Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Paralympian Chuck Aoki talks Vikings and going for gold

Episode Date: July 13, 2024

Matthew Coller is joined by co-captain of the U.S. Wheelchair Rugby team Chuck Aoki. Chuck, outside of representing the country at multiple Olympics, is a huge Vikings fan. Coller and Chuck talk about the Vikings heading into training camp as well as competing for a gold medal. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

🎵 Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of Purple Insider. A very special episode. Matthew Collar here, and I am here with the co-captain of the U.S. wheelchair rugby team, Chuck Aoki. Also, maybe the world's most gigantic minnesota vikings fan i am in ann arbor michigan so that means i flew here just to talk to chuck there's an article also coming out on his journey as well so make sure that you uh keep an eye out for that over at purple insider.com but we are in your living room here open concept for those fans of uh house hunters but i am absolutely thrilled to be here with you and i am incredibly excited because the paralympics are coming up

once every four years you get a shot to chase gold so why don't we start out right there with how you feeling man like how's your summer how exciting is this for you to have another chance? You have, is it two silvers and a bronze? And this is another chance to chase gold. So how are you feeling? Well, you know, at the moment, obviously, the highlight of my summer is being on the Purple Insider podcast. And then we'll just see where we go from here. It's hard to imagine we could get much higher than this.

No, feeling excited, you know. I've just wrapped up a training camp with the team a few days ago. We've got one more to go. We will leave for Paris on August 20th. So a little bit of time to go until that date. But, no, feeling good. You know, it's one of those things. You work until the last possible minute so that when you get to the games,

you just sort of give it all you've got. So the team is feeling good. We've got a balance of six first-time players, six veterans who've been to at least three games. So really interesting mix of sort of youth and experience that I think will be exciting. I'm excited to see what the team can do, but it's going to be a battle. It's not easy. They don't just give it to you.

You have to earn it. So it's going to be good, but excited. Really pumped for it. And, yeah know it's not easy they don't they don't just give it to you you have to earn it uh so it's gonna it's gonna be good but excited really pumped for it um and yeah it's my fourth game so i've done this a few times before but it doesn't it doesn't stop getting exciting it doesn't stop being something you really just you get a you get a feeling in your stomach that's not like anything else for it well i definitely want to go through the sport for those who have never watched it before the last olympics was the last time i watched it because of you because you are a purple insider loyalist and so we have talked many many times and i was like man i gotta see chuck play and uh what you don't tell people is that you're like randy moss out there so i want to i want to get into that uh but also

i've been seeing you everywhere that you went on Kelly Clarkson's show, and you actually made Kelly Clarkson cry in talking about Tokyo. So what has it kind of been like to, you know, you're on commercials, you've been doing a lot of interviews, and really carrying the torch for this sport and this Paralympics? Yeah, I mean, so I guess I'll do that part first. And then we can dig into the the wonderful sport that is wheelchair rugby, aka murder ball. But no, it's been exciting. You know, I started my career, the London Paralympics, my first games was just 12 years ago now. And, you know, if you had told me 12 years from now, then it's like, Oh, by the way, you're gonna be you're gonna be a national commercial, you're gonna be on Kelly Clarkson, you'd always think

that's okay, like, sure, whatever you say uh but it's happened you know it's been here we've seen incredible growth in the paralympic movement we've seen incredible growth in sort of awareness and interest and excitement behind it you know i think you referenced tokyo and appreciate you watching but unfortunately a lot of people weren't able to watch it was tough it was obviously covid a lot things happening. It was a, it was a tough games for a lot of reasons. And we're just excited to really get back to the spirit and the energy of the games. You know, the passion is going to be there. People are excited. It's, it's been amazing to see the growth. You know, I think you've seen so many different like brands and partners come on board and just interest, media interest, you know, to talk about these things.

And so I'm excited, you know, I can't wait to see it's been it's been overwhelming at times. Certainly, I look at my schedule. I'm like, Oh, my God, how am I going to fit all this in? How am I going to get all this done? You know, because at the end of the day, without the support, it doesn't really matter what all this stuff is, you still have to compete and perform at a high level. So it's been, it's been a challenge sometimes for sure to balance all that. And I have a new appreciation for when athletes, professional athletes talk about, well, it's just tiring. Some people are like, how tiring can it be? And it's like, okay, it's not working in a coal mine, of course,

but it's tiring. You're on the road a lot. You're waking up in different cities. You don't know where you're going. It's exhausting, but I'm just excited to be doing it. And sometimes on television, unlike this great podcast, you fly all the way to, was it LA is where Kelly Clarkson is? In New York. In New York. Okay.

So you fly all the way from Michigan to New York and you're on for three minutes and then you're just done. And I guess you do other stuff. But television kind of works that way. But you talk about the travel. That's a lot to do just to go on for a couple of minutes. But I did want you to tell the story, though, that actually did make Kelly Clarkson cry. Because, look, since you've been gone, it was a banger right about the time I was graduating in high school. I don't know how many times I listened to that show.

