Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - PFF draft analyst Trevor Sikkema on Vikings Trey Lance rumor and Cousins' chance to win in Atlanta

Episode Date: March 6, 2024

Matthew Coller is joined by PFF draft analyst Trevor Sikkema to discuss the #Vikings/Trey Lance rumors as well as breaking down Kirk Cousins' chances to win with the Falcons. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of Purple Insider. Matt Collar here and returning to the show, Trevor Sycamore, the lead NFL draft analyst for Pro Football Focus. And Trevor, I've got the PFF draft guide right up here in the window. It's slowing down my computer because I've been flying through it. Truly, truly one of the best resources for draft season. So greatly appreciate all the work you put in. So I don't have to, but as you join the show here, we've got some rumors that I actually need you to address before we get into all the draft stuff. And one of them I did not see coming, which was about

Trey Lance. Rich Eisen always does a craziest rumors that I heard at the NFL combine. And he started off with the Vikings and Trey Lance. So you've been doing the draft analyst thing for long enough to have evaluated Trey Lance, watch the entire Trey Lance thing play out. Is it a crazy idea if the Vikings lose Kirk Cousins in free agency for them to consider bringing in Trey Lance? You know, this was the craziest thing that he heard at the combine for a reason. And, and I cannot say that I had heard this one before, you know,

we've talked about Justin Fields destinations, you know, Baker Mayfield, where Kirk Cousins is going to go, what's going to happen with Russell Wilson, right? People have even thrown out, man,

Gino Smith restructures his contract. It's a little bit more tradable. I got to admit, this is the first time I've heard Trey Lance's name within this conversation. And I guess a good reason, right? Things don't go really well in San Francisco to the point where they're looking to move on from him. They trade all that draft capital to move up to pick him as QB3 in that 2021 draft and they lose him for basically nothing in return right I think Dallas traded a fifth round pick for him and so that's just I I don't really think that that speaks volumes of a guy who can absolutely come in and start right away that you feel really good about like I don't necessarily hate it as a bet you know when Dallas traded for him a day three

pick for Trey Lance I went went, all right, okay. I guess that makes sense. I think there are other teams in the NFL who probably would have done the same. But then to come around a year later, nothing's really changed. Same situation. And Rich says on his show, oh, maybe you can increase the price to get him from Dallas because they've already picked up his roster bonus, so they're already paying him. Maybe you just kind of up the price a little bit.

Third round pick, fourth round pick something that's like, all right, what exactly happened in the last, you know, six months, three months, whatever it's been since the Trey Lance trade where you think, all right, let's up the value on them. So look, I thought that Lance was alluring when I was grading him coming out of the 2021 draft, but I didn't have them on the same caliber as you, Justin Fields and Trevor Lawrence,

even Zach Wilson. You know, I had him as more of that QB for QB five in that class. And I thought he had a really big arm, a lot of really great tools as a passer, but he just hadn't played a lot of football, right? He had one year as a starter.

That was his true sophomore season in North Dakota state. Didn't get to play his junior year because of the COVID season. I think they played that one game that felt like more of an exhibition than anything else. And then he didn't play in San Francisco, hasn't really played in Dallas. And so the guy just has not played much football at all since high school, basically. And I think that that's where we have to go all the way back to. And so if you're taking a flyer on him sure maybe but to sit here and say yeah let's go all in on Trey Lance and trade a third round pick which does Minnesota have a third round pick I feel like they do not no okay okay so Rich said that and then somebody was like I don't even think

they have a third round pick so I mean to kind of up the price and say yeah we're losing Kirk Cousins but we've got Trey Lance that's's all good to go. I don't really think that they're even going to come to that conclusion if I'm being honest with you. Yeah. I mean, I think you could make some sort of case of like, look, if you brought in veteran X traded almost nothing for Trey Lance and drafted Michael panics, then, all right, well, you've sort of done like what San Francisco was doing with their quarterback situation last summer which was sam darnold let's see if brock purdy's arm is healed and if he's the real deal after the small sample of playing and see if trey lance can take that

step forward but there is so little evidence of trey lance actually playing football that it's hard to even say well you know i saw this one game or this, even this preseason game or whatever to, to make a case like that, there might be something there with Trey Lance and you're going to ask him to come in and then compete for the spot. I mean, maybe if your plan was to trade for him, keep him on the bench for a couple of years, but normally if a team like San Francisco is bailing on you with Kyle Shanahan at the helm, and then even Dallas is bailing on you, that means that nobody is seeing anything there. And even if you were to come in and even if you were to play and the ceiling was, he plays like Daniel Jones, where he's sort of serviceable and he runs for, you know, 800 yards or something, then you pay him or don't pay him.

