Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - PFF's Eric Eager talks Kirk Cousins and the Minnesota Vikings' 2022 schedule

Episode Date: June 3, 2022

Matthew Coller is live in Cincinnati with Pro Football Focus's Eric Eager, so why not have Eric be the first guest to answer Fans Only questions? Vikings fans want to know who was to blame for the shortage of leadership in previous years, how the 2022 schedule compares to the 2017 schedule and whether football nuts talk to their wives endlessly about football. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to a very special episode of Purple Insider. Matthew Collar here, and I am in Cincinnati with friend of the show, Eric Eager, inside the PFF gigantic studio that you guys have here. And so we have perfect, flawless audio in the soundproofed PFF studio. What's going on, Eric? Matt, it's so much fun to see you. So we're about to go last time i think i did one of these with besides the combine last time we did one of these in person we were just getting ready to go to a wnba game we're about ready to go to a reds game here

which uh the the sky has opened up a little bit here which is great um i'm excited to talk vikings i'm excited to interact with people who uh have reasonable expectations about the team as our listeners do i think i agree yeah um so what you requested to do though because i remember that show that you're talking about and that was the first episode ever of talk me into, which has now become a very strong staple of the show. A foundational piece, you might say, of the show. But there's something new that I've been doing since then. The Fans Only podcast. We don't have the Diet Cacti Pepper, though.

We don't. No, you guys are not stocked here at all with diet soda. And I am honestly struggling. I had to drink a cup of water. I can't wait until we go to the game and we can get because i haven't had a i haven't had an alcoholic drink in about a month and for no reason other than i just don't want to drink for a while and of course like you don't drink so i think at the game we should go get a i'm from minnesota a pop uh at the game uh watching the reds and the and the nation play. Yeah, you may have to break your streak watching the Reds play,

but it's not a good situation, but it's a great ballpark. But yeah, no, I don't have the, we can pretend to, you know, but right. But I also don't have to take soda breaks because someone else will be talking. So I'm just going to go to the file for the Only fans i'm sorry for the fans only show i thought i was going to get to it i know sorry i was going to let you sneak in there but uh that's what only fans said so uh but i've got the questions and i'm just not what matt isn't that what michael pitman said about matt ryan what did he say he can put it anywhere? He can put it anywhere he wants.

You could do a whole podcast alone on football stuff that has innuendo to it. I remember, so as people on the show know, I'm a Kansas City Chiefs fan, and I was in a suite for the 2019 AFC title game, and it was cold as hell. It was like 10 degrees out, and so I was in a suite for the 2019 AFC title game. And it was cold as hell. It was like 10 degrees out. And so I was in there a lot going back and forth. And so I go in to the suite I was in. And Mitch Holtis, who the guy is a touchdown, that guy.

Oh, yeah, yeah. And he goes, Austin Ryder, Laurent Duvernay-Tardif, they've been drilling dudes today, was his radio call, which I think the fitting of this podcast. Everybody in the suite was like, oh. Yeah, there's a lot of language that doubles um i know that there have been like some broadcasters who have apologized for language like after tragedies and stuff and like oh sorry for using it's like we all do this with sports though it's like you know what the guy meant he meant they've been very a physical football team that day maybe so i'm gonna read i'm gonna read uh some of these questions now i

don't read them before when people send me me, I take a peek at it, and then I throw it in the fans-only file, and then I just go in order from when I got them. So I'm just going to start off and see where this takes us. All right, so this one comes from, first question, from G underscore co-sports show on Twitter. I was always a believer that a coach sets a culture, but a quarterback pushes it. Bill Belichick set a culture and Brady pushed it and acted as a buffer between Bill and

his teammates. Arian sets the culture in Tampa Bay, but Brady pushed it. Same with Vrabel and Tannehill. It seems like Kirk isn't the best leader, but he's being absolved of all blame. Who do you think was more at fault for the toxic culture in Minnesota, Mike Zimmer or Kirk Cousins? I'll give you the first reaction to the first fans-only question. Yeah, I mean, I think most people know where I stand on Kirk Cousins as far as like all the intangible things. I think there's a reason why he's never won anything, you know,

really in his career. I think when you talk and in my role at PFF I talked to a lot of people in the league um you know when that when the topic of cousins came up you know a lot of people would just text me back and be like that's not a guy you want as your quarterback and and you know I know that's different than what Questy Adafo-Mences said I know that's different than what Kevin O'Connell said. I know and I've talked to Wesley before. He's a friend. I know

there's a talent level with him that's pretty high, I think. He's a very accurate, very good quarterback. But there are aspects of his reclusiveness that I think everybody in the league knows.

