Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - PFF's Sam Monson talks Vikings offseason and the PFF50

Episode Date: June 24, 2021

Matthew Coller is joined by Pro Football Focus lead analyst Sam Monson to talk about the Vikings' approach to the offseason and rebuilding their defense. Does this season represent a pivot point for the franchise? They also look at the PFF50 countdown and talk about which Vikings player would be the one to protect in a hypothetical expansion draft and why Justin Jefferson isn't yet in the top 50 players in the NFL. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Oh, welcome to another episode of Purple Insider presented by Scout Logistics. Matthew Collar here and joining me from Cincinnati Pro Football Focus' Sam Monson. What's going on, Sam? How are you? I'm doing good. How about you? How is summer in Cincinnati? Can you feel the buzz for Week 1, Vikings-Bengals? Is that the talk of the town? No, I don't think so.

Summer so far has been nice. We've had a little bit of time off. Been able to get out of Cincinnati, go other places now. The pandemic has started to ease. We can get places. We don't have to have the masks on anymore. Ohio is fully open. We're able to roll in pretty much everywhere, I think, now without any kind of COVID protocol. So the wisdom of that, I don't know, that's not my, my call, but it is nice not to have to wear a mask everywhere. Yeah, no, I agree. I mean, I went to a game here the other day and nobody is wearing masks in the stadium and, you know, you're going into the grocery store or the, I had to go to the DMV the other day to get my license renewed.

And if you saw my picture, I am now wanted in 32 States. Um, but you know, it just is like, Oh, okay. Uh, I guess we're not doing this anymore. So off I go. Um, but yeah, no, being able to go places traveled for the first time last week on a plane for the first time in over a year or so. So that's been good. And I imagine there will be a full stadium week one in Cincinnati. Now I to start I did a piece for my website based on your guys's offensive and defensive line rankings and one of the things I noticed Sam was the number of times where the Vikings are playing a really good defensive line they've got the Steelers of course the Bears and Packers are still pretty loaded they face a pair of Bososa's and Miles Garrett. I wonder what you think as we talked about this offseason,

the Vikings revamping their offensive line through the draft, just how that will play out considering that as we're going to go through the PFF 50, there's a lot of PFF 50 players that the Vikings offensive linemen are going to have to face in their first year. Yeah, it's a good thing. Minnesota's offensive line is rock solid and you never have to worry about it it's it's not not a concern at any point um yeah they they're going to be tested this year and look they've they've made some incremental changes they've made moves that should make it better the question is how quickly will they make it better? And in particular, Christian Darasaw, he's an interesting player because we liked him coming out. He ranked high on PFF's board. It sounds generally like the NFL collectively was less high on him than we were,

than most of the sort of consensus draft analysts out there, that they were just a little bit more concerned about his play overall um that's why he was not just available when the vikings pick came up but why they were prepared to trade back and get him anyway you know and run the risk that he wouldn't be there because if he wasn't i don't think they would have been that upset you know they didn't love him to the point where they were celebrating when he was still available when when their pick came up and, you know, ran in with the card. So, yeah, Darasol might be a worse prospect or the NFL thinks he's a worse prospect than we did. And even if he isn't, even if he's every bit as good as PFF thinks he was like offensive linemen

don't tend to hit the ground running in the NFL. Now, there have been a few guys recently bugged that trend and it's not impossible. But, you know, if you're it's one of those positions where if you're banking on your first round rookie coming in and fixing the position as a rookie, you're it's not a winning bet most of the time. I think you're probably not playing the odds and this reminds me a bit of when you know the Atlanta Falcons drafted offensive linemen with their first and second round picks a couple of years ago and the Falcons fans are like great

offensive lines fixed well it probably isn't year one it might be in year two or year three but year one the chances of both those guys hitting to the point where they're not a problem is not high now the vikings obviously only really have one but you know still particularly when you talk about the gauntlet of pass rushes he's going to have to deal with the chances of christian darusso being a good player and and sort of winning his share of those battles year one is not high right it's kind of like um survive year one right christian derisaw i mean there's a little bit the same thing with ezra cleveland last year where the first game he plays he's matched up with grady jarrett and it was just not good as you would

