Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Random questions week: Going back in the Vikings future

Episode Date: June 27, 2024

Matthew Coller and Manny Hill get together on Matthew's porch to talk about what moment you would try to change in Vikings history and then the best Kirk Cousins games and plenty of other random nonsense Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of Purple Insider. Matthew Collar here on the porch for another porch podcast. And who is joining me but Manny Hill. What is going on Manny? Great to see you. It's a beautiful day outside. I'm trying to take advantage of summer. So I have moved the studio and the video camera and everything out here onto my porch. And we picked a beautiful day. It's perfect.

You've got a great, spacious porch. It's a great setup. And when I pulled in here this afternoon, I was blown away by your wonderful setup here. It looks great. Well, thank you very much. I appreciate that. So this week, I told you, is Random Questions Week. So I have a bunch of random questions questions week so i have a bunch of random

questions for you you have a bunch of random questions for me and people can still continue to send their random questions purpleinsider.com a great place to do it or if you want to hit me up on twitter at matthew collar feel free to sneak into my dms and ask a question there but i'm going to start out with this so my wife watched back to the future for the first time ever she had never seen back to the future before and it holds up pretty well not the second one the first one holds up pretty well i think the second one is just the first one again and i don't think i realized that when i saw them three years apart but i definitely realized that when we watched them back to back so anyway it got me thinking about how we usually talk about Vikings history, which is a bunch of what ifs.

Hey, what if Gary Anderson made the kick? Then they might have won the Super Bowl. So I wanted to put a back to the future spin on this for random question week. And my random question to you is if you had the ability to go back in the delorean into vikings history what would you change and also here's the other part of this you have to tell me manny how you're going to change it because in the movie he has to sorry if this is spoiling it for anyone he has to go back in time and he messes something up so then he has to get his parents together so he can be born and have a family and a life right so you not only have to go back in time to fix something in vikings history

but you also have to explain to me how you're going to do it so what are you fixing how are you fixing it go okay so i'm gonna go back to the 1998 NFC Championship game, and I'm not going to talk about Gary Anderson missing the kick. I'm going to go to even an earlier point of that game because that was in the fourth quarter. The Vikings could have gone up by 10 and possibly put Atlanta away and go on to the Super Bowl. But I'm going to take it a step further and go back further back in that game. I'm going to go back to the end of the

first half where the vikings have a 20 to 7 lead and they have the ball deep in their own territory i think they were inside their own 25 yard line it was a little over a minute left in the first half and the vikings are just they're they're just getting really really greedy they're trying to you know dagger the falcons and they're trying to dagger the Falcons, and they're trying to get another touchdown on the board to maybe go up by 20 before the end of the first half. We all know what happens there. Chuck Smith goes around the edge on Todd Stuse. Strip sacks Randall Cunningham.

The Falcons recover the fumble, and the very next play Chandler throws a touchdown pass. I think it might have been to Tony Martin, but I can't remember who the receiver was. But that touchdown made it 20-14 at halftime, completely changed the game the rest of the way, and the Falcons really kind of dominated the game the rest of the way. So my change is to go back and to tell Denny Green,

don't be so greedy. You're in good shape. You got the ball at your own 20-yard line. You're running the risk of a turnover here, and that could drastically change this game. So the best way I can think of to get this message to Denny. That was going to be my next question. How exactly are you going to tell Denny Green this message?

I am going to try my best i'm going to go back in time months and months and months earlier in the season and i'm going to get myself on the vikings coaching staff somehow some way how i'm going to do it i have no idea but i'm going to get myself onto the vikings coaching staff as some sort of offensive analyst or something, some sort of made-up job. And we're going to go through the season. It's going to be a long process, but we're going to go through the season, and I'm going to get into Denny's ear right before that moment because I'll have the ability to do that because I'll be on the sidelines,

and I'm going to tell Denny, let's just relax here. Let's hand the ball off to Robert Smith and Leroy Hort here. And if one of them pops off a good run, then maybe we can try and get in the position, maybe kick a field goal before the end of the half. But let's not get too crazy here. We're in control of this game. Let's play it safe. All right, so you have to probably go back even farther to forge some sort of career in football

and then work your way into getting hired by the Minnesota Vikings and then earn the trust of Denny Green to the point where he's going to listen to you. I think this is going to be tough. I mean, maybe there is a, so I had this idea about Favre's interception, the 12 men in the huddle right before the interception. My idea was to be a ball boy and forget the ball instead of like tossing it into the referee you're like oh i fumbled the ball and hope that within a few seconds of the ball boy screwing around and everyone going what is this ball boy doing he's fumbling the ball he threw it over the referee's head that either the referee does not see the 12 men in the huddle or that they go wait wait

don't go on the field we're gonna have 12 men in the huddle that's not the personnel package so maybe there's something like that for you where you get to be a ball boy and you walk up to denny green and you say don't don't pass the ball here and and maybe he says, well, man, that's strange. I've never had a ball. Boy, he must be from the future. But otherwise, I think that's going to be pretty tough. The other one might be to go back and become friends, which you are now with the long snapper,

and tell him, hey, take a deep breath before you snap that ball. It's a little high, right? Yes. Maybe. Because it's not that hard it's probably hard to become friends with denny green or randy moss or someone like that but it might not be that hard to be friends with with uh with mike he he gets right he's a very affable guy he's probably in local establishments you maybe talk to him about that moment hey just one thing.

