Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Sam Darnold starts, JJ McCarthy to get 'significant' preseason playing time

Episode Date: August 10, 2024

Matthew Coller talks about Kevin O'Connell laying out his plan for the preseason opener Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of Purple Insider, Matthew Collar here and guess what? Free season action is upon us. Saturday afternoon, U.S. Bank Stadium, Minnesota Vikings, Las Vegas Raiders. And here's what we know. We are going to see J.J. McCarthy. In fact, why listen to me tell you what Kevinvin o'connell had to say about playing time when i can tell you or i can show you what kevin o'connell had to say about playing time so here he is to start the show

we are planning on playing the majority of our guys uh there's still some guys either dealing with uh you know a day-to-day thing here or there that we'll evaluate as we go into it and there may be a couple guys we hold out, but for the most part, we will play the majority of our guys. Sam Darnold will start the game, and then we will transition to J.J. McCarthy for what I'm very, very excited to see, a significant amount of work, and really see him hopefully apply a lot of the things that he's been doing really well, just as Sam has every day in practice. And it's been a really good start to the process for all those guys. And now we get the opportunity to play against somebody else in a game setting

before our joint practices next week. So now we're reaching the point where we get to see a lot of good barometer on where we're at, not only at that position, but a lot of good barometer on where we're at, not only at that position, but a lot of competitive positions right now on our team. More than likely, J.J. will turn it over to Jaron Hall to finish. Talking to Nick Mullins, he's had just an unbelievable way about him in that room with those guys, stepping in really at any moment and going in and just executing our system he's already proven that he knows our system nick will get plenty of work as we move forward through the

rest of the training camp but you know he will be available but might not might not play in this one in an attempt to really maximize the ops for some guys that are either new or even in jaren's case in year two in the system so let's maximize our ops folks with this live stream and talk about what we expect from the minnesota vikings and jj mccarthy sam darnold who's gonna play how much who do you want to see fired up in the comment section so we could talk about it i'll begin with just my thoughts on kevin o'connell playing sam darnold and talking about significant time for jj mccarthy and then it's all you guys what do you want to see what's on the table we'll talk about who it means the most to it for this uh pre-season game as we go forward but i want to know everything uh that is

on your minds going into this pre-season game with the vikings it's it's time you know what when was the last time that we had a pre-season game that uh mattered that meant something was it actually 2018 because zimmer would play the starters and we got our first look at Kirk Cousins and I want to say in the 2018 preseason he drove down the field and threw a touchdown to Diggs or something like that and that was the end he played you know one series or something it has been a long time since it meant anything to the Vikings, to Vikings fans. And now you get your first look at JJ McCarthy for most of you that haven't made it out to practice. This is truly the first time you're going to see him in purple. You're going to see him throw the football.

You're going to see him move around and what he looks like as an NFL quarterback. And that will be just really cool for the state of Minnesota. It's kind of funny and it's not political at all, but Governor Walz was out at practice the other day and he's talking about the Vikings team and what they're going to do this year and so forth. Then he gets selected to be a VP candidate here and potentially be in the White House. here that that guy with his position minnesotan is talking about jj mccarthy and the exciting future of the vikings i mean everybody in this state wants to see what jj mccarthy looks like and that is a type of energy that has not existed in any

way since i arrived here in the pre-season for this type of entertainment value for an afternoon preseason game. And that turns up the excitement by a thousand to see JJ McCarthy. The fact that Sam Darnold is going to play, I would expect that he might play, I don't know, maybe three series to get out there and start some work with some of the other receivers. Justin Jefferson not going to play. We confirm that right after he gave that, uh, uh, that introduction where he laid out the quarterback plan.

He said, no, Justin Jefferson is not going to play. Of course he shouldn't. He doesn't need any extra work. He's all set. He's good. Wouldn't expect to see Harrison Smith. Uh, Jonathan Grenard has been a little banged up the last couple of days. So I don't think that he's going to play either Gabriel Murphy. I didn't see out there. And I think that we might miss him

as well. And that's disappointing because he's had a really good start to the summer, but there wasn't any update on him when O'Connell asked, was asked about how he's played. He didn't mention like why he had been out of practice. So you know, I'm not sure, but he was one that would have been on my list of guys that could really help themselves. But going back to McCarthy and Darnold, it makes sense to play Sam Darnold. He's new in this system. It is not like it's Kirk Cousins last year where he knew the system inside and out. And he has been in the league as a quality top 10 to 15 starter for many years and he just didn't need to learn anything about Kirk Cousins and it would have been silly to risk any injury by putting him out there well I feel differently

about Sam Darnold and well on a daily basis he has done really well and there hasn't been a quarterback competition I think in part because Sam Darnold has looked so well and there hasn't been a quarterback competition i think in part because sam darnold has looked so good that there's been no reason to take first team reps away from him and they've been able to follow the plan if sam darnold had struggled at any point during this camp outside of one or two practices then we would have been saying yes might make a difference this might be a push for jj for JJ McCarthy if he plays really well. But the fact that Darnold has had such a good summer so far means that they can go into this saying,

get him some reps, get him a little familiar with us bank stadium. Maybe throws to Jalen Naylor a little bit. I don't know if Brandon Powell will play. I would assume that he would get the ball to some guys that he hasn't thrown to as much because he's been throwing to Jefferson Addison. Johnny month has had a really good training camp so far. Maybe it's two series. Maybe it's three series. Get with the offensive line, make a couple of checks and changes. Aaron Jones, I guess I would expect that he wouldn't play. Aaron Jones has not been practicing a ton,

not a guy that I want to see practice a ton and not a guy that I want to see at all in preseason action. I don't think they need to play Ty Chandler either, but maybe they just want to get a few reps from him pass blocking to get him a little more familiar with Sam Darnold, the cadence, how things are being called out at the line of scrimmage. Maybe we will see Ty Chandler get a decent amount of work, but even if it was just Kenny

Wong Wu back there, he's been taking a lot of reps and they want to see if he can be RB three. So yeah, I think it's probably better that Aaron Jones doesn't play, but with Darnold getting him a few snaps under Garrett Bradbury getting the cadence down having the offensive line hear him in a real game type of environment could be helpful for him I don't need him to do anything after this but just get him a little familiar with the surroundings and what it's like to hear Kevin O'Connell in the headset at US Bank Stadium and then if Sam Darnold is the starter he's going to be going to joint practices next week and he's going to get a ton of work there, which means very unlikely to play in the preseason game against the Cleveland Browns.

And then after that, it's the last preseason game. Of course, he wouldn't want to play him there, assuming that he still remains as QB one. So this is his opportunity to just get a couple of reps, know that he's done it before. And when he steps on the field, the U S bank stadium in week two, then he won't be surprised by any of the operation from going through that. And with JJ McCarthy, I noticed that Drake may didn't play a lot tonight. And I don't know what the Patriots thinking is with Drake may. I haven't been reading up closely on where they stand with him his development his chances to play but as far as um uh you know as as far as it goes with a let's uh

let's avoid the political stuff i just mentioned how big it was how important it was okay let's not if you start arguing with that stuff in the comments it's gonna that's gonna be the end of that um anyway uh back to sam darnold and jj mccarthy i think with jj mccarthy when you're taking a development track with someone as they have have him take the second team reps and he is progressing with ups and downs, but I think overall just getting better and better and all that, that it's great experience to play in the preseason. And I have agreed with Kevin O'Connell not playing anyone in these games in previous years that was a player who was locked in as a starter or somebody that was even going to have a bigger role as a rotational player like

don't get anybody hurt like mike zimmer did with irv smith a couple of years ago but with jj mccarthy the risk is worth the reward to put him out there uh against the raiders defense because the reward is that every single snap for someone of his age and his experience and his development track means a lot to get under center and to see what it really looks like to have NFL players coming at you. And I know that McCarthy said he was going to see vanilla defenses, but, you know, when it comes to Antonio Pierce, I don't know that there's any guarantee that it's going to be just vanilla defenses. Antonio Pierce might be the type to start sending some blitzes and, uh, you know, throwing some stuff at JJ McCarthy that he hasn't seen from Brian Flores because it's a different defensive scheme, but seeing how that actually looks out there on a real field, as opposed to practicing over and over again, there's nothing that can replace that.

And it's a little bit of a throwback because when I was growing up, they would do this all the time with young quarterbacks. It was four preseason games. And if you were a young quarterback developing, you got a ton of work. I don't know how much Peyton Manning played in the preseason back in the day, but I remember like looking forward to, Oh, there's a Colts preseason game. That's going to be on TV. We got to make sure we watch this. It's a great development tool to have people get these real reps. Uh, I would caution against over analyzing a preseason game and how someone performs. Uh, there have been plenty of players, including Peyton Manning to not have the perfect preseason game and how someone performs. There have been plenty of players, including Peyton Manning, to not have the perfect preseason

game and turn out to have a good career. So if it doesn't go perfectly for JJ McCarthy, it's just another step in the process toward him eventually becoming a starting quarterback. But I also think that this is the best strategy is to have him go out there with a lot of the same teammates that he's been working with all throughout the summer with the the offensive line of the second team a lot of the receivers that i'm very interested in seeing lucky jackson jashawn jones guys who have made catches throughout this camp so far nick muse has had a very good training camp. Those guys, to see him play with them out there in a real field with a defense that he is not familiar with practicing against

since minicamp, players that he's not familiar with, real pressure, real scrambles, real runs, real throws into traffic. And I think Kevin O'Connell mentioned real repercussions is what he said. And I like the way that he phrased that real repercussions. So there will be, if you throw an interception, you don't just walk over to Josh McCown and he says, ah, you know, okay, next time, why don't you just do this? It's like, that's an interception. You threw the ball away to the other team. And so you can't do that, you know, and that kind of thing. I just feel like the intensity is less than a regular season game, but it's a lot more as far as the pressure goes, the environment, then it would be out at training camp where you can throw an interception.

You can hold onto the ball too long. It's kind of like bowling with bumpers on the gutters at practice because you can never really have anything truly go too wrong you throw an interception all right offense back there run the play again as opposed to you can throw a gutter ball uh in the nfl when you're actually playing against the las vegas raiders and it is a physical team with good players on defense and a coach that is defensive minded. And I don't think that it's just going to be, Hey, I just go out there and it'll be easy and they'll play completely vanilla defenses and everybody will be wide open. Uh, there will be, uh, sometimes where he gets pressure. There will be times where he has to scramble and make a play. And I think you'll see

flashes of that, but, uh, it's another big step for the first round quarterback. I think to show up what he could do a little bit, but also just to gain a lot of experience and take further steps. And the fact that he's playing significant time would also suggest to you that it's not really a quarterback battle. If one guy, the starter is going to take one or two series and the other guy, the rookie is going to play a lot. Normally that would be an indicator that one guy is pretty clearly the starter right now. And the other guy is the backup. So I don't think that the repercussions or implications are if JJ McCarthy plays well, then he's got a chance to start. I think it would just mean that's great. We just showed the fan base. This is why we drafted him. And I think you'll see it.

