sneakers use surf shark vpn try surf shark today totally risk-free with a 30-day money-back guarantee. Get Surfshark VPN at surfshark.deals slash purpleinsider. Enter the promo code purpleinsider for three extra months for free. You heard me right, three extra months for free. That is surfshark.de deals slash purple insider. This comes from Ezekiel draft Fuaga was alignment at 11 or Latham to play guard and then Pennix at 23. If so the thing about the guard people, there's always the guard people. And a lot of times the guard people have been right. This particular instance, I have trouble getting fully on board with the guard people,

taking a guard at 11 and just rolling the dice on quarterback would be pretty wacky, I think for the Vikings, but the guard position in particular, this last offseason, changed the game a little bit as far as our positional value and as far as the surplus value. So I talk about this sometimes where what you're getting on a rookie contract versus what you have to pay for a player in free agency and that gap. So with a quarterback, you pay $8 million for your first round quarterback and 45 for Kirk. That's surplus value, the difference in between those. And when you look at a defensive end, it's massive. When you look at a wide receiver, it's massive. This was like Jordan Addison to get a wide receiver two in free agency would be very expensive. You have to pay wide receiver one prices a lot of times for wide

receiver twos. So to have a guy in a rookie contract like Jordan Addison is really valuable for the Vikings. And guard has always been one where you've said, you know, okay, well, those guys don't get that much money until they do. Now, all of a sudden they do. And when you're talking about beefing up in front of a rookie quarterback or quarterback on a rookie contract, the best you can do is, is good. I mean, right. So, uh, getting, you know, randoms to try at left guard is not really favorable. So the best you could do is to draft somebody super high because you couldn't go out and spend all the money right now on the

guard position. And you would have been overspending for half of those guys like crazy. So what I'm saying is that even though guard guy, I'm less on board with this year because defensive tackle is important to me. The cornerback is important to me. These are positions that I think Brian Flores could really use to have a top five defense, not just serviceable or good defense, but you're not as nuts as you might've been in the past, Ezekiel, because of the way this last free agency played out. I would just switch it though. I would not have Penix if that's who they were going to take. I would not have him at 23. I would have him at 11 and guard at 23 rather than take the chance that somebody else plucks that quarterback off the board unless they are sure, but you're never really sure when you go into that draft night. So what I'm saying is you're,

you're not, you're not a guard obsessive as I think we became over the Tom Compton and Dakota Dozier years. And it's not that wild of an opinion. I just feel like corner and defensive tackle are really important to completing Brian Flores' defense if they're going to stay at 11 and 23. Next question comes from Matt. Matt's get preferential treatment, of course, on this show. Says, assuming Kweisi Daffel-Mensah and Kevin O'Connell trade up to take a quarterback. If panic starts falling down the board and is there in the fourth round, how badly would fans scream draft malpractice if they took him to the hard part about doing this, uh,

is I always try to separate the philosophical from the realistic, right? Philosophically speaking, knowing how it went in Washington and knowing how it went in San Francisco, that sometimes the first rounder doesn't work out and it's the other guy that you picked that ends up being the best quarterback. It makes a lot of sense. Philosically speaking. In practice, I think it's harder to do because right away you kind of create an awkward situation. And Kirk Cousins has talked about this a little bit throughout his career about how uncomfortable it was, about how it wasn't the best place to be drafted. And ultimately it ends up working out for Cousins to get the job. But the owner and his minions didn't like Kirk Cousins because they wanted RG3 to work out. And yet the Shanahans, the coach, the head coach, and Kyle Shanahan, and that crew was Sean McVay.

They liked Kirk Cousins better because he operated their offense. And of course, RG3 wasn't the same after that first year, but they appreciated that Kirk Cousins was accurate and diligent and understood the ins and outs of their offense. And so there ended up being this conflict there. In this instance, if you're talking about trading up and putting all the eggs in a basket, you really can't bring in someone else to hedge because then it's going to be, well, what if that guy does look better in training camp? And I know the goal is to find the best possible quarterback, but if you take Pennix and trade up for May, it's altogether possible that Pennix is farther along than May to start. So do you want Pennix to win that job out of camp?

