Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Let's analyze Vikings draft woes with Chris Trapasso

Episode Date: October 29, 2025

Chris Trapasso joins the show to analyze where things have gone wrong for the Vikings in the draft over the past handful of years. Then, Maggie Robinson joins for the Robinson Roundup. The Purple Insider podcast is brought to you by FanDuel. Also, check out our sponsor HIMS at https://hims.com/purpleinsider Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See https://pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hey, everybody, welcome to another episode of Purple Insider, presented by Fanduel. Matthew Collar here. And look who it is, Chris Trapaso, who has moved over to the TikTok world. So make sure you go check out his analysis every week there, breaking down the National Football League. Chris, for many years, you have been the official draft analyst of the Purple Insider show. We have reached a point where the Minnesota Vikings are struggling. They are three and four. And when we look across the roster, the roster build a lot of the decisions that they

have made have not played out like they thought, especially in the positions where they have tried to cover up for either not having draft capital or missing on draft. So what we're going to do is deep dive into what has happened roster wise, of course, but also mainly with these drafts and look at the process and the results, what happened and how we got here. This is not reflective of a lot of our conversations in the offseason, Chris, where I think both of us thought this was going to work. But I think we want to work backward and we'll get to the 2022 draft because we know that

that one was an epic disaster. But as of right now, the draft from this year, year. They only took a handful of players and they have overall Donovan Jackson has been starting, but that's really it from this draft class. And I think that this draft as they just lost Kobe King, they released him and he was picked up by the New York Jets. I think this draft says a lot about their overall draft philosophy because they have no picks and they have not been stacking up comp picks like some teams. They haven't been selling off parts at deadline. instead they've been a buyer time and time again because they've been competitive and I feel like

this is an example of how it will catch up with you eventually when you don't have a lot of draft picks but just as of as of right now what do we make of the draft from 2025 well yeah I think it's good that you kind of put a bow on that with just that it's not a draft class that had a lot of picks in it. And for as fun as, you know, previous drafts where you trade up for Dallas Turner and you say, hey, you know, don't worry about next year. Like you said, it can catch up to you that it just narrows the margins of how good you have to be with those four or five or six picks when you don't have that abundance of selections. And I'll go back to all of our conversations in January through April. Yeah, we talked about quarterbacks a lot the last couple of years.

they draft J.J. McCarthy last year. But a core tenant that you and I share is that get as many draft picks as you can possibly get, Len. And it's four reasons like that where you're doing roster jockeying and you have to release your six-rounder, then you're subjecting him to waivers. And then suddenly that is just really a pick that's flushed down the toilet essentially because that guy, unless he gets cut by the Jets, you can pick him back up again. It's just a pick that you only got to see for a few games and for not barely any snaps.

Kobe King. So I think this year's draft, it was already one that was going to be challenging for Quasi Adafo Mencha just because it was small because of that Dallas Turner trade the year before. But I still want to see Ty Felton. I think Ty Ingram Dawkins is kind of the player. I don't want to say the player now that he's always going to be, but he kind of felt like this base defensive end that's a good run stuffer, which is never going to be this 50 or 60 pressure player. And I know that he's played as a rookie. He could get better. He could get a little stronger. He could get better against the run, but I don't think he's ever going to be a big time pass rush type. And obviously, Gavin Bartholomew got hurt early, like before the season started.

So it's Donovan Jackson, I think, will be a good player. I know he hasn't been amazing, but he's been serviceable at guard. And it's just, again, when you're, you know, we're only talking about five guys here. So that's what makes it such a challenge when you're a team that wants to take that risk the year before, you're kind of setting yourself up for, man, we got to really hit on a lot of these selections because we just don't have that many of them. And that lessened the amount of young and cheap talent we have on the roster. And I will continue to say that the Donovan Jackson pick overall I liked. Now I think that this is another scenario there where they could have traded down. And they've had opportunities to do that in previous years. And it's been a lot of

we like our guy. We're sticking with our guy. And there's kind of a reason why the broader philosophy, the analytics, the studies of the NFL draft say that trading down is the better thing to do because you're putting so many eggs in one basket as opposed to spreading out those opportunities. And if you do only have five players in a draft, every single one that doesn't work out feels pretty crushing to your draft class as opposed to if you draft 12, 13 players, if each one has a set of odds and the odds of a six rounder Kobe King, even making the team and becoming decent are 10%. Well, when he gets chopped, it's not that big of a shock. But also, if you have three or four of those guys, maybe one of

them hits if they're all 10% chances. So that's just the simple math of it. But with someone like Jackson, I like the logic overall of, hey, guard is really difficult these days. And this is a super talented player with extremely high character that can, meet a baseline right away for you of decent play, which I think he has, and then grow and grow into a potential star guard. Maybe you're not talking about the next Quentin Nelson, but these are hard to find, as you see from them paying $17 million for Will Fries. So I wouldn't criticize that pick with where we're at right now. And I think we've seen a lot of really good things from Donovan Jackson. But then when we get into, well, Ty Felton hasn't played, except for it as a

punt gunner and he didn't get many opportunities with the first team, even when there were injuries during training camp. I look at him as a player who's very raw and needs to develop, but this is again the issue when you're drafting in the third round with the last pick of the third round. This is not a player who's likely to come in and be able to help you right away. It's likely to be someone that is going to have to have a couple of years to develop. And it's also not likely to become the next Justin Jefferson or Jordan Addison when you're talking about a pick that is at that point. Yeah. And I think that selection was maybe a little bit of insurance in case Jordan Addison wasn't going to be around beyond 2025. So we're talking like now.

And obviously Vikings fans are like, hey, this seems three and four. Like what are we doing now? To me, that Ty Felton pick, and I think I said this right after they selected him on our post draft show, So it kind of felt like a 2026 selection. There's, I think, a handful of prospects that can go as early as the third round. I'll always, you know, bring up the bills in my backyard. They picked Landon Jackson, the edge rusher out of Arkansas in the third round because he tested through the roof. He played like he was a healthy scratch for the first month, played two games,

hardly did anything, did not make an impact whatsoever. He was like Ty Felton. He's a pick down the road when, okay, maybe we're going to lose some players at edge. We have this second year guy. I think that was more of an insurance pick for Jordan Addison, maybe Jalen Naylor, that maybe by 26 or 27, then they feel good about like you're saying, rounding out some of the rawness to Ty Felton's game, then he can be the wide receiver two or a really good wide receiver three in Minnesota. So that's again, those are the challenges when you only have a five pick draft class. If you really love Ty Felton's long term potential, but you only have five picks, well, then he's not going to make that impact. and that's your second selection that you made who's not really contributing to the team in this

2025 season. And that's obviously a problem now for a team that's three and four. Well, and when he is your second pick of the entire draft, then I think that just even visually, it looks a lot different than where that guy would normally be picked. It might be your fourth pick. And this is, this is a stat that I've continued to bring up that the Green Bay Packers have twice as many top 100 draft picks as the Vikings since 2022. So this is the thin line that you have to really believe that you can hit on those picks. It's not

unusual for the guy who's the last pick of the third round to not work out or become a huge impact player right away. Yet, but if that's your second pick in the draft, it's going to feel like, wow, you missed on your second pick in the draft. Although I'm

not saying, Ty, is a miss. Yeah, I've actually liked some of the things I've seen from him, especially from the punt gunning and I think special teams does translate in general, but you're right, when Jalen Naylor leaves in free agency, this is going to be your guy potentially to step up into that role. But as far as impact right away, if you're drafting guys in the late third round, you cannot or even tie Ingram Dawkins, the fact that he's been on the field is a win for them. For sure. We're not seeing any immediate impact. So I think we can say, though, Jackson is,

