Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Is Tom Brady washed? And a closer look at the Vikings' offense

Episode Date: December 10, 2020

Matthew Coller connects with Pro Football Focus's George Chahrouri to talk about Tom Brady's play this year as the Minnesota Vikings get ready to take on the Tampa Bay Bucs. And Trench Warfare's Brandon Thorn discusses his piece on how Gary Kubiak's offense is helping to cover up for offensive line issues and looks at the future of the Vikings' O-line. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Welcome to another episode of Purple Insider. Matthew Collar here, along with George Shahuri from the PFF Forecast podcast. What is up, George? Man, I'm out here trying to get ready for the dog days of winter here, which is when football gets good and when my thin California blood freezes up. So, yeah, nobody is having any sympathy for you who is listening to this podcast living in Minnesota. But I will say that I hope by the end of our conversation that somehow I owe you a steak dinner because I listen to the forecast podcast all the time. And I think your co-host, Eric, owes you about 15 of them at this point. So we need to find something to bet on since that is kind of how your podcast works. Yeah, I don't need any more dinners, any more steak. Maybe we can move on to an accompaniment, maybe some drinks.

But, see, I like to have fun, you know, and the betting is fun, but I like to be inclusive. So, you know, Eric will certainly get just as much steak as I get at those dinners. I can guarantee that. Yeah, I won't comment on his physique and how much he would enjoy steak. So we'll just move on from that. And I want to ask you about the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, because they have been a fascinating team, almost like a dream scenario, really. If they had just been amazing and gone 13-3, it would be kind of boring in a way. Like, oh, yeah, I guess Brady just did the thing and everything worked out. But they have been really volatile this year where some games they're great and they kill Green Bay.

Other games they completely no-show against the New Orleans Saints. What are we to make of the Tampa Bay Bucs as a Super Bowl contender, playoff team? Could they fall out of the playoffs? What is happening with the Bucs, George? Yeah, man. So I go back to that Green Bay game, and I'm, like, kicking myself because I rewatched it a couple of times,

and I remember after that game getting pretty excited about them. They played a couple of good games in a row. Tom Brady had played really well to start the season. But watching that game, they had a lot of good variants. You know, they got a pick six on Rodgers. Then they had Devontae Adams drop a pass that they intercepted. And their defense really kind of broke the spirit of Green Bay. But offensively, they did not impress.

And some of the things that have hurt them were visible in that game and have persisted. And the biggest thing that I come back to is you would very much struggle to find something that you love as much as Bruce Arians loves running the ball with two very mediocre running backs on first down especially given the fact that he has one of the best early down passing quarterbacks in the NFL I mean the Patriots did an excellent job throughout Tom Brady's you know kind of late run there of leveraging first down second down passing plays ran a ton of play action they're basically bottom five in the league in terms of play action in terms of early down passing they're also bottom of the league in terms of motion all things that every smart offense is doing and it's hurting them

it like really is just taking a lot of the good things that Tom Brady does it's hurting them and you mentioned the volatility and volatility comes from needing to perform in a smaller sample. Like if you took Tom Brady and you said, hey, I want you to throw 500 passes on first down, okay, you'd get a really nice picture of what Tom Brady really is. But if you go, hey, Tom Brady, I need you to throw half that many passes. It's all going to be on third and seven plus. You're going to get potentially games where Tom Brady does not look like Tom Brady or games where Tom Brady, you know, is the best Tom Brady you've ever seen. And that kind of volatility does not

bode well for an NFL season with only 16 games where things go up and down. So they're a team that can be beaten on any day. They're a team that can beat any team by 20 on any day. And that is the nature of the beast with them. You could see them putting it together. It wouldn't surprise me. I am not entirely shocked that it hasn't clicked yet, but I'm surprised that it hasn't progressed. Like I thought Tom Brady and the Bucs looked better the first four weeks than they had the last four.

I've seen some people say, well, that's just not how Bruce Arians runs his offense. He never ran it this way with this guy or this way with that guy. And it's like, well, right, I get that, but you have to adjust. I mean, even Gary Kubiak with the Vikings has adjusted the amount of pre-snap motion that he used after he saw that early in the season they weren't getting the guys open that they expected to get open. And then I had one of the ESPN guys send me a chart of how much priest that motion. It just went and shot up.