And there's no mistaking the fact that no one came and offered the Vikings enough for them to take on. I mean, if he was the kind of player that galvanized the team, I mean, I think more people would have come calling for him. And it would have made the decision for the Vikings to keep him a little harder. I think it's harder for a team with a quarterback who's not a leader and people get what quarterback who's not as good of a leader as other people. I'm not saying he's not a leader. I'm saying he's not as good of a leader as Patrick Holmes, Tom Brady, Josh Allen. You see teams like Green Bay with Rodgers win a Super Bowl with McCarthy. You see teams like Tampa Bay with Arians win a Super Bowl with Brady. You see a team – you see more teams with quarterbacks who lead more than the head coach leads win a Super Bowl than you see the other way around.

Yeah. A head coach dragging a quarterback through the through the finish line is just not something I think is as likely to have happen and so does that mean the Vikings can't win a Super Bowl with cousins I that that not that's not really you know I think that the probability is quite low but but I do think this is a great question yeah i i think that uh i i've always sort of stuck with this thing that i heard kevin arnovitz say who's an nba writer because he was talking about and i'm sure that i've said this before on the show but like he was talking about the spurs and the spurs culture and for so long it was spurs culture oh my gosh they just create this incredible culture culture culture

there spurs culture and the culture was tim duncan like and and like that doesn't mean that greg popovich isn't an incredible coach he won a ton with those great players not everyone wins with their great players there are bad coaches that hold back great players but most of the time you're only as good as your best player in terms of your leadership and as far as your locker room and your best players in general but a lot of times with the quarterback you only go as far as your quarterback when it comes to that leadership is in a lot of different ways and so i wouldn't say that cousins has no leadership qualities at all he knows the offense incredibly well and you might think like

was an nfl quarterback oh it's hard to know the whole offense i mean so like he will get everyone lined up and and again i know this sounds silly but we've seen enough training camps where the quarterback has no idea how to get people lined up one of them is a usfl star at the moment who just said on an interview that he's one of the 32 best quarterbacks in the league apparently in the world yeah yeah apparently not though uh because no one in the league thinks that about Kyle Slaughter but that was Mike Zimmer what he said about Slaughter he doesn't even know how to line people up Kirk Cousins will be in command he will tell everyone where they're supposed to go where they're supposed to be there won't be many questions

about it like he'll get everybody on the same page with the offense that he's running. You would not have success like this statistically if that didn't happen. But I think that Cousins is a guy who kind of lives in his own world. Like his view of what's going on is very much as it pertains to him. And I think that the best leaders sort of see the whole picture they're either so good that it doesn't matter what kind of leader they are which does not really happen at quarterback but sometimes i think aaron rogers could be that current aaron rogers could be that player where he's just so damn good yeah the lead by example aspect of it overtakes a lot of like the fact that he's a kind of a prickly guy right correct

someone like case keenum's the opposite where it's like a guy who has amazing leadership skills but does not have the peer talent and hey our guy jim mcmahon was maybe that right somebody who could get more out of everybody around him but i think that maybe it was sam monson on the show a while back who said that like your win total as a team will be whatever your team is like whatever your roster is number two through 53 because Kirk's not going to push everybody else to another level and he's not going to do that thing that gets everybody on his side and then what I mean is like he's not gonna dive dive for the extra yard. He's not going to often stand in and take the hit. He's not going to like force his will on guys to make them better.

Like there's a great story about Rob Gronkowski and Tom Brady where like in the first training camp that Gronkowski was there, Brady was on him about everything. And Gronkowski thought the quarterback hates me so much I'm gonna get cut and it was like no I think you could be a superstar yeah he cares enough to right he cares enough to get to go after you yeah I mean I think and like this is kind of where again the reputation around the league is something you can ignore it or whatever you can you can fall in love with his statistics and that's fine you can live your life however you want uh but the reputation around the league is is a guy who doesn't care enough to do something You can fall in love with his statistics, and that's fine. You can live your life however you want. But the reputation around the league is a guy who doesn't care enough to do something like that.

