Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Kyle Rudolph chooses the Bucs and receiver trainer Jerome McGee breaks down Justin Jefferson's game

Episode Date: July 21, 2022

Matthew Coller opens the show talking about Kyle Rudolph's decision to sign with the Bucs rather than the Minnesota Vikings and then talks with receiver trainer Jerome McGee about what makes Justin Jefferson special. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

and I've got a couple of items to get to, and then I've got a fun interview with a wide receiver trainer who takes us through what makes Justin Jefferson so special. So I hope you enjoy that conversation. That's coming up in just a minute, but let me begin with a news item. We have a real life actual news item, but it's about a player not signing with the Minnesota Vikings. And that would be one Kyle Rudolph that ESPN is reporting that Kyle Rudolph is signing with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and he will go play with Tom Brady. And if you recall a few years back, Kyle Rudolph was kind of threatening the Vikings that he would leave if they didn't give him a new contract extension. And one of the teams that was brought up for him to go play for was actually the New England

Patriots. And I believe this was after Rob Gronkowski maybe retired the first time. And then there was an open position there. So people were connecting the dots. And I remember Rudolph saying something like, sure. Yeah, I would go play for them. And well, now he gets his opportunity to go to Tampa Bay, to take Rob Gronkowski shoes and to play with Tom Brady and have a chance to win a championship. And this might be the last year that Kyle Rudolph plays in the NFL.

So if you're going to do it, go play with Tom Brady in his final season. It was reported by Jeremy Fowler that there might've been some interest in him returning to the Vikings. So let's talk about that real quick of him choosing Tampa Bay, uh, presumably, uh, over the Minnesota Vikings. Well, one for him to come back would have made a lot of sense because he essentially is a Minnesotan, right? I mean, he didn't grow up in Minnesota. He grew up in, uh, what Cincinnati or somewhere in Ohio, but, uh, and he also, you know, went to Notre Dame and so forth. But as long as he spent here, as much as he entrenched himself in the community, uh, you know, had his family here and all that sort of stuff, he really became one of

those players that you expect to be a Minnesotan for life in one way or another. And if he had come back, the only trouble would be, is Kyle Rudolph going to accept the tight end number two role clearly behind Irv Smith on a team that he played for before? Now, if he goes to Tampa Bay and he ends up having that same role, well, okay, you're competing for a championship. You have Tom Brady as your quarterback. You're just trying to step in, do what you can contribute in a 20, 30 catches and so forth. But Rudolph was not super happy when he left here. In fact, I believe he did a long podcast

about not being happy with his target share. And though he went to New York and did not get the target share he was looking for. Um, it's a little bit different. It's almost like when you go visit somebody else's house and the way that you act versus when you go home to your parents' house and you sort of kick off the shoes and throw your stuff on the floor. You wouldn't do that if it was a guest's house, but when you feel like it's yours, it's a little bit different. Here, Irv Smith Jr. is not competing with anybody else for tight end two, no matter who they brought in, whether it was Kyle Rudolph or anybody else. But is that going to be a spot where all of a sudden you're switching those positions

that were tight end one, tight end two just a couple years ago? And I also think that the this guy comes back here type of thing did not work particularly well in the recent past. I mean, think about all the guys that the Vikings brought back. I mean, Sheldon Richardson was one of them. It was okay last year, but not exactly what they were looking for. From Sheldon Richardson, Tom Johnson, Shamar Steffen, even Marcus Sherrill's got to the end of his run left came back uh anderson dayo gave them one

great performance in the playoffs but otherwise was you know a backup when he came back to minnesota after leaving everson griffin had a good run of games but was unable to play the entire season for them last year the whole i go away then i return is a fun storyline and hey look even sean manion did it uh briefly was with seattle and camp and then came back to the vikings i mean i'm mostly joking about that one but he did start a game uh but it doesn't always work things are different when you have your situation and then you leave and then you try to come back and fit back into the mix like was he going to be comfortable with being tight end two in an offense that just doesn't really use tight end two?

