Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Justin Jefferson feels he's 'close' to clicking with JJ McCarthy (Part 2)

Episode Date: December 19, 2025

Matthew Coller talks about Justin Jefferson's latest comments about connecting with JJ McCarthy. Christian Darrisaw looks like he's going to miss another game. Emily Leiker of the Star Tribune joins to talk about evaluating the final 3 games and Snoop Dogg playing on Christmas. 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.

This episode of Purple Insider is presented by Fandul. Welcome in now to the show, Manny Hill, and I just want to answer one question for the comments about the size of Sam Darnold versus J.J. McCarthy was a question in the comments. And I'm sorry, I'm going to be looking down at the game sometimes as we have this conversation. But Darnold is grown up. like that's yeah he's he's got man strength now from shoulder to shoulder i don't know how many quarterbacks that are in the league that have as big of a chest as sam darnold he was recruited as a linebacker so he's a big dude like whatever the height and weight is not necessarily

representative of the uh with i guess of sam darnold and one of the reasons he throws such a beautiful football is the amount of strength and torque that he can create from his upper body being so strong, where J.J. McCarthy drives much more from his legs, as we've seen like that whole thing of the kind of drop and drive. And that's why his leg kicks up. That's where he gets a lot of his velocity. McCarthy is no skinny kid, not like when he was going through, you know, recovery and stuff. He's, he's a pretty big kid, but it's not the same as, uh, as being, you know, fully grown as Sam Darnold, uh, has. So, manny here's my question for you uh as we you know pay attention to this and we can comment on

what's going on with ram seahawks like what a time to watch the national football league and not be a part of these playoff races uh what's a better what's a better conversation this is what i want you to tell me what is a better Minnesota viking's conversation right now is it what j j mccarthy can do in the last three games or what their quarterback options are for 2026 What is the better discussion? I think right now, especially considering that McCarthy's played a lot better these last couple of games, I think it's more about what he does to finish these last three games of the season. I think that's the most important thing because if you're Kevin O'Connell and you're Quasi Adolph-Menzza,

you want this to work out with J.J. McCarthy. I mean, you don't want to have to go into the offseason next year and be thinking about, all right, we're going to have to bring in a guy that's maybe going to have to compete with JJ, maybe push him a little bit more. You just want, I mean, you invested a 10th overall pick in this 22-year-old kid. You want him to be the guy that you are building your franchise around for the next decade. And, you know, he leads you to a lot of winning. So I think if you're them, you're really dialed in, obviously, to these last three games.

And I think for us as observers, it is what he does in these last three games. because I don't think we can really have a legitimate discussion about quarterback options for next year until we really see a lot more of McCarthy these last three games. And then that'll give us a better idea. I feel the exact same way is that how can we have that conversation truly and come to any real conclusions about what we would do, this, that, or the other thing, should they go after this guy? What about this option? until we know what the 11 game sample size actually looks like.

Because right now, the eight game sample size would suggest to you that, yeah, I mean, if you just scrambled these games up and said, all right, like, here's all the games. I'm not going to tell you what order they happened. You would go, ah, no, absolutely not. Call Kyler Murray. You need somebody, anybody to play quarterback, not this guy. But that's not real life. Real life works in the way that, you know, he gets destroyed in Green Bay, comes back the last two

weeks. There's clear differences in the offense in at least some ways, the personnel that they're using, building off of the run. And he's performed not just well, but confidently. It's if he came out and threw a bubble screen to, I don't know, Jalen Naylor, and he ran it 75 yards for a touchdown. And then his stat line looked really good, but it was like, well, there was a 75-yard bubble screen. It wasn't against Dallas. There was a little more of that against Washington, but even then there were some downfield completions,

a couple along the sideline to Jordan Addison. They were very impressive. And that's the type of stuff that Kevin O'Connell wants for his offense. And I remember earlier this year, we were having this like, oh, should they get quick game going and so forth? They don't want to get quick game going. They want to push the ball down the field, get explosive plays, and they drafted the kid because he's got a big arm.

That's one of the reasons. And so seeing that big arm come to fruition with accurate enough passes down the field to create explosives, even if he does whiz one over here or there over somebody's head on an intermediate throw and it's not perfect, if you can hit 28-yard passes, 58-yard passes, 18-yard passes like he was the other night, well, that could be your quarterback and it's going to be a little in flux up and down, but certainly you can win with that type of explosive offense. So, you know, seeing it look so much different the last two weeks is worth saying, well, let's see the last three before we decide where they should stand with him.

Yeah, I think the main thing is just let's see these, it's like you look at it as these last two games have been really good. They've been, you've seen a lot of improvement from previous games. And yeah, we can talk about the defenses. that he was going up against these last two games weren't very good, but you've got to start somewhere. You've got to see some progress somewhere. And those type of games can build confidence, you know,

just by having success, just being able to make, complete some of those big plays that Kevin O'Connell wants to see you create in this offense. I think the biggest thing now is just you want to see him, you know, put together a string of games, not just, you know, a couple of games in a row, put together a string of games where we start to see a little bit more consistency and growth and

improvement and then you can feel a lot better about him going forward again a huge opportunity against a defense in the new york giants that's not very good this weekend pass rushes a little better for them than what you've seen the last two games so that might present a little bit of a challenge but that i think that could be good it could be good to see him you know go up against a defense, a secondary that you can kind of pick apart a little bit, but it's, it's kind of like you're, you're playing a video game and you beat it on the easy level. So now you're going to try and beat it again on the, on the normal level, you know, or you start on it very easy, then you go up to easy, then you go up to normal, then you go up to hard. You just take those

steps where each time you play it, you play it a little bit harder to kind of test yourself and challenge yourself. And this is what it's going to, this is how it's going to kind of play. out for J.J. McCarthy here, these last three games, because you're going to go, it's these last three games, the way they're laid out, it's going to kind of progress that way where you're playing a bad defense again, but they're going to present maybe a little bit more of a challenge with their pass rush than what you've seen so far. Then you're going to take on Detroit, which is just a team that's just good, maybe not a great defense, but it's a team that is good that put some points on the board. So that's going to be a challenge for you. And then

you're going to be playing Green Bay. Now, again, as you've alluded to many times, what's Green Bay playing for or not playing for the last game of the season might kind of change things a little bit. But the backers are playing for something. They're going to put their best foot forward. They don't have Michael Parsons anymore, but that's still a pretty good defense that you're going to be going up against.