So he made an adjustment and played to his strengths. Although I think that the Vikings have a similar problem with their cousins and serving long all the time. And sometimes he's great and sometimes he's not. And running on second and nine. You wouldn't expect a team with Tom Brady and a group of Hall of Fame receivers, or at least of that caliber, with Gronk, Antonio Brown, Mike Evans, Chris Godwin. You would not expect them to lean heavy on Ronald Jones, right? I mean, that just seems counterintuitive. Let me ask you this.

So let's go back to Bruce Arian's last really good year. What was that, Carson Palmer 2015? Yeah, yep. Okay, think about what you were doing in 2015. I'm thinking about myself in 2015, and there are some things I'd like to have back. You know, like I probably wasn't eating as healthy. My workouts looked a lot different. Like my choices in life have improved.

I would hope as yours have. Yeah. Like what's, I don't understand how people get like, well, that's just the way you do things. Like, okay, well, like 30 years ago, we did things a lot more differently than we do now. And there's a reason we've changed. Like football, football is not some, it's not this like unique thing in the universe that doesn't, you know, know is not subject to all the the

laws of nature right like when people go you know i just i can't i can't let math tell me anything about football i gotta go by my gut it's like okay well if you ran a financial institution you told me that i'd i'd run you know so like those things to me are just completely ridiculous and um and i think the vikings are a good example they have made some improvements that kirk cousins find really well you know this is maybe the best um that he has played unfortunately is probably the worst supporting cast that he has had and even for the vikings running on early downs at least at least you have the best runner of the football in dalvin cook there like you know i don't think there's as big a difference between, you know, running backs as people purport, but I will certainly vouch for there being a large difference between

Leonard Fournette and Dalvin Cook with the ball in their hands. It was well before 2015 the last time someone said redonkulous, by the way. That was, I think we got to go back to like 06 in order for that to happen uh i want you to and we'll get into the vikings offense and all that but i want you to explain tom brady's grade by pff because um his traditional quarterback rating is okay and he's got a lot of touchdown passes and so forth when you look at box score stats but one thing that i've learned from you guys is that the grade, there's always a lot into it.

It's not just, oh, that means he's the fifth best quarterback. It could mean that he's had a lot of great plays. It could mean he's not had a lot of mistakes. So break down how Brady's sort of box score stats and our perception of his performance this year do not quite match up with where you guys have him ranked. Yeah, well, I think there's a couple of things. There's also the whole record, right?

Like I spent a lot of time laughing at Pittsburgh Steelers fans over the past couple of weeks who continue to cite Ben Roethlisberger's record and his touchdown-interception ratio, and now are citing things like offensive play calling and wide receivers on TikTok and many different things that all of a sudden have shown up as a reason why he's still a top five quarterback. But neither here nor there. For Tom Brady, what we've seen with him this year is he has thrown the ball really well down the football field.

There are four quarterbacks that have more big time throws than Tom Brady, and they are Patrick Mahomes, Russell Wilson, Aaron Rodgers, and Deshaun Watson, all of whom are grading better than Tom Brady, all of whom have been better than Tom Brady. But that tells you the company that he's in. Those are the only five guys that have 30 or more big-time throws, and those are, you think of, passes that are going past the sticks, maybe 20-plus yards downfield.

He's putting them in an accurate position. But that doesn't mean they always turn into touchdowns. It doesn't even mean they always turn into completions. He, I believe, is second or first. I can't remember which at this point in defensive pass interferences that have gone in their favor on throws down the football field, 20-plus yards down the football field. So those don't show up anywhere in his box score, right?

Like maybe one of the biggest reasons why box scores kind of stink is they just totally ignore penalties. You know, it's like one of the reasons we talked about the run game being inefficient. Offensive holdings on run plays just get forgotten. You know, like people just completely wipe them out from existence. So those are the things that he's doing well. He also, if you watch, you know, a lot of Bucs plays, you'll notice receivers doing things that are not optimal all the time.

And that shows up in the fact that if you look at that top five group, again, that I mentioned, Tom Brady has almost 10 more dropped passes than any of those other guys have. So, and only 18 sacks. So there are a lot of things that he's doing well that are not showing up in the box score. And every time that I've watched him play this year, I have come away with the same thought. Tom Brady is throwing the ball as well as I've seen him throw it. That doesn't mean that he's as confident in where he is throwing it. That doesn't mean that his receivers are always in the right place. That doesn't mean the play calls are great. But the ball is coming out of his hand incredibly well.