I don't doubt that you'll see the arm strength. I don't doubt that you'll see the mobility. I'm sure some of you will have the same observation that he looks pretty big out there in the uniform once he's out there playing. But there is a long way to go until they're completely ready to start him. So we should keep that in mind as well. And after the game from U.S. Bank Stadium, Dane Mizzutani and I will be breaking that down. So I want to know what you guys think you want to see from J.J. McCarthy. Like, give me one thing that you want to see

from JJ McCarthy. And I can go through real quick, just some other players that are going to be on my mind. And there's no guarantee of every person that's going to play, but just players that are going to be interesting to me in this, I'll give you a kind of a quick rundown, just going through the positions. I'll give you one from every position and then we can talk questions. Kenny Wong Wu is the most interesting to me. Kick returning and getting running back reps because last year they wanted to give him running back reps in training camp, but he didn't get them because he was hurt. And then by the time he came back, he was just a non-factor, but he is one of the fastest

players in the NFL. And I think they would like if he was a competent running back three, a wide receiver. I've mentioned him a bunch of times to Sean Jones is going to be the one that I'm watching the most, but also Trent Shurfield is the veteran signing has made a handful of plays out there in training camp, but this is big for him. Is he going to be the veteran signing who doesn't make the team or the veteran signing who turns out to be a savvy move, finding a guy deep in free agency.

We don't really know that yet. I think Jones has been better than him in camp or has made more plays in camp so far, but a sure field is an interesting signing. Who's been around a little bit at the tight end position. Nick Muse, Trey Knox, another guy who's made some catches recently with some players banged up. Trey Knox strikes me as a practice squad type of player that they could develop over a few years,

but Nick Muse is going to get, I would guess quite a few opportunities in this game. And if he continues to shine, then Robert tunyon and that signing we talked about so much and it's not robert tunyon's fault because he got banged up but sometimes you get wally pips you know you get injured and then somebody else comes in and that might be nick muse who they've developed over a few years uh walter rouse has had a really good camp want to see a lot of him from the guard position blake brand, even if it's only two series. Blake Brandel, left guard. I feel like it's gone pretty well in camp.

We get a much better look in the preseason games of how it really looks out there. On the defensive side from the edge rusher, it would have been Gabriel Murphy. I don't know what his status is. So if not him, Andre Carter, Andre Carter needs a big preseason in order to feel like there's something there. There have been at times some pressures that he's created, but you'd like to see him make an impact in a game like this on the defensive line. No doubt about it. Levi Drake Rodriguez taking first team reps. He's the guy that's

going to be high on all of your lists. I'm sure linebacker position, probably Brian Asamoah, less, less exciting spot there. Uh, Dallas Gant might be the undrafted free agent we've seen a little from, but Brian Asamoah needs to keep making an impact. He's on this team. It's just kind of a guy you'd like to see show out a little more. The cornerback position, Dwight McClother, no question about it because he's gotten a lot of reps there. Jay Ward is another one who has had some ups and downs switching over to corner, but that switch is interesting in itself. And from the safety position, I guess if I have to pick one, I would say, let's see what Louisine has got.

There hasn't been any plays at all during a training camp and he was banged up, but it's his last shot. I think it doesn't feel like it's going all that well, but maybe there's something there. And then of course, how dare I not even start with the punting competition? Ryan Wright V Seth Vernon. Every punt is like touch gloves ding ding ding here we go we're gonna be tracking each and every punt and how they look their parabola through the air the ball flight how it's falling out of the air which guy looks like he

could tackle better i think seth vernon's definitely that guy and the kicker does he get any opportunities to kick field goals for the first time in front of Vikings fans we have talked about him a lot and he's been really really good in training camp and mini camp so we're off for the preseason that's a lot there I wasn't stretching on any of those except for safety the safety group is set and it's great and there's nothing to say about it. But other than that, yeah, I mean, there's a lot of things to look at there. Jake, yeah, they did practice today, but it wasn't in pads. And so I take that mostly at a grain of salt. McCarthy did have a really nice deep ball early in the practice, but it's not in pads.

So it's more of a, what do you call it? It's like a three quarter speed if it's not in pads. So it's more of a, what do you call it? It's like a three-quarter speed if it's not in pads. If it's not in pads, your receiver should be open down the field because the corner can't do anything. But I thought McCarthy was okay today. He had one interception that was kind of rough, but again, not in pads. I just don't even judge it at this point. Okay. Back to the top. And now what i want to hear from you guys what's the top of your list what do you want to see from jj mccarthy drop it in the comments section and we will chat throughout the evening uh let's start alexander was in here in the chat half an hour before we even started that's how jacked this guy is for a training camp.

So I have to put his comments on the screen or I'm sorry for preseason. I have to, uh, Alexander says Drake may one series. Hopefully JJ plays more than that from the way that Kevin O'Connell talked. When you say significant, here's what I expect from that is that it will start with Sam Darnold and maybe it's two to three series and then it goes to McCarthy and it's the rest of the

half and then it will be Jaron Hall from there. That is my expectation. And I think they do still want to develop Jaron Hall and he doesn't get many opportunities in practice. So they're going to use the second half, but it's also possible that McCarthy even goes into the third quarter. Normally in the past, when preseason mattered a little more, we would see some of the second teamers get into the middle of the third

quarter before they came out for the fourth quarter. We could see McCarthy go into the third. When you say significant, that's kind of what I think is up until you know after the first couple series then up until the half and then maybe even into the third quarter or the entire third quarter i mean that would be great for everybody that would give a big sample for us to talk about a big sample for you guys to watch but i don't know if that's how far kevin o'connell is going to go with it uh let it. Let's get all three of these comments on the screen

that were dropped in here even before I started. Starters playing more reps this year in preseason. Camp more physical. Seems like KOC was bothered by the sloppy start in 2023. That is part of it, and he did mention that, although I just think conflating the two is not really right because in 2022, they beat the packers they beat their brains out and then won what eight of the first nine games out of the gate but you always

have to judge each roster individually where in 2022 that roster was good that roster was old it was well well curated or whatever not curated well well what's the word i'm looking for it was uh it was uh cooked in some ways but it was just it was like this roster had been around forever who who did you need out there doing pre-season stuff patrick peterson probably not right harrison smith no eric kendricks no there was so many players who had been around for a long time that there was nothing to worry about there and maybe last year he No, there was so many players who had been around for a long time that there was nothing to worry about there. And maybe last year he felt like there was some inexperience, but I don't know Justin Jefferson's fumble out of the back of the end zone against Philly. So random. Does this Josh

Oliver not fumble if he had had three preseason series? I'm not sure. I've never wanted to conflate how a team starts the season with how they handle preseason or even how they play in preseason. I remember when I was growing up, you know, the Buffalo Bills lost something like, I don't know, 10 straight or whatever preseason games every year they would lose because Marv Levy wouldn't play as starters very much. And it never mattered. Like it's never, I've never found it to be have any correlation to how a team starts their season but if you're judging by this roster i just named all those players who are interesting and could have some relevance to this team that needs some work and where the

battles could exist and you want to see a little more action. But also, when you talk about we're going to play a lot of our players, how much really are you talking about? Is that one series? Is that two series? And then they do joint practices and we don't see them again in preseason. But you could say, oh, well, we worked them a lot more in preseason this year. I don't think O'Connell enjoyed the line of questioning last year when he got repeatedly asked if they fumbled because of that. You know, I think they fumbled last year because they didn't have enough apparatuses to hit the players

with in practice to make sure they held on to the ball that was what caused it or total randomness that's actually probably it was just totally random somebody brandon powell had never fumbled before and then someone hit the ball and it's squirted out the eagles fumbled the punt themselves and it just bounced back to them i don't know no one can explain that so i don't conflate the two it might be in his mind a little i just think it's based on what the actual roster looks like and when you are in a building mode as a team then you're going to look at it more as I want a bigger sample of these guys playing to evaluate. I want to add the sample of Levi Drake Rodriguez that I've seen in

camp with what I see out there with him actually playing versus maybe a Jonah Williams or somebody like that. I want to see Blake Brandel get out there because he's a new guy, that kind of thing. The last one,lexander says with a tough schedule on paper the first six weeks before the buy maybe koc is trying to get the timing and speed up offensively i i just think it's it's probably not too deep of a decision um it's really just a couple of series for a lot of the starters that because he just wants to get them a little more work with a new quarterback with Kirk Cousins it's not like he and Garrett Bradbury hadn't worked together before they'd worked together for Bradbury's whole career so basically yeah

no his whole career and and that's the thing right I mean a lot of the players who were on the team had played with Kirk Cousins the the two wide receivers out of three. And then they did play Jordan Addison last year in the preseason a little bit just to get him out there. I don't think that it's some sort of crazy difference from what it's going to be last year. It's just, you know, a little bit more players on the roster than in previous years that they're trying to find out about. Uh, Evan says, do we win the game against the 49ers? If Iuke is traded, um, I don't know if they're going to win the game against the 49ers they did last year, but, uh, their roster is still pretty darn good. If Iuke is traded, um, last year they were able to squeak one out

because Brock Purdy threw a late interception after being concussed. Uh, but even without, I think Debo Samuel was out in that game and it was still a pretty darn good football team. Christian McCaffrey, Trent Williams, Debo Samuel, George Kittle, and not an easy football team to play. One of the best defensive lines in the NFL. Uh, I mean, to have, to be in a position where you could actually do that is amazing and really says a lot about the roster of the San Francisco 49ers.

It, of course it helps if Brandon Iuke isn't there, but I don't think that it completely changes the game and says, Oh, this will be a much easier game now that offense is still run by uh by kyle shanahan uh david says uh matt producer and recording engineer here never heard the lead guitar to the bumper music you made way cool man well thank you david i appreciate that uh yep that's uh that was uh made recorded and uh jammed out by me so i'm glad you liked it appreciate that and uh i love the way that producer Jonathan Harrison put it with the video and stuff and the Vikings highlights, cool stuff.

So thank you. That makes me very happy that an actual recording engineer liked some of my stuff. That's very cool. Alexander, more comments from you early in the show. This man is really, really into football. What's your Mullins trade meter? I don't know. from you early in the show. This man is really, really into football.

