Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Minicamp is over, how do we feel about the Minnesota Vikings now?

Episode Date: June 9, 2022

Matthew Coller is joined by Judd Zulgad at TCO Performance Center to discuss the feeling surrounding the Minnesota Vikings following OTAs and minicamp. How quickly can the Vikings adapt to Kevin O'Connell's coaching? What do we think the relationship between O'Connell and Cousins is going to mean? What's the biggest way the Vikings can get an edge over past years? What stuck out at minicamp to make us think the team can be improved? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to another episode of Purple Inside with Matthewin here, along with Judd Zolgedd inside TCO Performance Center. Following the last practice of minicamp, now school is out for the summer, Zolgedd, and we wait for training camp. What is up, man? I hope you all have a great summer. Just like the players, like Kevin O'connell said i hope everybody out there really enjoys the next six weeks because after that it's going to be time to get down to work it is it is unique for us here i mean it has been quite a while in my life since i've covered a new coach and the same for you right with the football coach at least the other teams do change coaches relatively often but

at least from my perspective i left buffalo in 2015 i think that was year two or 2016 so that was going into year two of rex ryan rex ryan is the last time i've covered a new head coach and it's all kind of interesting to me because there's no scar tissue built up with the players or with us so it's like it's you know the the head coach previously in mike zimmer he would come out after a year whatever six or seven to be like yeah i know what you guys are gonna ask about this or that or whatever and you guys think this and you're wrong. And now so we have Kevin O'Connell, like you said, saying, have a nice summer, guys, and we'll see you later. Thanks for coming out.

Right. Thanks for coming out. Appreciate you guys being here. And while I do think that O'Connell is a much more cordial person, I also know the rigors of the NFL season will wear this man down like everybody else. But I wanted to ask you, I just thought it was appropriate timing of how much you're buying because you are a skeptical human being and I know you are. And, uh, I sometimes, uh, can lean that direction myself of all this, but you know, I also think that there was something that stuck out to me today that I

think this team is doing. That's very smart and it's not taking the players to top golf that's totally fine and i'm sure they had a great time but it's actually that patrick peterson said his body feels better than it usually does by the end of mini camp and i think that's true i think that mike zimmer and i know from watching had them playing much harder in these practices than Kevin O'Connell to where I've tried to do takeaways from practices and I can't really give you a whole lot because they're not really pushing it I think that's actually smart and I think they'll handle training camp smarter and from the sports science side I think they'll handle injuries smarter and if you look at the Rams one of their like low low key edges is that they've had players be healthy over the last few years.

So I do think that there are areas of this where I roll my eyes just like you do and say, OK, Kevin, you don't know what's coming for you, buddy. This is your first time being a head coach. But I also think that being smarter in a lot of areas, there are edges to be had. I definitely agree. And I think part of the thing here, too, is this. And I mean, this is going to sound slightly cliche, but it's not. You know, when we were here for training camp last year, there was literally a heaviness, an air. It was miserable.

I mean, Mike, you know, and he wasn't wrong, but he had a lot of star players that weren't vaxxed. He knew that that was going to be a problem, and eventually it was. Mike was also, and this will happen to O'Connell eventually, probably, he was also at the end of his shelf life as the coach here. Like, just that's the way, unless your name is like Bill Belichick, that's the way things work. So am I buying this? I'm buying a lot of

what they're doing as far as being different, as far as being smart. And remember too, this building used to have a lot of smart people who went to Mike and said, we could show you exactly why you shouldn't be practicing hard in December. And Mike's like, but I practice hard in December. And so those, those folks eventually quit and left. But I have been told, and I think this is the best, like, encapsulation. I've been told, because I've told people who work in this building, boy, it feels different because it does. And every one of them says, well, yeah, Judd, that's true. But we haven't lost a game yet.

Right, right, right. And that's coming internally. The call is in the house. So I would say that that is, like can change things a ton and you can be lighthearted and you can be more fun and player friendly. But the real question is this. What happens if you start 0-2? Because it's plausible. It could happen.

And at that point in time, can you say, okay, here's what we have to do? Or do you change and and we both have seen people change very quickly when things go wrong and the pressure is on them and the last thing too is o'connell seems like a smart guy and he's certainly a more media savvy friendly guy than mike was all of that being, we have no idea if he can coach. Right. We don't know. Right.

We don't know. Now, one thing that what he's, I think, done well is he has tried to protect himself with some, I don't know, facts or science or scientific methods of way of doing things. And what I mean is one of the biggest issues with Mike Zimmer, I don't think anybody would disagree with this, is the clock management. One week he's going for it like crazy. The next week he's punting away.

The timeouts was always a disaster. Kevin O'Connell brought in a guy who I think has some crazy background of really smart math guy or whatever it is, who is probably going to be in his ear every one of those moments, helping him make those decisions. Somebody told me not too long ago that in Indianapolis, of course, Frank Reich always gets all the credit and all the blame for any of those decisions, but they have two analytics people who are on the headset that just say, yep, we're going for it here. And then Frank Reich says we're going for it here.