He would have been good depth, but I think they're only going to use the Ben Ellefson's and Johnny months of the world in run situations or when they want to go heavy and kind of surprise a team with the occasional play action you scheme that up but this is not a thing where you'd be talking about 15 20 25 plays a game for the second tight end when it's an 11 personnel offense where they want to use someone who emerged last year in kj osborne and they want to see uh other receivers emerge, like Amir Smith-Marset possibly as another outside wide receiver option, I think it was a pretty big question of whether Kyle Rudolph would have been fine with getting on the field for 10 plays in a game as a red zone threat and maybe catching over a season 15 to 25 passes at most with a couple of touchdowns in Tampa Bay, he'll get more opportunity,

I think, uh, to do a little more. And, you know, again, I mean, if you're talking about which of these two teams is favored to win a championship, it's Tampa Bay by a lot because they have the greatest quarterback of all time. So Rudolph goes there. If he had come back to the Vikings, I don't think I would have been against it I just would have had questions about it he's a respectable player that I think always wanted to win but also always wanted to be getting the ball as well and was he going to be okay with that secondary role I'm not really convinced of that I would have had to have been convinced of that. So I think it's something that, you know, a lot of fans of Kyle Rudolph's here locally would have

loved to see him return his personality and what he did for the community, the Walter Payton man of the year nominee, unquestionable stuff that he was, you know, a go-to guy with that sort of thing and a very, very popular player. So it's not to say anything bad about what he did here when he was here. A great red zone threat. Kirk Cousins probably should have thrown it to him more often while he was here as a safety blanket or a security blanket when Cousins got pressured. I don't think he ever got comfortable doing that in the same way that Teddy Bridgewater and Sam Bradford did, but I'm not sure that it was going to be the best fit

for the Vikings. So him ending up in Tampa Bay, I don't think is anything to be too upset about. The other thing is the Vikings cap space is an interesting conversation at this moment because Albert Breer tweeted out, according to the NFL PA, here's what everybody's cap space is. And the Vikings had the eighth most on his list. Now the problem with that number is, and it's a 15.6 that at least as of me talking into my microphone here, they have not signed either of their second round picks, Ingram or Booth Jr. Those are going to happen. There's really no arguments that can be held. Rookies are getting a little more in terms of guarantees and things like that, that their agents are fighting for. But since they came up with this slotting system,

nobody does the holdout thing. And even if it takes a little while into camp they usually do the injury waiver and they'll practice and you know we forget that this ever happened but that means that they don't actually have 15 million in cap space it's a little less than that because they still have to sign a couple of expensive draft picks still it is leaving the door open for something and with kyle rudolph signing with tampa bay now you start to look elsewhere would they want to bring back sheldon richardson for another run at it he's still a free agent uh would they look at a situational rusher because you know patrick jones is kind of the next man up and Patrick Jones played what, you know, 90 snaps or something last year. So they might be looking at bringing in somebody in free agency. The JC Tretter conversation, we have had that as far as Indomitian Sue goes, he has not made his decision

yet. Again, as of this recording, if he does, then there'll be an emergency podcast for you to listen to. But as of right now, he has not made his call. We're approaching camp, though. So these guys are going to have to do that. We'll see if that ends up coming to fruition. There was conversation about the Raiders as well, and it seems like he really wants to play. But that seems like the biggest position that the Vikings would be looking at is, would they bring in a situational edge rusher or maybe another interior defensive lineman that could rush the passer? And looking through the players that are still out there in free agency, I'm not going to read all the names, but there's a couple of guys who have kind of been around and might be potentially a fit. So it

doesn't have to necessarily be in Dominican Sioux. It could be an edge rusher to be more of a rotational player, but there's not much left in terms of anybody who rushes the passer for backup options outside of Sheldon Richardson. And you have to wonder why everyone watched the tape on Sheldon Richardson and has not decided to sign him yet, because he does have a pretty good history. Plus, you know, the Vikings did bring in Jonathan Bullard, and I don't think he's a big upgrade, but he's another guy to have in the mix there. So if it's not Sue, they probably are what they are. And then you've got a little bit of cap space to work with if there are things that you need to do through camp or if something comes up. I mean, who knows, really? The crazy one is that the Browns somehow have $48 million in cap space.

