Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Should the Vikings be afraid of Will Levis's bad stats?

Episode Date: March 31, 2023

Matthew Coller and intern Haley English talk about her extensive look at Will Levis and Hendon Hooker through a purely statistical perspective. She talks about the red flags and the ways in which Levis would need to be an outlier to succeed and how Hooker's stats are both good and not quite as excellent as other recent success stories. Plus they discuss the Vikings' 8.5 over-under win total and new rules in the NFL. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to another episode of Purple Insider, Matthew Pollard here along with intern Haley English who is now Hately English after she ran Will Levis's statistics for an article today and I want to start there with you Haley that you did a comparison between Will Levis and Hendon Hooker statistically and I think people have a sense for how this turned out, but there was a lot of interesting things that you ran across. Are you completely out after seeing the horrors of Will Levis's statistics? I have to say, I thought it would be better than it was, but it turned out to be pretty gnarly. Yeah, like back when people were saying he was a quarterback prospect through the college season last year, I was like, all right, let me like watch something on this guy. Let me look at his like just general box score stats.

And they were like all kind of horrible. And I was like, why is he regarded as this like first round top quarterback kind of talent type of thing? Yeah, but when you look at his stats, he's basically below average and just about everything. I think he was 187th graded quarterback by PFF in college last season. Nowhere near C.J. Stroud, Bryce Young, even Hendon Hooker, which we'll talk about. But yeah, just underwhelming stats all across the board. And so, you know, looking at historically, you ran all the numbers for recent first and second round quarterbacks by PFF grade.

And Will Levis was even lower than Josh Allen throwing the ball, which Josh Allen is the most famous outlier who has ever outliered when it comes to this. That almost everyone else across the board that became a good quarterback at least was grading elite by PFF in college, which kind of makes sense, right? If you're going to be a top draft pick in the NFL draft, usually you playFF in college, which kind of makes sense, right? If you're going to be a top draft pick in the NFL draft, usually you play well in college. But what do you, I mean, do you think that there's something to be said for a toolsy quarterback that has this giant arm? I mean, I think the trouble with a Josh Allen comparison is that Josh Allen is one of the great running quarterbacks in NFL history already in his career. And Will Levis is not that kind of quarterback, but maybe the NFL looking at guys

like this and saying, we know that there's great upside and we've seen other players who couldn't throw as well improve over the years in the NFL. Yeah. Josh Allen is that gigantic outlier he was kind of horrible throwing the ball in college he was graded like 65 in his passing grade the year before he entered the NFL and he kind of almost struggled his first two seasons in the NFL and then sort of had this random breakout year that now everyone thinks oh like maybe Justin Fields can do that maybe this quarterback can do that so Josh Allen has this been this like physical specimen who came out of nowhere in the NFL. And yeah, I don't really think it's easily replicable by any quarterback. But he also had that rushing ability in college.

So he was like, he had that skill that Will Levis kind of doesn't. But he was just kind of regarded with his arm talent. And I feel like that's what Levis is like has going for him. That was also like Paxton Lynch's thing too. And he turned out to be one of the biggest busts, even in the XFL. So yeah, just a weird situation all around. I noticed you didn't mention Christian Hackenberg. So I will, but it might have some vibes.

I mean, Christian Hackenberg, and we know this about Mel Kiper historically, that he has always kind of overvalued these guys who have giant arms in his mocks and his you know estimations of where they're going to be picked and hackenberg is one of the all-time examples of that he was being talked about as potential number one overall and he had the same thing where he had this really good junior year where he had a bunch of good receivers and a good supporting cast. Now, I think it was his senior year or whatever year it was that he came out. I forget exactly if he came out after junior or senior.

And his numbers tanked. And a lot of people, and I think the Jets probably thought this to some extent, thought like, oh, well, you know, the junior year, that's the one you should really be looking at. And the same thing goes for Will Levis, but there are some really concerning things that are stylistic play. And one of those is that he just gets sacked a lot. And a lot of his interceptions don't even come on deep balls. I mean, I think things, I think the mistakes that quarterbacks make in college can carry over to the NFL. And it seems like Will Levis has a lot of

them. Yeah, he had one of the lowest air yards per target out of most of the top quarterback prospects coming out of the draft right now. And he was throwing interceptions at a really high rate. His touchdown interception ratio, even his junior and senior season, was 1.9. So he's throwing about double as many touchdowns as interceptions but most of these other guys are throwing like 10 to 1 um in college just because kind of that's how the normal how it goes but yeah he's not chucking the ball downfield he's getting intercepted on the shorter passes and that's kind of not really like promising on what you want to see um coming into the NFL because that's like you should be really good at the short game. So yeah, that's a big concern with him. He did have that like decently good

junior season and kind of dropped off towards his senior season. And his EPA per play on passing was nearly zero in his senior year. And we can just like quickly compare him to two comparisons that I found most recently were Jordan Love and James Morgan. James Morgan drafted by the Jets, kind of a horrible quarterback, never really took an NFL snap, but they both had that decently good junior year and then dropped off on their senior year. And then we don't know about Jordan Love yet, but sort of kind of didn't pan out in the NFL as of now. And James Morgan was another guy who got talked about as like, oh, maybe he could be a high draft pick. And then the NFL just really wasn't buying it. I don't suspect that Will Levis will be a fourth round

