Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Jeremiah Sirles on where the Vikings can be like the Seahawks

Episode Date: February 12, 2026

Former Vikings lineman Jeremiah Sirles joins the show to react to the Seahawks winning the Super Bowl and what Minnesota can emulate about what Seattle did. The Purple Insider podcast is brought to you by FanDuel. Also, check out our sponsor HIMS at https://hims.com/purpleinsider Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See https://pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hey, everybody. Welcome to another episode of Purple Insider presented by Fanduil. Matthew Collar here. And it is time for Tuesday morning left guard with former Minnesota Viking Jeremiah Searle, who now can say that you represent a Super Bowl champion. Did you have a good time at the Super Bowl, especially watching your center plow over New England Patriots players? Yeah, it was a blast. It was super fun. San Francisco, I think, did a really good job hosting. the security was well put together. Like the whole event was very well run. And then obviously getting a chance to go watch my guy go win a Super Bowl ring to have three clients on Seattle.

And to all three of them have, you know, that experience was really cool. And it was funny. One of the parents I was with had his uncle was like, do you feel like you kind of won the Super Bowl? I was like, hell no. I know how hard that is. Like I had no, but I got them there. Like as a player, like how hard it is to do that and to watch them be able to fulfill that moment and know like we push that ball so close and like that's what you try and go for like I don't think as rookies they really understand it

yet like I was talking to a couple like this is so cool it's like you don't get it people have tried for this for decades and never even sniffed it and your first year at bat you're hosting the Lombardi it it doesn't get much cooler than that yeah how does it feel for you to watch it every year I mean clearly you're rooting for your guy and the way that they won and as well as the interior of the line played and so forth. That has to be really cool to watch. But, I mean, I was watching Chris Long and his podcast, and he went over and got the confetti that he had picked up,

and the man almost lost it, like just talking about that feeling. And to watch the emotions on that field, even Sam Darnold, who has been so stonefaced through this entire thing and admitted that when he met up with his parents, that's got to be like a conflicting feeling for you, because you feel so good for all those guys that did it, but you never got there. Yeah. Yeah, it is. It's a really interesting feeling because it's not jealousy.

Like that's not the right word for it. It's it's such excitement for them, but it just, it just doesn't feel the same. I mean, the player in me, that was my goal. Every time I showed up to April, they put the picture of the Lombardi up in the locker room and said, this is why we're here. This is the only reason we're here. Yes, we're here to make money. money, yes, we're here to win games, but if we're not hosting this at the end of the year, what's the point of even being here? And to get as close as we did in 2017 and to taste just the tiniest piece of what that might feel like and then to see them all come to fruition and see it all for them, I don't even know the right emotion to describe it. It's not envy, it's not jealousy.

It's just this desire that still is inside me that knows that I will never get to accomplish that. and this is probably the best way that I'll be able to is to live through my players now. But to see some of the older veterans like Leonard Williams and guys that have been around forever and have been on dog crap teams. And now on Super Bowl, like to see those guys as range of emotions

to seeing guys like Gray's Abel who they're like, well, this is normal. I've won FCS championships and this is normal, right? You just win championships all the time, like not know how to act. And so just that wide piece there and, you know, seeing Sam Darnold up on the stage, Kenneth Walker,

and just seeing that team how we talked about it in the year. We're like that. We think this team might be good. We think it has a chance. I don't think any of us thought back in August this was the Super Bowl winning football team, but just to watch how they put it all together and grow and to watch guys and cheer for guys like Sam Darnold. And that piece there was pretty fun.

It's a very unique story, really, because when you go back to the beginning of the season, they were 60 to one to win the Super Bowl, which is very rare that that happened. Most of the time, the folks in Vegas, the folks at Fandul, they get it right. They're at least in the ballpark for the top teams. It's almost always the top quarterbacks or the guys who are considered the top quarterbacks. I think Sam Darnold's resume, if you put it on somebody else's name who didn't struggle early in their career, you would just say, this is an elite quarterback from the way that

he's performed really going back to 2022. But, you know, at the same time, like he wasn't getting that level. of respect from the betting markets, from the people who rank quarterbacks, from the people who, you know, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. And I've been really fascinated by the way that each person responds. It's sort of like a social experiment in a way for Sam Darnold to win the Super Bowl. Like, are you willing to update what you thought? Are you willing to refresh your opinions?

Are you the person who needs to cope in some way by saying the Vikings, oh, they wouldn't have done it if it was them instead? Does that make you feel better about what happened? Or what was your reaction to Sam Darnold? Because mine was mainly having covered him, having seen him up close, act the way that he did such a professional manner around the Vikings and all those questions about, you know, hey, you're playing the jets and, you know, you got something to say to them now or something, you know, all that sort of stuff.

And he always, you know, deflected that. But if there was ever a time to dunk on somebody, it was now. and he still didn't do it. And I think that that really speaks to everything that I had heard about Sam Darnold before he got to Minnesota, everything I saw up close. And now the world is kind of seeing what type of character he has. So I felt great about that. But I also at the same time was like, this is an all-timer, folks.

There's no way to spin this one or put lipstick on it or whatever else. This is as tough as it gets for your fan base. But how did you react to that? Yeah, you know, I have a little bit of, of different perspective because the same thing like covering him and when we we covered him last year obviously and you know hearing and watching his press conferences and hearing how he handles himself and watching the locker room fall in love with him and when he wins the game they hoist him on the shoulders and they bring him in and so you know just seeing that he was genuine because

you can't fake 52 other individuals like you can't fake them all out and so when you see that from a locker room the the entire locker room offense defense special teams celebrate in love on a guy like that, you know it's genuine. And then to talk to my clients who are with Seattle and they're like, Sam's the best man, like just the absolute best guy. He's approachable. And I think that's a big word when you talk about superstar quarterbacks. Are they approachable?

Or are they just that layer of God tier like, I can't even talk to you? And from what I've heard from Sam is he's one of the guys. He hangs out with the boys. He sits in the cold tub. He comes and hangs out in the meeting rooms. And so whenever a guy like that has a success that he has, I'm going to root for him all the time. I'm always going to root for those kind of guys.

And maybe I'm closer to it than most, but seeing him be able to fight through all that and the adversity and how many people that adversity would have absolutely tanked and never been able to come back from and knowing the emotions he's been through in his life from probably thinking at times, I can't play in this league. I'm not good enough. The league hates me. Everyone hates me to hoisting the Lombardier.

as a Super Bowl champion, I don't think most people can really understand that range that he's been through through the course of his career. I was listening to a podcast not that long ago from another Jets quarterback who busted. And he was talking about how the coaches didn't do enough for him and how they didn't develop him enough and they didn't give me enough attention. And that's why in the organization and they're that bad.

And they are as bad as it gets. I mean, like I didn't even think anything the guy was saying was wrong. But I was listening to it. Right. Like, uh-huh, uh-huh. That's, that's all stuff that I would say in analyzing the situation. But it's remarkable to me that Sam has always gone back to I could have been better.

