Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Looking for the Vikings' path back into contention

Episode Date: October 6, 2021

Matthew Coller and Sam Ekstrom discuss whether they can see a way for the Vikings to fix the issues that have led them to being 1-3 and find a path back to contention. Sam suggests a lineup change to include Everson Griffen, Cam Dantzler and Christian Darrisaw but the reality lingers that the Vikings have gotten a lot of good performances that haven't been enough. They discuss whether it's time for Kirk Cousins to unleash the deep ball and talk about whether the Vikings should trade him if they fall to 1-4 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

I want to remind you before we get started, the TickPick is the exclusive ticketing partner of Purple Insider and the Blue Wire Network. TickPick should be your first choice to buy football tickets because they save fans money by never charging service fees ever. Hey everybody. Welcome into another Purple Insider. Bring me the news live stream. Matthew Collar, Sam Ekstrom here. If you are just finding us, make sure you go listen to our podcast. It's daily. Wherever you find your podcast, just type in Purple Insider and read our written work, purpleinsider.substack.com. Sam, it has been an interesting couple of days following the Minnesota Vikings' loss to the Cleveland Browns. What I've seen is a lot of people who are tired and exhausted of this.

I've seen some people who are saying, ah, but they've had a difficult schedule. We've heard Mike Zimmer saying we're actually a good football team. How are you feeling as now that you've had time to reflect on what happened on Sunday and where the Vikings stand at one and three? Well, let me just pose a question to those that want to point to the close losses as justification for why this team is actually good. Do you want to be the 2013 Vikings? Because they also had a lot of close losses. Their first game of the season, pardon me, second game of the season, they lost by a point on the last play or second to last play of the game. The third game of

the season, last time they played the Browns, in fact, they lost on a last minute touchdown. They had other games that season where they lost on last second field goals and they had games that went to overtime and they were a five win team. Now, I think people don't look back eight years later and say, hey, you know what? The 2013 Vikings, they were pretty good. No, you don't look back eight years later and say, hey, you know what? The 2013 Vikings, they were pretty good. No, you don't say that because they only won five games. The 2021 Vikings are off to that type of start. And I find it interesting that Mike Zimmer is really staking his reputation here on this.

And Henry Lake pointed this out yesterday when we did the live stream on CCO, that he is saying this team is good. Okay, well, what if they end up losing a lot of games? I mean, then it falls back right on him. He's shouldering a lot of this responsibility by being so vocal about how good they are. And he might be right. He might see wonderful things in practice. I mean, he might think the talent he has on offense is, you know, superior to what he's had before. He might think the veterans are really good on defense, but if you don't win, if you constantly lose close games, then you're not ever going to get the benefit of the doubt in that situation. So now that we're heading into the teeth of the schedule, starting on Halloween,

a couple more games to ramp up before that, that the Vikings absolutely have to win as you've written about. But then it's kind of, it's time for Zimmer to, to show us what he's talking about with this team. And if he doesn't, then I think he there's a lot at stake for him, for this organization.

Cards are kind of on the table right now. So I dug up something interesting from last year. The Vikings lost 27-26 to the Seattle Seahawks, you recall. Russell Wilson drove down the field in the last second, throws a touchdown to DK Metcalf. And here is a quote from Adam Thielen following that game. This is 2020. This is not the other day.

He says, the message in the locker room is we can be a dang good football team. We saw it tonight. We saw it the last couple of weeks. We just have to finish one more play. You can go back and look at situations and wish you woulda, coulda, shoulda, but one more play, one more yard, one more stop, things like that. That could have been said by Adam Thielen against Cleveland, against Arizona, and against Cincinnati. But the reality of those games is you don't get bonus points for getting close in the NFL. And also there are plenty of opportunities in those games to win. And it also

doesn't matter. And you don't get bonus points. If Arizona turns out to be the best team in the NFL, you don't go back and say, well, we only lost on a field goal to the best team in the NFL. Congratulations. Do you get 0.3 points in the standings? That's not how any of this works. And so I guess when you're trying to also project forward and you're trying to say maybe that they're better than their record, so they'll be better going down the road. I guess my question is, well, you got down two scores to Cincinnati. You got down two scores to Seattle early in that game and then had to dominate the second half to keep Russell Wilson off the field. Seattle was a good win, no question.