If there's ever a big moment here, take one extra deep breath and try to snap it a little bit lower, and then maybe Gary Anderson's kick goes in. I like it. I could probably pull that off. A very young Mike Morris probably wouldn't know who the hell I am, but I could probably develop a pretty good relationship with him, though. You know the Vikings, of course,

and you would already know so much about his team. You could strike up a football conversation. You're a friendly guy. That's maybe a way to do it. If you got to be friends with Todd Stussy, tell him to watch out for this particular move that Chuck Smith liked to put on because he was a great player. I think those are definitely ways to do it. there a way to prevent Teddy's injury because that was what I was trying

to think of yeah I don't really know what that would be because it was such a random and strange and fluky thing it was non-contact right right and people still wonder did someone step on him is there some mystery there I yeah I've never heard anybody confirm something like that. But if you could prevent Teddy from going to practice that day, then maybe he doesn't step weird and have the entire career altered in that moment. But how would you prevent him from going? I know, I've got it. You crash his car.

He's on the way. He's on the way. He's on the way to practice. And you crash his car in a way that he couldn't get hurt. You just T-bone him at a slow speed. Maybe this sounds a little bit morbid and evil. Could you just, like, slash his tires maybe? Could slash his tires. Before he even comes out and so he's late.

But he's going to find a way. He would call someone and have them pick him up. He's not going to just say, someone slash my tires, I can't come to practice. But all the other options seem much worse. Or maybe there was something hidden in his knee that was going to reveal that this was going to happen. So you could somehow suggest that he get an MRI. But even finding a way to do that is very difficult. Get that message to him.

Because if you sent a letter to Teddy Bridgewater or a DM on social media and said, get an MRI, be like, who is this lunatic? People send me stuff like that. Weird, you know, the Vikings theories and stuff that you just ignore. So I don't know. I don't know how to prevent it. Yeah, I don't know. Well, and before the injury, was there any sort of indication from anybody that there was anything wrong with his knee whatsoever?

Because that's the crazy part about that is it just came out of nowhere. There was nothing, you you know he didn't because I think that was after that third preseason game against the Chargers where Teddy had that really good first drive and he looked great and there was no sort of indication that oh you know Teddy's walking off the field and he's got a little bit of a you know he's kind of walking gingerly he looks like his knee is sore there was nothing like that so it's like how do we even how do you even know that something like that is going to happen do you just go back and say no teddy don't go out there just don't trust me don't go out there i mean do you call it a bomb threat like that seems to be too far for even this game

yeah to be talking about that. I mean, is there any way to keep him off the practice field? You could drive your car all over the Winter Park practice field and wreck the field so they had to practice indoors. You would go to jail, but you could just claim drunken disorderly and pay the fine and prevent Teddy Bridgewater. And no one would ever know. They would laugh at it. Hey, remember that crazy radio guy who pulled some stunt and drove on Winter Park's field? Could you get in there, though?

There was a fence. But it wasn't an impressive fence. You could smash right through. You got a big enough truck. You got an SUV. You could just smash right through it. Yeah. Well, especially if we're taking a DeLorean time machine.

If we're going back, I mean, DeLorean's as durable as it gets. I mean, you could crash that thing. You could flip that thing over 20 times and it'd be fine. I don't know if there's a way to prevent Blair Walsh from shanking wide to the left. Probably not. I think that was going to happen one way or another. No way to really prevent dante from getting hurt when he did just a random fluky thing that you would have thought was a normal

injury and it turned out not to be trying to think if there's there's other ones i mean 38-7 no way to prevent that unless you stole the eagles defensive or offensive playbook yeah and gave it to zimmer but i think they were losing that game no matter what, that they were emotionally spent, similar to the Lynx after their Commissioner's Cup victory melting down as they did just before we were doing this podcast. But that's the most challenging part. We all know what we would change,

but figuring out how you're going to change it. How do you get them, for example, to draft, say, Jalen Hurts instead of Jeff Gladney? Or, I mean, Antoine Winfield Jr. probably doesn't change their fate entirely, but we talked, because we were on the radio at that time, so much about Jalen Hurts and how there might be an opportunity. There were two first-round draft picks. They had extended Kirk in 2020,

but you still were talking about a short term extension and a project type quarterback that if you take him as a luxury pick in the first round, kind of as Atlanta took Michael Penix, although he's probably closer to being ready than Jalen Hurts. How could you convince Rick Spielman? Because they were so much in win now mode mode even if as the roster was resetting and after they traded stefan diggs everyone's jobs were under pressure i don't know how to i mean you would have to take on a job in scouting and somehow pound the table louder inside of the room

that jalen hurts was going to be great i really don't know a way to get them to pick or jordan love honestly but yeah but love was taken in between Jefferson and Gladney. So if you were still sitting at, I think, was he the 30th pick or something? I don't know if there's a way to do that. Well, and I would even go back a couple of years prior to that because that was, what, 2020? So you go back a couple of years prior to that, and you brought this up in the past, how do you convince Rick Spielman and Mike Zimmer to, instead of investing a three-year fully guaranteed contract in Kirk Cousins, to go back into the draft and take Lamar Jackson? And maybe you bring back Case Keenum or Sam Bradford or somebody as sort of a bridge guy.

Like, you knew that the three quarterbacks that were on the roster in 2017, that none of those guys, Teddy because of his injury, Sam Bradford because he was getting a little older and he was having some knee problems, and Case, you just kind of realized that Case just wasn't going to be a long-term answer. You knew none of those guys were going to be your future starter, but you could bring one of them back as like a bridge guy, and then you do sort of a soft reset with Lamar Jackson without the pressure of having to put him out there right away.