And that's what they do because he believes those guys know better than he does how to manage the clock, how to manage when to go for it on fourth down, that they are following the numbers. And he's not alone in that at all. In the NFL, the Baltimore Ravens have the same thing where John Harbaugh, I'm sure, has veto power of that because he's the head coach. But that's one of the biggest questions for me is how Kevin O'Connell calls plays and then manages everything else. But I also think that he's doing a smart thing by having that person be more in charge of that and being able to delegate.

So now will he be able to delegate throughout the season as he's going to need to do? But I think that Mike wanted everything on him. He wanted, and he talked about this with calling plays where he was like, the reason I call defensive plays and not Andre Patterson or not George Edwards is because I don't want to be mad at them. If it goes wrong, it's all on me. And you're like, yeah, that's kind of crazy though. Like, I mean, you can do it, yeah that's kind of crazy though like i mean you can do it but that's kind of crazy though sure to think of it that way i think offensive coordinator and calling plays is a little different than that but i also thought that mike just looked overwhelmed at times with his focuses on the defense during games he lost track of game management he lost track of what was going on in the offensive side at times and i

wondered when he would say why didn't we run more it's like mike were you watching the offense or you just like saying something to say something right and you were entirely focused on the defense well and i think that's going to be the biggest thing with o'connell that we will not know until they actually start to play regular season games is this what you just brought up. And early on in my time covering this league, I don't think unless you watch it super close, and especially coaches, that people understand what's on their plate on game day. And I'm not talking about practice plans.

I'm not talking about game plans. Because, you know, on the calm of a Tuesday when the players are off, right, you could put together the greatest scheme since Eric Coriel. But I'm talking about on Sundays when that ball is kicked off. On your belt, you've got basically a switch box that you could talk to the offense, the defense, and I believe if I'm not mistaken, so in addition to the in-game guy,

which I do love, the in-game guy who's going to say, go for it, don't. I believe Mike Pettin is now going to tell him to challenge or not. But anyway, the point is, and this is where I think it's dicey and it takes time to call plays as well. Kevin O'Connell is going to be calling plays, which is a full-time job. Like, that's not a faint of heart job. I mean, that takes if things go go wrong i am guaranteed i guarantee you within the first uh two games you will see times the vikings come out defensively and o'connell walks back to kirk to talk to him and doesn't watch the

game because that's just a fact and this is where i think it's going to take some time for him to gain a comfort there because you're doing 12 things at once and that's what I'm curious about and look would I guess that he's going to fail no I would not but am I but I am am I certain week one September 11th Packers am I certain that it's going to be absolutely smooth no I don't know and the other thing too is and this and this is going to be a very interesting talking point too so so kirk we know for a fact for a long time has been the tell me what to do i'll do it i'll do it guy i mean he literally told us last year i'm not empowered to call timeouts. He's a quarterback. Kevin O'Connell

has to make it very clear to Kirk that we are basically partners in a law firm. O'Connell and cousins and sons, right? Because if Kirk is like, well, Kevin, I can't do it unless you tell me to, which until Kirk shows that he's not going to do that, I'm not going to dismiss. I'm just saying, I'm not being pessimistic. I'm saying the reality is there is a ton of things that are going to dismiss i'm just saying i'm not being pessimistic i'm saying the reality is there is a ton of things that are going to probably take some time to smooth out do you think that kirk cousins is both like very coachable and weirdly uncoachable like i mean that like he understands his offense extremely well it's it's very clear and the thing that's impressive about kirk cousins when you watch him practice and i don't mean today it's hard to figure clear and the thing that's impressive about kirk cousins when you watch

a practice and i don't mean today it's hard to figure out what's even happening out there what's supposed to be happening but in training camp for example like when you watch a quarterback who's inexperienced the kellen mon for example who threw a couple of picks today in practice when that's hard to do actually but uh in these OTA practices. You're not wrong. And the defense had their day running it back for a finger quote touchdown, I guess. But that's totally aside. But one thing that you see from Kirk is that he's so much in command of the offense. He gets everyone lined up.

Somebody today lined up in the wrong spot. And it was just like, you over there, that's where you belong. Here we go. And when it's running on time, it's take the snap, take a couple of steps back, fire the football, and then somebody else goes in there, a Kyle Slaughter or a Danny Etling type, and you're like, okay, is it going to throw the ball? Is it going to happen? What's going on?

You know what I mean? And so that tells me that the reason one of the main reasons he is where he is and paid what he's paid is how great he is at mastering what he's told to do offensively and at the same time it there's always been this kirk can you just do a little more here can you just do this a little there and and the way Kirk is and this goes all the way back to when he was coming out of college is Kirk is kind of an argumentative guy like he even if you watch this is crazy but like watch his Gruden camp from way back in the day and Gruden's like why'd you fumble that ball and Kirk's like because the ball was wet and they wouldn't give

me a you know fresh football or something and it, okay, I think what you're supposed to say there is that's on me, but that's not kind of who he is. So I really want to see this dynamic play out between a coach who has gone all in on the idea that we're, like you said, O'Connell and Cousins. It's us together. But even when I asked Kirk today about, hey, what's the communication as you're trying to learn but also give feedback? And it was kind of like, yeah, I'm trying to tell him some things and I don't really know how that's going to work. You know what I mean? So it's not like we're designing this together. This is coach and player.