expect but he's found a way to survive in that game and kind of get through it and you saw okay well he's not going to get drew samia where there's just people running through him who aren't good it's just that i was kind of taken aback when i laid it out on paper how many times the vikings are going to be at a disadvantage still even if their offensive linemen play better than the line did last year you might get some of the same results which is kind of interesting to me I wonder what you think about the way that the Vikings distributed their cap space this year. They were able to make a lot of it, a lot more than we thought they were going to be able to make, but they put everything into the defensive side and signed, I think, 11 total free agents on defense. And I think maybe eight of them are

expected to start or whatever number it is, six of them expected to start, but almost nothing on the offensive side. I wonder what you took away from kind of that strategy now that Sheldon Richardson is a Viking, too. Yeah, I think they probably needed to. You know, the defense had fallen apart and it wasn't anything like the unit it was before. as before and even if you sort of budget in expected development from those guys particularly in the secondary you still needed to get and getting guys like danelle hunter back obviously is huge but you still needed additions and you still need to make some changes and improve the talent level overall to keep your head above water because you know we've talked before the vikings offense is always going to have a ceiling to it. It's never going to be the best offense in the NFL. So you can't just ignore defense the way that the Kansas City

Chiefs can, right? The Chiefs don't even need a good defense. They just need a defense that isn't the worst in the NFL and rely on the fact that Patrick Mahomes will make up the difference. The Vikings are never going to be able to do that. Even when their offense is the best it could possibly be, they're going to need the defense to do something. They're going to need the defense to be pretty good. And it wasn't last year, obviously. So I think they had to throw some resources at it. And, you know, Minnesota with Kirk Cousins,

they're always going to be up against the cap, but they've got a great salary cap, you know, guru guy pulling the strings. And they're always very good at having enough money to spend and you know maybe it's not every single move they want to make you know they they have to make a cut here or there that they wouldn't like or they can't go after a player that they they would love to bring in but generally speaking the Vikings are always going to have the money to to make some moves and add some guys where they feel they need reinforcements.

And I think they've done a good job of doing that. I'm kind of I think that defense will be markedly better this year. Yeah. I mean, it kind of has to be. You're not right. I mean, you're not starting Jaleel Johnson and Jalen Holmes. So that's definitely going to be better. I wonder what you think though. So I, in my piece, I laid out that you had initially ranked the Vikings as the 26th best defensive line. Now Sheldon Richardson is added to the mix. Obviously after the article comes out, how much does that change it in your mind? Because for me,

it kind of does quite a bit having the Daniel Hunter situation locked in, but also we were asking, so where is the interior pressure exactly going to come from when you have two nose tackles now the mixing and matching possibilities with the fact that they have some guys who can line up over the guard that are defensive ends and they have some guys that they drafted that might be able to contribute at some point and in some way uh I think you you have to kind of look at it differently now that Sheldon Richardson is here. Yeah, I think you nailed it in terms of, OK, there's a source of interior pass rush pressure. And before they didn't have one. Now they got dramatically better in terms of defending the run with Dalvin Tomlinson and Michael Pierce coming back.

And, you know, but you're still looking at that group and saying, OK, compared with what they had last year, they should be able to get some pressure. You know, Michael Pierce and Dalvin Tomlinson are not good pass rushers, but neither are they going to spend the entire season getting nothing the way that the guys they had a year ago were. And they can push the pocket as really big, powerful guys and run defenders so they can make an impact even if they're not actually getting pressure. But you were looking at it and saying, but who's actually going to get that pressure inside? Because he can't just have a stout interior defensive line and hope that the edge rushers can get it all done by themselves

