Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - NFL.com's Eric Edholm investigates the Hendon Hooker hype

Episode Date: April 12, 2023

Matthew Coller is joined by Eric Edholm of NFL.com to talk about why Hendon Hooker has suddenly shown up on everyone's radar as a first-round pick. They also talk about the receiver class and whether it is going to disappoint and Eric asks Matthew questions for his upcoming mock Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to another episode of Purple Insider, Matthewar here. This is a very special episode because this is an investigation. And I don't have the Law & Order music, but I would if I had it to be able to use. And joining me for a deep dive investigation into one of the most dramatic and intriguing and fascinating subjects of the NFL draft is Eric Edholm of NFL.com. Are you ready for this? Are you ready to dive so deep into a spellbinding draft subject and help me solve it over the next 30 to 40 minutes? That was my law and order sound. That means yes.

Yes, absolutely. Are you kidding me, Manny? I've always got time for you. I always like breaking down the draft from a team-specific standpoint. It helps. You're essentially helping me do my mock draft in about six days. So this is like a trade-off here. Well, you're welcome. Whoever played the bass on the intro. It's the same guy who did Night Court, I think.

Just incredible. I mean, anyway, but here's what we're investigating. How did Hendon Hooker end up with the Vikings in every mock draft? This is the investigation. Okay, now here's what I've been putting together. I was looking at maybe you've seen grinding the mocks or mock draft database, these places that sort of gather all the mocks together. And I was tracking going

back to when his acl actually got hurt and then for some reason the mocks sunk him all the way down he was like a third round pick and then just the other day whoop all the way up to being mocked by all the major mockers to the Minnesota Vikings. This man has not played football since then. What is going on with the Hendon Hooker hype? Yeah, I always say there are gateway mock drafts, right? I was talking about gateway drugs when you're in eighth grade health class, you know, right? Like don't smoke pot. It'll lead to other things, right? But there are gateway mock drafts out there, right? Some respected, I don't know if this is the case. I'm just throwing this out there as a potential theory that requires thorough

investigation. A respected mock drafter will put out a mock, let's say, you know, after the first week or two of free agency, once some dust has settled, we've seen maybe some visits, an idea, better idea of what needs are and things like that. And they'll put something of a left field suggestion like that. So Daniel Jeremiah, or, you know, again, my, my coworker side, I'm pumping up their work, of course, but, or an Eric at home, you know, just somebody like that. No, but, but somebody who, who a lot of people read and trust and you know, Dane Bruglerler, Mike Renner and, you know, Jordan Reed. There's a million guys out there who do great stuff.

And they go, huh, I never thought of that. Maybe that makes sense. Let me think about that. Right. And so there is that bias that exists. And one of the things I think you and I may have talked about this before. I've tried really hard not to look at mock drafts, other people's mock drafts up until about now, because now I've been able to kind of talk to people and

form some ideas of what I think is going to happen. And because anything before March, if you start looking at mocks, man, I'm telling you, you subconsciously start picking other people's picks without realizing it. And I just don't like doing that at this point. So the rabbit hole has led me to Daniel Jeremiah as the first mock drafter. Yes, the first mock drafter to include Hendon Hooker. And after that, that's when Todd McShay suddenly went with it and Bruce Feldman went with it. And each one of them have sort of cited the idea of like, well, he's going to have to sit for a year. So which team could he sit for a year? The Minnesota Vikings, they restructured Kirk Cousins contract. Okay. That makes a lot of sense. But

here is the missing piece is that is Hendon Hooker really a first round draft pick? Because I think what we learned last year is that we thought the NFL would be so quarterback desperate that they'd talk themselves into like Matt Corral and Desmond Ritter, and they did not. And I think that just my own observation, you can tell me how you feel about this, but I feel like Hendon Hooker is much more in that range of a prospect, much more of a Matt Corral, a Desmond Ritter than he is of a CJ Stroud or a Bryce Young. Now, nobody thinks he's going at the very top, but usually if a team is going to invest their heart and soul into a first round pick, and remember, I mean, this is like Kweisi Adafo-Mentz, it would be his first big quarterback

draft pick. Are you going to do it with Hendon Hooker is my question. Yeah. I mean, we haven't seen in recent years, correct me if I'm wrong. I cannot recall one of those Teddy Bridgewater, Lamar Jackson picks where they're, they come at the end of round one, you know, they're used to gain the fifth year option and I'll kind of just throw this back on you when you're a 25 year old quarterback like Hooker is you know he spent two years at VTech came to Tennessee 25 with like you said possibly a redshirt season of sorts where he may not be your number two at the start of the year he may not be your number two at the at the end is it more or less important to get that fifth year option I don't really know right I mean