And I wonder if some of the same pitfalls of coaching Kirk that other people have ran into still end up cropping up as we go along. This is really an intriguing discussion and I don't I don't want to turn this to a bashing Kirk discussion but I know exactly what you're talking about. Kirk's done two press conferences since OTA started and I will say this there's no question that there's buy-in and he's worked working hard here okay that being said i feel like there's a next level of quarterback who would be like yeah we're doing this and we're doing that and i'm involved with this and i'm involved with that and kirk has spent two press conferences basically saying yeah it's great but there's flaws as well like there's things i mean today he basically and in his defense, again,

because I don't want this to turn into a Kirk Cousins bashing, but he was asked about this. But that being said, the day O'Connell arrived, he gave us chapter and verse on how Justin Jefferson can be Cooper Cup. And what that does, right, is it draws the defensive lookout. So the Rams knew like 90 out of 100 times exactly what that defense was going to do because as soon as Kup moved, they basically said, okay, there are the answers to the test pre-snap.

Advantage offense. Kirk essentially told us that the defense the Vikings are going to run makes it incredibly difficult. And, of course, it's a Fangio defense, so it's now widespread throughout the league. Makes it incredibly difficult pre-snap to tell things so i guess my question is this is the vikings defense going to be great because it sounds like it's going to be um far superior to what we saw in 2021 but more importantly like can the can the motion pre-snap motion of Justin Jefferson tell Cousins the answers to the question?

Or is Cousins saying, you know what? I really still don't know. In which case, I don't think O'Connell would be like, oh, but that's fine. I think O'Connell's whole thing is, no, pre-snap, we're supposed to know. So I'm confused. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And here's the other thing, too. Everybody is also doing this in the league

like lots of people know about this this is not new uh brandon staley's defense that came from vic fangio ranked 30th last year you know what it really comes down to oftentimes players which i think that kevin o'connell and patrick peterson sort of indicated uh and maybe even kirk too of like kirk said chicago has not done anything different on defense for years and yet in 2018 they were unbelievable and last year they were not at all good and like imagine that that when they had all these amazing players and then last year khalil max not playing akim hicks isn't playing in one of the games like oh yeah now they're not as good the corners they had at fangio's best were amazing and this is where I have my doubts about this particular defense

is because of the secondary in the corners you might scheme now you also have a tough time selling me that this is so much better than Mike Zimmer it's scheming I think it's a it's different but it's not so much better Zimmer is one of the best in the league at scheming. I totally believe he continued to be that. It's that Brashad Breland could not cover other human beings. That your worst corner these last few years has been so horrendous that everyone just threw at them. Jeff Gladney two years ago, and then Cam Dantzler at times two years ago

in big situations, and then last year it was just everyone threw a Breland constantly. So if Dantzler and Peterson are good and Sullivan is kind of my guy that I'm like, I don't know about this. Like Shannon Sullivan being a starter at nickel, because if there's one weak point, actually, Mackenzie Alexander was pretty bad last year, too. If there's one weak point, I don't care what you do. They have to cover people and i think that patrick peterson kind of indicated that where he was like yeah it's a little easier but at the same time if you're on an island with a guy you're one-on-one there is no answer for that schematically that can help you and that's where i would say there's concerns

here still because they weren't able to go out and get big expensive free agents to be their corners and they didn't draft a corner in the first round they drafted one the second round who knows about his health who knows when he's going to play but what you're saying on the offensive side that's where you know with kirk cousins a lot of different things have been tried and it's always been this swinging back and forth of, well, let's take, let's put more on his plate. No, let's take it all off his plate. Like 2019 was we are running Delvin cook every play. And then you hit a 60 yard pass and that's your only job.

Um, it felt like the nineties with that, or it was just like the downfield passes West coast. So now we're leaning back more toward let's give Kirk a little more to do. And how is that going to work and how's everybody else going to master that because the benefit of laying it all out there for him is it's all out there for him like the receivers don't have to be on the same page with Kirk a hundred percent of the time and who's reading this this way and hey remember in 2018 at the end of the year when Kirk was doing that thing on the sideline about how to run a route like freedom also comes along with responsibility which is where it's going to be a lot on O'Connell to balance how much do you actually want to put on

Kirk Cousins but I think to your point like the scheme stuff that they're doing I think is modern but it's not insane it's not oh gosh, no one else has ever done this. The Los Angeles Rams had amazing players, and all of a sudden their offense was great. The year before, they didn't have as amazing of players, including a quarterback, and their offense was average or below average. Like, that's kind of how it goes a lot. Like, everyone knows all the chess moves at this point. Because I think one thing that was very apparent last season was this.

