Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Oddsmakers have Mike Zimmer as a favorite to be fired -- is that fair?

Episode Date: May 28, 2021

Jon Krawczynski of The Athletic joins for the Friday Roundtable to talk about Mike Zimmer being named one of the five coaches most likely to be fired first. Matthew Coller warns that firing coaches who are proven to be good isn't always the answer and Jon and Sam Ekstrom break down how the Wilfs will evaluate their head coach and whether Zimmer doing things his way has been a benefit or detriment. And how does Kirk Cousins play into their timeline with Zimmer? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Get Coors Light in the new look delivered straight to your door with Drizzly or Instacart, Coors Brewing Company, Golden, Colorado, and as always, celebrate! Hello and welcome to another Friday Roundtable here on Purple Insider. Matthew Collar, Sam Ekstrom, and joining us from The Athletic, taking a pause from reporting on legal matters and team sales and the Seattle Supersonics, which is who the Wolves are going to be in five years, John Krasinski. What is up, John?

What's up, fellas? It's nice to be away from a dysfunctional franchise and to one that's always totally no problems to worry about, you know, like a top, just nothing ever to be concerned about the Minnesota Vikings. It's a well-oiled machine with the Vikings. Level with me, John. Now that you're no longer obligated as an associated press man covering six

beats, which local team have you, like, ceased caring about? Who do you give no attention to now? I mean, I think it's pretty well documented. Like, the team in the suburbs, the Wild, like, I just, like, I don't think they even exist. Now, A, I'm happy for hockey fans that they've got their little run here, and it's great. But that's just, I only have so much bandwidth,

and there is none for the hockey boys in the suburbs so I tune those guys out you're a Minneapolis elitist I can respect oh 100% yes yes like nothing across the river even exists to me St. Paul Saints uh-uh who cares no what so my thing is just parking in St. Paul like maybe I would would go see, it's just a total mess. I would go see the team more often if it was at all possible to park there. And I love how they got to a game seven and we call it like a little run. Like, I mean, this is, this is the standard for the wilds. Like, well, they at least made it interesting in the first round. Good for them. I've told Sam before, for me, it's just baseball in general. Yeah. I just, you know, I don't have to talk about it anymore on the radio,

and I'm sorry. The Twins are really bad, and baseball is really bad. Remember when baseball wasn't really bad, John? I do remember that. No hitters every other night, and if you like the way a shortstop fielded the baseball, he actually got it from time to time. Yeah.

I mean, you're playing seven innings. All the games were nine innings or longer. Like, that's it. That was kind of cool. I mean, when the ball was actually put in play and not either just hit over the fence or thrown back to the pitcher after a strikeout, that was kind of fun too. The other thing with baseball too is, like, a lot of the kind of darlings that were in these huge markets that had these 80-, 90-, 100-year World Series droughts all won.

Like the Red Sox storyline sort of got taken out of play. The Cubs got taken out of play. The Dodgers got one. The White Sox got one. All of these cursed franchises kind of got off the schneid, and now there's no, like, lovable loser to root for either. Like a lot of the storylines have evaporated. Yeah, I mean, like, the losers are kind of unlikable, right? The Oakland A's, like who, who wants to root for them with their cheapskate owner? And, um, you know, yeah, you don't have

the Cubs or the Red Sox. I mean, I'm trying, I mean, the twins with all, with their playoff drought, I mean, maybe they're the closest thing to bad boy, you really want to see if they can break through it. But, yeah, I mean, maybe, I don't know, I might like go for the Brewers because their uniforms are cool. But, like, yeah, it's hard to find people like that. I mean, I could not find, like, you put Mike Trout at this dining room table with me and I wouldn't know him at all. So it's like, it's kind of crazy.

If baseball didn't have great stadiums for people to go sit outside during the summertime, it would have just disappeared. It's a soap event. That's totally what it is. That's what the Cubs were forever. Like, just go to Wrigley Field and have beers and enjoy. And, you know, oh, by the way, catch a couple innings here and there. Like, that's what it is.

And, hey, by the way, catch a couple innings here and there. Like, that's what it is. And, hey, great. You know, but it's like a super expensive outdoor summer club to go to. That's a good way to put it. All right, we'll move on from baseball and hockey. And good luck to you, Wild. Let's talk about Mike Zimmer and the potential for him to get fired. And here's why. Here's why.