unless you're a top 10 pick I don't know that there's a ton of sense in in securing him like making sure you get him in that first round range if you if you have a second or a third round grade on them let's say because for a younger quarterback fine like if Anthony Richardson was was being viewed as a late first round pick or or you know what I mean or a second or third round or let's say yeah then it makes sense right because there's a guy hasn't played a lot of football Hennon Hooker's played a good amount of football so I don't know that that element of it necessitates taking him in round one. I happen to think he's more likely to go somewhere in round two, just because of what you said last year provided a lot of evidence, only one quarterback who went in the top 70 plus picks,

that teams are being a little more patient. They're not showing that same kind of level of desperation. But then again, there are about six, seven teams that I could make a reasonable case for drafting a quarterback. Vikings would be one of the bottom ones, but still in that list, I think. Seven, eight, maybe even. So I'm kind of ambivalent, as you can tell. I think the talent is there, but the translation from Josh Heupel's offense to whatever offense he goes to, likely to be quite different. The ACL is a factor. The age is a factor. But, you know, he's athletic.

He's got a pretty good arm. He kept his turnover totals down. There's some good and some warts with his profile, for sure. The age thing is a huge factor to me because you have to get so much better at football in the NFL. Like that's just a fact of life. Like if you didn't, then Joe Burrow would have won like 12 games in his first year. But even Joe Burrow, who is unbelievable, still was not all that good as a rookie. And I honestly don't remember more than a couple of guys ever in history who have been good rookies. And obviously we've had a lot of really great quarterbacks in the NFL Peyton Manning's

the famous example but the dude was throwing like 27 interceptions in his first year and he turns out to be a literal goat uh that's that so then you're talking about translating like how much can a mid-20s year old quarterback who's not going to step on the field until he's like 26 actually develop and if he has this acl injury even in practice he's not going to play in a pre-season so his first pre-season isn't until the man is like 26 years old he's older than justin jefferson yeah by kind of a lot i mean like that's older than justin herbert you know i mean right yeah yeah we've been there have been just a couple of jokes about Hendon Hooker's age on this. So the best one was somebody said that he gets like my 90s football references, which

was pretty good. But I mean, but this this is why it's so mysterious to me, because there hasn't been a whole lot of luck. And Chris Winky was a Minnesotan, so we can't be too hard on him, but it didn't go too good. And Brandon Whedon, it didn't go too good. Like there's a reason why guys who are this age, but I mean, I guess you could say that Joe Burrow was like 24 when he got drafted. So I, you know,

I waffle because I think if they think he's a first round draft pick, it's hard for me to tell them, nah, I don't know, you guys are wrong. He's old, right? It's like, well, if Kevin O'Connell's evaluating him and thinking that he deserves to be here, how am I going to say, nah, Kev, sorry, throw him back in the lake. He's too old. You know what I mean? I'm very conflicted about this idea. Well, and to your point, Burrow made a big jump, obviously got hurt his rookie year too. So we don't know how he would have finished his rookie year, but as you pointed out, he was, you know, kind of ordinary for a time there and looked like he was still feeling his

way through it. And in his age 25 season, he took a big step forward. So, you know, it's not as if, you know, you hit a certain age and there is no more progression after that point, but it just limits the possibilities. Heck, even Geno Smith for that matter, had if, you know, you hit a certain age and there is no more progression after that point, but it just limits the possibilities. Heck, even Geno Smith, for that matter, had a, you know, a career changing season at age 32. So there are late developers out there, but if this were to happen, I think you brought up an important point, which is a level of trust in a young GM who's only been through this draft cycle as the guy one time in Kweisi Adolfo Mensah saying, which quarterback do you like, Kevin? And taking that and using it. I think that's important, right? We talk about GMs making picks. They do. They are, you know,

the buck stops here and all that, but collaboration is also very important in this draft process. And at some point, those guys have had a conversation about the quarterback talent. So I think you're, you're onto something there is that, you know, Kevin O'Connell may have said, I get why the analytics say this may not be a great idea.

