Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Sam Darnold shines, Mekhi Blackmon tears ACL in Vikings first camp practice

Episode Date: July 25, 2024

Matthew Coller was there in Eagan for Vikings training camp. Notes on Sam Darnold's good day, Mekhi Blackmon's injury, Christian Darrisaw, Justin Jefferson, JJ McCarthy and the lineups on Day 1 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey everybody, welcome to the first episode of the rest of our lives. Matthew Collar here. Training camp is back for the Minnesota Vikings. And if you notice from my sunscreeny glow, I just returned from TCO Performance Center where I spent the afternoon watching the Minnesota Vikings practice. And what a feeling it was. I mean, first of all, when it's about 78 to 82 degrees, brisk little nice breeze coming across, the football smell in the air, doesn't get much better than that overall.

I understand we have some 90-degree days on the way that I might come back looking a little more toasty and maybe a little more tired, but a beautiful day today for the Vikings to get out on the field at TCO Performance Center for their first practice. And of course, the early practices, we get super excited and really intense and we preview it and preview it. And then they only do about 30 minutes of actual 11 on 11 and seven on seven action, a lot of technique stuff, a lot of warming up, uh, and, uh, doing individual drills and things like that. So this was not the most intense practice that I've ever seen in my life

as it never is to start. And of course they are not in pads for at least a couple of more days as everybody starts to ramp up. However, I did come away with a notebook full of stuff to share with you from Vikings training camp day one. And of course, as always answer all of your questions from what I saw out there or just general big picture Viking stuff, anything really to do with the nfl i am here and i will be each night after i cover practice at tco performance center and also plans to interview other beat reporters out there also maybe have a special guest coming up from the vikings as well at some point during training camp so there's lots to come from tco performance Center and then back here in my home studio as we go forward. But if you're listening to this on the audio version and you want to drop in,

usually it's going to be about 7 o'clock where I kick up the live stream and we talk about everything from TCO Performance Center from the day. So let us start out with this. I know what all of you want to know. How did Sam Darnold and J.J. McCarthy look? what all of you want to know. How did Sam Darnold and JJ McCarthy look? That's what you want to know. And I am not going to hold back on that from the notebook. We'll start it right out with this. Justin Jefferson caught an outrageous, I'm estimating about 50 yards. I couldn't tell exactly how many yards, 47, 53, something in that ballpark.

Call it a 50-yard catch. That would have been no doubt a touchdown from Sam Darnold. And it was one of the best and most impressive passes from the arm of a quarterback into the hands of a wide receiver in a practice that you're going to see. Sam Darnold throws the ball 50 yards in the air with very little effort. And this is not about Kirk Cousins. He's a better quarterback than Darnold. So not a criticism, but the arm talent is different between those two players. And for the last six training camps, we've been watching Kirk Cousins crow hop his way into deep balls to Justin Jefferson. Whereas Sam Darnold, he just flicks the wrist and the ball explodes off of his hand. And there were two instances of Justin Jefferson getting behind the defense for large touchdown

catches. But one in particular, that was the 50 yard bomb really caught my eye. And I did ask Jefferson about it after. And he just said that there is an adjustment to the arm strength and that Sam Darnold's arm strength is very impressive. And he said, we're setting kind of the standard here. We could do it in practice. We've got to carry it over to the games. But Justin Jefferson, if you thought that he was going to get his contract and then take it easy, that was not true. over to the games. But Justin Jefferson, if you thought that he was going to get his contract and

then take it easy, that was not true. He was out for blood on the first day of training camp and looked every bit the superstar, as we all expect. I'm not breaking any news that Justin Jefferson is good, but his first day chemistry where they were running stuff a little more higher tempo than they would have been at mini camp and throwing some deep balls was extremely good with Sam Darnold. And I'm trying to put as many caveats on this as I can so as not to overreact to the first day of practice. But Sam Darnold looked to my eye like he had an excellent practice. He was in control of everything they were doing.

The ball was coming out. He was accurate with the football. He had one that was a little offline, but Brandon Powell dove and caught it, which we'll get to the wide receiver battle in a moment. But the warmups, the ball didn't touch the ground with Sam Darnold throwing it. The 11 on 11s, the seven on sevens.

He had a very, very nice first day that was highlighted by a couple of deep throws to Justin Jefferson. As far as JJ McCarthy goes, clearly taking fewer reps than Sam Darnold as QB two, I suppose right now there was a few Nick Mullins reps mixed in, but as of right now, we'll just call JJ McCarthy the backup I don't know how that'll work out as we go through this for the actual season but he's going to get the second most reps during training camp because he needs them and there were a couple plays where it was impressive for McCarthy including one pass that he had over the middle to Lucky Jackson against the first team defense which I mentioned the other day is something that Kevin O'Connell likes to do, which is practice second team versus first team.

And McCarthy was running the second team. And you can always tell by the offensive line, they mix in wide receivers, but who's snapping the ball, who the line is. I didn't catch any first team reps from JJ McCarthy with the starting offensive line. It is possible that I didn't identify it or that I might have been walking from one spot to the next and missed something. But it looks like Sam Darnold was taking all the first team reps. And McCarthy had one very noticeable pass where he let it rip. And when you watch him warm up, we have a very nice spot where we can get a good look at the quarterbacks warming up. I thought that JJ McCarthy looked totally fine in those warmups.

It hasn't changed since minicamp. He has an extremely good arm, but Sam Darnold looked like a starting NFL quarterback with a lot of talent. And if you had gone to this practice and not known what the pro football reference page said about Sam Darnold, and you just said, Oh, they've got a new quarterback. I don't know anything about him. You would have said this guy looks like he should be a star in the NFL. There is absolutely no doubt after watching the closest we've seen to a real practice that Sam Darnold was the number three overall pick for a reason. So a great day with him and Justin Jefferson to get that chemistry rolling and get started. We really begin the quarterback evaluation when we get to the padded practices,

the pass rushers can create pressure, but I didn't think today there would have been too many times that Sam Darnold would have been pressured. And this is something that he does have to work on getting the football out. He got sacked a lot early in his career, but when you watched him with Carolina at the end of 2022, and then with San Francisco in his start last year, I thought he did a much better job of throwing the ball on time or checking it down. So a good start for Sam Darnold in his very, very first practice. But you wanted to see some fireworks, right?

You wanted to see, all right, let's get that arm out there against the defense and see what Sam Darnold can do. And it definitely delivered with a few huge plays to Justin Jefferson. As far as what Jefferson had to say after practice wasn't a whole lot that's new from Justin Jefferson he watched the receiver documentary when he went to the premiere of it and said that he really enjoyed getting to know the other guys backgrounds and personalities and not a whole lot of new information there, but just that he seems to think that this can carry over day after day with Darnold's arm and is very impressed with it. Again, that's not breaking news, but everybody walked away impressed with how Darnold threw

the football. Of course, I am not saying that this means that Sam Darnold, and you'll probably hear this a number of times after practices when I come home and talk about it. I'm not saying that this means that Sam Darnold, and you'll probably hear this a number of times after practices when I come home and talk about it, I'm not saying that Sam Darnold is going to even win the job or that he is going to take the Vikings to the playoffs or reinvigorate his career or vigorate his career since it's never really had any sort of peak moments. It's just that you can't help but watch him throw even in warmups and hear the zip on the ball and see the way that it comes out of his hand. You just can't help but notice how good he's looked so far since he got here, even in minicamp. And JJ McCarthy will get his reps and will develop and we'll see how that goes as it comes along. But clearly, Darnold was fully in charge of the first team as of the very first day. We had a chance to talk with Christian Derrissaw after he signed his enormous contract to stay with the Vikings through, I believe, 2029 is when the extension actually goes through. And naturally, a very happy guy.