And if they would have brought Case Keenum back in 2018, they wouldn't have gone 6-10 or anything like that. They still would have been a pretty competitive team. I mean, they end up going 8-7-1 anyway, so who's to say it would have been much worse than that it would have been a lot better than that if they had trapped lamar jackson in the long term that's for two-time mvp lamar jackson right uh and every once in a while that will get brought up and someone will say well zimmer would have ruined him i don't know about that uh i think that lamar jackson i think two-time mvp too too good to ruin

i think mike zimmer would have loved coaching Lamar Jackson because Lamar's really good at taking care of the football. He's not reckless. He makes enough plays. He's a great leader. We've seen all of this stuff now develop over the last six years since he's been in the league. I think Mike Zimmer would have loved coaching Lamar Jackson,

much like he loved coaching Teddy Bridgewater. Well, and what is he like more than anything? Running the football loved coaching Lamar Jackson, much like he loved coaching Teddy Bridgewater. Well, and what is he like more than anything? Running the football, which Lamar Jackson, not only Lamar Jackson does it himself, but also the running backs who play with Lamar Jackson seem to always have a ton of success, which may be the case for Derrick Henry this year, who I was reminded the other day is a Baltimore Raven.

It's very strange to forget most of the off season for other teams and be like, Oh yeah, that's right. Maybe that's a podcast. Do you remember this guy plays for that team? But I, I agree with you,

the leadership element, how quickly he developed and came along. And he does have that baller nature to him, which I think Mike Zimmer did like and praised quarterbacks. He, I don't think that he liked just every alex smithian quarterback because he would praise the heck out of people like lamar jackson and drew breeze and joe burrow the playmakers and if anything i think he wanted

that a lot more from kirk cousins they make a play sometimes it's going to bail me out so that was my random question for you there's a lot of meat on that bone. Feel free to leave in the comments or email me what you would change and also how you would change it. Again, I don't know. Do I put together a dossier for Rick and slide it under his door or something? Or maybe I have to introduce him to someone who knows Lamar, who he would respect and listen to, but I don't know if I was going to be able to move that needle at all.

They thought they desperately needed a cornerback. This is why Michael Penix is a good pick, by the way. Yeah. Oh, you always need a corner. But you can find a corner. You can't find your next franchise quarterback. Anyway. I have one quick question.

Yeah. So Lamar went to Louisville. Who was coaching Louisville at that time? Oh, my gosh. It was Bobby Petrino, who Mike Zimmer is a huge fan of. Yeah, I was going to say, maybe that conversation wouldn't have gone over so well. Yeah, I don't think that would have worked out. I don't think that would have worked out.

I don't think they've talked would be my guess. For those who don't know, Mike Zimmer was the defensive coordinator of Atlanta when Bobby Petrino just walked out on them and took a job at arkansas and then mike zimmer trashed the hell out of him as mike zimmer want to do uh after that in a press conference so there's your bobby petrino connection if you were wondering okay give me give me your randomness what do you got okay so we know the vikings have a very rich history of like great wide receivers from chris carter randy moss obviously right now with justin jefferson

feeling and digs uh just a couple years ago so matthew collar i'm going to give you a hypothetical scenario we're going to take justin jefferson off the minnesota vik, off this Vikings offense, and we're going to insert Randy Moss. Oh. What does KOC's offense look? How is it different, if it's different at all, with Randy Moss as opposed to Justin Jefferson? We know they're both great, but what does KOC's offense look like? Hey, U.S. cellular customers, I've got got some good news so do not hit that skip forward

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plus $300 off any tablet. Terms apply. So I do think there's a difference between the two in their playing style, and the biggest difference is the deep ball. And Justin Jefferson is prolific when going down the field, say, 20 yards. I think he's most excellent at all intermediate route running. So double moves that take him 15 20 yards downfield timing post routes stuff like that things that have him breaking inside he often throws that head juke move snaps back like he's got just this myriad of moves that gets him open but what justin jefferson

does not do is just run straight down the sideline that's not his route and not only that they did not have the quarterback who could throw that route. So I imagine that Jefferson, I got hit by a bug, that Jefferson porch podcasts, I've got the mosquito preventer over here, but I don't know what hit me. Anyway, so I think Jefferson probably is good straight down the sideline, but they didn't run a lot of that. With Randy Moss, that's where you begin is how can we put him in spots where he is just running past somebody or drawing so much

attention on the deep ball that we've got everybody else open now where randy moss would have been different though is he mostly just lined up outside because that's what you did with great wide receivers jerry rice lined up more in the slot later in his career and it kept his career going, but that was something that teams didn't really adopt from the 49ers with those great wide receivers. So now we see every wide receiver plays in the slot. It doesn't matter who you are. If it's Cooper cup, he does it a lot, but Devanteams justin jefferson every receiver has to play every different position i think that he would have used randy moss's yards after catch even more to his advantage as great as it was you remember the punt return against kansas city like the explosiveness the speed that he had the touchdown against uh dallas the thanksgiving game one of those is a bubble

screen and he just explodes. There was so much of that at Marshall because it wasn't like Chad Pennington was throwing it 50 or 70 yards downfield. I think KOC would work him underneath out of the slot more often, and I'll give you even a specific play that Justin Jefferson does all the time out of the slot that Randy Moss would would annihilate and i don't know if he ever ran this because they they do it a lot more now it's called the slot fade and everybody knows what this looks like the guy on the outside does a little hitch so he keeps his corner there

and then out of the slot you run a fade kind of to the corner to the pylon and you just throw it up and that guy goes to get it and jefferson is insane at this route and i think randy moss would probably be even better so i'm saying that he probably catches instead of catching 80 passes and 15 touchdowns and 1300 yards he probably catches like 120 passes and less of them are deep but there's just a lot more randy moss with the ball in his hands because i guarantee you defenses are trying as hard to stop Jefferson as they were Moss. And with KOC's offense, they still can't do it. Yeah, I remember it reminds me of the first year that Mike Tice took over as head coach

of the Vikings. And he's opening press conference. He comes out. He talks about the Randy ratio. We're going to get the ball to Randy Moss as often as possible. Mike, you probably didn't want to tip your hand like that to everybody. But, you know. I don't think it was a revealing secret.