draft pick, but this is where it's really tricky to figure out because a lot of times the NFL will evaluate them on other things that go so far beyond just the statistics and their physical tools. And one of those things is like bringing guys in and meeting with them, putting them on the whiteboard, trying to see how they react and remember things because a big element of playing quarterback is being able to recognize patterns and then repeat those kinds of things. So you see safeties rotate and you know, where you got to go with the football and things like that. And it feels like someone getting sacked, even though they didn't push the ball down the field, because if they push the ball down the field, you could say, all right, well, he's probably just sitting in

the pocket for a long time, waiting for long routes to develop. This seems like, is he even in college reading the right areas of the field? Like I'm trying to figure out like two and two together of why someone would get sacked this much and have this many interceptions when they weren't pushing the ball down the field. Yeah, he took 36 sacks last year and in a shortened college season,

that's gonna be even more in the NFL. Hendon Hunker was another guy who took a ton of sacks but compared to Bryce Young CJ Stroud Anthony Richardson like those guys aren't taking sacks they took about 10 in each of their seasons that they started um meanwhile you have Levis taking over triple that amount um so that's just not another promising stat that we have for him so if Kevin O'Connell called you and he said, Hey, I saw your statistical article. You're really, really hating my guy. Cause we're going to draft will Levis. And he said, here's why I love the upside. I love the projection. We need tight window throws. We need a guy with a big giant beastly arm, no more Kirk floating balls into the secondary. Um, what would you say? What would you

say if he asked your opinion on this and said, and said that he liked a lot of the tools and a lot of the whiteboard and everything else that he checked the boxes? I would say don't do it in the first round or like, don't do it where you are at pick number 23. Um, like some reason mock drafts have had him falling out of the first round. So the Vikings, I don't know. Do they have a second round pick? I don't even remember.

They do not. They traded for a TJ Hawkinson. Okay well arguably like Hawkinson I'd say is better than Levis so um but if there's the right situation and you can get him in a good value then fine draft him but he's the guy that needs to sit for at least a year um and kind of learn behind Kirk Cousins he needs to learn NFL defenses because they're much better than college defenses. And he arguably didn't play great against college defenses that are weaker. So he's the quarterback that he needs to learn. But if you really feel that you could turn him into a Josh Allen, I'm not saying at all that he's Josh Allen because he is not. But if you really, really absolutely

feel that he can make that sort of jump, then fine, go for it at good value. Yeah. I think what I would say is that you're putting your life in your hands a little bit, if you do it, because do you want to make your bet when you have your big chance at drafting a quarterback? And look, I just want to make clear to everybody, if they draft Will Levis, I'm going to like the pick because it's the future quarterback. The Vikings have picked their guy. We know where this is going. And I don't think I'm any better than anyone else at predicting quarterback success. However, if you go so far against the standards that are set statistically in college for

the quarterbacks who made it, then you are really taking a big risk here. And you are, you are saying, please second guess me when we go back and like, oh, okay. So you, you drafted the guy that, you know, couldn't really succeed in college based on some one outlier. Cause there really isn't another guy who didn't play well, at least a bit in college than Josh Allen. And then put up, you know, really great statistics and became an all pro and everything else. You really can't find too many others unless you go like Dan Marino or something. You've got to go way back. But yeah, I think that's what I would say. Like, do you want to take the risk of making your franchise quarterback who might be your one and only pick

as a quarterback, that guy? And if he said, yep, I'm all in, I guess I don't know. Like, all right, okay, we'll see how it turns out. I mean, because none of us really know. I just think that like after looking at your statistical analysis, it just seems pretty scary to go with somebody like that and made me think that there might be four quarterbacks taken in the first and maybe some of this is just smoke and mirrors with him yeah if josh allen didn't have that kind of breakout in the nfl then i'd be like why are you even considering this guy as a

first round talent there hasn't been a quarterback drafted since justin herbert who's had a below 90 pff passing grade in the first and second rounds. So like Jack Wilson had the second highest PFF passing grade behind Baker Mayfield. And those two guys aren't necessarily the best in the NFL. So why would you want to take someone who's got a 65 passing grade when there's no one to compare him to in the NFL if Josh Allen didn't exist? Right. And I found it to be interesting just with your list that not all guys who had great PFF passing grades in college succeeded, but all the guys who succeeded had great passing grades for the most part. Like obviously Lamar Jackson did

not totally unique. Josh Allen did not totally unique. And the other thing is that Will Levis is not young. Like that's worth saying as well. We would be talking about how old he is if we weren't talking about how old this other guy is, which is Hendon Hooker. Now, speaking of those PFF grades, his Hendon Hooker's statistics in the regular season, his actual box score stats are fantastic. His PFF grade though, man, it's really not spectacular. What did you make of just a pure statistical analysis of Hendon Hooker? Hendon Hooker's stats, when you compare them against Stroud, Young, Richardson, and Levis, they're like outstanding. He's had the highest completion percent out of all of them, kind of by far.

He completed a little over 69% of his passes. And the next closest, I want to say was Will Levis at just over 65%. So that's kind of crazy. He's far like a really, really accurate passer. If you do adjust that completion percent, it's about 75, but Will Levis was like actually kind of in the same area. So I wouldn't take that with like the biggest stat because he was getting a lot of help from his

receivers um but he doesn't turn the ball over he doesn't create turnover worthy plays he's making the big plays down the field uh and he also was kind of a really great rusher last season he averaged 7.4 yards per rush which was kind of crazy uh if you compare it to will levis is like 2.7 yards per rush last season um But yeah, just overall great passing stats. The only kind of downside is he took sacks at about the same rate as Will Levis. And his PFF grade is 85, so it's great. It's 20 points above Will Levis, but it's kind of not in that 90 range where you want to stay. Right, yeah.