However, here's my, my opposition research here. And I'm going to tell you the, the, the case for Hennonhoeker or whomever. So yeah, exceptions exist and he might be one of them. I don't know. Okay. So let's say that they do it. Do you like it? Like, do you like it? Do you think that that's

a good idea? I think it can be a good idea. Obviously it's got to be the kind of situation like Detroit or like a Minnesota where, you know, you reasonably can see at least one more year with your current starter as the starting quarterback. Not at least. I shouldn't say a minimum of one is what I meant to say. Because obviously, you can't count on him now. There is a, you know, as you pointed out, he did say he wants to be or he expects to be fully healthy by the start of camp. You know, I mean, are they going to put him out there

in the first preseason game? You know, who knows? So, and it also depends, too, how big a leap is it from what Heupel was teaching him and, you know, which is essentially, if people know, like kind of the Baylor offense, right? It's like the Art Bryles, you know, system that a zillion college coaches have now taken, right? And put their own twist on, but it's not what they run in the NFL.

So I think that's a big deal right there. And, you know, we're still waiting to find out if Jordan Love is the guy, right? In Green Bay, he could be a tremendous success, but he's a total unknown now. He could be a ridiculous flop too. So you enter that gray area of, and he's similar to Love in some respects where you're betting on some traits, some intangibles, and you're hoping it works out either one to three years down the line. I mean, there's not a lot of immediate return, but there could be a long-term payoff for that. Okay. So you're only like four years older than Hendon Hooker, but you've been doing this a long time. I wish I was. I wish I was his age again. Yeah.

Oh, but when it comes to the quarterback, so one of the things that keeps getting said about Hendon Hooker is that he blew teams away at the combine that he got on the whiteboard and they were like wow it's amazing how smart you are now I kind of go I kind of go back and forth on this because I really do think that that's a thing that you have to have that you and I are both chess fans and you know, that these elite chess players, they can remember thousands of variations of different openings to a chess game. I think an NFL quarterback has to be the same way where you just have to have this photographic memory and you have to have this obsessive personality. And so there was one story

about Hendon hooker, I think from Bruce Feldman, about how he remembered everything from his Virginia Tech offense and that that really impressed them. And I do think that that stuff matters. But I guess I wonder in all the years that you've been doing this, if you have found things that correlate with quarterbacks to ultimately success in the NFL, because I've been very much draft is random, take a quarterback and pray because none of us can ever figure it out. Like if, if we had to figure it out, then Josh Rosen would have been great. And a bunch of other quarterbacks that all the draft analysts love, but don't tell me there's something that you can look at and say like these traits or the NFL is sort of found

anything that correlates to success. Yeah, and right. I mean, and that's the thing. I think we're, first of all, I don't want to make it seem like I'm, you know, besmirching Heupel's offense. I think there's enough in terms of the protection changes and whatever, where, you know, he's got a lot on his plate. It's just in terms of the reads where, man, his first read was open a lot, right? And you can't blame a guy for hitting his first read and often hitting him for touchdowns but back to your bigger question which is you know what have i learned in

my my vast years of governing the nfl of what works for quarterbacks and you know it's funny because you see them in all different sizes and shapes right some are highly athletic some are are statues obviously the game seems to be trending more in a direction where the athletic quarterbacks are more highly sought but you know it's not to say that that the statuesque guys can't have success and i think the the calm denominator is quick thinkers guys who play with a low pulse who can handle the spotlight and the scrutiny and everything that comes with it these are mostly intangible things right things that your mind mind is doing and telling your body what to do. Those are pretty important.

I mean, there's only so many ways I think you can hide a quarterback's deficiencies in the NFL. Eventually, they get uncovered. And that comes also into work ethic and how willing you are to work on your strong, strong, you know, or your weak points, I should say to make them strengths. So, you know, we've seen guys like Burrow doesn't have an amazing arm. I don't think anyone would say he does or anyone who follows the league, but you know, he has guts and he has pretty good accuracy when it comes to putting the ball, you know, in a, in a basket down the field. He can create and improvise on the way. I mean, what's the old war saying? No battle plan survives the first contact with the enemy. Basically, things go to hell pretty fast in the NFL, right? One guy doesn't

do his job, everything falls apart. you have to figure out what are my escape routes how do i make lemonade out of lemons here that trait while tough to sort of pinpoint you know that's why you're seeing bryce young atop the draft that matters to my in my opinion yeah i think that if i was trying to push the odds in my favor over a hundred draft picks, let's say, let's say we each got to draft a hundred quarterbacks, right? Because if you pick one, who knows, right? Like you could have a great small sample. I think that toughness and pocket presence is probably the top because I really learned a lot from Kellen Mon. There were a lot of people who loved Kellen Mon, but the one thing was the dude had no pocket presence whatsoever.

