Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - REPORT: Vikings 'working on' deal with Brian Flores

Episode Date: December 28, 2025

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Hey, everybody, welcome to another episode of Purple Insider, Matthew Collar here. We got a lot to get to on the show. I've watched back the tape from the game against Detroit, and there's a lot of interesting things that show up on that tape, as well as some very good fan questions. But got to start out with a report from Pro Football Talk on Saturday morning that the Vikings are, quote, working on a new contract with Brian Flores. Now, that has been a major discussion here on the show and within Vikings fans because as we have seen for this year, Brian Flores' ability to elevate the Minnesota Vikings defense

is like very few defensive coordinators around the NFL. There are other innovators, no doubt about it, but what Flores has done has taken defenses around the league to another level. it's a big talking point that you've probably heard about different progressions and things like that that offenses are using. And what do they always say is it's because of deception. Well, Brian Flores is the deception king. And when the Vikings beat the lions on Netflix in front of the nation on Christmas Day, it sparked further conversation about Flores and his future in Minnesota or elsewhere because he is not under contract.

for next year, according to the Star Tribune. And I saw a number of people, including some of Flores' former players, one being Stefan Gilmore, tweeting about his possibility of becoming a head coach in the NFL. Now, if Flores does get an offer to become a head coach, then, of course, he should leave the Minnesota Vikings and take that. And I don't think there's any doubt about it that he has proven time and time again since he has arrived here, that he is worthy of another head coaching gig. He was a winner with the Miami Dolphins before things corroded there with that

relationship. And then you have the lawsuit and so forth. Pittsburgh gives Flores a chance on their staff. The Vikings hire him and he turns around defense that was one of the worst in the NFL when he took over in 2003 immediately made big progress. And the last two years, it has been. an elite defense, and it's not just the innovation of Brian Flores, but also the way that the defense has galvanized around him. Harrison Smith has cited numerous times coming back to the Minnesota Vikings

this year in part because of how much fun he's had working with Brian Flores. And Stefan Gilmore was another player last year who advocated a lot for Flores' style. Now, there will be discussions about what happened in Miami, some of the comments that Tua has made in the past and relationships with quarterbacks and so forth. But I will say that, you know, oftentimes we have seen coaches do better in their second location than their first, including Bill Belichick with Cleveland and then with the New England Patriots. And you can learn and you can grow and having an opportunity to be with Kevin O'Connell and see his head coaching style, how he's built a culture, I think has also been major positive for Brian Flores.

So if one of the owners is willing to kind of break rank when it comes to the lawsuit issue, then we could see a team say, all right, we've got to get the best defensive mind in the National Football League here to be our head coach. But if that doesn't happen, then Flores options will be open for another team to come in and say, hey, how would you like this contract and this opportunity and this market, wherever it might be. I've brought up Dallas a couple of times because of how he showed out against Dallas on national television. And I have to imagine Jerry Jones took notice. But it should also be brought up that Brian Flores has repeatedly talked about how much he has enjoyed

Minnesota, how much his family has enjoyed Minnesota. And when you look around this defensive roster, it's unclear whether Harrison Smith is going to come back next season. But look at the rest of it. You have a player that he drafted in Dallas Turner emerging recently. You have Jonathan Grenard coming back, Andrew Van Ginkle coming back, some of his other developmental projects like Jalen Redman and Levi Drake Rodriguez becoming key players for this defense. I think Isaiah Rogers has improved as the season has gone along. Byron Murphy Jr. has always been a big fan of Brian Flores and they signed him to a contract extension. And even some of the other younger players like Jay Ward has emerged recently as a guy that they're putting on the field

quite a bit and has added a physical presence. So this is really the roster that Flores built. Back in 2023, he was trying to eke out as much as he possibly could out of the parts that were there. But over the last two years, it's been built in his vision and he would have a chance to see it fully come to fruition next year. This year was another step in that direction, but it's fully his now with this group that next year you could see being just as good or maybe even better with some players maybe being added or some players that started off a little slowly this year in Flores system and then could take another step, maybe a full season of Eric Wilson if the Vikings are able to resign and keep him in Minnesota.

And then there's an opportunity potentially to draft a player fairly high on the defensive side of the ball, if the Vikings want to, a cornerback, for example, or maybe a young defensive tackle to add to Jalen Redman and Levi Drake as guys you could build around for a long period of time. And even though it does sometimes seem like the grass could be greener on other sides with different franchises, it is hard to find a work environment, whether it's TCO Performance Center and U.S. Bank Stadium, whether it's the players that they've been able to bring in or the head coach that Brian Flores is working under, it's hard to find an environment quite like this.