That's going to present some challenges. So this is going to be a real good test, I think, at a good time towards the end of the season to see what J.J. McCarthy is really made of. The annoying thing about the Giants is that I don't care about him playing the Giants that much. It's more or less, can we just get to those last two games? Can we just Sim the Giants game? Can they just play Brosmer, move along from that game and then play the ones that really matter. Now, where it really matters is if you do have a bad game against the Giants, that team does not want to win.

I've actually been really amazed by, if you look at, like on Fandul, the Vikings are two and a half point favorites. I would have them as like 10 and a half point favorites. I was going to say that's it. They're so much better. Like across the board, from an actual roster perspective, they are wildly better than the giants who are missing scataboo, missing Malik neighbors, their defensive signings have not worked out.

Their best defensive player, Dexter Lawrence, has a half a sack this year. Like, what is even happening in New York? And they just got lit up by Mark. Marcus Mario da last week and you have a Vikings team that really wants to end with a winning record. I mean, they would love to run through the rest of these teams walk out and then have Kevin O'Connell be able to say, look, you know, all the things we went through with the young quarterback and everything else, I finished with a winning record, look how good of a coach I am. And I think he'd have, you know, somewhat of a case there if that were to happen.

If they were to beat Detroit and Green Bay. But this, this one is only a. pothole you can step in you get no credit for stepping over the pothole and that's the other part of it it's like if mccarthy goes for 260 and two touchdowns and they win you know 24 to 7 like okay that's great that team literally is tanked like they do not want to win they want the number one overall draft pick uh i'm sure that doesn't mean you know jackson dart won't play hard i'm sure he will but their organization uh wants to be at the top of the draft so like this doesn't really help us understand J.J. McCarthy better unless he absolutely stinks. And then it helps us understand him better. It's a no-win situation for him. Those last two games

really say a lot more because Detroit, regardless of their playoff situation, is going to come in and play hard. You know that. They're not going to bow down to the Vikings and just, you know, roll over. And Green Bay, if they are in a position where they need to win that football game, is going to be frothed at the mouth to do the same thing. they did the last time to J.J. McCarthy. And even if there's no Parsons, it's still a really good defensive mind who's running them. It's a lot of talent. It's guys who were drafted high. Like, it isn't, you know, it's not a joke outside of Micah Parsons, even if it's different. So those last two games should be a lot more telling than this one. And that's why the lead

up to this is kind of like mostly still about the Cowboys in Washington games because I'm just not that interested in this one. Just get through it. Nobody get hurt. Give us all a chance to see how j j mccarthy looks in the last games of the season uh now i want to get to um so seattle got a stop here seven to three you surprised by that you surprised by the field goal there i'm a little surprised by a field goal there a little bit yeah love the uniform combination oh it's great everything about this is full on see i's going full on oregon ducks tonight which i kind of like everything about this is great and it makes me so angry like i just I want to be there.

I want to be covering that game in the, you know, in the Seattle rain or whatever. So anyway, that's kind of where I stand on this game. But there is a test, though, Manny. And this was the Fanduil question of the day. And then I want to get to questions, comments, thoughts. I assume, you know, a lot of you are probably watching along with the game like we are. But any questions and thoughts, I'm going to get to them in just a second after Manny

answers this question. But Fandul question of the day is Justin. Jefferson's over under is 55.5 yards. Is this the week that it happens? I have never seen Jefferson this low on Fanduil or, you know, anywhere, 55.5 yards. But I feel like I've been saying it for weeks, hey, there's an opportunity there. Hey, this Washington team is bad. Hey, this Dallas team is bad. But the, at least the chances were there against Dallas. There's a touchdown negated. There's a touchdown drop. There's like, it felt. like there's an overthrow by you know just six inches or something i'm calling it manny i'm putting

it down on paper this is the week that just the jefferson goes for three bills that's it's like shocking to say a hundred yards for just the jefferson almost double the over under but i'm going there for this week yeah i'm with you i mean at some point it's got to click together between these two i mean it's just been it's been such a slog and it's been nice to see McCarthy play better these last couple of weeks. But at some point, you've got to get your best overall player. You've got to get him to football. You've got to get the ball in his hands. And to your point, there's been opportunities there these last couple of weeks. It's just been, it's just felt a little bit off whether Jefferson drops a touchdown or like you said,

the touchdown in Dallas that was negated because Josh Oliver wasn't lined up properly. I mean, It's just little things like that kind of seems like it just sort of adds up. You talked about the overthrow. Those are little things that are just kind of on the margins that you just feel like if you just, there's just a little bit more attention to detail there, a little bit more crisp, you know, understanding of what you're trying to do out there, then things are going to, you know, start to pick up for you. And it almost kind of feels like you get, you get Jefferson, you know, those first

three catches that he can get in this game, like that's going to get the ball rolling again and then it's just going to take off. That's what I'm kind of feeling like. And so that's what I'm going to be looking for now with this game on Sunday is just can you get, can you get Jefferson going early and then, you know, the takeoff is great. And then like you said, he ends up with over 100 yards and eight, nine catches. And we're like, there it is. There's the Jefferson. and we know, and now McCarthy's finally bound his target the way he should. And their desperation to get him to a thousand yards should be 10 out of 10 at this point. And that's the canary in the coal mine for us.