Because BetOnline has released its odds of coaches to get fired first and mike zimmer is fifth on this list and i'm going to start off just gonna make this statement and then john you react and sam go forth uh i think that there's a little be careful what you wish for with the idea of firing mike zimmer if this year is not any more than in the middle. And the reason I say that is because that Zimmer sets a standard of professional head football coaching that you can win with. And if you change that, you might just get someone who is horrible. You can change players and rosters and coaches, but I'm sorry, and quarterbacks, but there's only so many coaches who know how to do this job. And I think you saw a little bit of this, I don't

know, for the entire time you've coached the Wolves, that they've only had a few real professional coaches. So react to that statement, John. Yeah, I agree with it. I mean, I've kind of said for a long time that you, there is a floor with Mike Zimmer that's relatively high. And, you know, there is – you can look at some of the development of the draft picks that they've had and just kind of the – like you said, Matthew, like the standard that is being set. You know that by and large, I mean, you're not going to have embarrassing seasons. You're not going to have just awful, awful years. And maybe you could argue, well, maybe they should have one or two of those so they have a top five draft pick and do all that.

But in the middle of it, like there's a level of competence with Mike Zimmer that you just know you're going to get year in and year out. What is his ceiling? I guess that's the question that certainly is valid when you're looking at evaluating what he is because when he gets into the biggest of moments in postseasons and against really good teams, they generally are pretty outclassed. So I think you can evaluate that. But, yes, in terms of knowing what you're going to get from a Mike Zimmer coach team,

you're going to get discipline, you're going to get confidence, you're going to get competitiveness, generally speaking, most of the time. And I think there is a value in just being good year in and year out. So here are the six coaches in the league that are longer tenured than Mike Zimmer. John Harbaugh, Andy Reid, Bill Belichick, Sean Payton, Mike Tomlin, and Pete Carroll. What do the six of them have in common? They've all won a Super Bowl. They've all got at least one Super Bowl. So Mike Zimmer is in somewhat rarefied air, and he's also the one that doesn't belong coaches that don't win super bowls typically don't last this long especially coaches that have never won multiple playoff games in the same postseason that being said Matthew when you talk about the scenario of sort of thinking the grass will be

greener and then it not being greener think about the Detroit Lions in the division who had Jim Caldwell who went I just looked this up 36 and 28 he was a 563 winning percentage head coach and they exchanged that for Matt Patricia and they go into dysfunction zone they've fired him since they've got a whole new regime they've got a rebuild they've got a quarterback that got so disgruntled he asked for a trade. So that's sort of the low end, right, of what you worry about, for sure. And if the Vikings make a move, I think they're probably compelled to go someone young and someone offensive-minded, and that can be a gamble because a lot of times those type of coaches don't have a lot of track record. You're sort of betting on what they did in college or what they did in one or two years as a coordinator or a quarterback's coach. There's not a lot of proof there. Whereas, you know, someone like Mike Zimmer came in who had this three-decade career

as a head coach, you kind of knew what you were getting in terms of a defensive mind. So I like that you're being cautionary about it. I would also like to know, Matthew, who were the top four on that list on BetOnline that you mentioned? Okay, hang on. Let me pull this up because I have this. That would be, let's see. No, hold on. Wrong tab.

Sorry. This is great. That would be Mike McCarthy, Vic Fangio, Matt Nagy, and John Gruden were all the guys who were before them. So I think that the list is a good list of guys who could be on the hot seat. I don't know if they would can Gruden with the amount of money he's still owed. And that might be a factor with Zimmer to signing that extension last year.

But John, I think that Sam makes a really good point about like when teams move on from a defensive coach, who's old school, who had been a defensive coordinator for a long time sort of grizzled and so forth they always always want the young innovative this guy knows sean mcveigh or something and you've kind of been through this going from tibbs to ryan saunders where it's like tibbs had his flaws as mike zimmer has his flaws but it was like ah saunders he's the young guy he's gonna shoot threes. Great. And it wasn't great because he didn't know how to coach a basketball team.

And I think that that's always the concern when I talk about the grass is greener. Like who you're hiring, the sort of setup here would be, oh, they'll hire an offensive genius. And I'm just – I'm always cautionary about that. Yeah. I mean, you know, it's really interesting when, you know, looking at those two lists that Sam gave, that Sam and Matthew, you both gave us. So the two lists that Mike Zimmer has coupled in, one is with the longest tenured, and that list is unimpeachable great coaches,

right? I mean, we all agree, I mean, that all of those guys really, really good at what they do. And then so Zimmer's right on the edge with those guys. But then you go back to the bet online and all of those guys probably pretty bad coaches. Like, you know, I mean, maybe you make an argument for one or two like that. They're not so bad, but they've really not had a lot of success. And then there's Zimmer right on the edge of that one too. And so it's just kind of you can see how the pendulum can swing pretty wildly when you're looking at Mike Zimmer and his body of work. But you're right in terms of if they do make a move,