And Flores does have autonomy over that defense. I mean, he and O'Connell worked together on ideas, but it's his defense the way he wants it done and the way he wants it built. So there's a lot of value to staying in Minnesota, but just because they're working on a deal does not guarantee that it gets done. Once Flores reaches the end of this year, he is going to. to, I'm sure, want to listen to are their head coaching opportunities, are there other offers that would be more interesting to him, whether that's financially or opportunity

wise? And maybe is there a spot somewhere else where he could be more in the spotlight than in Minnesota? And that's again, where Dallas comes to mind first for something like that. And does Flores believe that the Vikings can be a winner next year? I'm sure that he knows that it helps your resume if you're in the playoffs and you have Chris Collinsworth talking in postseason games or Troy Aikman talking in postseason games about how Brian Flores has turned around the defense and all the great things that he does, that helps a lot more than playing a bunch of noon games. So the belief would also have to be there that he's going to get the shine that he deserves because the team is winning like they were last year, but not so much

this year. So that's something that we will be keeping an eye on, but at very least a positive development in keeping Brian Flores in Minnesota. And there's very few times over the years that I would point to one particular coordinator and say, they cannot lose this guy. But when it comes to Brian Flores, they cannot lose this guy. And I think it's a huge part of the overall picture of this team, which was if we go back to 22, you're taking over the older team, then going through 23, revamping it, moving on from players, rebuilding it, and go back and look at when Kevin O'Connell took over in that roster and look at it now. I mean, there's not very many players that were there then who are here now. It is their vision of O'Connell and Flores. And outside of the quarterback

play, we look around this roster and go, there is a lot to work with here. So it's a project over multiple years that if they have good enough quarterback play next year, you could see in a game like the Lions is certainly evidence of this. You could see the potential for how good this can be if things work out in Minnesota and they're able to keep Brian Flores. If not, I would nominate Durante Jones to take over. He's been the defensive back coach and has been working his way up the ladder for a long time. he was actually hired initially by the Vikings by Mike Zimmer. So he has been respected in multiple different defenses. He and Harrison Smith are also quite close.

And I don't know if that would influence a decision or just if you get an endorsement from Harrison Smith, that's pretty good for you. So Durante being familiar with how things are done with a lot of players coming back would make sense. But it is hard to replace the guy who you would put at the top of the National Football League in terms of his innovative abilities and also his trust in his players, which we have really seen with Harrison Smith in recent weeks, that he has said, you are the on-field defensive coordinator, you go out there and work within our scheme and make the calls.

And what has that resulted in? Some great performances from the defense highlighted by what happened against Detroit. Fellas, do you ever have that feeling when you see an old photograph of yourself that maybe your hairline isn't what it used to be. No need to be in shamed. You're certainly not alone. But why sit around feeling bad about it when there are solutions? I present you with Hymns.

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which the FDA does not approve or verify for safety effectiveness or quality. Prescription is required see website for full details restrictions and important safety information so let's take a closer look at that i watched the all 22 film back and i got to say masterpiece doesn't begin to describe it what brian flores did to jared goff and really if we go back to 2020 brian flores put himself on the map as a defensive wizard and also crazy aggressive defensive of mine against Jared Gough and the Los Angeles Rams. And the thing that those two teams, the current Lions and the 2020 Rams have in common, was that neither of them had great pass protection.

And you could see where that really deeply impacted the Detroit Lions, having backups in their miscommunications, struggling with one-on-one battles. But I wanted to point out a couple of things that I thought were really cool details of what the Vikings did. Now, one of them was putting four defensive tackles and two outside linebackers on the field on first down and just saying, go ahead and beat it. Can you beat it? Because we're going to put man on man all the way across this offensive line. Go ahead and try to run against us. See if you can.

Because as we know, if you slow down Jemir Gibbs, which they did amazingly in this game and they have done very few times in the past, if you slow down Jemir Gibbs, that lion's offense is just not. the same. And they get forced into second down and long, third down and long. And then you're asking Jared Goff to drop back against that pressure time and time and time again, which no quarterback wants to do, especially one that is generally lacking in mobility. He made one or two great plays in the game, but generally lacking in mobility. And they would put on first down, Jalen Redmond and Levi Drake Rodriguez, along with Javon Hargrave and Jonathan Allen across the line, with sometimes either Dallas Turner or Eric Wilson and then Andrew Van Ginkle on the other side

and it completely shut down the run game. They could not get movement and I saw quite a few reps where Dallas Turner did a very good job of setting the edge in this game which has not always been something we've talked a lot of him succeeding with but a lot of times those edge rushers like Eric Wilson or Dallas Turner they were matched up with tight ends. That's what happens when you've put four DTs across. If any of you have played Madden, I guarantee that at some point, you have just said,

goal line defense. That's what we're going to do. We're going to put in all the big guys and one linebacker. And then we're just going to go after that quarterback or we're going to stuff their run completely. And we're going to leave the corners and one safety out there. That's kind of what Brian Flores was doing early in this game to make sure you are not going to run against this defense. And then there were a lot of the typical things. that they do. Harrison Smith coming down to the edge, dropping players back into zones, so where

golf is dropping back and he's thinking maybe Blake Cashman's coming up the middle on a rush and instead he drops back into a zone. One of the things they love to do is have a guy drop back into an unexpected zone. So let's say he's on the left side and then drops back into a zone on the right side. And also dropping back guys into the parts of the defense where they would be. try to attack on a blitz and there are several different plays and this is one of those small details that when you see it on tape you go okay that's pretty awesome that's a great usage of this particular player there are multiple plays where andrew van ginkle starts to rush then stops and doesn't really drop back into coverage but just sort of stands there in a throwing lane

and jumps up in the air and andrew van ginkles like six four six five has a crazy long wingspan. So Jared Gough, looking for his hot routes, takes the snap. Okay, I'm going to hit this off that blitz. And there's Andrew Van Ginkle like a pteradactyl with his arms way up in the air. And it messed with Gough on multiple occasions. Just those little details that they are so good at. And of course, it was really fun to watch Harrison Smith before the snap.