And I think that's sort of the smoking gun of, hey, he threw to a lot of wide open wide receivers. It wasn't a lot of the high quality throws or it was a lot of easy throws. And plus, there's the element of him being extremely old, which if people think that I'm done making Hendon Hooker is old jokes. I am not. Somebody actually tweeted me the other day and said he's so old he gets your references from the 90s. Like, yeah, that's there are quite a few on the show. So I looked this up, I was trying to find and I and I added it as a sentence to your article just about if there was anything on age and quarterbacks. And I did find a 538 study, you have to go back a few years to 2018 on this, but that older quarterbacks, 24 and older, had pretty much failed across the board coming into the league. And that's the part that, again, where we talk

about with Will Levis, you're sort of risking everything on someone who didn't play good in college. You might be risking a lot on somebody who goes very much against the grain of statistical analysis from age. And it's not just the older quarterbacks, the Chris Winkies or Brandon Whedons of the world, but it's even like Baker Mayfield. When Baker Mayfield came out, he was 23 years old. And I guess, you know, Joe Burrow bucked this, but was a historically good quarterback at LSU his final season. I don't know what you think of that, if that matters to you or not, when you look at those numbers, but I almost think in a way, if you're going to be 25, you actually had to be even better than he was. Yeah, I'd probably say that too, because he's what a sixth year senior, I think right now. And like, if you're drafting someone pretty early on who's like an older

quarterback at 25 years old you kind of want him to start right away but i don't think hooker's that kind of quarterback that can start right away especially coming off an acl um so that's why i think he's got to sit also for a year maybe even two years to learn behind the kirk cousins potentially um but then if you wait two years, he's 27. So like, that's kind of the risk reward, like part of it. And yeah, it's,

it's definitely a weird situation with both Levis. Cause Levis is 24 also. And definitely like, cause they're so much older than Stroud and young and stuff. Do you think that we have taken too much air out of the will Levis balloon here? The Hendon hooker thing. I think fans really,

I don't know if there's a lot of debate it's sort of like i'm not sure he's a little too old again if they took him you would have to say all right it's quarterback pff uh draft simulator will give you an a plus if you draft a quarterback in the first round it always does uh but i don't know like with hendon hooker it's the same sort of thing where it's just hard to look at it on paper and really make sense of it. And there were things last year that we probably should have recognized with Desmond Ritter or Malik Willis, where Malik Willis took a metric ton of sacks. And I'm sure that that was the league's big problem. Like, oh, he throws really hard. He

runs really fast. This is the opposite of Anthony Richardson, by the way. Anthony Anthony Richardson never takes sacks it's kind of incredible considering he had one of the highest average depth of targets in the league like you could totally get it with Anthony Richardson he's young he's inexperienced he put on the best athletic performance ever at the combine he threw the ball down the field the big time plays are there but even with Will Levis it's hard to find the big time plays it's hard to find the big time plays. It's hard to find the like, oh, this guy had this crazy highlight reel in college. It's entirely just projection, projection, projection. So it does become hard.

But I also don't want to be the person who takes away everyone's steam for getting potentially excited about Will Levis or Hendon Hooker when they see these guys mock to the Vikings. I don't know what to do with that. Yeah, I quickly found a comparison for Hendon Hooker, just like trying to go through some stats from his past two seasons compared to another quarterback of the past two seasons. I came up with Dwayne Haskins. He was a quarterback in college who was very accurate, like completed 70% of his passes. He really didn't turn the ball over, like didn't throw many, didn't throw many interceptions. And he had very similar EPA per pass and air yards per attempt as Hendon Hooker. So I kind of see that comparison being

somewhat decent. I know he had kind of a drastic end to his career but um yeah definitely like something to think about because haskins wasn't wasn't necessarily the best quarterback um in the nfl given he was drafted like midway through the first round right yeah and i think with haskins and i don't want to speak ill of someone who's passed away but i think that he had some issues with adapting to the NFL, which maybe Hendon Hooker won't. But I agree that when you're talking about, and I think Hendon Hooker can run, but running in college versus running in the NFL, it's a big difference. You almost have to be one of the freaks. Think about defensive end. There's a defensive end coming out in this draft who runs a 4-3, 4-3're getting, you got to run away from him. So Lamar can run away from him and Josh Allen can

have him bounce off. But, and even, even Daniel Jones is a gigantic dude. So unless you're a gigantic guy and you're absolutely freakish athletically, you're probably not a difference maker. So if you're a pocket quarterback, you have to be unbelievably accurate. You can't take the sacks. Your pocket presence has to be through the roof. And that's why I just, I just have a tough time. Like Levis, I could see a little more because he's a freak with his arm, but I just have a tough time believing that Hendon Hooker is going to actually be a first round pick because when you take someone to the first round, even if it's 32nd overall, that's your guy. Like you're, that your dude because you spent a first round pick.

