Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Should the Vikings have regrets about how they handled Kirk Cousins this offseason?

Episode Date: June 20, 2023

Matthew Coller answers Vikings fan questions, from whether the Vikings shouldn't have restructured Kirk Cousins's contract to whether they should still consider trading him after his comments at the end of minicamp to whether rookies who were drafted high will get preference in camp to whether the secondary is reminiscent of 2020. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Purple Insider is presented by Oakley. Express yourself. Build a look that's made for you. When you wear Oakley, there really is more than meets the eye. Try it for yourself. Oakley is not only the best looking, but the best quality. So head on over to oakley.com for more information today. Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of Purple Insider. Matthew Collar here, and if you are watching on video, you realize that I am sitting outside. And if you're listening, you probably noticed the audio quality is a little bit different. Not only because there are some birds in the background and also some wind, and I'll try to limit the amount of those things that you guys hear, but I forgot my laptop charger. So I am just sitting outside here on the phone, but the content never stops and the questions never stopped being asked by Vikings fans. So I am going to answer them.

Uh, also planes are flying over, so I'm going to do my best though. I'm going to do my best. So, uh, but since it is the off season, plenty of opportunities, and we are in really the off off season now in the weeks before training camp, plenty of opportunities for you guys to ask fans only questions. I want more and more of them. So purpleinsider.com is a great place to go ask. You can also send me a DM on Twitter at Matthew Collar, go there, DM me whatever question you have, and I will get it in the fans only episodes. Also, if you contribute to the Friday mailbag from the written side, I'll usually pull some of those as well over. And we're going to get a lot of you guys questions answered. So do not be shy when it comes to asking whatever questions

that you have for fans only. So let's dive right into them since we have no updates. Aside from Jair Alexander said Jordan Love, he thinks he's good. I don't know if you saw that on Twitter. If you didn't, then you're lucky because this is the time of year where anything and everything has to be content in the NFL. So Jair Alexander saying that Jordan Love looks like a good quarterback, that's content. We can do better than that. We canair Alexander saying that Jordan Love looks like a good quarterback. That's content. We can do better than that. We can do better than that. So I would love to answer all the questions

that you have. So let's begin with Swervin Mervin here says, in hindsight, it somewhat appears that reworking Cousins deal wasn't all that necessary. If they are done with him, they can rework the deal and move some dead money. Oh, can they rework the deal and move some dead money into this year? Not that I know of. Yeah, it would have to come with his permission. And I don't see why he would do anything that would be different with his contract, especially when he made it clear and seemed intentionally going out of his way to make it clear that he does not want to talk about this anymore. That when he said that he's leaving it until March, I think he was making it very straightforward that he doesn't want any more contract questions and that, you know, if an extension happens now, I guess at this point, I'd be very surprised if an extension happens, though, you know,

I guess it still could be on the table. If the Vikings go back to his side, they could have a discussion. And if they do work out an extension, then yes, some of that contract could be worked out and they can spread out the dead money probably in any way that they want. I'd have to ask our local cap expert, Brad Spielberger, to come back on the show to explain that one, how exactly that would happen. But I do know with the dead money, that's really the only way to change it is to do an extension and be able to spread that dead money out. So otherwise they can't, and he would have to agree with it. And the fact that he said he doesn't want to talk about it again until March tells me that I think

that he's comfortable and must be the team is comfortable as well with going into this year with him in the final year of his contract. Now, the first part of your question, though, I think is very reasonable to wonder, was it something that they had to do? Because when you look at the Zedarius Smith situation, the Delvin Cook situation, they dragged those things out for how long and ultimately ended up with a decent amount of cap space to work with now. In fact, they went in and just funny how things change like this. They went into this summer break in the top 10 in cap space for what Jeremy Fowler tweeted out, which is funny because they were ranking like 32nd all the way

along until they moved on from Zedaria Smith and Delvin Cook. But had they just done those things from the very outset of the offseason, and I guess I understand why they held out and held out and tried to trade both those guys away. But if they had just released them, then maybe it would have made enough cap space so they wouldn't have had to restructure the deal. And so they could have just gone with the structure that was already in place for the dead cap money and not restructured to the fact that they get that huge hit of $28 million next year. And I think if they were to redo the offseason, it would be my guess that they thought that