I think that the people were aware of that. Right. But, you know, ultimately that year they did get the ball to Randy Moss a lot. I think he had over like 110 catches, 1,600 yards, something like that. And he was obviously very explosive. And there was a lot of, you know, quick passes, bubble screens to try and get Randy Moss to, you know, shake a defender and get out in space.

And, you know, we know nobody's running with him. So if that happens, a lot of times he was taking it all the way to the end zone. It wasn't quite as much of what we we saw with you know Brian Billick and and some of the other offensive coaches before uh before Ticey took over where it was a lot of fly routes and Randy just going deep they mix it up a little bit to try and get the ball into his hands a lot so yeah I can kind of see KOC doing a lot of those same things I also think O'Connell really likes the trick play. Sometimes too much. It has been brought up from time to time that he tried to throw a pass to Kirk Cousins,

which is the most insane thing I've ever seen. But Randy Moss could really throw the ball. And they might have come up with some even more trickery, or maybe it would be a little more successful. I don't know. They've tried it with Jefferson a few times. It hasn't really worked. Maybe he would use a little more successful. I don't know. They've tried it with Jefferson a few times. It hasn't really worked. Maybe he would use it too much.

But I don't think we would see Randy Moss as a punt returner, probably ever. I don't think KOC would risk that, and we'll never see that from Jefferson. Here's another one looking back at some players from the past. Let's say in some magical hypothetical universe, the Vikings made the Super Bowl. I know. Don't shut off the the podcast here this is hypothetical it could happen maybe someday but let's say and you got to pick who the quarterback from vikings history was to play in that game in the super bowl but it

cannot be fran targerton and it cannot be Culpepper. And anybody else gets to play the Super Bowl, any other quarterback in Vikings history, one game, who are you putting in? Brad Johnson. Super Bowl champ. Yep, and that's exactly why I would pick him, because he's already done it. We've seen him do it.

And Brad Johnson, listen, I mean, people kind of crap on Brad Johnson being on that Tampa Bay team and just saying, like, wow, if you can win a it. And Brad Johnson, listen, I mean, people kind of crap on Brad Johnson being on that Tampa Bay team and just saying, like, wow, if you can win a Super Bowl with Brad Johnson. Brad Johnson was pretty damn good. If you go back and you look at that season, the way he executed John Gruden's offense that year, he was fantastic. And we saw how well he played when he was here with the Minnesota Vikings when he had Randy Moss

and Chris Carter to throw to he played as well as any quarterback that we've seen in the last you know 30 30 years of Vikings football so if you're telling me the Vikings are going to go to the Super Bowl and I have to pick a quarterback that's not Targintender or Dante it's Brad Johnson. I think Brad Johnson's a really good pick now if tommy kramer had a team and let's say we could make tommy healthy and he had a team that was good enough is tommy kramer a better quarterback than brad johnson i think he was i mean relative to his era that when he was healthy and had a good team the one year he led the league in passer rating and really showed his true talent but they were kind of a team in transition at that point when he came in and never quite got the opportunity because of injuries he'd play like nine games or something

like that and half of them are banged up tommy kramer two minutes on me might be a better choice there maybe a little more risky with the ball might depend on who we're playing what our defense looks like because if you've got a great defense then you probably want brad johnson to play there might be some argument through vikings history and maybe maybe people be surprised i would say this to play kirk out of all the vikings quarterbacks because when you look at the numbers in comparison and even in the 13 win season a lot of comebacks and things like that that if the there was a good offensive line maybe he's got an argument you could also talk about a guy who stepped up in the playoffs wade wilson yeah had the great playoffs and if you had the right team with him he was willing to put the ball up in the air uh i i mean teddy bridgewater's got

a case for this played well enough to win in the playoffs but then was let down and then obviously we're talking about healthy teddy and not post injury teddy people will still bring that up he's all he is still the best broncos quarterback since 2015 he wasn't that bad which kind of tells you i think if he had never had that injury that he could have been very good after that but it's it's a hard choice let me give you the well cunningham is certainly in this i think there will be some people that will see this and they're going to say well what about brett farve i'm not sure i would trust brett farve in the super bowl and he did win one he played in two i just when you think about the throwing across the body in the Super Bowl. And he did win one. He played in two. I just, when you think about the throwing across the body in the NFC title game,

you know, because not only are the Vikings in this hypothetical Super Bowl, damn it, I want them to win it. And I just, for as great as Brett Favre was in 2009, I just feel like if it's a one-game scenario, he's not at the top of the list of the guys that I would want to play because he always seemed to kind of make that bad interception at the most inopportune time, and it just kind of derails and deflates your entire roster. So I don't know if I would have him as an option.

That's so hard because Favre is clearly the best quarterback to ever play for the Vikings. Not named Fran Tarkington as far as the, his career accomplishments, Cunningham had problems in the playoffs too, over his career and played fine in that game against Arizona, where Jake Plummer threw a couple of picks and they had a pretty easy win to move on in the playoffs.