Like I really cannot make this one work at all. Aside from what it sounds like to me is the Vikings brass went to the combine and started asking everybody about every possible quarterback. And I made a list of all the possible quarterbacks, came up with like 20 guys and Trey Lance would have to be on your list. But I feel like that mean girls quote, like stop trying to make Trey Lance happen. Just everybody stop trying to make Trey Lance happen. It's just not going to be a thing. It didn't work out. It was probably the hardest year in NFL history for evaluators

to draft players and San Francisco took their swing on upside and it just didn't work out. And that's what Trey Lance is going to be in history, I think. Yeah, I mean, I agree with you. You look at that, even if you just independently looked at the situation in San Francisco, you mentioned you've got Kyle Shanahan there, who is a proclaimed by many to be this quarterback guru, right? He's making it work with Brock Purdy. He's taking Brock Purdy to a Super Bowl. And they traded all of that capital to go up and get Trey Lance. Like if there was any team in the world that was going to hold on as long as possible for Trey Lance to work out, it was going to be the Niners.

And they've already moved on from him. Again, like I said at the top for a price that was nothing when it came to a return on that trade relative to what they gave to go up and get for him. So I agree with you. I think the larger point here, the fact that, and I don't know who Rich heard this from, like was it just kind of like somebody in the league who was maybe playing a game of telephone and all of a sudden Trey Lance's name gets brought up in a conversation where somebody goes,

like maybe the conversation starts with, man, Minnesota's looking at every single option, right? And then he goes, he tells his buddy and he goes, man, I heard that Minnesota's looking at every single option, you know? And then maybe they'll throw a couple of names out. They go like, yeah, I mean, even Justin Fields or Mac Jones or something like that. And then that guy goes to tell his buddy and Trey Lance just comes to mind throw a couple names out they go like yeah i mean even you know justin fields or or mac jones or

something like that and then that guy goes to tell his buddy and trey lance just comes to mind because he's a backup in the league and then all of a sudden that maybe gets to rich and rich goes hey vikings and trey lance and so i feel like it was just a progressive game of telephone that probably got us to that point but i i i'm with you 100%. The larger theme here, the actual takeaway from this bit of news, is that the Vikings are leaving no stone unturned. Even when they got to the combine, they said, yeah, we would love to have Kirk back. We're working to make it so, and it's ultimately his decision,

but we would love to have him back with the Vikings. And so I think that, to your point, the list is 20 quarterbacks long of possibilities in Minnesota because they know that they have an opportunity to really bring in whatever that next chapter is going to be. Do they want to run it back with Kirk? I'm not really convinced, right? I don't think here's the thing. I don't think they want to be bad. So they're going to say, yeah, we, we, we're going to try to run it back with Kirk, all that. Cause I don't think they want to be terrible. Nobody wants to be terrible, but at the same time, they're picking at 11. They don't really want to go through another simulated season just to get a

higher draft pick. I think they'd rather sit here and say, look, let's just use the draft demo now, right? We got good quarterbacks in this class. New England might be willing to move back. Washington might be able to, might be willing to move back. Let's offer a couple of first round picks and go get the quarterback of the future. So to me, I think that just as they are going through those exercises, you truly have to leave no stone unturned because if you are trading two, three first round picks, you better be sure that this is not only a swing of the bat that you want to take for the prospect, but also that outside the league,

like your pro personnel scouting is also up to par. You think that that's not the best option. Trading multiple first round picks up for a quarterback is the best option. And just to be clear, to put the period on the Trey Lance sentence, if they traded nothing for him, I'd be like, okay, like that.

Oh yeah. That's totally fine. Like, I mean, if you're giving up hardly anything, it was sort of like what Dallas did it. Like, does this make sense?

No, but who cares? Like you gave up, like you said, as a fourth or fifth or something like, I don't, that's fine. If I just love how you said that.

Does this make sense? No, but it's just, yeah, but who cares? Like, what were you going to draft a long snapper with the sixth round pick whatever no actually the Vikings have an elite long snapper so but uh you know I think that you're exactly right on that they have to look at every single

option which could result in people saying yeah they talked to us about Trey Lance that was weird uh but they may have talked to 20 other agents, 20 other teams, because they know the reality that Kirk Cousins may not be here, which is rumor number two that I want to get your opinion on. Kirk Lanta. How do we feel about Kirk Lanta? Pro Football Talk put it out there. Florio wants to be first on the spot here with Kirk Lanta. I think we've all been putting this together for a very long time. It's a team that is in win now mode with a roster that they've built through being bad for a very long time. They have not been to the playoffs since 2017. And you know what Tampa Bay Trey, everybody's saying about the NFC South is that Kirk's going to go there and win the South. And it's hard to disagree. when you look around and you go,

Derek Carr doesn't scare anybody. Tampa Bay has got work to do this offseason. We don't know if Baker's coming back. And the Carolina Panthers may someday get there, but they will not get there very likely next season. So it does make sense for Kirk to go to a team that could win right now and win that division next year if he comes back and plays like the version of himself. So what do you think of Kirk Lanta?