they were going to be able to trade Zedarius Smith and Delvin Cook for something better than they did. I know they did trade Zedarius for a couple of fifths, swapped with a sixth and seventh, but all said and done, was that worth hurting themselves for next year? Probably not. And I also think that maybe it was possible that they were trying to make that deal a little more tradable based on some of the reports that were out there. And it sounds a little more speculative than a straight report. They tried to trade Kirk, but there was reports that they were having discussions with a team like San Francisco about Kirk Cousins or at least trying to have those discussions, which says to me that maybe part of reworking it was to make it a little more favorable if they were

trying to trade him and so they weren't able to do that or couldn't you know make any steps toward trading him with san francisco he also has a no trade clause so that would play into it as well but ultimately i think that if you're insinuating that they shouldn't have bothered with that they should have found another way to get underneath the cap, probably just by straight up releasing Zedaria Smith and Delvin Cook, that maybe you're right in hindsight that that would have been better. And I don't think that any of us believed all the way along that there was going to be much of an opportunity to get a ton for Zedaria Smith and for Delvin Cook. I think that really from the outset, it didn't seem like those

were two players that opposing teams were going to just line up to give you a ton of draft capital for. So it might have been something that they could have seen coming. Now, I always leave the door open for other factors that we don't know about or we don't understand, or maybe they thought that they were going to ultimately extend Kirk Cousins at the time. And so they just reworked it just to buy them a little more time to negotiate. And then when it didn't come to pass because the two couldn't get on the same page, that that sort of changed the equation. But I think if you were to go back, start at the very beginning of the off season and redo it, that you probably would decide to do it a little bit differently than they did

and not end up with that big hit for next year. Now, I mean, if you look at their timeline, though, does it really crush them based on how it appears to us right now? And this could go differently for sure down the line. But if we think about it for this year, where it looks right now, it seems that this year is going to be the competitive rebuild year. Then draft a quarterback. This is ideally, but again, many things could change. You draft a quarterback. That quarterback develops for a year.

You work around the $28 million dead cap, but then you are free of it after that. And that's when you go crazy spending in free agency. So you use these years to find out what you have, develop and draft players and understand what you have going into 2025. But of course, as you talk about that, it can feel a little bit like hopeless because that's so far away. And what's interesting is I was listening to Cheryl Reeve, the head coach of the Lynx, and she was talking about her own team and where they're at right now, which is in a downturn, but talking about how just recently that she really started to focus on timelines and how every team kind of works on this timeline where you have your peak, but you have to get the top players from the top of the draft, and so you have to go back down, and that's the history of that league,

and that's not exactly the history of the NFL, as in everyone has the tank to win. But it is that you have to work on timelines and decide when your peak is going to be. So it doesn't mean that the next two years have to be a waste. You could play a lot of great games. You could win a division this year. I think that's very reasonable. That's what Mike Clay said the other day. He's projecting them to win a division, but it takes a while to build it all up and to hit those peaks where like we look at Philadelphia and even they hit a peak, went back down, came back up. And we've seen that from a lot of teams. The only teams that don't go through that are the teams with the elite franchise quarterbacks, which is what the Vikings would be hoping to hit on. So that's kind of a tangent off of what you're talking about. But I think that even if in hindsight we would change reworking his deal, I don't think that destroys what their timeline is right now. All right, let's go to Kyle here. He says, on Madden, I used to trade my first rounder for another team's before the season, and the team with the better record won the trade. So you mean first rounder for first rounder.

So your team's first rounder for another team's first rounder. If Kweisi did this, who would he want to trade with? I mean, I think the obvious answer is probably the Arizona Cardinals. The Cardinals just have no hope whatsoever. It's just very hard to see when you look at their roster and the fact that Kyler Murray isn't even starting. And even last year, they weren't that competitive with Kyler Murray because their roster is so shot that they are perfectly in line for Caleb Williams. And I think a lot of teams understand timelines these days. It's not just us here on the podcast. I think it's a lot of teams understand timelines these days. It's not just us here on the podcast. I think it's a

lot of teams that understand this concept of timelines. And, you know, when you're looking at Arizona, they fire their GM, they fire their coach, they bring in new leadership and that buys them time. Similarly to what we saw in Chicago last year to go to the bottom, struggle for a year and then bounce back and try to draft Caleb Williams and go to the top. And then we'll see where that ends up. But or Drake May or whoever else might pop up as a top quarterback. I always like to bring up that last year at this time, we had no idea who Anthony Richardson was and he ends up being drafted fourth overall. So that does tend to happen quite often where, you know, a quarterback emerges. So, emerges. So we're talking about two right now, but it might be more.