So I'm a fan, Kelly Clarkson. But actually, it was a great story that you told about being the flag bear bearer right at uh in tokyo and what that meant to you so please please tell our audience for sure yeah i wouldn't it's totally worth it i think i'd fly halfway across the world to hang out with kelly clarkson for five minutes so uh no it really was so you know something that people i think maybe know about the olympics and paralympics every there's something there's the opening ceremony how kind of the games kick off right and that starts with you know a parade of nations every single nation comes in and and each nation selects a person to carry the flag you know literally lead them into you know I think it's probably a military thing traditionally which is like you

know the flag bearers when it leads the charge you know you're there and so uh for for Tokyo I was you know amazingly wonderfully selected to to be the flag bearer for Team USA, which is just this incredible honor, this incredible privilege, because there are so many great athletes who've been around and done so many things and been around for longer than I have, shorter than I have, all kinds of amazing stuff. And they picked me. They picked me to be the flag bearer. And the reason that that meant so much to me and why it was so exciting is because my family's history in this country is a little checkered, I guess, to say the least.

I'm Japanese-American. Last name's Aoki. It's a very Japanese name. And during World War II, my great-grandparents, grandparents, virtually everyone on my father's side of the family was actually interned during World War II. And they hadn't committed any crime. They were just Japanese. And in that time, you know, the United States said, we're going to lock everybody up. This is what we're going to do. It was not the right decision, of course. My grandpa actually ended up enlisting in the Army Reserves after. So anyway, very loyal to this country. But either way, it doesn't, that's not really what matters. What matters is it was an unjust thing to do.

But what was just really cyclical and incredible for me is that, you know, that was only two generations ago that this country had put my family in prison, essentially. And then two generations later, here I was leading Team USA out. It was just, you know, it's one of those amazing stories that obviously we don't, you don't ever want to forget history. history and you know you don't want to say transgressions that happened are like oh well it's a long time that's okay it's you still remember it but it's incredible to see we have come a long way in this country in the way we view people and we still have work to go in many areas of course but I think that was that was a really special thing to, to have and to sort of, you know, reflect on as a, as an athlete and really my journey and my identity as, you know, and yes, I'm an athlete,

I'm a disabled person, I'm Japanese American, I have all these identities. And it was really cool. And I think, of course, to do it in Tokyo is sort of this cherry on top, like, oh, this is where my family is from. Historically in life was a really, really, really cool, really special moment. When I was, you know, it was unfortunately, of course, we marched into an empty stadium, which is no one's fault, just the way the world was. But it was it was still a special moment to get to share with with my team and Team USA. Yeah, it's such a great story. And it's so much part of your DNA and to be able to do it there.

I mean, that would be a great honor either way. But to have that to be so steeped in your family's history is incredible. So let's talk about the sport a little bit here. And you have been playing this since you were a little kid, but I love the story of how, because you and I have known each other for a while. So I know your story and I've watched your interviews and so forth, but obviously my audience has not. But how you discovered wheelchair rugby, and I would highly suggest the movie Murderball, which goes into where it came from, the roots, who plays it, and so forth. But you first start off with basketball and then found yourself, and there's going to be a connection here with football eventually to be um aggressive and enjoy

physical contact so i explain how you came across wheelchair rugby and why it fits in your athletic skill set yeah so yeah you referenced it i i grew so i'm from minnesota i don't think we said that well he said that you're a bit you're a humong humongous Vikings fan, but we are in Michigan right now. Vikings fans are everywhere. We're worldwide, baby. We're global. Yeah, so from Minnesota, from Minneapolis. And so I grew up there, you know, loving sports, of course.

But I had to start using a wheelchair when I was about 10 years old full time. And my parents sort of said, okay, you're going to be active. You're going to play sports. It's going to happen. So I tried a lot of things. Basketball is the first sport that I realized, like, okay, I I like this I learned early on I was a ball sport kind of person I wasn't a swim as fast as I can kind of person I wasn't a push a chair as fast as I can from a straight line person I was like I gotta have a ball I gotta be I gotta be doing stuff you know

so I grew up playing basketball I love that sport but then it was actually murder ball that I saw and was like oh my god there's a sport where people can crash into each other and talk trash and smack. This looks awesome. Like I want to try this sport, of course. So I did, um, I showed up to a practice in golden Valley, Minnesota, courage Kenny shout out to courage Kenny. I did a practice there. I got, um, and I got absolutely annihilated for two and a half hours straight. Like it's a physical, it's full contact, right? So I got beat up for, for two hours straight. Like, it's a physical, it's full contact, right? So I got beat up for two hours straight.

And as those things naturally go, I fell in love with it instantly because that's what you do when you play a physical sport where you get beat up, right? But yeah, I fell in love with it. There's nothing else quite like it when you have a disability. Another sport that just lets you get out there

and just sort of go for it, you know, I think. And not unfairly so. Sometimes you get, when you're disabled, you're sort of treated with kid gloves and, oh, we got to be careful. And again, that's valid in a lot of circumstances. But this was the first time I was like, oh, no, no, we're just going to,

you're just going for it. Like, it doesn't matter what you think. You are getting out there and you can't back down. You know, it's like in football. If you're out there and worried about when you're going to get hit, you've already lost the plot, right? You've already lost the game. So, yeah, so i saw a murder ball i showed up to a

practice when i weighed probably 140 pounds soaking wet and my they were like you want to play i said yeah they're like okay here we go and that was oh geez 7 16 17 years ago now and here here i am and it really resonated with you but also you realized right away that you were pretty good so what does the path look like from just trying a sport for the first time to now olympics you know again paralympics again uh for the i mean just how did you get from point a to point b yeah so you know i i had a lot, what, what helped is that, you know, for folks who probably wouldn't be as aware wheelchair sports, we know we use different wheelchairs. Like you're probably familiar with, you're familiar with the hospital wheelchair.