You know, and that's certainly, you know, look, if you believe that's true, you have four years of evidence to back you up. right right yeah and and right that's the thing is that like everybody kind of comes away with the same feeling um players don't go out of their way to make sure they stay and play with cousins the you know a lot more players left than stayed people stopped taking pay cuts after he came the like team atrophied significantly after he's been on the team and like a lot some of that is spielman team. And some of that is Spielman not drafting well. Some of that is bad luck. And some of that is the fact. And some of that is due to what we all predicted in March of 2018,

which is this is way too big of a contract to give a quarterback who doesn't transcend things. And that's been mostly proven true. But, you know, there is another element of this is that when someone does not take a team over the top we're going to look around for everything and we're not the only ones it's also the players who are on the team with him and they're going to look at the big game where he didn't show up and be like yep that's on him and he didn't lead us and he didn't do what was necessary he didn't make that one big throw he choked all that sort of stuff where if the team had been a little

stronger if you hit on a couple of picks if you have more cap space which does connect to Kirk very much but like if you were in a different world with him as your quarterback and you won 13 games in a season where everything went right instead of only nine or 10 or eight or nine, uh, we would maybe not say these things, right? Like even last year, early in the season, when he was playing really well, they were trying to be like, Oh, well he's coming out of his shell more and everything. Like they were trying to kind of urge him to do a little more, but you know, players believe in people who win. So like there there was a there was a meeting everson griffin told us about this 2017 where mike zimmer asked the team the team's leadership should we

stick with case keenum like if bradford comes back healthy or if teddy's ready to play like should we stay with case and they said we got to stay with the guy who's winning for us because they believed because they had seen him winning that he could do it and he also played well that year he did oh yeah yeah he did uh he played way above his skis or whatever is his level of talent but the point is just that like players who go to play for the steelers and play with ben roethlisberger they've got to know right like they have to know that he's not throwing the ball like old big ben yeah and yet they still believe look at look at this guy and what he's achieved in his career. And when someone is this far into their career and hasn't gone deep, you don't see that same sort of belief. So I think there is a little rewriting it.

But yeah, there's a reason why people think that now the question was, is it Kirk more than Zimmer? Well, yes, because it's always the players, but that does not absolve Zimmer at all. Like Zimmer, Zimmer did not do anything to help that situation. He made it consistently worse by letting the entire world know that he didn't believe in his quarterback. And, and, and look, the vaccination thing is very uncomfortable for everybody, but the worst thing you could do as a coach and no other coach did this about unvaxxed quarterbacks. The worst thing you could do is come out and say, yeah, what that guy believes is, is quack science. And he's not being a leader. And like, you say that in front of everybody, like that's not really a way to like help a situation that's already uncomfortable. Right. And so that's kind of that, the definition

of Zimmer with cousins is it's just an oil and water thing. He's not making Cousins a better leader by just telling him he needs to lead more. He's probably making him worse. And that's where I think there is opportunity for Kevin O'Connell. But do you have the roster is always the thing it's going to come back to. But that is where there is some opportunity for Kevin O'nell to be the person that's more encouraging for his quarterback as opposed to making sure that everybody knew when they didn't you know come through in those big games whose fault it was anybody can be a good leader when they get what they want yeah so i think when you know and zimmer

by the way like the 2016 season was a complete joke as far as like culture. And like you had players that were going against his calls in the secondary and so on and so forth. So to pretend that it just was a cousin's thing with Zimmer and that he's perfect, everything like that, not great. Zimmer was also fantastic, you know, in 15 through 17, you know, as far as record is concerned and all that kind of stuff, division titles um you know the last head coach I so so Childress had two division titles he and he had two division titles Simmer had two as well you have to go back to Danny Green before a guy had many more than two so um you know he had his moments but I think what's encouraging about the Adolfo Mensah-O'Connell thing

is that there's clearly an emphasis on doing what's best for the group, even if you're not getting your way. I mean, they just signed a second ago Jonathan Bullard. We talk about Kwasi as an analytics guy. Jonathan Bullard has been a zero-war player for four straight years. I don't know. That might be somebody that Ryan Grigson wanted right and he takes them anyway like there's there's certainly not my way or the highway with this group which was certainly what hurt zimmer which was he didn't want cousins and

he kind of pouted the entire time and and you know for better or worse that's why you know he's out first. Go to Sotastick.com. That is S-O-T-A-S-T-I-C-K, our loyal sponsor. Check out all of their great Minnesota-themed gear for your playoff run in hockey or for baseball season if you're headed out in the nice weather to a baseball game. That is S-O-T-A-S-T-I-C-K, Sotastick.com. Hats, T-shirts, hoodies if you need them for a cool evening in the summer. Sodastick.com has you covered. And if you don't empower somebody in a leadership position, it makes it harder for them to lead. Right.