That will tell us, is this really working or not? Okay, so getting into the questions in the comment section, Kyler Murray and Tua are two veteran quarterbacks who have had some success in the past. Because Joe Burrow, you know, we talked about this. There's a scenario. and man, did he not deny that there's a scenario this week at the podium. That's for sure. But, okay, let's put that aside as the pipe dream of all pipe dreams.

Tua and Kyler Murray, let's just say that these next three weeks do not work out for J.J. McCarthy and we're all going, oh, okay, I guess it just was Dallas and Washington. Are you interested in either one of those quarterbacks? I would be more interested in Kyler, just because I think there's a little bit more ability there. I mean, Tua, I, this is probably as low as I've ever been on Tua at this point. I mean, it just, with the injuries and, you know, the concussions have been kind of concerning, too, where you just kind of wonder what his long-term future looks like on that front and the decision-making with him too. has been very questionable and I also kind of wonder about the fit in Kevin O'Connell's

offense too where you know Tua's kind of with Miami especially under Mike McDaniel's been kind of a short short to intermediate passing guy is not really been a guy that's been good at just standing in the pocket going through the progressions and firing the ball down the field he's got the arm talent he's got the arm strength to be able to do that to make those throws but he just hasn't really done that well over the last couple of years. So I don't really love either option, but if you're telling me it's down to those two guys, I would probably lean Kyler in this case. Yeah, I would probably lean far toward Kyler.

The injury history for Kyler, okay, this year he had an injury that I think clearly could come back from and they were just like, nope, because if you get hurt, then we have to pay you, your guarantees. And that's kind of what's going on with Tua right now. why you know when we're talking about why they're benching him it's like well once you get eliminated from the playoffs this happened a couple years ago with russell wilson like we don't want you to get hurt and then have to pay you and keep you around um so we'll just put you on the shelf um kiler murray last year had a good season overall like it was a pretty good season let me see where he ranked

by pff last year last year he was there let's adjust this a little bit 11th best quarterback last season by PFF grade, which is, I mean, really good. If the Vikings had the 11th best quarterback play this year, they would be, I mean, at least in games like we're seeing from Seattle and the Rams, right, like games that matter in the NFC race if they had the 11th best quarterback. And that's something I don't think people realizes how well he played at times last year. He completed almost 70% of his passes, 7.1 yards per attempt. But in terms of his big time throws, he was seventh in the last.

league in big time throws last year. The trouble with Kyler Murray is consistency when it's either huck it way down the field or not or nothing, right? Like he is not a guy that can work the middle of the field consistently. He's got to kind of work the edges. He's kind of got to hit those deep shots, which, you know, when you have these receivers, you could see that working. And the scrambling has to be on point as well. So I wouldn't be like wildly out on that if The next three games go terribly, then you're saying, all right, is it Mac Jones, is it too, is it Aaron Rogers, is it Kirk, is it Kyler? I mean, this is not that hard of a decision.

When you look at last year, he had a game against Los Angeles where he threw three touchdowns and averaged 12 yards of pass. He had another one against the Jets where he was incredible. The end of the season last year, he threw for 321 at L.A. and then had another really good game with four touchdowns against San Francisco. I mean, he has the capability of putting up huge days. And then there's a lot of other games that I could read you from last year that are so mediocre and so frustrating that it's kind of like a,

it's kind of like a Kirk level, but done totally differently, where you're saying, can you really compete for a Super Bowl with this? The answer is probably no. but if you have to make an emergency pull the rip cord on J.J. McCarthy, which actually brings me to a question is how bad would it have to be over the next three weeks? And just for the record, I don't think it will be. Like, I think that McCarthy will continue to make progress, probably have ups and downs against the Detroit Lions and Packers. You're going to pick the schedule later. I have them winning two out of the last three games probably. but that's how I think it will go. But if it doesn't, if this is six picks, one touchdown, eight sacks, like just

for whatever reason, the wheels come off and I don't know, maybe he got way too confident. He just starts throwing into every tight window. I mean, how bad would it have to be in order to do something like this at this point? I think we would end up having to see something. that resembles the first game against the Green Bay Packers. I think it would have to be like really bad where it just looks like he's not seeing the field. It's holding

onto the ball too long. He's making, you know, not making good decisions, taking a lot of sacks. It would just have to be, and that was pretty much the lowest point of the season for him was after that Packers game. And I think we would have to see

something like that sort of repeat itself. Because then at that point you're thinking man, I was like this, we talk about roller coasters with young quarterbacks, but it's not supposed to be that bad again, like at this point where he's got more experience now and played a few games since then, it's not supposed to be that bad. So I think if we see something like that happen against, I don't, I think it's almost impossible to see that kind of performance against the Giants.

I don't think, I mean, if that happens against the Giants on Sunday, then yeah, it, it's, it's defcon five at that point with him um but yeah i mean i think if you if you're going to get to a point where you're thinking about like making a move for a kiler murray or something like that in the off season i think we would have to see a repeat of that first green bay game against Detroit or against the packers again on week 18 uh before military folks chime in technically defecon one is the worst or defcom one yes yes that's right just you know because there's there's two things that happen every single time is if you say DefCon 5, the military people are like, hey, or the horse racing, if you call something the quarter pole and it's early in the season, the quarter pole is actually

at the end of the race. So you have to, those are common sayings that sometimes go wrong. So just, just letting everybody know that I'm aware. But yeah, I mean, I think like if one of the games doesn't go his way, but there's things that you like, that's what was so disturbing about the Packers game. because every other game, even if it went badly, there's at least some stuff. The Atlanta game is a little harder to find, but at least there's some stuff in the Chicago game with the comeback. There's the Ravens game, he had a few nice passes, the one to Nailer in the back of the end zone. Like you could see it and then he just got a little wild there toward the end of the game. Chicago, there's a lot of tough moments, but he has the drive to put them ahead and the touchdown pass.

that sort of thing. And you're like, okay, well, you know, at least there's those moments and they probably should have won the Chicago game, if not for the whole kickoff debacle and everything else. But if there's more games, any more of these final three, where you can't even talk about anything that went right. And it's just, oh, my gosh, what happened there today? Especially, and this is where the owners do get involved a little bit, which is if it's a US Bank Stadium.