You've probably seen wheelchairs people use everyday life. The ones we use for sports are very different. The wheels are set wider. They're basically built to go fast and turn fast. Um, but they're just, they're a lot bigger. Uh, and so playing wheelchair basketball gave me a lot of what we call chair skills. So I was pretty good at manipulating the chair turning the chair going quick up and down what i was really bad at in basketball was shooting the ball which i am told that that is important to be really successful seems that way i mean you can be just a rebounder or something i say udonis haslam made a made a career out of not being a great shooter. But I also am not quite as big as Udonis Haslam or Rudy Gobert.

I can help you with that. Elbow in. Just get that elbow in. I tried. When you can't feel your hands, it's actually very tricky to shoot consistently the same way every time. So anyway, so I was really good at a lot of things, but I was kind of missing this one critical skill, which I could still contribute. As we know in basketball, there's a place for the the gritty just defender type but wheelchair rugby I found when it was like okay so I get to go really fast I get to hit people

which I don't really get to do in basketball uh I have to pass the ball which I was pretty good at passing and I don't have to shoot I was like oh this this might be the sport for me and so I you know I had so I had almost a decade of experience playing wheelchair basketball so I had those chair skills developed and then yeah I showed up to the sport and I was you know I worked hard I was my team was ranked my wheelchair basketball team was ranked number one in the country at the time so we're really good yeah so I had to work really hard to stay and compete and you know I was a starter on that team again I wasn't the main scorer but I was I was out there so I had to work hard so it brought a lot of physical skill

to the game and then on top of that as you said it eliminated the one thing I wasn't very good at so I started playing and you know the team we we we were kind of an up-and-coming team we had a guy named Joe Delagrave who is longtime U.S. teammate now the head coach actually the team so my coach which has been kind of a wild experience he he was on the team with me so we kind of grew up together playing in that development level and he and I um took us to we were playing there's two divisions in the U.S. there's division one division two oh there's division three now actually um we're division two so the lower division but we took the team to the national championship for division two our first year and no one had ever heard of us like who are these where do these guys come from you know so we showed up and we

didn't win that year uh we probably had a little too much hubris we made oh we made it we got this and then we were beat by a much more experienced team um but then essentially what happens and this is true of a lot of parent-owned sport interestingly enough is that there's not really a okay now you've done this you now go into the talent pipeline for this or development program for this. It's sort of like you show up to nationals, the head coach of the national teams, they're coaching his club team. Other national team players that are playing for their teams, they look around and kind of say, oh, anything interesting?

They're like, oh, we got this kid from Minnesota who seems like he might be good. And, you know, they watched me and they were like, oh yes, he does seem pretty good. So I got invited to go to tryouts that, um, that what would have been December of 2008, uh, for the national team. And I showed up there and again, did pretty well. Uh, so I'm, I, you know, I pretty much made the team my first attempt, which is pretty unusual. Again, I like to say, it's not as simple as I just picked up this sport and was good at it instantly. Right. Right. Like I spent plenty of time being bad at wheelchair basketball and learning the skills of that before I just showed up to this other thing.

It was like it just happened that a lot of the skills transferred well. Right. Which saved time. But so I made the team in 2008. And here we are in 2024. I've been on the team ever since. Ever hear of test driving a phone network? Well, U.S. Cellular is letting you test drive their nationwide 5G free. Try out U.S. Cellular wherever you have spotty service. Your commute to work, that one spot in your house where the service dips. It's as easy as doing a little boop, boop, beep, beep on your phone. Yes, that was me getting the app to try it out. I know, pretty good with the sound effects.

Test drive U.S. Cellular's nationwide 5G coverage free for 30 days. Just download the Try Us app. U.S. Cellular, built for us. Terms apply. Visit uscellular.com slash try us. That's uscellular.com slash try us. Oh, the way that rosters are designed is different levels of disabilities and there's a point system,

right? Maybe you can explain just your disability and where you fit in into that system. Yeah. So very briefly on the system, the, the, we,

every player is assigned what we call a classification score. And we also rugby ranges from 0.5 to 3.5 with half-point increments. So 0.5, 1.0, 1.5, et cetera. Four on four on a court, the four players total cannot exceed eight. So you can do it different ways. You can do it a lot of different ways. You could do, for example, two three-point players, then two one-point players.

