Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Is this another middling offseason for the Vikings?

Episode Date: March 27, 2023

Matthew Coller answers Vikings fan questions, from the Lamar Jackson timeline to whether Kwesi Adofo-Mensah's first full offseason has been analytical to whether the Vikings will draft a receiver in the first round to how they're going to fill the cornerback room. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of Purple Insider, Matthew Collar here with you. And it feels like for the first time in quite a while, we had a couple of days in a row with no Vikings news, which probably means that there's going to be an avalanche of Vikings news coming soon. We're still waiting on things to happen, like Zedarius Smith, Delvin Cook, the stuff that you have heard us talk about and speculate about for quite some time now waiting for resolution. But until then, we have lots of fans only questions

to answer about what is coming next for the Minnesota Vikings. And you know what folks, it's almost April and that means it will soon officially be draft season and we will start to kick things into full gear with draft simulations draft experts and much more coming here on the show so should be a very exciting lead up to the NFL draft also we did have a chance the other day to talk with Marcus Davenport and Dean Lowry and I did want to mention before we got into some of your questions, just my main takeaway was that both players were remarkably honest about 2021 being much better for them than 2022. And I asked both players, what was the difference between 2021 and 2022 for them? Where if you look at the combined 2021 sacks for Davenport and Lowry,

you get nine and five. So 14 together from those two guys, just one all of last year sack between these two players. So of course the Vikings will need the 2021 version. And Dean Lowry pointed to opportunity. And he said that in 2021, he was being used a lot more on third downs. And of course, we have ways that we can cross-check things like this. And I did find that he had way fewer snaps in pass rushing situations in 2022 than in 2021. Lowry also said that he talked with Kweisi Adafo-Mensa about some strategies for him to add things as he goes along in his career as far as pass rush moves so I think the Vikings look at it like if they do give him opportunity that some of that production will return now Davenport's

answer was a little more interesting and a little less specific where he talked about not utilizing the scheme enough to capitalize on sack opportunities because he did have very good pressure rates but he felt like he didn't use his teammates enough didn't buy into the scheme enough that there was things he wanted to improve on and said he was looking for a fresh start but there is a little bit of a concerning report that came from pro football talk that some of the holdup for his contract being signed was relating to a shoulder injury that he has or had. And that does make you wonder about his health situation. He's missed 19 games over his young career of five years so far. So that is one of the concerns. And there's a big gap here between these two players working out and really bolstering this defensive line. And if neither

player works out, they could be in a good amount of trouble on the defensive line. That's already lost Delvin Tomlinson and might lose Zedaria Smith. I'm sorry. Yeah, no, yeah. Might lose Zedaria Smith as well very soon. So anyway, let's dive into your questions. We will start out with Douglas here. It says, can you explain the offer sheet process in regards to an exclusive right franchise tag player like Lamar Jackson? Does it have to happen before the draft? So I think it's a little bit of a different label than the ERFA, which is usually for guys who are undrafted free agents. But I can look that up real quick, exactly what it's called with the Lamar Jackson franchise tag. But the thing with his franchise tag is that what happens is a team can sign him to a deal or agree to a deal

with him. And then his team, the Baltimore Ravens will have an opportunity to match that deal. Now I checked out on the timeline as far as when this needs to happen by. And I checked with our friend, Brad Spielberger at Pro Football Focus, who is the contract and salary cap expert. And his answer was by the middle of July. Now, don't ask me why it's by the middle of July, but it does not have to happen before the draft. And I know quite a few of you have sent your questions of,

hey, what's going on? Like, when is the timeline for this? When would the Vikings have to make an offer if they were going to do it? And so it appears that it can go past June 1st, which makes it plausible for the Vikings to potentially sign Lamar Jackson, trade away Kirk Cousins, and Kirk Cousins' contract becomes more favorable to trade if they're trading it after June 1st. So I imagine they would have to trade first, then do the offer, then see if it gets signed by the Ravens. And I don't know, or maybe they have to have a conversation with Lamar where they agree on it,

then find a partner for Cousins to be traded. It's very convoluted. It's very convoluted as far as how this could actually work for the Vikings potentially getting Lamar Jackson. But if that offer is going to come in, it has to come in by the middle of July for Lamar Jackson in order for it to work out, or at least that's my understanding of it. Because I wondered about that too. What about these two draft picks? And this is something that I am certain about. Those draft picks are not this year. It would start in 2024.

So it'd be the 2024 and 2025. The Vikings would not be giving up the number 23 overall pick for Lamar Jackson. So any team, even if you don't have a first round pick, you can make that offer as long as you have a first round pick 2024. So it is possible that moving parts could be connected somehow to make it work. At the same time, there is a lot of things that would have to go into the Vikings actually making a play for Lamar Jackson. But if you're holding out, if you are taking a jersey and putting duct tape over the back and writing L Jackson on it, you don't have to throw that out yet. The dream is still potentially alive that it can be done even if it goes past the NFL draft. But naturally, if the Vikings were to draft a quarterback, then, well, then that Lamar Jackson idea probably goes off the table at that point. But if they don't, if they go wide receiver, if they go corner, then you can still dare to dream. And look, with the way that this Lamar Jackson thing is playing out, his business partner reaching out to teams and Lamar Jackson tweeting his way

through it. It looks like it's not going to get resolved anytime soon. And the fact that he can let this play out through the spring and summer allows him to wait and wait and see if anybody gets a little bit desperate and says, you know what, we want this to happen right now and we're going for it. And the Vikings are not one of the teams, by the way, just to add a little more fuel to the fire. They're not one of the teams that leaked anything to a national reporter that they wouldn't be going after Lamar Jackson. So again, dare to dream, do something, Kweisi. Like, I don't know. We'll see. We'll see if anything comes of it, but that's kind of the timeline. I know a lot of people were interested in how that could potentially work out.