And Kevin O'Connell, very happy to talk about keeping one of the best left tackles in the league. But just something that came up with O'Connell and with Derrissaw was he's always been such a quiet guy that he's not a big talker. And in the locker locker room he's available a lot for reporters and I've interviewed him a number of times of course but he's not seeking cameras seeking attention trying to you know be out there pumping his own tires or anything like that such an understated guy and what Kevin O'Connell wanted to see more from him now that he's signing this extension and he knows that the organization is buying in fully is a little more of that, a little more vocal, a little more leadership, a little more guidance for other players and developmental players on the offensive line. And it was just

an interesting little note. I talked to Brian O'Neill after practice and he mentioned that Dennis Ryan, who was their old equipment guy, put Brian O'Neill and Derrissaw's lockers next to each other in the second year for Derrissaw. And the reason is Brian O'Neill is a great personality, great talker, very vocal guy, very welcoming captain of the team. And for those two guys to spend time together, work together and help Christian Derrissaw, you know, come out of his shell a little bit. A lot more personality from him now than it used to be. And so they want to see that. They want to see him with this big contract, a superstar left tackle, guiding the other guys along the

offensive line. But when you start talking about that, that really tells you how good Christian Derrissaw has been because there's no other step to talk about. Well, what's the next step for your game? Just continue to be amazing at football, I guess, is really it. So they're talking about, you know, take on that role as he goes forward. And it was something that he said he has to make himself work on, but he's going to continue to roll through that. So once again, a really good moment for him today to be able to stand up there and talk about his long-term contract extension and a big win for the Vikings to lock him up. Though there wasn't a really great explanation from

anyone about why it was done so much earlier. I think what Derrissaw said, and I believe him, is that he knew he wanted to be here. He knew that he didn't want to try to get out of Minnesota. You guys should love this because everyone's always afraid, Vikings fans, of people leaving them, great players leaving them. And I'm not blaming you. I completely understand. But with Derrissaw, that was it for him.

He wanted to be here. He wanted to get it done, lock it up, and then go forward and not have to worry about it. And there you go. You've got your left tackle for a long time to come. Jordan Addison spoke with us today. I can't say that I have a lot of takeaways because Addison started out his press conference by saying that he can't really talk about the details of what happened

because his lawyers told him not to. That's pretty much standard for this type of press conference. Not a huge surprise. He did say that he was in a dark place after the DUI, which I don't doubt. I'm sure that he felt a ton of embarrassment and shame for it happening, especially with the timing. And he said this quote, whatever comes with it, I own up to everything and feel like anything that comes my way is deserved. So taking some responsibility there as far as whatever penalty might come down from the NFL. And we don't have to get into that whole thing again, but that's just what he said. And he called Kevin O'Connell supportive. And that was pretty much all we got from Jordan Addison today. It was as standard as it comes for a, I got a DUI press conference because you can't really come out and

go, no, I didn't. That's not going to look good. And you also can't completely say nothing because that's not going to look good either. So he took as much responsibility as he could, said that his teammates have been supportive. And now we go forward. And the hope is with Jordan Addison that the Vikings have a good plan in place to prevent this from ever happening again.

That's the best we can do there. The left guard. And some of you are going to ask how the kickers looked. They didn't do the kicking today. They were just on the side practicing by themselves. They didn't do where everybody gathers around and they kick one from 35, then from 40, then from 45. That gets very dramatic and the fans love that and maybe they're waiting till the fans are here so we don't have a kicking update we have the next best thing that is a left guard update blake brandle took from what i could tell all of the snaps at left guard this is the guy they want to win the job it is blake brandle's job to win He is a part of the starting offensive line. Dalton Reisner solidified as the second team left guard for this entire practice. And if Blake Brandel has a good training camp, a good preseason, my guess is that he'll play in the preseason more than you would ever see the starters play. And if he holds it down and they like what it looks like, he's going to be

the guy at left guard because otherwise, if there was a true competition, they would split reps. So we saw this in 2022 where Jesse Davis and Ed Ingram split reps throughout training camp. I think Davis took a lot of them early and then Ingram got a lot more as it came in at right guard. And eventually they gave the job to Ingram and traded Jesse Davis away to Pittsburgh. Normally the guy who's getting the most reps here, if it's the younger guy, then they want him to win the job, which stands to reason and fits with everything that they've said about Blake Brandel. As of right now, Blake Brando is your left guard starter, and we will be watching how that plays out, especially when they go to Cleveland for the joint practices, because Cleveland has monsters on their D-line.

Speaking of the D-line, the Vikings were using their base package a lot in this practice and upfront Jonathan Bullard, Harrison Phillips, and Jerry Tillery were getting a lot of work as the starting defensive tackles. Uh, Jonathan Bullard is a guy that they clearly like and decided to bring back. They feel like he fit well as a run stuffer. But also I think in Brian Flores' defense, there is a role that is not exactly picked up by some of the data. It doesn't result in pressures for them. It doesn't result in necessarily a lot of tackles, but it is space creation. And Jonathan Bullard is a powerful dude who can create space for pass rushers, for blitzers. He can move guards and he can stick guards in their spot, turn them and allow the room to come in for the blitzing linebackers. That is not going to show up in any sort of box score or even a PFF

grade, but it is something that he's good at tillery has my attention though the fact that they wanted him on the first team ish here the the base package which is not what they're going to use mostly during the season that's going to be the nickel but the fact that he's out there as someone who was a first round draft pick and washed out with the chargers shows up last year with the raiders does a pretty good job against the pass, and now getting an opportunity here. It looks like he's going to get a real shot to play and to be that guy who is capable of rushing the passer. At least that is the takeaway from day one. As far as wide receivers go, and I'm just, this is emptying the notebook,

bouncing around here, not specifically sticking to one side of the ball or whatever. This is just everything I got for you. Brandon Powell and Jalen Naylor appeared to be the wide receiver threes on the first team. This is a position that there's a lot of rotation. A couple of guys take a rep. Oh, Tristan Jackson's there. Is that a first team rep? Well, yeah, but it was the only one of the day or something like that. Lucky and Tristan Jackson's there. Is that a first team rep? Well, yeah, but it was the only one of the day or something like that. Lucky and Tristan Jackson both saw a lot of action today, but it seemed that Powell and Naylor were getting more work, especially Brandon Powell.

I mentioned a really good catch that he had in this practice. Those guys, if you're making your depth chart out, are ahead of the others that are all battling for the spot. But we did ask Kevin O'Connell this, and he essentially named every guy they have and said it is a real competition for that wide receiver three spot. And I think that's true, but Powell and Naylor are going to get their first chances to prove that they are the guys that belong in that spot. And they might be the co-wide receiver three. It doesn't have to work like a Madden game.