It does not matter if it's 32 or if it's one. Every broadcast, Jim Nance. Hello, friends. We're back here at the game where first round pick Hendon Hooker is going to start his first game. They will always say that. And I just have a tough time believing they'll buy in. So I guess, you know, of course, we'll see how it plays out. But interesting to look at both under the microscope and wonder if either one is actually

worth that pick. Now, I have a little I have a little game for you. I was going to compare the scouting reports, but I found that hard to do. So I've just pulled a bunch of just just to tell us how strange and random the NFL world of scouting can be, to humble us after we have just spent 20 minutes talking about how these quarterbacks won't work out. So I have pulled a bunch of different scouting reports from NFL.com, and I am going to read to you the report,

and I want you to tell me whether you think the person worked out or not, and then we'll go through them, okay? So here is our first quarterback. This quarterback was compared by nfl.com to Jake Plummer, who you don't remember, but, uh, he was okay. He was all right. He won 13 games. Once this quarterback is an ascending quarterback prospect. This is from nfl.com by the way, Lance Zierlein, an ascending quarterback prospect who possesses the swagger and arm talent to create explosive plays inside and outside the pocket. The gunslinger mentality and improvised release points are clearly patterned off of one of his favorite players, Aaron Rodgers. However, he's a little more reminiscent of a blend of Jake Plummer and Johnny Manziel coming out of college, as was with Johnny Manziel coming out of college as was with Johnny Manziel. His work off schedule is due to inconsistent anticipation and a desire to hit

the big play. Do you think that this quarterback are gunslinging Aaron Rogers playmaker worked out in the NFL? I'm going to say no, just because that makes me think that Zach Wilson just because like Zach Wilson's favorite player has always been Aaron Rodgers so I don't know like obviously like I don't know if that's him but um I'm gonna say no just because the what like the presence and decision making isn't too great you are you're savvy yes Zach it's Zach Wilson. Of course, I had to include

a Jets quarterback, but that is Zach Wilson. But when you listen to that comparison and the playmaking and off schedule and everything, every year there's sort of different trends where whoever kind of just won or whatever just worked, the NFL would be like, ooh, what if it's that? Like, what if, is this a Mahomes? Could this be a Mahomes? And I think that Zach Wilson really benefited from that, that he was doing all these Mahomes-ian things with these funny arm angles and stuff like that.

But anybody who says that he was not spectacular to watch at BYU did not watch because he was one of the most fun players that I remember in college football. Okay, our next quarterback, though this quarterback had his ups and downs as a passer at his university, in a prolific spread offense, NFL general managers appreciate his ultra competitive nature, his athleticism, arm strength, and quick delivery, the insert mascot here, turned down a senior bowl invitation after regressing in the second half of the season. His eye level and pocket movement could be great, but he reverted back to staring down his first read.

During his sophomore season, he played in an offense that frequently took snaps under center, so he might have a leg up on other prospects in that regard. Did this quarterback work out or not? I'm going to say I have no idea who it is. I don't keep track of who declined senior bowl invitations. But I'm going to say that this quarterback did succeed. I don't know why, but I just feel it. Well, there is some ambiguity there. This is Geno Smith, actually. So he's being talked about as the spread offense and everything else but why I liked this draft profile is that Gino Smith

probably just needed a couple more years but there was no time for that and so when we were just talking about and I've tried to connect these in some way to uh Will Levis or Hendon Hooker is that like uh just like with Wilson and the arm talent and Levis, and then, you know, the same kind of thing of development is the NFL has got no time for that. You get like one year and then you better ball. And if not, you're probably out. I mean, even Justin Fields, like this is it, man, you play well this year or you are out the door. And so Gino Smith, probably because of the offense that he played in, did need more time to become a good quarterback and has proven that he could play in the NFL, but at the same time was not ready to do it as he was coming out of college.

But I thought that was interesting. For that year, there wasn't a comparison to make. Let me do another one here. This one is a NFL comparison to kurt warner okay so high praise for this quarterback the people's champ with a rags to riches story are culminating in one of the greatest one-year turnarounds in sports history he is a self-assured player with competitive toughness that teammates will gravitate gravitate toward. He's a rhythm passer who benefited from tempo and scheme, but his vision, touch, and read recognition made the offense special. He buys himself time inside the pocket, but creates explosive off-schedule plays with his arm or legs.

He throws with staggering precision and timing, but recognizes his own arm strength constraints, and he is forced to shrink the field accordingly. Did this quarterback work out or not? This weak-armed magician. It really sounded like that was going to be Joe Burrow or something until the weak arm. Now I want to say it's Brock Birdie because he has kind of been regarded as like a noodle arm type of quarterback, but I'm going to say he didn't work out just because of that. You are sharp.

It was Joe Burrow, actually. Yeah, yep, that is Joe Burrow. And I think that this kind of goes for how hard this is. When he came out, the arm strength was a concern. I mean, even through his first year, there were people putting together like compilations on Twitter because you can make anything work with film. So everybody like stay aware of that, that you can make anyone look good or bad with a couple of film clips. But there were compilations of like,

here's the underthrown passes in his first year. And then he gets the leg injury. So everyone thinks, oh, he's not going to get any better. He was older. And then he comes out and becomes one of the great quarterbacks in the NFL, probably the second best quarterback in the entire league. And you know, that's, that's, what's hard about it, but all those things about the swagger, the confidence, the pocket presence, the precision in passing all of that, I think, you know, sounds pretty good. All right. Uh, we'll do, you know, two or three more here. Okay. Our next quarterback is a Carson Wentz comparison. Okay. He is a big, talented, full field scanner who is able to find the right read and sling it around the yard from the pocket or on the move. He rushed throws in this draft year, but showed marked improvement in that area, including a specific game.