Next question comes from Joe. The Vikings have gone from 125 million in 2024 cap space to 62 million in one week. When will Kwesi be allowed to cook or is this truly the vision he has? If so, I'm baffled based on his background. Right. So this is a pretty common question about Kweisi Adafo Mensah in general. And I think our beliefs about what an analytics GM should be doing, right? And look, you've listened to the show long enough and we've had enough PFF people and Eric Eager and everybody from the analytics sort of realm and Brad Spielberger come onto the show and talk about all the ways you can set yourself up for the future, the ways that you can manage the salary cap, the positions you should be investing in and the ways in which you should be making those investments. And if we were to

bunch moves into analytics types moves, regular or all in type, not really for the future type moves, there seemed to be a lot more that go into the side of not really being analytically justifiable. So the trade down, for example, last year in the draft, okay, there were some analytics people that liked that, but then taking a safety, maybe not so much. Trading for Jalen Rager, probably not so much there. Although maybe they saw it as a swing for somebody with upside, but if the Eagles are trading you, that player, probably not, right?

They gave up a decent amount of draft capital for someone who another team really wanted to move on from. Maybe we don't call that so much of an analytics move or drafting a guard or drafting a linebacker. Those aren't premium positions. And then, you know, signing someone like Zedaria Smith was a pretty good move for them last year, but maybe, you know, not exactly fitting in the timeline of pushing in the chips for last year of trying to make moves that were for now and later. Right. So there are a lot of those short-term plays that we don't think of when we think of analytics GM. And I think this off season, they started to make some

of those where we saw Josh Oliver, who could be. Look, there's a lot of tight ends who in their second location or second contract have turned out to be very good players. So I don't want to call that like anti analytics because he's good at blocking. Maybe he ends up being quite valuable for you. I don't know if he develops and becomes something. And look, TJ Hawkinson does not have a contract extension as we speak. That's worth noting with the Josh Oliver signing. If TJ Hawkinson wants to run it to free agency, you don't know that he wants to sign an extension

with the Vikings. If he wants to run it to free agency, they could be looking at Oliver as someone to develop. That kind of angle hasn't really been brought up because I think we've all assumed that they're going to sign Hawkinson to an extension, but we don't really know that for 100% sure. That might've been more of an all-in move for last year to try to win with him. And then I guess, you know, having him for this year as well. We'll see how it turns out. I still think that they will extend Hawkinson, but you don't know what he wants on his side. So that might be a for now and then move. Davenport, Byron Murphy, for sure. Same sort of

thing, like exactly along that analytics realm, guys who had high peaks in their past that you might be able to capture, like it. That's exactly what you should be doing. And then the Dean Lowry thing comes along and then more reports come out of how they're handling these contracts of putting in the void years, not moving on from Delvin Cook and Zedarius Smith earlier, particularly Delvin Cook. It's kind of strange that there's such a holdup there. I don't know. Some of you have asked if the shoulder surgery plays a role in this. I don't know if that's the case, if that's what's making him harder to move or if they don't want to move on from him at all. It's very hard to

tell at this point, but adding void years to the contracts, restructuring Kirk Cousins the way that they did to really hit them hard for next year, those things do kind of make you scratch your head a bit at what's going on there. But I think that maybe the idea that when they hired Kweisi Daffo-Mensa, all of a sudden it was going to be a Cleveland Browns-like, strip everything off the lot and then completely rebuild it through draft capital and stacking all these things that you can use to your advantage, the salary cap space, draft picks, all those things. This team really wasn't in that position. And we always have to keep in mind that at the combine, we talked to Kwesi about what his role is and how he communicates with ownership. And he talked about communicating with them a lot and setting expectations for them was really one of his main jobs. So what are those expectations for this year? I mean, when Harrison Smith says he's coming back on a pay cut, does that change

some of the other roster decisions? Does that make you want to keep people like Zedarius Smith and Delvin Cook? Are there other factors when Aaron Rodgers leaves the division, we assume, that they say, okay, well, you know what, now we actually have a chance to win this division, so let's make sure we're not tearing it all apart. And then the quarterback thing is still sort of resting out there. It's possible that they decided it's a better move to eat it all in 2024 than it is to spread it out over time i don't know if that's really the case they needed to be cap compliant and that seemed to be the best way and in their minds for them to do it i don't know if it was the best in

my mind for them to do it when they had some other you know buttons that they could potentially push but i don't want to sit here and say that Kweisi Adafo Mensah is after one off season last year and then right here, not the analytics GM because he hasn't ripped it limb for limb. I mean, Ryan Poles was not considered that. He was the scout GM and he did rip it limb for limb because it's a different position in Chicago than where the Vikings are right now. Expectations from ownership might be different. Where your quarterback stands is different.

