Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - It's Aaron Rodgers vs Mike Zimmer with the Vikings' season resting in the balance

Episode Date: November 17, 2021

Matthew Coller and Sam Ekstrom get together to talk about the best matchups between the Green Bay Packers and Minnesota Vikings during the Mike Zimmer era. What do we make of Zimmer's ability to slow down Rodgers (sometimes) and why was the 2018 and 2019 games significant. Will this year be the last time Zimmer and Rodgers play each other? Also why isn't Wyatt Davis getting a look at right guard? And who's the coolest person Matthew and Sam have in their cell phones? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey everybody, welcome in to another Purple Insider slash Bring Me The News live stream. Matthew Collar here along with Sam Ekstrom from Purple Insider and we have got ourselves another football game that means something, Sam. This is great to have a big lead up to Vikings and Packers and it feels like this is the one that turns the season one direction or the other. If you beat the Packers, then all of a sudden we're talking about what can they be in the playoffs? Can they get hot down the stretch? Can they put themselves in contention with the other NFC teams that have gotten off to hotter starts? And if they do not beat the Packers, well, then that narrative changes a lot. And we go back to many of the discussions we were having before about who's going to

be here, where this is going to go. Can they even make the seven seed? Would they still fire people on and on and on? And from the perspective of conversation, Sam, it makes it very interesting when you have that much of a go one way versus go the other. So that's where I want to start with you. The difference between winning and losing this football game feels like the entire season is resting on this matchup and being the Packers just adds to the intensity of what will be happening there on Sunday. Yeah, they're exactly where they were last year.

They were coming off a road win. They had the Cowboys at home in that case, which it was a little less of a big game because Prescott wasn't playing and Minnesota was actually expected to win and they blew it. They had a chance to get back to 500 and they faltered.

This year on big stages, they faltered. They had that Cleveland game, which we had a big ramp up to that game, talking about how this was a chance to prove themselves, fell flat. Big chance against the Cowboys on Halloween. And of course, again, Dak doesn't end up playing, but that was going to be a chance and they faltered. So on all these big stages, the Vikings keep coming up short. And now again, Sunday noon against the Packers, a team that, you know, they often give good games, even though they are an underdog many times. This is the next chance. And these Packers, you know, whether it's the defense shutting out Seattle or whether it's, you know, Aaron Rodgers putting up some vintage performances, this is a legitimate team.

And I am really intrigued to see how much desperation the Vikings play with because they need to be the more desperate team here. This is a chance for them to put their playoff odds at 60% or better. I mean, if they win this game, it's 60. If they win the next game against San Francisco, it's up to 80. So this is a key stretch where they can separate themselves from the has-beens of the NFC that are still lingering one game out of a playoff spot. The Vikings, once again, Matthew, this is your favorite line. They're in the hunt. I saw my first in the hunt graphic today that the Vikings were at the top of the list half a game back of that seventh seed yeah so i went to the mall and saw christmas stuff all over the place

and you saw in the hunt graphic it's like it's that time of year everyone what the the christmas stuff comes out the in the hunt graphic has the vikings listed uh and that seems to be a yearly tradition so let me ask you this before we get into this discussion of just how this works. And I love that you have the numbers there to show that it's not my hyperbole that this game really is this big and the season does hang in the balance with the Packers, which is just sort of poetic justice, I guess, or whatever. I don't know what the right thing is for that, but it makes so much sense that that's how it would be that your first game against the Packers is going to more or less determine the direction you go for the rest of the year I want to ask you

a question though what do you think is the best matchup between the Minnesota Vikings and Green Bay Packers since Mike Zimmer became the head coach What's the first one that comes to mind? Packers coming to US Bank Stadium for the first time was really good. To win the division in 15 at Lambeau was pretty good. That was kind of a slog, though. It was really cold. It was really hard for either offense to get going. There was a defensive touchdown.

It wasn't that good of a game until late. The Packers made it a little interesting. I'm trying to think what else, you know, there were some crazy, like a lot of the games that they played have honestly been ugly. Like if you think about the, the 21 16 game there in 19, where Kirk had one of his worst games as a pro.