What's your Mullins trade meter? I don't know. I just don't think they're going to do that. I think that they want the veteran in the room. There's got to be somebody who would trade for Nick Mullins that is totally devoid of a backup quarterback and knows that last year he at least gave the Vikings a chance against the Detroit Lions by whipping it all over the yard. And weirdly, despite all of his interceptions, Nick Mullins has a quarterback rating. That's one of the best among backup

quarterbacks that you're going to find somehow just by throwing it toward Justin Jefferson. And other teams also know they don't have Justin Jefferson. That could be part of it. He's a really, really good veteran backup quarterback. I think that he's not, if there's a backup quarterback ranking, people probably wouldn't put him that high, but I might because of his numbers and the fact that he could give you a chance to win, but he's not going to win repeatedly. It's not like somebody as a Teddy Bridgewater who had been a

starter or Ryan Fitzpatrick or something like that. Guys who had won a lot of games in their career. It's more of this guy's maybe going to win one out of every three games that you put him out there. I'm not sure that whatever they would get back would be worth it when you have someone in the room who is willing to take on that role and to help guide with the offense. I mean, this is the Sean Mannion thing. Having another assistant coach in the quarterback room is, I think, very valuable. And also working through those reps in practice where you're being the other team's quarterback, the scout team kind of thing. I think that it's worth having a guy around for that. And just in

case, if they don't feel like JJ McCarthy is ready, totally. And Sam Darnold were to get hurt. Then if they feel like, you know what, we don't want him just going in, in the middle of a game, we would prefer prep him as QB one for an entire week and control when he actually gets the start, then you could have Nick Mullins go in there as QB two. Uh, and, and what are you getting back? I mean, is it Mullins for a conditional seventh? You might as well just keep them around. If they wanted to get rid of them, they could have cut him, uh, but they decided to keep them. So I think they'll, they'll keep doing that. Uh, Chris says Nick muse killed it last off season. Where do you think he is on the depth chart

he has done a really good job during this training camp at this moment it would be tj hockinson on pup as tight end one then it would be johnny munt josh oliver and then nick muse because robert tunyon was doing okay and then he got hurt and when muse stepped into his role he's just done really well. He's caught a lot of passes out there and done the same thing that he did last year, which was just repeatedly, you know, make plays in training camp. And that's a way you keep your job. And they kept four tight ends because Nick Muse really earned it.

And I wouldn't be shocked if he does again. I wouldn't be shocked if he led the team in receptions in this upcoming game and we all go oh yeah nick muse that's right but developing tight ends this is what the vikings have done well just like with tyler conklin where they draft him and then he develops and plays a season and does pretty well if you give these guys time it's such a difficult position if they have some talent a lot of times two three years later they start to show up and you go oh okay i guess there's something there that might be the case with nick muse and they may end up keeping four hunter says who's the naz reed of the vikings let's see so naz reed is a guy who fills a very specific role, but does it really, really well, like not a star, not a starter,

but he, I mean, this would be like a, like a Tom Johnson of the past. I've probably brought up Tom many times as that kind of player who you really like. I think that it can be Jalen Naylor. Jalen Naylor can be the guy who becomes the Nas Reed because maybe he ends up with 30 catches, but he gets 435 yards and he makes some big plays here and there. And nobody really knows about him outside of Minnesota, but here everybody likes him. That would be my comp, but feel free to give me different ones. If you got it, uh, Josh Metellus, I assume you said Josh Metellus. Oh, is that an answer to, Oh, you know what. Josh Metellus. I assume you said Josh Metellus. Oh, is that an answer to?

Oh, you know what? Josh Metellus is an answer to the Nas Reid thing. I like that. That actually might be better than Jalen Naylor. Josh Metellus. People don't know about him outside of Minnesota, but when you watch him here, you know how valuable and how good he is

and how unique he is. That's a great pick. That's a better pick than I had. I like that. Let's see. 53 strong says I'm, I'm just ready for a losing season. Curious if they draft the quarterback, if they're bad enough for the first pick. Okay. Well, that's going way too far from where I think they're going to be. I think they're going to be around 500 for the majority of the season and battling for the final wildcard spot. I do not think they're going to be at the bottom of the entire NFL because

there's just too much talent on this team. Starting with the highest paid wide receiver in NFL history, Justin Jefferson, if they can be in games with Nick Mullins, they can be in games with Nick Mullins, they can be in games with Sam Darnold. Uh, and I, I don't think that, see, you could say, and look, this is a pro tanking show and always has been, and look at Chicago, look at Detroit a couple of years ago and how bad they were. And you can go across the league. A lot of tanking teams have succeeded,

but now we've, we've gone past that opportunity or op as kevin o'connell would say the op for tanking is gone you can't do that now you spend 20 million dollars on jonathan grenard you got andrew van ginkle blake cashman there's just too much talent you signed christian derisaw uh brian o'neill still in his prime you brought in aaron jones too much talent to be saying right, let's win three games and try to draft with the number one overall pick. Also, if you draft with the number one overall pick, when you have an established coach who's been leading this team for two years, that puts that guy on the hot seat immediately or gets him fired.

If this team wins three games, it's very hard to bring your coach back with any credibility because that means it will have gone so bad. It means that everyone will have played at their absolute worst. If you end up winning three games, it's hard for a team with any talent not to get to like six or seven. The giant didn't the giants win six last year. What a horrendous awful season they had. And they had good enough coaching and a handful of good players and they won like six games. I mean, that's, that's the worst case scenario for this team. And it's still felt like a horrible season and it's still put Brian Dable

in the crosshairs, no matter how much you can say, Oh, I accept that it could be a bad season. If once you actually see it, that means a lot went wrong. A lot of players underperformed. A lot of coaching was bad. A lot of injuries would have happened. It's not something you actually want now. Now, when they first got here, if they had said, we're going to tear it down, we're going to get Marcus Mariota. We're going to win four games.

We're going to draft at the top. That would have been different. But the time has passed austin says do you think that jaron hall has a legit chance to unseat mullins for qb3 or as koc said mullins knows the offense so well that even if jaron plays better mullins will get the spot like manion before you know we should call it in the future the sean manion spot because it's really a role for a guy that you not do not want to play but you just respect the hell out of the guy. Sean Mannion, so respected that he stops playing football and gets hired as a coach immediately.

That's how that's. And Sean Mannion, truly, I mean, this one of my favorite players ever to talk to one of the smartest football guys you're ever going to run across had coach vibes the whole way. And, you know, Nick Mullins is doing that same sort of thing for them. And I think overall, it's good to have that guy on any team, but it's especially good to have that guy on a team with young players. Jaron Hall is also a player that no one is picking up. If you cut, uh, he's going to play the third or fourth quarter. He might play a lot in the final two preseason games. He can learn, he can develop still because he's not getting reps in training camp, but you are, uh, you are not like going to lose him. No other team

is going to watch him play and say, Oh man, uh, we just need to pick up Jared Hall and he could be our QB one or something. The Tyler think pen is not happening more likely than not. So they can put him on the practice squad, have Mullins with the plan to next year, have it be Jaron Hall is probably the backup to JJ McCarthy. Alexander says, make me a pie chart regarding the outcomes for Darnold season. Doesn't start short, terrible stint,

mid-season starter, complete a Baker like season. I would go, I mean, as far as a doesn't start that right now is looking about maybe a 2% that he doesn't start at all, but that would make my math really hard. So let's put that at 5%. And as far as a short, terrible stint, that doesn't look super likely at this moment either, despite the competition that they're going to play. But I'll give that maybe 25% to get us to 30. And as far as a mid-starter, does that mean like he's a mid-starter for a long time or he's the starter through the mid-season?

I assume you mean maybe the starter through the mid-season. That's the one I would give the most to that. He would start through the middle of the season. They start to fall out of the playoff race. He has a couple of bad games and they decide it's just time to go to JJ McCarthy. I would give that one probably 40% and then 30% to a Baker Mayfield. And I'm glad you said Baker Mayfield like season because that bar is, what did they go nine and eight or something and, and got in and Mayfield was maybe the 18th best been in place since Quasey took over.

He has gotten progressively better. I never saw. The end of your comment was cut off. I mean, I wouldn't be too concerned about any of that at this point. I mean, I know that that was a conversation when it was first like he first got here is that they didn't overhaul. And then the first draft went so badly. So was it his fault? Was it not his fault? All that sort of stuff. It is now, it is now his roster. It is now fully Kweisi Adafomense's roster. And if you look back at 2022, Duke Shelley is one of the few players that was on the roster then that's on the roster. Now

they have really overhauled this thing in his vision. And what the general manager's job is supposed to be is to tell the scouts what they're looking for. And the coach is to form the outline of, these are the types of players we're looking for, and now go find them and let's whittle them down to a group that we think is going to fit. If there's one person that is going to have a massive impact on their success rate,

it's probably Brian Flores because Brian Flores was a former scout. He knows exactly what he's looking for and he knows what type of defense he has and who's going to fit. And in 2022, they drafted guys for a different defense and they have not shown that they belong in brian flores's defense and maybe personality is some of it uh but you know i also think it's probably skill set as well was built for something different and that's impacted the results to some extent booth got hurt early on uh but i'm kind of like not concerned about that part of it anymore. This is his front office. He could have fired any scout that he wanted to fire at this point,

kept any scout that he liked at this point, brought in people that were from his background that have come in that he knew. So it is fully the Kweisi Adafo Mensah. And no team just fires every scout. You don't just come in as a GM and everyone's gone. They do. some guys will move on but anyway the point is that when you look at this roster almost everyone has been acquired by quesidofo mensa aside from some obvious star players who you would never get rid of like justin

jefferson and like harrison smith they've probably overhauled 70% of it at this point, which makes a lot of it up for grabs in some ways. And that ties into the preseason game. A Purple Lily says, way too early to make a guess on a guy's career, but I'm all in on JJ. He's been making progress, getting better the longer he's here and impresses everybody that knows him. That's half the game. Well, I agree everybody that knows him. That's half the game. Well, I agree with you as far as that being half the game.

Totally agree with that because your personality and how you handle all the things regarding the quarterback position is such a high percentage of your success. Can you handle the playbook? Can you lead? Are you a competitor? Kevin O'Connell mentioned how competitive J.J. McCarthy is, and we see that when he's out on the practice field. We see how his teammates respond to him. We see how his coaches respond to him,

and we see progress from him. You're right. It's half the battle, and that's why you can make at least that judgment here. You can already say through his first training camp, all right, this is not a disaster. Now, if he had had a worse training camp so far, I don't think that I would be saying, oh boy, but if he didn't know the plays, if he wasn't getting them lined up, if he hadn't worked hard before he came to training camp to get down the verbiage, if you will, if he didn't show any leadership qualities, if he looked at the podium or acted like he was arrogant or entitled, like all these things are things that you see sometimes from rookies and you immediately go, oh boy, this might be a problem if somebody's not getting it or doesn't come in

with the type of characteristics that we see from successful players, but he's come in with a very mature approach and he has the physical talent to do it. So all in, well, we're going to find that out. But as far as early returns, that's, that's been about as good as it could have been for somebody who has no experience at all and is as young as JJ McCarthy is. Uh, X says, I want to see a calm in control McCarthy with composure over the offense. Yeah. and mostly that has been the case in training camp and that's what i remember talking to you guys about this of a what am i looking for how am i going to figure out what my opinion is and the biggest thing was exactly what you just said does there look like there's composure and i asked a few questions uh through the last couple weeks to kevin o'connell

to jj mConnell, to JJ McCarthy, to Sam Darnold about those two minute drills, because I was curious about what they feel like they can learn. And the thing that Kevin O'Connell said was that with JJ McCarthy, he could call something off the play card that maybe they didn't necessarily prep and see how he handled it. And for the most part on those two minute drills, he has looked like he's getting to the line of scrimmage. He's getting people lined up. And there are small things that happen all the time where I noticed this with Sam Darnold, but I'll just use it as

an example. Justin Jefferson was going to line up on the wrong side and Darnold immediately, as soon as he was leaving the huddle, Darnold went like, no, no, no, no, no. Over that right side, right side. And then Jefferson, Oh, I'm going over was leaving the huddle, Darnold went like, no, no, no, no, no. Over there, right side, right side. And then Jefferson, oh, I'm going to the right side. And the quarterback has to know all of that instantly. There can't be any sort of look around. Oh, wait, the wrong receivers on the wrong side. What do I do?