Favre was amazing against Dallas that year. And overall in the playoffs, he had his bad moments, but if you play enough playoff games, you probably will have that happen. He should be the pick. I didn't say him because of exactly what you're talking about. Well, we kind of saw that opportunity there. And then I might throw out Jeff George, just because if you need someone to gun the ball around like crazy and we you know if we've got the randy moss and you're in the super bowl then he could put up like 400 yards passing or something the right answer has to be farv still but i think that's what makes the question interesting because when you went brad johnson

i was like wait is is it not farv and it And it might not be, even though he was the best quarterback in the league that year. I don't know. But how do you not pick him? I know. That's what makes it tricky because he was so good that year, and obviously he's one of the greatest quarterbacks of all time. And he did go to a Super Bowl, and he did win it. He didn't play particularly well in that Super Bowl,

and even in the next year against the Broncos, he wasn't really all that well in that super bowl and even in the the next year against the broncos he wasn't really all that great in that one either so it just feels like in the he's the guy that can get you there but you almost want to have somebody else playing in the actual game because it might give you a better shot at actually winning that one game scenario maybe it's unfair to cunningham i mean cunningham did put them in position to go to the Super Bowl. He did enough to get them there, even though there were some miscues in that game, but everything's amplified when you know the result at the end. I think there's an argument for five different quarterbacks in Vikings history that I would end up picking. What's your other, what else you got? What other random stuff you got? So the other one I had,

another one of the questions I had was for you now you've been covering the Vikings you got here in 2016 so you've done eight Viking seasons you're going into your ninth of your first eight seasons what has been the ultimate highlight of your first eight years and you cannot use the obvious answer which is the Minneapolis miracle the Minneapolis miracle right that's the yeah that was going to be my answer. Uh, the ultimate highlight. So do you mean a game, a moment, something for me? Oh, anything that stands out working with you obviously was the, uh, the, the ultimate highlight, uh, and, uh, Judd and Courtney. And we, we had a fun crew there when I got here but I think that my favorite thing has been when I can tell

the story of somebody and this is a cheesy journalist thing but when I can tell the story of somebody that fans don't really know from just seeing them out on the field and whatever maybe this guy's just a role player or something and a lot of times you don't know where this guy came from outside of his college what he's been through in his life and things like that a couple examples were like harrison hand was a draft pick of theirs who had gone through a ton before he got to the nfl his best friend was murdered it was the like he had i think that his uncle had passed away and his best friend murdered in a single year. So he had to get a hardship waiver, which is what you used to have to do to transfer

before you could just transfer wherever. And so for him to make it through all that, to get to the NFL was really cool. Kairos Tonga was adopted. His mom kind of left him early in life and he was in trouble. And then he was adopted and turned his life around and stuff like that so guys who have very interesting backstories guys who never ever should have made it i'll give you a one one highlight was um when i did a story on adam phelan right after his breakout game against the houston tex. And I did the story that everyone has done by now.

Like, Oh, how did he make it from Mankato? Did you guys know he's from Minnesota, Detroit lakes. And so I did, I did the whole thing, talk to the college coach, whatever else. And I remember thinking to myself, I hope that wasn't his only good game. Cause this article might look really stupid. And then through the years, you know, he became one of their best wide receivers. And I did another piece with him not too long after that, where I wrote about what a good basketball player he was. And so I was interviewing him and this is, these are the things that stick with me as much as the games is sometimes things that people say to you. And so I was interviewing Thielen about playing basketball in school and i said well good

thing you didn't pick basketball for college because he was thinking about that as opposed to football i said because obviously you would have never made a pro and he said nobody thought i was going to make a pro at football how do you know i'm like that's one of the most baller things that anybody has ever said in any of my interviews it was a really cool thing and then i think of the funny stuff that happens the i brought this up on the show the other day kirk cousins throwing it backwards uh the uh philadelphia eagles throw trying a fake field goal with their kicker like just random and really funny stuff and i'll give you another funny story because this is more of the stuff that pops out to me for the highlights is just sometimes it's when you get a great answer and sometimes when you get a terrible answer it can both be funny and great um so i was

doing a piece about uh qb sneaks this was before the tush bush and the vikings were about to play the patriots and my idea was because the patriots were so much better at quarterback sneaks than anybody else that when we got on the conference call with Belichick, I was going to ask him about the QB sneak. So I did. So we get, you know, it comes to me and it's my turn to ask Belichick a question. And I said, Hey Bill, you guys are converting 90 something percent of your quarterback sneaks. This is by far the best in the league. Is there, is there a key to that? And what I was thinking was, every once in a while, Belichick gets asked a random question,

and then he would be great for this week. He'll just talk for like eight minutes straight, and he'll give this amazing history or whatever. So I said, Bill, what makes your team so good at these QB sneaks? And he goes, execution. That's it. That's all he said. And it was dead air.

We're on a phone call. Just dead air. Execution. That's it. On to the next question. I'm like, that's amazing. And you thought you were going to get like, because there was that bit a couple of years ago where somebody asked him about like long snapping. And he goes on like this long 10 minute answer about the history of long snapping and what goes into it and why teams keep long snappers and all that

whole thing. And it was great. And you got execution. I'll give you one more or maybe two more. There's a lot. I really like this job. You notice I still do it. There's so the Vikings had Kai Forbath as their kicker.

Now I defended the heck out of Kai Forbath and thought he should have remained the kicker after he nailed the kick in the Minneapolis Miracle game. He never got credit for it. Nobody ever talked about how it wasn't cursed or anything. It was a massive kick. It was like 52 yards. But I did have a funny Kai Forbath moment. He was kind of a unique character.