He trusts his protection while working through coverages and route development and has a big boy arm with drive velocity to stress and impress defenses. This is, this is fantastic. He's confident attacking downfield, but touch throws evade him. And he may have created some tentativeness with certain shorts and intermediate throws again the comp is Carson Wentz did our quarterback work out or not interesting I don't know why I'm thinking Mac Jones just because I feel like you need a couple years under Carson well like under Carson Wentz's belt to compare him to him. But I don't know. I'm thinking Mac Jones,

and I don't know if you want to call that a make or a miss because he's a big question mark still, but I think more on the miss side. Half and half, I guess. Maybe if Matt Patricia wasn't his offensive coordinator last year. I don't know. I think get Bill Belichick his wins record, and then that is is justin herbert

yeah so it's sort of funny because carson wentz at the time that it would have gotten that comparison would have been thought of differently than after his injury when he was more limited but i thought this was interesting because this is the way we're talking about will levis and when justin herbert came out and this would be like my hesitation about saying Vikings, don't do it. Don't draft Will Levis. His stats aren't that great. There were a lot of criticisms of Justin Herbert of, you know, can he execute an offense? And the short passing wasn't very good. He used to do this funny thing where he would snap the ball and he'd like spin it in his hands. Like, what are you, what are you doing? Like just the details of the game were just not very good with Justin Herbert.

And he has become a complete superstar. Okay. One more you have done excellently in this game. One more. This right here, this here quarterback is compared to Andrew Luck. At the end of the day, this quarterback has NFL size, arm strength, accuracy, pocket mobility, po poise and field reading capability his wind up is an eyesore for sure but he has the velocity to mitigate additional

release time while this quarterback has mental toughness and talent to start tomorrow early sideline seasoning could help him better process coverages in an attempt to eliminate future interceptions. How did our man do here? I think our man did not succeed. And I think it's Sam Darnold because of the interceptions. You are absolutely correct. That is Sam Darnold. My gosh, you have done extremely well with this. Well done. Well done. Yes, that is. I mean, maybe a hint that I was going to throw in all of your Jets quarterbacks, but yep, that is Sam Darnold, Andrew Luck comparison. But the reason I included him was, oh, the interceptions, don't worry. He'll just work his way past that. No, he won't. A lot of times they don't. That's the thing with

interception, like turnovers, sacks. A lot of times they don't. That's the thing with interception, like turnovers, sacks. A lot of times they don't. Well done. Good job on that game. Thank you. So I also asked you, got a couple other things to talk about, to take a little peek at the over-unders for the DraftKings released them, which is like a news story these days, people's over-unders.

But the Vikings got an eight and a half over-under. I'm sorry, I don't have it in front of me. How many teams were ahead of the Vikings? Did you count it up? Did you make the list? How many teams were ahead? Yeah, so the 49ers were at 11 and a half. The Eagles were at 10 and a half.

And then three teams at nine and a half were the Saints, Dallas, and Detroit. And three at eight and a half being the Vikings, Giants, and Seahawks. Okay, so let's talk about this a little bit. First, your initial take on the eight and a half for the Vikings. I think it's fair. Just because last season, all of their wins were on like one score games. They won all of them. So that's like their wins last year, I guess it wasn't really reflective of kind of how good or not good they were.

So I think eight and a half is fair, maybe putting like some of those one score wins into losses. And I think in order to like be up there and like nine wins to hit that over, you got to be confident in the defense. Right now, I think they're kind of relying on the offense and taking that like mediocre to kind of bad defense into consideration when they're giving them eight and a half wins because like a team like the saints, they have great receivers. They have a decent quarterback in Derek Carr, but they have a great defense. So kind of that's, that's why I think the saints would be over the Vikings there. Yeah. So I want to talk about the saints, but for the Vikings, you can improve the scheme, but still end up with the same results if they don't do more, I think, in the secondary because the combination of Patrick Peterson

and Duke Shelley alone, just on production, I'm not saying that they needed to keep Patrick Peterson, but just on production is very hard to repeat. Those guys put together like 20 pass breakups on their own. And when opposing quarterbacks were targeting both of them their quarterback rating was like 60 for those guys so they're out the door and now Byron Murphy is in who might be a good player for them and then question marks all over the place but it would be almost if Andrew Booth Jr. came in and played like Patrick

Peterson last year I mean the Vikings have a pure superstar. That's kind of hard to project him doing that. So I do think that we're in a little bit of a dicey situation roster wise, but with the Vikings, I think that number could move depending on what comes next. If they're moving on from Zedaria Smith and Delvin Cook, then that one number might go down or stay the same. If they create more cap space, acquire more people, if Odell Beckham comes here or something, I know he's going to be a jet, but if he, if he comes here or something, you don't wear green pants unless you're going to be a jet. You don't do that. If you're joining the Vikings to the owner's meetings.