I think Arthur Blank, their owner, is fed up. I think that he is pissed about how the last, let's say, what is it, three years have gone for this team because coming off of the Super Bowl that they had in in 2016-2017 you know coming up just short you're struggling the next couple of years you know not really be able to not not really getting back to those heights having to move on from Dan Quinn and I think Arthur Blank looked at that situation and said okay we got close with Dan Quinn but we need to get over the mountaintop. And since then, they have kind of taken swings at the bat, whether it was Arthur Smith as

a coach or particularly, I would say, the way that they were forced to move from Matt Ryan because of how interested in how they handled the Deshaun Watson situation. They wanted to take a swing of the bat at Deshaun Watson as big as what Cleveland did and I think people often forget that Atlanta was another team that was heavily involved in that they were going they were gunning for Deshaun Watson to the point where Matt Ryan was like wow okay feel a little disrespected here then Matt Ryan left and then they obviously got left at the altar if you will for Deshaun Watson. And they had nobody. They signed a bridge guy in Mariota.

It didn't really work. They draft Desmond Ritter in the third round. Maybe, okay, we'll take a flyer on him. It didn't work. I think Arthur Blank is sick of it. I think he's pissed. I think that he is going to take the biggest swing of the bat possible. I think they're absolutely going to offer Kirk the most or tied for the most money.

They're going to make some team outbid them. And I think it's a really good situation. You know, they could boast Zach Robinson coming over the new offensive coordinator. Um, obviously like Zach worked under Sean McVay, uh, and his offensive system while he was in LA, Kevin O'Connell was coming from Sean McVay as well. So they could pitch to Kirk, like, Hey, a lot of this stuff is the same. A lot of the success you had to Kevin O'Connell. We can have here with Zach Robinson. You got a new head coach in, in, in Raheem Morris, who's coming with a, with a fiery attitude to prove, you know, he is a head coach in this league after having a head coaching tenure that didn't go so well when

quite frankly, he was a scapegoat when he was given the head coach job in Tampa Bay. And I feel bad for him that it's taken him 10 years to kind of build that back up and get that behind him. But I'm glad he's got another shot. I think the defense will get better with him being there and him being the head coach. And so Atlanta makes a ton of sense. You got a good offensive line. You got B. John Robinson, you got Drake London, you got Kyle Pitts. All of that stuff makes a ton of sense for Kirk Cousins to go there. And so I absolutely believe that he is going to be in Atlanta's plans. They're going to take a really good run at him when it comes to free agency. And then if they miss out on Kirk Cousins, I think that Atlanta will be one of the most aggressive teams in the entire league to get up to even as high as pick number one overall.

I think Atlanta is genuinely going to call the Chicago Bears and make them say no. And they're going to do the same thing with the Washington Commanders. And they'll do the same thing with, I think, the new England Patriots as well to go up and get a quarterback. So it starts though with Kirk, when we hit free agency, who there's a reason why these teams are being late. Cause it makes a lot of sense. And I do think because of that context of where Arthur blank is coming from

in the last couple of years, he's going to be aggressive to go get somebody good. It's always fit so much better than a return to Minnesota based on where the rosters are in my mind. And if you go through all the teams, the Pittsburgh, the Vegas, the Denver, you just can't make any of them work quite as well as Atlanta for Kirk cousins, the family connection that he has in Atlanta. But from a perspective of somebody yourself who used to cover the Tampa Bay

Buccaneers, tell me, would you be afraid of Kirk in the division? Like, do you think that this is a move that makes Atlanta a legitimate contender? Well, you know, as a Tampa Bay guy, I said that they weren't going to win the division last year and that proved out to be good. I turned it turned out to be the jinx, the curse, and then they actually did so yeah I have no problem saying that again because maybe it'll happen no but like in all seriousness Kirk Cousins in Atlanta I do think makes them the preseason favorites to win the division I really do even with Baker Mayfield coming back there was so much turnover in the coaching staff for Tampa Bay especially on the offensive side of the ball and um you know that was a big question mark with Todd Bowles when he took over for Bruce Arians is, were they going to be able to figure out on the offensive side of the ball?

Byron left, which was still there for a year. Tom Brady was still there for a year. And even that really did not work out well. I think they hit a home run getting Dave Canales and what he was able to do, especially in the last half of the season. Wasn't perfect, but they were really rolling. And I did not think that he was going to get poached for a head coach spot. He ends up doing so to the division rival Carolina Panthers, but it was more than just him. There was a lot of turnover. The quarterback's coach, I think the offensive line coach, I think there was a ton of turnover for Tampa Bay.

So even with a lot of those guys coming back, I say that to say, Atlanta is going to start the year as the odds-on favorite to win that division, and they should in the preseason. So I think that uh yeah they become absolutely a uh formidable foe in the nfc south and could potentially even make some noise uh in the playoffs as well if they can do well throughout free agency getting a couple other pieces in there and then really nailing the draft yeah i could very much see them being the division winner just based on where everybody else is and then if you were to project it cynically,

as I have been known to do on this show, occasionally I would guess that they go 10 and seven and then host the home playoff game and then lose that home playoff game to a team that's better than them. I mean, I don't know. They, they do have a lot of weapons.