And I was doing this thing about tackling for kickers on kickoffs very relevant potentially this year and so i asked uh mike prefer about how they tell the kickers and punters to tackle and the answer was basically like try to push them but don't put your body in harm's way because we don't have another kicker so we'd be up a creek so i go to kai forbath and i said hey when you have to when you have to make a tackle on a kickoff what's the key to that and he goes like are you serious like why are you asking me this i was like well you know i said it's kind of a quirky thing kind of a funny thing that happens sometimes where a kicker you know makes a great tackle and he goes i'm glad you find it funny. And that was the

whole interview, which I thought was tremendous. So I go over to Ryan Quigley, who's one of the great personalities in the Vikings locker room in 2017. And I, so I said, Hey, you know, same, same sort of question. Kai Forbath goes walking by and Ryan Quigley says, Hey, you should ask this guy. He knows all about it. Kai Forbett just stares at me, keeps on walking. And then quickly gave me great answers, uh, pointed out a few times that went well and not well for him, you know, and things like that, but it gave me the great breakdown of his entire mentality, but it was just perfect timing. He had just blown me off for this and hated the question more than anything. And then the punter says, hey, this guy will tell you. So it's stuff like that that sticks with me the most.

And I'll give you a game. New Orleans 2019. Yeah. First best food I've ever had in my life. Shout out to New Orleans. Oh, my God. Like just the hands down single greatest food city in the united states of america it's not even close so that was good but then the atmosphere of that game the superdome the noise was i would say

even beyond u.s bank stadium probably imagine minneapolis miracle level through the whole game it's the loudest stadium in the league and the back and forths of that game and in the locker room after the game uh anderson dayho remember he had had to play uh nickel corner for that game and they had brought him back like mid-season he had to play nickel corner because mckenzie alexander got hurt and he also played every special teams rep as well and he had the flute and he played really well and so i waited for him until everybody else was gone no one else in the locker room except for a completely gassed anderson dayho and me and walked up to him and asked him about playing in that game and i've never seen a player so exhausted but he gave i mean he gave great answers about what he went

through that week and everything else that led up to that. But it was one of those cool kind of everybody's gone moments, the quiet after the madness and everything else. And then you have a player who was sort of a quiet hero of a game that, you know, Kirk is the hero of the game, Rudolph's the hero, Phelan makes that catch over his shoulder. There were so many things that happened uh and then i got lost in downtown new orleans trying to walk back to my

hotel which was very scary so i think that's it i think it's my favorite part is kind of all those things and that was a really long answer so that's a great it's a great random question what's what's your favorite part of having me here? I'm glad you asked. It's a very short answer. Code words. Yes, the code words rant. That will forever be my favorite moment of working with you in Vikings coverage is your code words rant in 2018. Okay, but give me this, though.

Yes, and if you're not familiar with it, just Google it. It's on the internet somewhere. All I'm going to say about that is that certain people agreed. That's all I'm going to say is that I came to find out that certain people agreed. Anyway, I want to know, though, since I've been here, what your outside of the Minneapolis Miracle and outside of the New Orleans playoff game that we just talked about, give me two or three games that immediately come to mind.

If you're like, Hey, best games. How about even this? We don't give Kirk enough credit for a lot of entertainment. He was entertaining. Give me the three Kirk games that you had the most fun watching. 2018 in Philadelphia was pretty fun.

Just because, like, the Vikings fan in me was kind of looking for the quasi-revenge game. I mean, it didn't. It was a regular season game. The Eagles were not as good of a team as they were the year before. But you just kind of take those little victories when you can. But that game sticks out to me because of the Linval Joseph scoop and score in that game. It's just amazing. And then the moment of him getting the oxygen on the sideline afterwards,

and that's just become such an iconic image of Linval Joseph. Just a terrific, great player for the Vikings during his time here. He got a tattoo of that. Yeah, that's just become like such an iconic image of Linval Joseph, just a terrific, great player for the Vikings during his time here. He got a tattoo of that. Yeah, that's right. I remember you telling you telling me that the other day that he actually got a tattoo of that, which is amazing. So, yeah, that that game kind of stands out to me. Gosh, another Kirk game. Trying to think of big wins. Well, I think the comeback win over the Colts in 2022, the 33-0 come-from-behind victory, was big because they essentially had everything go wrong, everything possible go wrong in the first half of that game.

And to have basically everything go right in the entire second half of that game. Now, the Colts did them a lot of favors because it was just not a very good Colts team. And Jeff Saturday was their coach. So, of course, that helped a lot. But to put something like that together, the largest comeback in NFL history, I think, is one that really stands out. And obviously, I think the game in Buffalo that same season was a big game because, you know, Kirk made some really good throws. We know about the catch with Justin Jefferson. The scramble that Kirk made, I think it was in the fourth quarter, to get down inside the 20-yard line, down inside, like, he got him down inside the 10 or something like that, was just a really rare moment where we saw Kirk Cousins really do something really like tough and gritty and making a big time play so those are those are kind of the three games during the Kirk era that stand

out to me I'll throw out a couple of ones that are maybe less notable because the score wasn't that close when you have a comeback or something crazy like that, hopefully people can't hear the lawn mowing that is happening now. But when you have a comeback or something like that, it's so memorable. What happened in Buffalo was insane. In some of those things, Kirk lit the house on fire and then came to put it out. So he got them behind from Indianapolis by throwing an interception, although Jalen regger

probably ran the wrong route on that i think and in buffalo is the same kind of thing the first half of that game did not play very well had a pick and then ends up bringing them back got a lot of help from josh allen in that game with numerous uh turnovers but two games where kirk cousins played in big moments absolutely spectacular football 2019 against philadelphia they were still a good team with high expectations and he probably played his best statistical game annihilated them i mean every deep pass to stefan diggs every play action him and kevin stefanski and gary kubi, like one heartbeat in that game. They were, he, they were incredible. I remember a deep, like over type of route that he led the guy so perfectly. When you

watch it on film, it was one of those, when he lets it go, you go, how is that going to get to that guy? And just, he had that ability to lead people, which JJ McCarthy is going to have to work on to get to Kirk Cousins' level of that. And another one is the first game of the Kevin O'Connell era. Yes, the Packers did try to guard Justin Jefferson with defensive ends, linebackers, water boys, cheesehead randos from the stands, as opposed to Jair Alexander. I don't know why.