You see all the things that he's doing with his communication, moving guys, changing things at the defensive line. But this was, we're going to pretty much show you an all-out blitz look on every single down and see if you can figure out a way to pick it apart. I have to say on an individual level, this was Dallas Turner's best game I've seen him play in the NFL. And I had an interesting note statistically about Dallas Turner that he is now 19th in the NFL. in terms of out of 144 either starting or rotational edge rushers,

in terms of pass rush production, which is a PFF stat that combines the hurries, QB hits, and sacks versus how many snaps you've had an opportunity to rush the passer and then weighs sacks a little bit heavier. And he's cracked into the top 20 after this game. And he has 20 quarterback pressures in the five games that he is played in place of Jonathan Grenard,

pretty much confirming what we thought that he's more of a Grenard than a Van Ginkle and being a Van Ginkle probably takes a lot more time in the NFL for someone to truly master that. But in terms of actual pass rushing and the impact that he has been able to make as a pass rusher, it is growing on a weekly basis. He also was credited with four run stops,

which is when you make a tackle on a negative run. So if the run is less than four yards, say, that's, again, not a successful play. And he had four run stops in this game, five quarterback pressures. There is a really brilliant play where all day, they've been lining up guys across the line of scrimmage, sending at least five. PFF had them blitzing about 50 something percent of the time. There were other stats that had a little bit higher, but, you know, crazy blitz numbers. And then they drop everybody out and rush four. And the lions were completely lost.

and Dallas Turner and Van Ginkle both roast their guys and end up meeting at the quarterback. So Dallas Turner now has six sacks on the season. PFF credits him with seven because they don't count half sacks. They count those as full. So he's been a part of seven sacks, whether it's his or sharing it. And I think that's major progress for Dallas Turner this year and gives them something to look forward to his continued growth because he has not yet turned 23 years.

old. And this is exactly what we're looking for because halfway through the season, I think you could have said, I don't know that this is going that well. And the second half of the year, more of those opportunities, more confidence from him. And now you see him playing fast and playing physically in ways that it didn't seem like he was at all times previously. So a huge, huge moment for Dallas Turner and just an incredible performance from a schematic perspective from Brian and Flores. Now, the other side of those film notes, that would be Max Brozmer against Detroit. And you've probably heard by now, but he had three net yards passing, did complete 9 of 16 when the ball actually came out. But the question is always, okay, was it the pass protection? Was it the

wide receivers not getting open? Or was it the quarterback? And there are instances of the first two. there is a sack given up by Will Fries, who we'll talk about in a second against Aidan Hutchinson, where no quarterback in the league outside of Josh Allen, Lamar Jackson, maybe Jalen Hertz is escaping that, right? He got there so fast after the snap. It was an instant sack. There's nothing you can do on a play like that. But many of the other sacks and throwaways are plays that the ball absolutely should have come out. I'll give you a couple examples. Well, one, I actually saw something in the stat sheet on PFF that I've never seen before. And it's probably happened, but I haven't seen it happen before where a sack is not listed as a pressured down. So he took a sack where he was not pressured. And I think you can probably remember it was one where the seas parted. He kind of stepped forward and then like lunged to try to run and got no yards.

And that goes down as an unpressured sack. So that kind of tells you a little bit of just where we're at. with Max Brosmer's performance. But I'll give you a few examples that I noticed. There is a play early in the game where the Vikings get single high coverage from Detroit. So they have one safety out there and they send a blitz and just the Jefferson is one-on-one with the outside corner. The safety kind of stays in the middle and Jefferson is running like a 10-yard in-breaking route. So you've seen him run this a million times.

He, you know, pushes the cornerback back with his speed. and then breaks off the route at hyper speed and turns into it and he is by NFL standards wide open. Max Brosmer drops back, reaches up with the ball to throw it and then doesn't throw it and get sacked. He saw the read. He had his hand up ready to throw and he just didn't do it and he just didn't pull the trigger. And then he takes a sack. There is another play.

one thing that Kevin O'Connell has done recently that I think is kind of clever is he will design these plays that are essentially screens past the line of scrimmage. So Justin Jefferson will go into the middle of the field, get the football, but everybody else is a blocking assignment. So it's a one person type of thing and maybe there's something on the backside just in case or like a hot read or whatever if it's a certain look. But on at least one side of the field, there will be a play where the ball is supposed to get to Jefferson very quickly and everyone else is just running to block and how you know is you can see

them going and setting up blocks before the quarterback has even released the ball. They've done this on two or three plays the last couple weeks and they've usually worked. So they've got one set up for him to do this and it's a very quick hitch with the tight end kind of running at the defender that's guarding just to Jefferson to try to take him with him like vertically. Jefferson goes out, runs the hitch and is there, and Brozmer has already come off of his read and is trying to kind of scramble the other way. And there's just not a whole lot you can do there as Kevin O'Connell, the wide receivers, the blockers, when the quarterback is going through his read so so hyper quickly out of probably fear of making a mistake, pulling the ball down a lot more than

he should be when he should be letting it go to obvious places. There's a couple other opportunities where somebody starts to get beat in front of him and he panics, but these are NFL offensive linemen who can often recover. And so Donovan Jackson gets beat a little bit on the inside and then recovers, but Brosmer has already panicked and taken a sack or thrown the football away. And I think that's what most of it had to do with is just being a little, bit too fast, a little bit too quick, not hanging in there. Like, there's another play where, you know, somebody's probably going to hit him,