I mean, there's a lot to work with there and it's something that Kirk has really been missing since I guess 2020 is a running game and with bijan robinson going into his second year that and also they haven't had much of a screen game a short passing game it's really been uh hey kirk drop back you know seven steps and throw it downfield to justin jefferson whereas a tight end like this, a running back like this, could actually take some pressure off of him that he's had in Minnesota with the lack of a run game, lack of a screen game in the last few years.

I don't see the ceiling of that thing being a true Super Bowl contender, though. I see it much more as being a good team. It'll get Arthur Blank's club back into the playoffs, and then we'll forget they were there by the end of the year. But let's not count all the chickens before they hatch. I want to talk about this draft class with you because there's a couple of quarterbacks that everybody has different opinions on. In fact, we saw each other out in Indy and the first thing I said to your friend Kyle Krabs was, how do you feel about McCarthy? That's what I want everybody to know. I want everybody to tell me,

how do you feel about McCarthy? But something else I want to bring up with you was Michael Penix's combine. I was listening to Rick Spielman the other day. And I know when I tweeted this out, Vikings fans said, did you know he drafted Christian Ponder? I do. I do remember that. But Spielman was talking about how he was most impressed with Penix's throwing. But he also mentioned that he heard from friends of his in the league that Penix's medicals were good at the NFL Combine, which I think was the biggest thing for him. So where do we stand now on the second tier of these quarterbacks,

Penix, McCarthy, and Bo Nix? I'm going to be honest with you. I was never really worried about the medicals at all. I mean, we had two fully healthy years of Michael Penix. I mean, he seemed to be all good to go. I really wasn't worried. I wasn't afraid that like, wow, they're going to flag something this day because I really, I feel as though if there was something that was chronic that he was really dealing with that was going to continue to pop up from either the ACL tears or the shoulder injuries that he has gone through. Like I feel like we would have seen that over the last two years.

And we really didn't, I know he played tough and played a little bit hurt towards the end of this past season, but that's just a game of football. I don't think that it was anything that he was dealing with previously that was creeping up again. So I really wasn't too worried about the medicals. The fact that he got clean medicals isn't too big of a shock to me. So I was already kind of depending on that.

And, you know, it comes to his combine performance. On field throwing at the combine, it seems to be getting a little overblown, like whether you do it or not, and also the performance itself. Like Penix had some really nice throws. I don't want to take anything away from him but he also had a handful of throws where yeah he just barely missed which is something that I've written on his scouting report and it felt like a lot of people were like wow basically they talked about like a pro day right the perfect like as if he didn't he didn't miss a single pass and I watched him miss passes when he was in Indianapolis so So I don't know. I feel like I just,

I don't know if it's just kind of like selective, like the throws you see versus the throws you don't, you know, whether it's agent speak or just some hype from other people you're talking about, but Pennington stock is all over the place right now, man. I,

I would have told you that I don't think he's going to be a first round pick. Now. I don't know because we live in a league where there's 32 teams, right? 31 of them could say, we're not picking this guy until the third round. And if one team says we're taking him first round, guess what? He's probably going to go in the first round and we're going to sit here and say, see, the league thought he was a first rounder. Well, maybe the league didn't, that one team did. And I think that that is an opportunity here for Penix because even though

I think his stock is anywhere from a mid first round pick to a date to a, uh, sorry, a third round pick, it only takes one team. And so when you're a quarterback, we know that teams are going to lean towards taking you earlier rather than later. So I think the Penix is a really good quarterback. I think he's got a hell of an NFL arm. The two things that I need to see better from him that don't get alleviated from a combine throwing session are I need you to throw with better ball placement. I need you. Well, I guess three things I need you to throw with better ball placement. The accuracy numbers are fine, but sometimes the wide receiver said it's slow up. Sometimes they had to have some acrobatic catches to bring it in true NFL ball placement. I need him to attack over the middle of the field more because Washington's offense really, really dominated by throwing outside the numbers,

which is fine. But at the NFL level, you got to be able to attack all three layers of the field when it comes to outside the numbers, intermediate over the middle, and then outside the numbers again. And then the last thing is he's a good athlete. I think he is a better athlete than people give him credit for, but he just doesn't make comfortable plays consistently outside of the pocket. He likes to stay between the tackles. He likes to be a pocket passer. His passing grade when he was moved was one of the lowest of any quarterback

in this class this year, and that's a worry. It's a worry when the league is only getting faster and more versatile from the quarterback position specifically. A lot of these quarterbacks that are coming into the NFL draft, Caleb Williams, Drake May, Jaden Daniels, Bo Nix, J.J. McCarthy, just to name a few. These guys are legit players who can run an RPO and tuck it and run or run a naked bootleg, play action outside of the tackles. You can see if there's something to the sideline. And if there's not, you're picking up six yards with your legs. You got to be able to make those kinds of plays to be a priority quarterback in an NFL draft in these days. And Pennix just did not make a ton of those these past two years. So those are three areas that regardless of how well he threw at the combine