Compelling football. Very compelling football, but ugly. Then there was the previous year. You know, Kirk's first game at Lambeau as a Viking. Overtime. Daniel Carlson missed kicks. That probably had the most entertainment value of any of them, with Kirk looking like an absolute stud in that game

and Carlson continuing to miss. That's probably one of the most memorable games I've covered, to be honest. That was going to be my answer is the 2018 game. And I wonder if you think about the 2018 game as a great football game or as I cannot believe that it ended in a tie and the madness is what makes it memorable, but I'm not sure it was a great game. I think it actually was a great game and the kickers missing. It wasn't just Daniel Carlson who missed by the way, it was also Mason Crosby. But I remember walking out of that game and it was the weirdest thing I've ever seen. It was dead quiet because you know this, that when you go downstairs from the Packers press box, you have to go outside, which is just a treat in January. But this was, that was nice that day. And so everyone is walking out slowly looking at each

other going, what we 29 to 20, what just happened? And it was silent. there was no like skull chants or no Packers fans cheering or going woo yeah we want nothing there was like everyone was how am I supposed to feel and then of course they had a tie between the Steelers and Lions this weekend it made me think a lot about that game and remember where we were it's kind of funny to think back to the beginning of the Kirk Cousins era because they opened the season against the San Francisco 49ers. It's an unimpressive win, but it was okay. Like they played all right and they came away with the win. It was fine. And so, all right, onto the next one. And in this game, they get down by a lot and then Cousins is going off in the second half. And I was actually coming out of that game thinking they may have tied and

then cut their kicker, but I think they've got themselves an offensive coordinator and quarterback here, and this is going to go somewhere. This offense could be really amazing. Of course, the offense did not turn out to be amazing, but at that point, it felt like this is going to be an open offense where they're throwing the ball all the time and they're pushing it down the field and they're making plays and they can play with anyone. It did not turn out that way, but that's how I sort of remember walking out of Lambeau that day feeling. And we were saying, well, a tie today, but they've got Buffalo next and that's 2-0-1 going into Los Angeles on Thursday night.

Everyone was looking past Buffalo the following week. Buffalo was going to be a 17-point underdog, but there were so many elements of that Vikings-Packers game. There was a Treadwell drop, right? Treadwell was finally getting a chance. He was going to be their number two wide receiver. And I think at the end of regulation, Treadwell dropped one into a Packers player's hands and then Green Bay settled for a field goal the Vikings got it back the Cousins throw to Thielen in that tight window front front corner of the end zone for the game tying touchdown is one of the most improbable completions I've ever seen he threw it it like through a defensive back's body. I don't know how it got through, but it got in Thielen's arms.

That was the height, I think, of Thielen's career that started that 2018 season. Diggs had a bomb, had a couple touchdowns, and then it just became a bleep show of special teams blunders, which still to this day boggles my mind. Not only that, but there was also the controversy on both sides of 15-yard penalties for, I don't know, excessive touching of someone else. Remember, there was one on Clay Matthews where he barely touched Cousins through an interception. It was a bad interception that got negated because Clay Matthews had hit Kirk Cousins through an interception, right? It was a bad interception that got negated

because Clay Matthews had hit Kirk Cousins too late, even though it was a very soft penalty. But early in the game, the same thing had happened to Eric Hendricks. And that game, it didn't really shape the season or anything like that. It was only memorable because of how nuts it was. But it also sort of gave us a lot of hints on everything about that team where the special teams was flawed, where they couldn't really sustain this thing where they were going to throw all the time. They didn't run the football well that day, I think. And they also had a flawed defense. And that was the part we came out with as well, where we said, oh, well, this is just,

you know, it's just Rogers. He's crushing them. But by week four against the Rams, it became very apparent that they were not going to have a defense that was just going to smash everybody. And there have been a lot of similar feelings about this team where they, this team is much more play down to your competition, play up to your competition, or I guess maybe with the Buffalo game, they did that too. But there have been a lot of same feelings where if they get down in a competition, play up to your competition, or I guess maybe with the Buffalo game, they did that too. But there have been a lot of same feelings where if they get down in a game,

they have the capability to come back and play with anyone and never get blown out. But they also have these moments of, oh, the defense is kind of flawed here. And if you remember, they had a chance to stop Rogers at the end, and then he flew down the field and they kicked a field goal. I think he actually had a couple of potential game winning drives in that game. And I think that this team is a lot like the 2018 team and will probably end up with a lot like the same record as the 2018 team. Yeah, that team, of course, goes eight, seven and one. This team could very well go eight and nine or 9-8, you know, similar win total.

I think that team had some players that were on the start of a decline, Xavier Rhodes, Linval Joseph, maybe just a hair of Harrison Smith, and I don't think Harrison Smith has dropped off too much, but a lot of the guys that were playing their best football ever in 2017, we're just 10% less in 2018. It's hard to sustain that for a long period of time. And I think that we witnessed that happening. It's just defense is not always sustainable.

It's not like the offenses when the offenses are constantly getting better and the house odds are against you with the way the rules are constructed. It's going to be hard to have defenses that are that much of a powerhouse year in and year out. But, you know, you look at sort of the efforts that that team had on the road, like the game at Los Angeles, they came to play, they put up points, they fought, and they almost went down and tied that game late before the infamous fumble. There were a lot of good building blocks on that team. But I remember at the end of the year, Mike Zimmer was lamenting, we just couldn't put full games together. We couldn't play with all three phases at once. And we were saying that through the first eight games of this season,

I think until the Los Angeles win on Sunday, that was our complaint was that the offense and defense just never played together, you know, on the same day because they both had flaws and inconsistencies and it's hard to align those groups when you have, I guess, between the 10th and 15 best unit of the NFL, you don't do any one thing so amazingly that you can count on it being good every week like that 2017 defense was.