Everyone I've talked to has said as much, and it shows up in the throws he's making on the football field. And he gets two weeks to prepare for this game. So whatever TB12 methods he's going to use and so forth, he's really going to use over the week here to get ready for the Vikings. Now, something you guys talk about a lot on the Forecast podcast is how unpredictable defense can be. However, I would predict that the Vikings defense is never going to be great,

even if they've had some improvement because they don't pressure the quarterback. And that's going to be made worse by Tom Brady getting rid of the ball quickly. However, the Vikings know this, right? I mean, they know that Tom Brady gets the ball out quickly. Give me a chance that the Vikings have with their defense, considering there are still some star players and they have one of the best defensive play callers in the NFL against an offense that's going to get rid of the ball quick.

Yeah, here's, I think, something that you can try and leverage, which is you know that Bruce Aririans has this tendency to run a little bit on early downs can you coax him into doing more of that can you get tom brady into more third downs now you may still lose and it may he may still dice you up but you get into a situation where you at least you know you kind of know um the set of options that they have in front of them so you're less you're going to be less confused. And you can put a bunch of, you know, defensive backs on the field. You can run some exotic blitzes and you can try and make the game a smaller

sample game for the Vikings defense, because, you know, defense is something that's very hard to predict. And that's why oftentimes you'll hear us say it doesn't matter. And people get very angry about that. And what we mean is if you're trying to use it for it doesn't it matters on a play-for-play basis certainly but your ability to predict which way it will go is you're you're useless and in doing that like you are better off using the offense to make a prediction and so given that the the buccaneers offense has a ton of really good playmakers, you would figure over the two weeks, like Tom Brady, Mike Evans, Antonio Brown, Chris Godwin, like they may, Grock, they may have figured a few things out. So you want to give them as few opportunities to show that they figure things out as you possibly can. So that's what I would do. I would probably try, you know, as many confusing things as I possibly could,

especially because some of the issues that the Bucs have had have been with miscommunication and wide receivers and Tom Brady not being on the same page. So the more you can get them in situations where you're relying on that kind of telepathic communication between the two, receiver and quarterback, the better chance you have with him just putting a pass where he expects the receiver to be,

and uh-oh, there's no receiver there, right? So to me, that's what I'd be looking for if I were the Vikings. And then I think you've got to, on the other side of the ball, really think about scoring early and often. You don't want field goals. You want touchdowns. I saw Sam Monson say something that I thought made a lot of sense for the Vikings, which was just they should play like they're down two scores all the time as opposed to getting themselves into situations where they're down to the Jaguars or down to Carolina because Tampa Bay probably

will not let you win. I wonder what you think about this. The Vikings have had a very poor defense. There's no question about it. But Mike Zimmer has really mitigated some of its effects by playing a lot of two deep safeties. Like you said, kind of daring teams to, yeah, run for five yards a carry. Go ahead. Take 14 plays to get down the field against us because we're going to have Harrison Smith and Anthony Harris

over the top of your best wide receivers all the time. And then when it comes to third down, then when it comes to the red zone, that's where we're going to have, you know, something dialed up that's unique and interesting for the offense. And they've been great in those areas comparatively. I wonder if this is kind of like the model to play defense in the NFL because explosive plays seem to be determining how good your offense is and this goes for the Vikings as well I think Zimmery has the right plan of trying to take his risks on those third down spots maybe not Greg Williams level risks but but risks in those spots and then pretty much force teams to have these long drives otherwise I agree and that's

why the Vikings as bad as their defense has been, if you look at expected points added per play against versus pass plays, the Vikings are in the middle of the pack. And it's exactly what you're talking about, which is so many offenses generate big plays by pushing the ball down the football field, right? The Chiefs are the quintessential example of that. And if you say, hey, what I'm going to force you to do is instead of picking up 40 yards on one throw, I'm going to make you pick that up over the course of four throws. And a lot of bad things can happen over the, you know, like that's the beauty of, that's why football is so entertaining.