because even really good edge rushers, they're going to need some help somewhere along the line so Sheldon Richardson is that guy he is somebody that can bring a consistent amount of interior pressure and you know throughout throughout his career he's averaged somewhere in the region of 50 total pressures in a season it's a pretty high number for an interior guy and I think he's he's a really good player you know every now and again you're going to get those one or two games where he really shows up um and i think that's why he bounces around a bit because you're only ever getting 80 percent of what sheldon richardson is capable of and the one or two games a year where you get the hundred percent i think probably

annoys everybody and in particular it probably annoys guys like Mike Zimmer a lot. You know, looking at this guy that you know is capable of way more and you could really use the way more that he's capable of, but you're just not going to get it because whatever reason, you know, he isn't one of those guys that's going to give you 100% every play, every week, every season. You're dealing with some percentage of what he's capable of giving but if you put that to a side for a moment and look at the 80 percent that you're getting it's better than most of the interior players in the NFL so like at some point uh personnel people

you know need to look at that and say like it doesn't matter like okay unless unless his attitude or sort of i don't want to use the word laziness but you know propensity to not give 100 or 110 every single week unless that's like rubbing off on players around him and suddenly everybody is you know mailing it into a degree why do we care like just accept the fact that he's capable of more and you're never going to see it and embrace the fact that he's better than most of the people you could put in there in that position. Yeah, right. Exactly.

And also take the several games a year where he dominates because in 2018 week one, he, I don't know the pressure number exactly, but I remember looking back at the all 22 and being like, Oh my God, is he going to do this all the time? And the answer was not really, but then there was a big game against the Packers that could have been a swing game to get them into the playoffs that they won in part because Sheldon Richardson was in Aaron Rodgers face the entire night and if he does that five times this year then the signing I mean the signing is for almost nothing in terms of money and cap space anyway but if if he does that a handful of times, he's going to have a huge impact.

Now, I want to switch over to well, actually, let me ask you a big picture question first, and then we could switch over to the PFF 50 because I've got questions. But how interested are you in this season? You have followed the Minnesota Vikings a very long time. You've been doing Minnesota radio for a very long time given your given your takes right this season to me is incredibly interesting one of the most that what that I've covered since I've been here but just because there are so many avenues that this could take them if it does all turn around and it does all click and they go to an NFC championship because the NFC has no good teams left.

Then everybody's staying right. And then, and if they disappoint and go eight, nine or something, then everybody could be going. I, I think that they're among the most interesting teams in the NFL because of how different the directions could be based on how the season plays out?

I think to me, it depends a lot on what happens with Aaron Rodgers and the Packers. Like if the Packers don't have Rodgers, the NFC North is, is completely up for grabs. And that becomes really interesting because like, obviously the Vikings have this huge range of range of outcomes from, you know, the thing is a disaster and everybody gets fired to it goes really well. All the things that they've done come together and they do go deep into the playoffs because the NFC outside of Tampa Bay isn't great. Particularly, again, if Rodgers isn't in Green Bay. But when you look at that, I think that range of outcomes, it's's probably going to split the split the difference between those two extremes the way it usually does. And the Vikings end up in the same seven to 10 win range now that there's 17 games in a season, which is just ultimately an uninteresting place to be always.

But if the Packers aren't in contention anymore because Jordan Love is the quarterback that becomes a more interesting place to be because now that that puts you like you're charging for the division lead even in that range and that that becomes kind of fascinating because Chicago is going to be treading water until Justin Fields gets on the field Detroit probably aren't going to be in this conversation because they're only sort of halfway through the multi-year rebuilding project. So it's like Minnesota's division to claim for the first few weeks until Justin Fields gets on the field and potentially gives Chicago that boost.

Or Jordan Love is a much better player than everybody thinks he's going to be outside of Green Bay, and the Packers don't drop off as much as we expect. But, like, I think for Minnesota, you're right, though, it's a future-defining season, right? They've got a lot of young players who, you know, learned last year and now need to show what they're capable of in terms of development. And if they don't, then, like, the whole thing needs to be blown up and you start over. If they do, then that's, you know, that's a pathway forward.