I could have helped our, those fans have more success with the Jets. And I think that's why Jets fans have unequivocally supported Sam Darnold, because he's always said that, hey, I could have done something more. And having covered him, that was really the way that he approached a lot of things of dealing with adversity with the Vikings, where it was not, even when they melted down at the end of the season,

well, I didn't get enough pass protection. We didn't have a good enough game plan. And there are lots of ways you can layer that in there without clearly and blatantly saying it was someone else's fault. But we know they get very crafty when they do weekly press conferences at finding ways to slide in little things that pass the buck to somebody else. And he never did that. And I think it says a lot about leadership, especially in a world where everybody, is online all the time, wants to dunk on each other, wants to own other people, you know, to get whatever attention or likes or favorites,

not talking about you, Baker Mayfield. But, you know, it just, in a very, very increasingly petty and selfish world, it just made me believe in something again. Like, oh, yeah, you can be a class individual out there in sport. How about that? So that was a great part of it. But I think that the analysis coming out of it from a football perspective, Jeremiah has not been that great.

It's been, well, this proves that you can win with a quarterback who's only okay and not perfect, which, again, I just, like, what did Segnetti say? Like, Google me. Like, just Google what this guy has done over the last two years. He threw for the fifth most yards in the NFL this year. I think you're still going to have to have really good quarterback play. And also, are you guys Dory from finding Nemo and forget the NFC championship where he had to be an absolute super.

So I don't think that's great. I also think that, well, you have to run 50% of the time because that's what they did. I also don't think that's great analysis either. I think one is when you have a defense that dominant and you guys did this in 17, you do get ahead and then play to the game that is being played right there. I don't think it means that every team needs to suddenly switch to a 50-50 run and pass split. Yeah, it's so funny because when someone wins the when someone wins the, when someone wins the

Super Bowl. Everyone wants to do what they did. Right? When McVeigh won it, it's like, oh, okay, the league 11 personnel, spread them out, throw it up and down the yard. This is what wins Super Bowls. And then last year, the Eagles win it and, oh, run the football. You just got to run the football. If you just learn how to run the football, then everything's going to be great. It's like, yes, but the teams that are the most complete teams are usually the ones that finish at the end. And complete teams look different across the entire NFL. I would say that when the angles are fully healthy, fairly complete team, but they throw the football all the time. When you look at the Seahawks, how they built that team, how they roster manage that

team, complete team for what they needed. And there is no perfect answer. You have to be able, as the GM, as Schneider did, look at the pieces in which he could play with, put the coaches with those pieces and say, scheme it up correctly. And there is, so if it's run the 50-50 and that's our scheme, great. Let's stick to it and let's not waver. I think that's the biggest thing I saw from Seattle this year. They never wavered. They never went to the it's a copycat league. We have to pivot. We have to do this. They stayed with what they knew. They stayed with how they had to do it. And the great part is when they needed to take it to that next level, a NFC championship game, they could release Sam Darnold to say, go do it. But so many times they didn't have to because that's not the game that they

needed to play. And when you can live in that world, it's really hard to beat. It's really hard to beat when you're controlling the dictating so many games was the tempo was dictated by them, the run game, the time of possession, the turnovers. Like they just were so good statistically in all those categories that it almost looked boring for Sam Darnold. But when you're winning, you don't need to pump your quarterback up because he's not making $60 million. So you don't have to make him the focal point of the offense. Right. That plays a piece in it too. If you're the bangles and you're paying Joe Burrough 60 million. You're not going to hand it off 12 or 28 to 30 times a game.

So there's all these factors that played into it. But at the end of the day, Mike McDonald put together a complete football team with the pieces he had and John Snyder paid them all accordingly. And there's what you get. And also I think they had 12 draft picks that are starters right now. That really helps too when a lot of your starters are on rookie scale contracts. It certainly does to be allowed to pay a quarterback as much as they did, although that, you know, they structured it.

So his cap hit this year wasn't that much. He will certainly get, you know, a raise after this. And it will get a little harder for them in their front office, although they're bringing back so many pieces that, yeah, I think they've got a really good chance to be a top contender. We're also very, very close. And I mean, one pass away from the Super Bowl winning quarterback, having thrown 46 touchdowns, eight interceptions, and 4,700 yards this year in Matthew

Stafford. a team that basically just dropped back and pass every single play to Pooka, and DeVante Adams. Like, we judge it by the team that raised the final Lombardi. But the second best team in the NFL was the Rams. I do think, though, that there is something to a trend that has been bubbling in the NFL over the last couple of years, which is using bigger personnel. And I think that it has caused some problems for teams that got smaller, got more athletic.

And this is what makes our great game so beautiful is that there's, always these little ebbs and flows where everyone is taking deep shots and then all of a sudden, okay, now we're going to use two deep safeties all the time and start to negate that. So now, you know, teams are using this 11 personnel. Okay, we got to get smaller linebackers. We got to have nickels all the time, nickel packages all the time. And now teams are like, yeah, what if we got some fat dudes in there? What if we got some beef so we could play that way? I think the lesson of the Seattle Seahawks is get great players at every position. No, that's, I mean, that's really what it is.

But it's to be able to win in multiple different ways. And this, it stuck with me when Quasi Adopo Menz has said that his goal, which was not achieved ultimately, but the goal was to build a team that could win a lot of different kind of fights. And no one displayed that better than the Seattle Seahawks. Oh, we're in a shootout with the Rams. We can win that because we have a number one wide receiver. We have a star quarterback with one of the best arms in the National Football League.

Oh, we're playing a defense. game, we can run Ken Walker. We can grind it out. We've got the, the gritty offensive line to be able to do that. I think that that's the key there is that when you go through the playoffs, it's very rare that you get into the same game five different times, or I'm sorry, four different times. That doesn't happen. Usually you're going to have to play multiple different kind of ways and also shout out to their kicker and punter who are absolutely incredible in this football game. But that's part of it too. It's like you can win a game where you got to make a bunch of field bowls and pin the other team back and really play like an old kind of traditional type of football or you

could play a shootout, you know, type of football. Yeah, I mean, and you want to talk about a defensive mastermind. I broke down the film this morning that that defensive scheme had Drake May in an absolute blender from the word go. I can remember it's sitting in the stadium and watching him run to his right on that first series of the game. And I was like, free runner in the first 15s, not good men, not good. And it just got worse and worse from there. And when you can build that type of team and then also pair it with the coaching staff. And I think you got to give a lot of credit to this coaching staff for Seattle of Kubiak and McDonald on how they play with each other, right? Not one is more important than the other. Obviously, the defense is so good that the offense

will kind of dictate how the game flow is going based off of how much success the defense is having. but to all the stuff that you just laid out, you have to still be able to execute. And that's the part that for me, so many different guys on that Seattle team could show up when needed, right? Hey, we need a sack here. Are we looking at Hall?

Are we looking at Moffey? Are we looking at Lawrence? Are we looking at Biren Murphy? Are we looking at like, who's going to show up? We need one of you guys to show up. Hey, we need a big pick. Okay, is it going to be love? Is it going to be Witherspoon?

Like, they just had so many guys that when the moment came, someone showed up. And that, when you look at teams that miss the playoffs or you look at teams that were right on fringe, low-level playoffs, they don't have enough of those guys. And that's a big piece of having the X factor of, like you said, we need to win games in different ways.

Well, we need players be able to make plays in different ways. We need the guy that can call game by sacking the quarterback or we need the running back in the offensive line that can call game by operating a four-minute. You have to have the players in place to be able to do that at each level to make this Super Bowl run. And so many teams that are closer friends are two or three players away from getting there. And that's a really big piece as to why health matters to win the Super Bowl,

which the Seahawks were incredibly healthy for majority of the year. And then also having those players at multiple, multiple players at each level that can do that. All right. Let's apply all of these things to the Minnesota Vikings then. What they have and what they can do because I don't want to do a direct, how can they be the Seahawks? because you don't have to exactly be the same as them. But what are some of the things that they should be targeting in the off season to try to get to that point?