No, that's right. And that's been the case for this year where a lot of times, I mean, even they were pretty close to doing this against the Chargers, that they stopped the Chargers in the red zone and Brandon Staley surprisingly decided not to go for a touchdown. And then if they don't convert a third and 18 eventually into a first down, we'd be talking about, oh, here's the clutch Vikings defense being put to the test again. And we never got that chance because Mike Zimmer decided to go for it and they put it away. Now there's another Packers game that comes to mind that was memorable, but for different reasons. So the week two one was a great football game and we all

walked out of there going, I don't think I'll ever forget the time they tied in green Bay. The other one for what it meant to the general vibe of the Minnesota Vikings franchise was 2019 at home in week 16, where the Vikings had a chance to at least stay in this thing for the NFC North race. It may have been week 15, week 16, somewhere in there. Yeah. Okay. Okay. I had that right. So they had a chance still at that point to beat the Packers. And then if the Packers lost the next week and the Vikings won, then they could win the division. If I'm remembering that correctly, that there was a big swing of that game and Delvin Cook was out. Alexander Madison was out. Mike Boone starts, but there's a lot. It was national television and there's all this buildup to this game. Let's find out if the Vikings are for real.

I remember that was the big thing because it had been win against the bad teams, lose against the good teams. And now we get to find out if the Vikings are for real. Does this sound familiar? Like as what we're talking about for this year and the Packers just ran over them. Kendricks, I think, was out of that game or bar. Someone was hurt and they just steamrolled the Vikings on the ground, even though Aaron Rodgers threw a couple of interceptions. And that was a point where suddenly it became people are on some hot seats now because they lost another game. That was the big buildup, the national TV, and they were going to get the sixth seed, which is just not impressive really for what you had set out to do when you

signed Kirk cousinsousins. And even though the next week they played a meaningless game, and the week after that, which really tells you about football, they went and beat the New Orleans Saints and got a huge win and sort of for at least a week cleaned up some of that mess. But then the very next week it was like the same game, and they walked out of 2019 looking around going, well, now what with this

defense with all the players leaving that game in green bay was really memorable for it being as down as it had been the year before when they missed the playoffs so even though they were making the playoffs there was still a sense of i just don't think they can do it i just don't think that they can go anywhere past where they are if they couldn't even compete with the Packers in that game. Yeah. The will start putting out a statement about Mike Zimmer's job if they win that game. That's right. You know, and if they win that game, then they probably play as hard as they, they, they can the next week against Chicago. They might even win 12 games that year. But they were flat.

I mean, they were flat. They couldn't stop the run, which was always a mark of those Zimmer teams, right? You know, in 17, 18, 19, that was what he prided himself on, wanted the team to be good at. And it was the Mike Boone. Yeah, we froze for a second there, Sam. Sorry about that. Hello.

I was just going to get into the mike boone letdown game i was so excited to to let mike boone loose and i think he got benched at the end of that game for amir abdullah because he just wasn't hitting the right holes he was lacking the vision um yeah run game was disappointing run game was disappointing. Run stopping was disappointing. And it felt like Cousins was, again, folding like a tent under interior pressure. Same old story. The story before that game, the story after that game. I mean, it's all held true. And that was a good microcosm of it.

And that's kind of been the Packers, too, in recent years, right? They've won a lot more games like that where Rodgers might not be, you know, a Pro Bowl caliber passer in a given game, but their defense finds a way to win like it did last Sunday or the running game helps them out. That was kind of a win that was indicative of that Packers team and recent Vikings teams as well. Sam Ekstrom here wondering if you're stuck on your company's injury report. In an unfortunate situation like that, it's good to have someone in your corner. That's where Kemet, Sanford, and Kramer Law can help you understand your rights under Minnesota's workers' compensation laws. There's enough uncertainty in our lives nowadays that the

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And so they beat the Chargers out there in Los Angeles. And at this moment, the Chargers have a winning record. We'll figure out if they do, but they still don't feel like a powerhouse. This is an opportunity to beat a don't feel like a powerhouse. This is an opportunity to beat a team that's considered a powerhouse. I know they were close against Arizona. At the end of the year, they don't count it as a win if you're close. I mean, yeah, you should have won that game, but shoulda doesn't count. So this is their first opportunity maybe of the year to beat a team where you would say, this is a legitimate Super Bowl contender.