The Cowboys are over $20 million. Again, how, I don't know. It looks like, I mean, did they have to cut Amari Cooper or trade, I'm sorry, trade Amari Cooper for almost nothing to the Cleveland Browns? The Panthers did a great job with the way they handled the Baker Mayfield situation. They've got some money left. The Bears have reset their cap situation. And the Packers actually have the fifth most cap space at this moment. So they might be able to add somebody at the very last minute as well.

We will see if the Vikings decide to make one of those last minute moves. There was also one more thing I wanted to bring up, and I just very briefly touched on this. It really was not a long conversation at all. I think I just kind of laughed at it and moved on. But for whatever reason, it's continued to pop up. And as radio stations across the United States do their, uh, we're going to talk to every team about what's going up and, you know, going on in training camp. Uh, I end up on those lists for some radio stations. And so every radio,

well, we call it in the biz, a hit, a radio hit. So every interview that I've done, the big question is, hey, did Mike Zimmer actually really not like Kirk Cousins? And it's such an odd thing. I mean, because my instant reaction was like, hey, guys, do the Vikings wear purple? Like, is it hot outside in the summertime? Which some people think it's like cold here 24-7. Folks, we're not Siberia.

This is Minnesota. It gets up to 95, sometimes even hotter than that. But I digress. So the Zimmer doesn't like, you know, Kirk Cousins thing. There's a few different things I've thought of with this. And I think the main one is like Mike Zimmer didn't pick her cousins to dislike at random, but Mike Zimmer also seemed to decide kind of early on that making this decision to get an expensive quarterback was going to hurt his defense.

And he didn't like that. And then when cousins didn't have a great first year and didn't fight his way through it and find a way to get them in the playoffs, I just don't know that there was any salvaging that relationship. And I think that what needed to happen was ownership pick one side or the other after 2019 that they won the playoff game but they went out to san francisco didn't succeed and that one playoff win was not going to resolve the problems because if they extended cousins it created a little bit of cap space but not enough to keep mike zimmer's defense together only enough to sign michael pierce and trade for Yannick Ngakwe as long as Riley Reif took a pay

cut. And you could see where if Mike Zimmer had some resentment before when he lost all of his guys, and then the next year Cousins starts out with two poor performances in a row to start the season. They're 0-2 right away. They lose to Atlanta on a couple of first half interceptions. They're 1-5 or 1, was it 1-4 or 1-5? I mean, right off the bat. And it was the accumulation of those things that the letdowns were ultimately what it was with Zimmer. That a lot of times, and you guys know this, we'd go into those big games and talk them up all week. All right, this is time. And then they this, we'd go into those big games and talk them up all week.

All right, this is time. And then they would, it'd be a letdown. And that might connect to Mike Zimmer not believing in Kirk Cousins, but I don't know. I mean, he had the same feelings toward Cousins heading into New Orleans, right? That Cousins had come off a huge letdown against Green Bay at home that year and then went to New Orleans and won. And I just have never been able to reckon the fact that Zimmer made sure to get the right scheme for Cousins offensively, and he never trusted him enough to just really lean into that,

but also did the right thing in terms of getting Gary Kubiak, having Kevin Stefanski take over as offensive coordinator, run play actions and bootlegs and create downfield passes where he could be very accurate and comfortable in the pocket or outside the pocket if he was rolling out inside, if he was doing a traditional play action, their play action percentages were high. Their downfield receivers were really, really good. And, you know, they could have done other things. And Zimmer could have empowered him more. But also you have to empower yourself.