I don't want to say, oh, he's a hit, but overall that pick makes sense for them. That's a foundational piece that they can move forward with. Everything else is up in the air and there's not much there. Now, the 2024 draft and the Dallas Turner selection, that's one that we're going to look at for a long time of how much they invested. Now, moving up to get that initial draft pick, that was more of a, hey, if we need to draft a quarterback and we need to trade up with somebody, we need to have that in our back pocket moving up into the first round we need to have this extra first rounder they didn't

end up having to use it so then they get to that pick they decide to move up they decide to give up the next year's capital i think you and i both really liked dallas turner as a prospect well also acknowledging that if you're pushing chips to the middle of the table well the reason that metaphor makes so much sense chris is because if you go bust after pushing the chips to the middle of the table, you're out of the poker game, right? So that's, now, I don't want to say where we're at with Dallas Turner that it's over or anything like that, but through this point, it hasn't come anywhere close to justifying what they gave up for that move.

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Uncomcom slash Purple Insider. That's Uncommongoods.com slash Purple Insider for 15% off. Don't miss out on this limited time offer. Uncommon Goods. We're all out of the ordinary. Yeah, I think what my thought was right afterward, and we talked about a lot of those edge rushers in that draft class because we thought that could be a position that they could ultimately pick. We liked Dallas Turner. I liked him.

My draft algorithm, Resin, really liked him a lot. And we talked specifically, and I think this is a big part of why they were so aggressive, that he on paper, because he's kind of like an outside linebacker, he was young, he can be a blitzer. he seemed like a perfect fit in the Brian Flores defense. And I'm assuming that Brian Flores has a pretty strong, prominent voice in those draft rooms to say, look, this is the kind of player we need. And it's good for the GM to say, all right, let's try to find your specific guy,

that type that you want. Despite all that, in a draft class with Liatu Latu, who was picked, I think two picks before, and then Jared Verse, who went a few picks after him, I don't think I would have, or I know that I wouldn't have thought, hey, Dallas Turner is whatever the Vikings gave up better than those two players. They all, those three felt like these are the three first round edge rushers in 24. They're probably going to go somewhere from like pick 12 to pick 30. That's ultimately where they landed.

But one was just much more expensive than the other two. So even if Dallas Turner starting next week becomes a really, really good player, I think that was a miscalculation by the, Vikings. And maybe they felt we are going to spend this extra draft capital because of the fit. And maybe he can be moved around and maybe he has a higher ceiling than Latu and Jared Verst, who were a lot older. I know we've talked about the drastic age differences, but between those three edge rushers and certainly Dallas Turner is the youngest. So maybe like Donovan Jackson, there is still promise and upside with him. But I do think it was a miscalculation

because those three edge rushers were all very good. The Vikings had a spend so much more to get Dallas turn around the roster. And if throughout this season, because we are really talking about a small sample size of him playing, if throughout this season, there's a corner that gets turned from him. I haven't seen it so far, but it's also not like he's been a total disappearing act, non-impact player. He has a couple of sacks. He's shown flashes of the burst that we really liked out of him.

And I agree overall that when you look at his profile and you look at what he did at the the combine and you look at his production and you look at the way the guy moves, even the way he catches a football. Like we have watched them do this drill where they throw a ball at him and he catches it like he's a tight end or something. Like there's some special traits there from Dallas Turner. And I think what they saw was, hey, this can be like our future Andrew Van Ginkle type of player who is playing outside linebacker, moving inside, rushing from a lot of different spots dropping back in coverage all the time. He has not shown the coverage instincts that Andrew Van Ginkle has, who is more of a true linebacker, sort of becoming past rusher,

but more of a linebacker, whereas Turner was a pass rusher who occasionally was asked to drop back in college into a zone. And that has not really clicked the way we expected. Also, he hasn't been able to play the role that we expected because we thought he'd be on the field at the same time as Van Ginkle. So they had designed this role next to Van Ginkle of one guy dropping out, one guy rushing and a lot of different stuff. And he has been able to do that. Also, the Vikings have been down in so many games. Opposing teams are running all the time. Dallas Turner is not an edge setter. Like there's some circumstance in there that have played into why he hasn't become a star. But I think it's easy to say right now that the amount of draft capital that they had to use to go

up and get him is very hard to justify that it would have been a much more prudent play to use that to just trade back and to try to get more draft capital out of that because when we look at the draft history, their next selection ended up being in the fourth round. And this one really even at the time screamed, this is our big home run move, that this is the guy who's going to change our franchise. And he's the one we got to have, which we know. is extremely risky when it comes to the draft, even though at the time, I was like, hey, wow, Dallas Turner.

I love this prospect, but if it doesn't work, this is what you end up with. Yeah, that's something that my time as a draft analyst, I've realized like it's, and I do it every year. I do it on this show that I fall in love with specific prospects,

and I can see how general managers and just entire collective front offices, like fall in love with a Dallas Turner or a J.J. McCarthy or whatever, and they ultimately trade up for those players. and I'll kind of go around the NFC North. You mentioned the Packers, but I'll, and there's one tie that I think we need to talk about. But I want to talk about the Bears.

I know that you recently had Ty Dunn on. I was actually rereading that whole Caleb Williams draft process thing last night, and I was even like rereading it again. I just wanted to see it if there was anything else I missed. I was still blown away, even though I already knew what, like, the contents were. That story obviously was a number of. one overall pick. Caleb Williams, Ryan Poles, fell in love. It was not a good process at all. It was a terrible process. I just wonder, like, how much that happens around the league.

And I'm not going to suggest that Quasi, I mean, he seems very progressive, very smart, all about the analytics. I'm not saying that when they were debating those three edge rushers, they were laughing at Liatulatu and laughing at Jared Verst. And if anyone had any questions about Dallas Turner, they were thrown out of the room. Like, apparently they were in Chicago when anyone and criticize Caleb Williams. But I think that is probably something that that factors in that if it if it happens to me, that if I'm like, oh, man, I love this guy. I always have to push back based on what you just mentioned where it's like, don't be

crazy. I mean, I'm obviously not making picks, but like don't get too obsessed with specific players where you think teams should trade and move mountains to get them. There are other players. You have to look at the cost of each and weigh that into your evaluation. of that player, and maybe this was a situation where the Vikings got infatuated with Dallas Turner. And like you said, we're okay with their next selection, not being until the fourth round, which it kind of felt like for the second or the third draft for Quasi Adolfo Mensa,

the seminal draft with the quarterback and the edge rusher, maybe it's, it was still a draft where they needed some more foundational pieces to build around the veterans that they already had that were really good. And quickly on the Packers, I just wanted to mention. And you said it a few minutes ago that they have, what, twice as many first and second day selections as the Vikings since 2022. I always think back to now what we've seen with Tucker Kraft. He was the second tight end that the Vikings picked. They picked Luke Musgrave in round two, picked Tucker Kraft in round four. Musgrave's not, he's just a guy.