In hindsight, the Cincinnati thing, it's like at first the win or the close loss looked like, oh, pretty good. And now it looks like, yeah, maybe they weren't that good. But the Arizona one, that team's legit. Kyler Murray's banged up, so they lost last week, but they're a good team. I think the Packers are one of the maybe three,

four teams in the NFC that you would say this team can absolutely win the Superbowl. So beat a team that can absolutely win the Superbowl. And then we will take you seriously to go out to San Francisco to face Chicago, you know, to get, of course, you know, your win against Detroit, but like to beat Pittsburgh to face Chicago, play the games that you're supposed to play down the stretch, maybe get another big win against Los Angeles. All that seems possible. If you can beat a legitimate Superbowl contender, if you can't, then it's going to be very hard for anybody to change how they felt about you. Because if this team were to get on a run, if they were to find something here, beat the Packers, beat they were to find something here,

beat the Packers, beat the 49ers, you know, let's say there's a disappointing loss mixed in, but get on a real run. I could then circle back to buying, oh, it was just the close losses. Oh, it was just fluky at the beginning of the year. I could actually circle back to buying that if they can beat these good teams. But if they don't, then I'm going to say, well, that's kind of who you really were. And that's what you showed. Now, let me ask you another question. The Aaron Rodgers versus Mike Zimmer matchup. I really enjoy it. Even in that 2019 game where cousins had a very poor game and their running game went nowhere and they just got dominated in the offensive line. Their defense still picked off Rodgers twice and played a good game against him. Rodgers' numbers against Zimmer,

especially save for that 2020 opener where he just shredded their rookie corners, have generally been quite good considering how great Aaron Rodgers is for his career. Going into this game, possibly getting Patrick Peterson back, it looks like it based on his tweet Harrison Smith is going to return I don't know if Kenny Willekes will be back or how much that

will matter exactly but do you trust that Zimmer understands Rodgers so well schematically that the Vikings defense will be able to step up in this game against Green Bay? Yes. I guess I keep wondering how they can throw any more tricks at him. I remember a couple of years ago asking a similar question to what you did yesterday about how hard is it to prepare for a guy that knows you like the back of his hand? And Zimmer said, I hope we've got a couple of tricks up our sleeve.

And then if I recall, they did, they had some really interesting blitzes and personnel formations they used. And, you know, I don't know if you save anything for this late in the year, if you've used everything you have by now. But maybe there's still something else they can toss in there. It's yet to be determined. They've obviously been getting creative with the way they brought pressure.

And maybe that's a Paul Gunther thing who has been credited. I get, I think with some of this blitz work, but the linebackers getting home, the cornerbacks getting home, safety's getting home because they know that they're not going to get it from the edge that, that want them.

And you know, any, basically anyone, but Griffin's probably not going to get home. So they got to bring it from other places. But I think back to, you know, even in Zimmer's first year, they held Rodgers down fairly well at home.

Ponder got smoked in Green Bay. Like the welcome to the NFC North Mike Zimmer game was very one sided. It was all Rodgers. And since then, it's been fairly equal. And he's even played some pretty poor games against the Vikings, too. It's not all been average some of them he was he's legitimately been bad um which is kind of amazing considering his overall you know track record of not throwing interceptions but yet he throws them against the Vikings

sometimes um the Vikings have found a way to sack him too, I feel like. And he's a pretty mobile quarterback. So it's going to be a good cat and mouse. And if this is the last rendezvous for Rodgers with the Packers at US Bank Stadium, you know he's going to bring it. And he's the kind of guy that if he gets a sense of motivation or mission, he's probably going to bring his best game. So I want to see how the Vikings throw him off the game. And I'd worry if they have sort of the, some of those depth guys in there like Bynum or vigil,

um, what that would do from a weak link standpoint and where Rogers would attack in that situation, because I think he's smart enough to know that, yeah, you know, they put up some good performances, but can Bynum might still be able to be fooled on that back end. Well, the other thing too, is that against the Los Angeles chargers, they didn't really pressure Justin Herbert a whole lot. They got a couple of sacks where he was confused. And I think that a better quarterback maybe throws the ball away or more experienced. I should say he's very talented, but he's clearly inexperienced. So Aaron Rodgers might find ways to throw the ball away if he's confused by what the Vikings are throwing at him, which at some point, you know that there's only so many things you can prepare for. And Mike Zimmer will put something out there that he never has before.

What was memorable for me is when he started blitzing Mackenzie Alexander all of a sudden and throwing corner blitzes at Aaron Rodgers. And he hadn't done that almost at all with anybody through the years. And then suddenly in this one game, Mackenzie Alexander is coming off the edge a bunch of times, I think may have come up with two sacks or a sack and a bunch of pressures. And that will be a major part of what we study in that game is just how Mike Zimmer tries to confuse Aaron Rodgers. And like the reality of Rodgers is that this year he's had some moments, but he has not been as good as he wanted was it last year. And it feels like, and I know they beat him last year and he had a tough game in Lambeau, but it was like 40 degree wins or something crazy like that. It just doesn't feel like he is as infallible as he was before.