Think about the magnitude of these games. if Green Bay has something to play for. You are talking about Christmas Day. The nation is watching. Snoop Dog is here. Netflix. Like, it's a big thing. And if you embarrass yourself on that stage,

I mean, you could be talking about everybody in the organization feeling extremely embarrassed by how that went and then not having the type of trust. And then the same thing for the last game, we know that this ownership cares a lot about how they perform against the Green Bay Packers. And when people were talking at four and eight, like, well, there, you know, there's no way they fire this person or maybe this. And my thing was always, if they lose the rest of the games and they fall apart in that one, then you could be talking about it.

So now I think the firing conversation has probably been put aside. But, you know, look, so as we can see, so much can change in three weeks. Like three weeks ago, we're like, okay, Kyla Murray, Mack Jones, whatever. And now we're like, oh, we'll hold off on that. And this is the hard part about the National Football League is I could really use 20 more games to figure this out. And I just do not have them. Mr. Mayor asks, what player that we've cut over the last few years are we most upset about playing elsewhere right now, not including Sam Darnold? I don't know if I have a great answer to this, Manny.

And that kind of speaks to how I have felt over the last couple of weeks, really. through, I mean, a good portion of the second half of the season is the defense has looked like a defense you could win a lot of games with. And the offensive line when it's healthy has looked like a top five to seven unit in the league, which was the expectation. We know how good the receivers are. Their belief in Jalen Naylor is certainly paid off. The running game is the best run game we've seen from Kevin O'Connell, which is a very low bar, but that's the facts. The kicking has been on godly. I mean, the kicking is unbelievable. There's not a lot of complaints that you can have.

Now, there's certainly individual signings, moves, investments that you could say, well, specifically, I think the Jonathan Allen one is really blown up in their face. Byron Murphy hasn't been as good as they would have expected, although I think he'll be fine. But, I mean, the overall units, I mean, there's not a lot that I can point to and go, wow, man, they just totally botched the defense. They totally botched the running back moves. They totally botched the line or something. I have a tough time. I mean, are we talking about like, Nashon, right? I mean, I got, I don't know. I don't know that there's too many players out

there. Hey, they could really use Vedarian Lowe as a swing tackle. Is that the answer? I mean, well, and I think that speaks to the overall roster being a pretty good roster. I think just the biggest hurdle, the biggest thing that has held them back this year has just been the quarterback play. I mean, we've talked a lot about McCarthy, but, you know, things kind of went the way they went with Carson Wentz. And the one time you threw Max Brosmer out there, that was a disaster. So really, it's just been the quarterback play that has really been kind of the main, I think the main culprit to them being out of the playoffs and sitting here at six and eight. And we're talking about these last three games.

as if, you know, oh, what do we need to see to look forward to next year type of thing instead of can they finish the regular season with some momentum to go into the playoffs and compete. So, yeah, I don't know. I can't think of another player outside of Sam Darnold that you can look at and say, yeah, maybe they should have held on to that guy because the guy they replaced him with isn't good or, you know, whatever. So I don't know.

I'm just trying to think now. if there's anybody else. But not really. I mean, this is a pretty color. This is a pretty overall solid roster. I think there's some weaknesses and maybe some shortcomings in certain spots that you would hope that they can improve on next year. But overall, this is a roster that I think is good enough to certainly compete for the

division and maybe make some noise in the playoffs if they get good quarterback play. And there are going to be a lot of questions at the individual positions in the off season. Who are you drafting? How are you rebuilding? a secondary that may lose Harrison Smith. And do you feel comfortable with the cornerback situation? I kind of don't.

I would much rather see Isaiah Rogers be a third guy than a second guy. And their answer to that was not good. And letting go some of the younger players like Nashon Wright and other guys that maybe they could have developed a Caleb Evans ready steward. Like these are not great players, but at least they'd be young developing in your system. And maybe there's something there. I like that we're going to see a little more Jay Ward, someone who has developed under

Brian Flores and under Matt Daniels over the last couple of years, but that's probably the nitpick I would have is just that they haven't put much emphasis on younger players. And it's, you know, we look at the draft picks and go, well, this one didn't work out or that one. Mackay Blackman's the other one, which I'm not saying he's had a great year for Indianapolis, but I mean, Jeff Okuda gave them nothing and then was injured, which I'm I hate for him because, you know, he's worked really hard, but, I mean, Mackay Blackman was a young guy you drafted and then you just totally bail on him. I mean, even if it's, even if there's something wrong behind the scenes or even if there's a physical issue you're concerned about, like, it's a third year young player who you picked to be a major part of this thing.

And you just said, no, like, that's probably, uh, and he did have a bad camp. But again, like, I don't know, man, it just, they have no patience whatsoever with any young players to stick with them. And that's, that's probably the critique that I would have overall, not that I think, again, that Mackay Blackman is like an all pro. Well, and he was coming off an injury last year where he pretty much missed the entire year. And, you know, sometimes when guys are coming off an injury like that, is we're maybe kind of seen with Christian Dara saw this year where you're coming off kind of a major lower. body injury, you kind of need that next season, even if you're playing throughout most of that year, you kind of need that next season to get, get yourself back, to ramp yourself back up to being what you were before the injury. And, you know, maybe Mackay Blackman is a guy that next

year in 2026, that's the year where he kind of makes the jump because he's now a full year removed from that injury, a full season removed from that injury. And now he can kind of get back being himself and you know that's a guy that could be kind of helpful to you next year if you had them but now you don't because you know i get it he wasn't he didn't seem like himself he didn't seem like the old version of himself and you kind of were tempted to pull the plug on him but in that that specific position it was kind of an eyebrow razor like you're not exactly that's not exactly where you have a lot of depth there and you want to you want to pull the plug on this kid that, you know, maybe just give him a season to get back to his old