but Jefferson is running a post behind a defender. I think it's like a cover three type thing, but I'm not entirely sure. I don't remember the exact coverage, but he's running by a defender. And he's going to have open spaces one-on-one with a safety running a post, and there's no one around. If the ball comes out, he's got a pretty good chance of hitting it. But he's also going to have to hang in there. take a shot to do it, and he just doesn't. He just doesn't pull the trigger, doesn't throw with that

type of anticipation. And you could see where the defensive line winning, the guys that they have over there, maybe getting hit early in the game, really impacted Max Brosmer. There were a couple of decent throws in there, but this was, there were opportunities to easily throw for 150 to 200 yards in this game with throws that he just straight up turned down. Now, To give Max Brosmer credit, they're playing most of the game from ahead and not turning the ball over is the number one thing. So throwing it away, taking sacks to stay in field goal position rather than throwing an interception. Like, that's how you can win when you throw for three yards net. But at the same time, that's probably not going to happen very often.

And what Brosmer needs is just a lot more time playing against NFL speed and understand. when that ball has to come out and also building confidence in doing it. It's not that he hasn't done it on a number of reps. It's that he's just going to need a lot more time. And that's why he's an undrafted free agent. That's why he's a rookie. And I don't think it was so awful that I would say, okay, like a lot of you, you know, he should never play again and that kind of thing.

Well, we're going to have to give it time. And he's on a rookie contract. And he could be a QB3. A lot of teams carry three quarterbacks. go forward into training camp and see where it goes, but not somebody who is ready really to play in the NFL right now, as I think we saw. I would also like to say that, you know,

I'm not sure if we're going to see Max Brosmer or not. The door is still open for J.J. McCarthy to start week 18 against the Green Bay Packers. Justin Jefferson needs 53, I think, more yards to get to a thousand. And whoever it takes to get him there needs to be in the, the football game. So if it's not J.J. McCarthy, you know, Brett Rippin's back. They should maybe consider Brett Rippin playing. They should maybe consider John Wolford playing because you have to walk out of U.S. Bank Stadium week 18 with Justin Jefferson over a thousand yards. I mean, that's something he's expressed multiple times is very important

to him to get to that thousand yard mark and continue his streak of doing so every year of his career. And if Brosmer is coming off of his reeds so quickly out of terror of turning the ball over or getting sacked or getting hit or whatever it might be, then someone else has to give it a shot. And Rippins won a couple games in the NFL. Wolford's played before. I mean, you could say it can't get much worse, but three yards, it really truly cannot. And you'd rather throw three interceptions in a game that has no playoff implications for the Vikings and get Jefferson his thousand yards, then have Brosmer struggle as much as he did. And you do worry as confident as he comes across of, all right, if you get this many starts stacked up and no success

at all or not even close of, you know, you do lose some confidence at that point. So we'll see what they end up doing at quarterback. But the big question of was it play calling, was it this? play calling critique that I would have is probably the same that I've had for, I don't know how long, the screen game, the screen game, like Kevin Stefansky's screen game, this is not. And can you hire Stefansky to be the screen game expert if he gets let go by the Cleveland Browns? Because this is a game where you need seven, eight, nine screens to get your guys to football. And I know it's easier said than done, but they gained one yard on four screens.

That's just madness to me when you're talking about a quarterback like Max Brosmer. And were there times where you're asking him to hit a post 30 yards down the field and drop back and sit there and take a shot? Like, yeah, of course. But that's also playing in the NFL. And sometimes it is an absolute fact that O'Connell's downfield type of offense causes interceptions and causes sacks and there is a price to pay for the quarterback being in this

offense. And there have been times where I've thought that it's asked too much in terms of downfield passing of its quarterbacks this year. At the same time, if you can't run a post where he gets behind, you know, the defender and it's supposed to be there, I mean, I don't know what plays you can run. This is the NFL. You should have a certain standard of being able to do that. you can't throw a screen on every play, but they just needed better screens in this game to get something going. Aaron Jones being banged up was probably a factor there. T.J. Hawkinson being banged up, also a factor. But that's, that was a tough one to watch. I will say, in terms of credit where it's due, the play where they run Jordan Addison for a 65-yard touchdown, really nicely

designed play where there's a shift and then there's the jet motion. So the shift tells them that it is man-to-man coverage. And then he goes in motion out of the slot. So you see the corner coming with him, like, okay, you've got the man coverage. And then as he's doing the jet motion and getting the hand off, the corner is supposed to follow him on man coverage and just can't. He just gets caught up in all the wreckage of guys trying to make a tackle on that play. And also, when we talk about the little things that Jalen Naylor,

does that everybody loves that'll probably get him paid by the folks who have seen him on tape this year. On that play, Naylor takes off like he's running a route and his corner goes with him. If he doesn't sell that and it's clearly a handoff and a run, there's not room around that edge if that corner identifies it and can stop him. But Naylor sold that really well and they end up making a play to solidify the win there. it was it was not one that's going to win any beauty contests, but, you know, I think if you're

looking too deep into wide receivers and play calling and pass protection on that one, even, you know, when you look at the past protection numbers, they were fine for the Vikings. Most of the offensive linemen graded out by PFF, okay, and the pressures were just on the quarterback. But speaking of which, there was a 10.6 grade out of a hundred, for Will Fries in this game. That's kind of the ballpark of what we used to see from a Tom Compton playing Aaron Donald or Ed Ingram when he would have his tough moments.