So, right. So, this is kind of like both of you go to your rooms because of, and now that's what I think the entire ownership is banking on is a better situation for him getting better results. But clearly, even though they sign him to an extension, they didn't show lifetime belief in cousins either by only making it a one year situation where they can still move on cap wise trade wise it's a little harder but cap wise so even them they didn't go all in on this they want to see it themselves as well but that's a really good question let me move on to this one

from linwood uh if you could compare the 2017 schedule to the 2022 schedule. Does this team have the potential to take advantage of a week schedule in the same way it did in 2017? Funny thing about 2017 is it was made into a week schedule by hurting Aaron Rodgers. But overall, they won the big games, though, that year. They beat the Rams with the number one offense, 24 to 7 at home. And then they went to atlanta and beat a very good falcons team uh the nfc south had three playoff teams in 2017 the vikings beat two of them right lost the carolina lost carolina on the road a close game right a game they could have won they had the ball in their hands at the end of the game right so so they they played well against winning

teams which they haven't in the past but uh it's a good question, how difficult is this schedule? Yeah, I mean, so the things that you had in 2017 that were different than what you're going to have now. So, you know, let's throw the Steelers game out of there because the Steelers actually didn't make the playoffs in 17. No, they didn't. Yeah, the Steelers made the playoffs in 17. They had a bye. Lost to Jacksonville that year. That was Case's first start. Yeah, you throw that game out there because we didn't even know Case was starting until like Saturday before.

Right. New Orleans ended up being very good. Remember, they got beat by a double-digit to the Vikings in week one. Then got blown out by New England at home. And then that's when their defense started to round to the shape you saw in the 2017 draft class. So even week one New Orleans, that's a good win, but it was easier at the time. It's one of those not who you play when you play them type situations

with those guys. And then from there, the Lions game at home was really rough, but you got a Bears team starting Trubisky for the first time. You got a Packers team, like you said, they were three-point favorites in US Bank Stadium. And that game you ended up breaking Aaron Rodgers' collarbone or whatever. And so that game got easier. But Detroit was 9-17.

Detroit was 9-17. Splitting with them was decent. Yeah, and Detroit played a good game. Detroit was 9-17. Splitting with them was decent. Yeah, and Detroit played a good game. Detroit was like a blocked field goal. They were offsides on a blocked field goal in the Thanksgiving game. I think 2017's schedule was much harder. Kirk actually played a really good game against them, too, in Washington after the bye.

The Browns were a winless team, and you got them in London right before the bye. But then the Bengals were in the tank. Oh, right. The Bengals were in the tank when they came to the U.S. Bank. The Falcons game, that was a great game by the Vikings. I mean, just an utter – that was a Zimmer game, right? And the Falcons were a slow team then.

So you got a down Bears team, a down Packers team that year. Other than that, I thought it was a relatively modest schedule of difficulty. If we're talking about which team had the weak schedule, it's 2019. That was where you couldn't find any good teams. 2019, you had a bunch of backup quarterbacks on your schedule. Backup quarterbacks, some of which you lost to. Matt Moore, Chase Daniel. You almost lost to Brandon Allen at home in that game. Had a 20-point comeback against Brandon Allen.

Kirk's signature comeback. Yeah, and a ball knocked down in the end zone by J. Ron Curse. Otherwise, Brandon Allen would have had a game-winning drive. And people wondered why we kind of questioned that. I think you look at this schedule, though. You are underdogs at home to the Packers in Week 1. You're underdogs on the road to the Eagles in week two. You're only five-point favorites to the Lions at home, which is –

I mean, if you want any evidence that the world does not believe in Minnesota, it's that there are five-point favorites to the Lions at home. You're basically a pick-em in London against the Saints. Bears, you're going to be favored because the Bears are going to stink. And then you have teams. I think you're going to be an underdog to Miami. Cardinals game is going to be close-ish. I think the Commanders game is going to be close-ish.