The Vikings offensively did not very often, if ever, have the answers to the test pre-snap. It's why Justin Jefferson had the, what, seven catches for like 110 yards in the first half in the home game against detroit and then the lions just rolled a safety and and all of the films guys were like well they rolled a safety what are you gonna do it's like this is 2021 folks um i find the interesting thing here with kirk too is and look o'connell might be right he might be wrong but i do think that finally aside from bradbury who does scare me a bit um i think we've removed the excuses yeah so like you've got a line now i like the tackles i think the guards will hold up which is more than i could say for last season the center scares me but the skill positions i absolutely love yeah and and so i do think you're going to be running a scheme where you've

got high end high octane talent uh which is going to be absolutely huge now the question is when you empower kirk and i am all for that like they need to do that yeah empower kirk lean into the kirk lean into the kirk but can kirk take that we do not know we don't know the answer to that question kevin o'connell is basically saying i played quarterback i was not as i didn't have the god-given talent that you have kirk i probably have a better brain so i will be like the brain to your body and we'll see if that works but you bring up a very intriguing point about kirk which is kirk is the yeah but guy so instead of like instead of him i think telling kevin o'connell you know i'm i got talent like i got great arm he's got great

arm um but i'm not the smartest like i can identify things but i'm not the quickest guy but you tell me what i should do yeah he's more like to me that yeah but kevin shouldn't we do this guy and so this is going this is going to be and and look i think this team wants to be vanilla and boring which is good like i think they're going to have a good group of guys who are going to be very nice media fan friendly. But I think this is one of the most intriguing seasons for me because it's sort of like a Frankenstein experiment. Yeah. I have no idea. Yeah.

Do you? No. Well, offensively, I have no idea. I've got, I've got a, a leaning, a bias, but I'm willing to put that aside and say, you are giving Kirk like, this is it.

Yeah. Let me, let me go. Yes. Yes. And no, like, do I know,

do I think I know? I think I know because I, because I will just fundamentally always believe what Pat Shermer said. It's the players, not the plays. I will always come back to that. But that doesn't mean that the smallest parts can't end up mattering if certain things end up going right for them or if things end up going wrong for them.

Like last year, I remember bringing on Dave Campbell of the AP, our friend dave and i was like so what do you think of this team old dave you're the you're the wise owl of the group he's like i don't know eight or nine or nine and eight i was like man everyone thinks eight or nine or nine and eight like dave's always right about stuff around here and it's like and then it becomes exactly that it was like even though we got there in a weird way everybody knew from day one that it was eight or nine and nine and eight and though we got there in a weird way everybody knew from day one that it was eight or nine and nine and eight and then we got there whereas this year i think that there is a

world where things go wrong for them let's say like let's say new orleans is better than we think and like washington is good and miami's good and fields improves and you split with that like then all of a sudden your schedule's really hard and you end up winning like six or seven games if you get a few injuries, which they can try as hard as they want to prevent. But if Z'Darrius Smith's back is not 100%, then it's not 100%. They didn't really improve the interior pass rush, which I think is important.

They didn't vastly improve the secondary with rookies like that doesn't do it as we saw from a few years ago you need to develop those players over years at the same time if you add percentage points to an offense you go for it more on fourth down you get the edges you get a confident kirk cousins who extends his hot streak farther than a couple of weeks like it's there the margins are so small between being an 8-win team and being a 10-to-11-win team. So I think I know, and I think I have a good feel for it, but how this morphs and grows and how we feel at the end of it,

I think that's almost like, you know, on Madden I do this. I know you're a huge gamer, Judd. Oh, I love the game. On Madden, what I would always do is you buy the game. You simulate the first season so you could do the offseason. It's kind of like I want to simulate to the end to kind of see where we're at. Because really the entire future of this thing is going to pick a road we thought was going to happen this year, but it's pushed back one year, that they'll pick a road at the end of this year.

We'll either think Kevin O'Connell is the genius of the future and he's going to be great and wow they've really nailed it a gm and head coach and we were wrong that they should have ripped it apart and look how smart they are or we're going to go told you so and we're going to go see it wasn't the coach it was the quarterback like it's going to be one of those or it's going to be well same old story and you guys don't know what to do again and i be one of those or it's going to be well same old story and you guys don't know what to do again and i think any of those roads is possible so i think i've got them on i want to say eight wins right now but that being said what i find to be so intriguing about this entire thing is this they have chosen a path that should be like 12 wins like like they

have chosen a path they they had a chance to tear down they had a chance to make some moves certainly some tweaks and they said no no no we are going to go all in again with a first year coach and a quarterback who usually finishes around 500 and sometimes makes the playoffs but not much and so like they have put immense pressure on themselves in year one which i think is difficult to do like ordinarily it's honeymoon time and o'connell's here and he's much nicer and now they're bringing in young players they're looking for a quarterback isn't this going to be fun well he's being like that which is awesome and so it's crazy but they have put on an internal pressure which probably came from above them of we want to win now and so

that gets to be the question but back to the defense too because you're you're exactly right about this and this is where i am this is where i i want to see where this goes if zadaria smith and daniel hunter can play 17 games okay everyone on that defense is going to be vastly improved because they're going to cause havoc. I love the idea. And I never understood why after the 2019 playoff win against the Saints that Zimmer didn't do this more when he moved Griffin and Hunter inside. And that was genius. It's one of the best coaching jobs he's done. Yep. And I think it was the last great schematic game defensively that he had as coach of this team. If they can play and put pressure, and indeed Hunter is on a guard one play in the center of the next play, I mean, it's going to cause absolute havoc.