Right. And I don't know that he had any sort of actual presence either. Like the way that people responded to him and everything else, he was kind of like, you plug it in and he kind of has to do what he's asked to do. Kind of a robo quarterback a little bit in college. He had, he like had good speed,

but never used it desmond ritter's like this you're like oh he ran a 4-4 like feel free to show me where that is on tape anywhere um and but so that's why i like someone like anthony richardson is so interesting to me because you can throw a check down better than he can or more accurately which is wild but yet the guy gets rid of the ball when he's going to pass it, he gets rid of the ball and he's got a toughness to his game and he's got a presence to his game. And I think it was Georgia where they like beat him up early in the game and he just kept battling. And I was like, you know what? Like, I know that this dude is not perfect, but that's going to

play. It's like same sort of metaphor, but like, everyone's got to play until they get punched in the face. It's like, everyone's got to plan until Micah Parsons plays for the other team. And I think like what football player would I say in the draft could play against Micah Parsons? And it's like, uh, that guy, Anthony Richardson. So I think with someone like Hendon hooker, I think that he does have like some intangibles that are kind of like this when I watch him, but I don't know if it's like the Bryce Young or the Anthony Richardson level. And I guess that's the only thing with Stroud that kind of like would hold me up a little. It's like, is this dude like a baller? I don't know. He's a great passer,

but is he a baller? That's I think that if they're going in the first, then the NFL has decided they have the throwing skill to go and stuff like that. So I can only really analyze all the other stuff and like with zach wilson the dude wasn't a captain for his team like what like that that's a pretty big deal that maybe a lot of us overlook so i don't know i mean it's it's forever captivating for sure oh yeah and i mean i i that's why i think levis has gotten in my opinion unfairly killed in this draft process i wrote it the other day like i can't figure out for the life of me, other than the mayonnaise and the coffee thing, what did this man do to hurt everybody?

Because he's getting beat up in a way that feels almost personal. I don't know. But his toughness is off the charts. And that's a big reason why I like him is that, boy, if you didn't know better, first of all, he's just a competitor. He comes from a family of athletes, like one of those families where you look at him and which one of you aren't athletes like it's pretty amazing and you know he goes to the combine says I've got a howitzer I've got a gun a cannon whatever he said and and I'm gonna be the my

goal is to be the best quarterback in the league and you kind of you know you roll your eyes on one side but on the other thing you think I don't know that i doubt him as far as his drive is concerned and his toughness this year playing through two injuries an ankle and a shoulder and getting beat up behind a bad line i mean those things and what you mentioned with with richardson i think are absolutely true and part of the evaluation and just because you get beat up doesn't mean you make it in the NFL. But if you have that and a skill set to match, I like your chances better than some other guys. Folks, it's almost time for summer and I've got something to give you a boost. It's called AG1 by Athletic Greens.

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is giving you a free one-year supply of vitamin D and five free travel packs with your purchase. Go to athleticgreens.com slash insider. That's athleticgreens.com slash insider to check it out today. And this is why it's so hard, because I think that Will Levis or anthony richardson playing with tennessee's football team just put up totally different statistics i mean florida stunk like i one of my favorite things has been watching like the nfl tape watchers who during the season they

analyze the nfl and then they get done with the league and they start looking at the draft and they're like you guys know florida's team was so bad? Like, Oh yeah, they're horrendous. Anthony Richardson has a good game and completes 30% of his passes because no one knows how to run a route or catch a football. And it's like, how am I supposed to evaluate that dude when he's playing on such a different playing surface than another dude, this exists in the NFL and they're all NFL players who can catch the football and run routes. Like Brandon cooks is playing for the worst team in the NFL and they're all NFL players who can catch the football and run routes. Like Brandon cooks is playing for the worst team in the league. I mean, everybody's got good players, but Florida has no good players. Kentucky's probably even worse. And then Alabama and

Tennessee, like everyone's wide open. Uh, the Levis idea has just totally dissipated from Viking land, but I, but that was something that was coming up before of like wait if he drops to 14 or 16 right the vikings look at him but they also have like no draft picks so i i don't i don't know if that like that's but he makes more sense to me as a guy that at least is a beast and somebody said something in the chat the other night when i was doing a live stream they're like look if we're gonna pick a quarterback pick one that's a monster at least like we you know what I mean? So I think there is an argument for that. If you're going to do it, pick some dude who's an absolute freak show, and if you go wrong, you go wrong.