that didn't change that part of his take for me so that's still kind of a part of who he is as a prospect right and i i think that when we talk about like the velocity of what he could do with his arm it's really special like there's that thing comes out fast it kind of reminds me of jared goff in some ways where if jared Goff moves at all, the ball just goes right into the turf. And if he could step into it, it isn't always a perfect spiral. It isn't always the perfect ball placement, but it's got great velo. And I think Jared Goff's most underrated, amazing skill is operating and executing an offense. He's just shown with two different teams that if you give him the right offense and

the right receivers, he can run an elite offense that, I mean, there's not too many guys who could do that. So Pennix, what's upstairs might matter the most for him. If you're going to be that pocket quarterback, I saw that from the PFF data that he had a ton of throwaways, which I think is okay, but you want those to also turn into first downs sometimes, as opposed to just every time you're under pressure, you're throwing the ball away. And I think that the theme with this draft is that these are all prospects who have at least one skill where you could be like, okay, I could see that working. And they also have elements where you go, I could really see that not working. And that's where we lead to JJ McCarthy because I can see the velocity on his football

is really impressive. But you talk about ball placement. When you watched him play, it was a little all over the place. There is the factor of, I trust coaches and what they ask someone to do. And I think that that matters. Just for example, if you were a basketball coach

and you said, Trevor, stand over there in the corner and just shoot threes. There's a reason your coach doesn't have you dribble in the ball and driving every time. Cause if you were great at it, you would. And I think that there is like merit to that discussion with JJ McCarthy. And then there's always the upside. And we're also trying to figure out, is this the guy that is going to be overrated by the draft analysis community like Will Levis was, or is this actually somebody that the league is falling in love with? And I got to be honest, I don't really truly know still coming out of the combine. I think I could still see that there could be truth that he goes to the top 10 or he

could be drafted late in the first and we go, wait, where was all that hype for JJ McCarthy? Where do you stand on it? So I think he's going top 10 at this point. I really do. I think that he's going to the top 10 of the draft. I think there are too many teams that need quarterbacks that aren't going to have the opportunity to fill those needs in free agency and over the next month and a half before a draft weekend gets kicked off. So I really do. I think that he's going in the top 10. I think we'll get four quarterbacks in the top 10 this year, which is crazy. But I, you know, I would be much more comfortable picking him back into the first round, but that's just not how it goes, right? Two types of teams in this league, either have a quarterback or you don't. And so that takes precedence over a lot of other roster

building things that you might do throughout the draft. And so I gave him a late first, early second round grade. I was actually really impressed by his 2023 season because this past summer, 2022, I went back and I watched the first year of him as a starter. You want to talk about limited tape. I mean, they didn't really ask him to do a lot at all in 2022. He didn't have good pocket presence. He didn't have a good feel for pressure. He didn't really recognize things pre-snap the way that he needed to. He was slow to get to his progressions post-snap. So it was just a lot of things that he really needed to work on. Nice arm talent, clean mechanics like that.

I feel like has always existed through his tape and it did in 2023 this year, but a lot of those concerns that I had from him in 2022 got better this past year and he got more aggressive. He got more confident. He was hitting a lot more tight window throws. You talked you talked about okay the offense didn't regularly ask him to do this a lot but he still did it sparingly he still did it at times you know so you at least see it and you go okay so you can do this right it's not that you necessarily can't do it maybe it is a Michigan thing so I think a lot of things and his perception got a lot better this past year. So I can see why you throw in his progression this past year. For as much as we like to say

that wins aren't a quarterback stat, coaches and GMs love winners. He's like 27 and one over the last two years. Comes from a program that was headed up by Jim Harbaugh, now a head coach of the NFL, was previously a head coach in the NFL, previously made a Super Bowl, right? This is a dude who understands quarterbacks, praises J.J. McCarthy, started him as a true sophomore. So I think all of these things go into his scouting report of why NFL teams would like him more than maybe draft media because I think the draft media, we're just looking at the tape, basically.

We're not necessarily talking to the Michigan staffers and the rest of his Michigan teammates and you know Harbaugh himself and um doing all that kinds of due diligence things like that we're just watching the tape and I think when you watch the tape you see a guy who is worth being picked at in the top 50 back into the first round early part of the second round but to project him as a top 10 pick I think comes down to NFL evaluators hearing things about his football character that they love that they believe that his best football is ahead of him that he is truly getting better that the arrow is going up and then that progression that we saw from 2023 to 2022 is also going to exist in 2024 and beyond. Yeah, and when I listened to the guys talk,