Hey, wait, you get over there. You have to know that immediately because you're that locked in. And with McCarthy, of course, it's not quite on the same level as Darnold, but there's a lot of that showing people where they need to go, knowing the offense better than anybody else who's out there, the way that he's directing it, the composure that he's had, all of that has looked good to me out there, but now you go do it in a game. And now we get a new look at it from a different direction like under different circumstances and we see what it looks like there and where he might have to go bland toast says making sure people in the right spot and setting up protections while being

accurate with the ball nothing too crazy that's what you're looking for i agree and his accuracy has been pretty solid but there's also been some decision making that leads to interceptions where I think maybe he doesn't quite see where the ball is supposed to go and just kind of throws it. And that's where the picks have come. And that's where the identifying the patterns and seeing the defenses is going to play in because he had one in the red zone the other day where it looked like he kind of saw something flash and pulled the trigger and threw it. And then like, no, that is not there at all.

And it was easily picked off. Those are the rookie things that he's trying to work through. But if there's a mistake like that, you're not overreacting to that. You want to see protections is a big thing because he knows now by enough practices, what they're going to throw at him in practice, but he doesn't really know what the Raiders are going to do and Kevin O'Connell may say to Antonio Pierce before the game I think this happens and why don't you why don't you dial it up a couple times why don't you throw a couple of blitzes at us just to let us get some practice working through that I can't guarantee that's

happening but it it stands to reason that they would say let's not just give them all the vanilla looks if you want to dial up a blitz here or there, go ahead. And accurate with the football is something you want to see. The timing is different in a real game setting than it is in practice. So how is that going to look as far as the footwork? Is it going to look as comfortable as it has been at times in practice? Or are we going to see some of some nerves out there with the ball flying around a little bit? The improvement in accuracy with McCarthy, if you're like the biggest thing, if we were ranking, what are the biggest things with McCarthy that have been impressive? Number one, of course, is his overall handling of this environment. But number two is the improvement in how accurate he's been with

the football and that he is learning on the fly, how to put a little more touch on the ball. He's learning on the fly, how to get the footwork right. And to look pretty good, uh, at doing that and look majorly improved is a huge box to check. Uh, kinetic six, one, five. Remember JJ just turned 21 years old. How would he he compare to the others of his class if he also had the extra two to five experience so i'm not concerned at all about the other quarterbacks in the class i know that everyone's going to want to do that that on the outside the espns and the nfl networks and everybody and on the internet the fan bases are all going to want to argue about who was drafted. Where is he better than this guy? Is he better than that guy?

I mean, it doesn't make a darn bit of difference to me about Drake may like it doesn't impact the Minnesota bike. You know, it does with Caleb Williams, but they were never getting Caleb Williams because he was the number one overall pick. But, and the Caleb Williams thing is awesome. Honestly, from a football perspective, to have two first-round quarterbacks battling each other with teams that are building and stuff. That's just fun storylines. But the other guys, I mean, how much are they going to really impact? Like, Bo Nix has nothing to do with this team. Doesn't really matter if it works out.

I mean, I guess if Bo Nix became a megastar, that's really the thing, too. Bo Nix is the only one you could talk about here bo nicks is the only one that the vikings had a chance to pick so really and he's in denver he really bo nicks is the only one where we're going to look at it and say well you know they could have picked him instead but if you had picked drake may say at the top and traded everything then i would just all right now we're going to be evaluating uh who that who else they could have picked and we're going to play that game because they went on this entire journey to find their guy and they believed that mccarthy was a better pick than bo nix but as you're saying even if we try to judge that in

year one if mccarthy plays six games at the end of the season, Bo Nix starts the entire year and has his team at 500. Well, Bo Nix is better for that first year, but is he going to be better in the long run? We'll see though that, that one I'll give you that one. I'll give you a Bo Nix is a lot older, so we're going to have to grade it a little bit differently, but that's one where you can say it. Pennix, they would have had to trade up. I don't think anyone knew they were going to have to trade up if they had wanted Pennix. Maybe there will be some of, hey, would they have drafted him instead of McCarthy?

Had they gotten that opportunity, that op? Maybe, maybe, you know, we'll be watching that because of the Kirk Cousins situation, but really only Bo Nix is the one that they could have taken. Evan says, I want to see JJ to Munt connection on Saturday. I also work security in the Delta club. Oh, that's cool. Excited to see how JJ interacts with fans. It'll be great with the fans.

There's no doubt about that. We see him in training camp every day, signing autographs for little kids and doing all those things. I mean, I think he just gets it from that perspective. He's the first one to run up to the kids to start signing autographs for little kids and doing all those things. I mean, I think he just gets it from that perspective. Um, he's the first one to run up to the kids to start signing autographs and stuff. So,

uh, with, uh, as far as money, you might not see a JJ McCarthy to Johnny money. It might be Nick muse. I don't, I think Johnny month's going to entirely be with,

um, the first team. And so he may get only three series or two series. Let's see. Uh, 53 strong says our corners are cast offs injured or bad edge one is prone to injury and the rest are one hit wonders are bad our offensive line is two tackles and bad in the middle wide receiving and safety are our best position groups well that's true um this team is better from top to bottom than it was last year, even at the positions that you mentioned. I mean, saying edge one is injury prone. I don't know. I mean, he's had injuries in the past because he plays in the NFL, but

I don't think calling Jonathan Grenard injury prone is quite fair. He's had what two full seasons, maybe two years ago. And then last year was a full season for him. There was an injury at the end of the year maybe, but injury prone is always something I'm very, very careful on because I just think a lot of injuries can be bad luck in the NFL. Kyle Rudolph was called injury prone and then played 100 straight games and then got hurt. I don't know.

Who can ever predict injuries? As far as the corners, yeah, Fabian Morrow, uh, Byron Murphy's not a cast off, uh, Shaq Griffin, a little bit, uh, Caleb Evans, not a cast off. I'm not, I'm not telling you that they're good, but when you say, oh, well, the wide receiver is strong. The wide receiver is not just strong. The wide receiver is the strongest player in the league. And his other wide receiver is a first round draft pick. And then Hockckinson will come back then that's a pro bowl first round draft pick the tackles aren't just good they're two of the best in the league i mean the defensive coordinator is one of the best this just is not a team that i look at and say it could be terrible

unless the quarterback play is just absolutely awful and you cannot win at all but if they could be in games with josh dobbs and nick mullins and then improve on the overall strength of the roster then i think they're going to be in a lot of games i get your point and if i was evaluating it that you're doing it very harshly if i was evaluating it through a super bowl lens then my assessment would be maybe along the same lines of like, you don't have the cornerbacks probably to win a Super Bowl. You don't have the quarterback play right now to win a Super Bowl. We'll see where JJ McCarthy goes from here.

I mean, the interior offensive line is okay, but it's not, it's certainly not great. So yeah, I mean, I would do that same thing if we were looking at it through that lens but we're not like that's not what this season is i think this season is a true building competitive season for this team and uh if they outperform that then it will be a great job by the coaching staff but there is a wider variation so i'm not telling you you're completely wrong because there are a few injuries away from all that stuff being true and there is a wider variation. So I'm not telling you you're completely wrong because there are a few injuries away from all that stuff being true. And there is a wider variance for this team where it could. And the wide part is the lower part. When Kirk Cousins is playing, the lowest you're ever going to go is seven.

And the highest you could go is if everything goes right, I guess you can win 13. It has to go really right. But you can with the most of the time, the high on Kirk cousins was 10 with this team. Now, maybe the high is nine or 10, but the low is five, five games, six games. If things go completely wrong. So I'm not, I'm not like a complete disagreement that this could go bad, but when you're talking about really bad, uh, that would be harder for me to see. Evan says, what do you think of the what do you think with the kickoffs? Surely not.

Well, who does the kickoffs unless he's been practicing? No, I think it I think it's going to be Will Reichardt. Yeah, he's been the one that's been practicing as far as the what we've seen with the machine doing the kicking, but Will Reichert has been going to where he would go on those plays. And Matt Daniels has talked about it. I might try to get Kamu Grugier Hill out there doing it because he's done it before. I've been meaning to talk to him about that at some point. I'll still try. I haven't, I haven't gotten a chance to do it, but I think Will Reichert is going to kick off and their plan will be to try to avoid as much as possible that he becomes involved.

We aren't going to see really at all what the kickoff is going to look like in the season. That's what Matt Daniels made clear the other day. He said, look, what you saw in the hall of fame game, what you're going to see in these preseason games is probably teams not wanting to show anything and just running a very basic return. Oh, this I appreciate. This is good listenership right here. Oh gosh, I thank you very much. So don't forget your ad reads.

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Well, that's ironic. Let's find us again with UsMode from U.S. Cellular. Visit uscellular.com slash built for us to get started. Thank you for the reminder. And always, always do that for me because there's going to be more when it comes to the actual season. I mean, I have trouble keeping track sometimes. Joseph says Thayer Thomas, Mr. Mankato possible. It's he's got to show up in these games, though. I think that he's been one of a few guys who have made some plays lucky jackson joshua jones this is a game where you can really start to find out

because if jj mccarthy connects with lucky jackson or thayer thomas or joshua jones the way that he has on different days with them in practice in game settings, that's going to get more attention. That's going to make more noise even to the team because they've seen them do it in practice to some extent, but to see it happen in a preseason games could really catch their attention. We've seen that happen in the past. Stacey Coley had a standout preseason game, but there's always the one who was it was a victor cruz where rex ryan said who the hell is that guy like that is he had such a great preseason game it's when it's a game like this and the coach says he cares

about it unlike before uh and he said it differently than that, but that's the truth. In part, it's because there's spots that are actually open for a battle. Whereas I just don't feel like in the last two years, I could name more than one or two spots on the entire 53. If you did your 53 at the beginning of camp, you got almost all of them right by the end of camp, where a handful of things changed. Maybe last year was a little different than that because Ivan Pace, I wouldn't have put him as the starting linebacker at the beginning of camp where a handful of things changed. Maybe last year was a little different than that because Ivan Pace, I wouldn't have put him as the starting linebacker at the beginning of camp. But you understand, I think we even had him on the roster though, because he had taken second team reps

and he had to play a little bit. So there's always a guy. That's what Mr. Mankato is for, of course. But this year, it feels like there's five or six of those that we're watching and saying, hey, a defensive tackle, an edge rusher, a wide receiver, a punter, like all those things should be in play. Russ says, seems like we have not heard much from Dallas Turner.

Yeah, I'd be curious if he plays at all. Everything seems to be just going according to plan with Dallas Turner. As far as his reps go, I've seen the explosiveness. I don't think he's been pressuring the quarterback like every play, but he's getting a lot of those first team reps. And oftentimes if he's going up against Christian Derrissaw, that's why you're not seeing him in the backfield, but that's good for him.