there's always sort of the overcorrection. There's always defense to offense. You know, Childress was an offensive coach, so we're going defense. And there's always sort of the overcorrection. There's always defense to offense. Often, you know, Childress was an offensive coach, so we're going defense. Or Leslie Frazier, you know, then Leslie Frazier was an easygoing coach, and then we're going hard-nosed, you know, no-nonsense guy. And so I think that it really takes kind of a security in yourself as an ownership group, as a GM, whoever's making the decision, that to not overreact and to really look at a field and say, I'm not going to pigeonhole myself by just because we had kind of more of an old school defensive minded

guy, that all of those guys are off the table, that all the defensive guys are off the table. I mean, in general, in the league, everyone's hiring offensive guys just because that's the way the league is built. But to me, I think it, you really have to fight the urge to just do the massive overcorrection and just like evaluate the field and say, these are the three or four people that we think are the best let's just put them up against each other and make a decision that way

but again this is all assuming that something like this were to happen I mean I think with Zimmer you know we talk about the floor that he has and the reason for keeping him around that way but the other thing you factor in is he's had a couple of players that kind of get tired of him or kind of get disenchanted, disenfranchised, and really, really good players, Stephon Diggs, Daniil Hunter. Like, you know, when those kind of things come around, that's when you look at it too. Like, okay, is there something beyond just his coaching ability? Because Tibbs was a really, really good coach.

No one really questioned that, but it was his ability behind the scenes to manage personalities, to do all of the locker room politics that made him wear out here quickly. And I think that's the thing that I could see, you know, maybe forcing a hand with Zimmer as much as anything else. Yeah, not much to add to that John other than you could make a similar two lists for a certain quarterback on this team a list where you look at the last six seven years of statistical data belongs with the elite of the elite and you could also put him with a like top five list of quarterbacks set to be replaced either this year or the next year.

And I think Kirk Cousins probably belongs in both of those categories as well. And there are similarities between the head coach's situation and the quarterback's situation. And you need cohesiveness in those two positions. And right now there's a lot of uncertainty, I think, on both fronts. It's a great point, Sam. Like, you know, Cousins obviously has an entirely different personality than Zimmer, but both guys are exceedingly competent at their jobs. There is a floor with Kirk Cousins as your quarterback in an offense that you're never going to drop below. He's super durable. He's going to be out there.

He's going to put up numbers. But then in the biggest of games, when you need him the most, that's when oftentimes he falls flat. And that's the same with Zimmer. Like in the biggest of games, when you need him the most, that defense gets freaking shredded by San Francisco or Philadelphia or, you know, in these kinds of situations. And so you look at it and you say, okay, like how, what's our goal here?

And do you just, do you stay the course with Cousins and Zimmer? And do you say, we just believe in these guys and we believe the alternatives out there are not going to be any better than we can get right now or do you like swing for the fences and say you know it's time to it's time to you know maybe it's kellen mon next year maybe it's um you know maybe you bring in the next hot shot offensive coordinator next year and just say look we we we've run our course this way we have gotten as far as we can go, and we need to go try and get someone who can take us the rest of the way. And if that blows up, well, at least you tried something. And at least you tried something different,

and then you kind of go back to square one a little bit. So great points from both of you there. And my thing is the grass isn't always greener, so you have to be careful. But that doesn't mean that you can't do it under any circumstances or there isn't a case for it in some type of situation. Like maybe there was a good case for it when Tibbs got fired by the Wolves because they just needed to move on. And even though they moved on to the wrong guy, they needed to move on.

And I think of the Los Angeles Rams a little bit for this. They had Jeff Fisher. Jeff Fisher was Mr. 7 and 9, Mr. 8 and 8. And then they move on and Sean McVay takes over with a quarterback who was on a rookie contract, number one overall pick. They built up the roster. It's amazing how this works sometimes, right, where the roster all of a sudden gets great.

You know, the defensive roster is great in 2017 the Vikings are number one the defensive roster is bad they're number 29 it's almost like the roster has more to do with this and I do think that you make a good point about the Stefan Diggs thing has not stuck to Zimmer because of Justin Jefferson but if Justin Jefferson was not here I don think Zimmer is. I think if they draft Jalen Rager last year, they go 5-11 or 4-12 and Mike Zimmer is gone. But Justin Jefferson took over games and helped them at least be respectable. So we have to think of that too, that it's a good point that there have been some players who have been alienated during this time, which I think does happen over years and years. And there's the fact that Zimmer is not progressive when it comes to his

offensive system and how he wants to play. Sam wrote about that last year with just running on second and 10 and doing things that are inefficient. So there is, there is this push and pull of it. And I think John, that what it comes down to in a lot of ways is like, what are you doing with the quarterback?