We knew that all the noise was not going to impact Aaron Rodgers. Aaron Rodgers always thinks that he's under attack from everyone. So that wouldn't be any different. It's like a main Rodgers thing to be out there talking about how everyone is trying to screw him. So why would he feel different when he was under criticism over the last couple of weeks? That didn't surprise me that he was able to come out and get a win and get past all that. What I look at with the Packers offense though, is they're just not as explosive as they were last year. They're not putting up a lot of big plays. We've talked very much about Kirk Cousins, not pushing the ball down the field, but Aaron Rogers hasn't been able to do that very often either. And I don't think that they're a super scary offense and their best player, Aaron Jones,

their best player, not named Devante Adams is not going to be playing in this game. And that gives a little bit of an edge to the Vikings. Now, I mean, in this battle, I think it's still advantage Rodgers because he's one of the greatest players to ever step on the field. But this makes for, if you're putting something up on the marquee of this game, it's not so much Cousins versus Rogers, which is so often the case quarterback versus quarterback. It's Zimmer versus Rogers. And it's always one of my favorite parts of the year. And you bring up a great point that, I mean, this could be it.

This could be the last time that we get to do this. These last two games, a U.S. Bank same in Lambeau field that we get to do this thing where we break down. How will Mike Zimmer mess with Aaron Rodgers? Can the Vikings slow him down? Can they match on their side of the field? And I think that that amps up the level of hype for this game. And I also got an email this morning from somebody saying, this is one of the most intriguing years for the Vikings in kind of a long time, maybe since 2018, because there's things like this that are along the way of, we're constantly wondering, is this going to be it? Yeah, it's kind of, we all thought last year

might be the end of the road for Rodgers and that he was so good because he knew he was going to go out on a high note. And then of course they don't make it to the Super Bowl, but this Packers team seems more like the 2019 Packers team, which many of us deemed fraudulent based on their point differential um rogers looking much more mortal i think that you know the last what four or five games before um rogers missed that game with with covid they scored between like 24 and 27 points that's good that's that's not dominant that's not you know number one uh offense in the league and i think maybe it's because they have built up a nice running game there. That helps. And they don't need to score as many points because their defense is pretty good.

But yeah, Rodgers is gettable. I think he's gettable. I mean, we saw him have a horrible game in week one of the year. People thought he was washed. And then he comes out the next couple of weeks and looks really good. So you can get him on a bad day. I think that's possible. But what I love most about Rodgers and Zimmer is just the commentary between them.

They seem to genuinely like each other, but they like vocalize that they hate each other. You know, they, they, they say they hate each other, but they smile about it because there's just a lot of mutual respect. And Mike Zimmer's had some good zingers over the years talking about him. I'm, I'm sure Zimmer will put his foot in his mouth or something this week and say, too bad he doesn't have COVID again, because that's the kind of thing that he always says. Too bad he's healthy against us. And I know that's kind of his MO is just to have fun with Rodgers. And I know Rodgers likes to have fun with Rogers. And I know Rogers likes to have fun back. Yeah. Rogers likes the, or Zimmer likes the joke of like,

I wish they'd trade Rogers. So maybe next year, Mike will be the year where Rogers is playing somewhere else. So I love this matchup, but I want to talk about a few other players and just update the conversation that we haven't gotten to in a while. One of those players is KJ Osborne. Now, of course,

Sam, you've been following the KJ Osborne drama since day one of OTAs, but sometimes we just need to take a pause and talk about some guys that are kind of interesting. KJ Osborne in the recent weeks has not been a huge part of the offense. Do you think that something has changed there? Uh, that I noticed that they have used CJ Hammond of in a tight end position, uh, maybe more often than they ever have before, partly because they traded a fourth round pick for a tight end who can't really play in Chris Herndon. Um, they've used Luke Stocker a little bit because there's a person named Luke Stocker on the Minnesota Vikings roster. Uh, and we've just seen a little bit less of

the KJ Osborne thing. And I thought it was interesting. Something that Jeremiah Searle said last night when we were talking was like, they kind of went with the running game to the eye formation and smash it up the middle. And I wonder how they'll handle this with the Packers, because at first we were ready to declare, wow, they've got wide receiver three and they could spread teams out and they could do something they've never done before. Then that slowed down a little bit. Seemed like there was a correction maybe last week, but he hasn't been as big of a part of the operation in recent weeks. You know, I think that his drop-off is sort of just correlated with their overall offensive drop-off. Like, you know, leading up to the bye, he had a game with 76, 91, 78.