self and see what happens. And then if he's repeating that in 2026, then you pull the plug and say, all right, this is just not going to work out here and move on. But yeah, that's one to kind of look at, I think, for next year, wherever he's playing, I don't know if he'll still be with Indianapolis or not, but that'll be interesting to see how things play out for him. I mean, you're playing, look, Fabian Moreau is a decent veteran corner, but like, what did that get you, you know, in terms of progress at that position, that's just a guy who's a bandaid over that spot. He's somebody who can play if you have to. And if they were in the playoff race, maybe we wouldn't be talking about it or thinking about it too much. But even then, I probably

would have wondered, like, why did you just, I mean, they, we talked about Zamaia Vaughn, who they seem to like, but then he ends up on the practice squad, Dwight McLaughern, who they seem to like, he ends up on the practice squad. It's like, okay, can anyone play, corner who is under the age of 25 for Brian Flores. That I think maybe the one blind spot for him or maybe just for the entire organization when you get into this mode of we need to win the Super Bowl. Then you're going out

and putting Fabian Moreau ahead of someone like Blackman, someone like Stewart, someone like Nashon. Right. Like these are guys who, you know, if you have any eye on the future that you don't get rid of. So that's probably the one criticism I would have that that doesn't look great for them. right now. And I'm not saying like Brian Osamwa was the future either, but that's another guy who they basically never gave a chance to and then just bailed on. Like, oh, okay. All right. When it happens with enough players, you go, okay, there's maybe more to this story than just like, oh, well, that they all

stunk. And so you need to get rid of all of them. And then it's Eric Wilson at 31 years old who's coming in here and doing it. I think it's a requirement maybe of the complexity. of this defense. Let's see, KS or K. Skull, I think, says, if we trade away picks, how do we build around Joe Burrow? Well, here's the thing about the Joe Burrow scenario. 2026, you're trying to win the Super Bowl with Joe Burrow. It is very much a Matthew Stafford Rams situation where you are chips to the middle of the

table, Addison is still cheap, Jefferson is in his prime. you're going for it. Darisaw, you hope is healthy. This offensive line looks really good in front of a Joe Burrow. A lot of the defensive players are in their primes. Van Ginkle is still great. Cashman, Grinard, all these guys. And then you draft the top player or something.

Maybe you'd have to give, you'd have to give away probably that top draft pick for him. But, you know, you're in a situation where you're just going for it. And whatever happens into the future happens. but if Burrow comes in place for you and gives you a chance to win the Super Bowl, number one, that's worth it versus other options. If you don't believe that McCarthy can give you a chance to win the Super Bowl in the next two years, you might as well take the big old swing with the top five quarterback.

But then if he likes it, if he signs an extension, even as the Bengals have been a J-O-K-E over the last couple of years, he's over 500. you are you are just like Matthew Safford where it was like what are the Rams and I was part of this so what are the Rams going to do if they don't make it it's like well if you have a good organization you'll be back

yeah I mean and the Rams are the epitome of that I mean they they they said F them picks dent them off to Detroit got Matthew Stafford they won the Super Bowl and then they had

they had a little bit of a dip and Stafford got hurt and even then there were some questions of if that is Stafford going to play again because his injury was pretty significant but he's come back and you know and they have a great coach too obviously with Sean McVay so I think that's a big part of it there's sort of their resurgence but you know this is a league that if you make enough right moves even if you're not batting a thousand on every single free agency signing every single trade every single draft pick that you make. If you make enough good moves, if you have good quarterback play, you can get yourself back and recover and get yourself back into contention

pretty quickly if you have the good quarterback play. So I think if you're the Vikings and you were to make this move for Joe Burrow, if it happens, and again, it's still kind of a pipe dream, you know, even if, you know, you get yourself in a Super Bowl contention for the next two years. Even if you have a little bit of a dip because of cap situations or certain guys getting older and moving on, you got Joe Burrow and you still got number 18, that's going to give you a chance. And it's going to give you an ability to kind of recover and bounce back. And Joe Burroughs 29 years old. So he's right in the middle of his prime right now. He still has at least, I think, at least a handful of really good top-notch elite-level quarterback play in terms of years left

in him. So I think that window, if you have him, you're going to have a shot. And even if you have a little bit of a dip, he's going to be able to elevate you and get you back in the shape if you just make enough decent moves. And it becomes absolutely vital in that scenario to keep Brian Flores because he raises the floor of your defense just by proxy of having him. And if you have a quarterback that could get you ahead of games, even if your defense is kind of mid in terms of talent, but you have Grenard and you have Van Ginkle and a couple other players, like, as we've seen this year, you can paper end in 2023, like you could paper over some stuff, uh, on the defensive side, which they would have to do over multiple years with Joe Burrow. There's no

question about it. Like it does present some problems down the road, but that one shot to me is worth its weight in gold. And yeah, what if he gets hurt? I know. What if anybody gets hurt? Like you sign Jefferson to a contract, and I know he's got an injury history. That's part of it. He's also had some of the worst office of line play in the entire NFL. But to me, like last year he played the whole year.

So I don't know. I always say if there's the chance to really truly go for it. And you don't feel like you're anywhere close to that, then go for it. But a lot of it depends on just how they feel about J.J. McCarthy. And Jay asked about what about like getting Kyler, but keeping JJ, my thought there is, I'm not so sure that you can really do that in the NFL, the way things work. Theoretically, that sounds great.