You could do four two-point players all over the place. So with my ability, I have pretty significant impairments in my hands, but I have been pretty significant in my legs, but I've got a little bit I've got some core function, a little bit of leg function. And so I fall on the higher side of the classification. So I'm a 3.0. And what your rugby is on the second from the highest, right? So I've got a lot of function. So I do a lot of ball handling, a lot of the sort of coordinating passing, things like that. And so with me, if I'm going to play, sort of like passing things like that um and so with me if i'm going to play sort of like great awesome we then if you're going to play you're going to have to have a low

point player to go with me like just by definition and so one of our main lineups in the u.s team for example is a three a 2.5 a 2.0 and a 0.5 and so we call that a balanced lineup because we've got three players who handle the ball a lot uh one player who is more of a defensive kind of specialist, we like to say, an offensive picker, kind of like a lineman in some ways. But other countries will run what we call like a high-low lineup. They'll run two 3.5s, so the highest you can possibly have, and two 0.5s, the lowest you can possibly have. And so there's a lot of strategy that goes into deciding what you should do, where you should put people. And it's a huge component that people don't always realize about paralympic sport in particular because again i always say the the equivalent i say to this it would be like if in the nba

i said okay you can have a seven foot player that's fine no problem but if you're gonna play a seven foot player you've got to play someone who's under five six right right it's sort of like huh but then people hear this oh that makes sense that makes sense because right now there's the reality is you'd have to be i mean how many people under five six they've been like two or three ever mugsy bogues and nate nate robinson's yes but web was five seven i think yeah so like yeah under six feet is virtually impossible right and so it's the same concept because you know in paralympic sport the reality is you can't you can't control your level of function necessarily. And so that way you're competing against when you're trying to make a team spot, you're competing against other people with the same functions.

You are at least in the same band of function. It's not like the guy with a C6 spinal cord injury who's paralyzed from the chest down and can only do his biceps. He can only really do this. He's not competing against me. He's competing against other people like that. And likewise, I'm only competing against people who are in the same sort of band as I am. So it makes it for coaching and roster design.

Another wrinkle that you have to consider, which I think is fascinating because some teams take different approaches with the points. It's almost like those internet things where build this team for $500. That's how your Paralympic team is put together in the same kind of way. But your specific disability, like, can you explain that? Yeah, so I just, the baseline, I just don't have any sensation from my elbows down and my knees down.

So at a baseline, I just don't feel anything. What that leads to, though, essentially is injuring myself because I can't feel it. So when I was, I was six or seven, I broke my leg, didn't feel it, walked on it. Not good for a leg, believe it or not. No, it's not. Definitely not. Don't do that at home kids. Uh, so, so yeah, so that was essentially my childhood growing up was injuring my legs trying to walk around um slowly sort of deteriorating them to the point that i can still walk a little bit uh but uh by and large use a wheelchair to get around because it's just what's preserved what i have left the flip side to that then was as i started to use a wheelchair uh my hands would get in cuts and infections i would lose parts of my fingers um which i always say the whole silver line to all this is that to be eligible for

wheelchair rugby you have to be impaired in all four limbs. And without the hat, I wouldn't be eligible for wheelchair rugby. So it kind of comes full circle, but yeah, essentially at its core, I just don't have any sensation. And, you know, it's interesting and football players, maybe we disagree with this pain is actually a really good thing for our humans in some ways, because it prevents us from doing things that would lead to further deterioration of our function. Uh, and so for me, it's like, I don't have the pain. I don't have this heat, cold sensation. So I have led to injury.

I've gotten, and admittedly, as a younger person, I was perhaps a little more careless than I should have been with how I sort of live my life. But I've stabilized now. Like I said, I'm pretty level with my function where I am now. And like I said, it's just, it's allowed me to play this sport that's incredible. So it's sort of one of those, you know door closed but a window open type things so I watched you a lot in Tokyo tried to catch every game and uh you score a lot you score a lot because we would we would talk Vikings and we would message you know you'd ask questions for the mailbag and so forth and I knew you were on the team but until i actually watched you i didn't realize how fundamental you are on the team uh but give everybody a sense of what your role is

and how it works like how do you explain to people when they say what what is it that you do oh well what do you say yeah well i say i say well i play wheelchair rugby and they go oh wheelchair rugby so you should be called a murder ball they go, oh, wheelchair rugby. So it used to be called murder ball. They go, oh, oh, yeah. Oh, wow. Okay. Wow. That's pretty wild. It really is unlike any other sport out there.

It's really a mix of a lot of things. I meet people who are knowledgeable about rugby, able-bodied rugby. And they kind of get, they go, well, how do you do this? And I go, well, we don't really do that. And they go, oh, okay. So it's really a mix of wheelchair basketball. It's got a little bit of hockey elements to it. It's got some rugby elements to it. The way I always describe people is, you know, football, you can run in the end zone and catch the ball. You in rugby, you have to carry the ball across. We have to carry the ball across to score. So

that's, that's, there's some similarities, but I tell people it's, it's hot. At first, it looks like just high speed bumper cars, chairs are crashing. People are flying bodies are everywhere. Balls are going around. are flying. Bodies are everywhere. Balls are going around. But then the more you learn about it, there's actually quite a bit of tactics to what's going on. You know, the main goal of the game is to literally, all you're trying to do is cross, we call it the try line, with the ball in your possession. Seems pretty simple, and you do it within 40 seconds.