It doesn't have to work like fantasy. This could be, you do this well, you do this well. Here's how we're going to mix and match in that role. And we'll also find out if someone else starts to rise up and take one of those jobs. Tristan Jackson always looks pretty good to me. Lucky Jackson. They kept him around for a reason. Those two, if you were making after one day, the depth chart would probably fill out the

rest after Brandon Powell and Jalen Naylor. Very much subject to change. As far as tight ends go, we didn't see Robert Tunyon as much with the first team. Johnny Munt, Josh Oliver got the work there. Those are the guys who have been in the system before. So that was worth noting that when they ran some two tight end stuff, it was Munt and Oliver. That's not shocking considering that they've been with Kevin O'Connell. And the last thing, I actually did mention this earlier, that J.J. McCarthy let one rip to Lucky Jackson that was eye-popping with the amount of velocity.

And when McCarthy throws the ball over the middle of the field to someone breaking in, it just seems to be in his wheelhouse. And those have been most of his best throws that we've seen since he was drafted and got to OTAs and to minicamp. So that is the notebook for today. But if you are just joining, welcome. I have every day plans to, after practice, empty the notebook, what we heard, what we

saw from TCO Performance Center when I was out there. And you'll see me progressively get more sunburned from standing out there as we go along. But the highlight of the day was by far, and I'll bring it back on the screen, Justin Jefferson, a ridiculous 50-yard catch from Sam Darnold. If you want to see one of the two that he caught, I don't know which one it was they tweeted out. I saw the Vikings tweet out, if you want to go over to Twitter and see it, Darnold's throw. But what was really noticeable in person was how fast the ball came out of his hand and how quickly it got there to Justin Jefferson.

And it was enough today for me to say, all right, I am going to go with impressed with day one. very impressed with Sam Darnold for day one, day two through the rest of this off season. We will see. He looked like a starting NFL quarterback with a big arm, uh, in day one. So, all right. Uh, any questions, comments, subjects you guys want to discuss? I am very much for it. Whatever you want to throw in the comments, I'm happy to answer. But it was just generally overall enjoyable to be back out there. It was not a practice that you want to go too crazy trying to figure out every single type of, oh, okay, wow.

Folks, U.S. Cellular noticed that the way we use our phones has gotten ironic. We try to put our phones down for dinner, but the menu is on a QR code. That's ironic. We hit like on social media posts that we don't actually like. Ironic. Which is why U.S. Cellular created UsMode to help us reconnect with each other and use our phones less ironically. A phone company wanting people to use their phones less?

Ironic. Let's find us again with UsMode from U.S. Cellular. Visit uscellular.com slash built for us to get started. I am sorry. I mentioned, I thought it might be an arm injury the way that he was walking. But Makai Blackman tore his ACL in practice. Wow.

Wow. So I was just kind of happily running through my notebook but uh just texted to me right now that mckay blackman tore his acl in practice today that is crushing for the vikings cornerback group absolutely crushing wow mckay blackman was a guy to be very excited about for this year. First day, not even in pads. That is as bad of a break as you're going to have because he came into this training camp with real opportunity. And now the cornerback group, this is a very significant hit to the cornerback group. I believe they wanted him to play 700, 800 snaps, something in that range.

And instead, he will not be playing this year. And it will be another year until we see him. Someone that showed a lot of promise last year, an ability to make plays on the ball, an excellent, aggressive tackler. And all we could really see in practice was him go down on the sideline, the team coming over and talking with him. And when he walked off and it looked like he was kind of down a little bit, I thought, well, maybe this is a shoulder injury that he had last year and it's re-aggravating it or something like that. But instead an ACL tear that is going to keep him out for the year. And this might be a

situation now where the Vikings have to do more than just go out and get Duke Shelley. Generally, I have been against the idea of a Stefan Gilmore. Xavier Howard's dealing with some stuff off the field that is not good and would not necessarily want to get involved with that. But Stephon Gilmore had a good year last year for the Dallas Cowboys and does not presently have a job. Would he be interested in signing with the Vikings? They have Shaq Griffin. They have Byron Murphy as their starters. But Blackman was a real swing player to this.

His ability to play the outside corner, to make plays on the ball and be a tackler out there, to make plays on the ball and be a tackler out there and someone with upside that seemed to be getting better. Now it's a Caleb Evans and then it's Andrew Booth Jr. on your depth chart. And then it's Jalen Williams, who was one of the guys who came in and that's an undrafted free agent who played seven plays or something last year for the Vikings, they very much will have to look at that free agent list and say, is there anybody left out there?

Adoree Jackson, I believe is still a free agent as well. If you guys have other ideas, then feel free to let me know. But I was in the mode of, Hey, let's just wait and see. And we'll, we'll find out what happens to Blackman. And I guess we found out very quickly that his season is over and the Vikings take another hit. I mean, this was a day to watch them play and think, oh, all right. Or watch them practice and think, okay, like this looks pretty good and a good first day and everything. And then suddenly another hit to this team when

they've already taken a lot of punches as we are only one day in with Jordan Addison's DUI, the passing of Kyrie Jackson, which by the way, all credit to the Vikings, they put together a beautiful looking logo on the field. There's a slanted area of the field that goes up to where fans can sit, where it is often sponsored up there by Land O'Lakes or something. But they put the Kyrie Jackson's number and the KJ and really, really well done. Very, very classy by the Vikings to do that. But that is a reminder of what they're dealing with and what they've gone through already before they got here. And then the press conference with Jordan Addison talking about his DUI and whatever punishment comes, he's going to have to take it. And then

now to lose to injury, one of your most promising young players on the roster. Really, when we talk about guys that are under two years playing, we talk about Addison, Ivan Pace, and I think Makai Blackman belongs right in that list as someone who I thought was a very good draft pick last season. Now he's going to have to wait for his career to continue and they are just out of depth we know that a caleb evans can play and he's going to have serious ups and downs shatt griffin hasn't been really a full-time starter in a couple years and byron murphy jr remains as a quality player but even he has been banged up at times throughout his career so now they're going to have to go into the free agent market and see what else is there for them to be able to bring in.

But this is a tough one. This is not some veteran player who's bounced around. This is a young guy that was on the rise and now has his career paused after one practice. I mean, imagine all the things that you go through to get yourself ready for the NFL season and you go out there on the first day and you are lost for the year. Very, very, very tough news for Makai Blackman.

All right, well, we'll get into your comments here. And if there's anything else, any updates that you see on Vikings corners or free agents that you think, let me know in the comments there. But this is some very, very tough news for a Vikings cornerback group that was already feeling very down after what happened with Kyrie Jackson. And now those guys emotionally have to be pretty spent because when an injury like this happens in a room with position groups, everybody feels it. I mean, they've been maybe not Jack or maybe not Griffin, but you know, Murphy, Caleb Evans, Andrew Booth, Jr. These guys have been together for a while and they know Makai Blackman, they know his talent.

And then to see his season ended like that is another emotional hit to them to go along with the physical of him not being there to play now. And everybody else gets moved up the depth chart. This one is, this one is tough. And we ask Brian Flores to be the genius, the guru, the wizard, whatever you want to call them. But there's only so much you could do. If you have limitations of the roster at the cornerback position. That is one you can't really cover up or paste over. You have to have coverage corners and Blackman looked to me like he was going to be someone that was emerging. And now there is not much left of that cornerback room after a Blackman's injury with now Evans having to slide up into that position. I suppose there's a battle Evans booth, Jr. Jalen Williams,

not, not, not good for the Vikings on the first day, just as I was saying, Oh yeah, great first day. And we'll see what happens. And then that news comes to my phone. So very tough. But we'll carry on here and continue to talk about it. But wow, another hit for this team. Jeez. Extreme Birding Trees and Learning, which is quite the name for YouTube, says Darnold is already better than Cousins. The Falcon signing Cousins was a smokescreen. They didn't actually want him. They wanted Pennix, but they wanted to pretend that they want Cousins. The Falcon signing Cousins was a smokescreen. They didn't actually want him.