And there's an interesting dynamic on the defensive side. When you sign a bunch of guys to one year deals, where are you going to go with those guys in the future? Are you going to resign them and spend a lot of money and keep this thing together and build with those guys. Or if you go seven and 10, then all of a sudden you're talking about maybe saying, all right, well, those guys didn't work on the one-year deals and now we've got to try something else. And then I think at that point, you'd be changing a lot of things. So from that perspective, it is very interesting. I've still got Aaron Rogers coming in on the white horse at the last

minute. How are, how are you feeling about that i know that uh eric and george talk about the odds of rogers coming back at all the time but uh how are you how are you feeling about the chances that he returns i don't think he's coming back i don't i mean this is a guy that was perfectly prepared to like blow up the bridges between himself and his family over whatever the hell that beef is like green bay if they've slided him he's not like they're not piecing that back together again particularly as it sounds like the only thing they could do to actually appease him is like fire the gm which even for a normal franchise wouldn't be happening but particularly a team that's that's owned the way green bay is where the decisions are made by like a council of people,

like, you know, you would need one of those teams with an owner that has the sort of, A, the capability and B, like the knee jerk propensity to just walk into a room, be like, oh, like Roger says, if I fire you, he's coming back. So bye bye. It's been fun, but you're out of here because he's more important than you are. Like even there aren't many of those around and like, and green Bay certainly isn't one. They just don't have the capacity to make a call like that in the space of an off season. So yeah, I, I think if that's what's bugging him, he's, he's not playing there.

Yeah. I'm, I'm only going to believe it when I see it kind of thing. I, I really feel like he wants to have his sort of Farvey and moment where he just walks in in the second week of training camp or something after reports come out. The Jordan love doesn't look so good or something like that. That's just I I feel like the only thing that would appease his ego is being really needed by his teammates and saying, I'll do it for you guys and screw Brian. And he's the one that made the Michael Jordan comparison by calling Gutekunst Jerry Kraus. And so what did they do with Jerry Kraus? They all came back and they won a championship, right?

So that's how I'm feeling about it right now. Okay, here's my question on the PFF50, where you count down the 50 best players in the NFL and you've got Vikings here. So far, it's been released to the 21st and you've got Delvin Cook at number 26. Let's see. I'm scrolling down here. Harrison Smith is at number 32. Eric Hendricks is number 33. Here's my question off this related to the Vikings. If you were an expansion team that got to take, that got to pluck players off of other teams and you couldn't take Justin Jefferson because he was protected or something, but you could take anybody else off the Minnesota Vikings. Give me your like expansion team draft

board of guys that you would take from the Minnesota Vikings if you could do that? I mean, I think Danell Hunter might be the top guy on the list. That guy is still only 26 years old. It's insane. But he like the last time we saw him play football, the guy had 88 total pressures in the year, which is second only to Zedaria Smith that season. It was a career year for him. There's no reason he can't be getting even better because that was like the arrow was only going upwards. So Hunter can be a genuine impact playmaker for them. Like the other players that they have either that are in that caliber are either old, you know, Harrison Smith at some point is reaching the latter stages of his career, even though he's an amazing player or they play positions that just aren't that important. Like Dalvin Cook is a phenomenal player, but he's a running back. And like you can get Dalvin Cook-esque production if your offensive line is in good shape.

And then, you know, Eric Hendricks is a great player and incredible in coverage, but he's a linebacker and that's just becoming a less and less important position than it's been in the past. So Kendricks would be in the conversation. Hunter, I think, would be the clear number one. You know, Adam Thielen is starting to get up in age as well. So, yeah, they don't have like an amazing list of candidates for that. I think because just this weird, you know, dynamics of the best players that they have are sort of getting up there in age or play in positions that you're probably not grabbing high in that kind of franchise draft.