I mean, he's been hurt, but he's not really anything special. He should have been the fourth or the fifth rounder. So having those more, like, having that bigger. abundance of picks allows you to miss. And it's like, hey, we missed on Luke Musgrave. It was a top, I think he was a top 40 selection. I think he was like the 38th pick in the draft or something like that. And they still got a quality player at tight end because they were able to double down at that position. So kind of weaving those two NFC North rivals together, you want a lot of picks and you don't want to get too infatuated with a specific prospect.

That's not to say that I think that's exactly what happened with Dallas Turner, but maybe it was a little bit of a contributing factor to them spending so much when Jared verse was on the board. And we also have to say that the logic that they presented at the time did make a lot of sense. Like we have a very, very talented defense already. So you're looking for that final piece guy who can slide into his role. And it's superstars who drive this league. We know that, uh, that it's the best players who make the biggest difference. So there was a comparison there. Quacy was on the show. We were talking about this of the Minnesota Timberwolves making a trade for Rudy Gobert and how they gave up a lot for Rudy Gobert, but that was kind of the

final piece. And once you sense the moment with Anthony Edwards being a superstar, that's when you make these type of big swing moves. And the Los Angeles Rams are the most famous for doing this, getting Vaughn Miller, getting OBJ, like make a, you know, say an F them picks and all that sort of thing. So I think that they sense the moment of, all right, we're going to get McCarthy. We're going to spend a lot of money. And then this kid, if he's as good as we think he is, which that's the thing about Dallas Turner is a lot of this always ends up coming back to just the results in general, which is if Dallas Turner was a freak right now and he was the next Vaughn Miller, which is what he looks

like on paper, honestly, with his production in college and his athletic traits. If he's that guy, then we're being like, okay, well, you know, the defense is got some problems, but at least they've got this amazing draft pick that they were so smart to go up and get. But I think what the logic at the time, which is how we should always evaluate it, it came along with, and this goes with a lot of moves that they've made, a range of outcomes. And one of those range of outcomes is if he's just okay, then that's not going to be anywhere near enough. And just historically to add to that, pass rushers from 15 to 30, the 32 in the first round. They usually, it's very hit or miss. It's not Miles Garrett. It's not Vaughn Miller. It's very

hit or miss. So knowing that maybe adds to this. And then we're also talking about a draft class just to move on from Turner where Kyrie Jackson, a tragedy passes away in the off season. And they get in the seventh round, a very good player, Levi Drake Rodriguez. Walter Rouse still a developing tackle, a kicker who's turned out to be honestly a phenomenal kicker in Will Reichard, but another draft class that just has very few players outside of those top picks. And really, Chris, though, a lot of the discussion about whether the Vikings can draft, not draft, and should they have the traded all those picks and everything else, a lot of it will come back to the guy that they selected first in 2024, J.J. McCarthy. Because if this year was

going similarly with a lot of other pieces. Okay, Theo Jackson hasn't really worked out as replacing Cambinum or J. Von Hargrave was a bad signing or whatever. Okay. But if J.J. McCarthy had them at five and two right now and was playing really good football. It was a top 12 quarterback. We'd be like, this team's genius. This is great. Everything's going okay. So we have to keep that in mind as well, just how much that one draft pick of J.J. McCarthy dictates how we feel about all the other roster building. Yeah. And I'm so glad that's a perfect segue. I'm so glad that previously you also mentioned that some of the Dallas Turner, I guess I'll say disappointment has is situation based where they're not in these obvious passing situations for the opposing offense where he can

really pin his ears back and Brian Flores can get super aggressive. And that ties into what I was going to say on this show like the Vikings are three and four things are not going great but we have the multi-layered thing of they had to start their backup for multiple games and now we find out that on october fifth Carson Wentz got really hurt in his shoulder and it was a torn labrum and now he's having surgery and we're like oh my god like no wonder carson wens looked like even bad by Carson went standards the last couple of weeks if j j j mccarthy comes back when it would not surprise me in the least, and he looks good and more comfortable in this Kevin O'Connell offense that at times this season has looked like the offense of last year, that Justin Jefferson

is getting his targets, producing Jordan Edison, T.J. Hawkinson looks good. The run game at times has been solid that I don't think we're like, we're not realizing how big of a ripple effect that just having a good quarterback can have. It's like we all understand that it's the most important position on the field, but I think the ripple effect goes out a lot further than we than we can even realize at times where suddenly you're on schedule. Now you're not in a hole. Now you're not, your quarterback doesn't feel like he needs to press. We talked about that during the whole quarterback prospect evaluation process.

Your defense is just a totally different animal for Brian Flores blitzing, for Dallas Turner. So for as much as I knew that we were going to talk specific players, I also wanted to mention, And I know you know this. I know a lot of the smart purple insider fans understand this too. But it really, things can change quickly in the NFL and nothing changes things quicker and with more magnitude than the right quarterback being installed. And you look around the league, any backup quarterback that has to start three or four or five games,

if that team wins one or two of those games, they should be like, feel like the most fortunate a team in the NFL. So even though the record isn't anywhere close to where it was a season ago and they're three and four and the NFC looks better, I think the Vikings can turn things around and win a few games in a row and suddenly be right back in the thick of things in the NFC playoff race. And that's why we have to keep a larger view even with the defense and some of the draft picks that we're talking about because everyone has played on the defensive side below their standard, which means that it's a lot of other forces. involved. Now, I think that there's schematic things that teams have figured out. I think that there

were players that they decided to let go like Cambine them that maybe they shouldn't. They shouldn't have Mackay Blackman. Maybe they shouldn't have and stuck with it because now they have no cornerback depth whatsoever. I guess we're going to get maybe a look at some undrafted free agents here. But, you know, aside from that, if you are playing from ahead, it does look a lot different. And I think last year, we probably overestimated what they were as a defense because they we're playing from ahead so often. And the way the schedule worked out, the opposing quarterbacks, playing the AFC South, like all those types of things, inflated what we all thought of the defense. And now it's probably worse than it actually

should be. And all that ties into J.J. McCarthy. Now, as we're looking at McCarthy, let's just go back to that, that draft pick. I think we all know that they wanted Drake May and they tried to trade with the Patriots. That's been out there. That's been reported. they tried to trade for Drake May. The Patriots were like, no, we will not be doing that. And you can see why from Drake May looking like an MVP candidate, Michael Pennix was off the board. So far, Pennix has been sort of just a guy at quarterback, has not been an exceptional

superstar, also has not been horrible. It's really the Bo Nix one that I think Vikings fans up until this point were probably a little bit of, eh, you know, does he really have a high ceiling? Is he really shown a whole lot for Denver? But we are reaching a point where he's winning a lot more games than he's losing as the quarterback of the Denver Broncos. Let's just look at that. We can't really evaluate it when one guy has 900 dropbacks and the other has 50 so far in his NFL career. But do you look back at that and go, well, maybe they should have gone with that guy instead of McCarthy or is that just completely unfair because McCarthy hasn't been on the field?

I think it's completely, I mean, I wouldn't say completely unfair. But yeah, I mean, there's just such a stark difference in the amount of snaps that they've played, games they've played. To me, like, and maybe this, you could point to this as, hey, this is something that that I'm wrong about as a draft analyst. I came on these shows and I'm never coming on here to just placate you or the listeners. Like, oh, every pick is great. I just have tended to align with Quasi Adafo Mensa in maybe you could say, hey,

you know, Jared Vers was maybe more of a hit the ground running type edge rusher. Maybe Bo Nix because he was like, you know, started 60 games in college. It was like a 60 year player in college could be more of an NFL ready when week one as a rookie type player than J.J. McCarthy. But Quasi, like me, I'm all about traits and I'm all about upside. and they were still able to win 14 games last season with the bridge quarterback. And it was the perfect situation, even though you certainly didn't want J.J. McCarthy to get injured and miss his entire rookie year.