The crude matter matters, right? That's why I worry about Bryce Young, who I love. I mean, watching him is a pleasure. I mean, he covered up a lot of problems on that Alabama offense last year. There were some issues that didn't become issues because of Bryce Young. And you'd evade a sack, make a play, and you go, wow, even gaining six yards is a monumental victory on that play, right? But yeah, I mean, that's still, you got to think about the fact that

his margin for error is going to be pretty small he doesn't have a crazy whip for an arm he's got a small frame and the schedule is now 17 games plus playoffs like that's my biggest hold up that's why you know i i just can't 100 get behind him is that the physical traits, you can't just be dismissed. I mean, you know, obviously Lamar Jackson's thin and Kyler Murray has done some decent things in this league with a small frame. Drew Brees, you name it, right? Russell Wilson, whoever. But having those physical traits allows you to get away with some other things at times. So it's another part of the equation.

It's an imperfect science experiment, but we keep testing it. And eventually one of these years, we'll come up with a good theory on how it actually should work. Maybe if we put Anthony Richardson and Bryce Young together, then you would have the best quarterback in history. My head's spinning. So I want to ask you about receivers because I kind of had my head explode a little bit the other day with the receiver discourse. I tend to think everyone is just down on this receiver or like recently just down on the receiver class. Bruce Feldman's the beast that was reading the receivers. He has Smith the jig, but is the only first round prospect.

And one of the things we have to factor here is that becoming a wide receiver two is fantastic it's so great to become a wide receiver two and we have seen so many dudes in the late first or middle second who are like well i don't know i don't know if devo samuel runs routes well enough or justin or Justin Jefferson was only in the slot. And there's just been all these criticisms of these guys who have become not just like good, but great. But I also don't want to downplay that Zay Flowers is like incredibly small. So he's fun to watch, but very small. That's why I kind of like Jordan Addison in this draft.

But I wonder what you think of that concept, because that's been kind of a rant for me. I feel like that the scouting people are like, sorry, B. John Robinson, you got to take him because he's a better prospect. Like actually that doesn't matter because football isn't played by who's the better prospect. It's like positional values a huge deal here. Absolutely. You're building a team. You're not just collecting talent, right? I mean, you know, you think about all the the quality number two receivers out there I mean Jalen Waddle's a number two I mean Devante Smith is a number two right I mean you can go down the line and they're you know Chris Godwin is a number two right so I yeah this this is not an insult I I think like in the case of a Quentin Johnson

for Johnston from Tennessee or Tennessee, TCU, excuse me. You know, I've watched him and I thought, you know, it's kind of like Mike Williams with the Chargers where you say to yourself, he'll give it the big place. He's got some length. Do I think he'll ever be the alpha dog by himself? Probably not, but he'll be the one of the best number twos eventually, you know, once he kind of gets his, his feet underneath him and stops dropping passes. But, but yeah, I mean like that, that, that you have to have multiple weapons as everybody knows. And I think there's, there's a little bit of hand wringing when we use terms like that, but look, it, it doesn't stack up this class of receivers to what we've had the last four or five years, but the depth is okay. It's not bad. I think we were just, it just so happened that four of the

best receiver classes in modern history happen all come in consecutive years. That's part of it. So maybe we were spoiled by the riches of that. This to me feels like a very typical year of what we used to expect of the position, which is, you know, arguably four to five guys who could go in round one. Maybe it ends up somewhere in the middle half, you know, three or something like that too. But yeah, you're having to look through some of the smaller guys. That's a theme this year. Addison's tiny. He's 173 pounds. Jalen Hyatt is really thin. He's 180 pounds. Zay Flowers is five foot nine with short arms. Are these guys slots only? That's what you have to ask yourself. Tyler Scott from Cincinnati is another one. Marvin Mims, Jaden Reed, there's a bunch of them that are in that 5'10

180-ish range and you know you start looking there's Tyler Lockett in the league there's Stephon Diggs a little bigger but but same sort of body and then almost everybody else is like you know 5'11 6'0 195 200 or higher I mean it does give you a little bit of pause but i still think flowers is great i still think smith and jigba is great i you know i i i think there there are some talents in this group i just don't know that it's going to be jamar chase justin jefferson that kind of ability i think it's just height bias from you you just just are very against, you know, my wife for a woman is above average height and men who are shorter than her. There's always been like a little thing there.