Because if you are going to move on from Kirk Cousins you could make an argument that you want a coach who will continue to keep you competent and build a good defense and then you could set it set up a new quarterback with a solid foundation of an organization that's been here for a while you could you could also say if you're going to keep Kirk Cousins someone else needs to come in who's going to have him throw the ball more and just see if that'll work like it just feels like both of them moving together are going to yield the same results yeah that's I mean that's possible for sure I mean you could look at it like let's say eventually you know let's say that you do transition to Kellen Mond like do you want you, it would probably be easier on Mond to ease in to an

offense where you're handing the ball to Dalvin Cook a lot, where you're running play action and you're able to kind of, you don't have the weight of the entire offense on your shoulders, but it also could be restrictive. I mean, who's to say that Justin Jefferson in two years won't look around and say, man, give me the damn ball or get me out of here. You know, like that's what happened with Diggs. And that certainly could happen with Jefferson, or maybe it's not. Maybe he'll be just a great soldier and everything will be great with that. But, yeah, I mean, you just have to, I think this is just a huge year for them. Because, I mean, I think the Wilfs in general love to be pragmatic they love to be

viewed as not knee-jerk as as as we're going to be the stable franchise like we're going to be the one that kind of aspires to this to be above the fray and not give in to pressures and and react quickly when things go poorly we're sticking with our. But they've done that for a long, long time now with both Spielman and with Zimmer. And so if it doesn't work out this year, like if they fall flat this year, I think then the drumbeat probably starts to go even louder. And that's going to be the whole key to this, is that you reach a point where the body of work is large enough, the sample size is large enough that you know what a person is.

You know, the coaches love to say, you are what your record says you are. And Zimmer's record says he's a really, really good regular season coach, and then he gets waxed in the playoffs. Like, you know, like that's what it is. So he's going to have a large sample to evaluate. And hey, if they go, you know, 11 and six this year and win the division and that you win a playoff game and you're super competitive in an NFC title game or something like that, then you keep rolling with it. And I think you can keep going. But if it continues to happen where the team in the biggest of moments delivers a stinker,

then you have to look hard at saying, is this guy for as competent and as solid as he is, is he Mark Jackson and not Steve Kerr? Like, is that what we're looking at? Is he Jeff Fisher and not Sean McVay? Like, we don't think he's, you know, he's not Tom Sula. He's not, you know, some of these, you know, other guys that look completely overmatched. I think he's better than Gruden by a lot,

by as far stretch as a tactician, as a coach. But still, I mean, he is taking you as far as can be. And if they were to pull the plug on him after this year, after another similar outcome, it's not going to be a situation where they say, well, you didn't give him enough of a chance. You know, like, oh boy, why are you overreacting? You know, slow down here. Don't overreact on that. So the body of work is large enough that it just feels like this year is an especially important kind of make or break season for Zimmer and maybe for Spielman as well. Yeah, I think it's interesting

too that in this offseason, and Matthew and I were preaching, hey, give Kirk more weapons. Let's bolster the offense. Make it a top five unit. Make it a top three unit. Don't settle for being top 10 and being good enough. Don't settle for 26 points a game. Try to score 31 points a game, and they didn't do that. I think they looked at their past successes and they said, okay, the 2015 team won the division. How'd they do it? Very conservative offense and an excellent defense. 2017 team, extremely similar in their approach. 2019 team, a little more weight on the offense that year, but that was still very much based around a defense with a ton of veterans that had all been there since 2015. And it seems like they decided, okay, even if we get Kirk more weapons, maybe they thought, well, is he going to do a lot with it?

Because he's Kirk Cousins, and it seems like there's not a high ceiling with him, even if he has the weapons around him. So they said, well, we're just going to double down on the defense and try to build up that unit. We will aspire to have a top three defense, and they'll roll the dice with that. And Matthew and I were talking at OTAs yesterday, a lot of what-ifs on this defense. They are counting on so many things to go right that are not guarantees, like Xavier Woods has to come in in year one and be a pretty effective safety. They need Patrick Peterson to get back to his old form. They need Mackenzie Alexander to pick up where he left off here,

and they need whoever's playing opposite Daniil Hunter to be competent. There's just a lot of question marks on that defense, far more, I think, than they had in 17 or 19 or even 15. Well, and I honestly think, guys, that I think Zimmer is still scratching at the scars of John DeFilippo. Like, I really do. Because that was the time, right, where they said, okay, to take the next step, we're going to go with super experimental, forward-thinking offensive mind. We're going to try and unlock this offense and really let it go. And it didn't go well.

And so, you know, he has, the times that Zimmer has had most of his success with this team, and the best seasons have been, as you said, Sam, with stout defense, you know, kind of conservative offense. And the one time that he took the swing and tried to go Nick Crozier on it and really open things up, boy, it didn't work out, and you're firing him midseason, and it's a whole mess. And so that, again, gets back to, like, our whole conversation from earlier of do you overcorrect?

And, you know, and so, like, I think Zimmer overcorrected maybe with kind of going from super advanced offensive mind to more vanilla, more conservative, let's just play it safe, when, gosh, he has these weapons. Like you have Dalvin Cook. You have Thielen. You have Jefferson. You have the tight ends that they have.