You have to take ownership and leadership yourself. I mean, every coach in the league is not going to be the perfect quarterback whisperer. I mean, many, many coaches are really tough on their quarterbacks or don't believe in their quarterbacks or whatever else. And you have to power through. And there was a lack of ownership taken for the results by Cousins. So, you know, I think that those particular comments by Ben Lieber shouldn't surprise anyone. But I also think let's not relitigate this thing to be something other than it was,

which was, you know, Brian Murphy calls it a shotgun marriage. That's exactly what it was from day one that Mike Zimmer never really wanted, but had cousins won him over by starting off the 2018 season better or grinding them into the playoffs at the end after John D. Filippo was fired or whatever. I mean, maybe been a little more aggressive in San Francisco and gave it a shot, tried to win the game, tried to be, you know, a little more of a leader. Then, you know, I think that Zimmer wouldn't have had so much resentment and look, you know, we could get into the political stuff with the vaccination status, but the football reality was Mike Zimmer was right that there was more risks taken of missing a game. And they had one

last shot to make the playoffs, which was go to green Bay and get a win there. And the quarterback wasn't available, which was Mike Zimmer's nightmare. And so it's kind of like a relationship where, you know, the two sides end up breaking up and everybody, all your friends say, oh, well, you know, she was this or he was that. And you're like, well, you know, that's true. But that doesn't mean that everybody here was innocent or that you, you know, that you didn't egg her house or something like, yeah, that's, that's kind of how I look at it. And the other part is how much can Kevin O'Connell resolve of what we saw before of the letdowns or of the lack of belief in being the leader? Like, you know, it's part of the comments by Ben Lieber were, well, he wasn't ever like handed the team. Oh, I mean, I don't, I don't know about

that. Like you're given all the money, a new offensive coordinator, the receivers, everything else. It's like, you have to, the first offense that he had was not run first. It became run first after he earned it being run first by turning the ball over a lot. Like we just have to remember the order of things actually happening here so we can tell it the right way. So if Kirk Cousins earns the trust and belief of Kevin O'Connell, because you have to earn that, then we might see a better relationship. But if it starts off with two losses and two big games that they need and no show performances,

and then after we get kind of excuses or no responses or pointing the finger at somebody else, well, then Kevin O'Connell's going to have some of the same feelings that other coaches have had when coaching Cousins. So I don't think it's as simple as just saying, well, he's got O'Connell now, he's going to believe in Kirk and everything will be fixed. There's a couple of coaches who have expressed similar things to Zimmer in the past, uh, and that don't, you know, have jobs anymore. So, you know, I, I, I just, I feel like just as a, um, keeper of the facts here, I want it to be remembered in the right way, which is both of you go to your rooms, you know, but one of you, or, you know, whatever, like one of you has to your rooms, you know, but one of you or, you know, whatever,

like one of you has to move out of the house maybe is a better analogy. And it was easier to move Zimmer out of the house than it was cousins because it's easier to replace a head coach than it is a quarterback who can win you games and put up big numbers and make the pro bowl. Like those aren't as easy to find as someone who can be the coach. Maybe, maybe, I guess we'll see on that. So anyway, well, uh, I talked with Jerome McGee, who is a wide receiver trainer and a super interesting guy, uh, played some pro football, college football now trains receivers, and he loves watching Justin Jefferson. So we talked for an article last year and I really enjoyed our conversation.

So wanted to have him back on to break down Justin Jefferson's game for all of you folks from an expert's eye. So I hope you enjoy this conversation with Jerome McGee. Folks want to remind you to go to sodastick.com. That That is S-O-T-A-S-T-I-C-K.com. Use the promo code PurpleInsider for 15% off your purchase. It is summertime. It's baseball season. They have all sorts of great Minnesota baseball gear. And if you are prepping for training camp, get your Purple People Eaters shirt,

your Can't Stop the Thielen hat, and all sorts of other great football designs. Go there. Sotastick.com. S-O-T-A-S-T-I-C-K.com. Promo code PURPLEINSIDER for 15% off. Of route school, trains wide receivers, played wide receivers, loves everything involved with wide receivers uh and a great mind for the game what is up jerome great to have you on the show

going on matt thanks for having me man it's good to finally be face to face and then we talked over the phone we did that interview but this is this is cool i'm glad to be a part yeah and the thing that was super awesome to talk with you for the article that I did, I think it was heading into last season was just about the details of Justin Jefferson. And I think we were talking about how he gets off the line of scrimmage and how you scout cornerbacks and things like that. And you gave a lot of great insight. And so now here we are again with another very interesting Justin Jefferson storyline, which is changing potential roles from where he was over the last two years. So I want to talk with you about the details that you, as a former wide receiver and wide receiver trainer,