You have one more year of Kirk Cousins should you try to not win with him. When you know he's a good quarterback capable of having a top 10 offense, we never thought there was going to be a tank because Justin Jefferson still exists. And I don't think you can make moves that make Justin Jefferson believe that you're tearing it all down and trying to just tank and do the things that we talk about with like analytics pointing toward those, which by the way, there was a great study done by our friend Eric Eager on Sumer Sports website that showed that it actually is statistically easier to go from being really bad to really good than it is from being average or below average to really good. So that's like a fact. He studied that.

So it's not just like the all these crazy analytics people just want to lose the games or whatever. Um, that's a real thing that in the NFL sometimes, and a lot of that has to do with the quarterback, right? And that's where I would say, I don't think that Kweisi Daffo Mensah in the moves that he's made has ruined the future of the Minnesota Vikings, but a lot of that future is going to rest on what happens at quarterback. And that could happen soon. That could happen in the draft. That could be the Lamar Jackson thing

that we might have to wait until 2024 for that, or they could still extend Kirk Cousins. That is still out there on the table as a possibility. If they do that, then I think you should be asking, wait a minute, like, was this really the plan from the outset to extend a quarterback who is older when it's very hard to project an older quarterback? Plus, we know the whole thing about the price tag. So I understand why a lot of you are kind of wondering what exactly is going on here with this direction. And I think the answer is that so much stuff came at us in a waterfall in the first week, but we still don't have the whole picture or even a lot of the picture of this off season. There are still things that need to happen salary cap wise.

And there's the big quarterback question and if we get to there's kind of these these markers if we go through the draft that's a marker without an answer at quarterback for the future okay is there still going to be an extension is it going to be the classic training camp extension that happens all the time with this team and then if we go through training camp into the season then we we know that Kirk Cousins is going into the final year of his deal and they're going to have to draft a quarterback or acquire one in a different way in 2024. Now, all these things will play into how everyone feels about the general manager and the way he handles all of this situation because it all kind of starts with

that. So I totally feel young and you guys know where I stand on void years and things that hurt you in the future. It's not great from my perspective, but a lot of how we look at Kweisi Adafomensis' time here will be determined by what happens at quarterback. And the analytics thing, I mean, a general manager is one person that works with a lot of people as far as decisions go. So his name is on all the decisions. But it's a scouting staff. It's a front office. It's personnel directors.

It's people who advise him. It's the head coach. It's the ownership. And that one person has final say, maybe, mostly, that's the person who makes the decision, right? But there's a lot of different things at play. There's a lot of different people's feelings that have to go into it, including Justin Jefferson, as he noted at the combine. So long answer, but I think it's complicated is the way that I can put it. I wouldn't call myself baffled.

I think I would just say that I understand that there's a lot of things at play with every decision that they have to make. And I kind of want to see the rest of the picture before I say, yeah, what's going on here? Or, oh, I totally get it. And I think maybe after the draft, we'll have a better idea of all that. Next question comes from at Skol Doc. Could you see Bryce Young being the guy that falls on his size and the NFL's infatuation with height at quarterback? Well, I mean, I can't say anything for sure, except for that I don't know anything for sure when it comes to quarterbacks or where they'll be drafted. I do believe though, if we go back in recent history and this wasn't true for say

Aaron Rodgers, but, and we look at the consensus for mock drafts, a lot of times the guy that's the consensus usually ends up being the guy who the NFL takes at the very top. Now that's not always true, but it mostly is figured out from a year to year basis. And I kind of look at that Joe Burrow year as a good example where there was an attempt to kind of build up some, Hey, would they maybe consider taking this guy? There was even the classic, would Joe Burrow even go to Cincinnati? And he did. And he's turned around their franchise as a superstar quarterback will do for you in the NFL.

There's always those kind of debates. But I think with Bryce Young, like pull back a little bit away from the height, away from the size and look at his accomplishments, look at his talent. And you still have multiple quarterbacks in the NFL who have succeeded now that are not really six foot three, six foot four. Could this mean that he drops a little that maybe someone says, oh my gosh, Anthony Richardson, let's do that at number one overall. Or Stroud is a bigger guy, but he's very accurate. He's a really good thrower. Hey, let's do that. Let's go for it. That's possible. Yeah. But I have a tough time thinking somebody with Bryce Young's resume,

his talent, his character, his Heisman, his success, his statistics, all those things. And the fact that we just watched two players who are mobile and playmakers and things like that in the Superbowl, I have to think that teams are looking at that. At least some teams in the first round saying, yeah, I know he's a little on the shorter side, but we're doing this anyway. I still think he's going to go number one. I could be completely wrong. The Carolina Panthers have visited everybody. The Seattle Seahawks are tweeting out pictures of them with all the quarterbacks.