You have all of this good stuff going, and it feels like you could get more out of them if you were to go with an offensive mind that wants to get after him. Just because the last one didn't work doesn't mean you'd go with another McVeigh disciple and it wouldn't work out great. And so I just think he is very dogmatic to his style and his approach because it has generally worked for him to a certain level of success here. And when he's tried to stray outside of that boundary, then it hasn't worked at all.

And, you know, and he's using that to kind of put his heels in the dirt and say, this is the way that I believe in. And so, again, like one thing about that is that I enjoy and that I respect is that if he gets fired, he'll just say, hey, I did it my way. I didn't do any – I didn't get pressured into anything. I did it my way. I think what some coaches and Ryan's founders among them try to please people, try to do things they think other people want them to do, and then it's just a muddled mess. And so at least with Zimmer, he can say, this is my way. And so if he succeeds, oh boy, then he's going to really be walking tall. And it's like, see, I told you guys, like, this is the way it's going to be. So that's, he's,

he's going to do it the way he wants to do it. And if he, if it doesn't work out, he can at least say, I stepped with my principles, with what I believed in and hey, it ended where it ended. Hey everyone, Summer is here and you're trying to get out on the golf course but if you're like us here at Purple Insiders spending all day golfing isn't always an option that's why you need to check out Birdie Golf in Woodbury I'll give you an example my wife is new to golf and she's intimidated by the big courses but at Birdie Golf she could come and play without the pressure. You can make golf a family experience at Birdie Golf. Bring the kids, still get all of your swings in. They have eight of the world's best golf simulators where you can sharpen your swing and still have a great time.

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Go to SodaStick.com for your original Minnesota sports inspired goods. Code Purple Insider for free shipping. This is such an interesting observation because with Zimmer doing it all his way, in a lot of ways I think that it has worked for him extremely well in his career. He's had a very successful career. He's had great defenses. But there's also a part that sort of self-destructs a little bit. And 2018 is a great example of this because I just called this up 2018 before

Mike Zimmer publicly called out John D Filippo for not running the football enough, which came after the jets game, Kirk cousins was, they were five, two and one Kirk cousins had 14 touchdowns, three picks, 102 quarterback rating,

and was one of the top quarterbacks in the league at that point with John DeFilippo calling the shots. After that, it fell apart. They lost two of the next three games. Detroit was mixed in, so congratulations. And then they had the bad loss against New England, the bad loss against Seattle that ultimately got DeFilippo fired. Now, I am not saying that DeFilippo had all the answers, but I think that it sort of drove Zimmer crazy that they were not playing Zimmer type of football and he couldn't stay hands off even when they won the game where he was upset. They won the game

37 to 17 was the game that he was upset about. And that has always lingered in his mind, it seems, from hiring Kevin Stefanski, but then bringing in Gary Kubiak to make sure they run the ball enough. Then having Kubiak last year and overrunning the ball. And waiting until, if you look at Justin Jefferson's second half of the game, stats versus first half, waiting until you're behind to throw to your absolute best player who is destroying the entire universe in his rookie year. So kind of waiting to do that. And so at that point, Zimmer went from, ah, yeah, the defensive coach with these offensive

coordinators or whatever, to the coach who runs absolutely everything. And we even see that, I think, for the roster and the way that it's built to the exact specs that he wants it. So in some ways, it's like, yes, yes he did it his way which I think you can respect and appreciate but also sort of took himself apart by not trusting the guy that he hired to be his offensive coordinator to just do his job and to have as as much hands-on stuff with the roster to make a move last year and I don't want to directly blame him for this but like Yannick Ngakwe just screams Mike Zimmer demanded a pass rusher because he knew that Ifadi Adenabo wasn't good enough. And that

blows up in their face. So it's a really interesting dynamic there with Zimmer of like this push and pull of the things that he gives you that are great, but also the sort of issues that come along with that. Yeah, I mean, like, you know, you look at it too, is like the sign of a good leader is that he can empower the people around him, right? And so I think that one of the problems or one of the issues that Zimmer faces is when he's upset with something,

he doesn't like how it's going, you know, like there is no sugarcoating. There is no, I'm going to say what needs to be said to support my guy publicly and maybe behind the scenes we'll talk about it but like everyone knew that he did not like the way that the DeFilippo stuff was going and so that kind of takes away some of DeFilippo's authority some of his credibility within the team They know that he's not the head coach's guy. And so there's doubt that lingers in what he's doing from game to game. And so when you do that, because as much of a defensive coordinator as Mike Zimmer is, he's an offensive or a defensive coach.