We could say you need a darn good center if we wanted to pump you up a little bit more. But actually, I think that you do with the complexity of the way that defenses are playing. A good center is a great place to start. But let's talk about it through the lens of Kevin O'Connell. That's the most interesting. I think what Clint Kubiak did that, Kevin O'Connell, maybe in 2024, didn't always do. And in 2025, there were certainly times that we could point to that didn't do

was sometimes play in the way that it takes to win, not in the way that you want to win. So I think O'Connell has always loved the idea of like the dagger, deep bomb, which is, which is, you know, they went for that a couple times in this game. I don't mind that. But there are times where you have first in goal and Jordan Mason in the backfield and you get a bit overly clever or you have second and one and Jordan Mason in the backfield. And there's sometimes where you just have to grind this thing to a pulp, even if that's not really what you want to do here. You've got to run the clock. You got to hammer away at the defense, just

trusting and believing that those guys are going to wear down. You have to protect your quarterback. I think the biggest thing for me is protecting your quarterback. And we always put that on the offensive line. But I look at the Seattle offensive line and go, I don't think it's perfect from a past protection. I'm right card. I don't think it's perfect from past pro, but I think Clint Kubiak protects his quarterback with rolling him out, top graded play action quarterback in the league, moving him away from those things. And if you're not allowing the opposing defense to call their best stuff to go get your quarterback, they get frustrated. So I think that's number one is the fact that Darnold took one sack in the Super Bowl and the fact that he only took 27 in the regular season for a guy who historically has taken a ton is the biggest thing O'Connell should be going into the off season and saying, how can I get my quarterback sacked less?

Yeah, I mean, same thing. You can mirror that with what they did in Chicago this year with Caleb Williams. He was 69 sacks in 24 or whatever it was. And this year it dropped down there too. The more of those quarterbacks get hit, the more rattled they become, the more erratic they become. the worst decision makers they become. And so I agree, let's start there. Let's start with how do I protect my quarterback from a scheme perspective? Is it running the football more? Is it play action?

Is it three step? Is it what can I do to not put him in the position to take a sack? That's all you can really do is a coordinator. You can't say, well, I'd throw it here. I'd throw it here. I'd do that. Like that comes down to just the operating and the processing power of the quarterback. but you can give him the answers to the test and hope that he can just go execute the test.

Hey, in this formation, here's the film look. Here's where it goes. Three step, ball gone. Okay, if not dirt it or run. Like, those are the type of things you need to give him to build the confidence to be able to go progressions and true progressions, one, two, to three in that piece there. And so that's way you can build it in. And also, if you look at some of those play action shots that Sam Darnold had this year, dudes are wide open. like you're not having to fit it into this super tight window anticipation, timing.

It's play action, fake it, roll. The tight ends going, hey, over here, right? No one's around me for 10 yards and you just didn't get down to them or in Jigba's way deep because the safety's got caught flat foot in. So you just got to lay it out there and let him go get it. That's part of protecting the quarterback too is making those routes seem more wide open than they are because you did the run game earlier. and you stuck to the run game and it tricks people versus the Vikings right now, the team is playing past defense to stop the run. But hey, we'll stop the run,

but we're going to make sure you're not shooting over our heads. So that makes the timing of the passing game so much more critical, so much more important, so much harder to feed the right windows where you need to fit them. That's where it becomes hard. So I think from a scheme perspective, you're exactly right. We have to find a way to protect our quarterback regardless who it is. I don't care if it's Kirk.

I don't care if it's JJ. I don't care if it's Kyler Murray. Like scheme-wise, we have to protect the quarterback better. I also think that when I look at Kenneth Walker, who reminds me of Levion Bell the way that he runs, he's just so patient and he kind of like let everything develop in front of him. But the other team has to be afraid. Not the other team has to recognize, oh, you know,

they've got a running game. And the Vikings ran the ball. Okay. When you look at their yards per attempt, when you look at their EPA per rush, it was not terrible. For the first time, actually, it was not terrible this year, a little bit ironic in that way. But did any team come in to play the Vikings and go, oh, man, if we don't get on our piece of queues with this run game fit and we don't tackle whatever, this guy is going to make us pay.

I never felt that from other teams. I never felt like, you know, well, you know this. when Delvin was out there, I mean, you could see on tape the linebackers up, up on the balls of their feet, taking that first step on play action hard because they were concerned that Delvin was going to break an 80 yard touchdown every single time he was out there. And it was even different. And you guys in 17 had a good run game with Jerich and Latavius, but it was a little

different. Like there was not that same like this guy is special. I think that they need to find that guy. Like I think that they need to approach the draft of. finding someone whose explosiveness does strike fear into the opposing team, not just for the play action, but also for if you can hand it off to a guy and get 20 yards, it is like the best feeling in the entire world.

It's like we did nothing and got 20 yards. It's so easy to do that. I think that should be a main goal of the roster is to find explosiveness in that backfield. 100%. The hard part is it's really hard to predict that without, I mean, so many of these guys that are explosive have always been explosive, right? You're drafting, I mean, so what was, Kenneth was a second rounder, Charbonnet was a second rounder, Bejohn, James

Cook, Christian, like these guys that are the fear running backs have always been that way. Like, they've always been that guy coming from out of college. And so if that's the case, you have to be willing and so many GMs and so many coaches aren't on a day one or early day two running back pick. And that's terrifying because sometimes those guys do not work out, right? Well, Trent Richardson, not ideal. Didn't really work out the way you wanted to. Monty Ball, Melvin Gordon, like there's so many of these things. But the guys that are fear running back, Sequant, Jonathan Taylor, you have to be willing to spend the capital in the draft to go get those guys. Because I'm not a big believer of going and paying a free agent running.

back after the fourth year and expecting him to come in and give you the same results he gave you when he was four years younger. I think if you're looking to find that fear factor at running back, you have to be willing to spend the draft capital go get him. And there are guys in free agency. You know, I like Travis ETN as someone who's been a good past protector who's got some jolt to his game. But I tend to agree with you. The second round feels like a place where you could circle and say that is one where you can justify it. And because teams don't spend very many picks on the first round, usually the best running back. You could get the second best running back in the entire draft in the second round.

If you're willing to do that, it feels like they need to be. As much as Jordan Mason is a great grinder and averages, you know, 4.7 yards per attempt. But there's never that this guy could go all the way. He could jump backwards over somebody or whatever, you know, that Sequin did. That fear is just, uh, is just not there. on the defensive side, I look very much at the secondary. The Vikings have had patchwork secondaries and Harrison Smith mind bleeping quarterbacks.

And they've gotten away with that. And Byron Murphy's a good player. And I think Isaiah Rogers proved to be a good player. But I think that needs another truly dynamic piece. I mean, when I watch Witherspoon play, the acceleration of that guy from the second level was bananas. I mean, he was in the backfield in a lightning bowl. I don't know what he ran in the 40, but it wasn't like 4-2 because, holy cow. And that level of explosiveness, what we're talking about here is guys who are next level,

at whether it's, you know, turning a 10-yard run into a 50-yard run, whether it's turning a second-level blitz into, hey, maybe it's a pressure versus a game-changing type of play. And this is where these guys have to come from the draft. There's really no other way to get them. Lewis was supposed to be that. He ran a 4-3-7 at 6-foot-3, and it just didn't work out. Like, they tried to get that. But that is something that I think is missing a little bit on the defensive side.