Like, oh, get Kyler for a year, develop McCarthy behind the scenes for a year, and then bring him back. I don't know if you could convince him of that. I just don't think that that would really fly. And it doesn't feel like making any progress now. like the year to sit him was this year and play a veteran quarterback maybe like oh sam darnold i don't know and that would have been the time to do it the time to do it is not after he's already played a full season and then say all right well you made this amount of progress but now i actually have a seat kid for an entire season i just don't think that that

uh actually works very well um i i think if you're trading for kailer murray it's under one scenario which is really, which is really the discussion. Like, what's the scenario for each one of these things? The one scenario is that when you look at, if they get to the end of these last three games, and they look at the totality of his two seasons as a Minnesota Viking, one that was lost to injury, but he was here. And then two, what happened in 2025? And they just say, if they're sitting in a meeting and it's O'Connell and it's McCown and it's Quasi and it's the Wulfs.

and they say like, all right, everybody vote if you believe in J.J. McCarthy and no hands raise, you got to trade for someone like Kyler Murray. I could absolutely see that being the best possible option because Mr. Mayor was mentioning in the comments about Mack Jones, like being sort of tired of hearing Mac Jones's name. I mean, he does make sense, but he's not as good as Kyler Murray. Even this version of Kyler is better than or gives you a better chance of it clicking and then going kind of crazy and having it actually work because at least the one year that it really worked for Murray was when he had DeAndre Hopkins still in his prime and he played extremely well.

John says other than the Rams, what current NFL team is wide receiver first? I see way more balanced offensive strategy. Even the Rams are balanced. I mean, what is what is like wide receiver first mean? Like teams that win often have really, really. really good wide receivers. But yeah, like being good at everything is the best way to win. What's the model to win the Super Bowl?

Great defense, great pass rush, great coverage, great offensive line, great running game and great passing game. And a kicker in other words, being a everything. In other words, being a complete team. That's what used to drive me crazy when people say, well, defense wins championships. It's like, no, complete teams are the ones that win championships, the teams that are good in at least two of the three phases, mainly offense and defense. If you're a little shaking on special teams, then maybe you can kind of get through it.

But it's helpful to be good in all three phases and be a complete roster. That's how you, that gives you the best chance to be successful. I mean, as far as like who's paying their receivers, how they're performing. I mean, last year, the team that won the Super Bowl, if we want to do it that way, has two of the best wide receivers in the NFL that took a quarterback, who I think we would both agree, man, he is very, very good at his best, but is certainly not perfect and is kind of like a, has to be doing one thing. And that's throwing down the field to AJ Brown and Devante Smith.

And if that works, with those guys going to make a plays, you can win the Super Bowl. And he did not have a running game in the actual Super Bowl and got great performances out of his wide receivers and played like an MVP and all those things. so they are, they're wide receiver driven, even if they're run first, but they've got top wide receivers. It's, it's just, I don't know how to exactly answer that. I mean, Pooka is, well, maybe not the brightest bulb in the box, as we found out this week. Pooka isn't just sort of wide receiver driven. The guy has 1,400 yards this year, and the guy he's playing against Jackson Smith, the Jigba has 15. They are number 1 and 2, and these guys are

playing for the NFC. So I tend to think that, you know, having, you know, Justin Jefferson, Jordan Addison driving the success is the way to do it. But of course, we want to see a balanced attack. Yeah, I mean, well, look at, look at the Rams the last time they won the Super Bowl. They had, that was Cooper Cup at the peak of his powers. And he showed it. He was the MVP of that Super Bowl. It was not, it was not Matthew Stafford. That was the MVP of that game, folks. This is a little friendly reminder. It was Cooper. cup and he was arguably the best receiver on the planet during that time now obviously he's gotten a little older now and he's declined he's not nearly the player he once was five years

ago but yeah i mean that's we've we've seen this the only time i can really think of in terms of teams like winning a super bowl that were not that didn't have elite wide receivers was the new england patriots but that's they had tom brady they had tom brady right yeah that's just a little bit different and you have to go back a little ways for that. The Rams just scored touchdown. So they have taken the lead now on the Seattle Seahawks. This game is so far turning out to be the type of battle that we were thinking about. So we will go a few more minutes and then we'll jump off and go watch the football.

I want to go through, I want to go through just a couple of games for this week, Manny, because this is a thing I want to make. for Thursday nights into our near future is just our favorite games of the week to talk about. Just just for a few minutes, kick them around and then get to picking the schedule. But the picking the schedule bit at the beginning of the season, it takes up a whole episode. But now it's like, you know, five minutes at the end. The Packers are at the Bears. The Bears are pretty banged up with their wide receivers.

The Packers are playing their first game without Micah Parsons. on Fanduil, the Bears are one and a half point favorites. Imagine that. Imagine after week one that I told you, the Bears would be one and a half point favorites going into this game at the end of the season over the Packers. I probably would not have really believed it after that. What do you make of this game?

It's intriguing. And, you know, and I'm starting to be a little bit more of a believer in the Bears. I still don't think they're a great team, but they're well coached. I think Ben Johnson's done a really. really nice job. Their defense is not great, but they're finding ways

to win games and you know, force some turnovers on the defensive side. And Caleb Williams is playing a lot better. So there are a team that's really intriguing and the Packers you know, I mean, can they kind of bounce back from the tough loss

in Denver and losing, you know, sort of that the gut punch of losing Micah Parsons who was brought in as a guy that was really going to complete that defense and make them a legit championship contender and now they don't have them still the good defense that you can win with um but how do they kind of handle that gut punch of not having the sort of the alpha dog of that defense anymore for the rest of the season so that's going to be fascinating to watch

and uh i'm kind of leaning bears in this one just because they're they're at home i do think that it has been a little bit on the underappreciated side that the bears defense has improved quite a bit over the last, I don't know, a handful of weeks. I mean, of course, last week they're playing a top 10 pro bowl vote getter in Shadur Sanders, which I saw this week, which is just. Franchise quarterback. Come on. That kind of reminds me of the WNBA when they voted all of Caitlin Clark's teammates into because her fans had never heard of the other players. So they just voted for like random backups on the Indiana fever.

but their performance against the Packers two weeks ago. Like great, great scheduling, Raj. Two weeks ago was pretty good. They held the Philadelphia Eagles to 15 points three weeks ago. Like this team has been starting to come together defensively. Even,

you know, if you go back a little bit to the Vikings game, they played well in that game. It wasn't just J.J. McCarthy not performing. It was also Chicago deserved credit also. So them getting some defensive backs back. Their coverage has been much better. Their run defense has improved.