We've talked about this a lot. Still able to win games and show ownership. We can make the playoffs. We can be a quality team even as we're rebuilding. I think Bo Nix was just the perfect extension of Sean Payton. in Denver. Now, he's coming off of four touchdown performance against probably the worst defense in football in the Dallas Cowboys. I haven't been like blown away by by Bo Nix. I think more Drake May has been unbelievable. And there have been a lot of games that the Broncos

have still mustered some victories, some games where Bo Nix has not really been great. And there's been some, you know, more turnover worthy plays than big time throws. And he's taking a lot of unnecessary hits, things like that, where it's been the defense, the run game, the schematics that have really been the reason that he's won games. So I guess what I'll say is I don't blame Kwasia Duff Omenza for swinging for the fences with upside with J.J. McCarthy. And again, reading that Tide Dunn piece,

it was everyone was saying that, oh, man, you could tell that in the interview room, that J.J. McCarthy was that true alpha and really commanded the room and was really just a football guy, like nitty-gritty wanted to get down to the specifics of what he needed to do to become a franchise quarterback. So beyond the X's and O's and the analytics, he really ticked that box for a lot of people and a lot of teams that were looking for a quarterback in that draft class. So I am not myself looking at at this team from afar saying, man, they really should have picked Bo Knicks. I think that, of course, the jury is still out on J.J. McCarthy. And I think actually his upside is still a lot higher than what they have with.

Bo Nix and Denver. And there's a few other factors there. One is that, you know, Kevin O'Connell went and visited with all these quarterbacks, sat down with them, got of the whiteboard with them, took them out onto the field and broke it down into every single detail and they land on J.J. McCarthy being the guy. I also think that Bo Nix is a perfect fit for that Sean Payton short passing offense. Whereas, you know, I don't know that Bo Nix would have been the same type of fit for how O'Connell wants to run his offense, which is with a guy with a strong arm who can really rocket the ball into tight windows, which J.J. McCarthy can. The intermediate passing is where this offense is built on. And that's where JJ is at his absolute strength,

which is hitting, we've talked about this, you know, the dagger concept and how, you know, Justin Jefferson or Jordan Addison breaking across the middle into a window and the quarterback's got to let it rip. Like that's, that's McCarthy. That's his throw. So playing to the strength of your quarterback, drafting the one that fit you personality-wise, it seemed, for Kevin O'Connell and upside-wise, development-wise. And they had a plan that made so much sense. Darnold plays maybe if it's week 10 or something and it's gone off the rails, then you go to McCarthy. But if not, and it's a 14-win season, that he gets to develop every day and practice. Like, it's a good plan.

It's worked before. You never expect a guy to tear his meniscus. And as much as they tried to do behind the scenes, there's only so much you could do when a guy is not actually playing. So, yeah, I look at that as clearly the results go toward Bo Nix. But in terms of the process of it still made sense to draft J.J. McCarthy. And as you mentioned, it's not like the NFL, it wasn't a Christian ponder situation where the NFL was like, uh, that guy's not really, but you guys desperately reached for him. There were a lot of fans of J.J. McCarthy.

We just need to see him play to start comparing him. across the league. Now, let's go back to the 2023 draft. They picked Jordan Addison outside of some off field stuff has been clearly a mega hit for them. Mackay Blackman, Jay Ward, Jaqualen Roy, Jaron, Jaron, Hull, Dwayne McBride. These are the late round picks that we don't necessarily expect to hit. Jay Ward is still on the team might end up playing. Mackay Blackman is a very curious case. And this is where. Yeah, what happened there? This is where luck just plays into stuff, man. I mean, we talk about like, and it's, it's just terrible to even bring up Kyrie Jackson because it makes me so sad to even talk about what happened there. But injuries and different

things that have happened to some of these players, like that's, that is out of anybody's control. Sure. And I think even with Mackay Blackman, it was out of their control. He showed plenty of flashes, looked like he was going to be a solid NFL type of corner, has the ACL injury on the first day of training camp last year, came back and just did not look the same. And even when you look, I know he's playing for a great team, even when you look at his coverage numbers and his coverage PFF grade, things like that, this hasn't been particularly great was just nowhere near the player that we had seen before, the aggressive, the like downhill type of player who could get tackles in the backfield. And it just wasn't that guy. And I don't know if maybe they jumped the gun from releasing him

or if they saw some things medically where they were like, we're really concerned here that this isn't going to work out. And we're just deciding to move on. But I think that that one falls under the category, this draft of they crush the first pick, but then some bad luck, not a lot of draft picks. It's sort of the same story as the other drafts.

Yeah, totally. And it's, it's good again that you bring up those injuries that are out of the control where you can criticize a GM or front office for, hey, you know, why is this defense regressing a little bit? Why have these guys not turned out? Well, yeah, I mean, J.J. McCarthy for as good in terms of a win-loss record as last season was for the Vikings, like they would have wanted to see J.J. McCarthy on the field and to tear your meniscus, for Blackman to get injured on the first day of training camp, that's stuff that not every single player returns from injury the exact same way.

And I always thought with Blackman, being as skinny as he was, he's like, was like 5, 10, 511, like, in the 170s, which we talked about at corner today. You can be 170, 180. There's receivers that are that small in today's NFL. Maybe that was part of it. I mean, I'm not going to go down like some medical evaluation here, but that if you're going to tell me that he didn't look anywhere the same that he looked as a rookie, which I was really impressed going back and watching the film from his rookie season and seemed like such a good. fit with the Brian Flores defense that wants to be able to watch the quarterback and just plant and drive on the football and be ultra aggressive. Even if you are going to get beat over the top every once in a while, they want plays

on the football and pass breakups, interceptions, things like that. That's just part of the NFL that you can't get around. And it, I think, is kind of circular conversation, like goes back to why you want more draft picks because those injuries, those weird transactions where you have to. to release a player, maybe a little too early because of, you know, just the numbers on your roster, you want to have those depth in numbers with, hey, we have a, I mean, obviously 2020 didn't go well, but a big draft class like that so we can maybe plug in this fifth and sixth rounder and we missed on the third rounder, but the sixth rounder is actually better,

things like that. I think that's very, very important to ultimately have those bigger draft classes. And obviously, this was only a five draft pick class for the Vikings, which I think it is hurting the overall depth of this team. So with 2022, we've just gone over every player so many times on the show. We've gone over what happened. Yes, Kyle Hamilton is great. Yes, they should have picked him. At the time, I thought, hey, you draft Hall of Famers in the top 15 trading back.

I couldn't find too many super megastars at the all the way back of the first round in comparison to the top 15. So I wasn't thrilled at that trade back. But, you know, I think that just to close our. discussion. We should talk about how 2022 seemed to have impacted them long term. Because this was the one where Quasi Adolfo Mensa came in. I'm the analytics GM.