They wanted Pennix, but they wanted to pretend that they want Cousins. Okay, well, we can't go that far. Extreme is right. Darnold is not better than Kirk Cousins. He is more physically gifted than Kirk Cousins. This would be like comparing a major league baseball starting pitcher like Brad Radke, who paints the corners and who's savvy and can get people out versus a flamethrowing reliever that comes out of the pen and just throws as hard as he can. I do think Darnold has touch on the ball when he's throwing it, but does not have the numbers to back up that he can play better actual football than Kirk Cousins. He's going to have to show that. And as far as the Falcons signing him now, I mean, I think that they signed him in win now mode with their owner's age and they thought, okay, we can split the

difference. They're trying a competitive rebuild actually is that we can try to compete right now for this division and also have our future franchise quarterback but atlanta that's somebody else's podcast darnold is more talented and it stands out big time in practice and that's why he was the number three overall pick in the draft of the new york jets very, very few human beings can throw a football quite like Sam Darnold. Let's see. Kinetic615 says, doesn't Darnold always look good in camp though? Yeah, that's exactly it, is that Sam Darnold is so gifted at throwing the ball that he often does get this type of review from people in training camp. The difference

is Justin Jefferson and that a lot of his best throws went to Jefferson. Respect to DJ Moore. He's not Justin Jefferson. There's really no one that he's played with of this echelon because this is the best player in the league at his position. And then having multiple weapons and a system that is going to let Sam Darnold air it out. That's what makes this entire thing intriguing is that he's never had a receiver like this that can get open like he did today and just blow somebody out of the water and just leave this trail of frustrated players who can't possibly stay with him. That's not something that Sam Darnold has had before. And also, it's crazy to think about that Sam Darnold is only something like 26 years old, and there were guys drafted that were 24.

So we've seen development over the years. Could he develop and be a better version now with the same arm? I'm not setting the bar crazy, crazy high until we see this day in and day out. But to your point, I think it's fair to say, well, yeah, I mean, he does look good in training camp. That's what usually happens. That's why he's still a starting quarterback and still getting jobs is because he is capable of playing at a, at a high level. He just hasn't done it very consistently. Uh, Preston says last year, people mentioned that the BYU kid didn't look the part yet. I was going to ask if JJ looks the part and you already answered that. Um, yeah. So with

Jaron Hall, it's just a massive difference physically between Jaron hall and JJ McCarthy. It's really as simple as any person, no matter how much football knowledge you had could stand on the sideline and watch them throw. And you go, which one's the first round pick. And they would say, Oh, number nine McCarthy, easily, easily the first round pick not Jaron hall because of the physical difference. McCarthy absolutely looks the part with his size and his arm strength. And I thought he looked fine in his reps today. It wasn't perfect.

It wasn't horrible. He didn't look frustrated or didn't look like, oh, well, he was holding on the ball too long. And it's not the most intense ever when it comes to this type of training camp practice. But, you know, it certainly was, you know, I mean, it certainly was a fine practice and a fine start for JJ McCarthy. It's just that Sam Darnold looks like someone who's done this a number of times, like many times so far in his career that he's a veteran already at this age, but it doesn't look foreign to him at all when he's leading an offense and he's under center. Whereas JJ McCarthy, there is a little more walking through the steps. I mean, think if you are driving someplace that you've never driven before and you're following your GPS and you're looking

around, is that where, okay, I think that's the right turn, that kind of thing. That's what McCarthy looks like playing quarterback at this moment. Whereas Darnold looks like he's driven there a thousand times, confidently taking the correct turns and so forth. That's where it is right now. And we'll see where it is and track the progress. But Darnold had a very good practice and McCarthy looked fine. I didn't see any huge problems that would make me good practice and McCarthy looked fine. I didn't see any huge problems that would make me go, I don't know. I don't know folks day one, he was looking rough. The arm is still there. The size, the mobility, the athleticism, it's all impressive. There's a lot of high speed footballs flying around at this training camp.

Joshua says, do you know if Jordan plays all of his games this year? I have no idea with Jordan Addison. If I had to guess, I would say probably he does. Number one, issues like this DUI charge, falling asleep at the wheel. I imagine he's got a very good lawyer who might be able to work his way through this. And if there is not much that comes of it legally, then the NFL might just say, I don't know, wasn't that big of a deal, no suspension. Or if something a little more does come from it, the NFL could tack onto that or the NFL could just say, and it's so much spin the wheel of justice with the NFL. it's very hard to predict.

They could say, all right, DUI, after the incident with driving 140, we're going to send our own message to Jordan Addison. Here's a three game suspension. All of those options are on the table. I've seen the NFL rule in all sorts of different ways that, you know, sometimes it ends up, you know, being nothing. And sometimes, I mean, with Delvin cook, there was never any sort of suspension for Delvin cook and there were pictures and there was lots of noise about it. And yet the NFL just said, nope, not our problem. And they will go from there and shrugged it off essentially.

So will they do that with this or was this too much of a problem? I don't really know. I'm sorry. Now I'm just realizing that you guys were telling me in the comments about the breaking news with Makai Blackman. I was a little bit behind that. So So a huge boy says who has more arm talent, Darnold or JJ. I think that Sam Darnold probably does because, and this is Sam Darnold as a grownup who has now been in the league for quite some time. There's more touch on the football from Sam Darnold. There's more throwing with anticipation. These are things that JJ McCarthy eventually will develop, I think.

But Darnold is someone who came out of college with this natural gift. And where Darnold, the other thing is too, has the ability to be flat footed or not in a perfect position to throw and flick his wrist. He has huge shoulders and just flick his arm and the ball explodes off of it. And he can get it a good amount of velocity without doing a whole lot with the rest of his body where I think McCarthy to get the full effect of his power. Uh, maybe there's a comparison of an outfielder versus a shortstop where Darnold is the shortstop who could just field it, pick it up and fire it. Whereas the outfielder needs to get into the full crow hop and put everything behind it. That's with McCarthy and the deep ball

Darnold's deep ball is capable of looking pristine. Whereas McCarthy doesn't quite have it yet. Um, he, as far as the trajectory, uh, putting the right amount of touch on it deep down the field, but we're talking about two guys that are five years separated in their careers. So I'm not really sure where it's going to look in five years for JJ McCarthy, but their draft status tells the story. I mean, Darnold was in the discussion for the number one overall pick his year. A lot of people thought he would be. And J.J. McCarthy was the 10th overall pick. And there were multiple quarterbacks taken ahead of him for a reason.

Because Darnold has freakish arm talent. You look at some of the scouting reports from when he came out. People are saying, well, this could be the next this guy or that guy with his skill. I mean, that's just where we're at. And then you really see it when you're up close in training camp. So I would go with Sam Darnold overall. Again, it doesn't mean he's going to be better. I mean, decision-making is really the issue with Sam Darnold for his career. He's often tried to use that arm so much to his detriment, where instead of playing it safe, instead of making underneath throws and things like that, he will try to do something crazy. But he's also played with really bad teams, and McCarthy is not going to have that. He's going to play with good teams where he can make more sensible decisions and form better habits.