But you got up in the Arizona game and then you blew a two score lead in that game. And then against Cleveland could not move the football at all against the team with a defensive line that was very good. So in every one of those games, there were many more opportunities to win them. And yet the weaknesses of this team showed up in spades. All the things that we talked about during training camp that were concerning, they showed up when it mattered. I mean, the kicker, we weren't sure if Greg Joseph was the guy and then he misses a field goal. We weren't sure if Rashad Hill at left tackle was something that could stand up against a very good pass rusher. Against Seattle, it's fine, but not against Cleveland. And I thought there was something really damning too that Mike Zimmer

said that also points you toward the quarterback and whether he can turn things around and be consistent enough and be good enough. And Mike Zimmer said about the game against the Browns, well, we couldn't run the ball. So we were in a lot of third down situations where the other team could pass rush. Welcome to the national football league, Mike. I mean, this is the thing about if your offense can only succeed when it's second and short or first and 10, and you can run play action or you can run or pass it. If it can only succeed when everything is ideal, then you're probably a 500 football team, Sam. I mean, that's just what you are. And I did some research last night.

Teams that start three and three, by the way, and the Vikings would have to go a long way to start three and three. Teams that start three and three miss the playoffs like 75% of the time. And you know what their average record is? It's eight and eight. Like this league actually shows you who teams are very early in a lot of seasons. of the time and you know what their average record is it's eight and eight like this this

league actually shows you who teams are very early in a lot of seasons and you're not the Kansas City Chiefs you don't have Patrick Mahomes so if you fall behind in the standings there's no belief that you can come back so I know that the title of this thing is how they can get back in the race and how they can save their season and we we'll get to that. But I think that there is no use in my mind in looking back and saying, well, they only this, they only that they had a tough schedule. Football outsiders thinks they're DVOA. Is this, that, and the other thing, who cares? I mean, just none of this is meaningful at all when you've had opportunities to win and your weaknesses are not really all that solvable though we will talk about some

changes that they can make going forward yeah a lot of people are tweeting about the point differential being positive they're the only team in medical history that's one and three with a plus point differential and two two or less turnovers put a banner up man pointing to the the project like projected win loss might work in MLB when you have 162 games, might work in NBA when you have 82 games for things to level out, doesn't work in the NFL. If you lose two games early that you shouldn't lose, it's hard to make that up. I mean, that's the difference between 10-7 and 8-9, and that could very well be these Vikings this year. It could be worse than 8-9 with this projected schedule coming up. But you look at some of these losses, too.

They haven't played a complete game yet. Now they can point towards, well, we're going to figure it out. We're going to get all three units playing complementary football. But they work so independently of each other. Like I've never really bought in to the idea of complimentary football that, okay, like, you know, that's something we can learn to get the offense playing well and the defense playing well at the same time.

I just think you have what you have. You have an offense that is very good when the running game is able to prop up the quarterback a little bit and the offensive line can get moving forward and run blocking and not have to pass protect 50 times a game. You've got a defense that is still figuring things out and is going to make some good plays, going to have some lapses. They've got some weak links and they're still learning about who these players are. I think those units just are what they are. They're going to be prone to volatility, and you're going to have most weeks one of them working, one of them not working, special teams, crapshoot.

It's going to be rare that you put all three pieces together. Like in 2017, I think you just had a really good defense. You had really good special teams, and you had an offense that didn't shoot itself in the foot. This is not that team. This is certainly not, you know, at the defensive level we've seen in the past, even though they only allowed 14 points in that game, they still had some issues there too. So I don't know if there are any people on white horses that are going to like come in on chariots to save this thing.

But as you alluded to a couple of changes, a couple of tweaks that can be made to this lineup. I don't know if it's enough, though, to carry you through the rest of this season and into this gauntlet. And this is one of the issues with trying to find the path, which is normally how my brain works. Like, all right, let's think about the scenario in which they could get themselves back into the race and make this a really good season. And it's not impossible, of course, but think about who's playing well right now. Daniil Hunter is playing extremely well. You could not ask anything more of Daniil Hunter for the first four games. Justin Jefferson was not perfect in the first two games, but mostly I'd still give him a B plus. He's been great. Adam Thielen has been fine. Again, not great against the Browns, but overall Adam Thielen has been good. Delvin Cook is banged up.

That probably isn't going anywhere, which by the way, when we brought up last year, when they signed him to a contract extension, that the risk you take when you hand it off to Delvin Cook 300 times and throw it to him another 50 times, the risk you take is injuries. And here we are with Delvin Cook banged up in two weeks in a row. He has not been able to contribute a whole lot because of that. So anyway, that aside, but think about, you know, Brian O'Neill has been really good. I think Harrison Smith has been fine. Patrick Peterson has been fine. Eric Hendricks maybe had a tough day against the Browns, but overall is a terrific football player. Delvin Tomlinson and Michael Pierce, neither one has set the world on fire. Neither one ever set the world on fire in the NFL. They're good, solid football players who

can help a good team, but neither one of them is Aaron Donald, who's going to change the fate of your franchise. My point is that for the most part, and of course, Kirk Cousins, aside from Cleveland, has played extremely well in three out of four football games. So you've gotten the players that are your best guys who are supposed to drive your success to play very good football through four games for the most part, the key players that you have, and you still came up one in three. You have not lost any key players to injury aside from Irv Smith and then Delvin Cook missed one game. But aside from that, you haven't lost key players to injury. That's usually a cause for things slipping. Think about this.