And I don't know if that's her or that's like her perception. Like, oh, yeah, I was shorter than me. Like not like me because I'm five foot 11. You know, it's it's it's the thing with you tall, extra tall people. I know. Yeah. Hey, what can I say? I've been this way all my life.

I can't help it. I was born this way. I'm going to be biased against those 590s. I'm sorry. Well, but there's reason to be biased against anybody under 5'10". And that is called the history of football. I mean, because when you go back and look, it is super hard. I mean, so Steve Smith Sr senior is one of the most violent human

beings to ever play football. He's a vicious person. Most people aren't like that. And he's one of the only ones that you can find that's actually under five foot 10 that became a true NFL success story. Even Wes Welker, you know, and his hard nose gritty style, he's still like five, 10, five 11. So when we look at like a Josh Downs and even I have this thing with Zay Flowers where it's like man the guy is a ball player I'm just not sure that that's a good bet though based on like the Tavon Austins and the Tutu Atwells of the world yeah and that's and that's you know like David Achey and the running back some people you know want to get the ball in his hands a receiver return, returner, whatever. Same thing.

He's a lean guy who can't play exactly the same way he did in the NFL as he did in college. Now, that applies to a lot of players too, but I think you're right. I mean, the schemed up touches players who can't either naturally separate or win those one-on-one battles with some kind of physicality of some sort. They worry me a little bit, right? I mean, that's why, and again, I went into the combine thinking Jordan Addison needed to run a sub 4'4", like anything 4'3", 9", or lower. At 173 pounds is, I mean, we're now in that Devontae Smith discussion again.

Remember, he came out, he was 160, and he was over six foot, which is fascinating. Now, he's done very well for himself in two seasons. So do we put that to bed now? And he gets off press outside, and he separates. So I don't know. I mean, I'm always ambivalent about these scouting debates in general or whatever.

But, you know, like you said, the history of the NFL is a pretty good indicator of how these things work. If you kind of adjust for time and different things like that and throw out a couple exceptions, because if there's only one or two of them, it's not a trend. Right. And Smith was so special like as a as a route runner and as a playmaker on the football and as everyone as everyone saw when he caught but actually didn't catch but got credit for a catch in the playoffs um but i mean he yeah remind me the play remind me i'm trying to remember it was on the first drive against san francisco it was like a fourth down jalen hertz went down the sideline oh i think you said steve smith i'm sorry i was like oh yeah yeah san francisco wait when did they play that would have got well i i do like to watch old

games and i have watched a few jake delome hucking the ball to steve smith but i meant davante smith yes now i know yep but you know anyway the point just being that like he was really, really unique and I'm not sure that anybody else can just sort of snap their fingers and do that. So here you mentioned that you're putting together your mock. And so you are gathering information from all ends of the earth in order to do this. So I want to know what you want to know for me as you go to pick what you're going to do with the Vikings. And just like, aside from if you're doing the Hendon hooker dance. Right. All right. Let's, let's rank these. I'm going to ask you to rank these three possibilities,

staying at 23, trading up, trading down. How, what, what's most likely, what's the second most likely and what's the least likely it sounds like a pie chart which we really love on the show yeah uh percentages and yes yeah yeah yeah so um i will go then uh 60 on trade down i think and then i will go 30 on stay at number 23 and 10 on trade up the only trade up. The only trade up possibility is what we talked about with Will Levis. Like if there's somebody in that building who really loves Will Levis and that person has to be Kevin O'Connell and no one else, because no one else's opinion should matter as much as his.