But the flip side to that is what last week, I believe, in the last OTA before this camp began, Smith didn't practice because he, quote-unquote, slept wrong. Which, when you have a bad back and bad neck, as we know with Daniil. A tweak. Yeah, that's the last thing that you want to do here. And if those guys, if one or both of those guys goes down, yeah. I mean, the cornerbacks are probably screwed. So, like, this is all, it's very interesting that they're tying it in

to two guys who, when they're healthy can be great. But you know, in Smith's case, he missed almost the entirety of 2021 because of a back, a back surgery, which is no small thing. And in the last two years,

I believe Daniel's played six and a half games. Right. And you wonder about, like, I think there should be more confidence in Daniel playing, but that neck thing was two years ago. I agree. And you do wonder like, I think there should be more confidence in Daniil playing, but that neck thing was two years ago. I agree. And you do wonder about that a little bit. And if Daniil has to carry the load himself, I think you're just asking a lot of one player on a defensive line.

I just don't think that in any circumstance, but especially in the league where defensive linemen, there are D lines that have four or five guys who are really good you can't just have one at pressuring the quarterback like i think harrison phillips and delvin thomason can play but i don't think either one of them is getting five to ten sacks i think those are guys who just kind of push the d line or the offensive line back and then try to set up little lanes for blitzing and things like that but they don't really have either blitzing linebackers. Like Anthony Barr was really good at football. Like you get debate whether he's paid the right amount or what his PFF grade says and this and that he was a really good football player and he did a lot of things. Excellent. And now Kendrick's is asked to do more. And Jordan Hicks is kind of just a guy who I think they're going to play less. So how does this all work?

And it does take me back a little bit. We talked about when the last time I covered a coaching change was that Rex Ryan, the idea was when Rex Ryan came in and took over for Doug Marone, that he was going to take the defense to the next level. Now our new buddy, Mike Pettin could actually speak to this a little bit that Pettin was the DC and then Jim Schwartz and their defenses were great. And I think 13 and 14. Then when Rex came in, he changed everything around. There were all sorts of new changes and new calls and everything else. And it took a while for that defense to get it. And that's part of this too, where, like you said, like when you talk about the honeymoon period, if you're Brian Dable, when's the first time anyone's giving you a hard time even in new york it's been so bad week seven if you're not

good like it's gonna they're gonna give him the whole year problem daniel jones is our quarterback yeah i was gonna say he he might have till 23 does that did anyone criticize robert sala last year like no like because it was in shambles But if you come in and you teach this new defense and they don't get it right away. And I mean, like week three there, they haven't gotten it yet. Even if it's better for the long term, we're going to say, whoa, what is going on here? You guys were supposed to win. Are you this? This new defensive scheme was supposed to crush right away.

And even if the defense by week 14 has gotten it together and is playing pretty well yep there's really not that patience for them there's a lot of pressure for these guys to be there right away and there isn't a lot of players that they've really put their chips on developing and so i thought it was funny like mike smith the outside linebackers coach love it uh he said like oh i love the way that patrick jones gets off the d line i was like if patrick jones plays man like i'd be surprised if patrick jones plays because if things go right in your ideal world you're basically not developing anybody on this defense which has been part of the issue for the last few years that we get here it's like

oh yeah they drafted that guy a couple years ago never seen him like oh does chas serrat exist like i mean this is sort of something where they really have to be ultra competitive right away or we're going to look around and go you didn't even set yourself up for the future here right well and and on the flip side of the conversation too the offense it's the same thing. Yeah. Like, I mean, Kirk is still they're still trying. They're still going fairly slow and trying to and they can talk about, yeah, well, we're going slow because of this or that. But the reality is they're installing a completely new scheme and they are now going to go on a six week break. And they're going to hope that guys retain, which some people don't.

Yeah. Retain information, retain calls and show up at training camp like set to go well that's that's pie in the sky that's a great thought hey everyone's going to come back and they're going to have studied their playbook but that's simply not going to take place with a bunch of guys who are essentially in their early 20s so you're now going to have you know opening day when you are are trying to run plays and keep in mind too practices now i mean training camp practices are how short compared to to what oh yeah they used to be and you're no more two days and in the three preseason games you ain't gonna go run a bunch of schematics

like you're not gonna put anything on film i don't think they're playing anyone either if they do it like the rams they won't play anyone okay so sept so September 11th against, because we can debate then, well, but they're going to do stuff, Judd, right? Well, they are going to do some stuff, but it's going to be more classroom probably. So September 11th against the Packers, you're going to basically be like, how much of this can we run? And, you know, I saw, I think it was in the OTA last week, Jefferson was confused.