Penix and McCarthy both stood out to me as far as just how they sort of carry themselves, the confidence in which they answer the questions. They're not going to sound like Baker Mayfield or Kirk Cousins because they're not grownups yet. But when you listen to them talk, they kind of have that pro feel a little bit to them. And McCarthy, you know,

when he was going on TV and answering questions and getting the question about why he didn't throw very many passes and all those things, I thought he just handled himself really well in that spotlight. That is the NFL combine. And the other thing I think about McCarthy is that the NFL will consider is he was like a hockey player, I guess. And he's played other sports growing up. And also that catch that he made with one hand, like there is a natural athlete, a fluid athlete there that I think that coaches would look at and go, all right, look at that three cone score. It was super quick. And look at the way he caught this football and look, look at this, this movement, this kind of quick twitchiness that he has. We can develop some of that, you know, inaccuracy and smooth that out. And we

have seen that from other natural athlete quarterbacks like Josh Allen, like Jalen Hurts. So, so I can see the argument for why you'd want to take him and develop him. But as if you just watched the last four or five games that he played in college football, you'd be like, I'm not sure I really see somebody who is deserving of a top 10 draft pick. But if the Vikings were to take that shot, I'd be very much in support of Kevin O'Connell, JJ McCarthy, make that your franchise and go forward. Give me your, before I ask you about the defensive line, cause that is a problem for the Vikings. And seems like there's a lot of good potential draft picks here. What is your most different take about the projected top three than the draft Illuminati? Like, where do you maybe zig where everybody else zags when it comes to Caleb Williams,

Drake May and Jaden Daniels? Because it seems like we've kind of locked that in one, two, three. All right, let's talk about the rest, but we never really do know. So where do you feel different than everybody else? So I don't know how different this is, but I am very clear. Caleb's the number one quarterback in this job. Very clear. Would have no reservations about's the number one quarterback in this draft. Very clear. Would have no reservations about taking him number one overall. Wouldn't trade the pick if I'm Chicago.

I think a lot of teams are going to call up, including Washington at number two. I think Washington's going to put a deal on the table where Chicago is going to have to kind of say no to this and no to drafting Drake May or, or Jaden Daniels. But if I'm Chicago, I'm not moving off. I'm taking Caleb Williams. I'm working with him.

I think he's a franchise caliber quarterback. I think he gets too much hate. Like, yeah, he's got to take care of the football better. And when I say that, I mainly mean fumbles. You got to stop fumbling the football. But a lot of the other stuff that people bring up about Caleb is he's overblown, in my opinion. I think he's a really, really good prospect in a lot of different ways so he's no question about it QB one for me Drake May is no question about it QB two for me like I don't have a debate here with him and

Jayden Daniels Drake May is awesome he's fearless over the middle of the field he's got the most big time throws of any of the quarterbacks eligible in this draft over the over the middle intermediate middle so 10 to I think 21 yards down the field like he is he's got five big time throws i think the next close is like two and he's got any i think he has over 100 passing attempts over that middle of the field as well nobody else has over 100 so he's experienced um he understands the value of attacking over the middle of the field he's got good mobility to him i mean the ball just rockets off of his wrist. I think he's got arm talent for days. I think the weird part about Drake May is that there are passes in his tape that he just misses. And I think that it really freaks NFL

evaluators out because you'll watch some of these passes and it's not his footwork. It's not his release. His mechanics are clean. He got to it on time. The ball just didn't go exactly where it was supposed to go. Like it was just a little bit out of reach. He just missed him by a little bit. He just misjudged it, whatever. And I think people freak out when they see stuff like that, mistakes, and they can't go, oh, we'll see.

Like if we, you know, if we fix his footwork, it's good to go. Like he'll never miss that throw again. When in reality, I think a lot of quarterbacks miss a lot of throws but May has more of those throws that he just misses for whatever reason than a lot of these other quarterbacks now it's not rampant it's not like it's an epidemic in his tape but they exist and I think it kind of freaks people out a little bit most of his tape though phenomenal wouldn't think about it QB too easy would sleep well at night Jaden I think is getting overhyped in this class I do and I think that he is a talented football player I love the trajectory that he has been on since his Arizona State days his first year at LSU and then what we saw this past season I

absolutely love that from him but doesn't really attack over the middle of the field very well. A lot of his production comes from those like slot fades, fade balls on the outside. And those are, I don't want to take that away from him, but he's also thrown into two top 20 receivers in Malik neighbors and Brian Thomas jr. So that connection it's great there, but what happens if he goes to a team that doesn't necessarily have that wide receiver situation? Does it look different? He's got to take care of himself better. He's got to take care of the ball better. And he's got to get bigger and he's got to get stronger, I think, if he's going to survive at the NFL level.

Like Lamar, we've seen that over the last couple of years as well. And I'm not – don't take that as like a Lamar one-for-one comp, but Lamar was pretty skinny when he came into the league. And Lamar has put on some weight, like Lamar – in a good way. I mean, like he's gotten stronger. He's gotten thicker. I think he's gotten more durable. And I think that that gives him more confidence. When he's out on the field, it's allowed him to slow the game down a little bit

because he does have that extra muscle. He's got that extra strength to him. So Jaden needs to do that as well. Elite production this past year. Elite passing grade. Elite rushing grade. It's all phenomenal. It is one year, right?