That's why they draft Dallas Turner. And we saw lightning from Dallas Turner a few times this year. They need a lot more of that. But I think as they look to potentially replace Harrison Smith, that's where you're looking at someone like Eamonwari and going, you probably need some sort of freak man at that position in order to really be as dominant as you can. potentially be with Brian Flores defense. Yeah, especially with the scheme that we have.

I mean, what Harry's been so good at for so long is the eraser. Something went wrong, but we never knew it went wrong because Harry made the tackle. Or, oh my gosh, we're in the wrong coverage, but Harry fell and dropped in the right spot because he read the eyes of the quarterback and he knew where he needed to go. If you lose that eraser, you have to then replace it with a new spark. and that new spark is not going to be able to be the brain of Harrison Smith anymore. It's going to be half the splash playmaking of the physicality and the physical traits of that player. Like the Nicket, I mean, I'm going to butcher his name.

How do you say it? Imanwari. Imanwari is a tackling machine. The dude is long. He runs. I don't know if I watched him miss a tackle in the playoffs all the way through. That's the type of physical traits you're looking for. And in this defense, there's so many different ways.

that you can try and use that player. I mean, you look at like Kyle Hamilton, you look at, again, what Harrison Smith did in like, I think it's a fungah for Denver, like those type of guys that can just move around and be great, you have to find that guy in order to operate the defense that you need. Next year, I'm going to send you a player's name. Chris, I'm so bad with it, especially DBs.

I know most of the alignment. It's the DVs that get me every time, man. They just, they're not real people. So I think all the things that we just talked about for, hey, let's look at the Super Bowl team and compare them to the current Vikings. It doesn't feel crazy. None of that feels crazy. There's guys in the draft at safety. There's guys in the draft at running back.

There are some free agent additions after they restructure every single contract under the sun. And you can build out players number 52 or two through 53 pretty well on this team, I think. And you got the kicker and you got to resign Ryan Wright after last year in his performance. But that number one position is very much up in the air. And when I look at the leading passers in the NFL, a lot of them ended up in the playoffs. Several of them ended up deep into the playoffs. And yeah, you could get there with Bo Nix. But even Bo Nix had the eighth most passing yards in the NFL.

He was treated like he was just handing off or, well, you know, whatever throwing two-yard passes every time. but he ends up with top 10 in passing yardage. You cannot be 23rd in quarterback play and seriously compete. Sam Darnold has been a top 10 quarterback the last two years. It's not that random that he's the Super Bowl champion. Matthew Stafford was almost there. He's a Super Bowl champ and an MVP. Drake May is an MVP runner up.

He's on the other side of this thing. And it's even hard for him. So what how do they approach this? with a lens of like looking at Seattle's coming back, Chicago improved, Detroit, you know, they're going to bite ankles and do everything that it takes to build that old lineup again. Green Bay is probably not going anywhere.

They'll be the same Green Bay. I mean, which option for you makes you serious about playing with these teams? I don't know if there is one. And I think that's the biggest problem for me is when I look across the landscape of the quarterbacks and free agency, the quarterbacks in the draft and the quarterbacks on the roster, we're not close to having a Josh Allen,

having a Matthew Stafford or a Sam Darnold, a Drake May, a Jaden Daniels, a Caleb Williams, like those excitement levels. Even last year with how bad Caleb played, there was always that flash of, it's there.

I see it. If we can get this, I never really saw that with JJ this year. I never saw that. level of like, ooh, he could just, if that fix this, fix that, there was so much that needed to fix that I don't anticipate JJ taking the jump that Caleb Williams took the shoe. And maybe, again, maybe I'll be wrong and we'll be sitting here when they're raising Lombardi and I'll say I was wrong. But I just think that looking at the landscape,

I don't know what the answer is, Matthew. And I don't think I have one that says that vaults us to Super Bowl level contender at the quarterback position. And that's a problem. I've got one, there's only one. There's only one guy who you could make the case because there's only one guy who's available that is not 37 with an Achilles injury or 43 or however old Aaron Rogers is. And that is Kyler Murray. He is the only one. You could say maybe Derek Carr, we don't even know if he's actually coming out of

retirement, though. So that, even that's not exciting. That's very suspicious. But like that whole, that whole thing of all of a sudden everybody is out with this. So it may be Derek Carr. The only guy who is, and Derek Carr's old attacking has been beat up to, the only guy who has recently been a top 12 quarterback twice since 2020 that is available or presumed to be available is Kyler Murray.

And that's it. That's the list. I mean, Mac Jones has won 10 games and gotten to the playoffs once and was okay for the 49ers. I'd say pretty good for the 49ers this year. But what you were just talking about with Caleb Williams, what actually we were talking about with Nicky Menwere is lightning, explosiveness, who has a next level talent that could actually click and work. And there's only one guy who's available and that's Murray. And that's

why that's my pick for what they should do is because he's the only guy with that. If it was Aaron Rogers, you know, four years ago, I would have said, of course, you know, all right, Aaron Rogers. And I think to your point that with J.J. McCarthy, there were flashes of things that were very good. I don't know that there was flashes of, oh my God, which is what you're talking about with Caleb Williams. I remember saying to Courtney Cronin after the Vikings played in Soldier Field in 2024, I was like, Caleb Williams is going to run circles around this franchise for years, isn't he, like around the Vikings? And you see his escapability. He's Michael Vic level speed escaping, you know, Jonathan Grenard or something.

We didn't, we didn't see that from McCarthy. it was always going to have to be football IQ, great improvement in throwing technique, leadership, toughness, all those things. And then the skills would have to be good enough. It was never freaky, scary skill. Tyler Murray has some freaky scary skill. There's the number one overall draft pick. He's the only guy.

And nobody likes it. I don't love it. You don't love it. The odds of it working are not the highest I've ever heard, probably not that high. But he's actually got something on his. resume to say that that's happened before. Yeah, and that's what you have to hang your hat on. That that's what you have to go and get unless I win my milkshake and they go all in on J.J. McCarthy because there's no guarantee Kyler becomes available, right? So what then? Like,

devil's advocate here, Matthew, Kyler does not become available or they're just asking too much or someone else trades for them, right? Someone else gives up the farm or whatever it might be. Then what? Like, then where do you go? Where do you pivot from if Kyler Murray is no longer on the board because then it gets really desperate. So tell me the path then to J.J. McCarthy getting there to that level where you could make some sort of reasonable argument that if things broke well for you, you could go through the playoffs. I think it would take two years. I honestly believe that to get J.J. McCarthy to where we would need him to be to be deep into the playoffs, NFC North champions, it would have to be a Jordan Love type timeline. It would need to be next year. We need to see growth and

improvement. It's still not going to be perfect because I don't think you can magic wand and fix all of his issues in four months of an off season or six months of an off season. It needs to be next year makes big improvements and the game slows down. He controls the game better. He doesn't throw as many interceptions. He doesn't get injured. He has a full year under the belt. And then you expect him to take even a bigger jump going into year four. And that's really the timeline for J.J. McCarthy in my mind is I'm not expecting him next year to be a high and high level. I mean, I'm, I'm, hoping him to be 17, 18, like somewhere in that mid range of like, okay, that's a jump from 33, 32 or whatever it might be.