The offensive line, aside from Christian Derusaw who we know nothing about has been 100 healthy that doesn't happen very often in the NFL so even though they want to say that there's a lot of bad breaks that have caused this I don't think that bad breaks have really happened to them especially in injury form uh Anthony Barr but Nick Vigil's been fine filling in his spot as we kind of expected Nick Vigil would be. And that makes it even tougher because you're not saying, well, look, it's been a tough start for Kirk, but he'll get it together like he did last year. Like you knew that Kirk Cousins was not going to lead the NFL in picks last year when they were one in five. So you figured the regression would happen and he

would get going at some point, but he's been going until this last game where he was pressured an outrageous amount. And so we haven't even really seen the downturn of Kirk Cousins, except for that Browns game. And if there's a bad game that just is one of those, what happened there, Kirk, against the Lions or Carolina, your season is basically over. And then we're talking about, all right, who's sticking around and what do they do? Like, are they moving coaches? Are they trading players? What are they doing here? And I've got a very interesting scenario, I think, to throw at you later in the show. But as we look for that path, one of the issues is that the path sort of rests on players that I'm not even sure really have the capability to raise the level of play over the bar that they

need to be to go on a big run. And that's where I get caught up on the odds of this happening, of turning around and having a great season. It just seems improbable to me because, and I want you to talk about your piece, because I agreed with everything you wrote today at the website, but I also thought, does this, is this going to change stuff? Is this going to, is this going to make them go on a magic carpet ride? I don't know. Yeah, I think you're right to be skeptical because when there's 22 starters, it's so hard to get a positive, like tangible impact from any one of those players. The war, the baseball stat in football, it's very low for individuals. It's hard to have one guy come in.

But on the other hand, you look at how Bashad Breeland cost them and has given up four touchdowns this year. If you replace him with Cameron Dantzler, who was great against Cleveland, maybe there's some tangible gain there. The Everson Griffin for DJ Wanham move that I suggested, it's not like the be-all end-all because Griffin is still playing. It's probably just giving Griffin another 20 snaps a game and then subtracting those from Wanham.

Maybe that turns into, you know, another three pressures and a sack. It's not going to be that enormous. I think the move that probably has the greatest upside and also maybe the greatest risk would be Derrissaw, who we know nothing about, as you said. So it's hard for us to say, yes, he's so much better than Rashad Hill, because like with Griffin and Dantzler, we've seen them be good. It's an obvious move. With Derrissaw, we have no clue. All we know is Rashad Hill has been bad. Even in the Seattle game, he didn't grade well. He was horrible against the Browns, 10 pressures allowed. I went through and I looked at all 15

years of PFF data on rookie tackles, and none of them have ever performed worse than Rashad Hill is performing right now. So could it get worse by playing Derrissaw? Probably not. Could it get much better? Yes, if the stars align. And the team probably knows where he's at. They've said forever that it's going to be a long process

because his health might be good, but his football IQ is still getting there. He doesn't have a lot of scheme knowledge right now. So if he can get there and be an improvement on Rashad Hill, I think he could be an improvement by a substantial margin. If by some chance he comes in and performs like Brian O'Neill did as a rookie, that is a huge, huge uplift for that offensive line. So I think that's a move that you try to make if you want maximum results. And there's no need to play it cautiously when you're one and three.

I mean, you need results soon. Do you think about sometimes, because I do, the bets that this team has made and how they've just gotten them wrong in so many occasions? And what I mean is making the bet of having Rashad Hill start at left tackle and not trying Ezra Cleveland at any point at left tackle. So they made the bet that Ezra Cleveland is a guard and left no doors open for any other result. And Ezra Cleveland has not been a good guard. So far, his results through four games are poor. His results last year were poor, and yet they're sticking with that. And so then they made the bet that they could draft a replacement left tackle. And then Kirsten