He's an offensive coach, too, because he is always involved and he wants the certain style of play being you know done his way and and so you know like that is this is not a case of hey I'm the defensive coach I need to hire an offensive coach and he does exactly what he ever he thinks needs to happen like that's not the way that it works here this is Mike Zimmer through and through which is always why always why I've always been confused by the roster construction or roster approach in terms of like, you know that you are a head coach that prides yourself on physical play, on dominating the line of scrimmage, on really imposing your will on your opponent.

And that's what his offense was built on And that's what his offense was built on. That's what his defense was built on. But they have never really prioritized the offensive line to the degree that allows you to dictate the terms of engagement the way that I think would best work for a Zimmer team. You have, you know, you have just great thoroughbred skill position players, but then there's that feeling put on the teams because your offensive lines can't stand up to the big bad boys that you face in the playoffs

from a defensive standpoint. And so that's what I've just always looked at. It's been a curiosity of mine. And now, you know, with this draft and with kind of a few things they're doing they're trying to it feels like they're trying to kind of finally address that but for years and years it just it didn't compute with what they were doing with with the philosophy and then with how they were built that way yeah they've never had a lot of glass eaters on that offensive line and they they talk about wanting physicality.

And Mike Zimmer talks about how good it feels to be able to run the ball down a team's throat. But they don't really resemble that kind of archetype. When you look at the line, you've got a bunch of 280-pounders who kind of struggle with their strength and struggle with their pass protection. They don't pancake a lot of people out there. So in that sense, you're right. And I think in general, to your first point, Zimmer, he's not really a delegator. He's pretty type A, and he's very confident in the things he does.

And he doesn't trust a lot of other people. You know, he has insisted all these years to continue calling the plays. You know, he every year goes through this where he thinks about it, he toys with it, and he never gives it up because he wants to do that. I don't think he trusts anybody else to sort of run the show because that's his baby. And when he sees risk brought into the offense, I think his instinct is to say no no no

no no I want the fewest things to go wrong on that side of the ball so that I can sort of you know pull the strings on my side of the ball so we've got a quarterback in case Keenum who's taking too many risks whoa dial it back uh we've got a play caller who's going to air it out on a windy day in New York. Dial it back. And I think that's always going to be his type A personality, which enables him to be a hardworking coach. You know, he gets there at 4.30 a.m. and that's sort of his idea of leading from the coaching position, which is not always, it's not the most progressive way I think that we think of leadership, but that's the way he does it. and it's worked for him for a lot of years. And I think we might be starting now to sort of poke a few holes in that methodology.

But again, if the victories come, he looks brilliant. And when they're losing, it doesn't look brilliant. So winning cures all issues, I think, in this case. Well, there's another part of it, too, that is, you know, the quarterback. I mean, which is actually the biggest part of all these things. Because if you are a head coach who, you know, manipulates a couple people, an offensive coordinator, you know, a linebacker, receiver, whatever, and your quarterback is able to take you to the next level no matter what. Think about Aaron Rodgers in Green Bay like I'm sure Matt LaFleur is a good coach I'm certain of it but you know Mike McCarthy

may not have been a good coach at all and they certainly won a lot with him with Aaron Rodgers just being Aaron Rodgers and doing incredible things and it covered up and painted over a lot when you have a quarterback who doesn't paint over everything or anything in Kirk Cousins case what you end up seeing is all the holes in the patchwork right or all in the foundation I think that that's like sort of this conversation is we have covered Mike Zimmer for so long we know all the dings and cuts and if you guys well I know Sam has I'm sure you have John when you buy a house you go through it with a guy and he's like, well, this is wrong and that's wrong. And then you go, oh my God, why am I buying this house? But then, you know, it turns out it's mostly fine. But like, we're doing the same thing with Zimmer of sort of saying this is wrong and this is wrong and this is wrong. But really, if you have the quarterback who can

make up for any of your shortcomings, because no coach is perfect. And even Bill Belichick goes seven and nine when he doesn't have Tom Brady. It's this is this is kind of what we see and that's where it sort of circles back to my general concept of like when when you have a guy who prepares his team from day one like unlike say the Carolina Panthers who weren't even practicing right according to Teddy Bridgewater from day one of OTAs to the end of the season they will be prepared for games they will be they will they will practice the nfl way they will have the detail level the schematic level like those things just gets you to a baseline that a lot of coaches don't and if you hire the next guy you could ruin more years of justin jefferson because you hired

someone who doesn't know how to do those things let Let me ask you this, John. I kind of want to wrap on this point because you have more teams being sold to cover. Sam and I have both been covering the team for a while now. From the moment I got here to this moment right now, I have no idea what the Wilfs think about anything. Anything. No one, like there are no leaks. There's no person you send a little dm to or text to say what are you thinking about this like why don't you just kind of let me in on this