And this is why circumstance often has a lot to do with whether a player succeeds or not. Wade says, looks like Flores won't be stopping the blitz percentage anytime soon with no corners. You're right about that, that Brian Flores has to be shaking his head right now and just saying, gosh, really? Really? With a guy that they drafted with

Brian Flores that fit well into his system last year, an aggressive, not a huge guy, but aggressive playmaker on the ball, tackler, all the things that would fit in Flores' system well. And now he's out for the entire year. And that is just crushing for the Vikings to be without Makai Blackman. And you're right that the strength of this team is going to be its edge rushers. Van Ginkle was out there today doing a decent amount of work. I didn't see a ton of 11-on-11s, but saw him out there for 7-on-7s, moving pretty well. Dallas Turner, Jonathan Grenard, this is the best part of their defense. The linebackers as well.

Those guys are going to have to cause a lot of havoc because the one-on-one just leave them out on an Island and you'll be fine. You're not going to have a lot of that for this Vikings team. Very unfortunate for this to happen. Preston says Flores needs to call Gilmore. I agree. I wasn't into the idea a few weeks ago, but I am now of them, you know, bringing in Stefan Gilmore for a tryout. And Preston also mentions Patrick Peterson. No problem here with bringing back Patrick Peterson. He was our media good guy, but also played extremely, extremely well. I don't think that he is as good of a fit for what they want to do as Gilmore, but Patrick Peterson, he was okay last year for Pittsburgh. They had some problems with their cornerback situation. Of course, he's not going

to be the impact player that he was years ago, but savvy still could take on a role. If he wants a job, I haven't heard anything from him, whether he wants to play or not. I would have thought that he would have been somewhere if he really wanted to play, uh, and instead of walking away, but he also hasn't announced his retirement. I don't know what Patrick Peterson is up to. I know Gilmore wants to play because he had mentioned it somewhere where he thought that he should have a job already in the league. This could be Stephon Gilmore's job potentially because the Vikings are going to need another corner and much respect to Duke Shelley. He played great in 2022 for them. That's not someone that you just

plug and play as much as Stephon Gilmore would be. And now they are one injury away from this looking very ugly, a Shaq Griffin or a Byron Murphy Jr. injury away from going, okay, now we're talking about a Caleb Evans and Shaq Griffin or something with nobody behind that. There is, there's just a pretty tough situation going on in the Vikings cornerback room which actually to me looked like going into training camp that it was going to be an interesting competition that was improved from last year because last year we were talking about Juwan Johnson as a first guy out there and I mean that was somebody that just didn't even work out as a first guy out there. And I mean, that was somebody that just didn't even work out as a high draft pick.

And he was taking first team reps at times. Now that changed as camp went on, but I thought last year it was borderline dire in the cornerback room. And okay, well, Blackman is a huge part of it. Griffin's played before with Blackman out of the mix. Now tearing his ACL.

Very, very tough. Very, very tough situation. Stephanie says, KOC said this would be a physical training camp. Does that mean a change from last year's approach? I don't think it will be. But I've also never heard a coach say, no, it's going to be a very easy training camp. I think everyone's just going to chill, have a good time, and we'll play when we get around to it. I mean, every coach says they want to have a physical training camp. Maybe it gets ramped up to some extent. I just don't think

that's the way that Kevin O'Connell operates or has never been on teams that have operated like Mike Zimmer did, where it was going to be a you know, a very physical camp with Zimmer, a physical mini camp with Zimmer. It was just always that, that was how it was always done. And, you know, maybe Kevin O'Connell having worked for the Rams saw it much more this way

and saw it have success this way. I haven't had complaints about it. I think, you know, when they did it 2022, it was pretty surprising to see a less physical approach to camp. But they do have a handful of practices throughout the summer where they really go hard and they view those joint practices as mini games. That's where the physical nature really is on display.

And last year, it was very physical with the Tennessee Titans. A little too much. So for everybody and one guy got kicked out of practice, but Tennessee was battling hard against the Vikings in those practices. That's what they're going to see the most as far as physical play goes, but the ramp up, uh, I don't think it'll be much different. Uh, wildfires podcast says we will be okay. Corner is a hard position for every team. Yeah. I mean, it's, I don't think anybody has four Darrell Revis is, but

you're down to now a player that got cut mid season last year, a solid veteran player, but not great in Byron Murphy jr. And then just question marks. Caleb Evans can kind of play, but then also had his troubles at the end of last year. Andrew Booth Jr. has barely ever played in the NFL. I mean, we're talking about not just a situation where, well, you know, it's kind of tough out there for all corners in this league. Well, this is, you barely have anyone who can even say they've been a quality starter recently. That's much, much trickier. Scott says, how does a bad D line make bad corners look? Well, it's a bad interior defensive line when it comes to creating pressure, but they should be able to create pressure from different areas this year rather

than just relying entirely on Daniil Hunter to do it and then just blitzing and blitzing and blitzing and blitzing because they have edge rushers who can win right off the snap it's still blitzing and blitzing and blitzing might end up being the answer uh Craig says Booth is undersized we need DBs on the outside well I don't really think he's that much undersized. The issue with Andrew Booth jr. Has been, uh, well, one was the injuries in his first year yet last year he was healthy, but he was not as physical of a corner as Brian Flores wanted. He was more of an off corner that mirrors wide receivers. He has

extremely good footwork. He's very dexterous. Is that a word? And he is good at tracking the football and good at tracking wide receivers, but he's not a guy who is known for getting in a receiver's face for press coverage and not a guy who's known for blitzing or known for getting up to the line of scrimmage to make a big tackle those aren't things that he came out with as big you know pluses to his game they might end up needing him though they might end up needing him to be a different player than he was last year man just blackman was a swing guy to this defense and to have him out almost immediately is, is pretty tough. Cameron says tight end is one of the most interesting positions on the team. If Nikhil Harry is serviceable as a tight end,

does his position flexibility between receiver and tight end make him worth keeping? I'm not sure there is much flexibility there because he was not at all good at the wide receiver position. They're giving him a kind of a last shot here at tight end to have any type of chance to play, but I don't have any expectations for Nikhil Harry. He's a guy that was pretty much given up on by most people in the league. They gave him a shot after some injuries

last year, brought him in and decided to move him over to a different position. That's usually not a very promising sign for someone's career. And today he looked okay to me. I think he may have had one ball he should have caught or something, but it's a hard transition from receiver to tight end. Even if you are a good blocker, I just look at him as maybe they'll put him on the practice squad at the end of the day, and if they have some injuries, they'll bump him up. But as far as being valuable to the team and flexibility for his position, he's just trying to find any position he can play at this level. So I'm not really looking at it exactly that way.

Evan says maybe dropping Van Ginkle or Turner into coverage will help, but damn, we can't catch a break. Well, there's always going to be the confusion element that Brian Flores thrives on. And that's like you said, Van Ginkle, Turner dropping into coverage, blitzing. Sometimes Van Ginkle is much more experienced as a cover player than Turner is. He can drop back. He's done it a lot during his career. Turner did it a bit in college, but he's a pure edge rusher. He's going to go chase the passer most of the time.