But if Will Levis dropped to like 16, 17, but here's the, so here's the funny thing though I did the other day. So I looked on the other day. So I looked on the Jimmy Johnson chart and I took all the Vikings draft capital that they have all of this year. And if I did a Ditka trade, how far could it get me? It got me to 16. Okay. For 23, 16, that's all their draft capital. So who are you trading up for? How, what are you using to trade up? So I don't't know how do you feel about that yeah i i feel i i feel pretty good about the trade down option now unless they're willing to dip in

next year's pick and then it becomes this sort of kicking the can down the road thing i got another one for you here how how willing are the vikings to consider what you would call exceptions like we talked about earlier, right? The either the undersized receiver. Now, obviously defense is probably a position they're going to look long and hard at if they do stay at 23. So what about a guy like Emmanuel Forbes at 166 pounds, but the production six pick sixes in college? Who's who's ever done anything like that is off the charts or a kalijah

can't see for instance somebody who is the aaron donald ed uh i mean what's his name the the um buffalo bills d tackle i'm blanking on his name ed oliver yes thank you i knew you'd know it from from your buffalo days but um how willing are they now obviously change brian flores there now are are players like that in play for you know kind of an analytics driven front office and i would also throw in like a will mcdonald um excellent call yes yeah he's like 230 something as an edge rusher but they're going to use him as an outside linebacker so uh i think that they are very willing to do that and the evidence is just in last year's draft that i mean one they went against the grain by even picking andrew booth jr now so far they've gotten burned

on that but i had heard and maybe you've heard the same or different but i had heard that some teams were just not even looking at him because he was so injured in college and that they were pretty much terrified. But the Vikings said that even Kweisi Daffel-Mensah said he had gone to his people in the building and said, are you guys sure that we can do this with his injury history? And they were willing to kind of buck that. He's also not very big. Like he's pretty slender himself. Now, he's not 160. But I think that if they like any of those guys from...

Now, one of the things, though, that people have to keep in mind is just because Kweisi Adafo-Mensa knows data does not mean he just datas his way through everything, right? I think that was maybe even for myself. Like, oh, the analytics GM is here to analytics the hell out of the draft. And then they pick a guard in the second round. What? Wait a minute. Yeah, right.

One who was supposed to go on the fourth and then gave up a ton of sacks. But that's a different podcast. Hey, he started. I mean, that's better than everyone else in the class, right? Hey, in Hendon Hooker's days when he was growing up, starts would have been the way we evaluated it, right? Like as opposed to giving up 11 sacks, according to BFF. Yeah.

But yeah i i think very much though i think very much my thing the one thing i wonder about with someone like kalijah cancey is do they care about interior pressure because they signed dean lowry and harrison phillips and they wanted to keep delvin tomlinson it's like it just seems like they want stuffers in the middle, but there's so much on the table here. I mean, they need a corner for sure, but also we don't really know what's going on with the edge position. We don't know like what, uh, Daniel Hunter's future is. There's a lot of stuff that's up in the air. And I feel like in this draft in particular, maybe give me

your read on it, but I feel like if you're not willing to take little dudes, like you might as well just trade your draft picks for other stuff, because that's what this draft is. Especially at receiver, also at corner, even at safety for that matter. Like, you know, there are a couple longer, taller, even, you know, thickly built guys at that position. But, yeah, I think you're right. I mean, you know, running back, we have Jameer Gibbs at 199 pounds.

Like, I don't know if people realize that's small. You know, that's a specialty back weight, right? So this does apply. Obviously, you know, you look at defense, like linebackers are getting smaller. You know, you go to more sub-package defenses, things like that. You know, I mean, part of it is a trend in the industry, but also it's this draft class in particular i think you're right there's just not you know outside of the the freaks like blake

freeland and and darnell washington and whatnot i mean there really aren't those or dewan jones for that matter i mean those super long and thick and big guys more of a more of a smaller guy class which is interesting to note okay so now that i've given you this extra incredible insight here from viking land yes you don't have to give it away because you want people to click the mock but give me give me like a couple things that you're considering yeah i think i'd have to look at corner as an option um i wouldn't go in married to one pick i try not to obviously there's there's some you just can't avoid but if you think about let's say corner for them at 23 is you know devin witherspoon's gonna be long gone christian gonzalez gonna be long gone

i think joey porter is gonna be gone it comes down to almost like a Deontay Banks and Forbes we mentioned is another possibility. So, you know, you've got to be pretty needy to just say, all right, no matter who's there at that position, we're taking them, right? We feel so good about the possibilities that, you know, we'll take our fourth fifth or sixth corner I mean I don't know about that so at least that's not how most teams go about it other position would be somewhere on that defensive front I would imagine you know at that spot though edge would be in play I don't know that other than can't see there, there's at least not immediately, although I guess you could say Brian Bersih would fit that mold

of kind of the tough physical guy up front. I mean, that's not exactly what he does best, but he could still thrive in a system like that. So I don't know. It's going to be a tricky team projection for sure because I think this is going to be just big picture. This is going to be one of the hardest drafts to make a mock for and have any hope for accuracy.