The tough thing is that there are teams, I mean, this is not revolutionary, right? And I think it may work well against the Bucs because they have shown a desire to push the ball down the football field. But you look at teams like the Rams, you look at teams like the Niners, teams that are really good at creating big explosive plays without throwing the ball down the football field. I think that's where you can run into some issues. So some of these better play callers who are going to say, okay, you want to do that? Well, I know how to generate huge yards after catch opportunities. And maybe it won't be a 40-yard play, but you're going to get gassed for a couple of 20-yard plays. I think that's the weakness there. That being said, I think that's the perfect game plan against the Bucs because they have really shown, I mean, a complete just lack of whether it's

desire or ability. They just do not generate yards after the catch. That's one of the other huge weaknesses that they have. And they have no running backs or running game that like they they even seem to trust you know it's like a real disaster every time they run the ball in first and 10 and so you kind of get yourself a free down if you will closer to to third down so i think that's definitely the model so george earlier this year uh your cohort eric eager had a complete meltdown on the podcast. He lost it.

There's no other way to put it about the Minnesota Vikings. They have run into a very soft part of their schedule. There are other statistical websites that I've seen that rank their schedule 31st in the NFL. It's right now there's, you know, one ranks them 19th. So it's somewhere in the range of not great for an opposing team schedule. These last couple of games, they've got fairly good teams or competent teams on the schedule. Do you think the Vikings beat the Bucs? Would you bet on it?

Right? Forecast, podcast, betting. Or, I mean, would you bet me a milkshake on it? Like, what do you want to say here about the Vikings' chances to beat the Bucs? Well, I will say that they have a pretty hard schedule going forward. According to our PFF ELO power ratings, they have the 10th hardest remaining schedule. So there's certainly ones that are harder.

To date, they have had the seventh easiest. So it certainly does not get any easier and that's why um if anyone watched Sunday Night Football they saw uh Steve Kordacki talking about the playoff odds for teams and we were lucky enough to get a chance to to power those for them um and even though the Vikings are in the playoffs we had them with the worst chance of making it um than the Cardinals in large part because the Vikings have got to play a couple of really tough games. This is one of them.

I would not bet you straight up. I would not bet the Vikings straight up at even odds with you. But let's see, what's the spread on this game right now? It looks like it's Tampa Bay favored by six and a half. And I'm with you. I do not think that the Bucs right now are six and a half points better than the Vikings. So I'll be happy to treat you to a milkshake if that's what we get out of it.

Since you love the – what are they called? This shows my betting knowledge, you know, betting on certain things that'll happen during a game. I listen to your podcast all the time and I can't think of the word prop. I had to have Eric explain to me what teasing something was. Oh, yes. Anyway.

How about this? This is a great teaser opportunity. Now, the problem with this is that if you were going to tease this game, which means you have to parlay it with another game, but you get to change the spread by six, you would want to bet on the Bucs because you would be able to get the Bucs all the way down to a half-point favorite. So that might not be up your alley.

You might want to look somewhere else. Although, the emotional hedge, something Eric's very good at. Maybe you'd join him in that. Well, I was going to suggest a prop that an over under 0.5 missed extra points in this game because uh special teams has been an issue kicking is not the best thing that the bucks have so how about how about that i'll let you pick and that'll be a milkshake bet for when i come to cincinnati again sometime when covet is over and i'll pay it off if i lose beautiful i would assume that you would prefer the side where they miss an extra point,

but you know milkshakes are coming your way, and I'm happy to oblige. Okay, great. I'll have to learn how to make a milkshake, though, because I'm not sure I have found a place. It's not something that I go seeking out very often. Yeah, yeah. I mean, any kind of milkshake is fine after someone misses an extra point in this game and I win.

But if you do, then I'll find you something special for any milkshake. I will. When you come to Cincinnati, what I'll try and do is this shows you how much of a California snob I am. There's an ice cream shop in California. It actually started in Portland, Oregon. It's called Salt and Straw. And in my opinion is unequivocally the best ice cream that I have ever had. And I try to try a lot of ice cream. And so I get it.

I will get it shipped out here during the holidays because I don't go home during the holidays. So I have to have something that makes me feel at home. And for me, that's six pints of ice cream overnighted from Los Angeles or Portland. So I'll have some, I'll have some here for you when you visit. That's perfect. Getting food shipped to your house is a thing that I've just gotten into because you know, what's going on. So now chili shows up at the house every, every couple of days. So, you know, that's something we have here in abundance. That's good. Oh, yes, I've heard, and I've heard you're not the biggest fan.