He had, you know, only fewer than three catches one time. So he was consistent up to the bye and out of the bye. Obviously, they have two sort of offensive duds with Dallas and Baltimore, and he has two and one. So I think that all made sense that he would drop off along with, like, if Jefferson's not getting targeted, Osborne's not going to get targeted. I think the only real anomaly here is the Chargers game where the offense was working, Thielen was getting targeted, Jefferson was getting targeted, and Kirk was working it

around, and Osborne for the first time this year was shut out. Didn't have a catch. And I don't think we need him to be the guy he was in weeks one and two where he was like the leading receiver. That's not reasonable. I think that he is probably a three or four reception guy per game. That's what you want. You hope a couple of those are big first downs like he had against Baltimore, where his one catch was actually a big third down conversion. So I'm not going to panic on Osborne. I just think that the overall regression of the offense is obviously going to have a bigger impact on the guy who's on the field less and isn't going to have as many opportunities to begin with. So I'm not going to panic. I still think he's really good.

I mean, he's already like doubled Chad Beebe's output from last year. So keep it going. Keep putting him out there. He'll make good things happen. I have faith. With KJ, people maybe who are watching for the first time don't fully understand how closely you have followed the KJ Osborne story from day one. But yeah, I think that with the three wide receiver thing, there's always a push and pull to everything you do in the NFL. So if you want to run more three wide receivers, every team is more prepared for three wide receivers because they play that the most one thing that

the Vikings had in recent years was they were the only team running two tight ends all the time and so opposing teams would be like oh okay so I guess uh uh Steve the equipment guy you're the third linebacker this week and he would just be like confusion at times and and I know that Kyle Rudolph got frustrated by having to run block so much, but it was really effective in the run block because it was usually a disadvantage if the other team tried to play nickel. And if they tried to play with the extra linebacker, there was Irv Smith who was too quick for those extra linebackers. And they're not as good at getting back into their zones and things like that. Maybe part of that is an adjustment to the, the change there that was working early on because teams weren't used to the

Vikings playing this three wide receiver offense. That can be part of it. I think he could play, but he's not somebody who you're going to say every single week, like Jefferson, if you don't get them targets, then you go to jail. Like it's not like that.

Um, you're, but having someone competent there, it feels like if there's going to be a big game where he kind of has to break out because they're going to put so much focus on Jefferson and Thielen that this might be it against the Packers. I also wanted to ask you your thoughts on the offensive line situation and whether they should make a change, but not just whether they should play Mason Cole over Ole Udo,

but what we think of the fact that Wyatt Davis is not a part of this conversation at all. He is just not in the discussion. And when someone got hurt two weeks ago, it's Blake Brandel playing. When we're having now a conversation about whether Ole Udo, who has dropped to second place in penalties in the league. Thanks to Connor Williams. But, you know, so when we're having that discussion of this guy who moved from tackle to guard is really struggling with it. It's all right. Well, I guess throw the veteran

over there because the guy that you drafted initially to start has been no part of the conversation. My thought is, is this a, well, the Vikings don't like rookie thing, or is this a, well, Wyatt Davis must just not be anywhere close to ready thing. So I'll say this again for those that might not remember me saying it in August. Wyatt Davis was taken one round before Drew Samia, Willie Beavers, TJ Clemmings. It's not that different. Third and fourth round is not that different. I know there's an entire sleep that you have to have before the second and third round or the second and third day of the draft.

I know that creates an arbitrary divide in our minds. He's a day two guy. He's a day three guy. It's not that different. Wyatt Davis dropped into round three. It's not that different. Wyatt Davis dropped into round three, which is not that different from round four. And I think in our minds, we say, ah, you know, round four, you hit and you miss. You take a flyer on a guy.

It doesn't always work out. This is not that different. You know, Pat Elfline worked for a little bit. He was a round three guy. It's not guaranteed to work. So I think maybe the expectation was a conditioning commentary that he made in training camp which also applied to wyatt davis you know that there were just some conditioning signs early on that well maybe this guy just isn't you know very athletic maybe he's just not not very committed to the game of football. And it's hard to know, like, where Wyatt Davis' head is at in all this. But there was writing on the wall that this wasn't going well.

And then to not elevate him in training camp, you know, when you had opportunities was odd. You bring Ole Udo in to sort of step in, cut the line and step in front of everybody. So I think that there was foreshadowing for this. And, you know, the team, like remember with Samia, they tried to get Samia to like take that big step in his first off season. And that didn't work out, but they wanted to give him that opportunity.