And they're going to use him in different spots. We've noticed that a little bit for Brian Flores. There's going to be different packages with Andrew Van Ginkle, Jonathan Grenard, but Dallas Turner, sometimes you're just not the bell of the ball. I mean, the quarterback gets so much more attention. Everything seems to be going along fine with Dallas Turner because I'm judging it more from the rep counts than I am necessarily what I see. It's like,'s like oh well did he do a swim move or something it's more like now if he was in the backfield all the time like everson griffin or something okay well that would be different uh but if they're continuing to make him a part of the plan where

day after day he's on the first team then i'm assuming that brian flores likes what he sees and that we'll see it. We'll really see it when we get into the season with the game planning and all that. That's but that's been the story. It has been quiet with Dallas Turner. We haven't talked to him a ton, a couple of times. He's very clearly a bright guy and has made a good impression on them. But one thing with Dallas Turner is edge rushers do have a tough time transitioning into the NFL as well.

We don't talk about that as much, but there's not too many guys who come in and get 15 sacks right away. Having him as part of a rotation rather than just saying, hey, you got to go play every single snap will be good for his development, too. I mean, his development matters as J.J. McCarthy's does, and he's going to get slowly brought along as well. It seems, uh, with, I mean, maybe he plays 20 snaps in week one or something like that, as opposed to, Hey kid, now this is your entire thing. And he's pretty young as well. Uh, 53 strong says I need to see McCarthy be the polished winner that he was advertised. Well, he doesn't have to win this one in preseason uh accurate pocket presence hit on deep balls when needed rookie selected in top 10 must be in the

top 15 uh eventually yeah is what they're looking for uh he can't do all of those things all at once for us in the first preseason game where he might take 20 or 15 dropbacks as far as being the polished winner and all that. But being accurate, showing the pocket presence. The deep ball is something that has improved from the start of minicamp when he got here that he I think is getting the arc down a little bit better. He's getting a connection with his wide receivers a little bit better he's getting a connection with his wide receivers a little bit better and the timing on those i saw he threw one today and josh mccown dapped him up or high-fived him or something you know it's like exactly what they wanted to see uh but you know some of them sail on them a little bit or aren't as accurate that that's something that is probably going to have to continue to be worked on even through next year in the off season with the QB trainer and all

that. But as far as the pocket presence and as far as looking fairly accurate and on time with his receivers, that's what you really want to see. Whatever the stat line turns out to be, it's really, it's a feel. Does it feel like he's in command? Does it feel like when the pressure comes, he senses it and scrambles out, which he's done a really nice job of so far in camp does it feel like the ball is coming out accurately which the outbreaking routes I think were a thing that people talked about but I've seen quite a few of those that have been quite accurate recently I think what you're also going to see is the velocity on the football like that's another thing that I want you guys to see that i've seen up close on a daily basis but i want you to see on tv is him really let one rip because when he does it scoots and so there's a little bit of that too there's yeah okay

you want him to look you what you're describing yeah you want him to look like a a five-year veteran of the nfl completely in charge, accurate on time, throwing great deep balls. Okay. Well, yeah, I mean, everybody wants to see that, but how about just flashes? How about just flashes? How about a scramble, a throw down the field, a rocket over the middle, a good series, like stuff like that. Like, let's take baby steps here. It's the first preseason game. And, uh, you kind of want him to be, you know, like 25 years old when he's 21, we'll get there. Um, Jonathan says, uh, Kirk didn't need to start in the preseason last year. Darnold needs to start a preseason game. Yeah.

I mean, Darnold started enough games in his career where if he didn't, it would be fine. I think it's more just about let about letting him have the feeling of going out of us bank stadium, the feeling of getting under center with Garrett Bradbury, getting that cadence down the center and the quarterback cadence in an actual game is important. Just a little sense of that. If, if he only plays one series, then there's really nothing to talk about as far as who's the starting quarterback the rest of the way it's clearly Darnold if he plays kind of a lot in comparison to what we think then you know maybe it's a little more interesting than that then maybe they do want to see a little

more of him than they've seen in practice so far but I don't think I really don't think at this point in his career for Sam Darnold that there there's different gears that there's, he's going to learn from this preseason. He's going to take a step forward because he played in the preseason. He needs more reps. He's had a lot of reps in the NFL. What it really comes down to is can Sam Darnold be a similar version of himself from the past, but have such a good situation and have learned about turning the ball over enough, how to avoid it and how to avoid taking bad sacks that he can be pretty good. Like that's really what we're talking about. Uh, the, the Sam Darnold that started the last game of the season against the Rams, like that was a guy who was doing the point guard thing. He was

not making all sorts of wild crazy throws he wasn't trying to make a superstar play all the time he was also playing for a really good coach with some good players around him and the same thing at the end of the carolina season where they ran a lot of play action a lot of screens they protected him a bit and then every once in a while he let one loose and every once in a while he let one loose to the other team that's really what we're talking about here with sam darnold not someone that i think is getting better and better he's probably reached the point where that's not that possible to change the stripes of the tiger it's just dude does the tiger fit better in this i don't want to say

players aren't animals this environment, does he fit better in this environment than he did before? Because this environment is so favorable with the offense and with the wide receivers. That's what you're really looking for is can the version that went eight and nine with Carolina and 17 starts, can that guy come here and be a little bit better than that because of who he has around him and get you to a playoff type of season that's kind of what we're looking for there uh a purple lily i think that's what that is um says uh still evaluating the quarterbacks to a degree hard to do that with all the third teamers around them uh to throw um around them against whatever

the raiders throw out yeah i would guess that anytime mccarthy's out there it's going to be second team and maybe when the raiders go to their third team they'll keep him out there and he'll get a little bit easier competition so maybe he'll start off against the second team and that's where we'll be looking at it the most but to gain a little more confidence all right the raiders have taken out their second teamers go in with against the third team with the second team and then outplay them because the difference between a second team and a third team in the nfl is pretty huge that's dalton riser david questberry these guys are second teamers whereas the guys on the third team of the Raiders are probably just not making a football team anywhere. Uh, they're going to play indoors, uh, and, or, or something or become high school

coaches. They're not going to be playing in the NFL. So maybe there's, there's some chances to get some easier, uh, reps, some easier routes for the wide receivers, some open chances for McCarthy, uh, versus the easier group for the raiders that would be the advantage of maybe playing him into the third quarter jake says have you noticed any adjustments from the offense or defensive scheme and training camp it's hard to do because it's the base stuff like what they do over the first couple weeks of training camp and this is for you know the people in the stands who take videos and all that. I know Kevin O'Connell doesn't like that. Uh,

doesn't want videos out there everywhere, even though they are every year, but you know, a lot of teams have those policies and stuff, but what you're seeing is stuff that every team in the league knows that the Vikings run as their base stuff. It's not game planning. It's not the wrinkles. Cause you're not going to practice the wrinkles in front of fans.

You're going to practice those when the fans are gone and can't videotape you from the stands and tweet it out. That's what you're going to do. You're going to show all the stuff, work on all the stuff that are the basics of your scheme and that they've already seen a million times on tape. And every football coach knows exactly what those are and that's not something they're going to go oh wow they they're doing this out there i mean it's stuff that probably any high school or college d3

college coach could watch and go oh yeah that was that route concept uh maybe they changed up a little bit with flores's defense from time to time, but not well the fans of that. What Mike Zimmer used to do is he would only run the base defense when fans were at training camp. I mean, three linebackers out there. And then once they left, now we're doing nickel package a lot more and so forth, and they're running the different blitzes. That's just how it kind of works.

And it times out with how install works anyway. You got to get all the base stuff in before you can build off of that and start game planning which is just to say that do i notice anything wildly different if it was going to be wildly different it would just be if there were a lot of different players so on the defensive side dallas turner van ginkle and grunard on the field at the same time. Now that's different. There were not too many times last year, I don't think, where they would have had three edge rushers.

Maybe Patrick Jones, DJ Wanham, and Daniil Hunter, but that's not very effective. Like this could be different. Things like that. If it's personnel related, well, okay, they've got a different wide receiver that they're running short stuff with or something but um it would it would it would be hard to pick up on because it's probably pretty subtle uh if they're doing anything right now but i think that's going to happen in the in the coming weeks um alexander says is it too too late for irv smith to break out? Uh, I don't know. I feel like that's been a storyline for about four years. I saw it in Cincinnati last year.

Uh, 2019 Irv Smith was good. Um, he, it was legit. And at the end of 2020, when he played for Kyle Rudolph, it was legit, but it just never, whatever happened in that injury, it never came back after that for him after, after he was hurt. And that's sometimes is how it works in football. And I don't think he ever really got it because tight end is such a complicated position. And I'm not sure he ever really mastered the details there, but 2019, the role that he filled, he made some great catches for them. And he remember i forget who was against

he ran some sort of like seam route 20 yards down the field caught it maybe against kansas city and i went whoa this guy is a real player and it just never after that injury he had a great camp that year too looked like he was ready to take off it hasn't been the same maybe lost just some of his burst that was difference making uh anybody, anybody could stand out with Andy Reed, but they like to run a lot of wide receivers. Well, they, they do mix in their tight ends. Maybe that's possible. Uh, Jason says, has JJ scrambled much in training camp? He was elusive at Michigan, but will that hold up at the NFL level? I think, um, it's, I'm trying to think of a comparable quarterback with his scrambling.

His scrambling is going to be, so I did ask Kevin O'Connell about this the other day, about the deciding when to scramble and how you figure it out. And what he said is the important thing for McCarthy and Darnold, two guys with mobility is to keep the eyes downfield and look for a play in the passing game still before they decide to run. And that's the type of scrambler that JJ McCarthy is, which is escaping, which he's done, but also still looking to be a passer. Will it hold up at the NFL level? That will scrambling around to try to make a throw down the field still, or even check it short or just get something off.

That I believe will be something he could do at the nfl level he's a good athlete he's quick for his size but is he going to scramble and then run for a bunch of yards probably not i don't think he has special speed they want him in there making plays as a passer so it's more of an elusiveness, a buying time in the pocket, buying time outside of the pocket on the rollout. He's very good at throwing the ball in the role. You can see that, you know, had he played shortstop in baseball, that he's got that, like I'm on the move and yet I can kind of flip the hips and make a throw. He's got all that stuff that's what i would expect to see more of is is that kind of thing then i would expect to see him just like taking off and running for first downs what you

want is somebody who on third and eight could drop back think about like case keenum did this and you don't want him to scramble as much as case keenum and throw the ball around but case keenum was like this where he didn't run the fastest 40 wasn't blazing speed but if he dropped back and everybody was in man coverage or deep drops and there was 10 yards in front of him he would just run for the first down i think mccarthy has that in him hunter jefferson would have to get hurt and darnold would have to be unbelievably bad or worse for with Nick Mullins to get the number one pick. Yeah. Knock on wood there as far as people getting hurt, but I just think there's, there's too good a coaching and too much talent. I mean, this team went through a lot last year and still came out with seven wins and was very close to nine or 10 without their quarterback, without a backup on the roster that they could play initially.