This chili, nobody does anything really insane to it. Yeah, I'm assuming you're talking about real chili, which is quite good. Right. Now, I didn't try the Skyline when I went there. You guys were so against it that I didn't give it a shot. So maybe I will have to just just to know what it's actually for anyone that's listening who does not know skyline chili is not is nothing of what you're thinking it is literally spaghetti with an enormous amount of grated cheese on top of it and then some tomato sauce like that that is not chili for 99.9 of human human beings. Right. That's just spaghetti with cheese.

Yeah. To each his own. Not everybody has the greatest, you know. Here in Minnesota, they've got a burger that they like. I come from Buffalo. The wings are as legit as they sound in Buffalo. But, you know, not everybody can have a great specialty for their city. We need to do some wings in Buffalo at some point.

I am a huge connoisseur of wings, and I have never been to Buffalo before. I have had many, many good iterations of wings in New York when I lived in New York. I tried to become good at making them myself, but that would be worth the trip, in my opinion. So let's find a time after this whole thing is over and we'll go to Buffalo and make that happen. Once we're vaccinated, we'll make our way there and we'll have vaccine running through our veins along with hot sauce. So, all right, George, I really appreciate your time and all the great analysis. Listen to the PFF Forecast podcast. I listen to every episode and follow them at PFF underscore George. I really appreciate your time and all the great analysis. Listen to the PFF forecast podcast. I listen to every episode and follow them at PFF underscore George.

Thanks a lot, man. Thanks for your time. Hey, anytime, brother. Be well. Got a great holiday deal to tell you about from SodaStick. If you use the promo code PurpleInsider15, you can get 15% off your purchases during this holiday season when you buy two items or more. Go to Sotastick.com, S-O-T-A-S-T-I-C-K.com to get your original Minnesota sports inspired goods. So many great designs, especially the holiday sweaters. Make sure you check out the Let It Skol design. All their apparel is screen printed here in Minnesota on super soft, super comfy shirts and hoodies. You will love it. That's sodastick.com, original Minnesota sports inspired goods. Code Purple Insider 15 for 15% off anytime you purchase

at least two items this holiday season. All right, we welcome into the show Brandon Thorne, once known as the O-line guy, but now a different introduction is required for Brandon Thorne. Trench Warfare is the website. It's the podcast as well. Brandon, I am proud of you that you have launched. You have joined Substack Nation along with me and launched Trench Warfare to educate the masses about offensive line play and defensive line play. What's going on, Brandon? Not too much, man. I'm excited to be here and, you know, especially now that I have the newsletter

and everything and I'm just, I'm really excited about where I'm going with it man it's it's going well so far and yeah I mean thanks in large part to your help I'm doing this well that was part of the agreement is that you have to thank me publicly on the podcast or you can't come on to promote it um trench warfare newsletter people can go to trenchwarfare.substack.com or uh follow you it's right in your bio on twitter if they don don't already at Brandon Thorne NFL. And one of the cool things you include is testimonials from different NFL players and analysts who follow your work. I know that Robert Mays who comes on the show is a big fan of yours as well.

So really happy to see you get going with that. And I want to talk to you about the future of the Vikings offensive defensive line and what they need to do down the stretch here. But you also wrote about Gary Kubiak and the system that he has deployed for a very long time, using the wide zones and concepts out of eye formation and things like that, which you and I get excited about as old-school football fans. If they would only bring back the splitback, like the pro set, that would be great. I never see that anymore.

But explain kind of some of your findings, because you talk to people about this, about how it helps offensive lines. And that has definitely been an observation of mine since Gary Kubiak has been here. 2018, I thought their system made it harder on offensive linemen. And now I think we've seen a lot of guys overperform since Gary Kubiak has been here. Yeah, so it's interesting. I mean, just starting with Minnesota's kind of the foundation of their scheme, what Kubiak does.