I think the same could be said for Davis and Ole Udo is far from entrenched. I think he's a restricted free agent. He might still be on the team. And he might, no, I guess he might have one more year on his deal. I think he's over? Probably. He probably is. Even though he's got limited guard action, Mike Zimmer seemed to really like what he's done in these first two games. And especially in the Baltimore game, he was really, really good from a PFF standpoint. So I think that when I asked Zimmer yesterday, he didn't debunk the notion that Cole might be inserted, which almost guarantees that he'll be inserted. I think, I think he's going to start now, whether it's at center or right guard is the intriguing one. Right guard is very understandable, but if he starts instead of Bradbury,

that that's pretty telling as well. And I think it always chalked it up to Bradbury being a little out of shape, not in condition after his illness. Um that would still be a big move for a third year starter, former first round pick. That would be enormous. Folks, have you ever thought about taking a bike to work, but figure it's too far or that the hills are too steep or heck who wants to show up to work covered in sweats? Well, that's why you need to check out the electric cruiser bike from my friends at Boogie Bikes. The Boogie Bike gives you all the experience of saving gas, getting outside,

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the spooky fall season and the design with the wolf carved into the state of the minnesota is just awesome it's very cool stuff and hey for you college football fans check out the tanner morgan t-shirts as well soda stick has tons of hats and hoodies with all their great designs on them you will love it go to sodastick.com that is s-o-t-a-s-t-i-c-k check that out today use the promo code purple insider for free shipping and also follow myself and sodastick on twitter for our giveaways i would agree with it if they decided to play cole over Bradbury. I don't think it's a massive upgrade, but Bradbury has been so poor this year in pass blocking that it's hard to justify him getting his job back just because he's a first round pick.

They did not do this with Laquan Treadwell. It's not like they forced Laquan Treadwell up the depth chart because he was a first round pick. They didn't do it with Cordero Patterson before they didn't do it. I guess whenever Mike Hughes was healthy, he sat on the bench behind Xavier Rhodes and Trey Waynes. They didn't force him into the game. So there have been a lot of times where they didn't say, oh, you were drafted in the first round. You have to play over somebody who's better than you. Adam Thielen played over Laquan Treadwell. Charles Johnson actually played over Laquan Treadwell. And I

think it should be the case here where Mason Cole is a better football player than Garrett Bradbury. And that might not always be the case for the rest of time, but it certainly is right now. The question to me is whether it's better to have Mason Cole at right guard with your right guard struggling so much and Bradbury at center, or is it better to pop out Garrett Bradbury and have Mason Cole at center since it's more of his natural position? But one of those two things is right. And we did not see them, as it pertains to Wyatt Davis, we did not see them use like Brett Jones last year. So I think that there's almost a feeling that the coaching staff has no idea what it's doing when assessing its players. But think this and i and i feel like from your experience covering this team

you would agree they rarely get it wrong they rarely watch guys play all the way through training camp and preseason and then go yeah well that guy can't play and then he goes somewhere else and is amazing or he secretly was just fantastic and they couldn't figure it out. Usually if somebody can't play, they can't play. And there aren't too many guys that I can think of. I don't know about you, but who have been cut by the Vikings or didn't get opportunities by the Vikings in the Mike Zimmer era.

And then they just left. And what, how did they miss it? Like people have brought up Kurt Coleman before and like Kurt Coleman, I don't know. He's kind of just a guy, right? Like, um, but you can't think of almost any example. So I tend to think that if in fact, there are some guys who were decent with the Vikings who can't play other places like Eric Wilson. Um, but I think that this coaching staff has and does know how to evaluate whether an offensive lineman is ready to play or not. And it's clear in the case to me of Wyatt Davis that it must be on him.

It must be that he's not ready to play or it must be that he's not good enough or in good enough shape or that they have a reason because they would really want to judging on how the right guard has played. They would really want to, and that he was thought of to be the day one starting right guard. They would really have plenty of reason to say you go in there. And the fact that he's not makes me think, well, he just must not be the best option. Yeah.

Circling back real quick. What are the storm Norton pff grades any good because storm norton was the first one that came to mind no oh gosh no no he's uh he's high he's sitting high says everson griffin um he's rashad hill basically yeah you know yeah i think the knock is probably on the the draft evaluators not as much the coaching staff who has just been just been blessed with a lot of a lot of mediocre players like they're choosing between a four out of ten and a two out of ten and they'll cut the two out of ten and try to make the four out of ten into something and it just continually does

not work but um what what is their play you know know, if not Wyatt Davis? There's not a lot of good options. Is Kyle Hinton ready to do anything? You know, like, is Rashad Hill able to move inside? They don't have a lot of interior flexibility. There's no proof that Garrett Bradbury can play guard. So if they think a move needs to be made, it probably has to be Cole or Dakota Dozier, which, as we've seen, doesn't work that well either. And Dakota Dozier is coming off a serious illness, so he's probably not available.