But, um, you know, I, I think, I think you're right. It's kind of a safe and very fair number for them. Are you buying new Orleans? I don't know. I think that like around nine wins is like where they're going to get them. I think Derek Carr is like a quarterback that can't get you more than like nine or 10 wins. I think that's like the biggest, like along with the Vikings one being fair, I think the Saints is like the biggest one that's kind of a fair ranking for them. Yeah, I think that's kind of right where they'll be

because their defense is going to keep them in a lot of games, but I don't know how much Derek Carr is going to, I don't want to say hold them back, but like kind of like on offense. If I'm making the case for the Saints being better than that, I think I'm just looking at those other teams saying, how many games will Carolina win with a rookie quarterback? Atlanta? What are you doing? What are you doing? Atlanta? What is Atlanta doing? Atlanta buying in fully to Desmond Ritter. Is that what they're really going to do here? I hope not because he wasn't good. I know he wasn't. Uh, and they have

such a good team around him that I think that they're being a little bit foolish I could be wrong, he might end up being great But there's no actual evidence to suggest that that would be the case Between his draft status and his initial performance And then Arthur Blank saying, I don't know, Lamar could get hurt It's like, okay, Arthur, we know what everybody's doing here with the owners You don't have to make up stuff So anyway, Seattle was the other team that was eight and a half, right?

Yes. And the Giants. OK. Oh, OK. Right. So what do we what do we think there? Seattle could be Geno Smith regression or it could be Geno Smith plays the same and they're a better team and they win more than that. I think. Yeah, I think eight and a half is almost like kind of deserved for the Seahawks because their offense is great. Like Kenneth Walker and then DK Metcalf, Tyler Lockett, and Geno Smith. I feel like that's kind of a similar offense to the Saints, but Seattle's defense is much worse than the Saints, so I think that's kind of what lands them at 8.5.

I think they could potentially go under if their defense plays kind of like it did last season and really took them out of games. Um, but their offense is going to need to keep them in. Yeah. So the hard thing about these all the time is because, you know, gamblers are good at their job, setting these lines and it's like, Oh, that sounds right. You know, like that's not the take was supposed to be like some sort of pound the table. It's going to be over. I guarantee it. But it does sound right. I think that Seattle, this is why they should draft quarterback because Gino Smith probably gets you in the middle only with new Orleans.

Derek Carr's your guy, but he's a middle and quarterback. So, you know, you can win some and lose some with Gino. You could still be competitive. You could sit somebody that kind of screams Anthony Richardson to me. I don't know if they'll actually do that, but it kind of does. Like sit him for a year, scrambling quarterback like Pete Carroll had before. The New York Giants are interesting here because Daniel Jones does not play the Vikings. So there's no way he's putting up the same statistics as he did last year but but we have to admit that with Darren Waller there

they should be a better offense around Daniel Jones like his supporting cast had receivers I had never heard of that were smoking the Vikings but they weren't smoking other teams now at least he's got that weapon that's true but I think the Giantsants are at the most risk out of the eight and a half teams to go under. Just because their offense isn't great. I don't know if Saquon Barkley is going to want to play on the tag, so that's a question mark as of right now. But they did lose their number one graded receiver, which was Richie James, I want to say. I don't know if he's a free agent, hasn't signed anywhere. Last I could find, he's just not on the team.

So I don't know. Like Darren Waller is good, but he has that risk of injury. So he's also a question mark. I really don't think the Giants got too much better on offense by losing some players and gaining Darren Waller. But it may help Daniel Jones. But again, like Daniel Jones, I don't think is the player that's going to get you pretty far or at least like too far in the playoffs or the Super Bowl or anything. So I think they're most risk of going under. I agree with you. I think they're even with Darren Waller there. There is just the kind of regression monster.

I mean, they were the fraud team more than the Vikings were halfway through the season. And they had a couple of good games toward the end and then won a playoff game. But I mean, playoff game, like there are quarterbacks who win a playoff game, a single playoff game all the time. And it always changes your life and everyone thinks that you're good, but I don't think that that's the case. I think that he is probably the 20th best quarterback in the league. And last year they got away with the one score wins and everything else that the Vikings did. We just talked about it more with the Vikings because it was historic, but that, that screams regression for them. If they don't get a lot better, uh, of the teams that are ahead of the Vikings in the, the, uh, win loss total. Is there any that you think are not actually better than the Vikings? That's a good question.

I don't necessarily think so. For the 49ers, they're set at 11.5, and I think – because as of right now, I think Darnold's starting the season. I don't really have much promise in that. It depends on how long he starts. If he starts for a good portion of the season, then I'd say, oh God, no. No matter how good their defense is, I don't think Kyle Shanahan can fix Sam Darnold. So I'd have a Darnold-led 49ers lower than the Vikings. But I still think the Eagles, even though they lost their entire defense,

I'd still think that the Eagles are ahead of them. The Saints with their defense and a decent Derek Carr and company. Dallas. Yeah, I think they'll be better than the Vikings. And I think they may go over nine and a half. I think that's a good one. And Detroit, they fixed their defense with one of the best offenses in the NFL last year. I think that's better than the Vikings too. Yeah.

I mean, Detroit, the amount that they've poured into this defense, if it's even average. And when we say, we do that here all the time. Oh, well, if the Vikings can even be average. They actually have proof that they could be average based on what they've added, that they could progress quite a bit, especially secondary. And this is something that we've seen many, many times, that you can sack the quarterback all you want, even pressure. But if you can't cover anybody, it doesn't really matter that the opposing quarterbacks are going to shred you.

And that's really what happened with Detroit last year. They didn't have anything, but now Aiden Hutchinson, second year, a lot of additions there. I do like them at this moment to still win the division. But what is your, what is your feeling about the Detroit lines?

I mean, they're very Jetsy, really. But the one response I see from fans who can't deal with the fact that the Lions are favored to win the division is they're the Lions. Like, that's the main argument. It's nothing about the roster, the coaches, the coordinators, whatever. It's just they're the Lions. It's not a statistical analysis, but is that a fair analysis?