nobody there is nothing that ever comes out from them and when we talk to mark wilf once a year he says almost nothing right except for we expect to make the playoffs whichever owner is going to say you have been around longer than I. Do you have any sense? It's the most common question that I get all the time. What do the Wilfs think about X, Y, and Z? And I have not found a way to answer these questions, John. Yeah, no, it's hard to get a read on them for sure. Like what has become apparent and what was apparent right from the start,

but certainly, you know, as the years have gone on, they having grown up in New Jersey are want to be the Maris. They want to be the Roonies. They view it as we will stay as behind the scenes as possible. It will be the people out front in the organization are Spielman, are the head coach, are the GMs. They're our leaders. We are not going to undercut them in any way, shape, or form. And they don't have any sort of the sort of kind of ego that goes with it where like they will just they will say you know oh off the record I wanted I didn't want Kirk Cousins you know or off the record um I thought we should have traded up to

draft Justin Fields like you know just so you know like they are not covering their tracks in any way because they just don't want to play that game. I think that they are intensely sensitive about being viewed as meddlers, about being viewed as the, you know, the Jerry Joneses of the world are like the kind of antithesis. Like they can't imagine being that kind of out front because they don't, they do not want to be public figures like at all. And, and so the more that they would wade into situations publicly, then the more they're

going to be asked to wade into those situations. And that's just, that is not their cup of tea. They're intensely private and they want to do it. But it has, you're right, like generally speaking with most organizations it is easier to kind of run some flags up the flagpole and try and get at least some indications of which way the wind is blowing with them it's really hard to do that with these guys um and and so i think that you know that is what kind of would make this a very, very attractive job for any GM or any president or any coach to get because you don't have to worry about them, you know, getting in the way, taking the headlines, not, you know, meddling and not letting you make your decisions. They just don't do that. And so it's been a very, very interesting run for them.

And I can't say that I know what their philosophy is, that I know, like, how they make their decisions because they don't justify them. They don't explain them to us. So, you know, they very much put everything much more on Spielman and Zimmer to, you know, they'll rise and fall with them, but they never fall because they never make any firings or anything like that. So I don't have a read. I wish I did, but it's there. They're just intensely private guys, and it's a whole different thing than over at the Timberwolves spot. A couple points on the Wilfs, and then I have a one-off question for John that's related a bit to your Timberwolves beat. The people I've talked to about the Wilfs, not within the Vikings organization,

but more on the business side of things like stadium construction people, have told me how dogged they are as arbitrators, how they will, you know, go tooth and nail to try to save a million dollars if, like, they're trying to fix the panels on the stadium, for instance. That's the kind of thing that they invest a lot of energy in, and I think that's reflective of what sort of takes up a lot of their bandwidth. It's not, who are you going to make your starting tight end this year? That's not what they're concerned about. They're concerned about making wise investments and then developing those investments so they can make profit. That's why they invest in an e-sports franchise. That's why, you know, they buy what, Orlando City soccer team. That's why they got a

cheap professional football team and have turned them into a cash behemoth with a new facility and a new stadium that has hosted a Super Bowl and a Final Four. Like they are interested, I think, in development. That's their background. The Omni Hotel, you know, Viking Lakes, the whole land around Egan, like that was their vision. And that probably takes up a lot of their day-to-day. I don't think the day-to-day operations of the football team are hugely in their mind. Maybe the big picture stuff. And again, we don't know all of their inner workings. We don't know if it's, you know, Mark who cares more about this stuff or Ziggy or Leonard, who I don't think I could recognize on a street. But in that sense, John, they would have been the perfect Timberwolves

owners. And I know there was a period of time where we thought they might be involved. I think Adam Schefter had a report about that that was quickly kiboshed. But my question for you, John, one-off here is, I know you're a good reporter. You'll probably find a way to get A-Rod on speed dial. But will it be tough to lose Glenn being as accessible as he is for you and for your colleagues because he's such a rare breed who's willing to talk and kind of give his insight on anything. Hey, everyone. I want to tell you about our friends at Scout Logistics. And I really do mean it when I say friends.

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to find out how Scout Logistics can minimize risk and overperform and go the extra mile for your company. Yeah, I mean, absolutely. We can always disagree with the decisions that Glenn Taylor makes. We certainly can say that over the years, in general, he's made poor decisions because they are where they are from a competitive standpoint but the one thing that I've always had respect for is I never had to guess why he did something he will tell you why he did it and I think that you know that's to me important if I'm a fan of a franchise if I'm investing in a franchise, is like having some transparency, having some

kind of someone who will explain themselves to me, the paying customer, or me, the media member, and at least put the information out there for people to digest. And they can say, oh, yeah, that makes sense. I agree with that, Glenn. Or boy, what an idiot. Like, oh, yeah, that makes sense. I agree with that, Glenn, or boy, what an idiot. Like, why would you do that? But at least like he understands that he is the figurehead of a public entity and there should be some sort of transparency and accountability with fans and some message sending. Yeah, you're right. I mean, like the Wilfs don't do that. I don't know if Laurie and Rodriguez will do that.