And when you look at the totality of the Vikings signing Will Fries, he has performed worse this year by PFF metrics than Dulton Reisner has. And it kind of speaks to, and I think Fries has had a fine overall season. He is an average guard by PFF standards. And he's had some weeks where he's been dominant in the. run game and has been a good pass protector at times throughout this year. But it speaks to the desperation of last off season. And when you really start to sense the moment that you can overpay certain guys and

think, no, I've got to have this particular guy at this particular price when maybe the actual gap in performance between that player and someone who's less expensive is not as much as you think. So I'm not saying that Fries has had a bad year, but it was probably predictable at the beginning of the season that it would not be worth $17 million. Now, one thing I will say to Fri's credit, he was dealing with a leg injury last offseason and recovering. And what has happened multiple times through my time covering the Vikings is when a player has

missed a lot of their off season, by the time they get to the end of the year, they're pretty physically gassed. And I think that that may be part of it for Will Fries. And I, again, he's a, he's a solid guard. He's a solid guard that you can feel pretty good about going forward. It's just that this last offseason, the Vikings took all ideas of efficiency and the things that have kind of been proven to maximize efficiency and toss them out the window, which we knew then, and we would have celebrated had they had good quarterback play this year. But when you don't, have good quarterback play and you win eight games, then those things come a lot more under the microscope, like signing the 34th best guard when the 21st best guard was on your team and didn't

cost that much money. So I know Fry's is a better run blocker from a physical perspective, but from a PFF grading perspective, it's about the same with him and Dalton Reisner. So again, I am aware that the skill sets would tell you fries is more dominating. But I also think, that maybe risner because of his reputation it wasn't quite as bad as we thought so that's just something from this game to take away michael jurgens performed i thought very well and graded well and give blake brandel a ton of credit this guy has become very valuable to them and maybe proven himself to be the center in the future going out to right tackle he was all right he got beat a couple times and i would also say just in school uh has really recovered in the second half of the year he

does get beat, but early on, he really struggled in this offense, and I think he has improved quite a bit. So let's get to a fan duel question of the day here for every show. We have a fan dual question of the day. So you can answer this one in the comments. Here is the fan dual question of the day. That is, which team winning the Super Bowl would be the biggest gut punch for the Vikings. Right now, the Seattle Seahawks are plus 650 with Sam Darnold to win the Super Bowl, Pittsburgh and Aaron Rogers plus 3,500, Chicago plus 1,600, and Green Bay plus 1,400 to win the Super Bowl. Which one of those would you hate to see the most? Personally, I think that Vikings fans should be rooting for Sam Darnold. I know that a lot of people

like to run around in internet comments and say, Sam can't win the big one. Good thing we got rid of him. Of course, he's going to be playing in many more big games here coming up, but the point with Sam Darnold isn't about that, whether he can win in the clutch or not. It's really that Sam Darnold is a Minnesota Viking did everything the right way. He never had a bad word to say about J.J. McCarthy, never had a bad word to say about any of his previous employers. Since he has left the Vikings, never a bad word to say about the Minnesota Vikings and the way that last year was handled when he has every right to dunk on the Vikings for letting him go. He never did that leading into the game, never did that after the game.

A first class person, Sam Darnold, and a great leader for this team when he was here. The locker room fully bought into him last year. Love the way he came to work every day. I've heard similar things since he's gone to Seattle about how they immediately realized that Sam was a professional quarterback day. day out. So he gave you one of the most fun seasons, regular seasons, that you've ever had watching this team with 14 wins. You should be rooting for Sam Darnold to succeed, even if it's not with your team. The others, of course, though, Aaron Rogers, the nemesis and maybe the quarterback next year, the nemesis of the Vikings, that one you don't have to root for Aaron Rogers. And the others are,

of course, in the division. I'm sure the Packers would be much more annoying to Vikings fans than the Chicago Bears. So there's your fan dual question of the day. Who are you rooting? And if you got others, go ahead. Who are you rooting hardest against? So I've got a few fan questions that I want to get to here as well. I have four questions that fans have sent in off the live show.

So I want to or not as a part of the live show like off the air type thing. And I wanted to answer some of those. So let us begin with a question from listener and reader at purple insider. dot football. Kip says how many firings or coaching changes will we see this offseason because of the choices made and the arrogance of a head coach in front office that put the world on a young quarterback who needs time, but also can't stay healthy listening to other podcasts had they just

signed Rogers or brought back Sam. This team would be in the playoffs and looking like a dark horse Super Bowl contender. Nothing is for certain as a fan, but I'm upset. and need reasoning for Purple Insider to calm me down. Okay, well, you certainly are within your rights to be upset. You should be because the expectation when they did not bring back Sam Darnold or Aaron Rogers was that J.J. McCarthy would be ready, that he would be able to step in the way we've seen some other younger quarterbacks.