He was like trying to line up at the right place and running around because he's being asked to do a lot of things. So you're right. All of these things are going to come down to teams now have limited practice time. They don't want to tip their hands. I mean, I think O'Connell told us a while back, when fans are in the stands, I ain't going to be running a ton of stuff. Yeah. So, okay, so that's out. while back when fans are in the stands i ain't gonna be running a ton of stuff yeah yeah so okay

so that's out so now the question becomes and this is where you need your quarterback to take control completely and say kevin we can't run that play or to say you got to be here you got to be there at the risk of showing up teammates and so there are a ton of questions, which all comes back to the most intriguing thing is they have applied this pressure. Right. I mean, so there's so many scenarios that can happen. And one that I thought of is, and I think that I do think that pros adapt pretty quickly to all this stuff. So the guys at this level, it's not like teaching freshmen in college to do it like they should be able to adjust schemes they've changed offensive coordinators like no excuses but the scenario runs through my mind that they end up getting behind from the outset like they have

when they've turned over the roster the last two years that's something we really didn't discuss because we pointed the finger at kirk and at mike zimmer they earned that. But a big part of the slow starts may have been like, Oh look, you're changing more guys on the offensive line. Again, you're changing more guys on the defense again. And lo and behold, you don't start the season very well. Oh, then a couple of guys get hurt and you're just a bad defense. Uh, so I think there is an adjustment period in the NFL when you make these overhauling changes.

So if they were to get off to a slow start and have a similar trajectory as last year where they play better at the end, and let's say they get one of those wins that they didn't last year at the end and make the playoffs, then they're in this situation where they could go, oh, well, the second half of the season. See, that's the real us. And then we get back into the cycle again. So I think that that's the thing that's the most interesting to me is just all of the different outcomes that are possible that didn't feel possible under Zimmer. But then I also struggle a little bit, Judd, with this roster because the number of question marks, tell me if you agree with this or if you have some that I'm not thinking of, the number of question marks tell me if you agree with this or if you have some that i'm not thinking of the number of question marks on players is very few it's like well amir smith

mar said anybody right i mean right like who you know who wants to talk about if troy die will have to play i there everything's kind of set going into camp which is going to make that day-to-day basis really about how are they getting it how do they look do they to make that day-to-day basis really about how are they getting it how do they look do they look on a day-to-day basis like last year was just ugly to start training camp after the whole debacle with Zimmer and cousins but I mean if they look like that again I think we're going to be saying what's going on here I mean you really have to get it in camp you have to look good because that's often an indicator of what's going to happen long term i fully don't expect this offense to hit the ground opening day of camp looking good i think it's going to be a slow uh a slow work in progress

and that's the problem but then the question becomes on september 11th against the packers can you come out there and you know because in, this should be the Rams' offense, right? Sort of this high-flying machine, and it looks great. And fans, of course, are like, well, Kirk and Stafford, they're the same guy. And so he's just going to do everything that Stafford did. But, of course, the difference is Stafford, I think, has a higher upside and also doesn't care about risk, and Kirk hates risk. Right, right.

And so there's a lot of things about this um which is why I find it interesting that they didn't choose to sort of slow cook this thing and put less pressure on themselves but they didn't and are they going to make the playoffs they certainly could yeah the the Eagles made it they stunk right the Eagles made it um but there's a difference between making the playoffs and make it a coaching change and really a whole philosophy change here to where you feel that this team can contend for the long term and that it's not smoke and mirrors and that you are now a Super Bowl contender. And that's my question about how this is starting out. And like in year two, do you think that you're going to be improved again with Kirk? And now Kirk's your guy for two more years after that?

Or are you set to hit the reset button again? There's just a lot of things I would actually like to ask the Wilfs as far as what – because I think it's on them. I think this goes above O'Connell and Quasey. But I guess my question is this. What is your intention with the franchise? What do you think it can do? Because I can't blame fans one bit if they say we're really

tired of barely sneaking the playoffs right we're really tired of nine wins can you ever can you ever consistently and yes they have certainly fallen short of super bowl but do what the packers are doing what three consecutive 13 and three yep yep can you can you achieve that that's really hard and i get all that but i mean this fan base deserves something more than it'sbacks. And that's why we usually talk about that rookie quarterback contract and you might have one shot or two shots. The way I started thinking about quarterbacks in the past is the all-time greats will give you 10 shots to win a Super Bowl in their career.

Sometimes over multiple teams like a Favre. But maybe you don't do it because Favre throws an interception oraron rogers or somebody blocks a punt in the playoffs it's pretty random it's one game you're playing a great team it might snow um you might have zero degree weather and shank a kick who knows in the playoffs but to win the super bowl you usually have to be a 12 win team or better so peyton manning gave his team 10 shots 12 shots at winning a Super Bowl a really good quarterback a Matt Ryan and Eli Manning will give you five shots at winning a Super Bowl so they'll play for 15 years but only five of those they were legit contenders they will they'll dip up and down and then I think the next level down for quarterbacks to play a long time in the league

is you get maybe one shot I think that's where Kirk Cousins is. I think that's where Matt Stafford is. Matt Stafford got one shot and won. Like he had never had a season like that before. I think he had one 11 win season before that or something, but never really before too many ups and downs from him. Everything had to click. And so we've gotten so far here with Kirk where it's like, all right, this is kind of it. Like this year, this is maybe the last try for you as the quarterback. And after that you have your results, you have lots of different offensive coordinators. You got different head coaches, you got different cultures, you got different schemes. You're probably not getting another shot, or at least with the way that this whole thing is structured. If he had gone to the rams last year or maybe whatever other great great team the eagles in 2017

certainly kirk could have done the same thing as nick foals did or carson wentz under those circumstances but that's pretty rare so you're looking for your first shot though like your one your one real shot maybe they had it in 2019 but they didn't you know they didn't they won what nine games ten games so yeah they certainly have not been great but they didn't you know they didn't they won what nine games 10 games so yeah they certainly have not been great so they weren't and they won no games that were important throughout that season so it wasn't a good enough team it wasn't ass handed to them right by san francisco it wasn't good enough so you're really kind of down to the wire of is this is this your shot right so i think and and like you with ownership, they're so fickle that who knows.