I'm not sure. I'm hoping so. But it has been a valued part of covering the Timberwolves is that being able to have at least some insight into the inner workings of what's going on. We don't know with the Vikings. Like we just don't know. But to your point, Sam, about that is like, you know, you're right. And like they have concentrated fully on what they know best, real estate development, you know, that kind of

commercial enterprises that those types of things to their credit. One thing they haven't done, which we often see owners do is they, you know, an owner will make a billion dollars in the software game and then come in and then start telling his GM what players to pick. Like, and it's like, oh, I know this. I watch these games on TV. Like I, I'm, I'm an expert. I'm going to weigh in here. And, and we've seen that time and time again in all, in all professional sports, like the

ego that comes with it and like, oh, this is not a big deal. Like I'm going to, yeah, I'm going to do that. But with, with Glenn Taylor, one thing that Glenn Taylor and the Will family have in common is that whoever they hire, those are the people that are making the decisions with the personnel, you know, with, with the game itself. And, and so I think that is the best way to go about it. Clearly it has not worked out for Glenn because he had hired the wrong people

for a long time with the will. They've hired Spielman who's done well in the draft. They've hired Zimmer who coaches who has done well as a coach. Like, and they're just saying, all right, you guys handle the football. We're going to handle all the ancillary stuff around it because we're making a ton of money off the football. And it's not that they don't want to win, but it's like we're going to stick with what we know best

and you stick with what you know best and then we'll make the decisions after that. Which I think is decidedly the right way to go because Johnny Manziel texted the owner of the Cleveland Browns and then they just drafted him. Like, oh, okay, I guess we're doing that. To be fair though, like the Vikings wanted Johnny. That's right.

They got lucky there, you know, and you need a little luck on your side as well, but they absolutely got lucky that they weren't able to get up that the Browns outbid them or else Johnny would have been in purple and uh who knows what would happen okay John since we've kept you far longer than uh I intended to we have to end with something fun because it's been very heavy so I have a list from the Guardian of the top 30 boy band members of all time. I also have the Vikings roster. So I'm going to give you a name.

You have to tell me top 30 boy band member or camp body. Okay. Oh, man. All right. Okay. So first name, Turner Bernard. Is that a Vikings camp body or is that a top 30 boy band member of all time from the Guardians? I am going to say Viking.

That is a Viking long snapper, yes. Their backup long snapper. Okay. Miles Dorn. Is this a boy band member or is this a Viking? Viking. Man, two for two. Are you guessing or do you know, John?

No, I literally have no idea. I have no idea who either of those two guys are. Okay. This is a Viking or this is a boy band member. All right. Jordan Scott. And Jordan is spelled J-O-R-D-O-N. Jordan Scott.

Man, the O-N. Jordan Scott. Man, the O-N. See, now I'm playing the numbers game and thinking, would he go three Vikings in a row? But man, that D-O-N is total boy band-ish. I'm going Viking. Man, that's three Vikings in a row. Alright.

Okay, alright. So next name on the list is Zion Malik is the next one on the list. Is Zion Malik a – That's got to be a boy band member. Man, four for four. Bam. I don't know what boy band he was in, but he's on this list.

Okay. All right. I think I've heard that name. Am I, like, sharing my screen or something with you? All right. We've got to stump him. We've got to go until we stump him. Okay, fine.

Jordan Knight. Oh, that's a new kid on the block. Dang. Wow. Yeah. Now we're in his wheelhouse. Yeah, that was back when I was a kid, and my sister was a huge NKOTB fan. So you're not going to get that one.

Still not stumped him. Xanaday Johnson. That's a Viking. All right. Got that one right. I'm running out of Vikings here. AJ Rose. Boy band.

Okay, we got it. Finally, we got it. AJ Rose is a running back. He wears number 36. He's not going to play in the NFL. There you go. Finally. Boy, that sounds like a Backstreet Boy, doesn't it?

AJ Rose. Yeah, that's why I – There wasn't AJ in the band. Yeah, there had to be, right? I think so. I'm not super familiar with any of these names, but there you have it. Any two initial, like initial like first name you know yeah with an inanimate object flower or something yeah like that's a boy band member well done he

probably was in one when he was a kid so i'll have to ask if we ever get if we ever get access to the guys who aren't going to make it uh john great stuff really great to catch up with you um really appreciate it and you're doing incredible work that people should read if they are interested in what is going on with the Wolves. And we'll get you out to cover some football soon, I'm sure. So thanks for your time, man. Great to catch up. And we'll talk again soon. Thanks, fellas.

Talk to you soon. Thanks, John.