It can make it easier if you're not sure who's coming after the quarterback and who's dropping back. It can make it a lot easier on the corners, but you can't fool them all the time. Right. And we saw that when Herbert or Jared Goff played against the Vikings, those guys just weren't shocked by any of it. They knew how to deal with it. They had weapons. They remain patient. It's you got to get after them with four, a lot of times, and you have to cover. There's just no way to paint over not being able to cover. So this puts a lot of times and you have to cover. There's just no way to paint over not being able to cover. So this puts a lot of pressure and this actually adds more pressure

to Josh Metellus to continue to play that slot role where I thought that was out of desperation that he was playing nickel corner a lot last year. He can do it, but you usually don't want Josh Metellus as a nickel corner on third and 12. You want another cornerback in there to be able to do that. They're a little short on those corners at the moment. Although maybe you didn't have to do that as often, but just, you know, cause they would put a lot more corners on the field, but they just didn't have a lot of good ones. And you would have preferred Blackman on the outside along with griffin and allow in certain passing situations them to take metellus off the field and play more of a pure nickel

situation maybe more like a a second and 12 or something like that that they could run but they're more likely to pass uh west says you'll find our pass rush and d will be better you'll see that our running game with Jones is better and we will move the ball well enough to win eight games. That's saying a lot. Yeah, they should run the ball better with Aaron Jones if he remains healthy and they were mixing up the reps quite a bit today. But as far as the pass rush, uh, that is a little more complete than it was last year. I don't know that the overall defense is going to be better. When you look at the quarterbacks that they are set to face,

especially at the beginning of the year, outside of Daniel Jones, there's a lot of good quarterbacks early in the season that they are going to go up against. Brock Purdy, Jordan Love, CJ Stroud, Jared Goff. We'll see what Aaron Rodgers has. That's a lot of talent to go up against if they're facing healthy quarterbacks that they're going to have to find a way to stop. It's going to be a lot on Flores, but there's only so much you can do. There's some good wide receivers mixed in there too, especially for the 49ers and the Texans.

275 Ranger, who appears to be more physically gifted between Sam Darnold and JJ McCarthy? A similar question about the arm talent. Same deal where I would say Sam Darnold is the more physically gifted player than JJ McCarthy, but that's not what determines who's going to be the best quarterback. That's a lot of other things. Just ask Tom Brady, who is not the most physically gifted. Peyton Manning was pretty darn gifted at six foot five and with a golden arm, but not exactly the most mobile type of player. A lot of it is between the ears. A lot of it is throwing to the right place at the right time. And if JJ McCarthy does that, he could be a little less accurate or a little less physically gifted. And Darnold overall through his career has not been a very accurate quarterback consistently. One week, he's great.

And even if you look at the end of his 2022 tape with Carolina, I did an article on that earlier this year. Some games, he's just downright phenomenal. And then other games, even during a good stretch for him, you go, what, what, what, what was that? And if JJ McCarthy has a lot fewer of the, what was that type of throws and games, then he could be the better quarterback. But as far as pure physical gifts, I mean, if we were doing an entire list of the most physically gifted quarterbacks to come out in the last 10 years, Josh Allen is number one. Lamar Jackson's right there. Patrick Mahomes is fairly close. And Sam Darnold is right there with him, which is why Sam Darnold was drafted so high. Uh, let's see. Uh, Evan says, does losing Blackman change your season

record prediction? I think you said eight to nine wins. No, I mean, losing one guy doesn't, unless that guy was Justin Jefferson, uh, then that would change my prediction. But if that guy is a corner who I thought could be pretty good, no, it's not going to shift my entire viewpoint on this season and the expectations for the Vikings. It's just something that immediately they have to overcome instantly. We just started and now you've already got to overcome a significant injury. They still won seven games last year with half a season of Kirk and then Dobbs Mullins hall and a lot of corners who came and went. It's a long season. That's where I would still put it. But if you're talking about other significant injuries that come, I mean, this is one, yes, you can overcome, but if there's more of those, then it's going to be a real struggle

to get to nine wins. MKF says, who do you think will struggle more when the pads come on McCarthy or Darnold? Well, easily McCarthy. He's never done this before. He's going to struggle with everything more than Sam Darnold will. Sam Darnold is a very, very talented veteran player who has been through a lot of training camps, has had pressure on him in camp before, has learned a lot of offenses, who knows how to go through the learning process, the taking stuff from the meeting room out to the field. And Sam Darnold doesn't have to learn fundamental things. Hey, the footwork on this concept is X, Y, Z. Well, Sam Darnold's probably done that 500 times. Whereas JJ McCarthy is saying, oh, okay, how does this work? It's just a, just an enormous

difference between the two in their experience. And this is why you can go back. A lot of veteran quarterbacks do win the job out of training camp. Andy Dalton over Justin Fields, Mike Glennon over Mitch Trubisky. Those aren't maybe the best examples because those quarterbacks weren't good. How about Nathan Peterman over Josh Allen? That happened. Matt Castle over Teddy Bridgewater to start the season. Because this is why that the veteran is going to know a lot more and is going

to be way more comfortable. Not that I think that Darnold's going to struggle to put together good practices. He will put together good practices. I mean, heck, he won the job over Trey Lance last year in San Francisco and outplayed him in the off season. It really comes down to with Darnold, how good does McCarthy look as we go on? Does he actually press Darnold for that job at any point during training camp? And then when the games start happening, does this carry over? Which was Justin Jefferson's point to me today when I asked him about Darnold's arm talent and the deep balls.

And he said, we've shown even today that we can do it. So now we got to go do this when we actually get to game time. That's Justin Jefferson's mentality. And he's right that, uh, Sam Darnold having good practices is certainly notable, but it, when we've got a sample size on the guy, that's this big of him playing in the real games, uh, we know that maybe a little more skepticism is required than just, hey, one great practice, but he's going to do better than J.J. McCarthy when the pads come on initially. It's really, for me, about the middle of training camp, the preseason games, where we stand at the end of those joint practices. Does he get first team reps in the joint practices? If he gets first team reps in the joint practices, then we can call it a battle.

Until then, probably not. Maybe he'll mix in with some first teamers unless he does it before then. But that's where Kevin O'Connell is going to treat that like the dress rehearsal. They used to say the third preseason game was the dress rehearsal. The third preseason game was the dress rehearsal. The third preseason game is, Hey, guy, who's going to be selling insurance in six weeks. You get to put a Jersey on and your family could come to the game. It's a very nice moment for you. Happy trails. That's what the third preseason game is largely now for these days. The joint practices is where

it's really at for O'Connell. If McCarthy is caught Darnold by then, and, and, you know, we've talked about this a little bit in the off season, but you really saw it on display today where Sam Darnold sets a high bar with his talent and the way he can practice on a daily basis that if McCarthy's going to win the job, it's not like beating out Case Cookus or something. It's like beating out a real NFL starting high draft pick quarterback. So he's not going to be able to do that easily. Anthony says, Blake Brandel looks like a huge dude. He is.