So maybe they're considering one or maybe they're just messing around on social media. I don't know. I have a really tough time thinking somebody with that resume and is that much of a consensus of either the number one or number two quarterback in the NFL draft is just going to fall and free fall. There was much more debate over other quarterbacks who did free fall. Lamar Jackson being one of them, he didn't work out at the combine. And I think that there were kind of questions, not just about the throwing, but like how he's going to handle being an NFL quarterback with the whole his own agent thing, which was not a problem until like recently.

Then it has become a problem just like since the other day. But for the most part, things like that, there were concerns about him. Bryce Young is a phenomenal thrower of the football. He is an incredible playmaker. I think the only thing you worry about is his durability, but I mean, there's, you're never going to find someone who's perfect. Like every one of these quarterbacks coming out, it's like, aside from Andrew Luck and even Trevor Lawrence is not a perfect NFL quarterback. Those are the only guys I can remember in recent years who were talked about as like flawless quarterbacks coming

out in the draft, even burrow, the question about his arm strength, Justin Herbert, was he dynamic enough? All sorts of questions about these quarterbacks. So I think that someone's going to take a big swing at the upside, but if I'm wrong and he's the guy that drops and he makes it the 23 somehow and the Vikings better pick them, that's for sure. They better absolutely end up picking Bryce Young if that's the case. Okay, this from at Paul M.N. Official on Twitter. Are Kweisi's short-term free agent deals a strategy to find possible gems that we can extend or just to fill out a semi-competitive roster. I

think that it's both, but definitely the first more or just as much as the second, because, you know, someone like Marcus Davenport, if you bring him here and one thing that they know they can hang their hat on is that if you bring players here, they're going to like it and they're going to stay. That ownership pays for guys who they like and they want to stick around. And players like the atmosphere, players like the culture, players like the coach, and they certainly like the facilities. Minnesota, you know, once it gets cold, it's a little tough, but, you know, they're mostly going to work inside the facility anyway. But, you know, it's a great place to be. And a lot of players want to stay after they're done playing or for many years and sign extensions. We've seen

that in recent years. One of the reasons they're in the cap situation they're in is because players don't really usually want to leave and ownership wants players who want to be here. So anyway, the point is that they understand that once you get a guy in the building, he will probably like to stay and you have a good chance at extending him. So let's say that Marcus Davenport, for example, gets nine sacks this year and you go to him and say, Hey, we want to keep you. This is where you turned your career around and got back on the right track. We got you healthy. We got your second dudes.

You like our coaching staff. You like that. You don't have to pay for meals like they did in Arizona or no, as Byron Murphy, who would have had to pay for his meals and brought that up in the press conference. But all this applies to Byron Murphy as well, that the short-term deals are, if you play well here,

we're going to pay you. We're going to extend you long-term and make you if you play well here, we're going to pay you, we're going to extend you long-term and make you a big part of the future. And then maybe they found a bit of a diamond in the rough. Marcus Davenport is that, Byron Murphy is that, Dean Lowery, not as much. And that's the one that I've just had trouble figuring out where it fits in. But with those two guys and even someone like Josh Oliver, who's in his mid twenties, it all, it all makes sense from that perspective to try to, um, you know, get them in the building, hope that they hit their upside. Like they did in 2021, Murphy had a good year in 2021 as well,

and then sign them to longer term contract extensions. That's why we've used that term sort of now and later with these signings, just like Harrison Phillips last year. I like that signing because it was for last year, but I believe he was either 25 or 26 when he signed. You can have that player for five or six more seasons if he remains healthy. Even a defensive tackle might even go longer than that. Those are guys that you want to give your free agent dollars to, not players who are in their 30s where it's got to be really a short-term kind of thing. Next question comes from Thomas. Let's see. Jalen Rager was drafted in the first round. What's his cap hit for 2023? Can he be cut? Can his contract be negotiated? Well, I can look up his cap hit real quick while we're talking,

but, you know, and I'm bad at doing that, looking up things while I'm talking at the same time, but I can pull this up. So his cap hit for this year is $2.4 million, and they cannot cut him either before or after June 1st, but they can trade him and earn $2.4 million in cap space. I wish them the best of luck if that's what they want to do. I don't know why anyone else would give up anything for Jalen Rager at this point. And they'll probably just play it out with him

competing with Brandon Powell for a punt return position. I think we saw last year how Rager was not really capable of playing wide receiver. I have wondered to myself if Jalen Rager could be a running back, but that might be silly. It might just be based on what we saw from Cordero Patterson. But I don't know, maybe he's really good with the ball in his hands and he's very tough. And this from Matt Daniels, the way he talked about how he's built, he can run with the ball and he is kind of electric when he's got the ball in his hands. It's just been the matter of how do you get him the ball in his hands when he is not very good at the details of wide receiver. So that's been a problem in Philly. And not surprisingly, he didn't change

who he was. I think they were looking for a punt returner that they wanted and hope that there was some upside to that move. It ended up that there really wasn't so much upside for him. And you know, like it wasn't a lot of draft capital, but at the same time, was it really worth the draft capital that they gave up? Probably not. So unless they can find somebody else to trade them something for Jalen Rager, maybe another team becomes super desperate for a part returner. I don't know. And they trade him away, but I would be a little bit surprised if they were able to find a trade partner for Jalen Rager. So I think you are going to end up having him still on the

team, or maybe he's one of the guys who ends up getting cut out of training camp and you just eat the $2.4 million in cap space. I guess we'll have to see on that one, but so far, at least until this moment, that move has not looked very good for the Vikings. Our next one is from Josh. The Vikings are going to draft a wide receiver in the first round, aren't they? Well, there's a good argument for it. That's for sure. Because let's, let's take a look at the landscape right now. Okay. So Adam Thielen is gone. And I think most people are looking at Adam Thielen going to the Panthers and saying like, okay, well, you know, look, age, production dropped, average depth of target.