I think this should do all the telling. Is this the time that he's good enough to get you somewhere and O'Connell's good enough to get you somewhere or isn't it? And if it isn't, then you draft a quarterback. And that's it. That should be the fork in the road. But I also thought that last year. Exactly. And keep in mind, too, this current staff just brought back, the fork in the road but i also thought that last year and yeah well exactly and and you know

keeping my two this current staff just brought back and it's going to seem like a small thing but to me it's not sean manion to be kirk's backup oh yeah because kirk likes him you bet so they're they're bending over backwards for kirk and they have no money yeah that's also why that's also why they're bending over backwards though to make kirk as comfortable as possible here's my question about Kirk as well, too. And this actually goes to the O'Connell-Kirk relationship. You know, Stafford, and we've seen this before, Matthew Stafford has no conscience at times. But McVay clearly turned him loose at times as well.

Oh, yeah. And it's very apparent. If you throw a pick, you throw a pick, dude. I don't, you know, let's take the shot. What happens when O'Connell says that? And I'm not I'm not saying that you encourage a pick, but I am saying that you say we need this pass and it's a high danger pass. You're walking a tightrope, baby. As Mike Zimmer tried to push Kirk Cousins to do.

Right. But I think Mike told him to do it. Right. I think O'Connell will say, here's how you accomplish it. Right. And Kirk has did not say, yeah, but that's a but that's a risk right like there's so much there's so many interesting things at work here because i think mike told kirk don't be afraid to take chances i think o'connell is going to show him film and say here's where you need to force that ball in a little bit yeah yeah what happens yeah yeah i think that i think that previous offensive coordinators probably tried the same, but they always knew that if he threw a pick, Mike could lose his mind.

And it was like, I mean, with Zimmer, I remember they had the Atlanta game to go 1-5 in 2020, and Zimmer was like, yeah, sometimes Kirk predetermines his read, and that's why he throws those picks. And it was like, okay. Like, wow wow that is quite a thing to say in front of everybody um sometimes i think that zimmer forgot that everyone could hear him like you know what i mean like sometimes i think that he thought we were just in one room or in that case on a zoom and he was just talking to you and me uh at a bar and like wow mike that wasn't what you wanted to say right there.

But like, that's going to be a thing right there of like, I think they've had everybody try to do this with him, but you never knew what Mike's reaction was going to be. So if you throw a 50 yard bomb and it's a pick, that should be fine because it's kind of like a pun, right? But was Mike going to be pissed because his defense had to go back on the field? Like never really. Mike was so volatile that you never really knew in that game for us too.

We would come out here some days expecting him to be so angry with us. And then he'd be like, fine. And then other times you'd be like, oh, you just got a big win yesterday. How you feeling? It was bite your head off. And I think that players dealt with the same thing. I don't think they'll deal with that with O'Connell. But Judd, I wanted to wrap up on a completely different thing with the same thing. I don't think they'll deal with that with O'Connell. But, Judd, I wanted to wrap up on a completely different thing

with the Vikings. Yeah. I wanted to ask you, I saw CBS Sports put out one of those clip compilations of Chris Carter today. And I mean, my God. Like the catches that Chris Carter made throughout his career. Here's what I want you to do. And I think this is actually a very hard exercise.

Okay. I want you to rank for me your top five Minnesota Vikings wide receivers of all time. Oh, wow. Okay. That's pretty good. Moss is one. It's not even close. There's no debate.

Change the game. He's one. Chris Carter would be two. After that, I think it gets pretty interesting. It does get, it does get, I'm going to give you names. I don't know if this is how I would rank them. I grew up watching Rashad. Yeah.

Rashad was fantastic. I liked Sammy White a lot, but I think Rashad is the dominant guy from that time period. OK, you know who else has to be at least in this conversation? Anthony Carter. Oh, of course came from from michigan of the usfl back in the day uh signed by the vikings he definitely has to be in this conversation um and after that i am going to go i'm not gonna i'm going to leave jefferson off on purpose just because it's two two years. Because he probably should be on this list.

TBD. But it's no fun if I just put him on the list. And I'm going to put Stefan Diggs in that mix as well. Okay. So I got Moss one, Chris Carter two. You going Rashad there? Or do you go Anthony Carter? I think Anthony Carter.

I'd probably go Anthony. And I'm just going talent here because off the top of my head, I don't know the stats. I'll go AC three. I have the stats in front of me. And AC in that playoff run where they were bounced in the, I believe it was the conference championship game by Washington was unbelievable.