And then to take that jump again, kind of Josh Allen like in that realm of like, hey, first two years weren't great and that kind of exploded for him in year three. That's where the path is for him. Unfortunately, I don't know if KOC and Brian Flores can wait that. And in a theoretical world, he just continues to make and prove. after improvement and it slowly gets there and then you, you know, reap the rewards, but you don't know that that's everything has to go right. Everything has to go right. And very rarely does everything go right all the time in the NFL. And you think about some of the quarterbacks who got three

years of starting. I mean, Kenny Pickett got multiple seasons of starting. How about Justin Fields? A guy who was drafted in almost the same slot as J.J. McCarthy and wasn't, you know, the top pick in that draft with a lot of quarterbacks. And he never took that other step that people were always sitting there waiting for. Oh, if he just improves his anticipation throwing, if he just improves his timing, if he just gets a different offensive coordinator, what, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. And then you've gotten to the point where, uh-oh, we handed the keys over to someone who just can't do it.

And at that point, everyone is just completely fired. And, you know, you're changing regimes and drafting a new quarterback. and everything else. And after these first 10 games, the odds of him being more Justin Fields than he is Josh Allen or Sam Darnold are probably 10 to 1 based on how it's gone historically for guys like this. And teams usually do hang on, but not teams, and this is like a Tray Lance or an Anthony Richardson, not teams that are good for the 53 man roster.

They usually do not wait. So I don't expect them to, which I guess is my last question before our final love to see I'd hate to see it is just what's your, what's your prediction? I mean, this is our, this is our final show before we kind of go into a break here and then stuff happens. I'm sure we'll talk when decisions are made, but what do you think? Honestly, I think Kirk Cousins is wearing purple again next year. I know.

Because I'm not sold that we'll be able to, A, afford Kyler Murray's price point if they're, if the Cardinals don't just straight up release him and be like, we're done, go on, go about your way. I don't know if we'll be able to afford the price point for a trade if that's what they're asking for. I think you talk about some of the other options. If you're truly looking for a quarterback that's going to come in and compete, a.k.a. start over J.J. McCarthy. There's not enough options.

And so I think, you know, he doubled down on we're bringing a veteran quarterback in. So I want to compete. It looks like it points signs to me that Kirk Cousins is going to be a quarterback in purple again next year. For what price point, I don't know. and from there it's going to be him and J.J. McCarthy show through. And I'm hoping that with this new leadership with Brzezinski and with KOC and B. flow kind of at the helm leading this thing, that they can watch what happened in this Super Bowl, build the team properly, adjust the scheme properly, and give this group of guys the best chance to win,

not like you said, the way that they want to win. But being able to build that is going to be tough and it's going to be hard. but you have to get the number one choice on your roster of quarterback, at least in a much more serviceable position. And Kirk probably brings that, at least better than what we had. Isn't the irony of all ironies that a Mike Zimmer coaching staff just won the Super Bowl? Kennedy Palomalo is there.

I didn't know that Rick Denison, Clint Kubiak, all these guys, Andrew Janoko, all these guys who worked for Mike Zimmer. And now everyone wants the Vikings to use Mike Zimmer's offensive strategy. Zimmer always believed run on early downs, stick with the run, build play action off of it. It got them with Stefansky to the playoffs in 2019 with a good offense. And now Kirk's going to come back and they're going to become a run first team with the coach that they hired to be a past first team because they were tired of Mike Zimmer and his obsession with the run. It's a giant circle, Matthew. Do we just go round and round and round and round we go?

I'm just the McConaughey meme of just like, so now we want Mike Zimmer to be the coach? Hey, Spielman's still out there for GM candidates. I mean, it's presents. Bring him back. Just bring them back. Spring him back. Zimmer and B-Flow working on the defense together.

Those A-gaps would never be the same. And the paint would come off the walls of TCO Performance Center. Okay. here's a last thing for you. It's been a wonderful year for us podcasting, even if it was a struggle at times for the old football squad. But what was your biggest love to see it from the 2025 National Football League season? I think my biggest love to see it was there was no clear-cut winner pretty much the entire year. It was very much no one really had any idea who was going to be. be the best team in the football league. No one knew who was coming out of the

NFC, who was coming out of the NFC. You had a full kind of regime flip in the playoffs. Mahomes was out. Burrow was out. Lamar's out. And you see this kind of new Drake May, Bo Nix and everyone come through. I just like when the NFL is not predictable. And that is my biggest thing I liked about the NFL this year is you're watching Trevor Lawrence and the Jags going, holy, you guys pretty damn good football team down there. And you're looking across the pond and you're going, oh, London and England and all this stuff, I just loved how competitive from top to bottom the NFL really was this year compared to the last few years.

I think that's a great one. I also feel like, well, I mean, my love to see it should be that every team goes for fourth down all the time now. In the Super Bowl, they didn't have to because if they got ahead by nine, the game was pretty much going to be over. And I think they knew that. But the analytics continuing to win with NFL teams going for fourth downs, that is kind of a part of a love to see it is that so much drama is created by the higher

variance way of playing in the NFL now. And you have these crazy switches and twists and turns. And I don't enjoy the fact that every kicker can just chip shot from like 68 these days. But I also did love to see the impact of the kickoff on the NFL. It's a play. And it looked weird at first. And then now you've adopted it. And now it just feels like a real.

play and it's changing games. And I think special teams being back was kind of cool for this year because it felt like, oh, yeah, one third of the game. Yeah, more like 0.03% of the game. I really enjoyed that about this year. I think that I was going to go quarterback redemption stories. They were kind of across the league this year. But you mentioned Trevor Lawrence was a really good one. And Sam Darnold, of course, raising the trophy at the end. But there were quite a few this year of quarterbacks that were kind of left for dead a little bit and then, you know, we're able to emerge. But I'll go with this one for love to see it. Even from the time that I was a young tyke, Jeremiah watching football, got to tell you, I love Bruce Smith. I love Derek Thomas,

loved Reggie White. Defense is back, my brother. It is back. And look, it's, I know, it's always been great. It's always mattered. Being good at everything matters. But I feel like the defensive minds of the National Football League, driven by guys like Mike McDonald, driven by guys like Brian Flores, have taken defense to a completely different level where it's scary out there. And where this goes from here and offense is counterpunch, I think is going to be really fascinating. So I love to see that. I also loved every podcast that we did.

We had so much fun throughout this season. We are still, oh, for, we have not covered a Super Bowl team yet, but maybe someday we will. Well, they'll try again next year. But we'll do check-ins for sure in the off-season when things happen. But it was a real, a real journey from the end of training camp through the season, reacting to every game and everything. And I could not ask for anyone better than you to do that with. Oh, I appreciate that.