We also got to be honest. I know Joe Burrow was kind of in the same situation. Joe Burrow worked out, but Jaden Daniels was probably a day three pick before this past season. And he has one year where he just goes absolutely nuclear, wins a Heisman trophy, and he should have deservingly. So if you want to talk about that guy is QB three to take a chance on the top half of the first round, I'd get it.

We're now talking about him over Drake May, and I cannot get there. I just, I cannot get there with the level of conversation that we're having about Jaden. So really talented football player, but I guess that's just an overview of how I see that top three. I'm no question about it. Caleb is one. I'm no question about it. Drake is two. And then Jaden Daniels for me is a little bit further down as QB three. Yeah.

With Jaden Daniels, I've wondered, and there's always something that's different than what we expect with the quarterback class. And it's like, what is it? What's it going to be? And there is probably a world where Jaden Daniels is maybe not as high for

some teams than we think he is because of the year he put out there for me, the ball just doesn't come out. And when I watch, and of course you've covered the NFL, you watch enough NFL games and you go, all right, drop back. There's the routes. There's the play. Ball comes out. There's the play.

Ball comes out. And so when you watch a college quarterback, and they all take longer to get the ball out, so that happens for everybody, but it's like, come on. All right, throw up. Are you going to? And then a lot of times, even on a route, it'll be quite a bit late on where it was supposed to be.

But the go routes are absolutely magical. And it reminds me of watching Tyrod Taylor. And I'm not trying to say that's what he's going to be. That's not what the ceiling is. But it might be the median outcome is like, you're really special running the football and you're really special throwing deep routes, but you get yourself killed all the time because you hang on to the ball

forever. And Tyrod Taylor was a quarterback who could take a team to the playoffs, but he was not a quarterback who could take a team much farther than that. And there were some limitations. You could also bring up Justin Fields who gets sacked at an absolutely comical level. Like that could be the same thing with Jaden Daniels in the NFL where he just gets sacked all the time. And a lot of it is how much of this can you fix? Like with every, any of these quarterbacks, how much are you capable of fixing? Are you capable of fixing getting the ball out on time because even Patrick

Mahomes is known for his scrambling what percentage of his throws come out in two seconds I mean you would know this for PFF data I bet it's 70 I bet it's almost you know seven out of ten throws are coming out really quick and then one out of ten it's special it's he does something crazy you can't do something crazy all the time. So I think that there is more risk with Jaden Daniels than the other quarterbacks. But the upside is if he is Lamar Jackson, then you've got yourself an MVP. So, you know, I could see where a team would take him number three overall. Yeah. And I'm glad that you brought up the arm strength part of it too, because I think that his arm strength is adequate, but I don't think it's close to

what Caleb Williams is or Drake May. Honestly, Jaden is way closer to JJ McCarthy than he is Drake May and Caleb Williams to me. He's way close to that. And if you wanted to tell me that JJ McCarthy is your QB three, I would not push that far back on you because I have those guys pretty close. Now the difference is I have Drake May and Caleb Williams as top five and top 10 overall grades. And then QB three for me is like late first, early second. And that's kind of around, I think Jaden, I think his numbers might've kind of bumped him into just that, like just round one label, like first round grade, as opposed to a late first, early second, but he's right there. there I mean him and McCarthy are right there so again if you told me that you've got McCarthy over Daniels I'm not

pushing that far back on you it's just weird to hear that because we all think that a quarterback is going to go three overall we all think that the draft is going to start with three QBs in a row so whoever your QB three is whether you have a first round grade on them, late first, early second, or second round grade, we think that person's going number three overall. So when you say, so when you say out loud, Oh, I have JJ McCarthy over Jane Daniels, people would freak out about it just because that like what you're saying means that McCarthy would go three. And then they'd be like, Oh, McCarthy's not worth three overall. And it's like, well, hold on, hold on. That's not what I said. I just told you my QB rankings. And so people, I think, need to remember that part of it, too, when we have these conversations is that it's still about the overall big board. It's about the round grades that you have on them. It's not necessarily here's my one, here's my two, here's my three, because in reality, the gap between a lot of those guys could be big and small. So you answered the question. I mean, the question was, where do you differ from the draft industrial complex?

And I think that does go a little bit off of the trail there. So let's wrap on this. The Vikings also need an entire defensive line. And what I noticed from the combine is, holy moly, there are some freaking athletes in this draft. At every position, we got the fastest player ever we got fat offensive linemen running sub 540s for some reason they still run 40s i don't know why but i'm i'm into watch it but the defensive lineman i thought did themselves a lot

of favors chop robinson really standing out and my favorite guy in the class for defensive line if the vikings could find a way if they don't draft a quarterback at 11, because Trey Lance is their future quarterback, then for me, it's Dallas Turner. I think Dallas Turner is the guy. I like him a little bit better than everybody else at that position. If the Vikings were at 11, it's the first defensive player potentially off the board with the way that everything could fall. But there are other options. Jared Verse is here. Byron Murphy, I would not argue with the defensive tackle.