You can run through all those things. But at the end of the day, 70 catches is a lot to make up. And you can say, well, you know, TJ Hawkinson, right? But TJ Hawkinson was on the team with Adam Thielen already. So, I mean, yeah, they're going to pump the ball to TJ Hawkinson for sure. And I don't know how much more you could possibly throw it to Justin Jefferson. Although I thought that last year and they did throw it to him more. But okay, let's assume that you throw it to Jefferson about the same and he puts up the same huge numbers. I mean, KJ Osborne still had a good

overall season last year. Where are these targets being made up? Are they going to be made up by Josh Oliver? Kind of doubt that. CJ Hamm is back. Maybe. Maybe you throw him a few more footballs. His career high catches, I think, is like 17, so probably not. Brandon Powell had 24 catches last year. Not really a wide receiver necessarily necessarily i think he averaged 6.5 yards per reception now jaylen regger jaylen nailer maybe maybe they like what they saw from jaylen nailer is it likely that he's as good as adam thielen right away even the older version maybe probably not um so there might be kind of swinging for uh desperately for somebody there if they don't draft a wide receiver.

And that is why it makes sense because it is a now and later type of need. Yeah, they're going to need one right now. And that's actually a position where guys can come in and make a difference right away. If you draft someone like Jordan Addison, who's an experienced college receiver, and he's a good route runner in the NFL. You can make him your number two or number three wide receiver. He can contribute right away. And then you really need a partner for Justin Jefferson long-term. Assuming that they get a Jefferson contract extension done, then yeah, you're going to want a young player to be on his rookie contract when Justin Jefferson

is becoming expensive. And so those two can be a dual, a duo for a long period of time in the best case scenario. That's kind of what you're looking at. It's just that there's so many of these needs you can make an argument for the cornerback position. You've got two injured corners. You've got Byron murphy who's going to be a big part of this thing but after that like i don't know um if they're going to sign somebody else if they're going to create cap space or they're just going to say here's your group of people or do they want someone in the first round the defensive line if they do move on from zadaria smith marcus davenport we don't know what Daniil Hunter's

future is who else could be an edge rusher on the interior maybe Dean Lowry precludes you from drafting someone maybe they think that Ross Blacklock can be better for them as a rusher but what if Kalijah Canty is still there or what if they have to trade up for a quarterback then you're probably not looking at a wide receiver. So it could be that year, could be. And we've, you know, look, we've been banging the table long enough. Eventually it might happen, but I don't know.

There's so many other possibilities for the draft that I don't want to say, yes, for sure, this is the year, but it's probably more realistic than it has been in the recent past for them to draft a wide receiver. All right, on to Strider619. With Duke Shelley signing with the Raiders, what do you think the plan is for defensive back going forward? Hard to imagine they feel comfortable with Murphy and essentially two unproven rookies.

You mean they'll be in their second year, but neither one really played in the Caleb Evans and Andrew Booth Jr. And we were just kind of alluding to that for why it would make so much sense to draft a corner in the first round. Not only that, but this is a draft where there's a lot of disagreement on the corners, and we could see a couple of them taken really high, like Joey Porter Jr., Christian Gonzalez, and then kind see a couple of them taken really high, like, you know, Joey Porter Jr., Christian Gonzalez, and then kind of a lull. And the second wave is where the Vikings could sit and draft whatever guy they like.

So there's lots of opportunity there potentially to draft a cornerback with the first round pick. And I wouldn't be surprised at that. It certainly would be a throwback to, I mean, the people who talk about how the off seasons are all the same. I mean, well, if they drafted a corner and, you know, we were still not a hundred percent sure about cousins future and the future captain looked that great and they got a blocking tight end.