But there's a lot of strategy going sort of back to the team makeup that you talked about that matters. So I think I referenced, we run what we call a balanced lineup. So that means there's three people on the court who, if they had the ball, we're like, oh, no worries. They've got it. They'll push. If they get stopped, they'll pass the next guy, pass the next guy. Versus some teams, like we said, run these more high-low lineups where they have two guys who they really only want those two to have the ball as much as possible. And so they'll run a lot more like pick and rolls. And we run some too don't get me wrong but they'll do a lot more like okay

they got a defender all right we're gonna come hit this guy off so he can get free this person is gonna the low point player is gonna pick this person so they can get around it there's a lot more sort of picking and maneuvering and then just going really fast as opposed to sort of methodical okay get the ball from here to here, now from here to here, now from here to here, and off you go. Or from here to here, here to here, off you go. So it's an interesting combination of, like I said, a lot of different sports. There's a little bit of football elements in that each play starts

with an inbound. People are moving, quote-unquote, pre-snap, but the person with the ball is just sort of sitting there. So it's really an interesting mix, and I appreciate you watching, first of all. But I think, folks, you almost have to watch it to really get a grasp oh i i can kind of see the different tactics evolving again at first it just looks like a bunch of people in wheelchairs crashing into each other yeah but the more you watch it the more you realize oh he hit that guy not this person because he knew he was going to catch the ball and he

didn't worry about this guy catching the ball or something like that and there is a score clock you have to score in 40 seconds which keeps it moving back and forth and no i really enjoyed the high paced nature of it where it does move very quickly which uh you explained to me earlier that there was a rule change where it used to look like a harvard offense to be no shot clock and so it was like pass, pass, pass. They say basketball before the shot clock. It looked like James Naismith era basketball, I think, where it was like pass, pass again, pass again, pass again. Yes, where there was no three-point line and there was no shot clock. Although in Minnesota, you know this,

the high school basketball didn't have the shot clock until recently. Until like two years ago. Teams would get ahead and then just pass it around. What? I don't know. Anyway, so that must have been less entertaining than it is now, but it moves quickly. When you're when you got a breakaway, this happens to you quite a bit is what I noticed. You feel like Randy Moss? Is that who you're thinking of?

When you're when you when you have a breakaway, the ball's coming your way. You look back to catch it. You Randy Moss. I think when i make a really cool catch i do feel like a good receiver sometimes like sometimes i'll stick my hand out and pull something and i'm like wow that's pretty cool like a little chris carter action yeah i can't feel my hands and i did that um yeah a little car a little little i i do think actually sometimes when i i will admit in the moment you're more thinking kind of about the next play because

of course very important but i think when you go back thinking kind of about the next play because the sport's very important. But I think when you go back and watch, you know, it's not quite the same as getting absolutely crunched after you make a catch in front of a ball. But there are times where I'll catch it and then immediately get hit by two people. I'm like, oh, that is kind of like when Jefferson, when you go across the middle and just squeeze it and just have to,

you have to hold on, you know, you don't have a choice. So yeah, no, I don't. It's more of just the cool catches you feel. You're like, oh, that was, that was pretty, that was pretty cool. Well, the reason I ask is, is because that you are a huge Minnesota Vikings fan and you were seven years old in 1998. So that's maybe a little, a little early for you there with the memories,

but growing up in Minnesota and developing your Vikings fandom and what we were talking about a little earlier before we started recording is just you're not just a casual you don't just sort of keep in contact a little with the Vikings and see them on Sunday you are truly obsessed with the Minnesota Vikings every roster detail you you read all the Purple Insider articles and so forth. Why, as you have kept up with your journey here, which takes up a huge amount of your time, have you still made as much space as you do for the Vikings in your life? Well, you know, I think, like we said, I'm from Minnesota.

That's home, and it's always been home. And I've lived a lot of other places. I've enjoyed my travels, and I enjoy doing the things I get to do. But I think, you know, following Minnesota, and I should say Minnesota sports too although the Vikings probably rise to the top you know following Minnesota sports has always given me that little tie to back home right it's always felt like I always text my buddies like what's going on you can't really know hey what's going on and you know you check in on them but it's not quite the same as like hey I'll see you this weekend it's like I'll see him every few months at best right and so I think it's always been just yeah it's my tie to home you know and it's not quite the same as like, Hey, I'll see you this weekend. It's like, Oh, see him every few months at best. Right. And so I think it's always been just, yeah, it's my tie to home, you know, and it's always been, you know, that little connection I have with friends or with

my dad or whoever about, Oh yeah, the Vikings are doing this, doing that. And, and also I think when I, when I really fall in love with something, whether it's rugby, whether whatever it is, and Vikings are in this, in this realm, you want to know everything. I do, at least. I want to know every detail. I want to understand. Because I think, having spent a lot of time in sports in my life, there are interesting details to everything. How do we evaluate players? How do you decide which players can be great? How do you decide that was a good performance, that was a bad performance, outside of the obvious sort of situations you know and and how do you do that how do you think about who the the fourth fifth string person is going to be how do you decide to come up with that how do they how do they think

about that you know like i think that's one of the most fascinating things to me and then of course just the sheer complexity of the way modern nfl offenses work right there's so much depth and complexity to it i as a athlete i always find interesting like pushing myself forward and so you know i'll watch how linemen pass off a a stunt right because it's it's essentially like defending a pick and roll it's the same concept it's obviously different because they're standing but you can watch ways of how they get their leverage point how their balance matters how their angle matters a lot and i try to learn something from it too. And I think that's, that's a big part, but overall, it's just, you know, I, I just, Minnesota is home and I bleed purple and gold. And so I think that

I want to follow it. I want to know every detail and that's the beauty of, you know, places like purple insider and the explosion we've had in development and media like this is there's, you can learn everything you can learn about these things and really think about them intellectually too and not just have to say well he scored 20 touchdowns he's amazing it's like well yeah we didn't need that but what can we actually learn about you know why Patrick Jones is really not very good it's because this this or this or we can say oh Andre Carter is maybe doing a little something interesting you know I I find that fascinating poor Patrick Jones he didn't do anything he just got a drive-by he didn't do Andre Carter is maybe doing a little something interesting. You know, I find that fascinating. Poor Patrick Jones.