Derisaw gets hurt and he's not ready to play. So then they're forced to have Rashad Hill start. Think about on the defensive line. They made a bet that DJ Wanham would be fine as their defensive end. In fact, even if you go back and think about Yannick Ngakwe and how well he's played for the Raiders this year,

there's like a long form 30 for 30 on what happened with Yannick Ngakwe and the Vikings. Because that guy has consistently pressured the quarterback, including when he was a Viking, he had five sacks. And yet they just couldn't get rid of him fast enough because they thought DJ Wanham was the answer. So then they bring in Everson Griffin and Steven Weatherly and Everson Griffin is immediately far better than DJ Wanham. So they made that bet that like, oh, this, this guy will be fine. They made bets on a lot of the free agents, which are still up in the air. Some have worked and some have not,

but they drafted a lot of guys in the third round, the fourth round, the fifth round in terms of defensive linemen that have not played out very well. Armand Watts got dominated again in the run game. And I guess I think about how the first iteration of Zimmer Spielman made a lot of bets and had a lot of them pay off. The, the free agents that they signed, they made a bet that Linval Joseph was better than he was in New York. And oh my gosh, he was. And you know, that Terrence Newman could play nickel corner in 2017 and then it worked and that they could bring in Joe Berger, a veteran, you know, sort of backup and have him play well.

And he did and start a rookie Pat Elfline in 2017 and it worked and he did. And that I think that is sort of definitive of the second half of the Zimmer-Spielman regime is just how many times they've said, no, this is going to work, guys. This is going to work guys. This is going to work. And it really hasn't. And so now they're having to scramble to fix these things and whether they, I think that they will follow you along. Um, but well, I mean, even Breland of like, we'll just sign this corner for 2 million bucks and he'll be a starting outside corner to be fine. When the whole league looked at him and said, I don't know, I don't think so.

Right. I mean, so I guess, uh, that's, that's what I'm thinking about here is just that the bets that they've made have not paid in these first four weeks. And so they either have to make all the adjustments that you said, and I think that they will, or they're going to keep doubling down on bets that haven't paid. Yeah. I think that the ladder is the real incrimination. It's not making the bets, making the bets on low cost veterans is fine. I think that was an approach that we endorsed. I think it's the stubbornness of sticking with those bets. Um, last year it was Dakota Dozier. We're like, why, why are you sticking with this when it's clearly not working? And this year, you could say the same.

Who knows how long Breland is going to wind up being a starter on this team? I think that there was a cause to bench him for this upcoming game, and then Dantzler goes on the COVID-19 list. So it could be Breland again in week five, and then who knows after that. But again, on the offensive line, you don't really have recourse to put Cleveland at tackle. You just don't have good tackle depth at all on this team. And they've always kind of had been in that situation where they don't have a lot of options. They will never bench players

for performance on this offensive line. I mean, find me an example of where that happened. It's always injury related, but it's never performance related, which has always been mystifying to me. So it's sort of like, you've got your, your roulette number, right? You're like, okay, it's on eight and you just keep spinning the wheel and it's not eight, but you say, we're sticking with it. Darn it. I mean, we've got a one in 30 chance here. We're going to hit it eventually. And the wheel just has not been 1-30 chance here. We're going to hit it eventually. And the wheel just has not been kind to the Minnesota Vikings. And I think you've got a couple examples on this roster right now. Folks, Minnesota football is back,

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Like, how do they have to play football for them to get back into this? How do they have to play football differently and are they capable into this? How do they have to play football differently? And are they capable of it? And this is where I hit a roadblock, Sam. It's like, well, they've mostly been who we thought they were going to be. We didn't necessarily think they were going to be one in three. But if I told you, what if I told you, Sam, that the Minnesota Vikings would struggle against the defensive line that was good. And like that was expected.

It was expected that the offensive line would not be perfect, even if they are average now, and maybe even a little below average after what we saw against Cleveland. But even if they're just okay, like we never thought they were going to be game changing. Cleveland has a game changing offensive line. Those guys can plow people and they gave Baker time to throw, even though he decided he didn't want to throw to his receivers more over them. But those guys, they changed the game. But the Vikings defensive line, sort of the same way they have a game changer. They don't have five game changers or four game changers, like teams with elite defensive lines, even the secondary. It's like Patrick Peterson doesn't have three picks or something in these games it's not like he's just shutting down the opposing team's

best wide receiver like Xavier Rhodes in 2017 and I don't expect him to at any point and Harrison Smith has not played like an MVP he's just been a good safety out there and I don't expect him to anymore I don't expect him to play that way and so I guess I think like well who needs to play better what scheme needs to happen which I think that Clint Kubiak had a terrific scheme through the first couple of weeks and probably did last week and it just got blown up by defensive linemen like that's where as we look for that path I have trouble saying if only only X, Y, and Z come together, then you can go on a four or five game streak where you win four out of five, five out of six,

something like that. Because last year they had that easy schedule and this year they don't. So what needs to happen here? Do you have ideas, Sam? It's hard to figure out what this team is really good at because you want to play to your strengths um I think they were hoping for their defensive line to be the ace in a hole with the run stopping and I'm writing about that for tomorrow morning it has not been the ace in the hole I mean other opposing offenses are running on them every game 100 plus yards in each game. They're eighth worst in yards allowed. They're fifth worst in yards per attempt.