You're going to be underdogs to the Bills. You're going to be underdogs to the Cowboys. You're probably maybe favored against the Patriots at home, favored against the Jets. I think on the road against Detroit, you're like a field goal favorite, which again, let's steady things here. Colts, Packers, if they win the games they're supposed to win, there's about seven or eight games here that they should be favored and they should win. After that, it just amounts to whether they can steal a game or two. And this team can steal a game, but they play so many close games by virtue of who the quarterback is

and how he wants to play the game that, you know, we talk about close games, and yeah, close games are kind of a coin flip or whatever. But by virtue of how he plays, are blamed you you're you you deserve some of the blame for close losses because you make games close that shouldn't the fact that Cooper Rush had a chance to score a touchdown against you to win the game is because you checked down to CJ Hamm 18 times in that game so that that that that's where I get worried if if I'm a Vikings fan which is there are tons of winnable games on the schedule. But do you think there's a 0% chance the Jets play a close game at US Bank Stadium and then

something weird happens like a Dalvin Cook fumble that's not even a fumble? And they kick a field goal and you're like, how the heck did they lose to the Jets? Yeah, every year they have that one. There's always that loss on the schedule that you can't believe in the Detroit lions last year was that one. And then this is why I always think going into a season, we try to project how hard the schedule is. You don't really know until the season's over how hard your schedule was because there's a lot of games in there where you're like the Patriots could be really hard or not hard at all I really don't know like based on their point differential last year if they bring that squad like you're gonna have a really tough time with them they had an incredible defense

I think a top 10 offense but I'm not projecting that team to show up but they might like you know what I mean there's the Cardinals won 11 games last year beat the vikings but they but everybody thinks that they're terrible this year right like um and there's good reason to but you're not catching necessarily the good side of variance either you're getting the cardinals before the halfway mark of the season when cliff kingsbury decides to melt down every year so like you you don't get that you go to the commanders like i'll be honest a team that i've kind of puffed up in in in my eyes a little bit is Washington. That team won seven games last year, which is, frankly, only one game less than the Vikings. And they had one of the worst quarterbacks, former Viking Taylor Heineke.

He was one of the worst quarterbacks in the league last year. Antonio Gibson was one of the worst running backs in football. When you look at perfectly blocked runs, he did the least with them of any back in football. You put Brian Robinson from Alabama in there, they could be good. Their defense has tons of first-round picks playing for them. Again, I think what you said is extremely – Or Carson Wentz could throw four picks. You really don't know on a lot of these teams.

You could lose by 30 because Wentz is terrible. But I think Wentz won nine games. Wentz won nine – because Wentz is terrible, but I think Wentz won nine games. Wentz won nine. Kirk couldn't win nine games last year. Wentz won nine games. So I think this is where, I think if you're a Vikings fan, you're optimistic. You said, look, if you're a Vikings fan, you're the only one and a half

point underdogs at home to the Packers. They could very well win that game the same way. They were only one and a half point underdogs when they played at US Bank Stadium last year, and they won that game and they were very convincing and it was a very good win for them you could easily go to philadelphia you have the better quarterback in that game you have um you know you have the best weapon in that game even though they have good weapons for the eagles like you can win that game obviously you could beat detroit and you could beat the saints and you could beat the bears you could be five oh, but like with all of the history of what we've seen with this team, you're basically I think there's five coin flips there.

So good luck, you know, and that's kind of and that's what we've come to expect. And that was one of the things, by the way, if you want to circle this all the way back to 2017, because I want to do that. Their quarterback was not a very good quarterback. He was a quarterback who was playing a very good season. But you know what they did? They beat Tampa by 17. They beat Green Bay by 13. They beat Baltimore by 8, but you remember there was a backdoor touchdown

at the end that screwed over all the under-betters in that game to put it at 40. You were, I think, down at halftime to Cleveland in London, but you beat that team by 17. You beat the Rams, the aforementioned number one offense football, by 17. You beat the Bengals by 27. You beat the Packers by 16 in a game that Case Keenum played like poop. And then you beat the Bears by 13 points.

Like when your quarterback is – and, again, we're not saying Keenum's as good as Cousins. We're saying Cousins is not elite. If your quarterback is in that sort of like anything can happen kind of guy, you win by – when Andy Reid had Alex Smith, they won 66% of their games. Andy Reid had the second best record in all of football in games decided by more than one score to Belichick. That's how you win when you have a quarterback like kirk right you don't leave them to chance right and uh the the variance of kirk in general like which kirk do you get in any one of those games like they can beat good teams with good kirk and they can lose to bad teams with bad kirk

and you just don't know when it's showing up. Um, and the numbers really show that like whether if you chart his PFF grades and you chart, it's funny about his PFF grades, where it's like overall he grades very high, but then you chart them and it's like up and down. It's like the highs are very high and the lows are pretty low. And the same thing goes for QBR or whatever other metric you like. And so with any one of these on the schedule, you go, well, you know, you've got this one and you should win that game at washington but it's like well what what if washington's d-line is good that day and you lose alignment to an injury like there's so much that can play into whether he plays well or not which is what ultimately determines uh whether you're going to

and the more games you have to go down to the wire the less time you can rest people and the more the higher risk you have of everything and i i think one of just to briefly talk about this i think one of the cool things that the that the vikings might be able to do this year is lean into some of the stuff that the rams did in staying healthy yeah like that that was the rams true analytical edge was you know you know steps you know measuring steps measuring load all that kind of stuff. That's been the Vikings' Achilles heel. I think that the path to ultimate success with Cousins is in a completely healthy team to the point of the 2017 to bring this all the way back.