It's been a blast. Obviously, I mean, we're going, what, five years now? Is this five years strong? Yes, starting 2020. Yeah. Yeah, five years strong on this. And we'll get to a Super Bowl one day, but also this, it's never, it's never not entertaining along the way. So we have, we have found bad great seasons,

we've had terrible seasons and everything in between. And I appreciate you. I appreciate the Purple Insider fans and everyone that is a part of this podcast every single week. So you guys make a lot of fun. One more time. Close us out. Football. All right. Welcome into our final Robinson roundup of the year with special contributor to the show, Maggie Robinson, who will not be gone forever, but will not be sifting. through random highlights of restricted free agents signing their qualifying offers and so forth. We've had a lot of news to work with, though, over the last couple of weeks. So the floor is yours, Maggie, to run us down, whatever it is you want to talk about from

the NFL this week. Let's run it back one last time with a Super Bowl recap. So Seattle, I said it last week and I was proved right. Defense was the name of the game. This was an incredible defensive showing. And I was listening to some journalists from the ringer, and they said they think this game is really going to restructure how teams build their defense. Like if you have a really solid defense, you don't need that star quarterback.

And I think this game proved that the unflashy and the not standout necessarily players are the ones who get the game done at the end of the day. And I mean, it was just an incredible showing from the Seattle defense. What stood out to you? Yeah, see, I think that's interesting because, you know, I've always had this crazy theory about the Super Bowl that you need to be good at everything. And that's usually the model. And with Sam Darnold being treated like he did nothing en route to winning the Super Bowl, I understand he didn't have to be special in the actual Super Bowl game. But he did throw for 346 yards, three touchdowns in the NFC championship and was a top 10 quarterback this year. And in his last, what is it, 43 games, he's won like 35 of them or.

something like that over since 2020. I mean, I think that Sam Darnold is still not getting the respect that he deserves, even after two 14 win seasons where the only guy who's ever done that other than him is Tom Brady, even after a performance where he played just as well as the MVP of the NFL, Matthew Stafford, because his defense was good. Well, most defenses who go to the Super Bowl are good along with most offenses. Check out where the Seattle Seahawks rank. in offensive scoring this year also very, very high.

And the reality was heading into it. And I think everybody had a sense for this, but was hoping it would go another way, was New England was a little bit ahead of itself here in their timeline. And was not really a fully complete team with a very, very young quarterback, whereas Seattle was an extremely mature team of top to bottom, every position that you can circle on the depth chart was strong. And that's what usually wins you the Super Bowl.

I don't think there's any big takeaway of, well, this is really the model now and the Super Bowl proves it. Okay, have a top 10 quarterback, top 10 running game, top 10 defensive line, top 10 set of linebackers, top 10 corners, top 10 safety. Oh yeah, okay, that's it. And by the way, the most underappreciated people in the Super Bowl, the kicker and the punter who also had an unbelievable game. Just do everything. All 53 be really, really good. and you too can win the Super Bowl. Good luck, everyone.

And to highlight that point, to go back on what I said, there's two players that stand out to me. Obviously, Kenneth Walker named Super Bowl MVP, first time in 28 years that are running back, has been named Super Bowl MVP, 135 yards, 27 carries. Like, it's a running back. They have gotten like the bad end of the deal every single time in money, in deals, in respect.

And here he is getting the biggest title, on the biggest game of the year. And then also, you look at Jason Myers, who scored 17 of the Seahawks 29 points. That is ridiculous. And the rest of the offense should honestly be a little embarrassed. It's their kicker who is carrying them on their backs. Marist Red Fox, one of three in the NFL,

like not a guy from a big school. I just, I think it kind of points out there's a lot of different pieces in here. And then when people look at the bigger storyline of this Super Bowl game, Like, oh, well, it was, it was just defense and no one else stood out. Yes, but you had these players do incredible things and you don't score points with just a defense. Well, not only that, but the defense was in a very favorable situation because the Seattle offense had the ball all the time. I mean, by running the football, by completing passes, especially into the second half, Donald had some incompletions in the first half, but by moving the sticks, they just controlled the football.

They controlled the field position as well. seem like every time Seattle got it back, even if they didn't score, they were moving the football a couple of, you know, first downs and then punting it all the way down inside the five. And you mentioned all those field goals. I think that that was proof of what Seattle thought of New England, because throughout the NFL, what we've seen is all sorts of teams going for fourth down all the time, even erroneously like Denver trying to get a fourth down with Jared Stidham as their quarterback. But usually you do that when you're the underdog and you go, I may we're going to need points because if we don't get a touchdown here, we're in trouble,

where Seattle just said, you know what, field goal? Like, if we get, if we get more than a one score lead, this game is probably over. So Sam Darnold played the game to win. He didn't take any risks. He took, I think, one sack the entire game. He barely threw into traffic outside of maybe a pass or two early in the game and just made sure that he kept the train on the tracks for them to win. So I thought it was really well managed from.

top to bottom, but you're absolutely right that, you know, the kicker needed to come through too. It takes everybody to win a Super Bowl. And on the other side of the ball, Drake May getting sacked six times, three turnovers, one of which was an interception for a touchdown. Do you think it was his lack of experience? Was it nerves? Was it the whole season catching up to that team that just looked young and an experience? And we kind of had the wool pulled over our eyes.

Yeah, I think that it was, I mean, in part that their offensive line could not. handle Seattle's defensive line. And throughout the season, Drake May did a really good job of papering over that by hitting on deep shots. I mean, he's probably the best deep passing quarterback in the entire NFL this year. Plus, he's got great mobility and athleticism. But that was mitigated by a team of absolute freaks on the defensive side. I mean, when you look at the domination outside of everyone except for the Rams and the MVP

of the league, the Seattle Seahawks were the best defense in the league and they dominate. them and the Texans really were one and two all year long for the most dominant teams. And Drake May had to play both of them en route to the Super Bowl. So he didn't have it very easy there. But I think what we've seen is almost every time that a team's offensive line is overmatched in the Super Bowl, they do not win. Because you are talking about the best team in the league that you're facing. So if you have a major weakness, it's going to be really hard to survive. I also think that there were some nerves there for Drake May.

He is 23 years old. It is very, very rare that we see a quarterback at that young of an age reach the Super Bowl. And I think you could tell from early on jittery in the pocket, not getting it to open receivers. And then really the devastating miss where he had an open tight end just after they had gotten a little bit of momentum. And then he overthrows him and that seemed to unravel things even further. So, you know, it was a it was a really, really tough performance. and I just like people to keep in mind that they were in the Super Bowl because sometimes because it's the only game because we all watched it.

It's like, oh, they're left tackle. He needs to play guard now. No, he doesn't. No, he doesn't. He had a pretty good year all season long and played the toughest of the absolute toughest defense and just got beat. So I think it was a combination of probably the stage being as big as it is, but also you're working from behind there to start with an offensive line that can't

take on Seattle's D-line and Seattle had an amazing blitz plan that I hadn't seen them use all year long. And then they brought out for the Super Bowl because you get two weeks to prepare. Yeah. And then Will Campbell is just sitting there like, oh, on his heels, reacting to every play is not on the forefront, not on the first step. And I mean, the stats are bad. They speak for themselves, give up 14 pressures, which is the most of any player this year, including the postseason. And for that, there's no excuse. But he is a rookie. I understand he was drafted fourth overall.

Top five. We have high expectations. Yeah, and he did deliver the entire season. It's one game and it just happened to be the worst game to have those mistakes in. Hands down, I'm not giving him any passes, but I think just put it all in perspective of, yes, he played poorly. Yes, he was also recovering from a knee injury that never fully healed. And he's a rookie.

That guy's probably younger, I believe, than, um, than even Drake May. Like, this is his first time doing this. You can't expect him to get everything right. Yeah. And it kind of reminds me a little bit of what happened with Sam Darnold last year in the playoffs where now Sam was really, really good all regular season. And then it went downhill. But when he got an unfavorable matchup, just like Drake May, just like Will Campbell.