I was very good last week. So that's something to watch there. Christian Watson's health is absolutely something to watch. And just when you're missing Devante Wyatt and Michael Parsons, what do they do? Like how do they? Because Parsons is not just a, oh, well, they're missing one edge rusher. No, no, no. This is like a, where is this guy?

Like he's a, he's a scare factor for offensive. who have to game playing completely differently when he's not in there. So I like that pick, Manny, and, you know, if the, there's, there's a bunch of scenarios where the, the Vikings just look super bad, which is like if Chicago's rebuild is way better than theirs, if Seattle makes the Super Bowl, like there's, yeah, there's quite a few of those situations. Tampa Bay and the Carolina Panthers, the Panthers are three point underdogs to Tampa Bay. Baker Mayfield has been really poor in the last four to six weeks, just not the same guy.

But I actually think that's who Baker is. Very hot, very cold. The Panthers fumbled the bag last week against the New Orleans Saints. Do we think this is really a, are the Panthers there yet for real or not? Because if they're actually there yet, like, hey, you're a competing team. They're back. Panther, who knows when the last time they were actually competitive was, like, you're back.

I think you win this week. And if it's, you know, Panthers are probably going to need another year, then you lose this week. Yeah, I think the Panthers have a chance to sort of expedite this plan of, you know, getting back into contention and, and, you know,

they have a chance to kind of do this, you know, this year and being kind of a year ahead of schedule maybe. Because I'm certainly surprised by the fact that they're, you know, you know a five or six win team at best going into this year but the fact that they've kind of gotten themselves and you know last week aside kind of kicking that one away against the saints is kind of working against them but you know the fact that they've gotten to this point and they

picked up some some wins against some quality opponents they beat the packers they beat the rams like they've they've got some wins over teams that are really really good and you know super bowl contenders so um i think they're pretty well coached it feels like You know, it seems like Bryce Young is starting to kind of turn it around a little bit and put things together. That's still not 100% sold on him, but it's looking upward now for him. And this is a great opportunity because the Buccaneers just are not playing well right now. You mentioned Baker not playing well. They've dealt with some injuries.

You know, Mike Evans is just not, doesn't look like the same receiver anymore. You know, there's some questions on, you know, on defense and can they get, can they get enough stops on defense? and they've kind of struggled with that too. And the Panthers have them at home. So you're going to have the home crowd behind you. I think, you know, given what this game means for both teams, I got to think the Panther fans in Charlotte are going to be pretty amped up and pretty pumped up for this one because they know what it means.

This is chance for them to take, grab a hold of the division lead again. So I think that's going to work in the Panthers' favor. I like Carolina in this game. thank you so much to Jim for the super chat and Jim doesn't offer a question or comment just football. I mean, that's when you really, like you're legit. You're like the gold star member here of watching the show is when you just toss in a great super chat, which I really appreciate, just say football. Thank you so much, Jim, for that.

Yeah, I'm very interested in that game because I feel like they're really even, but Tampa Bay does have the more experienced quarterback. is on the road yeah we'll see on that one uh the one other one i want to talk about and this is one where it's actually funny a friend of mine steve palazolo works for a 33rd team now the check the mic podcast formerly pf uh he tweeted out he tweeted out the last time the broncos played the jaguars and it was like 97 or whatever it was when they beat them in the playoffs and it's like obviously they've played since that and it got community noted on the social media like they've played 13 times as like no no no no you're not getting it like community

notes has no l-lls to it the jaguars of bronco is i mean this is a hell of a football game two of the best defenses in the NFL two quarterbacks that everybody questions for reasons that those quarterbacks have certainly proved along the way the broncos are three point favorites you have a young coach in leum cohen you have an old coach in sean payton defensive talent out the wazoo Benito. You've got Heinz Allen, like great players on both sides. This is, this is my favorite game of the weekend. And Denver, I don't know what the weather's going to be like in Denver, but, you know, you could get that little bit of snowfall or a little bit of crispiness on the field. Like, oh, man, do we have to watch Giants, Vikings? I'm sure, because that one, that one,

I can't wait to see. Yeah. I, you know, This, this, I feel like with the two defenses in this game, this kind of, I'm getting, I don't want to get too far ahead of myself in terms of like magnitude of the matchup, but I'm getting kind of those vibes of like, if it's low scoring, it'll still be really intriguing because of how good both of these defenses are. So I'm getting kind of, again, just bear with me here. I'm getting kind of 2011 Alabama LSU vibes that the nine. It's an overtime game where it's just like, you know, it's like you, it's such a low scoring game.

We saw no touchdowns in that game, but it was just so compelling because of what was on the line in that game. It was, you know, one versus two and two, you know, two really great teams. I'm getting kind of the same kind of vibes. Now, it's not number one, number two game of the century type of thing, but I get the sense that this is going to be a really low scoring game. And it's just going to be so compelling to watch because it's going to be like, you know, it's 12, 10 in the fourth quarter, which quarterback, which one of these sort of polarizing quarterbacks can make the one throw, the one completion that ends up being the difference in this game, which kicker can make a kick at the end of the game, which defense can make that one

last play to seal a victory. I'm excited for this. This is going to be a lot of fun. I don't know if this is this going to be a CBS. Nance and Romo game or what? I'm not sure. It's all AFC. Yeah, I don't have strong opinions on broadcasters, but I have a struggle with listening to Tony Romo these days. So hopefully America gets something else. Greg Olson. Let's wrap with picking the schedule here. Oh, I was going to say, as you're talking about,

predicting this is going to be like a knockdown, drag out game. I remember a couple years ago when there was that, I don't know, 51 to 48 game or whatever. whatever the score was between Kansas City and the Rams and they're like people were debating, would you rather see like a shootout or like a like a game in the mud that goes six to three that's just brilliant defensively. And my answer was just yes. Yes, I would like to see that football. If you told me it's a great game now, not three nothing Vikings and Las Vegas Raiders with Aiden O'Connell and Josh Dobbs, but I'm talking about like two great teams like this. Just just throwing fists at each other like let's go.