The 2017 Vikings had the same 11 starters on defense in week one as they did in the NFC title game. That is the ingredient to winning a Super Bowl with Kirk. Okay, next question here from atheadcoach21, who is a super subscriber, if you will, to the newsletter. For the fans-only podcast, teams whiff on draft picks all the time. How in the world do teams whiff on hiring a head coach, i.e. Urban Meyer and Joe Judge?

Well, one is Galaxy brain owners. I mean, for one, like Urban Meyer is galaxy brain owner and no other reasonable person would ever do this, except for the owners wanted to make a splash. He was on TV. You could see them being like, yeah, like he won all those games and he's on TV and he sound. And remember when Urban Meyer was on TV, he sounded super smart. And then as soon as he had to get and he sounds, and remember when Urban Meyer was on TV, he sounded super smart. And then as soon as he had to get in the league, he was way over his head in the NFL because surprise, he'd never been there. And he's a sociopath. It's not a great combination, but one thing you can never predict, and this goes for Kevin O'Connell, you can never predict

how someone who was a coordinator reacts to the strain of being a head coach. Like, think about this. If you're the offensive coordinator and you wake up and you look at your phone and you see a report that a player on defense got hurt or a player on defense got arrested or a player, you know, whatever it might be. That's not your problem, right? Like, if you wake up one day and somebody tweeted something they weren't supposed to, and now the media has got a bunch

of questions about it. You don't have to answer those. You just stay in your office and watch film. If, if somebody in the front office has a problem with the way that you played the player that they drafted, that's not really your problem as the offensive coordinator. You might hear about it, but what if there's some sort of conflict? What if the general manager they drafted that's not really your problem as the offensive coordinator you might hear about it but what if there's some sort of conflict what if the general manager wants something that you don't want that's not your problem as the offensive coordinator you're three rungs below everything is your problem and the amount of stress that builds up over a year you also have to answer for everything think about this if you are an offensive coordinator and you make a horrendous play call, you might get asked about it the following Wednesday. If you are the head

coach, the minute that game is over, you just lost, you just blew a 20 point lead. You have to walk in and answer for everything that just happened instantly. And then by the way, you have to answer for it three more times that week and everything that's going on like think about the stress of mike zimmer last year delvin cook's off-field issue everson griffin's off-field issue players going on the covet list he's bringing in covet experts to try to explain why everybody should get vaccinated is that like like think of everything that is not your problem if you're a coordinator well and and and i know this isn't absolute because we've seen – obviously there are coordinators who call –

or head coaches who call plays who have been successful. Matt LaFleur. Yep. Andy Reid has done it forever. Nick Sirianni even last year made the playoffs with the Eagles calling plays on offense. I get worried though, especially if you look at Vikings history with guys like Brad Childress.

And this is where I take it even a step further. Brad didn't call plays in Philly other than the last five games of 05 when McNabb was injured. O'Connell, his last called play is 2019, I want to say. Washington, yeah. He was making the game plan. Guys who want to say Washington yeah he was making the game plan guys who want to be head coaches who also call the plays in the first year I get worried about that like I get worried because a there's not evidence that O'Connell was a good play caller

to begin with right so he's doing a job there there's a projection there right but it adds to all the other stuff that the guy's got to worry about that you just said, and I get worried about it. I think that those guys, and it's why when I look at some of the great coaches in the league, some of the guys I really respect, Mike Tomlin shows up in Pittsburgh in 07. Dick LeBeau's there. Tomlin, Vikings fans know this, he was a cover two guy, ran cover two of the Vikings in 07. Dick LeBeau's there. Tomlin, Vikings fans know this. He was a cover two guy.

Ran cover two of the Vikings in 06. LeBeau was a 3-4 Blitzburg defense. He's like, you call the plays. I'm going to be head coach. John Harbaugh, special teams coordinator, just a head coach. Belichick is kind of like doing that thing now where he's deciding who's going to call plays for his offense and defense and stuff like that. I mean, those guys are unicorns, the Reeds and the Belichick. But even Reed.