Yeah, I think it is. It's kind of like saying, hey, it's the New York Jets. They're always going to be the Jets, the same old Jets, so like the same old Lions. I think, yeah, I think they definitely probably should win the division, assuming Jordan Love doesn't become Aaron Rodgers in his first full season. But, yeah, they address the defense. But I don't know how much Jared Goff is going

to really take them. Cause he was a big product of the receivers around him last year and they are kind of getting Jamison Williams. I don't know how good he's going to be, but, um, yeah, I think the, but the lines have an easy path to, to the division win. I think, yeah, I think so too. Um, uh, that it's just fair to look at their roster and say it's very strong. If they had lost Ben Johnson, their offensive coordinator,

I may have questioned it, but any man who draws up a play where he throws the ball to Penny Sewell is a man for me. So no, I, yeah, I don't think it's a valid argument because, you know, obviously I'm from Buffalo, but you can do this with a number of teams where they were just tragically bad for a long time. I think it was 17 straight years that the Bills missed the playoffs and then they got Josh Allen.

And then now they're there every year. It's like if you turn that corner, you can stay there and just be good. This happened with the Saints and Drew Brees. I know Jared Goff isn't that player, but offense will do that for you. Okay. So real quick, Brian Gutekunst said that he hasn't been able to get Aaron Rodgers to pick up the phone, which is part of the thing that facilitated the trade. So that makes Aaron Rodgers seem like in his interviews that he's been lying about that whole thing. You worried that your future quarterback has a little troubles with the truth? No. I think this is going to be a whole big thing of like he said, she said. I don't really think we'll ever get the full truth.

Aaron Rodgers has his story. The Packers probably have their story. And they're both trying to make themselves feel like a victim, I think. So, yeah, I don't see really much concerns. Aaron Rodgers is a weird guy. He might have taken something differently just because he was going on a darkness retreat. He may not be totally like mentally there when he heard about something. So I don't know.

It's a question mark. What would Aaron Rodgers have to do for you to be out on Aaron Rodgers to the Jets? Nothing, honestly. Legally, let's say legally. Legally, like obviously if you commit a crime, like don't. But yeah, as of right now, like nothing really. The Jets want him, so yeah. Only crimes. That is the only thing that would make you out on Aaron Rodgers. Yeah, we poured enough cold water on quarterbacks today for that. So I won't say that it won't work out. But if they, if they get Odell Beckham on that team and Garrett Wilson and the rest of the, the Alan Lazard is a fairly good receiver as well.

You are handing the man, one of the best supporting casts in the league. And that's kind of the Tom Brady thing to Tampa Bay was New England's receivers fell apart. Their relationship started to sour. And then we kind of thought like, is he even that great anymore? And then went to a great, great, great supporting cast. And then, you know, so I not saying it's going to work or it's not going to work because who knows, but I could see where you're in a position to not care about his, his little fibs on whatever YouTube show. So, uh, okay. Last thing is just, uh, if you have any Vikings questions for me, wait, we forgot the rule changes. Oh, we forgot the rule changes. Yeah.

Sorry. Um, okay. I, I forgot about that. Yeah, that's right. I was going to ask you about if, um, because the NFL is looking at a bunch of rule changes. If you had any thoughts, if you had favorite rule changes that you wanted, or if, uh, there's like one rule change that they made that you remember that you really liked or hated. Okay. So I did some research on this and the coolest, most best rule changes. Uh, the first one I'd probably say is when they move the goalpost back. Um, so they're not running into a goalpost that's in the end zone like the CFL does.

That was a pretty interesting one that I found. And then there's also this crazy time at the end of the 1800s and the beginning of the 1900s where a field goal is worth more than a touchdown. So like in 18 from 1898, the touchdown went from four points to six points, but then in 1904, the field goal went from five to three points. So between 1898 and 1904, the field goal was worth five points and the touchdown was worth four, which is absolutely crazy. Like why ever go for a touchdown? Just go for the field goal.

Once you get in like red zone. Um, I found that pretty interesting. Okay. I love that. And that sounds like an article for you at some point. It's like, what if the rules had been the way that they were back then now with like today's kickers and everything who, who would have won last year if field goals were worth more than touchdowns,

maybe we can work on that. I love that. I, you know, for me, the, the worst rule probably people know what I'm going to say, is all rules that took away kick returns from us because kick returns were such a fun play and provided us with so much entertainment. And they just cut those by about a third and ruined everything. I think that one of the great stories ever in football history Is why you can't fumble the ball forward The holy roller, I'm sure that football fans know that But the Raiders being sacked and just like Heaving the ball forward and it bounces Picked it up for a touchdown to win a game

I mean, stuff like that, rule changes that come from that And I know what Vikings fans want me to say The most irritating rule change was the overtime rules in um the playoffs because brett farve and everything else do you like the overtime do you think it's fair like do you want it to be this way where each team touches the ball or do you feel like hey man you could have won in regulation um i think it's fair for for only the playoffs to have each team, like, touch the ball at least once. Like, mostly because that Bills-Chiefs game was so great

and it ended so kind of, like, unfairly, I'd say, just because, like, yeah, the Bills didn't really have a defense, didn't try to stop them, and, yeah, you need a defense to win a game. But, like, if you have two offenses that are just, like, slinging the ball back and forth and, no one's really like stopping them like don't make the like one rule in overtime kind of stop that game and end it for them yeah i think um in the regular season i would be this is maybe people might not like this take i'd be fine with ties i would be fine with no overtime i would feel bad for all the people who showed up at the game and saw the time,

but I think it would create more madness at the end of games where teams knowing it's a tie are scrambling to try to win in that last 30 seconds, as opposed to say, going to overtime and kneeling the timeout or something like that. That, and I also think it's more fair because if you're determining it with a coin flip, even when they have the field goal, the whole thing, you're still basically determining it with a coin flip.