I mean, Gary Bradbury, I talked to him about for, you know, for the story and he talked, talked about it being a tight zone scheme with wrinkles, you know, some outside zone or wide zone, and then a lot of keepers and bootlegs and things like that. And kind of the angle that I was going at for this article was figuring out how some of these schemes actually help the offensive line and and one of the ways that it does that is by keeping everything simple for the offensive line there's not a lot of complexity to what they do they dress up a lot

of their their concepts in different ways pre-snap with formations and personnel but for the most part it's pretty much the same stuff so that's one way that it helps the offensive line just because it allows them to really practice kind of the similar technique and get really good at it over time so that's that's one thing and then what I found really interesting was on the keepers and the bootlegs, just I guess how much goes into that, which I I never really understood, at least to the degree that I do now in terms of all the different strategies that are happening there. instance. So if you could picture the offensive line rolling out to their left and Kirk Cousins booting out to the right, for instance, if Bradbury has a, you know, a tight shade or like a one technique over his outside shoulder to his left and they're, you know, that's where the offensive line is going. He actually gets to practice on that rep, his reach technique as if it was a run and then you know obviously it's a it's a boot to the other side but just getting that extra rep against a different

player and you know a different team is very helpful especially early on in the game to set up maybe a wide zone or a tight zone run later in the game. And over the course of a season, those add up, and he can get more comfortable faster. And it really needs to happen each game because every player is different. How you're going to block him is different. The angle you're going to take to block him is different. So you need kind of those practice reps before the runs really start to kind of hit for chunk yardage later in the game. you need kind of those practice reps before the runs really start to kind of hit

for chunk yardage later in the game. And I think that they've seen a lot of success doing that. You know, just as far as the run game in general, I mean, you know, I know Dalvin Cook's leading the NFL in yards before contact, you know, by a wide margin right now. He's getting to the second and third levels untouched more than anybody. And I think part of that is kind of how they have that baked into their system off of a lot of their passing plays to set up the running game.

So I thought that was really interesting. And, you know, another benefit of that is if Bradbury, for instance, as a center, this goes for other guys on the line as well if he's uncovered on those rollouts he gets a free shot on say the three technique over the guard shoulder and it also really is tiring for defensive linemen to to chase the ball and chase offensive linemen you know because if if they're running that you know bootleg keeper type of look and the offensive line's flowing one way, the defensive line obviously has to follow with them because they're reading

those keys. And then once they realize it's a pass the other direction, especially if it's a quick pass to like a fullback in the flat or a tight end in the flat the opposite way, they have to retrace across the field. And over the course of a game that obviously can get a little bit frustrating especially when you're getting hit when you're not expecting it having to run all over the place and then that sets up the run later in the game it slows down the pass rush and it all kind of feeds off of uh you know itself there and it really sets up everything so

um and i've provided a lot of video examples of what that looks like in my article as well. But yeah, I thought it was really interesting and I learned a lot kind of about the intricacies of how the scheme is friendly for offensive line. One thing it does is if the other team has a great pass rusher, it can just take them out of that play. And so you're making them irrelevant for that play. If it's a defensive end on the right side of the defense and you're making them irrelevant for that play if it's a defensive end on the right side of the defense and you're rolling out to the offense's right side I mean that guy basically has no chance to get to the quarterback on that particular play so if you're talking about a superstar over there you're washing him down the line or I mean this goes for interior line too because I mean those guys have given the Vikings offensive line hell usually when they have an

overpowering nose tackle or overpowering three technique. And that's one way to mitigate them. Because, like you said, Garrett Bradbury gets to fire off the ball. He gets to do a reach block, gets to get a nice hit on somebody. And it's not where he's kind of backpedaling into a pass blocking type of snap and the other thing too is it really plays to the quarterback strengths in this case where Kirk Cousins needs extra time to throw the ball he is generally one of the guys who takes the most time from snap to release to throw the ball and if that's going to be a thing you don't want him sitting back there in the shotgun and waiting and waiting to throw

the ball you want him to get time to do that and when he can set his feet or when he can get his momentum going, he's one of the better passers in the league. But I like how you talk about how it sets up the run for later. That's an angle that I didn't really think of. And I'm not surprised with Cook. I think it's a great combination for them of a running back who is truly an elite talent. And here's Gary Kubiakak like classic Gary Kubiak who can make mediocre runners good and good runners great and I think that's exactly what's happening with this offense

yeah absolutely the running game is is just incredible this year I mean Dalvin Cook I you know coming into I think I mentioned this a year or two ago I've always been a huge fan of him I thought he's kind of like an elite talent, really, you know, in terms of running backs and, you know, just looking at the other running backs in the league. I think he's certainly in the top, like, two, three, four, even before this scheme. So, like you said, the scheme making guys just a little bit better