There just aren't a lot of cards to play right now. So you can make the same argument, and you made this argument earlier, Collar, with Rashad Hill, is that if you make a switch, it's hard to be worse. It's hard to be worse with Christian Derrissaw. And in his case, he's actually been much, much better. The Udo penalties are drive killers. They are just like sacks. And it's pretty damaging to have that in there. So my guess is Bradbury and Cole will start this week. I think that Udo is the odd one out, but not 100% on that. I think Bradbury could be in trouble too. Yeah, I mean, if they look at it and say,

we've just been better up there with him in, and we'll deal with the penalties, or we'll try to figure out what technique he can use. It's not like Udo has been destroyed all the time. It's just that when he gets beat, his inclination is to just tackle the person or stick his whole arm around them. And that's maybe something he has to learn that sometimes you just have to let that guy go. The rest of his play has not been an atrocity. It

hasn't been great, but it's not as bad as where Drew Samia or Dakota Dozier was last year. So I think that Cole staying in, and then like you said sometimes they do this where it's we want to make a change but uh drew samia got that uh knee injury yes that was it it's a knee is his problem and so we're going to start somebody else at right guard instead and then the guy just never gets back on the field. Maybe we'll see that with somebody here where it's so well, you know, he's, he's not a hundred percent from COVID. So we're just going to stick with Mason Cole and whoops. He just stayed there and hope that no one notices really. Let me ask you the, before we wrap up, I have a question for you yesterday on the Mike

Zimmer press conference, he received a call from Dion Sanders at the end of the press conference he received a call from deon sanders at the end of the press conference and even though it was a little bit wonky how the phone call was answered and it rang really loud and like mike has been in you know playing in us bank stadium hurt your ears why is the ringer so loud or maybe it just came through the audio that way but he answered and deon sanders talked to him for a few minutes which is pretty boss it's prettyer, especially if you're like my age and you grew up with watching Deion Sanders at one time, the guy is up there with Michael Jordan and Ken Griffey Jr. and neon Deion primetime Sanders for the most exciting player. So that's, it's a pretty cool thing. If Deion Sanders calls. So before we wrapped up the press conference, I asked Mike Zimmer,

who's the coolest person you have in your phone outside of Deion? And he said, Kenny Chesney. Let me present that question to you, Sam. Who is the coolest person that you have in your phone? Before I answer, Josh Metellus on the COVID list. The COVID cases mounting up they do activate radbury and the practice squad guy they're sticking around it's not going away um i mean i'm just i'm just casually scrolling through we got kent herbeck ken herbeck's cool uh yeah i think so world hero. Do you want to know what Searles his answer was? His was

post Malone. Wow. Yeah. He knows post. Wow. Got, I've got a lot of who's who of media in the twin cities. Um, you know, through my job, um, when I was producing radio about seven years ago, I got a lot of numbers of guests in my phone, which I've never, I have no reason to contact these people, but for questions like this, you know, it's nice to have Owen Daniels. I've got here. He stood me up for an interview, um, a couple of years ago. Uh, what, what else do you have? What else do you have caller? Well, my number one is easy and it is by far number one. This would even impress Mike Zimmer and Jeremiah Searles. would be wayne gretzky the great one and i just the same exact way as you where he was going to do a radio interview

with us in buffalo and so they gave us his number to call as the producer and you could bet i put it in my phone and of course i am not texting the great one and being like, what's up, Wayne? What you doing today? You busy? Cause I don't want a restraining order against me, but I will say that was pretty cool to have Wayne Gretzky on the air and really like down to earth. Nice guys. How is of course he's Canadian, but like that's his reputation.

So maybe he wouldn't hate if I texted him, but he's the coolest that I have in my phone. And then if you're a fan of like journeyman quarterbacks, I mean, I've got a few just from having guys on with Sage, like Jay Fiedler. Jay Fiedler is a pretty cool one. Brooks Bollinger guys like that. I love that. I mean, there's, there's probably a few more that are pretty cool, but nobody's got Chris Cluey here. Oh, Chris Cooley. Okay. There's, there's nobody a i'll probably ever get that will match uh wayne gretzky no yeah i don't think i can beat her back i i'm trying to do a quick scroll through i think

oh chris carter i have chris carter because we had chris carter on the show and they gave us a backup phone number just in case like hey text chris if you know there's a problem with the zoom link so chris carter not bad jack jablonski he's pretty famous all right that's all i got that's all we got uh all right so you and i will talk again after the packers game got a lot on the purple insider podcast though this week some in-depth breakdowns i'm planning some fun games to go along to lead up to this week, including Kirk Cousins and Mike Zimmer versus is what I'm calling it. Comparing them to not only the rest of the schedule, but also to other potential future combinations of coach and quarterback.

So that'll be later in the week. Make sure you check that out. Listen to the purple insider podcast, wherever you get your podcasts and check out purple insider.substack.com for our written work. Thanks everybody who took the time to watch us here on this Bring Me The News live stream, and we will be doing it again every Tuesday. So we'll catch you then. Take care.