He didn't do anything. He just got a drive-by. He didn't do anything but get a PFF grade below like 50, right? Quite a bit below, unfortunately. I think that he in a better role would probably be okay. More of an average player, but he was asked to play so many snaps. Just to to clarify in case Patrick Jones sees the interview and is unhappy that he got slammed right there. But with the Vikings in particular,

what I know about you is that you really have a deep appreciation for underdog stories. And I think that this comes from for you, that your sport is wrought with underdog stories. There's a lot of people who have gone through very traumatic things in their lives and used sports. And my wife is actually going to be broadcasting Paralympic basketball, wheelchair basketball on both the men's and women's side. And she's reading about how a lot of these people became disabled. And some of the stories are just absolutely remarkable

from things that they overcame to be here and i i think that that is a connection with you with certain players that you know how difficult it is and also you being an athlete at your level know how many people try and cannot get to that level so if you are the fourth string running back and you came from tulsa or something how how did you overcome all that and it's never-endingly fascinating so I think we agree on this but you are going to have to explain your obsession with Matt Asiata this this is when you told me that your favorite player was Matt Asiata I was like excuse me I don't think I should have to defend that in the slightest

to the purple insider community but I will i i i think it's unusual i would say it's unusual i would say he's my well he's one of my favorites for sure um well you know that so i'm trying to i i i as i get older i have a hard time remembering the exact years but there was the one year that asiata kind of burst onto the scene so speak and was like this little i've always really appreciated, for lack of a better way to put it, the bowling ball running back. And I obviously enjoy all of them. The shiftiness is great, things like that.

But the bowling ball who just sort of goes out there and just somehow just rumbles forward. They're not going to blow by you. They're not going to juke you. And they just keep running. And they just sort of keep going and it's really remarkable to watch them keep moving forward and it's it and i've amazed it and matt asia was the first one i remember doing this this first sort of bowling ball i remember just oh he's just still going oh he's

just still going plus he scored like three touchdowns in a game which is incredible and i think as a kid i was wow that was, he's going to do that all the time. And fun fact, he did not do that all the time. He did not. But I really enjoyed it. He seemed like a pretty good guy, you know, too. He seemed very, you know, friendly and just affable. But something about the bowling ball running back has always been,

you know, a favorite of mine. I do think the bowling ball is kind of going out, unfortunately. You know, we don't have as many bowling balls these days, but, but no, I, I, again,

I don't feel I need to defend Matt as my fan, as you out offend him, but I will happily do so. I just mean that if you asked a thousand people for their top five, Minnesota Vikings, I think you might be the one out of a thousand who says Matt Asiata. That's not related to him. I believe it was 2014 when he and Jarek McKinnon split the role

after Adrian Peterson, let's not talk about it, and all that thing that happened there. Thunder and lightning, baby. Thunder and lightning. Ish. But this is somebody who probably had almost no chance to carve out an NFL career and found a way to do it in this specific role. And while he was not a superstar, he was a contributor and could do a lot of different things for them and had a lot of toughness and grit,

which you and your sport requires a lot of that toughness in order to do it. So here's the thing. Every week on the written side on the newsletter side we have a friday mailbag and i'll tell you what shows up in my dms pretty often from chuck some sort of friday mailbag question so i'm here i came all the way to your house what do you got what do you want to ask exclusive just to you mailbag questions whatever is on your mind about the minnesota vikings you can ask me oh my gosh and actually give your own feedback to my answer which usually you just read my answer right oh okay okay i was gonna say i can answer my own question yeah you can that's kind of a that's kind of odd well i guess really for me i think the question that is currently because

you know we're in that sort of between things regard i'm curious to know and this is this will be a little more i usually put a lot of thought into my questions by the way i really you know i noticed something concrete i think the biggest one for me right now is where do you think this defense is going to fall because they've they've they've added players who are good i think that's i think that's just a fact they they lost a couple who were good too but they know hunter specifically but they added lots of good players and i think you know you you talk about and you hear this a lot it's like defense is variable and they were good for some of last year but then not very good last year which maybe correlates with quarterbacks they played huh weird how that works but i am curious where you think the defense is

going to fall just based on the talent collection and then of of course, that Brian Forrest knows what he's doing. He's good at his job. Yeah. I would say that that will depend entirely on the health of their secondary. Because if you're talking about Shaq Griffin, Byron Murphy Jr., and Mekhi Blackman, they are going to have to hold down significant roles. And if you can't cover people you can't do anything defensively we saw this last year when byron murphy went down

they were a totally different defense even i think it was in the cincinnati game he got hurt and he kept playing but wasn't the same and then they took advantage after that and it was never the same the defense and even though he didn't have the highest pff grade that was a starter and it was someone who could handle a lot of different things at at least average to above average level and when he went down and it was a caleb evans having to take over that big role it was just not the same at all and that's the biggest weak point because if you go through the other parts of this team like the defensive line interior d-line is a major concern but they can rush the passer off the edges they've got tons of versatility they have three safeties who are excellent they have now two linebackers i don't