see in Justin Jefferson and then how maybe adjusting him might help his game. But maybe we could start with just a broad topic, which is, to your eye, what has made him so great so fast? I think it's the pedigree, honestly, like he comes from a football family, older brothers that played at a high level. So early on is the mindset. You see a lot of kids that are really explosive or have great athletic ability, but they don't really reach their potential until they start getting the the football iq side of it and he kind of got that part early so that's why you're seeing him seem like he's so advanced like when he comes into the league and he's putting

up numbers with the guys that are out of the vets the all pros um and i think you can only go up from there just because he's still called he hasn't got his grown man strength yet still a pup so once he really once the game really slows down and that usually happens for some guys like sometimes year five year six year seven where everything is just so easy that they can really focus on just using what their actual abilities are in addition to their football IQ I think right now he's ahead of the curve just because he has a high football IQ. And then guys start to catch up. So you see some guys kind of plateau after they might have a really explosive first two

years and then the league kind of figures them out. So I think to his advantage, he comes from a background that kind of already has him on that pace to where he's just going to keep leveling up. Yeah, that's such an interesting point because one of my observations as a reporter was, even though he can be happy-go-lucky in front of us and answering questions and has fun with us, that he handled this superstardom, like instant superstardom, in a very mature way, especially on a team that did not win right away, where it's way easier to come off as great to the world when you have that instant stardom.

And the other thing is too, and this maybe will strike a chord with you as a football obsessed human being, but having his brother move to Minnesota with him and coming home from practice and then watching the tape with his brother. So it's like the guy shows up in the morning, does his workouts, goes through all the meetings guy shows up in the morning, does his workouts,

goes through all the meetings, goes through all the practices, goes home, has some dinner, and grinds more football. It's like not everybody's like that at the age of 21 and 22. I think that his personality has played a huge role in this. That's definitely the definition of eat, sleep, breathe football. We say that a lot of times. We try to hammer that home with the kids that were training, like, no, you really have to love this.

Like there is no, oh, I played football and then I want to do this. Like there's, you have time to spend with your family and have fun and things like that. But to really be great at this, you have to really be obsessed. And to the point where, uh, I have a video of my son, he might have been like five or six years old, we're walking through the mall, just walking and he's like maybe 10, 15 feet in front of me. But every time somebody is walking towards him, he's doing this spin move. He's visualizing himself running down the field with the ball, like

juking defenders. And that's kind of that mindset that you have to have even at a high level like everything is football. How can i make this correlate to football how can i work this math problem in school for the high school kids okay what is this in terms of football like everything has to to relate and that's how you actually excel if your dream is i don't want to just make it there i want to leave a stamp on the league i want to leave my mark leave a legacy then you have to there's always somebody coming next year trying to take your spot. So you have, you have no days off in that, in that capacity. Yeah. It's such an interesting subject to me because I don't think there's any way to scout college guys and teams try like crazy and just say, Oh no, that guy's

definitely got it. Like until they really get there and the atmosphere is so different, you can't tell. So it's like, I kind of want to emphasize how impressive that is to see someone at such a young age step in and handle it the way he has but from a technique standpoint this is where you can break this down uh much better than me when jefferson came into the league the only reason that he dropped in the draft you know still a first round pick but not like as high as he would be if you redrafted it was the idea that he couldn't necessarily step in as an outside receiver right away. He proved that wrong day one, first start 175 yards as an outside wide receiver technique wise. Like, what do you see that allowed him to do that? And maybe that the scouting world kind of missed. Uh? He has an understanding of what he does

well. I'm big on knowing what your superpowers are. I'm not trying to play to the opponent, but rather I'm going to make you adjust to me. And his explosiveness, his quickness, and his in and out of his breaks and his ability to move defenders, they have to respect that. But I think just him knowing his own game and being able to control the tempo. You have some guys that are really, really fast, and they come to the league, and you're like, well, he's so fast, he should just run by people. But you can't stop. So if you have all gas and no brakes, well, then we'll just back up