I'm going to do the analytical thing, which is to trade down. They seem to trust Ed Donatel with players that would fit his system. We know in that Fangio system that the deep safety is a super important player to have. So they go in and they get

Lewis seen and think, this is going to be our Eddie Jackson or something for those Fangio teams in Chicago. And it all, I mean, it all goes to hell. Just every single one of these picks is a complete mess. Ed Ingram is still a starter in the National Football League, just not for this team. Uh, Caleb Evans, Brian Asimwa, a Sasea Tomalow. I think I saw the other night, maybe playing for someone. Yeah, I did too. So I thought of you when I saw them. Yeah, these guys are around, uh, Andrew Booth, never worked on any level. I mean, this was one of the to me, crazy bad luck streak type of drafts that Rick Spielman had in 2016 that yes you can question the

trade down and all that but I think altered because it went so wrong altered the way they drafted into the future to the point where they were just like no we're going to get our guy we're not trading down anymore it's just our favorite player and in some ways that's worked with Jackson and Addison in some ways it hasn't with Dallas Turner but I think it altered their draft strategy for the future. And I wonder about if they had sort of stuck to that, hey, we blew this draft completely, but we're still going to accumulate draft picks as much as we can. We're still going to do the trade downs that the analytics say we're going to do. That may have made this a little bit different, but I really think that messing up that draft

as bad as they did, cause them to maybe overcorrect with the way they handled it in the future. Yeah, I think that is a really fascinating point, and that's kind of next level. And it makes a lot of sense that, again, I'll go back to the Tideon piece on Ryan Poles in Chicago, that there's like a line in there where it's like, in a way, I understand Ryan Poles. Like he has made his way up to a GM spot and he has one, you know, this is his, I mean, slightly different because it was the first pick in the draft and a quarterback. but I think they did overcorrect kind of like, you know, like, hey, this is their one chance to trade back, to go the analytics route.

Oh, it burned us. Like let's maybe like we don't have three or four or five more years to get this wrong again. We're not going to have jobs. So I think it's kind of a parallel to that where you don't blame these guys for going, look, we put in all the work, we scouted all these players, we scoured over the analytics. We are going to do what we want to get Dallie. Turner. We are going to just make it happen after we traded back. We could have picked Jameson Williams. We pick Lewisine. He gets injured again, which obviously plays into our other

topic that we discussed, that these bad injuries early in these players' careers that really kind of thwart their development early on potentially has happened in Minnesota. I agree with you. I think that they had over corrected the last couple years and said, let's not just trade down and try to have 11, you know, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 picks. Let's just get our guys. Maybe that is something that maybe even Quasi, I don't know if you would ever admit this, but maybe feels like, yeah, we probably did overcorrect. And I came in with this fresh analytical mind, but then things change because life happened

as a GM and we saw what could happen when you do have a big draft class and it ultimately doesn't work out, especially at the top. And I think that there's even other ones too, like T.J. Hawkinson tearing his ACL. and then not having the quarterback play to maximize Hawkinson, where Darnold didn't play with him through training camp and was looking downfield for other receivers. And then this year, the quarterback play has just been brutal. So when was T.J. Hawkinson supposed to justify the contract?

But it was also a second round draft pick that you moved for T.J. Hawkinson as well. Who knows where that could have gone. So give me this. Give me like a 60 second like Chris Trappaso, advises the Vikings drafting in the future type of spiel. Like if you were to say one thing about, hey, here's how you can learn from these first few drafts. And again, I do want to say, like they did find some good players in here. And if McCarthy is good, then we're going to forget about a lot of the other ones. I still think Donovan Jackson is going to turn out to be a really

good pick for this team. So, you know, I don't want to say that there's just nothing here at all. Ingram Dawkins, I'm intrigued by. But you got to hit. more than this in the future if you can't just rely on grabbing free agents all the time. So give me 60 second. Chris Treaso helps the Vikings in the future. I think overall they have to continue to emphasize athleticism because typically the best players are the guys that had big time workouts at the combine or at their pro days, which they've done that.

I mean, Dallas Turner, we talked about it was, you know, looks like von Miller on paper. I think they need to do a little bit of a better job taking a step. back and looking at the top players at specific positions when they're about to draft. The Ed Ingram pick was such a weird selection. And we talked about it, Dallas Turner. There was Jared Verst sitting right there and maybe spend a little more time, whether that's in meeting rooms, whether that's, you know, scouring the film, the analytics of, all right, who are other options?

If we can't land a Dallas Turner in next year's draft, what does Eddrusher two, three, and four look like? And how much worse do we think they are that we can make? maybe trade back and still get that player in the second and third round. And that leads me to the last point, I think, maintaining that analytics savvy approach of not getting too enthralled with a specific player and understanding that the draft needs to come to you and don't get too overzealous, especially in round one and round two.

If there's a guy that's near the end of your board and the fifth round that you really like that you have a third round grade on, sure. trade a couple extra day three selections in the future to get that guy. But when you're trading up in round one or two and you're trading future first and seconds, it again just puts you in a little bit of a bind and can ultimately very much hurt your death. More guys, better luck, because when you've only drafted 28 players, I don't think it's a really great sample size.

If most of them are not even day one or day two, it's a real great sample size to really tell us they're good or bad at this, especially if a couple of, of their a we love this guys are addison and jackson and those guys work out and even turner can still uh you know turn a corner here and be a good pick i think it just says when you don't have picks how tough it can be uh but i would also say that you know sometimes just falling in love with a guy versus taking the mass approach um when you feel like we we got to win now so we got to get this guy to do this thing that's where i think you can fall into trouble some Sometimes.

Yeah. Can I quickly say, I know that you got to get out of here. I was just checking. And I'm pretty sure that I have this right. Let me see. Okay, yeah. 2023, I think, is the prime example in that draft class. We'll never know, like, you know, the conversations that were being had when the Vikings

were on the clock. But those three receivers went ahead of Jordan Addison. They let the draft come to them. Yeah. And in that draft, yes. Okay. JSN is having his best season. He looks like a star.

There's not a lot around him. So he's got ample opportunity. Quentin Johnston has become actually a pretty decent player. Zay Flowers, a pretty decent player. So the Vikings there said they probably liked all four of those guys. They didn't go, oh my God, we need to trade two seconds and a third to get JSN when you can get Jordan Addison at the same price, just a first round pick. I think that is the prime example for what should be the foundation of what the Vikings do in the future to have a better sense of position groups and the difference between prospect one

on your board and prospect three. And if there's not that big of a difference, don't get crazy and move up for prospect one when you can still get prospect three and not lose extra draft capital in the future. I also think that this is the nature of football is when you call a play that doesn't work, you called the wrong play. And we need to pick it all apart and criticize it and say it was completely wrong, but sometimes you can make moves that make a lot of sense at the time that don't work out and then you can go back. So I think that's two different things of going back and saying, well, why didn't it work out versus you did everything wrong? So I don't think that they did in all of these cases. And other times, maybe you could second guess right from the

beginning. Chris Rapaso, where can folks find your work these days, my good friend? You mentioned it at the beginning on TikTok. I post between three to seven videos. videos a day, just analyzing the entire NFL, specific trends, specific players. I try to really bounce around the league. So you're not just getting like the, you know, the ESPN teams of like the Cowboys and the, and the Chiefs all the time. I try to touch on all 32 teams every single week. So just follow me on there at Christyrapasso on TikTok. Perfect. Thanks a lot, man, for all your time for on demand draft analysis as always. Always. Appreciate you. And we'll talk again very soon. football football all right before we get to maggie robinson a quick reminder the show is presented