I mean, this is, uh, yeah, I just think, and also to the odds of a fourth round pick working out. And again, I know there's these two examples and even with Seattle, they got trashed for taking Russell Wilson when they had Matt Flynn, the odds of anything past the third round working out at quarterback are very, very low. So if he were to get there, that means those medicals are a disaster or that means that there's something very are a disaster, or that means that there's something very wrong with his game or his character that we don't know about. I don't see that happening with Penix, but there's probably a reason for someone that talented and successful. The reason Kirk was a fourth round pick was because he just didn't have a physical tool

that anyone could really buy into and Russell Wilson because he was short and those are the only real reasons. Penix because he's got size, velocity on the football, all those things and even more athleticism than we expected. If he were to drop that far, that means that everybody knows there's something going on there because even Hendon Hooker ended up as a third round pick. But I like it from a, if I was building the team on a computer, boop, I'll take that other quarterback, building a team in practice, actually putting it out on the field, much, much harder to do, I think, but a good idea, just one that I think would be very hard to implement. This question comes from RO,

is it possible for you to think back to the end of the college season and re-rank the top quarterback prospects based on their game tape instead of the measuring tape? Sure. I mean, this one's not that hard. And this is not from my guess at how the NFL feels about these players because we just don't really know. And we only hear from this scout or that scout or this position coach and that position coach that talks to this reporter. And then we've got telephone game. And then all of a sudden, JJ McCarthy's being taken number two. And as I, what, but if we go back to the end of the college season, in my opinion, I thought that Caleb Williams was still the best prospect, but I had some questions and I was in kind of a little bit of a mode of maybe Drake may, we'll get the number one spot. And as the off season has gone on, it's become very clear that that was never going to happen. The Caleb Williams was always the guy. So, okay. Now with Drake May, that's an interesting one because that sort of smacks of boredom where Drake May was locked in at number two, it was Williams May

whole season. And then May had a pretty tough end of his season that I think convinced some people, Hey, you know, maybe he won't go number two overall and he might not still, but go back to 2022 and some of his best games in 2023. And you see the high end type of skill and natural ability to throw the football off platform playmaking that makes Drake may a top prospect. So I watched and I'm doing a podcast on this as well, that you should go back and look for, but I watched, you know, Drake May back against Duke the other day and was like, yeah, that's that to me is a top quarterback prospect. And there's really no reason that he should be anywhere but number two.

And Jaden Daniels threw halfway through the season. It was not clear that he was going to be what he was. And then he had that game against Florida, the explosive running ability, and he ends up getting hyped up as potentially number two. I think at the end of the season, he probably would have been number three, and I would have left it that way. The only difference for me would have been I would have had Michael Penix ahead of J.J. McCarthy

and Bo Nix probably also ahead of McCarthy. And this is with watching less of Nix under a microscope, but even still, there are just times where you watch Bo Nix and he plays so on time where, where it's dropped back, make his read, get the ball out, not screen passes. I'm talking about throwing all over the field that I just really liked.

And it's hard to pry me away. And I know I'm, I might be wrong liked. And it's hard to pry me away. And I know I'm, I might be wrong for this. It's hard to pry me away from those stats, right? That the stats of Bo Nix that he put up this year, he just played as well as you possibly could have played with a good team and with a good offense. And he didn't turn the ball over and he didn't take sacks. And it was like, man, that looks good to me. I thought he was taller. So that kind of knocked it down a little bit for me. And the more I watched, the more I saw some stuff where I went, ah, I don't know if that is going to translate as well.

And the more you learn about McCarthy, the more you hear from him, the more, you know, when you see that three cone and the quickness, because it's hard to know, okay, he's running away from college people. Can he scoot away from an NFL guy? All right. He's got that three cone number. He probably can. Right. But I would have had McCarthy behind the other two at that point.