I don't really love that for playoff scenarios and everything else. But in the playoffs, it's somebody, you know, you got to determine it somehow in the playoffs. I agree. We could play all night in the playoffs. I could, but I just, I never liked the idea of, Oh, this team got the ball first. So game over, they're probably just going to win in the regular season. It doesn't seem fair. So did you, do you like the number zero in the NFL now? I think I do. I was a big, like not fan. I don't know the word for that, but, or I was against when they let like, like cornerbacks and stuff where numbers like one through 10,

just because like, I didn't want the change in anything. Like I wanted all the numbers to be like nice and clean for like whatever position they were, but I don't know. It's kind of cool. It's like sauce Garner's wearing number one. He's rocking one, but I think Cowan Ridley was the first one who said like, I'm wearing zero. So I think it'll be kind of cool. It'll like up Jersey sales. So more money for them, but cool number. All you need to say is that you were being hately. That's what you were just, you're just being hately. Yeah. I like, I like the, the weird numbers kind of looks like it's college,

but I think whatever players want to wear different numbers. I of looks like it's college, but I think whatever. Players want to wear different numbers. I just wish they let the big guys wear number zero. And I also want to just scold the NFL. We got to make those penalties for roughing the passer reviewable. They're just too hard. They did not pass that one. And I don't get it.

How many of them are there a game? All I want is the coach to say that wasn't roughing the passer and the standard can be very, very high. But like what happened with Chris Jones, where he causes the fumble, the ball is already out. And then he's called for a roughing the passer. It changes the game so much that I think it's a thing that would probably get challenged 10, 12 times a year, but all of those could just be a mistake. It could just be sometimes a guy hits the chest, but it looks like the helmet because he throws his head back.

It's so fine of details that it needs to be that I think that was a big mistake. And also the third quarterback thing, it might still happen, but we're not really sure. That's sort of tabled, so to speak. So, okay. Any Vikings questions for me to close us out yeah i've got one so um let me get it so i don't know how we haven't talked about it but the herschel walker trade um i'd say probably the worst trade in nfl history but if we compare that to the russell wilson trade and the deshaun Watson trade, how bad do those two quarterbacks have to be for that?

Like those two trades to be worse than the Herschel Walker one. So there's another part of this where it's not just that Russell Wilson has to. Well, if he just plays like last year for all the years, then that'll be one of the biggest busts but seattle has to win the super bowl in order for it to start to approach because yeah the vikings gave up all this draft capital to uh dallas and there were weird details to that to where like the vikings sent players but if they cut the players then dallas got draft picks and then yeah it was crazy it was one of the most insane trades ever and then so of course Dallas was like yeah we're cutting those players and taking the draft picks so Jimmy Johnson with

the all-time robbery there uh that's part of it but then Dallas uses those draft picks to create one of the greatest football teams to ever exist so that element of it really adds to the sting it's not just that Herschel Walker didn't work out. And then the other part of it too, was the Vikings didn't even use Herschel Walker with the right running scheme. They were trying to have him adapt to their skin. It just, it was complete calamity. So if Seattle uses the draft, let's say they use the draft pick on Anthony Richardson and he becomes the next Cam Newton and they go to the Superbowl, they win the Superbowl. Let's say they get to play on good turf, unlike Cam Newton and his Superbowl, but then it starts to approach it. Gosh, the Deshaun Watson thing is kind of the same way where it's like, it's not just if

Deshaun Watson is a total failure in Cleveland that happens all the time where you trade for somebody and it doesn't work out. It's if what you traded turns out to be completely transformational for that franchise and they win. And the other one that should be mentioned in this ballpark, too, is Ricky Williams. Mike Ditka trading his whole draft for Ricky Williams. As a kid, I had the Sports Illustrated where Ricky Williams was in the dress on the front cover, which didn't draw any attention to that trade at all. Just, you know, was memorable for all of history, but yeah, that's, uh, that's, that's great. I'm sure people love that you brought that up. Yeah, definitely. Like one of the worst trades out there. And, um, yeah,

I think Russell Wilson and Deshaun Watson could easily like, as long as they keep playing kind of like how they played last year, I think they can make a case for that. Yeah. Well, I, yeah, I think so too. I, I mean, I see Sean Payton trying to talk himself into it.

So we'll see how that works out. I don't know. I don't know. I think if he can't run anymore, it's going to be a problem, but he does have concussion water. So he should be fine. I don't know if you get that reference,

but he was like touting some water that supposedly could cure concussions like a few years ago. And that's weird as that's exactly right. Okay. Haley, good stuff. Go read her article. We'll both tweet it out.

Purple insider.com. It is a terrific statistical look at Will Levis and Hendon Hooker that will maybe give you nightmares leading up to draft season. But just a reminder, you know, PSA, we don't really know how it's going to work out. But man, those numbers aren't that good. So great stuff from you again. And we'll talk again next week. Thanks, Haley.

Awesome. Thank you.