and force the quarterback to throw in the lead. We know you're not changing directions. And so some guys have a tail if they're if they're running a short route they start chopping their feet up early he has the ability to make everything look the same and then just drop his hips and change direction and so when you can do that and control your speed defenders never know if you're actually running full speed so they have to respect everything is full speed you drop your hips change direction and then you apply that burst and change gears now it's like why is he getting so much separation so i think that's one

of his his assets um playing on the outside you're on the island you know that db is just you the db in the sideline so it's like whatever i want to do you're at my mercy depending on you know game scheme and the play call and things of that nature, but that really helped him out. Now the, uh, going up against the specific corners, uh, he was talking recently on a podcast about how Marshawn Lattimore and Jalen Ramsey were the toughest guys to go against, but I'm really interested in how, as an outside wide receiver, and you know, we'll talk about maybe moving to the slot more often and the differences, as an outside wide receiver when you're facing that press coverage the corners in the nfl are so strong but also their eyes are very quick of reading where you're going to go what moves what releases you have they've studied you for an entire week as much as you've studied them

um kind of explain to me that that chess game that those two guys play against each other and what Justin does and what great receivers do to win that battle. Yeah, it's really a chess match, going back and forth. I'm going to show you a little bit. I want to see how you play it. And you have to be really good about retaining information. That's why it's great that he goes home and watches film and breaks down stuff. Because you have to be, even in the course of a game, it's about how quick you can make adjustments so if i came out and played you played a certain way as a db and then you come back and you do the same thing or if you keep hitting your head against that wall then the db is not going to have to change anything so as a receiver we got to be able to make adjustments

quick and understand that they're going to make adjustments quick so it's now it's a new game every series it's a brand new game we got a whole whole new matchup. Could be the same guy. Could be on a different side of the ball. Could be in the slot. And then by the fourth quarter now, it's just, who made the best man win? Do you think that's the hardest part at the highest level is making those adjustments during the game? I think it's, it's a little bit of both. It could be the easiest part if you're coachable. My guy Brandon Thompson likes to say you're only as good as your ability to make corrections. So you can be the best guy, but if a coach is giving you something to change and you can't be a one rep guy and pay attention to those details and make it happen,

you're not really as good as you think you are. So the guys that make corrections the quickest doesn't have to be the most athletic guy, the fastest guy. But if he can make those corrections and those adjustments, he's going to have the upper hand. So that's the beauty of the game. You can be really good at making corrections and not have superpowers, but that is your superpower. Are you coachable? Can you make corrections quickly? Can you make adjustments? I mean, you got other guys that are really, really talented. They might be one dimensional. So it's like, well, we like this guy, but we can only use him in this. He's not really coachable.

Those guys kind of fizzle out. So you got to have a little bit of both. I think that's the game within the game. That's actually the fun part. I've done all this preparation, but now the solving the piece of the puzzle, whatever the missing piece is, I get to exercise my brain. I really like the football IQ stuff even more so than the technique and the skill and that stuff is fun. But I like the game, the chess match, the nerdy kind of stuff. That's why you're here, because you and I like the same part of the game. And I think that this applies to talking about Jefferson playing in the slot more often, which seems to be the plan.

Now, maybe they're kind of throwing us a little curveball and saying, oh, yeah, we're going to put him in the slot. So other teams read that or whatever. I don't know. But I think that they will because he was so strong at it in college and also because he has that capability to move all over the field. But it seems to me that the slot is kind of an intellectual position different in all of itself, because you're really running through a lot of these zones

and then having to read them and make adaptations. But you could speak to that much better than me. So kind of explain when you're in the slot, how much different that is than the outside. You're basically another quarterback on the field. You kind of see the same thing that the quarterback does. You get a bigger picture from the interior. You kind of see the same thing that the quarterback does. You get a bigger picture from the interior. I like to call it the coverage triangle. You know, the guy that's over you, what is his alignment or leverage? Is he playing head up, outside shape, inside shape?