by fan duel let me give you the three games that i'm watching this week and the lines on fan duel baltimore at miami on thursday night baltimore is a seven and a half point favorite but here's the reason to watch that is because lamar jackson is going to return and of course next week he is going to be playing against the minnesota viking so what does lamar look like with the baltimore ravens team that has struggled with him in the game so far this year. The over under on Fandul, 49 and a half for that game. The Green Bay Packers are 12 and a half point favorites against the Carolina Panthers. Can the Packers keep rolling after their big win against the Pittsburgh Steelers? Also maybe says a little something about the

recent schedule of the Packers. They beat Cincinnati. They beat Pittsburgh and now 12 and a half point favorites on Fandul against Carolina. They have not really been tested recently. And speaking of that, the Chicago Bears unlikely to be tested in Cincinnati. Cincinnati, but they're only favored by two and a half points. The over under for this one, though, crazy. 51 and a half on Fandul. Caleb Williams has a chance to bounce back after a rough game against the Baltimore Ravens and the Vikings face the bears on their schedule very soon.

So will they be able to take down the Cincinnati Bengals as two and a half point favorites? We will see. All right, now on to Maggie. All right, live from Syracuse University, we welcome in Maggie Robinson for the Robinson rundown, Maggie, our special contributor each week, looks through the National Football League recaps the weekend that was, and we look forward to headlines around the NFL as well. So, Maggie, where would you like to begin? This was actually analytically, they did some data on this, one of the worst weeks of football

in the NFL that's ever happened. I saw this on Twitter that in terms of games that were blowouts and not competitive at all, one of the truly worst but that doesn't mean not much is going on but if it wasn't just anyone's imagination if you were like man was there a lack of good football games there absolutely was but you know what that shows parody around the league if everyone's not good right if there's lots of blowouts then everybody's got a chance okay i like the twisted logic but someone who played into that not good football spencer rattler he just got bench this is breaking news and tyler shuck is now starting quarterback of the New Orleans Saints.

I think we all kind of saw the writing on the wall here, though. Tyler Shug was the 40th pick in the 2024 draft under this new head coach, Kevin Moore. We kind of knew this was going to happen, but we didn't know at what point. And Spencer Rattler closes out his Saints current career with a 1 to 13 record. That is pretty outstanding. Yeah, not the best situation at any point for Spencer Rattler. I had been very skeptical. I know that a lot of draft analysts had liked him.

got a really good arm, but could he actually be a starting quarterback in the NFL, didn't really see it. I think if he was, he would have been able to at least get that team into mediocrity as opposed to losing nearly every game he ever played. But at the same time, I think he showed enough that if you're another team in need of a backup quarterback, when he eventually becomes a free agent to go somewhere else, maybe you're looking at Spencer Rattler because this team doesn't give you any real chance at success. They cannot block. They cannot run. They've got one halfway decent wide receiver. Their defense is a Travis Dealing. They are completely tanking. The one thing I do wonder about tanking teams is who are you looking at a quarterback in

the future? Because this upcoming draft class, not great. So they need Tyler Shuck to at least be decent enough for them to play into the future like next year, the next year after that, because this upcoming draft class probably doesn't have the answers. And New Orleans just needs bodies. They need players you've seen from your hometown Tennessee Titans that just drafting a quarterback and being like, fix, do it. Go ahead, Cam, it's not the way to build the team. So I think New Orleans is going to have to take a couple of year process here.

And Tyler Shook is probably going to take a lot of it on the chin over the next number of weeks here next 10 weeks if he makes it that long. Yeah, it feels like this is their commitment to. the rebuild. They waited as long as they possibly could before fully declaring it. And this declaration is just being like, you know what? It's here. We're not going to hide from it anymore. We're looking to the future. And it really, it is what it is. That's the only way we can go because we've been at the bottom for so long. Unfortunately, though, he does have a really tough start against the Rams on the road. Brutal game to kick off your season with a team that is already just

having a poor start. Yeah, I did notice the other day that he averaged about four and a half yards per attempt. He will probably have to do that again. The Rams have one of the best D lines in the NFL. The Saints have one of the worst O lines in the NFL. It's not like you can really just hand off the entire game. That is a very tough place to start. I guess you got to begin somewhere that usually in the NFL, there's no by weeks. You're always facing somebody tough. But did you have to do it against the Rams? That one I might have given Spencer Rattler one more swing at it before going to the young quarterback because if you're going to have him debut getting smashed by Jared Verse and the rest of that D line probably isn't the best way to start along with a really

good Rams coaching staff and a team that's competing for a Super Bowl. That's pretty tough. I would say though, credit to the New Orleans Saints, they hung on for a bunch of years after Drew Breeze being like, no, we don't have to rebuild. We could just keep messing up our salary cap. The fact that they finally committed to going all the way to the bottom. That's what they needed to do. But boy, is it ugly as they're doing it. No, it's not going to be cute, as the girlies say. Let's look to next week, talk about looking to the future. The trade deadline, November 4th, I have a game for you. We've played this in the past. It's called sleigh or nay. It's really an excuse for me to hear you say sleigh, because I find it really funny. Okay. So I have some hypothetical, and that is the

Key word here, hypothetical trades that a lot of journalists are speculating on. And I want you to tell me sleigh or nay. Do you agree with this? Do you see it happening? Or are you super against this? No way. Okay. Dexter Lawrence to the Ravens.

That would be a sleigh for the Ravens. I think Dexter Lawrence is one of the best players in the NFL, but he's not at that kind of year. Last year, he was completely dominant this year, totally disappointing. And you wonder about his motivation to continue to play for the Giants. because they have just been so bad and they got a little injection of life on the offensive side, but their defense, it was supposed to be a lot better than this. And we saw that comeback against the Broncos, the collapse against the Philadelphia Eagles. I saw former Giants players calling out Dexter Lawrence for his effort.

And it just seems like that may have run to an end. What it would cost, though, I think is the biggest question. Because if the Ravens won Dexter Lawrence, his reputation and his past, would suggest to me that that's at least the first round pick and probably more to get a player of that caliber. It would be just the Vikings luck, by the way, if one of their biggest nemesis, Dexter Lawrence, went to the Ravens right before the Vikings get ready to play them. But I love that idea for any team that acquires Lawrence. If you can get that guy, that is a position that's very hard to replace the past rushing gigantic defensive tackle.

Just don't think that the Giants should be moving on from any talent. They need more and not less. Agreed. agreed 100% on that one next here we go trey hendrickson to the cowboys uh that would be a nay for me uh i just don't think the cowboys are one player away i mean i think that i mean look trey hendrickson's been on a defense that's an embarrassment and he's still great and what does it meant uh defenses are weak link systems and this goes for even the micha parsons trade where if micha parsons is on the cowboys they're better but they're not way better because he was great last year when he was in and they were still a bad

defense overall, if you can't cover anybody and you only have one pass rusher, it's not enough to have a great defense. And I think it would look pretty stupid for Jerry Jones to make the trade that's kind of looking forward into the future, gives you cap space, gives you draft capital. Not that it's that defensible to get rid of Micah Parsons, but if you're doing it, that's why you're doing it, is to give yourself more caps flexibility and draft capital. Why would you go negate those things by trading for Trey Hendrickson when you're not a real contender? I think the cowboys are fun but they're not a contending team they are just a average eight and eight nine type of football team with a good quarterback and good receivers they can't stop anybody one dude is

not changing that they should not make a trade i'm going full nay okay i have one question though because trey hendrickson was actually involved in this holdout if you remember at the beginning of the season and he signed this kind of one year yeah on track there's nothing really after that so if he's a free agent like do you think that's when he looks to move from the team because he's probably got to be a little disfrontal with his positioning. Well, and Cincinnati's defense has been such a joke that what's the point in keeping him around? They clearly showed that they didn't want to long term lock into him, which I think, look, they got to rebuild a lot of parts of that roster.