Daniil Hunter was born in 1994, which feels super weird because he's been around for a very long time. It seems in the NFL, a good point about the ages of some of these players and where they're going. The one that I might say is an interesting discussion is Eric Hendricks because while the linebacker position might not be as valuable, there are only like four guys who are as good as Eric Hendricks. It sort of reminds me of tight end a little where you're like, well, you know,

most tight ends, they're not changing their offenses, but if you have Travis Kelsey, he's changing your offense. I kind of look at it that way for Kendricks, especially over the last maybe two to three years where he's taken his game to a completely different level. I wonder how you feel about that position, because I think if there's like Kendricks and a couple other guys, Bobby Wagner, and then sort of everyone else. And I wouldn't take almost anyone else, but I would take him. Yeah, I think it's a good case. You can also make the argument that, hey, the general standard of linebackers is getting worse,

or even if it's not getting worse, they're playing worse because they're getting attacked better by offenses. You know, the linebackers might not be getting worse, but the job is becoming harder. And so the gap between guys like Eric Kendricks and Bobby Wagner and Fred Warner, the elite cover guys in particular, and the rest is becoming wider. And it's more important to get a guy like that, even if generally linebacker is becoming less important because the average guy you're bringing in isn't great. But if you do have a Kendricks or a Wagner or a Fred Warner, whoever it is, then that actually becomes even more valuable than usual because of the rarity of them. So yeah, I think you can make that case with Kendricks. And certainly you can point to games where he's changed the way it's happened because of what he can do in coverage. He is one of those players that is able to change the dynamics in the middle of the field because he will make plays on passes that linebackers aren't supposed to make. that game where they ultimately got wrecked by the 49ers. But like Jimmy Garoppolo was,

seemed intent on throwing the ball to Eric Hendricks because Kendricks was places that he's not supposed to be. Like most linebackers are not able to make those plays. So it made like Jimmy Garoppolo look like an idiot, but like they weren't ridiculous decisions. He was making plays that you can make against most linebackers. You just can't against a guy who's as good at it as Eric Hendricks is. Yeah.

Last year, he ran a go route with Devontae Adams step for step, and I think either broke it up or at least got in Adams' face enough. I mean, how many linebackers are running step for step with a wide receiver to be able to take them on in a go route? We know that that happened a couple of times in 2018 against the Rams to Anthony Barr and did not turn out so good. So there are very few guys, if they get caught in that situation, are going to survive it, especially with Aaron Rodgers throwing the ball. And yet, you know, that to me is just an exceptional skill set from him. Let's talk about Justin Jefferson. So, you know, I don't have the top 20 yet. I've got to imagine Justin Jefferson

is among the top 20. So let me sort of turn the question in another way. If you could start a franchise with any player in the NFL, that's not a quarterback is obviously you're starting it with Patrick Mahomes, but not a quarterback. Where is Justin Jefferson among all NFL players on that list? Yeah. So I'm going to ruin your day and tell you that he isn't in the top 20. He's not? What? Where is he? Was he earlier? Look at the list of wide receivers in the NFL, right? Come on, he's not in the top 20? There's so many incredible wide receivers.

Look, he finished last season. What was he, our number two graded receiver behind only Devontae Adams? If you're looking, the only data we have on Justin Jefferson says he's the number two receiver in the NFL essentially. Right. But we know like there's a season in there where every one of these guys in the top 10 has been a top two graded wide receiver in the NFL. Like that's the problem with wide receiver is that it is so stacked in the NFL right now. Guys are coming into the league every year and lighting it on fire and immediately being incredible and we know that it fluctuates more than that and that as much as jefferson was

incredible year one doesn't mean he's going to be incredible plus 10 year two we might see him take a step backwards like a small step back and even if he does he'll still be a great wide receiver and still better than most people thought he was going to be coming into the NFL. But it doesn't mean that you can then like project that automatically he's a better player than like Mike Evans, right? Or Chris Godwin, who's had a season like that. Or, you know, Keenan Allen. There's guys down that list who have had just five, six years of really, really good seasons like that, who in any given season could easily be better than Justin Jefferson