So you're learning that, all right, these two big bodies that tackle aren't really doing a whole lot better than Jaleel Johnson, Shamar Stephan. And that's alarming. I mean, it should not be that way. And oddly, that's happening while Pierce and Tomlinson are playing fine. Like Tomlinson is very highly graded. Pierce has been, I think, decently impactful when he's in there, but that's the problem is they are more or less, and Pierce especially, they're sub package players. They're in there on rundowns, but this is a passing league. They can't always be in there to snuff the run out. And also, it's still incumbent on your linebackers to make tackles, which they didn bad situations. That hasn't been the case. You know, without Barr, their linebackers aren't quite as deep. Their secondary has flaws. Their run game, I think, is probably the best thing they do,

but Dalvin Cook's banged up. So that takes that down a notch. Their receivers are good, but they still have limitations with this quarterback. I mean, I don't think you can say it's a really good passing game. Kansas City has a really good passing game. The Packers have a really good passing game because their quarterbacks are elite. This is an above average passing game. I don't think it's explosive. It has not been a downfield threat at all, even though that was a big emphasis this offseason. So you hear me talking in circles. There's not really a huge strength of this team. They do a lot of things. Okay. Few things pretty well, few things below average. It screams 500. Um, and do I want to endorse like running the ball more because you're good at it?

No, I just think that's bad football strategy. Like the thing that they're best at is the thing that's also the most inefficient. I think you do need to try to lean on those receivers more. We've seen what KJ Osborne can do, and he's been good enough that I think it's beginning to change this team's philosophy. Now for four games, they've been more 11 personnel than we ever saw last year. Chris Herndon barely has a role. This is not a two tight end offense anymore. So if they lean into those three wide receivers, that might be their best approach to try to outscore teams instead of the plotting rushing attack, which they usually stick with too long when it's not working as they did against Cleveland. So I think this is the only answer.

The only answer is that when you and I are sitting up there in the press box, we're looking down what we can see. That's really honestly very cool. And anybody who's sat up in the way up high knows this, that when the ball goes up on a deep pass, you look and you see where, like, where's going, who's the receiver. And you sort of, you know, like, where like where's going who's the receiver and you sort of you know like oh where's it headed and when it's headed toward Adam Thielen or Justin Jefferson

what automatically I think is he's going to catch it and it was exactly this way with Stefan Diggs where you'd look and you'd see the ball traveling in the air and you'd see them gaining that last second separation or positioning their bodies just so they can get that little edge to let it uh Thielen is terrific in this like let it drop right in over their shoulder or Jefferson can rise up over a guy and grab the ball I mean these are amazing wide receivers uh and I like the fact that they had a quick game through the first three weeks uh but I think the answer is probably more that you have to hope that variance strikes your way on deep balls and pushing the ball down the field because the quick game still got blown up by the Cleveland Browns good defense and if even if it's going to work against Seattle but it's not going

to work against the good team in Cleveland. Well, you're facing enough good teams the rest of the way. I've run through them enough times, but like, there's a lot of good defenses that you're going to face the rest of the way. So it's not always going to work. A quick game is great. It certainly is. And play action game is great and all those things. And, you know, having those little routes that come underneath for easy completions for eight yards and stuff like that on play actions, those are all good. But I think that ramping up deep shots and what Tom Brady has really shown us over the last few years is that you can get the ball out quickly on deep shots. Like you don't have to stand there, stand there, stand there, stand there. These guys are fast enough. They get down the field. Like in a way you almost have to play like

Jameis Winston type of football where you're saying my guy or your guy's going to go get it. I'm going to throw it up and push it down the field. And I'm going to hope that something amazing happens. And I don't mean do this every time, but they haven't been able to do this almost at all this season. How many deep shots have we seen? I mean, I can't think of any that have connected so far. I think that what kept them sort of in the game last year and definitely what kept them in games in 2019 was pushing it down the field. And so I applaud the quick game

and I'm not saying get rid of it, especially if you're up in a game. It's great to have. But if you're going to sort of outperform the talent that you have which is what they have to do the rest of the way if they go eight and five think about an eight and five rest of the way that still leaves you with nine and eight if you go eight and five the rest of the way that's a good second half of a season or a good portion of a season so you you have to go you have to go nine and four you have you have to go

ten ten and three to be a good team am i doing this math right yeah right ten and three like that's what you have to be to be a good team how are you going to do that uh it's probably not by running and getting you know four yards and then throwing a quick pass or screen like i i don't think that's the way you're going to do it. And you really do have to outscore teams because the defense is not going to be number one in the league. They have been healthy, mostly on defense. If they get a couple of injuries, I mean, you know, the whole thing can fall apart just like it did last year. So that's, that's my only answer. My only answer is to start, go back to Gary style and to start pushing it down the field, especially if your offense is