It was year three for Jalen Hertz when he went to the Super Bowl. It was year two for Jared Gough when he had led the number one offense in the NFL. It was year two for Brock Purdy when he went to the Super Bowl as well. Bo Nix was in the playoffs in year one. And now in year two has what, 12 wins, whatever it is in Denver and et cetera. All right. We've seen a lot of starters who weren't that experienced have success. So it stood to reason they must see this in J.J. McCarthy to the point where they can move on from a 14 win quarterback who had one of the best seasons in the NFL last year.

and also turned down one of the all-time great quarterbacks, though it clearly in his twilight. And that decision right there is the difference between playing right now week 18 for nothing and potentially having been playing week 18 for whatever it might have been. The division, I might say the division because if we go back and look at how many games that they lost where they had a good enough defensive performance to stay in it, they've only really been blown out like what against the chargers and against the Packers. But even then in the first half, they're in that game and could not get offensive production and got 87 yards from their quarterback. There's a decent chance that they win that

game in Green Bay. They certainly beat Chicago at home if they get anything out of the quarterback position. They beat Atlanta at home if they get anything out of the QB spot. And maybe even the Pittsburgh Steelers, if you're not playing Carson Wentz and he's getting sacked and turning the ball over as a good chance there. So at least you can find three or four more wins on this schedule with average quarterback play. And I know, as you said, like, you can't really do that. You don't know how it would have turned out.

Maybe Rogers gets hurt or something. Like, you don't really know. But that decision right there is the singular reason, because we've seen how good the defense really is. They would have, I guess, got healthy in a different scenario down the stretch, maybe struggled a little bit earlier where you need. good quarterback play to get through it. And then if it was right now and Aaron Rogers or Sam Darnel is your

quarterback, yeah, you're talking about this team could run through the playoffs with the way that their defense is playing. So that decision is so costly that when you ask about changes in coaching or front office, can't see any world where you would fire Kevin O'Connell when you have a coach whose worst years are still seven and eight wins and his best years. are 13 and 14. That's not the type of coach that you move on from, not somebody who can navigate a tough season this way

or lead a winning season the way that he did last year and in 2022. So I would not be saying, hey, because you were at the center of this decision and the McCarthy draft pick, you are out of here. I do think, though, about going into next year and hey, you're picking another quarterback and maybe, not in the draft, but maybe somewhere,

uh, free agency. Well, who's it going to be? Is it going to be Sam Howell again this time or what? Like, it's going to have to be a lot better than that. But would they move on from, you know, Kwecci da Fulmenza after this year? I would be very surprised at that. There's always kind of buzz or rumors or whatever about his status with this franchise. And yet they signed him to an extension. That's a believe it when I see it, which is also what, uh, Albert Breer wrote about that subject as well, just said, you know, I'm kind of not buying that they would make that change. And I think that the two head positions from O'Connell and Quasi da Flemensa set up to have a couple of seasons where it's your winning window on J.J. McCarthy's rookie deal and with

this roster where it is. And I don't think things have gone so badly this year that you would say, all right, you just have to just clear the deck, bring in somebody completely new. I don't think that for either one of those positions. I think they should get 2026 based on how far they came to get to this point with the roster and they should have the opportunity to either ride with J.J. McCarthy and get another season with him or fix the mistake that they made last off season and give it a shot. If they were incompetent, if they were infighting, if the culture was falling apart, if the players in the locker room were saying what in the world are we doing, as a franchise like it was going on in

2021. If you had Bashad Breeland throwing a shoe at the general manager or whatever happened when he was released, I mean, then, yeah, okay, sure. That's time to let people go. I don't think we're at that spot. This year was they made the wrong decision at quarterback and it cost them. And a bunch of other injuries and things cost them as well.

But if you judge it only on this year, I think that's a little harsh considering there is a past of Kevin O'Connell winning a lot of games. But next year, that's where the pressure is extremely ramped up. In the NFL, you just do not get five years without a playoff win and stroll down the streets feeling really well. Now, about the other coaches that I don't know, that is probably a lot easier to figure out for Kevin O'Connell than it is for me from the outside to say.

say, oh, this coach has got to go, that coach has got to go. Run game coordinator always kind of comes to mind, though they did run the ball a lot better this year, despite an Aaron Jones injury than they have in the past. Offensive line coach will be up in the air. I think it's been an impossible year for an offensive line coach. I mean, they've had so many different combinations of off. I lost count of different offensive line. Blake Brandles on what, his third or fourth position of the year.

they're playing their third string center. They're playing, I mean, at one point, Joe Huber, a UDFA guard is being tossed in. I mean, that's really, really hard for an offensive line coach. And when they had even four out of five, they played really well as an offensive line. I don't know that that's the right decision to make. You're not moving on from Keenan McArdle, who's as good as they get for wide receiver coaches. Maybe the offensive coordinator position is up there. because when you have the 31st quarterback ranking or rating in the league,

something has gone wrong for sure. But I always look back to, I mean, the guy with the final pen on the game plan each week is Kevin O'Connell. So can you blame? I mean, there was the eight fall start game, which I think is probably, you know, somewhat coaching as well. But I don't know. It's really tough.

That's where with this whole season you want, because you're, angry at the way the team is performed, you want blood, you want somebody to pay, and they might. And oftentimes in the NFL, they do. So I wouldn't be shocked. But when it all kind of circles back to one thing that J.J. McCarthy just wasn't, he just simply was not ready to play quarterback for this team. And he just simply was not healthy, even if he's healthy and progresses like he did eventually, maybe they would get to a point in this season where you'd feel great about it. but we have no idea because he's been injured so many times.