I'll never quite understand it. But, no, I mean, Kirk Cousins to come out and play like that in the opener of the KOC era was pretty significant, I think. And it was memorable because of that. It wasn't like, wow, the earth has changed entirely. But you did get a sense from that game. This connection between KOC and Kevin O'Connell, or well, that's him, and Kirk Cousins might be legit, and there might be something here right from the very outset.

Yeah, I mean, that game was just remarkable, and there were so many, you know, just fireworks with that game because it was the first game of the year. It's against the Packers, and Kirk Cousins and Justin Jefferson are just lighting the world on fire that day. And, yeah, to your point, that was a really strong early indication that, oh, yeah, this offense, we don't know what this defense is going to look like, but this offense is going to be pretty damn potent.

And, you know, and it was that year. I mean, you know, they won 13 games and, you know, we saw what happened in the playoffs. But, you know, it what happened in the playoffs but you know it was a it was a really fun year and i think it really was an early sign that this team has a pretty good offensive mind as a head coach and they've got obviously a superstar wide receiver and a quarterback that can go out and execute the offense and so it ended up being kind of a an early sign that,

that at least the season itself was going to be pretty fun. All right. Let me throw this random at you. Do you have any more? Do you have more random? Uh, Nope. I'm good.

Okay. That's it. All right. So let me throw this one at you. Six first round quarterbacks this year. I want you to put them in order one to six in how good their careers will be. So who, I don't know how to evaluate that, but who will have, let's just go, let's just go QB wins.

Had a guest the other day who was really offended by QB wins. Mike Payton, my friend from Detroit, not a fan of that. Understand anyone who covers Matthew Stafford doesn't like QB wins, but, but let's just say who of the six quarterbacks selected, what will the order be for who ends up with the most career victories? All right. I have to. You got to look at the six.

I could just tell them to you if you want. Yes. Why don't we do that? Okay. Well, it was Caleb Williams, Jaden Daniels, Drake May, Michael Penix, J.J. McCarthy, and Bo Nix. Hmm. williams jayden daniels drake may michael pennix jj mccarthy and bo nicks how about you go worst to first maybe that's easier to do worst i'm gonna go bo nicks um not even because i think he's the worst one it it's – I just don't – I mean, we know Sean Payton has a history of having great offenses,

but that was with Drew Brees. And when he became the coach of the Saints, the Saints had signed Drew Brees who had been – who had started to kind of establish himself as one of the best quarterbacks in the league at that point. How Sean Payton handles developing a young quarterback with not really a lot of weapons to work with either on offense. You know, what is that? What is that going to look like? I don't know. And is is, you know, is that going to bode well for Bo Nix long term?

Because, you know, Sean Payton going to be able to put something together for him to have early success. And Bo Nix might be a guy that needs to have some early success to end up having a good career so I'll go with him at number six I'm probably going to go Drake May five um the tough situation yeah very tough situation again kind of the same thing where the physical tools are there but are the Patriots going to be able to put enough around him over the next couple of years to allow him to really grow and develop? Are they going to throw him out there right away early? I would highly advise against doing something like that. So, yeah, I'll have Drake May, number five. I'm going to go Jaden Daniels, four.

Oh, okay. Are you not to go Jaden Daniels, four. Oh, okay. Are you not a huge Jaden Daniels believer? No, I do believe in him, but again, it's kind of – Yeah, it's Washington. And, you know, Dan Quinn, pretty good coach, got the Falcons to the Super Bowl, but, you know, I think a lot of that had to do with Kyle Shanahan running that offense and Matt Ryan being a veteran and MVP. So we'll see how that plays out.

I do believe in Jaden Daniels' ability, but again, it's like, does Washington have enough to really kind of put enough around him to be successful? I will go J.J. McCarthy number three. And now we're at a point now where I think like all of these guys, I'm not as worried about the top three guys as I am about the bottom three. But I'll go J.J. McCarthy, number three. I think the Vikings have a really good setup for him. He's probably not quite ready to play yet, but I think when he does, when that time comes, when he is ready to play, I think he's going to come out and play really, really well. You and I, we both love Michael Penix. I think he's going to be fantastic.