Yeah. I don't know if Delvin cook stays around. It really continues to be very Spielman ish, uh, with that, but something they need. I mean, they've drafted these corners in the past and none of them have come to fruition to be those shutdown guys that they're looking for with releasing cam Dantzler that kind of ended that possibility that he could be a long-term option for them. And yeah, Duke Shelley was never really any kind of long-term option for them. And yeah, Duke Shelley was never really

any kind of long-term option or starting option for the Vikings. They didn't have a whole lot of money to match any other offers. So the Raiders ended up picking him up. I know that a lot of people were very disappointed by that. And I guess I would say you have every right to be disappointed by that. He was a really fun player. I mean, for him to come in and just start making plays, there's several games, maybe they don't win without Duke Shelly. But if we're being realistic about what he was likely to become for them, it was probably depth. It was probably somebody in a best case scenario who's coming off the bench and is reliable and you can trust them to make some plays if they come off the bench, but not like a, Hey, this guy's going to be one of the foundations

of our defensive backfield. So you don't want to lose players who help you and losing him's not great. That's a product of the cap, but there wasn't a whole lot they could do. They just didn't have much space to be able to allot to someone like Duke Shelley. I think what they will do if it's not drafting one in the first round, because I don't want to say that's for sure with all the other needs, but I think the other possibility is if you look at the corners in free agency, there's still quite a few that have played, that have started even as recently as last year. And now I bring up this example, not to upset anyone, but like Bashad Breeland, which at the time seemed like a decent signing and those types of signings have worked out in the past. It did not with Bashad Breeland,

not even close, but they have around the league worked where you wait until after June, guys are hanging around on their couch, waiting to get a phone call, waiting to go to a training camp, and they sign very reasonable deals. And I think that's what the Vikings should probably do is they're going to have to make a little more cap space at some point after they do that a lot, some of that to trying to find another veteran. And one of the things about signing a veteran late in camp is, or before camp, just before camp is there's, there's no real promises there. It's like, well, you come in and we'll see where you fit in. And if you're a backup, you're a backup and you should be happy to be here.

And it's not like, oh, we're spending big money on you. And sometimes the corners who get the big money do not play better than the June corners that sign late for, you know, $2 million or something like that. So that might be a good idea. It might ultimately work out, but they will have to create some space in order for that to happen. Next question comes from at THW0110. Talk me into this weird half measure off season making sense. It will, if I think this is not a hard one, it will, if they solve the future quarterback problem, then it will all be okay. It will all make a lot of sense because yes, things are a little restricted for next year, but if you're moving on at least from a portion of Kirk Cousins deal, and you can see the light in the future of being out

from under Kirk Cousins deal, then you can start that process of spending. And I think what they're trying to do here is churn the roster in a way that allows them to stay in the NFC North race that gives them a chance to repeat. And look, here's the thing. If the Vikings won eight games last year, they might be tearing the whole thing limb for limb right now. And they might be saying, we need a rebuild. Look, that's just the reality. We needed to tear it all down, but they didn't. They won 13. And I don't think anybody thinks they're winning 13 again. Draft Kings doesn't. Draft Kings came out with its over-unders and had them tied with the Packers at eight

and a half and with the Lions ahead of them to win the division. I think that's fair. I don't know if the Packers will win eight and a half. I don't really know what to think of the Packers with Jordan Love, but still, I mean, that's what Draft Kings, that's what Vegas, the gamblers, the people with money in the game, that's what they think of the team right now. They just don't see it. And this could change, of course, as a legitimate contender. But when you get the home playoff game, you want to continue to be competitive. You don't want to tear everything down,

or at least from their perspective, but you can still draft successfully. You can still sign guys who can help you in the future, which they have done some of, you can still move on from pieces that are going to weigh you down in the future, which they've done some of half measure off season is a way to put it restructuring cousins. So it helps them now, but hurts hurts them later not a fan of doing that exactly so yeah that's right because I could take two buckets and put half the things I thought were good and right in one bucket and half the things I would question in another one but at the same time if you come away with here's where we definitively know and it doesn't mean they need to draft one this year it means they need to definitively know here's where we're going.

Here's the end date on Kirk Cousins, or here's not the end date on Kirk Cousins. Here's when he, you know, signing an extension, know where you're going at the quarterback position. And you can talk me into almost anything else because that's what has the trickle down effect on the whole rest of your future. So if they trade up and draft Will Levis, then we know. Then the half measure offseason is actually pretty good because you're competitive and you know your quarterback next year is going to be Will Levis.

Or if they do not do that, then we know, all right, it's going to be 2024 where they're going to draft someone or they're going to be players for a Jimmy Garoppolo type move with the Raiders. Don't really love that unless the Raiders draft a quarterback, but they can be in a spot where they could look for a Gino Smith situation and then draft one. Like there's a lot of different options, but if we know where that bus is headed, I will still probably call this the offseason a success, even though the micro might have some nitpicking to be done. All right, next question from at single player 1978.

Um, so is Louis scene going to play cornerback this year? I'm excited for Flores, but not excited to watch this defense so far. Yeah, here's the thing. So Lewis seen, we're not really sure on, but one thing we do know is that his health is in good shape at this moment. So they are expecting him to be back for training camp. That is good. I think he fits better with Brian Flores. That is good for their defense. Harrison Smith is back. That helps pair those two together. Hopefully you can take the training wheels off and then Lewis seen as your starter.

Best case scenario, you go forth. Unfortunately, though, when you look at the rest of this defense, Brian Flores is probably better at his job at fitting this group to what he wants to do schematically. But if we played a game of talk me into this defense being more talented right now than last year's defense, I would not be able to do that. Patrick Peterson was one of the best cornerbacks in the entire NFL last year. Byron Murphy was not and had some back issues. And Delvin Tomlinson, at least by PFF grade, I know some of you could say, well, he didn't look the part sometimes, but still one of the better defensive tackles in the entire

NFL. And you saw what he got paid. There's a lot of respect for his game in the NFL. And Dean Lowry is not Delvin Tomlinson as far as his impact. He never has been. And look what he got paid. A huge difference between Tomlinson and Dean Lowry. Where else have they improved on defense?