I think it's been a lot more bad luck than bad everything else. And it's just football. So we need somebody to get thrown over the plank or off the plank. But I don't know that they, I don't know that they need to do that. I think staying the course is okay. And then if it fails again in 2006, then you're talking about much bigger implications. Uh, next fan question comes from Bill says, I'm not a J.J. McCarthy skeptic, give him a chance, but why not emulate the Green Bay model

of just taking another quarterback early if they both work out, then you have trade capital. So, yeah, it is not exactly the Green Bay. I know what you're getting at, not exactly. The Green Bay model is to have a quarterback set in place and then go get another one and develop him for multiple years. they actually could have done exactly what you're talking about with franchising Sam Darnold and developing J.J. McCarthy or signing Aaron Rogers or Daniel Jones and developing J.J. McCarthy, they did not choose the Green Bay model. They chose, it was more of a San Francisco with Purdy.

It was more of a Philadelphia with Jalen Hertz. Really, I would say that that was probably closer is Philadelphia with Jalen Hertz, where they moved on from Carson Wentz. And if you go back and look, there's a lot of questions about them moving on from Carson Wentz. A lot of questions when they draft Jalen Hertz. So it was more of that kind of thing. But they were not able to get Jalen Hertz type performance from their quarterback. And thus, here we are.

But anyway, should they draft a quarterback in a theoretical world? Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Yep. You always should. If you don't have your answer, then yep, keep swinging. because what we know, and think about this year.

I mean, Tyler Shuck, who I hadn't heard of until about two weeks before the draft, has played the best football of any of these rookie quarterbacks. Okay. And, you know, Jackson Darts had his moments as well, okay, and might have something there. Those guys are kind of just taking a swing at somebody you like. And if they failed, if Tyler Shuck was terrible, well, then whatever. New Orleans move on and get somebody else. And because so much was put into the decision the Vikings made to draft J.J. McCarthy, it put much more of a spotlight into like, this has to work. And you have to make it work. And we should give it forever to work. But that's not how the NFL often goes. And we saw that in the Josh Rosen decision. I mean, if you look at Josh Rosen's numbers versus J.J. McCarthy, it ain't that different for how they played in their first year. And Arizona moved on because another guy,

was a better opportunity. So is it like the right thing to do? Oh yeah. Yeah, it is. If you love somebody, then you should draft them because there's nothing that's more important than the quarterback position. Will they do this? No, they will not. Absolutely not. No way. They do not have time to draft and develop another quarterback. They don't have time with this roster to put another young guy in there and then sort of hope and dream that he's ready to go. They need a veteran quarterback. And I'm going to give this PSA, and I know I'm doing it a little late in the show, so you'll certainly hear this again for me. Every time I talk about quarterback ideas, I'm going to give the PSA. The PSA is, you are going to hate all the ideas that come up regarding the quarterback

position this offseason. You will hate them. Prepare yourself for that. When you go to leave the comment, I hate that idea. Just know, you will hate every idea. You are not going to like when I do the video about slash audio about Kyler Murray or about Mac Jones or about anybody else. There is not a single guy on this list that you're going to go, you know what? That's great except for Joe Burrow. But aside from that, you're not going to. And even then, like there's still, you know, money and injury questions there. You're going to hate all the ideas.

So you better prepare yourself because the only idea this you might love other than Burrow is to draft their favorite guy this year because we love when a team drafts a quarterback. I can't see any chance it happens. This team, as you saw against Detroit, can beat teams in the NFC North. They beat Chicago, and they were one stinking kick return away from beating Chicago. They could have beaten Green Bay with the way the defense played. They're going to look at it that way. Hey, we're right there.

We need a real quarterback to take us over the top if they don't believe that JJ is ready. And as far as being, you know, a skeptic or not, I mean, We just have to look at the, what the facts are. I mean, the lack of games played, we are now going to be talking about. Think about this. This is absolutely insane that since he was drafted, it has been, what, 620 days and he's played eight and a half games. I mean, it's just, you just can't rely on that. So they have to go out and look for other options, regardless of whether he comes back and plays this week or not.

And if he plays Green Bay's backups and throws for 400, like whatever, like you still have to be a in the market for looking for somebody else. But I don't think that that is going to be in the draft. I think it's got to be someone who can run the whole offense right now. And that means throwing to Justin Jefferson. So a great question. Okay. Let's see.

Our next question comes from Hunter, says, do you think the Vikings will be open to trading JG, Jonathan Granard, this offseason? Even though outside linebacker is important, it seems that we have a surplus of talent there. we, that we can't maximize and we should exchange some of it for a star defensive back or another spot. So again, theoretical world, I get where you're coming from. And I see your point that it really is just about Dallas Turner, that Turner playing Jonathan Grenard's role has been a beast. I mean, the second half of the season when he's gotten to be in that spot,

right defensive end, right outside linebacker, that's where he's most comfortable. He's great rush in the passer. He's shown explosiveness, some growth in past rush moves, quickness, bend, all those things. He's looked even more comfortable in the run defense when he's in Jonathan Grenard's spot. But Jonathan Grenard's really, really good at football. I mean, really good. And when you have a rusher who I would not say is quite of the level of a Miles Garrett or a Max Crosby, but he's one level down. I mean, right there in the Let's say the first level is you're all pro Hall of Famer. And the next level is like Pro Bowl, he's in the Pro Bowl, the level.