Andy Reed has played like a fiddle sometimes at the end of games with his time management stuff. So to answer this question, I think it's just – it's always a projection, right? And we were talking about this. You were talking to my colleague George Shahuri. and we've undergone some changes at PFF. We've switched leadership people around and stuff like that. And just because you're a good data scientist doesn't mean you're going to be a great person at running data science for PFF, right? Like just because you are a great editor doesn't mean you're going to be a great editor-in-chief like there are always projections with this and anytime there's projections so like head coach 21 he says

you know how do they get draft picks wrong when they get well it's the same thing right it's it's you're you're taking somebody from one environment and moving them to the other and at least for college to pro for most part they're playing at least the same position to play in the same sport whereas now like kevin o'connell's job is fundamentally different than the one he had in los angeles so you know i'm not necessarily saying i think he's going to fail i just think there's a they're always all they're all up against it a lot yep yeah oh head coaching is incredibly difficult but i think that in terms of why they get them wrong it's it's similar to draft picks because you've never seen it like think about this what would you do if this room suddenly burst into flames what you can give me a great

answer you could be like well i would get up and i would run to the door and i would save the women and children first and i would put it out you know with my two hands and i would be like uh jose canseco in the simpsons episode where he's running in and grabbing the furniture. But really, you might be George Costanza where you're pushing over old ladies and yelling fire and trying to get out. You don't actually know how you're going to react. Lots of projection. Until you actually end up getting into that spot. So someone like Joe Judge, you could be like, the guy was a special teams coordinator.

What were they thinking? John Harbaugh was a special teams coordinator what were they thinking John Harbaugh was a special teams coordinator best coach in the league or one of the top three and Joe Judge was a coach for Belichick which I has been a variable that you want to fade right let's be honest yep um but but at least like he wasn't some special teams coordinator for like the Packers who are giving up playoff games by block punts and stuff like that like it it's it's not um it's just it's a hard problem all these problems are hard i i have a ton of empathy and these are big decisions and these contracts are guaranteed i know they got offsets and stuff and you know if they were to move on from him or whatever like they would get money back if another team picked them up and hired him as a coordinator and stuff like that but it's also a really risky financial

investment yeah and uh so i think as you're an owner trying to figure out like who do we hire you take your best shot i mean you listen to everybody give you their pitch and and it's just like you know what we're're going to redo the bathroom. And we got a guy and we found him on the internet. And we're just hoping that the guy knows how to put in a bathroom, right? Like everything is like this. But most of the things, most of the decisions. Now, if the guy messes up the bathroom, I'm not going to be happy about it.

So it's pretty costly for me. It's really costly for an owner. so you're like listening to everybody's pitch and you're trying to put it put together you know who's going to be the best and why you should hire this guy and that guy and sometimes we know immediately you hire matt patricia when he didn't tell you about some very unfortunate stuff i told you about my matt patricia. No. Weak handshake. That's what I knew. Oh, he had a weak handshake? Matt Patricia was my first July at PFF. I joined PFF full-time July 9th.

July 12th, I went and visited Detroit. We demoed a few of our products. I met Matt. Nice guy. Nice guy. The handshake was weak, though. And that's when I immediately thought. I immediately thought handshake data, handshake data. That was my hashtag analytics. Grip strength. Yeah, it was just it was a weird like it was a weird thing because like, you know, it was it was it was one of those situations. And again, I'm a I'm the biggest numbers guy in the world, but I certainly I played the game.

I've looked I've i was in a room giving a presentation to all of the coaches and the scouts and stuff for the the lions and if i didn't know that he was the head coach i would have never guessed right like he was he would did not command the room at all he sat in the back slouched he was not a head coach slouched huh didn't he yell at the reporters for slouching? Well, look, hypocrisy is never a trait of men in leadership positions. Oh, yeah, that's for sure. So, yeah, I mean, I just think it's incredibly difficult, if not impossible, to tell. And I remember that when Belichick was hired by the Patriots, some Boston newspaper wrote,

this is like the dumbest hiring of all time. And what are they thinking? And this guy's a failed retread, should hired somebody else and you know what maybe somebody else would be the biggest genius in the world uh if you know they had tom brady right so like all these things are tough to figure maybe joe judge wouldn't have lost his freaking mind at the end of that thing if he had a good quarterback and a healthy team they actually had the most man games lost last year in the nfl uh in the new york giants which is a reason they should be stronger okay uh one more now this is directed at me but you and i could talk about a little bit of the differences here with our situations