And since then he has on everyone's mock draft board been moved up to QB for pretty unequivocally at this point, but just how I would have had it. I would have had McCarthy behind, uh, Pennix and Knicks. And, you know, maybe, maybe I was completely wrong for that, but it seemed like that wasn't even a crazy take versus what the mock drafters had at that point. And it's only really changed since then. So is that driven by the combine and stuff we learn about the guy? Is it driven by more football people talking to reporters and insiders getting more knowledge since the end of the season? Or is it completely fake news and we're going to end up with Michael Penix's QB4?

Like, I don't know. That's just, that was my feeling coming out of the college season. And, you know, you do more studying and more reading and everything else about the prospects since then I think McCarthy is probably clearly a better prospect than Knicks but with Pennix you know that might depend on a matter of preference for a team but it is an interesting mind experiment and I think what a lot of Vikings fans are concerned about reasonably so is are you kind of taking the bait here? Are you taking a guy that was never really that good in college that everyone's been talked into? And I don't know the answer, but I can see from McCarthy. I can see the way that he is built and the skills that he has,

the raw skills he has could be developed into a very, very good NFL quarterback. So I don't want to be down on the idea just because my impression at the end of the season was something else. So that's kind of important. But is it a legitimate worry? It might be. It's just hard to say based on because we only have history to draw on. But McCarthy is only he can only be himself.

Right. So what happened to somebody else? Blake Bortles has nothing to do with J.J. McCarthy. And that's what makes it hard to say, well, X proves Y when they're just so different of things. Adam asks, do you think part of what's taking so long is that they are simply okay with a few guys

and maybe don't have a huge gap between them so it gives them more options talking about the trade up. I think that there's, there's probably like a ranking of top potential reasons why this is what it is so far. And they haven't made this move. And I think the number one reason is likely that the Patriots and the Cardinals, they don't have to do this right now.

They just don't like they've got the rest of the month to figure it out. And they've got draft night and they understand that deadlines make deals and there's more pressure on the Minnesota Vikings to make that move and give them everything. The closer we get to the actual draft, there is not that pressure as of right everything, the closer we get to the actual draft. There is not that pressure as of right now, not until we get there. And so that's number one reason why I think it's taking so long. Number two might be that the Patriots and Cardinals are full of it and they don't want to trade and they never did want to trade and they just want to take their guys. But in public, you look foolish if you don't say, oh yeah,

we listened to offers. If you're number four and you say, we wouldn't dare listen to offers, then people can go back and second guess you and say, hey, wait a minute, you drafted this guy, but you could have had these guys. It just makes it maybe sound better to say we're open for business and they never know when they're going to get a crazy, insane trade offer. That could be one of the reasons. It could also be that the Vikings are going through their process. They're meeting with all these guys and they don't want to make this trade all the way up until they've had their sit downs and their meetings with everybody. And they are a hundred percent sure like, Hey, this is our guy. We sat down with them.

We're all in on Drake May. We're all in on JJ McCarthy. So pull that, pull that lever to Ching. There's the trade. That's our guy. Everybody cheer in the draft room. We're good to go, but you can't do that until you've met with them because you've got to be everybody all in with complete diligence. And as much as I've talked about how you've got to be everybody all in with complete diligence. And as much as I've talked about how you could pick names out of a hat with quarterbacks, try going to your owner and saying, yeah, you know what? We made that trade. And then we met with the guy and the owner's going to go, what, what, huh? Wait, why you weren't sure. And you just made the trade anyway. So you have to do everything you can to be prepared for that.

And then they can decide, is it right to give up three firsts, for example. So we still continue to wait and see and find out what the Vikings will do with their draft capital. But you guys have lots of great ideas about this and I love hearing them. So purpleinsider.com, that's where you can hit me up, send me an email, your ideas, your, about this. And I love hearing them. So purple insider.com. That's where you can hit

me up. Send me an email, your ideas, your draft questions, also anything else as well. Football related. We've had some fun questions here running through these fans only emails as well. Also hit me up on Twitter at Matthew collar, and we'll catch you next time here on purple insider football.