I did well last year. I'm not assuming I'll do well this year. People don't know how difficult it is. The weight that you carry as a mocker, they just don't know. The world does not understand your plight. It's tough. It's tough out there. You're walking my shoes.

I do. You know, I do think that the most likely scenarios, though, for the Vikings are just not all that exciting. And that's the unfortunate part. It's like they have to rebuild this defense. My God, they have to rebuild this defense. My God, they have to rebuild this defense. And here's a crazy stat to take with you on the road. They have drafted 30 defensive players since 2015, you know, after 2015,

because they had that insane draft. Yeah, 30 defensive players. Three of them have come in the first or second round. I mean, they have spent no draft capital at the top. And guess what? They have a horrible defense i mean because that's that's life right uh and at some point and and i don't mean that's not including last year because we don't know what last year is going to be so that's 16 to 20 yeah 16 to 21

uh is the 30 guys three of them in the first two rounds it's like at some point you just have to start spending drafts on defense and no one really enjoys that. Like there was, there was a Lance Zierlein mock where he's got him taking the linebacker from Arkansas. And I'm like, Oh man, they're going to burn that place down if they do that. Or like the linebacker from Iowa, you're just like, it's going to be a huge problem. But I, I just feel like we're,

we're in a spot where the most likely scenario is trade down, maybe take a receiver in the third, take defensive players, and then all of us kind of go like, oh, well, okay. Yeah. Well, it's funny you say that too because I don't know Lance's methodology at all. I don't know who he talks to or whatever. I could actually see the Drew Sanders thing working, but at 23 you'd have to have a PowerPoint presentation

ready to come and convince people this is the right move. It may turn out to be, right? I mean, he's a one-year guy, essentially. You saw one year of tape at him at linebacker where he went after the passer. He's a former edge guy, whatever. If they do trade down, that's a name I would file away. He checks a lot of Patriots-ish boxes, right? You know, Patriots-ishy? I don't know what I'm saying. But, you know, if you're thinking Brian Flores has some say over who he likes, I could put Sanders on that list. But at 23, he might be doing what I did with Willie Gay a couple of years ago. I caught wind that the Chiefs like Willie Gay. And I thought, boy, would they take him at 31 oh

that's rich so i put him there knowing that there was a far greater chance they'd take him in round two so i didn't get it right but i got it right you know what i mean so i'm just wondering if lance may be using that that that logic for that so i don't know and he he did have a trade down i should clarify he did he did have a trade down so that should clarify. He did have a trade down. That helps. That's better. Yeah. Well, we've accomplished a lot here. I mean, we got to the bottom of Hendren Hooker.

We resolved all the Vikings draft. I mean, we always get a long way in doing this. I think this was a draw between us, just like every time we played chess. We both gave equal percentages here. It's a right. It's real. Let the record show that I believe our first game. I like, I saw you make a move with your Bishop and I was like, all right,

just slide the queen over. And I sacked my queen without accomplishing anything in the first game we played. So not every one of our games. I mean, I did that move because I've had that same setup or what I thought was the same setup, like five, 10 times in the last last two months i just didn't actually look at the board that was my problem so you did you did crush me on that first game pretty badly the jobaba london

opening if you miss that one move uh it'll get you is that what it's called it is called the jobaba london i'd heard but i didn't know Joe Baba. Well, I never heard of that. You know more. Yeah, there's a grandmaster and that's his name. He's maybe I don't want to guess on what country, but he's pretty creative. And so he came up with this system that a lot of other grandmasters adopted. And this is the one that it's the easiest to remember. So I taught my wife how to play it when we were just like learning chess. Like just do these moves and you'll have a chance.

And so it worked. It paid off. That's the only win in all of our games though. The rest are draws. Is that right? Jeez, okay. Well, after the draft, let's get after it. Rapid games will have some results.

Yeah, I can do that. Anyway, only like eight people who listen to the show know about anything we were just saying. We'll do a summer podcast. We'll educate the people, right? On chess. Mix some draft talk. Yeah.

Chess is hot right now. Eric at home, an absolute must, must follow. NFL.com. Really appreciate all your time. Always a super fun time when we get together. And we will absolutely do it again after the draft. Love it, buddy. Looking forward to it.

Enjoy everything up there in Minnesota Vikings land. And we'll see you soon.