so this comes from at you vike that one oh nice yeah another uh another longtime follower of the show so appreciate him uh both you and your wife work at sports, meaning me. And do you ever have to turn sports off for your relationship? My wife and I both work in mental health and healthcare and have learned not to talk work when we are at home and find other interests to talk about. Well, let me, I'll answer first. But mental health and healthcare, a little heavier than sports. We always talk about sports. I mean, all day, all the time and watch sports at night. So we're watching the Lynx game last night. We're texting today about college softball that I'm watching here in the PFF office and she's watching back at home. She broadcasts Lynx games I go to the links game as a season ticket holder

as I go to every single one so I can watch the game and then we can meet up after and talk about the game. I mean, it's a huge part of the first date we ever had was playing one-on-one in basketball. So it's like a massive, yeah, it's a massive part. I mean, it makes up a very, that and the dog makes up probably the majority of our conversations in our entire life. I mean, it makes up a very, that and the dog makes up probably the majority of our conversations in our entire life. I mean, honestly, it's a, I have been extremely lucky to have that, but we are very much the same. So no, we don't ever have to turn that off at all. Like I wouldn't, honestly, if you said you don't have to talk about sports, we would, I'm sure, find other things to connect on. It would be music or whatever else else things that are going on she used to be a news reporter so we discussed the stories that she was covering so it's not like that's what all we do but i mean it's yeah

i mean no not at all i you know this you know this eric because we talk all the time i do not ever get tired of talking about this like and neither do you. It's like we will do Vikings all day, and then you'll call on your way home from work or something, and we'll talk about the Vikings. And then I'll do a radio hit in Rapid City, North Dakota, and I'll talk about the Vikings some more. Shout out to Nate Brown. Shout out to Nate Brown Show that has both of us on all the time.

So, yeah, that's kind of how it is for me. But your wife is not in the industry, so this is different for you. Yeah, I mean, last time I was on, I sort of gave away how much I bet on things. And, you know, by the way, the draft was very good. Congratulations. I'm concerned that you are teaching your young children how to be. Yeah, so like my daughter. Well, I've gotten into the WNBA in large part because of betting,

but also because you're one of my best friends and we chat about it all the time. And also, I will come back to this. You and Sloan are very well-rounded. I think you have good opinions on things, even though you don't go out of your way to not talk about sports. But for me, it's almost always if i have a bad week betting that you'll talk with your wife about it no no no like i go to like amusement parks with my kids i do i do stuff like that my wife and i chat sports but we also chat other things i don't ever have to i

don't always i never go out of my way to turn it off. But I just remember I've had a bad week or two, and I'll just go to bed really early and just be like, I don't want to think about this game for any longer. But yeah, it's hard. I mean, we're into this, and I think there are a lot of people, I actually know people specifically who have been in this business for decades who don't like the game that much yeah oh for sure yeah I'm not one of them so no uh well neither am I but I think that it is different like people people who do the job of reporting on football who have spouses that don't like aren't in sports or don't care about sports, I think it is challenging for those people because it's hard to understand how much of your life this takes. How much of your life this takes up and how much time,

how much brain space, how much emotional energy that goes into it. And it's like my wife and I were talking about our schedules for this fall. It's like, well, I'm going to be traveling to this game and she's got to travel. She's doing something that's going to be really awesome this, this fall. And she's going to be traveling every weekend. And it's like, we end up being away from each other a lot because we both work in sports. Not everyone understands that. Like I've got to go, I've got to write last night. I mean, I was getting ready to come here on a fairly early flight and it's like 1230 at night and I'm still trying to finish up an article for tomorrow. And it's just like, that's how it is. So I think that's a challenge for people who

have spouses that don't understand. But since both of us are in the industry, it's like, well, you got to do what you got to do. I have to do what have to do and um you know it's really beneficial so it's a good question but uh for for us it just yeah it never stops so football football eric uh this was great you and i got to run because we're gonna go to the reds game and Chris Sabo at third base. You have Eric Davis, Barry Larkin. Yeah, not to be – Ken Griffey Jr. and senior. And senior, yeah. I'm trying to think of – like, obviously, Joey Botto is still there,

but he would be a good one in a couple years. Yeah, he might be a Hall – I think he's a Hall of Famer. So, anyway, well, this was fun. It was good to get together with you. You're the first guest to ever do a Fans Only, so maybe that will become a thing that ends up happening more often. So thank you all for listening, as usual, and we'll talk to you soon.