and have a hell of a lot more of a track record of doing it. So it's tough because, like I say, the only evidence we have on Jefferson so far had him ranked like number two in the NFL. So it's hard to then say, well, then he's worse than that. But in terms of like how we know this works, in terms of player grades and how players perform and develop in a kind of growth curve in the in the league he's probably not going to be better

year two than he was year one like he was so good year one he's unlikely to be even better year two and if he isn't even if you just shave that little piece off, he ends up slipping outside of a list where everybody's amazing. OK, I was going to ask the one the one that you're going to get the most crap for. Oh, hello, Steve. How are you, Steve? Back on air. What's going on, buddy? Cheers. Got my coffee. Nice to see you. We were talking about your offensive line rankings earlier. Totally wrong. All wrong. Perfect. Yeah. your offensive line rankings earlier totally wrong all wrong perfect yeah um so maybe you

could just blame steve for justin jefferson not being in the top 50 that's that that's another way we can do it but uh i was gonna ask like which one you were gonna receive the most crap for but i think i know now already that answers it yeah uh josh allen at number 40 bills fans love to uh get on you guys for every ranking and every time you mentioned them in any way, but well, that's it. That's an interesting way to look at it because you're right. He has not proven it over a multi-year. And if he has another year, like last year,

he will absolutely be in your PFF 50 for next season. But still the question though, in terms of starting a franchise, considering his age contract, all those things, I would think he would have to rank among the top. Yeah. I mean, if you're removing quarterback from the equation because you're always starting with the quarterback, like your next position is corner or wide receiver, and Jefferson would be one of the top wide receivers you would take.

He's young. He's, as I say, the only evidence we have of him, he's like second best wide receiver in the NFL. So absolutely, he's going to be one of the first guys you would grab. And also, we know that he's got experience of lining up everywhere. Like he can win all over the field. He can win at wide or in the slot. He can win through kind of speed and athleticism or through right running savvy.

He's one of the most complete players at his position already. So absolutely. All right. Last thing on the PFFff 50 and you guys are tweeting it out so if you follow pff there or you can go to pff.com to see it love i love the off-season lists um you know the weather was i know right i mean like it is it's like we have we have this the right the pre-season the regular season the free agency the draft and list season and now we're in list season and i'm doing the same thing so um most underrated player that is on the top 50 the one that your mainstream media your nfl network your espn will you'll never

talk about but the guy or several guys are just should deserve more credit. Bryce Callahan, best slot corner in the NFL guy. He's like five, eight, 180 or whatever. And that guy was told, asked to play outside, you know, be a true number one cornerback last year because Denver's cornerback room just got absolutely eviscerated. So, you know, you take one of the best slot corners in the NFL and you say, OK, Bryce, today you're going to have to go one on one with DK Metcalf because we don't have anybody else. Like it's your gig. Nobody else can do it. And he played well. He did just as well as outside at an outside cornerback alignment as he was in the slot. And it happened multiple times in the year. So he was one of the most valuable defensive backs times in the year um so he was one of

the most valuable defensive backs in the nfl last year he's one of the best players period and i i mean i really don't think that people view him you know in that kind of bracket at all yeah no i agree and he was the name that popped out to me but i think vikings fans do give their respect to bryce callahan because of his time with Chicago. And they noticed Buster screen is not Bryce Callahan. And they certainly learned that last year when Chicago all of a sudden was not the same. So while that, and another reason, by the way, Justin Simmons is on there as well. Another reason why Aaron Rogers should want to play with the Denver Broncos

because they are pretty stacked. So anyway, uh, Sam Monson, always great to catch up with you, buddy. Good to see you. And, uh, we will definitely do it again soon. So the, the rest of the list is coming out, I assume in the next couple of days. Yeah. And, uh, so make sure you go to pff.com to check it out there as always, you guys do awesome work and, uh, I am very appreciative of your time. So let's do it again soon, man. Absolutely. Thank you, sir.