think people realize how good blake cashman was right they did not sign him because he's one of us they signed him because he was in the top 10 by pff last year he has to stay healthy though because the next guy down is kamu gruge hill who has been a journeyman kind of backup special teamer type that guy's not supposed to play five or six hundred snaps the health of jonathan grenard the health of andrew van ginkle these guys have all been banged up throughout their careers if everyone were to stay relatively healthy and we're not talking about getting into the uh you know deep depth of this unit uh i think they should be somewhere between 10th and 14th that it's not quite a team that is ready to get to the elite level and they do have

a very difficult quarterback schedule you go through there's a lot of proven quarterbacks, which is kind of how I look at it is how, how much can you rely on here? But with Flores, his brainchild, the amount of different things he can do with people they brought in, like Andrew Van Ginkle, who again was just absolutely excellent last year. If these guys are healthy and they're playing a lot, then I would say fringe top 10 defense. Yeah. I i think you know to answer my own question yeah and to respond to you do we agree yeah no i i tend to agree i i've

always you know i i've always found the the courage versus pressure i forgot what pass rush pass rush debate really interesting because you know and it's like it's like the meme of what is the meme of where it's like uh when the bengals were drafting oh either jamar chase or pene sewell is like well if he has if no one's in front of him he can't throw jamar chase at all it's like well turns out he could actually um but i've always i've always leaned and i've i've come to trust my intuition on things a lot not all the time but like my intuition was always that pass rush mattered more that was just my intuition it was like it made sense to me that if within what is it like a quick pressure is like under two seconds right yeah if someone's in your face in under two seconds that is going to make a difference now and i and i still believe it does make a difference but i think the reality too is

quick pressure rates for good players is what like the it's not it's not actually all that high when you consider how many snaps happen in the game correct so if you're talking about immediate pressure under two seconds that's going to ruin every quarterback all the time in his treatment can't do anything correct correct and we saw that in the giants of patriots super bowl with tom brady but pressure that's more around 2.5 to 3.5 seconds is often on the quarterback and can be prevented if the quarterback is good enough. And that's how good quarterbacks have lower pressure and sack rates. So I think what you're getting at is even if they have these players

who create pressure, unless they create insane instant pressure all the time, which is not realistic, the corners are going to have to do their jobs. Yeah, exactly. And I think that's why I've come now too. I think I still believe that quick and as you said quick pressure is the best pretty much still the single best thing you can do as a defense as far as i'm aware um but but to your but to bet but beyond that the corners have to be able to stand up and apparently and shack griffin is apparently going to be like he's going to solve the defense he's going to solve the defense which which you know if we consider a weak link system and you upgrade one of your weak links to a

pretty good player here we go i've always thought that the gap between average and great is similar to average and awful so if you go from awful to average that is a massive upgrade not not quite in the same impact way as going to greatness, but that it matters a lot to, to be average. That's not like a, you know, that's, that's a compliment in a lot of ways to an NFL player. The question is really, can Shaq Griffin be average when early in his career he was at times, but he was also cut from his team last year in the middle of the season, which is not a huge selling point to can he be average?

It doesn't fill you with confidence, but at the same time, you know, it's a situation, I think we've talked about this, where if you believe in the organization that said, this is a good person for us, we think this is good. And obviously they didn't have their pick of any quarterback they wanted. They had to pick what was available. But if they identify and said, this is a player we want, you it's at a certain point as a fan you have to say all right these people this these people do know more about this than i do particularly what makes a

cornerback really really good right i have to trust that they know what will make a cornerback good and trust that they just you know i mean let's be real brian force put together defense last year at some point that really didn't have anybody particularly greater than Daniil Hunter on it, and they were really good. I think trust for Brian Flores specifically is more, it kind of depends on who we're talking about because maybe Ed Donatell would get a little less trust in this situation. Okay, one more.

Give me one more. Give me one more mailbag question. Wow. Well, that was the high level. That was a good one. Yeah, well, let's see here. I guess. You've got to ask something about the quarterback, don't you? Well, that was the high level. That was a good one. Yeah. Well, let's see here. I guess... You got to ask something about the quarterback, don't you?

Well, okay. Yeah. I guess what I am still wondering about the quarterback is what... I'm trying to think of this. Obviously, Sam Darnold, to me, is the fascinating example, right? Because this is a player who has been really really bad like just objectively really bad outside but you've obviously watched a lot of his tape you've kind of gone back and looked at him what what have you seen from the the the in the tape that's existed that makes you say that okay that could actually what what has he shown other other than the physical tools i think

we know the physical tools exist is there anything besides that i guess that gives you hope in terms of seeing decision making seeing i'm just curious if there is something other than his physical tools seem good we believe in a coach kyle shanahan was really happy to have him as backup go all right so the answer was going to be physical tools that was going to be where i started uh i'll give you this that if you only watch sam darnold play in his last seven games so you only watch and this is a bad way to do it i understand that you can't just say hey chuck remember all those bad games you played let's forget about those focus on the recent good ones but if you only watch the performance when he was not with matt rule and not with adam gaze and he's only with steve wilkes