They lost Eric Hendricks. Now you could say, okay, all right, well, it's Brian Asamoah time. And I like what I saw from Brian Asamoah last year, but there is no guarantee he's better than what Eric Hendricks gives you. So they are worse by kind of a lot as far as talent wise right now. And there's not a lot that they can do about it. And if they lose it, area Smith, that makes them even worse, worse. Yeah. It's, it's hard to see. And Brian Flores, I do not doubt is good at his job, but it is hard to see this team be any better than a bad defense next year. And then, you know, we've talked about

the schedule. It's pretty tough. There's a lot going on with that schedule and it's as of this moment and they can, you know, prove us all wrong. Of course, that's just hard to see. It's just hard to see because they've lost way more than they've gained. And our friend Kevin Cole does objective measures on this. The Vikings are at the bottom of the league as far as in his estimation, what they've lost versus what they've gained in free agency. Now, those projections are based on Dean Lowry and Marcus Davenport having really poor years last year as far as sack production. So they can change that narrative.

Of course, Asamoah, Lewis Seen seen there is a world where these guys connect and everything works out and they're good. But even then the cornerback position is still so up in the air. A lot would have to go right for this team to even be a mediocre defense. I think it is going to be a transition that is not fast. And they are risking getting stuck in that Raiders kind of area where year after year, they just can't figure out how to put all the pieces together and have a good defense. So that might be their argument for drafting a corner is that they need someplace foundational to start and go forward. And we still don't know Daniil Hunter's future either. There's a lot of questions to be answered there, and it just doesn't really seem like there's

enough assets left over, even if they restructure Brian O'Neill or trade the other guys, to be able to replace those positions. So there will be a lot of pressure on the development of the younger players that are on this roster, especially the corners, and then the system being more aggressive and smarter and better than it was last year. But you will never find an easier group of quarterbacks on your schedule to play than they had last year. I mean, it was just one backup after the next. So yeah, I don't know.

It might be tough. It might be tough. And this is why I think Brian Flores is probably here for multiple years. That would be my guess. And that might be a good thing for them because of his scouting background. Can he build up a defense over two years and then be in a position when they do have more cap space down the road to be able to build it up? Kind of like Detroit's doing where they're just going to free agency and I'll take one of those, take one of those, take one of those. That's the position the Vikings will have to be in.

But right away, there's not going to be a lot of positive change unless Lewis seen becomes that star instantly. That could change everything. Or Brian Asamoah becomes what Eric Hendricks was. That could change everything. And we still don't know. And the same thing goes for the corners. If Andrew Booth is the shutdown corner and can stay healthy, that can change everything.

So a lot rests on that last year's draft class for what this defense is. And I think that's why they invested so much in it in that draft was they were looking two years down the road saying, we're going to need corners. We're going to need another safety. We're going to need another linebacker and they need all of them to work out if they're going to be a good defense next year. All right. This is from Adam and it's a similar question, a similar question, but I'll answer it still. Is Quacey the galaxy brain GM rather than the analytics GMm we were hoping for building a mediocre at best roster for 23 which isn't a contender screwed the cap for 24

and first draft looks shaky the real key there is the first part of it is he the galaxy brain gm um actually i i think that if anything so the galaxy brain would kind of be like cockamamie ideas that are out of left field and make it all sorts of weird trades or doing crazy stuff. I almost feel like Dave Gettleman was kind of the galaxy brain GM. He was drafted a running back at the top. He's seeing one drive at the senior bowl from daniel jones and wanting to pick him after that like that's galaxy brain stuff i think what you might be asking is is he kind of like a regular

gm or the one that's supposed to hack the game and so far it's been more like a regular gm but again this is a such a small sample size i feel like the roster is starting to become Kevin O'Connell and Kweisi Adafo-Mensahs, but there's just so much more to go. There's so much more to be decided. I don't want to say, well, look, I don't like the way you restructured Cousins this way for 24, so I'm just out and you don't know what you're doing. These things have been, because I think we would have said about Rick Spielman that he was a good general manager, competent general manager. Now, some of you might completely disagree with that,

but let's be fair to him. He drafted Jefferson. He drafted a lot of really good players over the years and a lot of busts like everybody else. And he drafted good players and he signed good players and he built teams that won a lot of games, but there was always that little edge that might've been missing from them. And when he was on a podcast and he said he didn't really think much about positional values,

like, well, that could be part of it. And then there's always the question about the quarterback contract, how restrictive that is, the relationship with Zimmer and how whatever went on there so there's always those sort of types of things but I think we could say about Rick Spielman that he was a competent trustworthy general manager who knew how to build a competitive football team they was they were never uncompetitive really with Rick Spielman so we could say, but when you move on from that, which is good, what you expect is something very different. And the fact that it has not been very different, even though they won 13 games last year, and there were a lot of good moves, bringing back Patrick Peterson, signing Zedaria Smith, short, good short-term moves, trading for