or if it's a shootout between great quarterbacks also let's go i'm happy with all kinds of different football outcomes uh let's uh have manny pick the schedule here to put a wrap on the show it's almost half time in this game so then we can jump off watch the second half the vikings at the giants manny will you pick them to win yes i will i think the giants are awful to the point you made earlier. It doesn't even look like they're really trying to win. It seems like they're fully tanking. The Vikings are the better team by far, and they should take care of business. I totally agree. I know I vowed not to pick them for another game this year when they got to four and eight, but unfortunately, I have to break that. Or maybe fortunately, because they've played

much better. I have to break that. I'm picking the Vikings to win. And I'm picking them to win by and ass kicking. I think it's going to be, I'm going to go like 24-7. I think that's what I'm going to go with, 24-7 Vikings. I just think they stink. I mean, they have the worst record in the league. It's not a hot take, but it's like looking at their games. It's nauseating. So then the games that matter, Vikings at home on Christmas Day, in front of the nation on Netflix, in front of Snoop Dog. Do the Vikings win that game? I'm going to say no.

I've been pretty consistent the last few weeks of picking Detroit to win this game. I'm going to say no, but I actually think it's going to be pretty close. I think the Vikings will play well. I think the game will be competitive, but I think the Lions will make one or two extra plays and end up being the difference. I think so, too, it's, you know, without Grenard, without Mattelis. St. Brown, Gibbs, Williams, I just, that's going to be, that's going to be really tough. I just don't think that they'll be able to stop them like they did last time.

And I do think McCarthy can have a good day. Like their defense is pretty down bad recently. So he can have a good day. And, and look, if the final score at Detroit and Minnesota is 31 to 24 and the Lions win, you can walk out of that game still feeling pretty darn good. All right. now. So the Packers, so that would leave them at a, what are we at, seven and eight, right, season, or seven to nine at that point, if they were to lose to the line. So they're seven to nine. Do they win in the final game of the season? I'm going to say no, because I'm going to predict that the Packers are still going to be playing for something. Because I just, 10 minutes ago, I just picked the Bears to beat the Packers. So I think the NFC North is still going to be up for grabs there in week.

18 um somehow and the packers are going to need to win it to win the division and i think they're going to put their best foot forward obviously without micha parsons that's a big loss for them but i think they're the better team they're going to put their best foot forward because the game's going to mean something for them and i got green bay winning the game cooper cup man what are we doing what are we doing cooper cup supposed to be your revenge game uh cooper cup fumbled and botched an opportunity for seattle to score at the end of the half Game changer. Sam Darnold's fault somehow, probably.

If they are to finish, last thing, if they are to finish seven and ten, what do we do with that? I think it's going to depend on how McCarthy looks. You know, I mean, because I can live with them losing games if McCarthy's playing well. Yeah. Obviously, you mentioned Grenard and Mattelis being out,

so that's going to make things a little bit harder for the defense. You know, so if they're giving up a little bit more on the defensive side because they're missing those two guys, you know, I can I can live with that. But if McCarthy's playing really well and I mean like legitimately playing well, I'm not I'm not talking about 140 yards and a touchdown and a pick. And oh, hey, McCarthy played well. No, no, it's got to be we've, we're past that now.

we've got to see legitimate well over 200 yards him performing well multiple touchdown passes that that kind of performance if we see that and they still end up losing to Detroit and Green Beta end the year then I can I can live with that but McCarthy being successful is so vital to this team's future they need him to be good they need this to work out and we need to see signs that this is really progressing in the right direction seven seven and ten for me would be eating vanilla ice cream with it being 62 degrees outside while listening to smooth jazz just boring can't make anything of it like uninteresting no flavor to it at all just what what am I supposed to do with this I mean yeah there's this scenario you're talking about where McCarthy plays really well and they lose two games because most of their, you know, or several of their big defensive players are hurt now. I'm like, okay, that's, all right, that's a scenario.

But if it's just like what you said, where, okay, plays well against the Giants, mediocre against the Lions, mediocre against the Packers, you don't win either one of those games, like, what am I supposed to do with that? Am I supposed to, like, I want to come out of these three games, either saying, okay, folks, they got to get somebody else, or come out of these three. games saying, all right, they're good. And the middle one is just so frustrating. Yeah, well, and I, and let me, let me be clear too.

I'm talking about even if they lose those games, he plays really well. So again, if it's, if it's, if it's, if it's, if it's kind of mid and they're losing games, that's not enough for me. That's not enough for me to feel really good about it. It's, you know, if they're losing, if they lose to Detroit 3831 and McCarthy through for 300 yards and. you know, a few touchdowns, then I'm still feeling pretty good because it's like at least, at least he's playing well enough to where, you know, you have some optimism with him going

forward and you just need to kind of reset, recalibrate for next year. But if it's mid, like I need, I need better than mid. When lose or tie these last three games, I need to see better than mid at this point with him. Mani Hill. Thank you so much for your time, my friend. and we will have the roundtable cooking on Monday night, where we react to whatever it is that we see from J.J. McCarthy. You never know what's going to happen next. But I do think that these last three games are a real opportunity for him to turn the corner. So thank you for your time.

And I will see you Monday. Everybody else, here's the deal. So tomorrow night, it'll be myself and Andrew Kramer with the Hardcore Breakdown. I also record a podcast today with Bobby Peters. who wrote the book on the Vikings offense, X's and O's, last year, wrote an actual book about their offense from last year. So he gave a lot of great insight. We're going to run that interview tomorrow night.

So thanks, Manny, and we'll see you all later. Enjoy the rest of the game. Football. Football.