And then from there, where are the safeties you have? Middle of the field, open, and there's two safeties high. Middle of the field, close, one guy high. Are there two safeties, and then close one guy high are there two safeties and then one's gonna rotate at the snap like that's all the stuff that you have to see the same as the quarterback and then you look for where the help is receivers you know we're kind of kind of bold in that way like we don't think that one guy can cover us you know by himself so i know you're lining up over here but where's your help okay you got you got a backer there

you got this guy sitting here that's your help so now your leverage is going to tell me where your help is because you're trying to funnel me that way which means you're protecting something whatever you're protecting as receivers we want to attack or at least give the illusion that we're attacking that to make you move your feet and expand your defense and open up those holes so with the you know you have to have those really high football iq guys Cooper Cup, another great example. And I think the Vikings plan to use Jefferson kind of in that same role as the Rams use Cooper. Just from the OC's background, I could see a lot of that where you get matchups that favor your offense. Because now, do you want to put your number one corner inside in the slot?

And you know what I mean? So now it's a matchup or you put your number three your nickel guy or your four whatever your dime guy or do you have a backer down here or you bring down the safety those are things that the defense those are puzzles that defense has to solve now and it's about matchups the rams like to move cooper cup a lot back and forth in motion to create those same matchups because if you're in man and i go in motion well that guy has to go too now you just told you gave us a clearer picture from my quarterback to know where the matchup is and the routes that we have and where he wants to go with the ball or do you do you just bump down the next guy well now you got to get him because he's over there now now you're giving the quarterback also another picture because we have middle of the

field open middle of the field close you can kind of start guessing or reading where the zones are and knowing where those holes are and if you got a guy that runs routes the same way and sees the things the same way the quarterback does he knows where the holes are so i think uh the relationship with cousins and jefferson will be like a big factor in how much success he has i know cousins has had i don't know how many different ocs in the last five years but you know what I was reading he's done pretty well in the beginning of seasons even with all these new adjustments he's been pretty even keel as far as his playing is concerned so I think that's just that's a positive and that he's able to adjust and he's as good as his ability to make corrections and I

guess that's why they gave him that guaranteed money. Yeah right well clearly Jefferson, clearly Jefferson cousins are on the same page with each other to the point where he can have the most yards in the NFL over the last two seasons. The underneath stuff is interesting to me because it almost, we almost present it and it's probably wrong. Like, oh, quick routes, like anybody can do that. But what is the difference between being a quick game receiver and being more of a deep threat? Like what's the, what is the difference between being a quick game receiver and being more of a deep threat? Like what's the, what's the differences between those? Deep threat is you have a lot more time to work what you're doing. You kind of know if, if, if it's a deep zone, you see where everybody's going. You're not worried. You're not concerned about what's going on you know back back down

below because your your focus is on getting getting over the top clearing stuff out then looking but looking up and finding the ball you're not going to see the quarterback throw the ball if you're running deep at least you shouldn't i would hope you don't because that means everybody else on the field and in the arena sees that too and it's probably going to get picked off or you're going to get knocked out but underneath you have to anticipate so it's if you're if you're reacting to something it's almost like you're too late like if you're in the slot and the outside linebacker blitzes and you just run your route it's like oh i should go there it's too late the quarterback's getting hit or he's ready to throw the ball and you're not there he has to go somewhere else so you have to see it before it

happens and kind of have a feel for it and and at the same time be running your route and then make what we call side adjustments so you could be running a route and as you're running you see something that tells me okay i'm supposed to go here now or i'm supposed to sit it down i'm supposed to keep running through this area um and so it takes a lot a lot more study and a lot more reps you just have to get like with anything you just have to rep it the more lot more study and a lot more reps. You just have to get – like with anything, you just have to rep it. The more you rep it and you get used to it, it's a formula to everything. There's rules. If you see this, you do this.

If you see this, you do that. And a lot of guys will kind of overcomplicate it and be like, well, I have to figure out what the defense is in, what coverage is. Nobody knows the full coverage during the play because on one side, they might be showing one thing. And so this receiver comes back and says, oh, my corner stayed down in the flats and the safety went over the top.

It's cover two. And on the other side of the field, the receiver is saying, oh, well, my corner dropped into deep thirds or deep quarters and the safety on my side stayed, it's cover four. They're both right. So the big picture for the quarterback is he has to recognize his quarter, quarter, half or cover six as some teams call it. So he sees one thing over here, big picture, but then you see something over here.