struggling or you get, you know, down in games. And then it might give you a chance to get hot and put up a bunch of points over a section of time to get you back in the season. Yeah. I was a little saddened when I heard Zimmer kind of regretting the deep shot that Kurt took on the interception. He said, Oh, we got a little impatient and we, you know, we tried to make a big play. I love the shot. I mean, it was intercepted, but it was like a 60 yard punt. In essence, it wasn't that harmful. You got the ball right back from it. That was the first time all year where I've seen Kirk throw it as far as he can. And I hate to say it. This is where they miss digs because the one thing that digs was unbelievable at was adjusting to deep balls I mean he could track a ball like no one I've ever seen not quite what

we've seen from Jefferson who is incredible intermediate he's great after the catch um he runs great routes he's maybe not quite the vertical threat of Diggs. That's okay. He can still be a phenomenal player. But I don't know if they have the speed guy to do that incredibly well, like a Tyree kill. But I think you're right. You've got to do more of it. You can't have these 10, 15 play drives. I know Mike Zimmer.

They wear the defense down. They take time off the clock, but I think Mike would also admit that you can't always survive with those long, drawn-iak. And I'm kind of curious your thoughts too on what's happening to this offense later in games. We haven't seen a touchdown now in three consecutive second halves. You were very complimentary of his opening game scripts. And I wonder what's changing later in these games. Do you have any thoughts on that?

Yeah, and it almost reminded me of John DiFilippo where the first couple of games in 2018, I was like, wow, they got themselves an offensive coordinator. I mean, remember the Green Bay game, they put up like 420 yards passing. They converted on big downs. It's like, wow. And then they come out against Buffalo and have the doors blown off. And by the end of the season, they're putting up seven points in New England or whatever and struggling. It sort of felt that way against the Browns. But

the second halves of games, yeah, you get off the game script is one of them. But I also think that it's maybe just played out sort of the way the games have worked. Like in Cincinnati, they did play for behind and they were able to score and move the football in the second half. And then let's see in Arizona, they were up in the game and sort of played more conservative at times than they should have, including when they ran a few times to set up a long field goal at the end of the half, which was just totally confounding. Right.

And maybe that's part of it too. And the run game started to get shut down against Seattle. I thought that the offense moved the ball. Great. They just didn't put it in the end zone at the end. So I would say that they were still good there. And then in this game, outside of one drive, there was just nothing there. So I don't know if it was a second half thing or it was just, there was nothing there. But I do think that something that is going to be problematic forever. And, and this is where you end up with this feeling of resignation about this team that I'm sensing from a lot of people is that you know Cleveland also mixed up their coverages a lot

and that is something that consistently gets this team off of what they're doing is when they show show one thing change to another thing even after the game Justin Jefferson was like yeah they kind of showed a lot of different stuff and there's a coach on Twitter that I follow who was talking about some of the things that Cleveland was doing to throw off Kirk Cousins reads. And that's where, that's where it gets tough because when Case Keenum was thrown off and I'm not meaning to say he was a better quarterback than Cousins, not not by any means but it felt like he would just throw it up to somebody like i don't know what to do so digs just do something double coverage i don't care and this is where i agree with you on that deep shot it's like well let's just take a shot because nothing's working so throw it down the field

you get a pass interference you get a great play they did it last night in the raiders game when the raiders were trying to come back they just threw it it up to Henry Ruggs and he got an edge on a guy and nearly turned around that game if they hadn't kind of fallen apart on that drive. But if you don't, this would be the thing for a rookie play caller and rookie offensive coordinator. Like, do you have answers to the things that the best that this are doing against you and against Cleveland. It wasn't just the D line plowing over Rashad Hill. That was certainly helpful. But when you can't find where you're supposed to go with the football, when you don't have the answers, when you don't have whatever adjustment or counterpunch, you end up scoring zero points

in the second half. And that's how I felt about this. And, you know, I am still impressed overall with what Clint Kubiak has done to start the season. And I think he's got a good plan, but yeah, I mean, that might be part of it. And if you're going forward, this is, this is the thing about the number of things that need to align. Remember we did our math equation early in the season. Like you need this, this, this, this, and this, and what are the odds of each one of those things? And the odds that you know cousins can overcome more pressure that's on its way that Kubiak can overcome the second half issues by dialing up something or figuring out a counter punch to when teams adjust their coverages

the the only answer I have is just the guys who can save this season are Adam Thielen and Justin Jefferson and I don't know if it's anybody else. KJ Osborne, man. You can't leave that out. I will say his catch against Cleveland was phenomenal. KJ Osborne deserves credit for sure. I did think in a game like that, though, maybe they missed Irv Smith a little. Oh, yeah, certainly.