And this year didn't get as many sacks. A lot of that's for running quarterbacks. But the pressures will sustain year to year. They will result in sacks next year. I promise not very many opportunities to get sacks with the other team running all the time. But he's a great player. And I don't think you want to move out a great player just because you have another emerging good player there, what you would probably rather do is rotate those guys and just keep

Jonathan Granard more fresh than he has been in the last two years. And if you have, you know, Van Ginkle, the other problem is, too, that while Turner was not as effective filling in for Van Ginkle, he does have an injury history that is concerning enough to want to make sure that you have somebody who is a plus player at that spot, even if he's not as good at playing in that role. I think you'd rather bring Wilson back, treat him as an outside linebacker hybrid, and have the four of those guys rotating in and out all the time and just be nasty as you could be. And when we look at, you know, Philadelphia last year, all the rotational, defensive guys they're running out there, we focus a lot on certain stats. But if Dallas Turner played 600

snaps next year and got seven and a half sacks and 40 pressures and Jonathan Grenard got eight sacks and 50 pressures, that's like having Miles Garrett, like it's not quite, it's not quite, but it's kind of like that, like putting those two together, sort of like a platoon player in baseball, doesn't really matter if one guy has this and another guy has that. If at the end of the day, your shortstop position got you 28 home runs and a, you know, 380 on base percentage, doesn't matter if two guys did it or one, it just matters that that's what you got out of it. So I would not be in the market for trading Jonathan Grinard.

unless there was a humongous offer coming the Minnesota Vikings way. Everybody has a price, but his leadership, I know that he's going to have to do something with his contract, but his leadership, his pass rush ability, he is in his prime. Like, you want him here. I would not be looking to move out talent on the defense. Last question is about J.J. McCarthy and his most recent injury. This one comes from Brad. when it comes to J.J. McCarthy, how would you rate his level of unluckiness when it comes

to injury? Okay. Well, I think he's been very unlucky when it comes to his injury history, tearing a meniscus. I mean, there's not much you can do about that. Who, and that happens a lot. I mean, it happened to Adrian Peterson. There are lots of guys, Carl Anthony Towns, like lots of guys in town have torn meniscuses over the years. and it's just a bad luck thing. He may have also had in college something with that knee, just speculating, and then he got to the NFL and maybe tried to push through it or whatever else, and that's why it ended up where it ended up.

But when it comes to this year, you have the ankle injury on a scramble where someone falls on his ankle. You have the hand injury, I think, on a scramble, or I'm not 100% sure still with that fracture in the hand. but you have him taking multiple sacks, you have him scrambling, and then the concussion also, at least we think, happened on a scramble as well, but he got hit a bunch of times in that game.

So you are talking about a quarterback who plays in a fashion with one of the highest pressure to sack ratios, with one of the highest scramble rates per dropback of anybody in the NFL, if you are constantly running and throwing your body forward, and he can justify it any way he wants with diving forward. But to me, if you dive forward too often, you are running yourself into guys diving at you. You're running yourself into guys' knees and whatever,

get kicked in the noggin or whatever it might be. And then if you're jumping into the end zone at defenders, you could get hit. I think that playing with aggressiveness is really important. But when you take a lot of sacks trying to make that extra play, play that it does cross a line to, yeah, you can have a much higher chance to get injured than other players who are safer with their bodies. Every quarterback is going to get hurt. There's no doubt about it. Like throughout their career, there's no quarterback that I can remember

that didn't have some injury. So this might just be bad luck. But when you play it in that way, if you don't learn to protect yourself, you're going to get more injured. And that would be my concern for next year for J.J. McCarthy is if you go into week one, week two, and here he goes scrambling, and here he goes diving, and uh-oh, it's a fractured wrist, I mean, if you don't have another option, a quarterback, you are just up a river. So they have to factor that into the total equation of how they handle this year in the off season, that there is a good chance that he could get hurt again after multiple injuries this year and missing the entire year last year. And the biggest issue is, for me, is that progress is just lost.

Every single game is progress, whether it goes well or very poorly, because it's learning on the job for J.J. McCarthy. I know this year wasn't about learning or progress, but that's what it is. And if you've missed most of it, you're not getting better. And even if, you know, he goes into the off season and can't throw in the same way or whatever because of a fracture, We're still talking about, you know, every minute matters from the quarterback position, and they have to be majorly concerned about that. So great questions. The mailbag usually comes out on Friday.

There's going to be a Monday mailbag at purple insider. Football. Make sure you go sign up all the offseason coverage is going to be over there. Also wrote a long story along with Anthony Barr about Harrison Smith's love for the game that timed out really nicely with the other night. And it turned out that I was standing. within the camera shot of Harrison Smith being emotional the other night. So I heard from a lot of people about that.

Thanks to the local news for including my face standing next to his. Anyway, so thanks everybody for watching slash listening. And we will have lots to break down leading up to Vikings and Packers next week. And we'll see what happens with J.J. McCarthy. So take care. Hope you all had a very safe and happy holiday. And we'll see you all again soon. Football.

Thank you. Thank you.