Well, he was a left tackle in college. Between him and that talented monster Derrissaw on the left side of that o-line aaron jones should be happy running that way we'll see if size matters in this case uh as blake brandel goes forward he did run block okay when he was in the game last year he's playing right guard that's an awkward position for someone who's always been on the left side he is a road grader type. He is an enormous human being. And if he can get, let me get super football, a pad level, and if they can put together a good running scheme, we haven't really heard a whole heck of a lot about that. And O'Connell kind of said when it came to the running game and why it didn't succeed last year that part of it was the

mixing and matching on the offensive line I don't know if I fully buy that considering that every team has a lot of mixing and matching they change left guards but it wasn't like guys were hurt all the time early in the season yeah Derisaw I think I hurt early in one of the games and Questenberry had to show up, but it wasn't like there. So I had a long-term injury. They should have been better. Reisner played game after game. They just should have been better as a running attack. Is that the scheme? Is it the offensive line? Could we just blame it entirely on Dalton Reisner? That seems unfair too. He could be an upgrade. It's hard not to be an upgrade from Dalton Reisner in the running game.

And I think that they are counting on that of him being that upgrade and that left side plowing people. So you're right. That, that is a part of the equation. I believe a tie D skull says this season is probably going to be a transition phase season. As far as I'm concerned, there is not a bad outcome. Bad season is better pick. Good season is playing with house money. Allow me to offer a counterpoint to that argument. Now, all of you know that I have appreciation for tanking because it works a lot for teams to get really good players. But when you aim to be pretty good and you end up bad, that's the worst thing in sports. The Vikings are not aiming to be bad.

If you're aiming to be bad, it's already hard enough to be bad. We've seen all the strife with the Wolves for all those years where they were bad and maybe tanking, but not on purpose, just losing year after year after year. But sometimes they were aiming to completely rebuild. And even when you had one of those rebuild tank seasons,

they still had a lot of drama. And there was a lot of things that went really wrong and ugliness and people get fired and stuff. If you win four games for the Vikings, that means your coach was bad. It means that your quarterbacks were bad. Your star players didn't perform to their level. Your darn kicker probably missed two or three game winners. I mean, nobody wants that. That's yeah. Okay.

You get a better pick. If you win five games, you pick eighth. If you win seven games, you pick 12th or 13th. I would rather take a couple of slots down where you still have a chance to get a really good player at a key position and have the things that you wanted to go right. Actually go right. That's what we're looking for. Mike says, I reviewed the schedule and think we can win 11 or 12 games the defense is way better than last year I think it slides into the top 10 Darnold will do great division contenders well it is the first day of training camp Mike and I'm not going to tell you you're wrong because

anything can happen the doors are wide open of course the tone of the podcast, unfortunately, had to change with Makai Blackman's injury and tearing his ACL. But it is altogether possible that everything clicks. It's a tall task when you are short at the cornerback position pretty bad now with Makai Blackman out. And when you're saying, you know, Darnold will do great. He's looked really good from what we've seen thus far. There is no point in his career where he did really great. And that is what makes it more difficult to say that there'll be a top 10 defense and that they will be division contenders.

But go nuts. We've got a long time before we're going to find out. What, six six seven weeks uh northern pride says do you have do we have another undrafted player that will blow our socks off like Ivan Pace Jr. that takes a couple weeks to find out normally even Ivan Pace it was the night practice which is what a week and a half two weeks into practice where he took over as the starting linebacker. That'll be a little bit of a line in the sand of this is the depth chart for now. There's always these moments throughout camp. All right. It's the first day, then pads come on the first few

padded practices. Then we got some night practice and we got some dog days and then you got joint, you know, there's, it kind of has all these phases. So phase one with no pads on, you are not going to figure out which undrafted free agent could be the guy. Phase two is where someone can catch your eye. And that is when the pads come on in the night practice. That's when Ivan Pace started to stand out. Um, I would say the cornerback, uh, McLaughlin has a chance to white McLaughlin. I want to be, I want, I keep wanting to say Chester McLaughlin has a chance to white McLaughlin. I want to be,

I want, I keep wanting to say Chester McLaughlin, who was a defensive tackle in the nineties, really good player for the Raiders, but this is Dwight McLaughlin, a cornerback. Who's good at playing the ball. He's really big six foot two. Gabriel Murphy is another guy that stands out. I've mentioned Bo Richter is a really good physical player, but I think probably needs a lot of development. Usually there isn't an Ivan Pace Jr. That's why he's so unique is that normally that just doesn't happen. That somebody is a UDFA that shines to the point where they win a job. We'll be looking for ones that even get to the second team and that might have a shot at making the team as a special teamer or even beyond making the team could potentially carve out a role. And then we'll look at guys that might have some potential down the road as practice squatters who are going to get cut, but then you keep around.

And they have a number of those type of guys. Dallas Gant is another one to keep track of. They spent a lot in the UDFA market. So they're really hoping that one of them becomes call it Ivan Pace Jr. Ish, call it Mr. Mankato. They're hoping one of them becomes Mr. Mankato. Sloth says, if one of the depth receivers builds great chemistry with McCarthy, do you think he could win the wide receiver six spot, even if he isn't the sixth best receiver, if he builds it with McCarthy and McCarthy is the backup quarterback, this is like a, like some sort of mind twister or whatever.

Uh, if two trains are traveling and one of them is named McCarthy and Darnold, and they pass each other who gets to Chicago first? That's what this question made me think. If you're playing with McCarthy and you're a depth player, because McCarthy is the backup quarterback and you're standing out, they're going to assume that you could play with McCarthy in the future or with Darnold. And that would be good for you. So anybody who's builds that chemistry and stands out, it's also hard to build chemistry with a quarterback unless you're good. Normally you have to be pretty good. Uh, so if Malik Knowles or lucky Jackson or someone actually lucky Jackson kind of has this a little bit stands out with JJ McCarthy, that might mean that he's

just a pretty decent player and they would keep him around in the back end of the wide receiver group for that. And McCarthy is going to be responsible for helping them figure out who the depth wide receivers are because there's not a ton of first team reps that you can throw random guys into with Sam Darnold. It's going to have to be JJ McCarthy that figures it out with these players. And maybe you do find somebody who works well with him that they go forward with that we didn't necessarily expect. Intrepid Fool says, it is unfortunate that Darnold's mental game doesn't match his physical traits. Seeing ghosts and can't handle pressure is why he's a journeyman backup.

I wouldn't get too excited. The thing about that is when you start to dive a little bit deeper, and I'm not trying to sell you on this, only saying that what makes it plausible is he was put into a position so early on with such bad coaching that was the mental game really developed in the way that it needed to be developed. And I did a look at this on how Darnold performed when it was third and long. And my idea was, I thought, I have a feeling that Darnold tried to make more happen than he needed to make happen. And he threw interceptions at a ridiculous rate when it was second or third and long.

But when it was normal situations that could be run or pass, he was a little above average, but not crazy. And he did cut down significantly on the turnover worthy plays in Carolina in 2022. And also not very many of them when he started in that one game for San Francisco. Now that is not a tremendous sales pitch. It's only to say that a young quarterback with bad coaching and bad circumstances trying to do too much sounds like someone who's going to

throw a lot of interceptions and make a lot of mistakes that maybe you can work your way through. I don't think it's ever going to disappear when it comes to the decision-making. But also, he's not a journeyman backup yet because he is starting. And that tells you something right there. At least he's starting right now. That tells you something right there that he has given numerous teams reason to start him, that Carolina did, and San Francisco, he wins the job against their backup.