TJ Hawkinson, a lot of good stuff in there to win last year and to go all in on last year, which almost worked. And they want, and they did put themselves in a position. We set that standard and said, look, if you can't win 11, 12, 13 games, then you're not a real contender. Well, they did. And, and, and they were a contending team going into the playoffs last year in an NFC that was pretty spotty outside of Philadelphia and San Francisco. You never know what's going to happen. I was just watching the other day, the Joe Flacco win over Denver in 2012. Totally shocking. No one expected it. And go back and watch that game. It's freaking nuts, by the way. 35 to 35 in overtime. Totally

crazy. One of the best divisional round games ever. That's not the point. The point is just that they went into the playoffs with a chance, didn't work out for them, probably wasn't going to be as strong as some of those other teams, but they built a team that was trying to win last year and it almost did. So I don't look at that as some massive failure. I don't look at it as a massive success either, but it's okay. Well, you had a really, really good and fun season in your first year as a GM. Your second off season has had some transition to it, but it has not broke the game in maybe some ways, analytical ways we expected, but we're also far from having it finished.

I think you need a much bigger sample on Kweisi Adafo-Mensa to say what we think about his era, about his direction, all those things. And I'll just keep kind of coming back to it. A lot of it will be on how they handle this quarterback situation, but that doesn't excuse some of the salary cap stuff. I just think that when you look at the way that everything is structured and what he took over and some of the things that he did to himself,

like the Thielen extension last year or re reworking of the contract, they were in a position where there were very few things they could really do when they had to be cap compliant. So pushing some of it down the road, not my favorite thing, not something I would have picked. And I'm not trying to say it's okay or that he like, shouldn't have done something else. I don't know. I don't, I'm not, you know, their cap guy, but don't love that. Don't love that. I don't think that that means like, oh, well, the guy must not know analytics. Like, I don't think that's quite it. So I think I want to wait and see some other things that come down the pipe and how the

rest of this off season goes. And then we'll have a little bigger sample size on where they're at. I think the main goal of coming out of this year was, can we understand the clear path? Can we see it? You know how like those pictures straight down a train track where you could just see for miles and miles and miles. That's what you want. You want to look straight into the future and see for miles. This is what they're doing. These are the players who are going to be the foundation. This is who's going to play quarterback or a draft pick. This is how they're going to build their team.

This is some of their ideals for building a team and then go. At this moment, I can't say I have that, but it's not April yet. So there's still a ways to go. Okay, last question here. If you had to speculate after what they've done so far, what do you think the main targets in the upcoming drafts or what do you think they'll be?

Well, I think it has to start with opportunity when it comes to quarterback. I mean, this is just clear. This is why all the mock drafters are giving them Hendon Hooker and Will Levis is opportunity. So if I were to speculate right now, I would say that they are considering how much opportunity they'll have. Remember this, they always know more than we do. They know more than the mock drafters do. They have a much better sense for what their scouts and how they do their job and the internal stuff that they know about these quarterbacks than we do. So earlier, someone asked about Bryce Stroud. Could he be the one who

drops? I'd be shocked, but it's happened. Maybe the league does think that, like, I don't know. Like it's that they know, I don't know. So they have an idea of whether they can get someone at 23 or where they'd have to trade up what team that might be. So they know that that's a main target. It has to be, it just has to be with where they stand with Kirk cousins. After that, I would probably rank it at this moment. And this is a longer podcast. I'm sure to rank all the positions, but I would go corner wide receiver, not my preference, but just speculate on where they'd go corner wide receiver defensive line after that. And I, I mean, that's pretty much it because they don't really need anything on the offensive line. They brought back Garrett

Bradbury. So there's no reason to bring in a center. I think if they're thinking about drafting the running back from Texas, they are insane. And yeah, I think that those are really the main positions. It comes down to corner, wide receiver, defensive line. Those are really the only guys that we should be looking at for the Vikings in the draft. As far as like which exact players, well, you're going to have to listen to the draft simulation episodes for that.

But no, I've got my eye on some receivers, some corners. We got a lot of draft simulations to go. It's not even, again, not even April yet. We will break that down in great depth with all of our friends, including Chris DePasso, who will be doing weekly appearances here. So thank you all so much for these great questions. And I guess I would just say on the off season as a whole, because there seems to be some pretty clear anxiety, take a deep breath, enjoy the March Madness action. It's been amazing. It's been incredible.

And we'll see. We're going to have to wait to find out really the whole picture of this thing. So before we decide on whether the general manager knows what he's doing or not, let's see a little bit more. That's what I'm going to say. Let's see a little bit more. And then we'll kind of try to put the pieces together from there. All right. Thanks, everybody, so much for watching, as always, and for all of your questions.

If you want to submit questions for fans only at Matthew Collar on Twitter, feel free to send me a DM or just send a normal at mention or purpleinsider.com go to the contact us. And I know that some people have told me that like they've tried to send their draft Sims to me and they can't attach something on the website. just send me the order just write out the players i know it's hard life's hard but you can just do that as well or dm it on twitter all right thanks everybody appreciate you we'll do it again