He had a day, I think it was against in the upset of San Francisco where he just went off and he's a marvelous player. I'd probably put him three. In fairness, I'd probably put Diggs four and Rashad because of the era five. But that's a very, very close one. So Sammy White is fifth all time behind Chris Carter, Randy Moss, Anthony Carter and Jake Reed, who is on the edge of this conversation, I think. Because before Randy Moss gets there, Jake Reed is one of their dominant wide receivers.

He's very good. One of the best in the league. But I mean, I'm going off what I perceive to be talent, too. And Jake Reed was really reliable and really good. But I think I just gave you five names of extremely, extremely talented guys. Yeah, I think the only one, though, that statistically maybe doesn't quite match is Rashad over Sammy White. That Sammy White has better...

That's my youthful... Yeah, but he caught the pass against the Browns to win the division at Met Stadium. Man, it's hard not to... And he did have great hands. White was a great player, too, though. That's absolutely true. Now, here's one last question to wrap on

because this is sort of a leaning into a summer conversation about vikings wide receivers had percy harvin remained healthy where would percy harvin have ended up on this list oh my god and remained uh well grounded yeah Honestly, probably third. But here's the thing about him. He would have as so he would have actually been playing the game into a time that it evolved in a huge way. So beyond receiving stats, just as a as a to use a cliche Swiss Army knife player. Yeah, he would have been magnificent. Like the Vikings have had,

so the Vikings really before it became in vogue, the Vikings had Percy, who I mean could line up anywhere. It was a nightmare. And if you go back to 98, David Palmer. Not Percy, but still had this, like now he'd be used in a multitude of ways but Percy Harvin would probably be third because my god athletically talented wise Matthew what a joy to watch that guy could play I don't think anyone even the trajectory Jefferson is on will

press Carter and Moss for the number one and number two. Even if Jefferson makes the Hall of Fame, it's hard to press those two guys. I mean, they're like top 10 receivers of all time. Moss doesn't get touched. Yeah. Moss doesn't. And it's like Carter goes almost underrated. Carter had 12,000 yards receiving.

Sideline catches. Unbelievable. Toe taps before that was like the the standard thing which now it's just like you know oh yeah toe tap chris carter in total receptions almost doubles randy moss yeah which is wild i mean played from longer but that just tells you about his dominance over his best years but number three is absolutely feasible for percy harvin and i think as far as most exciting players to ever play for the franchise r Randy Moss will always be number one. Yep.

Adrian Peterson will probably always number two. Harvin could have been right there. I mean, was very briefly, but could have been right there for most exciting players to ever play for the franchise had he had a smooth ride. Marvelous player. Marvelous player. And I will say this. Thielen has been incredible. But I think in retrospect now, and we did this all the time back then,

and I feel now it's been separated more. But, you know, it became this thing of Thielen and Diggs, 1A and 1B. The more I've thought about that, and this is not to put Thielen down, but the more I've thought about that and watching Diggs and watching Diggs now especially, I don't think that was really fair. Like I think Thielen is an incredibly solid player. Yeah. But I think this whole, yeah, they're 1A and 1B. I think Diggs was one.

And like now with JJ, there's no question he's one um but i think we sold digs a little bit short including me by like talking about those two like it was the same player feeling for two years i think is one of the best receivers in the league i don't know talent wise that he's ever digs i mean we've seen what happens when you throw to digs all the time which digs new and we used to look at the data to remember that with like reception perception matt harman's thing hopefully i'll get him on soon he's going to publish some more of his data on justin jefferson we usually get together his numbers on digs always said my gosh everyone why are they not throwing it to digs more and digs was absolutely vindicated but i think that

with feeling it's such a short run of being an elite receiver because of the long road he had to travel to get there so 2016 he emerges he's already like 26 and then you get to those two years 2017 2018 where he's elite he's hurt in 2019 very good in 2020 but he's already getting toward the end of his prime so if he had come into the league the way that jefferson has at 20 years old and played like that for a long time he's a top three or four on this list but it was only end up being brief just because of kind of uh his age and when he really was able to emerge but i think it's always an interesting discussion to talk about the vikings wide receivers beyond moss and some good ones man can you imagine if that entire list had elite

quarterbacks too like that's the other thing briefly briefly elite for a year or two i mean rashad for a while had tark and and um you know call pepper in his prime for moss and moss was just such a generationally great player but like we're talking about guys who you know Culpepper in his prime for Moss and Moss was just such a generationally great player but like we're talking about guys who you know worked with God bless him Case Keenum I mean but that's the thing right like 2017 Diggs and Thielen are at their best and they put up amazing numbers but it was still Case Keenum if it was Brett Favre in his prime yeah no you're right it would have been out of this world what they would have been able to do man offensively well I man. Offensively. Well, I think that we're sitting here talking about remember the Super Bowl team if they'd had a great quarterback.

But that's a different discussion for a different day. Judd, great to get together with you whenever we can. And as they said, have a great summer. Yeah, you have a great summer, too. Great summer, Judd. Great seeing you, too, by the way. Great seeing you. Have a great summer.