That's why in route to this whole thing, you know, I kept saying that it doesn't mean that Sam Darnold could never be clutch. This doesn't mean that Drake may can never be clutch or that Will Campbell can't improve. And I'm sure that he's going to go into the offseason knowing that he's got to, you know, step up his game for next year. But when you look at most, I mean, his regular season, he was solid. And he got them there. But when you get there and there's anything that isn't 100%, whether it's an injury or whether it's a game plan or even just a matchup, Sometimes with offensive linemen, one guy just has an advantage against them.

And they figured out pretty early on in the game, their rushers, that he was struggling with their power to anchor down and, you know, keep them off Drake May. And they just took advantage of it all day. Like, that's what happens. But it's just one game. And we really don't need to start talking about this guy as if he's a bust or if he can't play or something like that. Although the breakdowns of what happened have been really fascinating to see from

former players and things like that. But as you said, keep it in perspective that they were in the Super Bowl. Talk about keeping it in perspective. I want to ask your thoughts on Sam Darnold. Where does he sit now in your quarterback ranking? Has he moved up? Is he staying where he is? I think a lot of people like you're saying are really underselling his ability.

Yeah, I think that that really is true about underselling how good he actually is, which is bizarre to me and really shows you how people's first impressions just die hard. And they don't update their opinions. if they didn't like a quarterback three years ago, they're not going to like him now and they're going to keep saying that he's getting lucky. But the weird thing about that to me is, you know, giving everybody else the credit in his defense, of course, deserves it. But he came through and beat the Rams with his arm is that he was always supposed to be this good.

That's the strange thing to me that Darnold was drafted to be this player and became it when he was in Minnesota. There was nothing fake about it. There was nothing lucky about it. Like, that's crazy arm talent. And he had to learn how to manage a game. He had to be coached better. He had to be in the right system with Clint Kubiak and their play action game working off the run. And then there you go.

I don't know how that's different from any other star quarterback. You know, Jordan Love needs things to be the right way. Justin Herbert didn't have his offensive tackles and got steamrolled in the playoffs. But for Sam Darnold, there seems to be a different set of rules. But when you look at his numbers, since 2022, since he turned a quarter, corner in his career late in the 2022 season. He's got a higher quarterback rating and adjusted net yards per attempt than Patrick Mahomes does since then.

Now, I'm not saying he's a better quarterback than Mahomes, but this has been a sample size now of multiple seasons of this guy being excellent quarterback. I don't like quarterback ratings because I think everything is in context, right? It's how do you fit in your team, your system and everything else? But in terms of actual skill, talent, I mean, he's way up there for me. I think he falls in the same category of he's not one of the aliens, the, you know, Josh Allen or Lamar Jackson, he probably won't ever win an MVP. But he's right below that.

I mean, a similar caliber to a Philip Rivers, a Matt Ryan and Eli Manning of, you know, time gone past. And like Eli Manning or Joe Flacco, when things clicked in, he was able to win the Super Bowl. He meets that threshold of being a Super Bowl caliber quarterback. something that I think of when you mentioned that is who's coming up next, who has had kind of a quote unquote bust of a start in the NFL and can maybe pick it up and turn it around. And I don't want to get too drastic. But Daniel Jones, if he plays the way he played for what, like the first six weeks of this season and can do that again for the Colts, I think we're looking at someone who's kind of like risen from the

ashes as well in that player of he has the ability. We know what he's capable of. All the pieces have to come together for him. And you're right. It's the coach. It's the atmosphere. It's the players around you. Like it all has to line up and be stacked. But that's someone that I'm keeping my eye on for next season of this could be,

this could be it for you. Yeah. I think that's a good pick. The thing is Daniel Jones is a free agent. So I assume he's going to go back to the Colts, but he may be the Minnesota Vikings quarterback. I don't know, which, you know, Kevin O'Connell, to his credit, kind of saw this coming with Daniel Jones and wanted him to be.

a Minnesota Viking. I don't think he's got quite the skill of Sam Darnold, like the arm talent. And, you know, he was helped a lot by their situation. But he was probably always better than he looked for the New York Giants. All New York teams should truly be ashamed of themselves. But, you know, he's a good pick. Here's what's hard, though. There's a bunch of quarterbacks who have gotten a bunch of different chances and some of them are just bad. Like Justin Fields is probably just not good. But there's always going to be now, I think, with that Darnold has done. this in the back of everyone's mind, well, maybe we need to keep trying it just in case. And to Donald's also, you know, his success and how it needs to be respected, there's a lot

of quarterbacks, a lot historically, who did not start to hit their peak till 26, 27, 28, when they got in the right situation and they learned enough football to really understand what they were seeing out there. So it's hard, though, and the Vikings are already dealing with this because you know the right thing is to be patient with your quarterback, but it's so. super hard to do it in real time. Yeah. And let's throw a wrinkle in the Seahawks plan. Clint Kubiak, now the head coach of the Las Vegas Raiders.

That's an important person that they just lost in that organization. And it makes you wonder who's filling in for them. And are they looking for a new system or are they looking for someone to replicate what was already done? Yeah. I think, well, one of the interesting things will be whether they're able to maybe just bump up their quarterback coach, Andrew Janoko, who has been in this kind of world. and that's that Shanahan Kubiak style system for a long time.

He worked for the Minnesota Vikings or if they're going to lose people to Clint Kubiak's staff because they have a lot of those guys who have run this system for a long time. It's not just Clint. But it really was the perfect fit for Sam Darnold. They reduced the amount of times he took sacks. And where Sam Darnold is truly excellent is when he's on the roll left or right. And he was at the top of the NFL for passing yards when he was rolling out on the move. And so there's little details in this thing that worked really well.

And I thought Clint managed the game, the NFC championship, especially super, super well. But in this game, too, it was like, okay, Sam, just, just don't, you don't have to do anything. You can just win the game by just not messing up. So we're going to get the right time to run the right play action, score a dagger touchdown, game over. He did a remarkable job this entire season with Sam Darnold. But now we're going on, you know, two coaches. He got a coach of the year for Kevin O'Coh. Connell and he got a head coaching job for Clint Kubiak.

Once again, I think maybe it might be a little bit to do with the guy actually throwing the passes. I don't know, hard to say. Those are big words. People might fight you on those. Good, good quarterbacks make everybody look like a genius and bad quarterbacks make everybody look like a dope, always in forever. Correct.

And I'm looking ahead to the Raiders thinking, okay, how's Fernando Mendoza going to look in the NFL? I'm sure he's, I mean, I know he's a media darling. he's done what he did at Indiana, carried the team. But it's different when you get to the NFL, as we've seen time and time again, you have these big stars. You have players who come up

and they have everything going for them. And then they just kind of fall flat. And then it's like, all right, we're done. Cool, thanks. That has happened more times than you can count. And I'm intrigued to see if it is in fact, Clint Kubiak who can foster him as a quarterback and make it so he doesn't have to have the most stellar season.

But is it someone that we can see on the up and up? not someone that just immediately tanks. Yeah, I'm very curious about how they decide to handle that. Like, are they going to have Fernando Mendoza start right away in the NFL? Or do they find a bridge type of quarterback, maybe even bringing back Derek Carr to have him start for a year? Could be he worked with Clint Kubiak in New Orleans. So if he came back for a year, let Mendoza develop.