It's just to be able to still be in it. I remember my friend Sage Rosenfels and I were talking about Gary Kubiak one time. You all know how much I respect Gary Kubiak that he said that one of the years with the Texans, they had a terrible roster and just, it wasn't good at all, but they still found a way to get to 500 back when you could be 500, eight and eight,

because they just had good coaching with Kubiak and they played for him and they believed in him and he had a good culture and all that. And that's the same thing about the giants, the giants in New York, it's always on fire. Things are going bad. And they still found a way to win a handful of games with Tommy DeVito. Like to be that bad, it takes a total catastrophe.

It takes like end of days level stuff. If you're not doing it on purpose, it has to completely fall apart. So, you know, and this is not at all me declaring that Sam Darnold will just step in and lead them to a bunch of wins. But the fact that Sam Darnold went eight, nine with the Carolina Panthers tells you that, and they were nowhere near as talented as this team and had nowhere near as good as coaching as this team. And he still hung around 500. You have to be pretty bad to not be able to do that. First name, last name. Would you really want two rookie contract quarterbacks?

Or would you want to go get another Vets to add to that room? I feel like Mullen's extension actually makes some sense if he stays as cheap as he is. Well, if Jaron Hall's been in the league if if they feel like they like what they've seen from him this year and he's been in the league for three years already then he's no longer really a rookie guy he's also like my age he went to byu i think he's like 26 so he's quite a bit older than jj mccarthy i understand what you're saying would you want somebody who had played in games? I think so.

Yes. I think you would still bring a veteran to camp, but maybe you're hoping that Jaron Hall is your QB too. But at that point he would be okay as a backup if they believe in him. What about Bob? Give us a story about an inflammatory question that you witnessed during a head coach press conference. Inflammatory.

I don't know. There was a battle between a reporter and a former head coach for a while that went on, but I don't know if the questioning was inflammatory or if the former head coach just didn't like any questioning. So that's a, I'm not sure what you mean, like inflammatory, like trying to bait him into something or whatever. It doesn't really happen too much here. I just think the media market here, the Midwestern Minnesota is a little more careful with its questioning. If that, if that makes sense there, I mean, as aggressive as it gets is probably Kevin Seifert saying, hey, the owner just said you're not getting a contract extension right now. What do you think? That's about as aggressive as it gets here. I'll think about it.

I don't remember one offhand that I've been covering at the moment where there was some sort of like really tense thing or that somebody tried to bait a coach into something. I'm not sure. I'll think about it. tense thing or that somebody tried to bait a coach into something. I'm not sure. I'll think about it. The best, I'll tell you the best question I've ever heard asked, though. Not inflammatory, but the best. Zulgad comes up on the show all the time. You guys like Judd.

And when Mike Zimmer, after Kirk Cousins got COVID in 2021, couldn't participate in the night practice, the famous Jake Browning night practice, Mike Zimmer came out, started talking about it and Judd just said to Zimmer hey Mike are you mad and and Zimmer just went off after that it was like the best question so sometimes it's funny about how questions work right you can ask some brilliant uh hey you know I noticed that the trips left had a uh you know the route combination with this tweak with the guy. And then the coach will be like, I don't know. Yeah, maybe. And then you go, you mad. And then he just goes nuts. They don't, I don't know if they teach kids that in a

journalism school that maybe you should just ask the coach if he's mad and see what happens. Uh, Chris says, uh, there's a lot of anticipation for this season can you compare this much excitement to a season in the past probably one that i wasn't here for uh which is 2014 or maybe even 2015 might be 2015 but they won the division that year so that feels like setting a lofty goal uh maybe 2014 is a better comparison. Maybe Matt Castle is the Sam Darnold of the program here, but in 2014, it was a new coach, a breath of fresh air, a new feeling. No one thought they were going to win the Superbowl. They had some talent to work with, but not enough talent to win the division and a rookie quarterback that everybody wanted to see in Teddy Bridgewater.

That's how it feels right now is that the fans are realistic about what this is likely to be, which is maybe a fun season, but not one where you're talking about raising the Lombardi trophy at the end, but one where you take steps toward that, where it's a long journey. It's like a Netflix series that goes for seven seasons. And this is season one. You don't expect to find out who killed somebody at the in season four right now. You don't expect to find out right now if JJ McCarthy is the answer and you can win the Superbowl, but you expect to learn a lot about it along the way. And you're following the story along the way. That's what this year can be for the Minnesota Vikings. Unless it would be this year of all years with Sam Darnold, they win the Superbowl. It's gotta be

someone weird, right? It can't be, uh, it can't be the first round pick if this team's actually going to do it. I'm kidding. Uh, but no matter how it happens one day, when it happens, it will be something bizarre that leads to them winning it. Uh, the point just being, happens one day, when it happens, it will be something bizarre that leads to them winning it. Uh, the point just being, yeah, I don't think that any of the seasons that I was here for, because every year I was here was always win. Now, 2016, when I arrived, they traded a first round pick for Sam Bradford right after Bridgewater got hurt.

And, uh, then it was just on from there. When you trade a first round pick, then you're expecting to be in the playoffs. And when you go to 2017, Sam Bradford's there, it's veteran players, it's young rising stars. How about young rising stars like Daniil Hunter? Because we're old now. Then 2018 is all in. And every year from there was really all in. 2020 camp was the most miserable thing I've ever seen in my life and uh 2021 was a close second so no nothing has been like this there was the anticipation for o'connell but the expectations were still win now in 2022 uh uh louise says uh or lewis not sure which uh says uh o'connell uh will win his first preseason game on Saturday. Good chance. Good chance. Got to win one eventually. That really speaks to how little he cared about it.

I mean, Zimmer had some run of wins because he cared about winning those games, whereas O'Connell has treated them as PR stunts in the past. It's so different going into this game than before. Chris says, I think quacey cooked this offseason how do you rank our offseason i'm not sure what i'm ranking it against like uh rank it as it you want a meter you want to get like a can we get a one out of ten i can do it that way because i it's hard to compare to the rest of the teams in the league how because every team is in a different spot or do you want a letter grade? You should give it a letter grade. Uh, I think I would give it a B plus would be probably it, or maybe an a minus. I think that all the things that were feasible to accomplish were

accomplished. They moved on from Kirk. They drafted a top 10 quarterback draft pick in a year where they had planned to draft one because it was such a good draft class and when we talk about when mccarthy was picked among the other quarterbacks it's still a top 10 selection he ends up going they bring in guys on defense that can help brian flores now and later like grenard like Ginkle, is under a two-year contract at least, and Blake Cashman could be here for quite some time. But I can't say that it was perfect. I mean, you're still talking about an interior line with questions, cornerbacks with questions, defensive tackle with questions, even the wide receiver depth. We're seeing some emergence here from Naylor, but it doesn't mean it's fully there yet. I didn't disagree with

anybody that they let go. Maybe there could have been some more additions, but they set themselves up for the future. I would rank it very highly. This was a huge offseason for Kweisi Daffelmensen. We move on so quickly from things. We have the conversations over onto the next discussion, so much football. This was huge for him. Over over the first two years we're swaying in the wind a little bit about where this is going to go the first year they did a good job of doing what the owners asked them to do win 13 games bring in zadarius smith he was great for them overall things like that but then the next year like all right if you're gonna let go all that talent which i was in total agree with agreement with you know you're running the risk of having a pretty bad season potentially.

And seven wins is not good enough. Uh, but the fact that they were able to find players who filled those spots like Ivan pace and Josh Metellus, uh, that's good. Now, I mean, Metellus was a previous draft pick, but Ivan Pace is the UDFA drafting Jordan Addison to take Adam Thielen's spot. Like that was a really good move and getting the cap right. And also not extending Kirk. Like you just cannot enough, not this year even,

but two years ago when Kirk wanted X number of dollars and they just said, no, that's too much for us. Too many years, too many dollars to lock us in. And that set up to get to the point where they are now. So that decision alone was terrific leading into 2023, but we still were not really all that sure. Is this vision going to get to the end? And I remember making the Cody Rhodes joke, complete the story or finish the story. And I felt like the moment that they drafted McCarthy, they finished the story. And then to add Dallas Turner to that, uh, I did think it was a very

big off season for him to prove that he could execute the vision that they had had when they started. And now there's another vision that begins this year and is a two or three year plan to compete this season, find players who emerge, get the cap space for next year and all that. So yeah, I mean, I really think that overall as a front office, they did a good job. Oh gosh, says speaking of star players, other than KOC and Kweisi and Capman,

I assume you mean Rob Brzezinski, who are some of the star front office guys. There's a few of them. I don't know everyone's name, but I mean, this is the thing. I haven't memorized their entire front office. Ryan Mullins is one of them. There was a guy hired from San Francisco. Last name is Washington.

I met him once. The front office guys,, like they do deserve more credit. We always put it so much on the general manager, but I haven't, I haven't, uh, gone through the directory and memorized every person and figured out every job that they do. Um, because mostly we don't interact with them a ton. Uh, they're mostly in the building and we're out there and there's not a whole lot of crossover with reporters. We get to meet a couple of scouts during the draft, but there's not like it's hard. Just for example, George Payton got named the general manager of the Denver Broncos. I met him one time. I think we talked for a story once. It's just kind of how football works.

Like in hockey and in baseball, scouts are hanging around people. You get to meet a lot of different people. Football is very buttoned up. They don't want, you know, Ryan Grigson is another one who I have met and is around, but they want less people talking to reporters out there.

They're, you know, this is football, the very tight lips they want to be and all that so uh but they're yeah they have they have key players in the front office it becomes an entire group effort though so we put all of it on one guy there's a lot more to it uh purple lily says if nailer awesome law and stick and contribute, they need to reevaluate the 2022 draft. That would be six players from the draft, including Ingram. Yeah, I think three years is right when people say it takes three years to evaluate a draft.

I agree with that. If Naylor, now you say Asamoah, I would say Chandler. If Naylor and Chandler are oh yeah you mentioned Chandler and Evans end up being contributors so you've kind of already decided on Chandler I need to see a little more but if you end up with Naylor Ingram Chandler and Evans as significant contributors and not even Asamoah or Muse the draft is still not great but it's definitely not horrible it's just at the top of it ended up turning out bad a cup of joe mama says what i don't want to see is jj mccarthy being flamed for mistakes in the preseason game yeah i think that in this position well look there's always

going to be people no matter what happens somebody's always going to be people, no matter what happens. Somebody is always saying something sometime in every comment section. There is somebody. But as far as from us, from the people covering the game and giving our recaps and analysis. Yeah, being flamed would be wrong because we know what this is. This is supposed to be development time. It's just like when he has a bad practice. We come back and say, ah, you know, didn't have the best practice,

but we don't say, oh boy, it's a disaster out there. He had one bad practice. Of course not. And the same thing for the preseason game. If it looks a little fast for him right now, that's okay. This is going to take a while.