Well, I mean, if not for the receiving, for the blocking as well. I mean, this is where the three wide receiver offense can be a burden too, is when you don't have as much help to put on that offensive line where your number two guy is Ben Ellefson right now, and he has zero catches. That's where we're at. DeeDee Westbrook has one catch on the year. He's not doing much either.

So you do still kind of have to rely on the big guns, the Jeffersons, the Thelans, and in my opinion, the Osbournes. But just to add on to what you were saying about Keenum, who is willing to take those shots, and they more than often worked out with him. Cousins, if he encounters something confusing, if he can't read a defense, what's his instinct? Turtle. Hold the ball. Throw it away, maybe. Maybe try to escape and still get sacked. Usually he doesn't give his receivers that shot. And I think that's a Zimmer influence a little bit. He didn't like the Keenum shots either,

and he certainly doesn't like the Cousins' carelessness. So that could be a product of the system and the head coach, but he's not a quarterback who's going to make something out of nothing. And in fact, against Cleveland, you could tell he was feeling the ghosts. He felt some pressure and then it got in his head and he started getting more hesitant with those second and third reads because that clock was going off in his head. And that's a cousin's problem that is going to pop up whenever the offensive line struggles the way it did. And that's where that feeling of resignation for fans comes in,

where it's like, you know, I think that there, I think that there's fringe people who always are going to yell at each other on every side of everything, right? Whether it's political or food on Twitter or Kirk cousins. But if you were 90% of the fan base, I think wants him to succeed, of course, and thinks that he's really good, but also knows exactly what it looks like when it's going to be a problem. And that is exactly what Cleveland was. It was like, Oh, they have, they have the kryptonite. They have the answers for cousins, and this is going to be a really long day. And they're going to need a pick six, a punt return for touchdown, a something, something, something that's going to get them a win

because the quarterback's not going to be able to carry you. And I was thinking about this as I was watching Justin Herbert last night versus Derek Carr because it felt like this is the future and this is the past. And I think Derek Carr is good. I mean, just like I think that Jimmy Garoppolo and Jared Goff and Kirk Cousins are all good quarterbacks because you know what? Seem bad quarterbacks. Nick Mullins, for example, you just lose games. But I was thinking about the teams that are succeeding right now and let's just go through them. Buffalo, they drafted a quarterback who has a monster arm and who is on his rookie contract

and can run. Okay. They're three in one. The Chargers, monster quarterback, huge arm, rookie contract, three in one. Denver has a very cheap quarterback and Teddy Bridgewater, three in one. Vegas, they have a Kirk Cousins-like quarterback, so they're three in one. Cincinnati, rookie quarterback contract. Baltimore, rookie quarterback contract. Cleveland, rookie quarterback contract. They're all three in one. Let me go over to the NFC and I'm sorry, this is tedious. Dak Prescott is the opposite here. He's got his big contract, but he can run and he's mobile. So then Arizona, rookie quarterback contract, LA Rams, Matt Stafford, little different. We'll see if they continue to be good. Green Bay, all time great quarterback.

So that's just totally different. Carolina has a cheap quarterback in Sam Darnold. Tampa Bay has an all-time great quarterback. So those are your best teams. So what you have is this very clear separation. I counted one team and it was only Vegas that is similar to what the Vikings have here that is actually good. And this leads me to my question for you, Sam. If the Vikings lose one of the next two games, would you try to trade Kirk Cousins at the deadline? Is the deadline during the bye, like last year? I think it's at week eight. Okay. Or maybe it is week six, but either way, it's a week eight okay or maybe it maybe it is week six but uh either way it's a it's somewhere in there i mean are you giving up your second round pick with it like what's the what's

the uh the selling point to whoever's who you giving him to okay let me make a case here okay because because my my take would be sure but who wants him okay the miami dolphins have no answers at quarterback none whatsoever they are one in three with a team with high expectations tua is bad and hurt as much as i liked him coming out of college he's just been not good and he's hurt and he was hurt in college so that might be they're playing jacoby brissett with a good team every other team in that division is one and three. They might believe that they can turn it around and get in the playoffs and then sign Cousins to a contract extension.