So he's at my number two. And who knows how this thing is going to play out with Kirk Cousins, you know, in the beginning. So we might see Michael Penix this year. We might see him next year playing. And I think he's just got the physical tools, the arm, to really be successful. And I think they've got the right idea in place down there in Atlanta

of there's no pressure to put Panics out there right away because you have Kirk Cousins. And I think with him having all the experience, when the time comes when he is ready to play, he's going to come in and he's going to do a pretty good job. And I think Caleb Williams, I love what the Chicago Bears are doing. I know Vikings fans don't want to hear that, but I think they have really a really good setup and foundation for him to come in and have some early success. Now he's got some things that he's got to, you

know, really kind of clean up, but you look at the weapons that they've given him on offense, they've still got a ton of cap space they've i like what they're doing on defense with the defensive minded head coach and matt eberflus i i think caleb williams and we know about the physical talents i think caleb williams is going to have the best career out of all of them and that's scary for vikings fans because that means he's going to be with the bears for 10 15 years and he's going to be a problem so the only reason i might not pick pennix number two would be just his age and i mean if we're talking about career wins if jj mccarthy turns out to be good and michael pennix mccarthy can play longer than michael pennix can pennix has a more serious injury history which might end up

playing into a shorter career for him overall that would be somewhat of a concern. It's impossible not to pick Caleb Williams number one, because historically number one picks have by far the best chance of succeeding. There is a large drop off in, in success rate from number one, even to number two picked quarterbacks in NFL history, much less, you know, going all the way down to the fifth quarterback taken in JJ McCarthy. Now it doesn't go on a straight line down. It's really the first guy by far and away,

and then the rest are pretty close together for their chances to succeed. So Williams has to be number one. You could put McCarthy number two based on the circumstances that he is going to have. The hard thing about McCarthy number two is the division that he's going to play in for the first few years of his career. We could project out it's not going to be easy. If Caleb Williams is any good at all, then that's going to be hard. Detroit will be hard for at least several more years. And if Jordan Love is good, then you're talking about sometimes you might have a great team

and lose four division games because you're playing all really good division teams i still might put him up there the hard one is jayden daniels yeah it's a new franchise it's no more dan snyder so they're running it more reasonably it's a guy who owns a basketball team i think he'll let the football people run the football which could be a massive improvement so i'm going to say that i think jayden daniels might end up with the second most wins okay if they rebuild it correctly he is on the older side though gosh that one's hard hard man it is really hard because the drake may how much do we buy that he's going to just be set back for several years because that's very plausible but what if it's only one year what

if it's like jared goff where it's only one year and then they spend a bunch of money and it works out and and they end up rebuilding that team very quickly drake may is super talented yeah but he's very volatile i think in his play i i might actually i might actually go williams mccarthy pennix it's going to be funny to see how wrong this is like in years williams mccarthy pennix it's going to be funny to see how wrong this is like in years williams mccarthy pennix daniel no it's hard daniels may nick nicks is the only other obvious one that is that is a hard random question well but i think but here's what's interesting about it though because all i think all six of these guys have a lot of talent and have, I think they're all going to have the opportunity to be good.

I don't really look at any of them and say, oh, yeah, he's going to suck. Yeah, he doesn't have it. I think a lot of it just is going to come down to the circumstances that they're in and how well their teams, you know, especially the guys that I had at 4, 5, and 6, how well those teams are able to sort of build around them and provide enough weapons, support, infrastructure, stability, all of that is going to come into play for all these guys because they're all talented.

They're all really good. So it's really going to come down to what the organizations that have them do to sort of build around them. And I think that's really going to determine their success. And I'm trying to figure out, too, not which guy I like the most, but which team in a year or two will reach a peak where they could win 10 games plus over a couple of years where you can really rack up the wins right when you look at the nfc east the cowboys are probably in their last year or two of this window where everybody is on rookie contracts like micah parsons and you know cd lamb can they maintain success like past that sure but probably super bowl window is closing the giants might just continue to be bad for a while so there's an opportunity there philadelphia is probably on a bit of the decline.

So from where they reach the Super Bowl, you have a chance to be Washington and shoot up to the top and have Jade Daniels be great. With the Patriots, it's a little harder to see because Miami's got a really good coach. The Bills are going to continue to have a great quarterback. But the Jets are kind of a mess. Maybe you could see that in a year or two with them it's just harder because they're so

far down and out i don't know the answer i have honestly no idea but we may not know we may not know what drake may for like three or four years if he's even if it's even going to work with him you know what i mean i mean we know the talent is there, but the Patriots are so, that roster is so freaking bad right now that it's going to take at least a couple of years before we even have an idea of how good Drake May is. And my concern for him is that they're going to throw him out there too early and, you know, maybe not right out of the gate

because I think they've got Jacoby Bursette back out there, right? Yeah. So you've got to think maybe he's going to be the week one starter for them. But does Gerard Mayo decide to pull the plug on that if they're 0-5 and put Drake May in there? I mean, I don't think that's going to go particularly well. And what kind of impact does that have on Drake May going forward for his entire career?

It's going to be really fascinating to find out. And we might be giving Penix too much credit because he could be 26 by the time he actually starts. Right. And several seasons behind these other guys. So Jaden Daniels will win games. We just don't know how many. But within, he's going to have a two-year head start. He could win 13 or 15 games in his career before even Michael Penix gets on the field.

So maybe I might go Caleb Williams, Jaden Daniels, J.J. McCarthy, Penix, May, and Nix. I don't feel good about any of this, which is really the whole tagline to the podcast in general. You just don't feel good about any of this. Anyway, this has been really fun. How good are the vibes on this porch? It's awesome, man. Right? There's lights, too, but there's no reason to turn them on.

It's in the middle of the day. This was fun. It is fun. Yeah. We'll do more porch podcasts as the summer plays out. And this was a perfect day because it's not 97 degrees because it does get a little toasty there's a fan up here as well nice it's a great place so thanks everybody for watching slash listening thanks manny for stopping by after work and

hanging out and we'll do another porch podcast again hopefully very soon dane mizzitani having been to my house has already requested a porch, so he's definitely the next man up. So thanks everybody for coming along for the ride, and we'll catch y'all next time. Football.