We're going to get there. We're going to get to a point someday where we have the answer, but it's not going to be on Saturday. Saturday is the introduction. It's not even, if you're a book reader, it's not even chapter one. It's the introduction, which sometimes I just skip. I go right to chapter one, but we can't do that here. We can't skip the chapter one. we can't do that here we can't skip to chapter one we can't skip the intro when you're watching the wire or sopranos or something and you've heard that song a million times so you skip the intro this is the intro can't skip it you got to watch through the woke up this morning song on the sopranos

maybe that makes sense to you just it's not we're not deciding today but we're gonna talk about it if he makes mistakes we're gonna talk about what those mistakes were and what they're going to do to correct them going forward and then it gives us something to work off as a baseline for the next game uh for the mistakes but yeah i mean if you're if you're if you're trying to call it and you're trying to say oh if the first preseason game i know this guy is not going to make it or i know this guy's going to make it well i mean that's fun to do but it doesn't really mean a whole lot like there's not a whole lot of nuance to that there's not a whole lot of

it's not really a smart take it's more of just trying to be right about something someday and hoping uh reconnected says ownership not extending koc was a little surprising koc should have responded with he's planning on testing the market oh that would have been funny that would have been funny if uh o'connell had said that if he had said yeah well i'm hitting free agent but as far as timing, had the years been switched and had it been seven wins than 13, then we'd be talking about an extension going from 13 to seven. It does ramp up the pressure a little bit. There's no way around that.

When you haven't won a playoff game in two years after being hired, that's the same number of playoff games as Mike Zimmer won the two years before he got fired. Now it's very different. It's very different environment. It's a very different situation roster wise and where they're going. But I understand it. I understand the ownership saying we're not going to crown everybody. Remember how important it is not to crown people.

We learned that, that you can't say we're crowning anybody, but they haven't won anything. And if they're looking at it that way as, look, we like the direction. We like the culture. We like where they're going, but you got to win if you want that big extension. Okay. I think that's fine. It's a little unrealistic for this year for that to happen though. That's where I agree with you that it's, it would make more sense to give a two-year extension

and say you know what we're seeing this through this is it's not about the extension fill it in it's what the extension represents the extension would represent full buy-in to the kevin o'connell and quesadilla fomenta plan the competitive rebuild plan into the competitive plan, that would be, we're going to see it through with these guys. And at this moment, I'm very much ready for that. I mean, very much ready for that, having seen how they handled the first two years. The roster has been built in a way that is ready to go up on the upswing with the salary cap

space for next year and the first round quarterback who is on the rookie deal and the players that they've brought in who are going to be multi-year parts of this the head coach well I still have some questions I'm sure as you have about can we in a running game you know and uh can he take a team deep into the playoffs? Like it's always going to be a question until you do it. So I still have those questions naturally as well. Uh, but I think that the leadership that's been shown has been exceptional. Uh, the culture that's been built from the trainer to the, and I know they made a change there, but even making a change there, if it's not working out as a good thing to do, um, getting the right defensive coordinator took a year, got, you know, everybody's got to make

progress or process. I don't know which one, but, uh, you know, O'Connell got the right defensive coordinator who you'd like to see stay here for multiple seasons. They have a good special teams coordinator. They have a good coaching staff overall. Josh McCown is here. He was able to bring him in, which I think was big for them. I mean, there's just a lot of things with the way it operates, the happiness of the players, how they respond to the coach. It's not toxic. I mean, all these things are good and I'd like to see how they go all the way to the

end. I don't want them to stay with the Netflix series thing. I don't want them to cancel it after a season that maybe was something to get you to the end of the story. I hate this with a show, right? Where a show is going along and it looks like it's a setup season to the conclusion in the next season, and then they cancel it and you don't get to find out what happened. Well, they, they shouldn't be thinking about that. They shouldn't be thinking about canceling it before it gets to the end of the series. I want them to see this plan through. And then if it doesn't work, then in fire, whoever you want to fire, because like this year,

the results matter to some extent, but the next year is really where the pressure starts to ramp up. And if you win five or six this year and you win eight next year is really where the pressure starts to ramp up and if you win five or six this year and you win eight next year we're gonna start looking around going is this really it is this can you really get over the top with this but as of right now we are so far away from that ending that the extension would represent buy-in to that overall plan that's why i think it wouldn't be a bad idea. And also an extension seems like, well, why don't they want anything yet? But I mean, a lot of these coach contracts are five years or six years to start with. If O'Connell's indeed correctly was only four

and nobody has disputed this. So I'm assuming that that is correct. If it's only four, it was short from the beginning. But realistically, it's always what it represents because at the end of the day, if you want to fire somebody, you'll just fire somebody. They have money to be able to pay it off. What about Bob says, good to see O'Connell is flexible enough

to have a more physical camp and play as starters in preseason. This team is young and needs real reps. Yep, I agree with that. Yep, I agree. is flexible enough to have a more physical camp and play as starters in preseason uh this team is young and needs real reps yep i agree with that yep i agree yeah malleable is the word i think where always willing to adjust based on the situation is important and he's doing that here uh jeff says i feel better about jj mccarthy being drafted because rick spielman didn't draft him a total total drive by there jeff but it's appreciated it is appreciated i yeah i understand that well and look with jj mccarthy if it doesn't work out they had the former quarterback and the quarterback

coach who's the former quarterback running this thing and looking at these guys. And if they can't identify which guy's going to work out, then I don't know that. I don't know that none of us can, which we probably, we probably, nobody is perfect at it, but if,

if it doesn't work out and look, they exactly what they told us, JJ McCarthy was, is what he's been. And that's important. That may be the most important thing so far is with JJ McCarthy is the things that Kevin O'Connell said. This is what you're going to see. This is what I like.

I like the arm. I like the character. I like how we gelled. I like how he competes. I like how he retained information and how hard he worked at it. And then he shows up and he does all those things. That's a, that's a big win two weeks into camp,

two and a half weeks into camp already that he's just been those things. And now it's going to go out in a preseason game and we'll see a little more of it. Anthony says, do you think awesome law will be a pure special teamer again this year saw a clip of scene on the field yeah he was on the field he certainly was uh awesome wall will probably be a special teamer yeah i think if someone gets hurt at linebacker it's going to be uh camu gruge hill he's played a lot of games that's what he's there for so

i just think with awesome wall and scene i, they don't feel like they're fits. And it would be a big jump forward for Asamoah if Brian Flores found a role for him. But last year when he went out and got or when the team went out and got Anthony Barr and played him over Asamoah, I was like, OK, that something doesn't fit there. So it would be a big jump. If, um, he actually had any sort of role at all. Um, Noah says, is JJ playing against the first team defense? I thought I heard that. Yeah. Uh, it's been a mix. So early in camp, he played quite a bit against the first team defense. And what Wes Phillips said was that they were trying to get him used to the speed of what a first team defense looks like.

I wrote a little story on it and, um, you know, I think with Sam Darnold, he had already played his whole career of games against T he doesn't need that. Uh, but since then, since the last maybe week of practices, there's been a lot more ones versus ones twos versus twos than there were early in camp i just think that was something that they wanted to do to help him get the feel of the footwork when it was a little muddier when things were sped up a little faster that was what west phillips explained to me but it's been a lot more twos versus twos ones versus ones as we've gone along. It's just become more and more clear that Sam Darnold is the quarterback and something would have to happen.

I don't know. JJ McCarthy throws for 300 yards and four touchdowns or something in this game and then comes out and annihilates the Cleveland defense. And then we start and Sam Darnold falls apart. And then we start talking about it. But right now there's, there's no signs at all that JJ McCarthy is going to start, which I've always given my thumbs up to thumbs up to the plan. Kevin O'Connell said he had a plan. This seems to be the plan. And even the rep difference here of, well, we're going to start Sam Darnold is going to play're going to start sam darn is going to

play a little but jj mccarthy's going to play a lot another sign of that's how you would treat a qb1 versus a qb2 who's developing and i i'm into it i've liked it from the start um tim says why do we care how jj interacts fans? Oh, I care. No, for real. No, I care. I care, man. Look, here's the thing. And I heard this from someone that even when coaches go out to visit with quarterbacks and they're trying to figure out, is this a guy we want to draft? They watch everything with a quarterback.

They watch how they interact with the people who work there they go around and talk to people who they go they go to where the guy eats i mean they do their research on how the quarterback treats people because it it's indicative who of who you have to be as a quarterback like you have to be a quarterback is so different than everything else if you're a defensive tackle you can show up and you can do your job and you can go home and you don't have to sign an autograph or give a high five to anybody because you're just a nose tackle. When you're a quarterback, you are the front door to a franchise.

The first person you think of with every single team in the NFL is the quarterback. And if you take that as your identity identity you are accepting as your identity i am a franchise quarterback and you act that way that means something and with jj mccarthy the way that he acts all the time it's one of the things that people like about him it's one of the reasons that he was drafted here is that he is the first guy to run over and start signing the autographs the way he interacts with the fans the way he interacts with everybody around the franchise is like this. This this is on me to lead these efforts to be a part of this franchise leadership.

It's not just whatever. I'm another guy on the team and I'll act however I want. Petulant quarterbacks don't do very well. I mean, honestly, if you kind of act like you're better than everybody else, you don't have to sign the autographs or whatever. That would not be a good sign. Doesn't mean that he would automatically fail if not, but there's just so much more to being a quarterback than anything else. And how you carry yourself minute to minute to sound maybe too much like Kirk cousins, like minute to minute would, it matters.

You have to take every single part of your life and set it to franchise quarterback. And I think when you see guys like Josh Allen, when you see guys like the homes, Joe burrow, like, look at, look how they do. You see pictures all the time. I still follow on Twitter. My friends from Buffalo all the time, Josh Allen, interacting with fans, Patrick homes every year, you're going to see some behind the scenes with franchise quarterbacks, how they have a relationship with somebody who's the kid who's dealing with cancer or something like this all important man these franchises are worth six billion dollars and you're the most important person there how you carry yourself absolutely matters uh what about

bob says jj mccarthy has a 91 arm strength should be higher from what you're saying as i assume you mean on madden his speed is 85 that might be a little high. None of that matters. It certainly does not, but not, I mean, well, so my understanding of recent Madden grades is that they're just all higher than they used to be. Because if I went back and I turned on my Madden 05 over here, a 91 arm strength would be maybe top three in the league. But I guess now every player got pissed about the grades all the time. So they just moved everybody up because somebody sent me some of the grades

and it had Lewis seen as like a 70. 70, you could have started on 05. This guy can't even get in the game all of last year. I think in an old school Madden, he would have been like a 50, right? A guy who's barely on the team and never plays and they don't trust at all would not be a 70. So I guess the, I just, it breaks my brain. Doesn't make sense. 91 sounds great to me. I don't think JJ McCarthy has the strongest arm I've ever seen. I think it's really impressive and there's a lot of zip on the ball. I don't think JJ McCarthy has the strongest arm I've ever seen. I think it's really impressive and there's a lot of zip on the ball. I don't think it's Jeff George

or, uh, you know, Josh Allen. I just think it's got, it's got a lot of scoots. So 91 sounds fine to me, but it also feels like those ratings have just changed. Uh, let's see. Uh, Alexander says, uh, Jordan Addison punishment for dumb dui throw 12 receiver screens to him all they needed to do was just not having practice for maybe two weeks and send the message that's that i thought it could have been as simple as that uh hunter says is there anyone on this team that can beat justin jefferson and one on one-one basketball. Absolutely. There is. Yeah. Uh, probably two guys. Uh, the two guys that I would pick for actually maybe three. So Byron Murphy would be one. He is a Mike Bibby's nephew. I think he is probably a sick basketball player, but the two guys that I would pick are Walter Rouse and Brian O'Neill. These guys were prolific high school