Now it's a matter of where are the routes, where are the holes in the defense? So it's not even about knowing, following the receivers on their routes. It's knowing where the holes in that defense are based on the alignment of the defenders, players, the defensive players and their leverage and knowing where to throw the ball and where your guy's supposed to be. Other than that simple game, right? Simple, easy. It's like a pound cake recipe. It's one of my favorite parts of football is that there's there's just always more layers like it never stops like it just keeps going deeper and deeper into the coverages the matchups how teams are trying to play against you yeah i mean it's right the rabbit hole never ends now when it comes to the cooper cup role one of the things that i find very

fascinating that the rams did and they did this with Robert Woods too, is they were not afraid at all to have that guy be a tight end basically for them and say, oh, you want to chip a defensive end for us? That'd be great. Like you want to take on a linebacker. Now this is something we've seen Justin Jefferson do effectively, but that's, I mean, that is quite a task I think for wide receivers to be asked. So I wonder even what you train your guys about blocking because I think that this is going to ask a lot of Justin Jefferson to be a blocker too. Blocking is all about pride and want to.

It's not really about size. We like to say no block, no rock. Because as receivers, realistically, if there's 60 plays in the game and half of them are passes so you're looking at 30 passes you have five eligible receivers every play right so you're looking at possibly six targets a game if you just do the math that way make it even six targets in the game is not a lot quarterback might be getting hit one or two of those now you got four decent passes hopefully coverage might be good on half of those so now you got two contested catches that you could possibly make in the game like that's not really a lot of opportunities but how you get your opportunities um by creating explosive plays you're blocking

down the field in the running back split springs one big one now what happens is they have to put more guys in the box now you get those favorable matchups so you can create more plays for yourself by being an unselfish player so how you play without the ball as uh Coach Marion down in uh Texas receiver coach in Texas says that how you play without the ball shows how much you love your teammates or something to that effect and so that's that's true like if you're willing to do that extra stuff and guys see it and they'll they'll be willing to block for you longer because they're trying to get you the ball they're willing to make those plays and it's reciprocated so i think yeah like i said it's about pride and want to like just being able to impose your will like i'm not gonna let this guy my guy's not gonna make the tackle

like whatever i have to do that's legal without getting a flag or as long as the refs don't see it, whatever I have to do to make sure my guy doesn't make the tackle, I do my job. Yeah. And I think that that's been another part of his game. It's like when we talk about Justin Jefferson, when a player's top three or top five in the NFL, it's like, can't find too many holes in his game. And that's not one of them either when it comes to his willingness to block but i think where it's really interesting is they're going to play a lot more three wide receiver than they have in the past where they've had a full back in or two tight ends so now all of a sudden there's a trickle down effect of this where you play extra wide receivers but you don't have to lose a lot when you're taking that bigger guy off the field which means that the other team

has to put more defensive backs on the field, which means that the other team has to put more defensive backs on the field to go against you. And it's, it's so interesting that there's just this trickle down effect and that the Rams have taken great advantage of. If you could get these receivers blocking, then you can do a lot more in the running game, which like you said, forces them to pay attention to your running game. And I think that's what the Vikings are looking for here. Um, it was like maybe last year when the tight end got hurt that we saw more three receiver sets from them and so that's when they're like well you know what we're not really losing much now when he comes back that's just that's a bonus to have a tight end that can block and run routes but we're

not necessarily losing anything so defense defense does have to play us honest and I think by putting him in the slot, that's another thing for defenses to think about because now he's not so far away from the ball. Now they can get him the ball in space a lot quicker and you don't have to worry as much about long pass protection or play action. They can get him the ball right now and let him do what he does. You can follow Jerome, by the way, on Twitter, at Jerome underscore McGee 2.

The route school and the website is therometraining.com. I assume that is Jerome, the Rome training. Clever, clever on your part. But it's cool to get to know you, man, and to listen to you talk about wide receiver play. I absolutely love it. So I'm glad that we could get together again. And you know what?

Let's grind some tape together at some point and do it again. Live for it to live. All right. Thanks a lot, man.