than they actually are. I mean, you pair that with a guy like Calvin Cook, and I think we're seeing kind of the fruits of that. Just the season he's having is pretty remarkable. And, you know, a large portion of that is because of the scheme. You know, I think he'd probably be pretty successful without it, but it just makes him that much better. And, you know, I mean, they do so many interesting things, you know, with Cook as well. You know, some of the highlighted this, they even run, you know, with Cook as well. You know, some of the, I highlighted this, they even run, you know, they mix in different schemes here and there, like some counter stuff here and there that's, it's, it's kind of rare. But that I think suits Cook well, because it allows him to

get downhill really quickly. You know, the amount of screens that they run, I think are a nice change up as well. And they just do a lot of, a lot of things are based around Cook, I think are a nice change up as well. And they just do a lot of, a lot of things are based around Cook, I think in this offense. And the scheme just allows them to really thrive. And, you know, something that you talked about earlier with the pass protection, I, you know, I think that that's really important to point out that it also kind of just takes away the amount of times that the offensive line has to block and pass protection in just terms of like a straight drop back and this is something that Kubiak and Shanahan do as well that's another guy that I wrote about talked to a couple guys for as well and they all mentioned it Bradbury, Joe Staley, Trent Williams they all talked about

the fact that if you call five or six keepers a game, that's five or six less reps that we have to block our man and pass protection. And then you throw in play action, just basic play action on top of that. And then you throw in where you're just leaving in a tight end or a running back or a full back or two of those three. That's just another couple reps where we don't have to block just our you know us versus them um you know so there's there's so many different ways that they're able to uh you know pass the ball without asking their offensive linemen to actually just you know straight up block them in across from them i'd say that the majority of times they don't ask them to do that so uh at least a lot of games so So, I mean, that's huge for an

offensive line. And I think it also helps that the offensive line, you know, are staying healthy for the most part. I think four of the five starters right now are playing a hundred percent of the snaps, which is very rare right now in terms of across the league. I think there might be maybe one or two other teams in the NFL right now who have four starters who haven't missed a game. They may be the only team. I haven't checked that in a few weeks now. But so that's huge. I mean, because I talked to Joe Staley about Shanahan's scheme, and I think it's applicable to Kubiak's as well. One of the things that makes it more difficult on offensive line, maybe the only thing is it's so reliant on everybody else.

You know, the details of the steps and the angles that guys have to take for a run to hit or for a pass protection to, you know, block just right, it's so nuanced. So if you have guys get hurt, if you put different guys in there and they take one wrong step six inches, you know, one opposite direction than they should, their hands aren't perfect, then it just kind of has a, you know, kind of like a cascading effect down the line, and it can ruin a play.

So that's huge, I think, for the success of the run game and the offense this year is the fact that guys are staying on the field and staying healthy as well. 2020 has already reshaped how we work, and it's almost over. Businesses across the globe are challenged to be their most efficient, which means every hire is critical. Indeed is here to help. Indeed is the number one job site in the world with more total visits

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Don't forget to use promo code BLUEWIRE at BetOnline.ag. That's BLUEWIRE, all one word, BetOnline, your online sportsbook experts. And I think we saw it when Drew Samia was in, just how much one part not working in conjunction can take apart the entire thing. And Ezra Cleveland, since he's come in, has performed really well. I don't know if you've had a chance to see him, but I think, Brandon, they actually, for the first time in a very long time, that you've been coming on this show for now years to talk about this, I actually think that they have the bones of a good offensive line here that they can build and add another piece in the draft or add another piece in free agency

and go into next year because this year it's been dodgy, I would call it. At times they've been good, at times there have been problems. The left guard is clearly not a starting player in the NFL in my opinion, but if you're talking about fixing that and then Cleveland showing what he's shown so far, a layer of toughness to his game, the fact that he's been able to step in at a different position and perform pretty well. I mean, all that speaks well to his future. But I mean, am I wrong to say that there may be a player away here from looking like they have a very solid to good offensive line?

Yeah, I mean, I think that there's the foundation there from the center over to the right side. You know, I think that they're in place, and I think that that's probably the trio that you want to build around. I mean, you know, Riley Reif could probably do it another year and be, you know, serviceable, you know, functional type guy. But I think obviously you would like to replace the whole left side. I don't know if you could do that in one off season or not. But yeah, I mean, left guard is obviously the priority to replace because I think Dozier and, you know, and pass protection is just is really rough for him. You know, and it's just it doesn't really seem to be getting much better. So, you know, and it's just, it doesn't really seem to be getting much better.