They can't put it all into one guy. So they should be looking to trade him. I just don't think that the answer is trading him to the Dallas Cowboys for Dallas. So if I'm going to slay on a trade, I think it's got to work for both sides. So, but for Cincinnati, yes, they should be looking to trade, Trey Hendrick. this is making me so happy hearing you say this okay next up we have this one highly unrealistic because they've literally come out and said they're not interested but a j brown to the patriots yeah the j brown thing is so weird because when they throw deep to him he's awesome but he doesn't

get the same volume as a lot of other receivers he did win the super bowl with the eagles last year and they're still really darn good as the vikings found out and as the giants found out And as the Giants found out, I would not want to move A.J. Brown if I were them, they're a Super Bowl contender. I would not, if I'm A.J. Brown would not want to leave, despite any issues that you have with your fantasy stats and maybe frustrations with the offense. Like, your team is great. And you look around the NFC. You're one of three or four teams. You could see the Eagles, the Lions, the Packers, the Rams we mentioned. But you're one of those four or five teams that could be right there in the Super Bowl race.

I wouldn't want to move. but if you were going to do it, the Patriots with Drake May would be a place that would make a lot of sense. I just don't see this as a good reason for the Philadelphia Eagles to move him unless it's gotten so tense, so out of control that last week him not playing had to do with more than just his injury, although he slayed against the Vikings the week before. So I don't know why he would be upset and sitting out.

There's been tension between those two sides. I would want to work it out and then deal with it in the off season rather than move him in the middle of the season, take a huge player off your team when you're in that position. But for the Patriots, 100% sleigh, they should be looking for the more they can fill around Drake May as he's playing like an MVP, the more you want there. And often we've seen digs go to the, you know, Buffalo Bills and Josh Allen took the big step, AJ Brown. That's when Jalen Hertz took the big step. they should be looking everywhere for another receiver to add to that room with him. Absolutely. I do think it's too risky of a gamble for the Eagles to just throw that away off this weird,

awkward drama that maybe isn't even what we think it is. And then this final one here pains me to say it, but you know, I have to ask Mack Jones to the Vikings. Yeah, I think San Francisco needs Mac Jones. Like they're still in the playoff race and Brock Purdy has already been hurt. When Purdy comes back, there's no guarantee he stays healthy the rest of the year.

And San Francisco has lost too many players to win the Super Bowl, but they could make a wild card if they continue to play even halfway decent football and teams start to fall off and, you know, sell off parts and things like that. They don't have the hardest schedule in the entire universe. They should keep Mack Jones. But maybe next year, if you're talking about a quarterback competition at some point, Mac Jones really did show a lot in this short amount of time with San Francisco. not that I think he's a franchise quarterback, but he could step in and he can win games

and he can get the ball out of his hands. So he's shown a lot, but I don't see any reason for the Vikings to make a deal for a backup quarterback now when, look, I think I'd rather just see Max Brosmer. When you're three and four and there's no real evidence that you can actually compete for a playoff spot, just have your young quarterbacks, J.J. McCarthy, and if he gets hurt, Max Brosmer play. I think they truly have nothing to lose at this point. They've hit that they've hit that low bar where it's like, you know what, get the guy in. If the New Orleans Saints are looking ahead to the future, no shame in you doing it as well. Truly no shame. So I guess we'll see. Let's talk about some drama up here in New York. There's a lot of it. And there's

two teams. There's a lot to go around. But I'm talking specifically about the Jets because owner Woody Johnson was throwing some heat saying, quote, it would look good if the Jets could complete a pass while he was at the NFL league meetings the past few weeks. And that didn't really sit right with Justin Fields, rightfully so. And he came out and the Jets finally got their first win of the season, this 39, 38 win over Cincinnati and Aaron Glenn's first as a head coach. But boy, I'm sensing some tension between owner and head coach and QB1. Yeah, I just think that bad owners lose and Woody Johnson has been at the bottom of that pile

for a very long time. They have just had constant drama, as you mentioned, turnover with the coaches, constantly hiring and firing and, you know, trying to bring in Aaron Rogers to save the franchise and then giving Rogers all the power, which probably was a huge mistake. Some of it is bad luck. You miss on Sam Darnold and then Zach Wilson. And I mean, it's, you know, you miss on enough quarterbacks. It's pretty rough, but there's no need to say that about a player. Like, Justin Fields has been in the league. He didn't play that bad with the Pittsburgh Steelers before. I mean, you should always be looking in the mirror. When you have a guy with some

talent who has shown he can perform a little bit before, if he's not performing at all, then that's probably on your organization, your players around him, your coaches. And I'm not saying the field should have seven wins by now, but it shouldn't have been as bad as it was. and Aaron Glenn has looked mostly in over his head. So, I mean, good for him to get his first win, but it's been a very, very rough ride. The owner did not need to pile on like that. But that's what bad owners do, right?

Like we talk about Jerry Jones running his mouth and the things that he says. And these words, they have consequences. It's not like you're saying them to the local newspaper and only a handful of people will see it. These things go viral immediately. Everybody's family sees it. Everybody in the organization. And if you're, even if you're a cornerback on the team, aren't you like or a linebacker? What the heck are we doing here if the owner is just going to trash people when we don't play well?

So I felt bad for adjusted fields and good that he was able to overcome that and get a win. Certainly the Cincinnati Bengals defense was helpful there for him. I think sometimes and people in positions of power forget and get way too candid with the media. And listen, as journalists, we love that because that's how you get the good stuff is when they put their guard down. but ooh be careful when you're criticizing direct players when you have a financial involvement with something that just gets so messy and also like take the high road you're a full grown man you don't need to be slamming people like that if you need something done you talk internally that's the whole point of the organization that you've built right

exactly i mean there's he just came out with that nobody even prompted him to say it it was just yeah it's all just in field's fault okay uh who's the guy that's writing the checks who's the guy that's making the hires, who's the guy that has final say over everything in the organization and you're going to blame Justin Fields. Well, you brought him here. So I guess you should have had a better answer if you don't like how Justin Fields could throw the ball because he wasn't the best thrower ever before. And yet your offense hasn't really built a scheme that fits for Fields the way that Pittsburgh did last year. But again, I mean, we're talking about the bottom of the barrel of NFL owners and franchises in New York. And it's on them to,

prove that they're not, but just, just a mean and unnecessary thing to say to Justin Fields. And I know after the game, he had said like how much that impacted him. I mean, words hurt, man. And so for fields to be able to put that aside, but anytime you have to call your owners comments outside noise, you know it's pretty bad. And it's hard to see, even though they've got some nice players there. It's just hard to see that ever, that team ever getting back into contention as long as Woody Johnson is at the top. Yeah, it's just spelling dysfunction all the way around. There's no way around it.