There is reasons why Sam Darnold still keeps getting these opportunities, is because he does have enough capacity to be a starting quarterback it's but it's hard it's not an easy job especially when you haven't had great circumstances so far again not trying to sell some magic land that i think is super possible of him leading them to 12 wins it's just that the mental game develops over the years. At 20 years old, he saw ghosts or 21 years old, he saw ghosts. And I'm sure he loves that they put that on

television so it could be thrown in his face all the time. Did he see the same amount of ghosts when he was 25 or 26 last year or now? That might change a bit, but we can't really tell until he actually gets into the game. Uh, intrepid fool says McCarthy has more velocity, arm velocity. Darnold throws a nice deep ball. I don't know that he has more velocity than, uh, Sam Darnold. It's it's up there. The ball moves. I mean, I don't know what that, uh, combine thing where they throw it into a pillow and they put a radar gun on it is supposed to mean necessarily, but when Sam Darnold puts everything behind the ball, it's moving just as fast, but both of them are in the, when they put everything behind it are in the 90, whatever

fifth 98th percentile of how hard you could throw a football where it really stands out though is it's not just Darnold's deep ball it's his ability to throw it in any way he wants he could be standing there just no footwork whatsoever and just flip his arm and get full velocity on the ball or a very high percentage of velocity where McCarthy when he did go to the combine and threw it really hard. And when you saw him whip it in college, a lot of it is when he puts everything behind it. So those are two different things. Kirk cousins could throw the ball pretty darn hard when he put everything behind it, but didn't have those, those adjustments. Uh, when McCarthy is on the move, he's very good at

generating that velocity naturally, but they're both really good arms. I mean, we're kind of nitpicking between this one's a little better than that one and so forth. They both could throw the ball very fast. What Darnold has is anticipation and touch more than McCarthy naturally. I think he's more naturally gifted at putting the ball out in front of a wide receiver or guiding it over a linebacker. That's a little more natural to him. But he also, when it comes to the games, he definitely hits some drives in the woods. He definitely has those throws that kind of go crazy on him. But as far as watching him practice and just judging off of what does this guy's arm really look like in this kind of go crazy on him. But as far as watching and practice and just judging off

of what is this guy's arm really look like in this kind of stripped down form, that isn't a real football game. You could tell both of them very talented, but Darnold has a little more of the touch. Cam Dantzler. I'm just, I don't think so. That's a name you guys are throwing out there. Can Seen play corner? corner no he cannot can't even play safety so far i wouldn't expect him to be able to play something else um let's see wildfires says now is when we get to really see if quacey can cook i mean i i don't i mean yeah after that like everything is set up for this team to go into the future with Derrissaw extended and all those things to be able to cook, if you will, if you're Kweisi Dafflomensa. If you mean to find a corner in free agency, I wouldn't judge it that way because there's not much left on the free agent market.

Huge Boy says we should trade Booth for Kair Elamam picked in the same draft by the bills fits our scheme. It's fine. If you want to do that, I will tell you a quick story, just real quick story in relation to that. When I first started covering pro sports, it was doing hockey and the Buffalo Sabres, the team I was covering traded their first round pick from only a few years ago for another team and their first round pick from a couple of years ago. And both guys were bad.

If you're trading your bad player for their bad player, hard to get ahead. It's just not a situation that's very easy when it comes to trying to replace somebody like Blackman, who they were really counting on. Trading someone who hasn't worked out for you versus for somebody who hasn't worked out for somebody else. If somebody's good, then the teams are going to keep them. If they're offering them to you in a trade, there's probably a reason. There's very few steals that are happening in a trade

at this kind of time. Not that I wouldn't do it. It's just, what are our expectations here for this position? When you lose someone like Blackman, he was a third round pick who played very well last year. It's not like there's something there on the table to be able to fix that. Wes says, am I wrong, but isn't Jones a 5.0 yards per carry that puts him at the top of the league for active running backs. Oh, it does. Yeah. For, for his career. Of course that career started when he was 22 and not when he is, what is he? 29, 28, 29. Uh, at this point, a little bit different. Uh, I have high expectations for

Aaron Jones, but it's not five yards per carry 320 times. It's five yards per carry 170 times. If it's even five yards per carry, I don't know that you're also talking about coming from a LaFleur offense where running is a major part of what the Green Bay Packers do. And Matt LaFleur is someone who's known for that and was known for that when he was in Tennessee before he got the job. That isn't something Kevin O'Connell has really thrived with so far. I don't have him expected to be five yards a carry and leading the league. He could be a big upgrade though. Definitely a big upgrade at the running back position.

I don't want to downplay that at all. I definitely think that he can be a major upgrade, but you can only play so much if you're Aaron Jones at his age. I think maybe 175 carries is a pretty decent place to put his number. And then you have to have Ty Chandler step up and maybe someone else. They had a running back in for a workout today. They didn't sign Cam Akers. We had a whole thing about Cam Akers and then he signed with the Texans. So they are still rolling out. Dwayne McBride was back. That was in my notes. Dwayne McBride was back off the NFI list, non-football injuries. It wasn't very serious, obviously, and he was playing.

Kanae Wongwu got some reps today. Maybe there's something there, but they have to rely really on those top two running backs to improve, and then the offensive line and the overall scheme. Let's see. Is it confirmed about Blackman's knee? As far as I know, yeah, everyone has tweeted it. Ian Rappaport, uh, Alec

Lewis, uh, Dane Mizutani said that he confirmed it. So, uh, it looks like, yeah, that it is confirmed at least as far as every reporter has heard the exact same thing, which I imagine is coming from his agent and the team are telling reporters Tom Pellicero I think had it as well so that is a very very very tough break for the Vikings on day one well day two is tomorrow and we'll see if it goes a little better than that I think as far as if we were talking about things that are promising versus not the promising part would be Justin Jefferson and Sam Darnold looking like they're getting their chemistry together pretty quickly here. J.J. McCarthy not taking a lot of reps or if any with the first team. We'll see how that develops over the training camp. I'm not concerned about that. And then the Blackman

injury is a huge, huge gut punch to a team that was otherwise coming in pretty healthy, getting Van Ginkle healthy. And there weren't a lot of lingering injuries or anything that we were talking about. Now we will be looking for what's next at that cornerback position, because there is now a spot to be filled there with Makai Blackman going down. Really, really feel bad about that for him as someone who I thought could take a step to being a key player in the future. Now we'll talk about that next year. I just had him on my list today. I did a whole list of players that have the most to gain in training camp, and he was on my list that he could gain a lot of ground and even be a starting corner on this team. If he had a very

good training camp and beat out Shaq Griffin, now they have to hope that there's a lot there with Shaq Griffin and Byron Murphy stays healthy and somebody between a Caleb Evans and Andrew Booth steps up and proves themselves that's where we're at after one day and guess what we'll be doing this all the time so if you're joining for the first time welcome welcome I am going out to practice every day, coming back, talking to you. Uh, we'll also be doing some podcasting out at TCO performance center, as I have done with Dane Mizutani, Will Raggetts, Alec Lewis, uh, from the athletic scheduled to be on the show very, very soon. And, uh, we will have all sorts of daily coverage here on the show. So thanks so much everybody for joining for day one. Football is back. Training camp is on. And, uh, I am excited

to talk to you guys every night that there is a practice. I will be live on YouTube. So thanks so much to all of you. And we'll talk again soon. Football.