Remember, Miami was in on Deshaun Watson, but so is the FBI. So you can't really do that. That is the other team, by the way, the Houston Texans. And I don't know what the cap implications are, but if you traded cousins to Houston, they would have their quarterback. Maybe going forward, you could sign him to a contract extension. How about this team? The Pittsburgh Steelers, the one in three, they're struggling. Joe Nelson tells me the deadline is November 2nd. So after the Dallas

game, but you can do it at the deadline. Like they did on Gawkway last year. How about the Indianapolis Colts? Their quarterback is bad and hurt. They're one in three, but they can still get back into the playoff race. There are enough of these teams that make me think is, is somebody interested? Could somebody, and you never know who's going to get hurt in between. And those are AFC teams too. So I don't know. I mean, I guess it just ran through my mind. We've talked so much about the coach and the general manager, but where they stand with Cousins, if you go to one and five, I mean, what's the point in sticking around if you could get anyone to take him?

I mean, at that point, you should know that you're drafting a quarterback very high next year. Like as we've talked about many times in many circumstances there are things that this team like could do and should do that we know they won't do and i think this probably falls into that with this regime now if the regime like if zimmer is fired and spielman is left to pick up the pieces and it's clear that the team is in fire sale mode maybe he makes some calls i still don't know like who's going to accept that contract although the implication is is that the

vikings are bad but cousins has still like put at least three good games on film and maybe he adds a fourth or fifth and they still lose um so some there could be a team intrigued by that. But what did you just lay out? You don't want to have the burdensome contract, especially you don't want to have a burdensome contract of a Kirk Cousins type. So you go into next year, whoever this trading team is, and you still have that burden. I think that that's a pretty big reason not to make the trade. I love the talker, though. I think we should write it out. I think we should talk more about it. I just don't think it's going to happen. Has there been a high profile quarterback traded at the deadline in recent

memory? Do you have any, any comps? The only one I could think of was a very different situation. That was Carson Palmer being traded to uh the cincinnati bangles or i'm sorry from the cincinnati bangles to the oakland raiders at the time that and he didn't save their season but that was one of those like uh situations where carson palmer was going to hold out he wasn't going to play so they had to trade him and then they traded him mid-season so no it would be very rare and it would be difficult to figure out the cap implications of how in the world you would do that. And I haven't researched the details yet. I will,

if they lose this next game, I suppose, but it just made me think like, if you know the answers to the test already, which I think they do after this week, if they lose, then you know, the answers, the answers are you ain't making the playoffs if you lose this next game and you go to one four you can't beat the own four lines you're not making the playoffs there's no magical run coming um and there's also if you are one and four to start the season there's no reason to keep this quarterback it i mean ultimately i was listening to rex ryan talk the other day and this may may be Rex's saltiness from his time in New York and Buffalo where he never had a quarterback.

But Rex Ryan was saying, look, where things are now, it's your quarterback. I mean, you can defense some weeks. In an individual Super Bowl, for example, you can defense. You can win that one game. But ultimately, what your franchise is comes down to how good your quarterback is. 12 games of Kellen Mond would be invaluable to this organization to know what they have. That would be enormous. Right. Why not?

And if Kellen Mond can't play, then you move on to the next guy. And if Kellen Mond looks great, then there you go. At least, and the other thing too is is at least it would give people something if you just go along the rest of the way and you go 6 and 11 or 7 and 10 and this is in the scenario that they lose this game against Detroit which I don't think they will I mean what kind of football is that to watch for people and I and I'm always thinking about this for just, you know, because the way that we do our jobs is very connected to the fan base.

And so I'm just thinking about the, how just tough that would be to just watch week after week, knowing you're out. It's like, maybe like watching the twins this year. Did anyone watch the second half of the season? Right? No.

So if you make a trade that puts then Kellen Mond to the starting position, at least things become interesting for the rest of the season right no so so if you make a trade that puts then kellen mond to the starting position at least things become interesting for the rest of the season yeah and you get it you probably still get a great draft pick i mean either either mond is great um which is encouraging for the future and you get a middle middling draft pick or he's awful you learn what you need and you get a great draft pick i'm liking this scenario more and more but they'll beat detroit they don't yeah they'll be true yeah they'll be to detroit what's your stat what's your stat again say you give it to us for the 10th time

against detroit kirk cousins six and oh against detroit 2024 and one against everybody else so there you go he will beat detroit there will be no kneecaps bitten uh at U.S. Bank Stadium I am certain of that but if we're wrong then it is then it is really on so thank you for your time Sam and all of you watching thank you for yours and reminder our podcast with lots of different guests rotating guests uh every different day Jeremiah Searles former Viking Sage Rosenfels was on the other day we had Chris Carter on the show as well. So feel free to pop in and listen. It's Purple Insider, wherever you get your podcasts, purpleinsider.substack.com. And we'll see if things get interesting one way or the other. If they make it a magical season, then we'll remember this conversation, how funny

it was. And if they don't, then there will be plenty more to discuss. Thanks for your time, Sam. Yep. Thanks, Collar. Thanks, everybody.