I do want to go down to Pittsburgh. We had Aaron Rogers reunion game against the Packers and 3525 win for the Packers. It really turned out to be the Jordan Love Show, which was kind of a cool storyline here that the pro not, I don't want to say prodigy, but like the guy who sat under Aaron Rogers for three years finally has his moment. It felt very hallmark movie-esque. Also, Tucker Kraft was literally everywhere. He had the best game, I think, of any player out there, just doing it all, essentially.

Yeah, Tucker Kraft, the yards after catch monster and also caught that kind of ball that Jordan Love threw up into the atmosphere and the defender lost where it was and it came down his hands. That's, that's always Jordan Love to me, like what he is as a quarterback. And this is not a criticism because his numbers are really great, but he pretty much goes as the hero balls down the field go. And in that game, they worked against one of the worst defenses in the NFL in Pittsburgh, which is really shocking when you look at their talent. But with him, it's also a really good scheme. It is a scheme that allows him to get the ball into his

playmaker's hands. Then they can create yards after catch. That's how everything works. It's built off of these motions and getting Tucker craft the football and the flat, getting some of the other playmakers, the football in the flat. And then every once in a while. Now Christian Watson is back, hit something deep down the field, and you've got yourself an offense. The first half, they didn't really hit too much down the field. And it was like, oh, what's going on here? And then the second half, they get some of those big chunk plays. And then Aaron Rogers and the offense didn't have enough for Pittsburgh. But overall, Jordan Love has played like a superstar quarterback this year. And I know Vikings fans don't want to hear that, but the numbers are

what the numbers are that Micah Parsons got all the attention for the defense and that acquisition. But their quarterback is playing as good as you can play. Now, the question for Jordan Love is always, can you put together a complete season like that? Because it has sort of lived or died on those deep balls, those, hey, just throw it up into the air and see what happens. If they keep catching them, they are a very dangerous offense. But Tucker Kraft, what he gives them is consistency.

You could get him the ball underneath and he's getting you 8, 10, 12 yards, breaking tackles, making plays. That has a new dynamic for this office. offense that wasn't really there in the same way last year. So the NFC should not be too thrilled to see it all kind of clicking together for the Green Bay Packers. And you talked about the Steelers defense just not performing. Aaron Rogers was sacked three times. I mean, that's kind of what the Packers were going for. They wanted to get him moving on his feet in the pocket. They know that he's not that agile. He's kind of lost that with age. So their playmaking on that side worked

really effectively of let's make him super uncomfortable, highly pressured, decide really fast, run around, like, that's not his forte anymore. He's not at his physical prime, and it worked. If you're a person that, and there aren't many, that wanted Aaron Rogers to play for the Vikings, well, you know what it would have looked like because the Vikings defense, the Vikings defense hasn't been good. And so he would have been playing in situations where he had to drop back to pass a ton. And sometimes it would have been okay. And sometimes it would have looked. like that, which is just old. It just looked old.

He could still throw the ball real hard, as we saw in his bomb at the end of the Cincinnati game, but his mobility is playmaking. Those things are gone. And every time they're in third and long, they were just thrown at five yards underneath so he wouldn't get killed by Micah Parsons. And that's what it would have been for the Vikings. The Vikings would probably be four and three instead of three and four. And we would have said they're not good enough to win a championship.

So it's likely better off that they're just going to have J.J. McCarthy play. than had they gone to Aaron Rogers. I also have to say, this is so unrelated, those Steelers uniforms were Fugly. I'm sorry. Who designed those and do they have eyeballs? Because what was that? You're going to have to check for your future broadcasting career

with the FCC if Fugly is allowed. I mean, yeah, it's a throwback, but not, I don't know. No one asked for that. Right, yeah, just the Pittsburgh Steelers. There are how many franchises would you say maybe five or six that should just never, ever mess with their uniforms ever, the Dallas Cowboys, the San Francisco 49ers, the Las Vegas Raiders, and I would put the Pittsburgh Steelers and Green Bay Packers under that category. The Packers ones were fine, I guess, but the Steelers, don't throw me back to that.

Don't throw me back to anything. Just stick with what you have had forever. I mean, when did they play with? What's this a throwback to 1902? What are we doing here? That was rough. No more were we in. Like what are we doing?

Yeah. I just had to put that out there. It was sitting heavy on my chest. Anyways, to wrap this up, I'd love to tie this back to my hometown of Nashville, Tennessee. So Cam Ward was speaking to the Tennessee media and his post game presser and said, hey, I have a challenge for you because you guys always criticized the quarterbacks. I'm going to show you how hard it is to remember a play.

call. So I'm going to say one and you're going to say back to me. Okay. No one in the audience could do it. So I want to see if you can do this. Okay. Okay. Okay. Where did this play call come from? What is this play call? Play call was used by the New Orleans Saints with Drew Breeze and Sean Peyton. Okay. Okay. Okay. A little bit of a throwback, but not as far as those uniforms. Okay. All right. I'm going to say it once. That's it. Okay. Hop to gun king, trips right, tear 52, sway all go, special X shallow cross H wide. Okay. So you've got let me think of what that would be it's probably two play calls and the first one is it's out of the shotgun you said so uh i missed what the first word was but it was gun gun king right and you said

the formation would have been trips right tear 52 i think that's the first no tear 52 sway is the is the first play because usually what happens is they give two plays and then they kill to a second play so that was the first play the second play was all go yeah ex shallow and x shallow cross and something wide so wow am i close that let me oh okay so it was it was gun king trips right it was the formation then tear 52 sway you said and then all go special x shallow and something wide. I forget what word you said wide. Cross H wide.

Cross H wide. Okay. Wow. Everybody in the chat, give it up for Matthew because that was quite impressive and I would challenge you to do that because there's definitely no way.

Well, so I don't know exactly what that play is, but this is how you chunk the things when you have to remember them. It's like, as you were saying, and I'm like, okay, we got the formation first. I knew that that would be the thing first. So then the first play is probably three words. And then the second play would be like three or four

more words. So yeah, not bad, not bad. I'm impressed. I'm impressed. You get to keep your media credentials. That should be the test every year. Yeah, yeah. Well, I think that what would be better is like understanding what the play is and how it works. I mean, all go is not hard to figure out and age shallow or whatever, H cross and shallow. Those are just two routes. So probably understanding things like that is harder than memorization. But, yeah, that's fun. that's fun and no it's not it's not easy you hey look if it was easy to play quarterback at the NFL a lot people would be better at it it is so so hard full respect because that's just one and they have to have 200 right just right there but they give you a long time to prepare for the

test they start in OTAs so you know after that but that's why veteran quarterbacks are able to do it because they've heard this language so many times so then it's like oh I can't believe Joe Flacco showed up and played a game it's like this guy's heard this so many times it's no different than learning music where you learn music theory and different stuff. If I say stuff about music theory to people who don't know music, it's going to sound like gibberish. But you know, you learn the language just like anything else. But great, great stuff. And my best to Cam Ward, it's not going to get better. It's only going to get worse, my friend. But hang tight. Don't lose your mind. Keep that sense of humor, Cam Ward, because

it's only going more sideways. Not going sideways for you, though. Maggie Robinson, love this segment, always get great feedback from fans on it. So great stuff today. We could even say that you slayed the segment. Yes. Very well done. Thank you for your time. Thank you so much.

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