One thing I'm really impressed by is Mendoza's understanding of football. Every time he talks football with somebody, things really. really pop out to me that he's going to have the intellectual part down and he's a study boy. He went to kale before Indiana. But the question is from him in a physical perspective, can he be athletic at the NFL level? Can he work on the accuracy, which I thought was spotty at times? Because I think he's got the intellect and I think he's got the intelligence and the toughness, those things.

But you got to, you know, throw the football accurately and you got to throw it on time and you can't take sacks and things like that, can't take big hits. So it's a hard transition to make to the NFL, but I do know that there are now decades of Gary Kubiak, Mike Shanahan, to Kyle Shanahan, to Clint Kubiak, passing down this system that has helped many a quarterback get the most out of them. So I think Fernando Mendoza is in a good system for quarterbacks there with the Raiders. Now it's up to them to put together an offensive line and some receivers. There's a lot to do with that roster.

I personally would not want him to start right away with that roster. Yeah, it's a dangerous situation to be in honestly for him. And Max Crosby isn't even a solid lock on this team right now. We don't know. Kubiak met with him and it sounds like he wants him to stay, but Max Crosby has said multiple times, like, I don't know. Lots of unease that he was placed on IR at the end of the season and didn't want to kind of against his will.

So I think there's a lot of locker room things to be figured out. and I do not envy the GM of that team for rebuilding and restructuring under the current circumstances. Yeah, I mean, it needs to start with the offensive line, which was just a crime against humanity this year. I mean, it was so, so bad. Like, they couldn't run with Ashton Genty, who is crazy talented. And they did absolutely nothing. So they've got something to work there in the backfield. But unless you build the offensive lineup, you're going to be in a lot of trouble.

So I think he should look at what Ben Johnson did last year, which was go out and a acquire basically an entire new offensive line for Caleb Williams. And I think that that helped quite a bit. And once again, that system is usually pretty friendly to offensive linemen. But I don't think it should be a shock that Seattle had multiple first round draft picks on that line. They took a guard in the first round to come in and make an impact right away. They need to do that again. But one wrinkle in that plan, two wrinkles here. The Seahawks are going to be sold. It's kind of inevitable. I mean, the Portland Trailblazers are finalizing their deal, and this is all under the Paul Allen Trust Foundation. So Paul Allen, former co-founder of Microsoft, passed away in 2018. And then his

will was like, yeah, you got to sell my teams, but I want all the money donated to charity. Really respectable. But this team is valued anywhere from $7 to $11 billion with a B. And he bought it for $200 million back in 97. So if that doesn't show you the rapid growth of the NFL and what media rights money does. I don't know what will. So this is kind of a big up in the air question of you're coming off the best game, the best season you possibly could have had. Who's the next owner? When is this getting sold? Does it have football implications? Right. And who's got 11 billion to buy it? Normally what seems to be happening now is it's its groups. It's not just one person who's got that hanging around. I mean, there are, you know, quite a few billionaires. But, uh,

Washington, you know, Josh Harris is the guy who has led that, but they have a lot of other people involved. And then, you know, you got the Walmart team in Denver. But, you know, if that happens, I think that that actually might be good because you end up with the football people more running the football team as opposed to owners coming in and saying, I want this. Go go do it because I decided I wanted this. That usually doesn't work out that great. It's always been my opinion that the cheat code the Green Bay Packers have is that they don't have an owner. They've got all their little owner certificates, but those people don't run the team. Football people do.

And they tend to make good decisions. So we'll see on that. I mean, I can't imagine that it would have an impact anytime, any soon with this team that they've been able to put together and their GM is knighted forever. Two Super Bowl teams that he put together with nobody crossing over is an incredible accomplishment for John Schneider. so they should be in good hands with their football leadership. It's just an odd thing to happen.

I feel like an NFL team coming onto the market is just not something that you see every day. And I am intrigued to see where is this money coming from? How is it being collected? And just like, I don't know. It makes me wonder, I know there's a lot of money coming from the Saudi and like the oil money that we're seeing with sports and especially with football. I don't know if there's going to be any partial ownership there. Lots to think about. I nerd out on like the media business side of this, but.

I have no idea, but I just know that there's not that many people who have enough money in their own bank account to buy a team. So it probably will be some sort of, you know, some sort of collective of people who put together enough to buy it. But that is some kind of investment. I bought a bunch of baseball cards when I was a kid thinking they would be worth hundreds of dollars when I grew up. And they're not. So you're not rich? I'm not. Not from that anyway. I want us to look one more step ahead to the Fandul's Super Bowl odds for next year.

Who do you have in your mind winning the Super Bowl in 27? Yeah, it's very easy to pick the team that just went. It's hard to see a lot changing. But, you know, offensive coordinator change does matter. And there will be guys who leave in free agency. There will be changes. Seattle is starting as the strongest team. and as the favorites at plus 750 on Fandul.

The very interesting pick is probably that, or at least what I notice is that Fanduel was not thrown off by quarterbacks who are great, not winning the Super Bowl or getting to the Super Bowl, MVP's Josh Allen, Lamar Jackson. The bills are fourth at plus 1,200, and so are the Ravens at they're tied at third at plus 1,200. Here's the one that pops out to me is the Packers at plus 1,300. behind the bills and the Ravens.

The betting market really buying the Green Bay Packers bouncing back. I mean, they were 9, 3, and 1 to start the season before Micah Parsons got hurt. But I think they're going to have to prove it in Green Bay. And they are not at all buying the Minnesota Vikings, which how can you when we don't know who's playing quarterback for next year? Do you have an interesting pick here? I think looking down a little bit, Kansas City being plus 1,600 seems like the easiest bet you could possibly make. they're going to come back with a vengeance, right? 100%.

I mean, they're hungry for it. And you know, no one on that team is sleeping well this off season thinking, what did I personally do wrong? How can we be better as an organization? I know the hunts aren't taking that well. They talk about owners who are super invested in their team. That's a family who they'll throw money at it and figure out whatever they can to make this change. And I mean, Patrick Mahomes doesn't want to waste another year of his career.

I'm sure of it. He's not the kind of guy to just turn it over and have that mindset. So I would expect them to come out hot at the start of next season and change the narrative that they had this year of no, guys, actually, we're back and there's nothing to worry about. That was a mess up of one year. Don't write us off anymore. Thanks. Well, Maggie, it has been terrific to have you breaking down every single week going back

to the Hall of Fame game, actually, and even a little bit before that. but all season long, every week, given us some perspective around the NFL, along with your own contributions for different interviews and things that you did. Just terrific, terrific work all year long. I know the audience loved having you here.

And again, this is not like goodbye forever, but the contributing guests are not asked to, you know, come in with February headlines all the time. So thank you so much for all of your effort putting together a weekly segment here. I have greatly appreciated it and enjoyed it.

Thank you. And I want to say thank you guys for letting me learn and for hanging out with me all season. This was a new journey for me, learning the broadcasting side on air. And you guys watched me grow from May until now. And that is something that I'm really honestly so grateful for. And then shameless plug for myself, follow me on Instagram for more of the journey at Maggie Robinson, my name. And if anyone's hiring, I'm looking for a job. So let me know.

But this has been a blast. Thank you guys so much. Go bikes and football.