players, uh, especially Brian O'Neill. I think Brian O'Neill was like Mr. Basketball of his state or something. And he's 6'7". And Rouse is 6'6". And he played on a state championship basketball team as well. Justin Jefferson would have a pretty tough time with Brian O'Neill down in the paint, backing him down over and over. And O'Neill is also quick great movement skill could

play defense the the big men would give him a really tough time i mean i justin jefferson's probably great at everything i don't know who else on the team if there's anybody else who is a sick basketball player i was assuming that murphy was really good because i think he was in uh in high school maybe uh but definitely brian o'neill would be my pick for the guy that you would not want to play one-on-one uh at 50 likes maybe matt plays his guitar it's upstairs i i'll get it for you guys sometime i'll bring down the amp and i'll mic it up i got two mics down here i'll mic it up and we'll play we'll play a little some night like after dark when we've gotten gotten to the two hour mark of previewing a preseason game, that's where we're at. Isn't that great? Isn't that great? We got a couple hundred people watching preview in a preseason

game, two hours in it's a, what a time. It's exactly what I was hoping it would be. I'm going to tell you the truth this past nine o'clock. Let's let's all tell each other the truth here late at night. This is what I was hoping it would be when they went into the off season at the end of last season i thought the best possible thing for this fan base for the energy for just a refresh would be if they drafted a first round quarterback and we went into that first preseason game having a two-hour conversation about the guy because everybody's so jacked up as opposed to the preseason where we went i don't know like maybe i'm watching for the third string left guard and we'll see what happens but this one i i feel it i feel it from

you guys and i'm really enjoying it and i'm enjoying uh your questions your comments your thoughts um it's it's all it. It's been a really fun time leading up to this. So I'm so appreciative of you guys and Vikings fans for supporting the show and having a fun time with this every night. It's just been great. It's been a great lead up. I don't even know what led me to that. Oh, asking if I would play guitar. It's been a great lead up. Maybe right before the season starts when we're bored and we're just waiting, then I'll do it. Uh, Mike says, uh, I bet once a JJ starts, he's not getting benched no matter how he plays. That's tough on the mindset. I bet KOC says once he's got the green light, he'll be expected to play through

ups and downs. Yeah. Mike, uh, I think what you're talking about there is right. And if this is sort of referencing like being the backup and having to go in or something, once what you're talking about is along the lines of my thinking, which is once he plays, he's the quarterback for the next two years, at least. So you don't want to have to put them in and pull them out. You don't want to have to put them in and pull them out you don't want to have to say all right you're week one starter and then okay he is you know too green to be able to succeed here now we're going to darnold you would rather darnold plays and then you get a feel for it and then maybe it's week six or seven and you've decided it's time. And then it's just going to be his show for the next 20, 25 games guaranteed. It's your show, man. Off we go. That's, I think a good

way to look at it for why to be patient and why not to, you know, just throw them in there and see what happens. Because if you have to pull them out, then it's not, it's not a good situation. In that case, you'd rather just be able to go with them. Uh, first name, last name says, speaking of the 2022 draft, Theo Jackson was a rookie that he acquired that Casey acquired. Yeah, that's a great point. It's a great point. And I mean, Theo Jackson will soon become a guy for them. I think more and more this year, he's going to get in the game. I wouldn't be surprised if he splits some reps with Harrison Smith because I mean, Harrison Smith, they don't want him playing a thousand snaps again.

We see Theo Jackson out there all the time in training camp. And he's been, if you're ranking the best players in training camp this year, number one is Justin Jefferson. It's always going to be Justin Jefferson. Number two might be Theo Jackson. The guy's made plays everywhere. It's a great find. And it's a find of a scouting staff picking up a guy who would fit for Brian Flores or a way. Actually, did they pick him up before Brian Flores? Oh, I guess that's just a coincidence then. How about that? They just found a guy with some talent. And yeah, I guess, I mean, that's the

thing about it is I don't really care. And I never have how you got the players. I just care that you've got them and okay. You got Ivan pace on drafted free agent. Well, it's not a draft pick. Who cares? You don't have to give them back. Same with Theo Jackson. Well, you got them off someone's practice squad. Well, they got Anthony Carter in a trade with Miami. They didn't have to give back all the catches. They got Chris Carter from a trade with the Philadelphia Eagles because he caught too many touchdowns or something in Philly or whatever it was that Buddy Ryan said. I mean, it doesn't matter how you get them.

You just got to get them. And that's a good point. It's a good find from the scouting staff that year to bring him in. Matt says, does the night practice being postponed after the first preseason game sort of throw you off in the evaluating the phases? It doesn't really because, well, one, there's a day between. So there's the game and then there's a day off.

And then usually when they come back from a day off, it's a pretty intense practice. But also Kevin O'Connell just doesn't treat that one the same as Mike Zimmer did. Mike Zimmer treated the night practice like it was a preseason game, that it was a scrimmage and they ran a ton of 11 on 11s. It was intense. He cared about it. He cared about how people performed. You could make a difference, a move on the, on the depth chart, potentially, if you had a great night practice,

Kevin O'Connell has run it like a very normal practice each year. Which way is right. I don't know. I know which way was more entertaining and which way I could ascertain more information from who, if you made plays the night practice you had more of a chance but i think you'll just run a normal practice and people can see what that looks like and get their look at darn old and mccarthy and jefferson will hype up the crowd and it's a fun time for all the fans still it still has that energy but after the first year of it i thought okay i don't i don't think this is i can use this the same way as I used to. I did a preview a couple of times of the night practice. I did articles that said,

here's what we're looking for in the night practice because it was a big step in the, in the Zimmer camp. It just isn't now. So I think, you know, the one thing that will be interesting though, here's what I will be looking for is does anything change after? So I guess here's the answer is a little more yes than no, because does anything change as far as the lineup after preseason game? So if somebody has a really good preseason game, Oh, now they're getting a lot more reps out there or somebody has a bad preseason game. Oh, they're getting less reps.

That will be something I'm taking a look at. Let's see. I like that you guys are keeping track of the count of likes. Yeah, feel free to like. That does good stuff, right? Evan says, is the rookie deal with the fifth year option even going to be an advantage in a couple years

when players are demanding new contracts after three or four seasons? Oh, it definitely is because even let's say JJ McCarthy's phenomenal next year and they win 12 games and he's a franchise quarterback and all of you are cutting your hair like JJ McCarthy. And he then is great in year three and they're going to sign him to an extension you can spread that out a heck of a lot more the earlier you sign it and you try to make it longer and that's part of the deal like okay well we'll sign we'll sign that three year you know after three years for you but we need it to be five years right and And you can use those final two years that he's already under contract to spread out the cap hits. So when you look at some of the deals that have

been signed after three years, usually it isn't until year six that it actually becomes somewhat problematic. I think that was the case with Josh Allen, where it was either year five or six, where it took the big jump up. And, uh, that is an edge to be able to do that. It's still an advantage. You can keep it low for a few more seasons. Um, but that player gets the huge signing bonus. They get the cash in their pocket. They get to say they're the highest paid and all that, but there still is an advantage there for sure. Uh, all right. Couple more questions when we're approaching two hours here it's probably time for me to go do some work on something else still got a article to write for the mailbag

on the written side so go check out uh the the newsletter over at purpleinsider.com christopher says if jj mccarthy impresses in the first preseason game, do you see him getting more time with the ones possible? It is possible. So I look at it this way. If he has a really good preseason game and doesn't get any action with the ones in the joint practice, then we know that it's completely over. This is no sort of competition. It never was. We're good here. Sam Darnold's the quarterback. And I think that that will happen even if Sam or even if JJ McCarthy has a good game, that it will still be just Sam Darnold. This QB won the rest of the way, but it at least opens the door for that discussion a little bit more. If he goes out there and goes 14 for 20, 215 yards, two touchdowns, no picks scrambles for another one or something. If he looks phenomenal, then maybe we do see a little

bit of JJ McCarthy getting in with the ones against Cleveland, but, or, or even in the night practice, as you mentioned. So yeah, I guess the night practice I'll be looking for what the implications were. And that might be a good point there. Uh, I changed my mind. I talked myself into it, but I still expect no matter what JJ McCarthy does that Sam Bradford, Sam Darnold will be the guy that this is when I'm approaching two straight hours. Now I'm starting to start to make mistakes. I like in the fourth quarter where I've become fatigued. But no, seriously.

Yeah. I think if he has a really good game and he still doesn't take any first team reps, then we don't need to talk about that really anymore. That's pretty solidified. Darnold's the guy, but if he has a good game and starts taking some reps with Justin Jefferson, well, then we got a conversation to have.

That seems like something we'd live stream on. Uh, miles says, has McBride flashed anything? Unfortunately, no, he truly hasn't. I just don't think he's an NFL player.

That's kind of how it looks right now. He's a camp body status at the moment. And if he proves otherwise in the preseason game, maybe we'll see, but it's a seventh round picks, man. I'm not even going to try to pronounce your name, but I'm glad you're here. I think JJ McCarthy will impress us with his athleticism and throw on the run. Yeah. That, and that's what you should really be looking for. Uh, the results, uh, and the final stat line

are worth looking at and talking about, but look at the skills, look at how he operates, carries himself, but look at, look at the skills. Cause that's what is going to be developed over a few years. Okay. Um, let's see. Well, Mike Boone played for the Panthers tonight. All right. Good for you, Mike Boone. Uh, Mike Boone is a really nice guy. I'm glad he's still out there doing it. Uh, did, did I do the ad read? Yes, I did. And, uh, thankfully someone reminded me of it because I would have totally forgot. I would have totally forgot. So, all right, I've reached the bottom of my scrolling. Took an hour and 55 minutes, but we got here.

And now we've gotten here to the preseason. I'm so thrilled that we're going to have it. We're going to have the podcast live after the game, about an hour after the game. Once Dame is a Tani from the pioneer press and I go down to, uh, Oh, did I need the Circa ad? I don't have to do that for every show. That's like a twice a week deal. Uh, but shout out to Circa. We'll be there soon. Um, but you guys are on it. You guys are on. I really appreciate that. You're going to have a lot more to remember. I should, I should email a few of them to you guys during the season. Cause there's going to be more, uh, but thank you for bringing that up. Um, so anyway, after the game, about an hour after we'll go down, we'll listen to Kevin O'Connell. We'll talk to JJ McCarthy. We'll

come back up to the press box where the coordinators usually are. That's where we shoot from and we'll do a live show from there. So if you're new, then this will be the first time that you're seeing us do that. And that'll be fun. Cause I see the audience is growing every day here on YouTube. Super happy about that. And very thankful for all the people who have joined and continue to join on a nightly basis. I just can't thank you enough all season long, a lot of live broadcasts and the first one of the year from TCO performance center on Saturday. So I will see you guys then. As long as there's no news that I need to do a podcast for tomorrow,

I'll see you guys then. I really appreciate it. Thanks so much for everybody. And we have football. Football. Football.