How do you kind of lay this out with the defensive line class? And if the Vikings weren't going to get one at 11, what are we talking about for depth of the defensive line? Could they get one at 11 what are we talking about for depth of the defensive line like can could they get one at 42 yeah I think that you know when you look at these top edge rushers in this class think Jared Verst and Dallas Turner really put on a show Turner obviously was a top performer in basically every explosive category you had the 10 yard split the 40 yard dash the vertical jump the broad jump and and that shows up on Turner's tape right I think that when you look at the debates between Dallas Turner Jared verse and UCLA's layout to lot to for who would be edge one in this class each one of them has something else that they boast right I think that Turner

has the best overall athleticism explosiveness arm length and bend you know he has that potential like that mold verse his power profile is fantastic i mean he's just strong as an ox he's dense when you when he runs into an offensive tackle man they feel it he's going to be that heavy-handed 4-3 defensive end who i think you defend the run really well i think you get after it with a nasty bull rush and he's got some good pass rush moves to him as well but he's the more power player versus um what dallas turner is is an explosive athlete and then the finesse god is laatu latu who is not necessarily the best athlete in the world we saw that with some of his combine testing but over 23 pass rush win percentage over the last two years

ate like 95.0 pass rush grade over the last two years, which is just absolutely ridiculous. His pass rush bag, his pass rush profile is as deep as they come. And he just understands pass rushing so, so well. So all three of those guys, it just depends what your cup of tea is, right? What kind of flavor of an edge rusher that you want there? I think Dallas Turner is going to end up being my edge one in this class. Certainly testing confirmed a lot of the things that I love about him. The big question mark that I have with Turner is how much strength is he going to play with at the NFL level? Because I asked him specifically about his playing weight journey while he was at Alabama. He said he showed up to Alabama at 260 pounds, but he kind of laughed and he said, it wasn't a good 260. Like it was a COVID 260. Like I was not in shape. I was a big boy. And so he had to lose a bunch of weight. He said he had his

freshman year. He ended up starting playing at 240. So he's lighter. He was faster. So he lost 20 pounds. He's playing at 240. And you could tell he really had only a speed profile to him. The same can be said about his sophomore year, He used a long arm technique, used his burst off the line of scrimmage, but he was really just attacking the outside shoulder or maybe giving you inside spin counter, but it was just speed moves. And he was playing, he said, at 245 that year. This past year, he said he played between 252 and 255. So he was bigger and you could see that on tape. He had a little bit more power to him, but I asked what's your most comfortable playing weight. And he said,

I like playing at two 45 the most. So you have to take his sophomore tape from his two 45 days and say, is this player strong enough for us? Like, are we good enough here? Because that's where he wants to play. He wants to be a speed rusher. So I think a lot of people that looked at turner this past year

and said okay he was at 255 he was playing a lot more powerful you might not get that preferably when he gets to the nfl level you have to i think evaluate him as more of are you okay with him being a speed rusher and if you are some people might still for him being edge one in the class. That's just something that you have to think about there. So I think he'd be a great addition to the Vikings. I think he'd absolutely go in that range between picks. I think his range probably starts at eight with the Atlanta Falcons.

I think nine's consideration for the Chicago Bears as well. And then I think obviously Minnesota sitting there at 11. I think all those three teams will have him pretty high on their board. I love that you described someone as dense. Like's whatever the i'm like the opposite of that like that is my body right so no look so so am i i was uh i was playing man so here's a long time ago now i was playing like flag football and i was playing against somebody who was being a real try hard about it and he lines up in press coverage against me.

And I knew that he had played some sort of like, I don't know, like D2 football before, whatever. And I've got my hands out. And so the ball gets hiked and it's flag football. We're getting a little bit physical when we're up at the line scrimmage. So I kind of get my hands on him and he just takes his forearm and breaks my like it breaks my

forearm not like physically but like just it gets me off of him and that hurt so bad I was like I don't want to do this anymore and that was at that moment that I realized that even you know d2 d3 football players they've got dense muscles they've got dense bodies. And I just was not built like that. So you saying that reminded me of that. Yeah. I mean, it kind of is like if you play pickup basketball and you play against somebody who played like D2 or something and they put 50 on everybody and you're like, oh, yeah. Yeah. But I could definitely score 10 in the NBA or whatever TikTok guys say. But it's like the picture of that offensive lineman standing next to all the

reporters. They're like, yeah, I don't, I don't think normal people would want to go out in that field. Anyway, Trevor, I could sit here and ask you just about player after player after player. You take such a great approach, the NFL draft. I cannot recommend enough the PFF NFL draft guide. Make sure you check it out.

Tons of data data tons of analysis a ridiculous amount of work that you guys put into it so thanks so much for coming on it was great to see you in indianapolis and we'll definitely talk again soon man appreciate it matthew it was great to be on a podcast with my favorite author whose book i am flying through right now and if anybody has not read the book on pro football focus and matthew wrote you should absolutely do it because I'm loving it and you should go out and buy it. But it was great to be on the podcast with you, my friend.

Anytime. Appreciate that, man. Football.