and then kyle shanahan in that one start that he had and when he came in against baltimore you would come away thinking this could be an average quarterback there's some times where you can't believe what a bad decision he made and there's also a lot of really good throws on that tape and there's some complete games and you can also see how the smarter coaches try to protect him a little bit try to allow situations where he could scramble because he's very mobile and it maybe was underutilized by his previous teams you can also see where they went with some quick and easy stuff where they went with a lot of play action and rpo stuff to make it a little bit easier for him as opposed to

let's just drop back on third down and long all the time and what levion bell was saying on twitter is absolutely right like they ran a ton on second and ten when he was with the jets they and i looked at this his numbers when he was playing on third down and long he throws masses of interceptions on third down and long but not third down and long it's still above average right but it's not horrendous like you can't believe how many interceptions and turnover worthy plays and his turnoverworthy plays were significantly reduced from his previous times in those last seven games. Now, how much weight can we really put on a small sample? That I'm not sure.

But it's when he had the better coaching and a better design for him that he played better. And if he was able to give 17 games, if they have to, of that type of play, you can be in the playoff hunt uh but if it's the play that he was you know in new york then you're not then your season is going to be over pretty quickly but i don't think that's the same player i mean that's six years removed from that and a lot of different circumstances including the universe's greatest wide receiver which cannot be understated and i i have to say i've been chuckling a little bit and look i do think jordan love's gonna be good i think the packers are good so you know but this idea that it's better to have a bunch of man receivers than the greatest receiver disagree you know why

because i've watched justin jefferson and i don't think that it's wrong to look at what Nick Mullins did last year. And I know you're a fan of Nick Mullins and say, if he just throws it to Justin Jefferson, you've got a chance to be in every game. They, they, they, they almost beat the lion,

which were objectively a good team trying to win the game without TJ Hawkinson. I think they're missing somebody else too. I can't quite remember. They, and they, that's not the one they should have won. The first one's the one they should have won.

And Hawkinson got hurt in the game. Yeah, that's right. So for half of the game, he's not there. They could have easily won both of those games with literally just Nick Mullins. In Madden, he was hitting snap and he was pressing, what would, he'd probably be the B receiver. He'd probably, whatever the top route is in that game.

He was just hitting the same button over and over again. And it almost worked. Like, it's just, it's, i don't want to call it preposterous because it's not preposterous to say hey if you just give the ball to the best player on the team yeah it will work really well but it was it was just comical to watch so yeah no that uh that makes sense i i'm i said he is probably the most interesting you want to have an underdog story that's trying to come back from really, really struggling. One, I think we've said, I've, I've, I've believed this. I think you've talked about this.

The NFL knows like there is a reason he has stayed in the league this long. It's not like he was in it. This is, they just cut him off his rookie deal. And someone said, all right, let's give this guy a try. No, he's stuck around. Teams have looked at him and said, there's something here. A lot of different football people. And of course we spent the first bit saying maybe the first group of football people weren't the best football people but they know they also probably knew a

little something about football so carolina gave up a second round pick for him and if he's good enough for kyle shanahan right he has to be at least good enough to try for you right and he beat out trey lance who they traded everything for. And when you consider that they probably didn't want to do that, they probably didn't want to trade away their guy that they spent all those draft picks on, then it does kind of make sense. And I think they picked the perfect bridge quarterback

because if it doesn't work out, you didn't pay that much. But he is, if all the most intriguing players in this training camp number one is mccarthy number two is sam darnold then you could switch them uh because adversity comes in many different ways and for him he's been through this whole journey and if you're still here and still getting chances that means people believe in your character as well and i've gotten that sense uh this has been a great pleasure of course to meet you in person we had breakfast this morning you crushed a giant burrito we had we went to a great breakfast the place here in ann arbor it's beautiful i've been driving around and stuff great place uh the

paralympic games are coming up i'm nervous for you i know that you're like that's cool man whatever but uh this is this is such an exciting time for you, headed back to Paris for another chance at gold. Where can people learn more about your sport? Where can they watch it? Let me know. Yeah, no, I appreciate the time. I'm glad you've enjoyed your time here in Michigan. You know, I think folks can follow me and the team,

Chuck Aoki on pretty much every social platform. Instagram is probably the main one I use, along with Twitter, X, whatever it's called, and all those other things. You can also follow the team, USA Wheelchair Rugby, Team USA. And then, yeah, the Paralympics kick. You're hearing a lot about the Olympics right now, which is fantastic. You should watch them. You should watch all of them.

The Paralympics will start opening ceremonies August 28th. NBC, Peacock, all those platforms. You should be able to watch literally everything you could possibly watch or want to watch. So make sure you check it out. It's going to be a very exciting time. Apparently your dog is a fan of Diet Dr. Pepper. I saw that. She just took your bottle down.

Grabbed my bottle there. It's been so much fun following your journey. And there's a lot of times where I'm like that meme that's pointing at the like when i see you on television or you went to the white house yeah i've been away as a couple times that's yeah that's pretty cool so uh chuck aoki make sure you follow him on whatever social media platform you prefer and again just an honor to be here to meet you in person to do this show with you and for you to give me an opportunity to write an article about you as well the one of the world's largest minnesota vikings fan a minnesotan going for greatness going for gold so thanks again man i really appreciate it and thanks everybody for

watching slash listening uh to purple insider thanks for having me