So, you know, he's, I think he's functional in the run game, but in pass protection, you really have to protect him and do a lot to make sure he's not isolated, you know, really at all. So that's a problem. So yeah, I mean, I think if you could replace left guard and get a more functional guy in there in pass protection, especially, then you could be, you know, like a middle of the pack type offensive line. Because right now, I mean, I still have them kind of maybe just a little bit below middle of the pack, you know, like around 20 or so. But, yeah, I think if left guard's replaced, then you're certainly able to get in that top half kind of range. And then eventually you're going to probably need a left tackle as well if you don't move O'Neal or whatever you do. You need another tackle.

So it'll be interesting to see how they approach that this offseason and see if they, you know, try to get two new starters there or one. And I think, you know, certainly one at minimum, but it'll be really interesting to see what happens at left tackle. Yeah, no, I totally agree. I think Reif has played his way into a conversation about an extension, but at the same time, Ezra Cleveland, the way he stepped in at right guard, I think says something about how he could move over to left tackle and grow from there, that you know he's got the talent to be an NFL player, and that was his position at left tackle. And like you said, moving O'Neal to the other

side is an option I don't love that option but it is an option that they could try to do and then you know maybe replace the right tackle but at least you've got the talent there unlike years past where we're talking about replacing maybe four spots or something like that last thing next year Michael Pierce comes back Daniil Hunter presumably comes back. We know what Daniil Hunter brings. How much of a difference from what you've seen on this defensive line, which has been a struggle, Brandon, it's been a real struggle, especially in the interior.

How much different is it with Michael Pierce playing that nose tackle from what they've had at the defensive tackle position this year? It'll be a huge difference. I mean, specifically against the run, though. I mean, Pierce isn't going to offer you a whole lot as a pass rusher. I mean, he's going to be able to push the pocket more than what we've seen the guys in there do now, but not in any sort of, I think, dramatic way.

But I do think it's going to be pretty dramatic in terms of his run defense and just what he's going to be able to do to take attention in the run game, always get the double team, you know, free up linebackers and allow other guys to play, you know, in a little bit more isolated type of matchups. So, yeah, I mean, I think in the run game, you know, when he went down, you lost really like an elite level run block or run defender at nose tackle. So his return is going to be huge in that one area, especially. And then obviously Hunter, I mean, you know, there's not much I could say that people don't know. I mean, he's an elite pass rusher, you know, and losing him was crushing to everything up front because he's clearly far and away the best player, one of the best players in the league, his position. And it really, you know, obviously just forced a lot of guys who may not have been ready to play, you know, play, have to play a lot.

And, you know, in some ways that might be good long term because these guys are going to be able to, you know, kind of reach the ceiling that they have quicker with all the, all the reps and experience that they've had. So, you know, you'll get answers on them quicker than you would have if they're playing sparingly. So that's, you know, maybe a, you know, a plus out of it, but, you know, ultimately that was, you know, kind of a crushing loss and you know, hopefully he'll be able to return a hundred percent and just be back to what he was doing before. Cause you know, the, the game has missed him and, it's crazy how many Ed rushers have been hurt this year,

but he's certainly one of the best. Yeah. On the interior, I've never seen, at least since I've been covering this team, so many six, seven, eight yard runs right up the middle, because Linval Joseph was always there just packing that in and teams had to find ways elsewhere because they just didn't even scheme to try to run up the middle. They knew they couldn't against Linval Joseph. And this year it's just been guys getting pushed back and pushed back.

And that's going to be a big change. I think you make a great point though, about certain players that we didn't know about getting opportunities. And now, you know, yeah, you need Michael Pierce back. So follow Brandon Thorne's terrific work at Brandon Thorne NFL on Twitter and go to trenchwarfare.substack.com to check that out and check out the piece that we discussed and the Trench Warfare podcast as well. It's the perfect name for what you do, Brandon.

The best analysis of the trenches out there. And I always appreciate learning more from you every time we talk. And I hope people go check out your work. Thanks for coming on, man. Anytime, man. Thanks for having me.