But I think Arizona wants to be in that discussion at the very top. So if you were trading your first rounder for anybody's, it would be theirs. I would also nominate the Texans. I like actually a lot of the stuff that they did. I like the coach that they brought in. I like the quarterback that they drafted. But what are the odds that they are a really competitive team this year? I think that that is pretty low. So those are the two teams you would do it with. If only this were Madden

and you could just swap first rounders with somebody because the game thinks it's equal value. I think though that, you know, what you'd want to do if this were Madden. And I apologize for the the outside noise here. There's, I think, a leaf blower and a plane flying over at the same time. So it doesn't get much worse than that for recording content. So I apologize for that. But, you know, when we talk about, you know, the timelines and things like that and Madden, what I always used to do is I would just simulate the season and then I would trade away. But before that, I would trade away everybody who was

expensive and not nailed down, simulate the season. And I think that if you could, if you were Vikings fans, you'd like to sort of simulate the season and see where you are the next year into free agency and see where you're drafting, see what type of players are available because quarterbacks do come available. And I think if this team, and again, tangent away from your question, but this team could also be in position for another team's quarterback, a Russell Wilson, a Matthew Stafford, and obviously you hope it works out better than Russell Wilson. But this team could also be in that position because if you get to the end of this year, let's say you're a nine win team, defensive improvement, Brian Flores, it looks like he's going to be here a while and it works out.

Then you could be talking about an attractive location because you have Justin Jefferson. We'll see about extensions and TJ Hawkinson, but even then Jordan Addison as well, and an offensive line that's been built over a number of years. So, you know, if you put that all together, I mean, you could have a team that is very exciting for, you know, quarterbacks to want to come to if they are unhappy with their team. Now, I don't know who that would be. Kyler Murray has kind of been brought up in this discussion, but, you know, it could be just about anybody. I don't think any of us saw Tom Brady to the Bucs once upon a time. So again, long story short is if you were doing this on Madden, you'd simulate the season, see how

everybody developed. If the game still develops players, I don't even know anymore. See how everyone's developed on defense, see where your holes on the roster are and see who the available quarterbacks are before you try to find a way to, um, to, you know, draft high at that point. So, uh, CJ says digs for Hunter who says no. Well, uh, I think that, um, digs for Hunter is about the most unrealistic trade you could come up with for the show. So who says no? I mean, just imagine Justin Jefferson and Stefan Diggs together. It would be insane. I don't think the Bills would do that. As important as Daniel Hunter is,

I think wide receiver is the number two most important position in the entire NFL. And I think we've seen it from Diggs. You see it from Justin Jefferson. And it's not to take away credit from quarterbacks, but receivers are just driving success. Because one thing that we really saw with Cooper Cup, and the Vikings certainly tested this last year, is if you have somebody who's elite, you can just keep pushing him the ball.

And sometimes you'll have some dips, and sometimes you'll have some dips and sometimes you'll have the opponent figure out a way to slow that receiver down for a week or something like that. But even Devante Adams, year after year, 13 to 1500 yards, Justin Jefferson has proven completely unguardable. So has Stefan Diggs since he went to Buffalo. And that was maybe what Mike Zimmer and the Vikings missed before when they had Stefan Diggs is that you can just keep finding ways to throw him the football and it'll succeed and it can drive the success of your offense. A defensive end is great.

And the Bills could use some more pass rushers for sure. But this is part of the discussion about Daniil Hunter in general with the Vikings, is the positional value is very high. But there are a lot of pass rushers, and there are ways to cobble together pass rush. The Bills have had good defenses. I mean, Vaughn Miller, when he was there, he was really, really helpful to their defense. But the Bills have had good defenses without having, aside from half a season of Vaughn Miller, that one stud, freak show, Bosa level type of player. And yet they have schemed together and played very well in the

secondary to create a pass rush in the last few years. And I think that if you're the Vikings, that's one thing you're really considering is, could you cobble together without paying someone $25 million, one guy to be your entire pass rush? And I think Brian Flores' answer would be yes. When you look at the fact that they were a top sack team in 2021 with Brian Flores in Miami, and yet nobody had double digits on that team. Now they did draft Jalen Phillips high. They did draft Christian Wilkins high.

So it's not that you can't, you're going to do it without any talent. It's just that do you need to have one player making that much money? I think one player can have that impact on an entire offense at receiver, but on defense, I don't know. Daniil Hunter was amazing last year and and the Vikings' defense was awful. And I think that that really tells a story. Even when he started off hot in those first seven games and had six sacks in 2021, they were still bad.

And I think that tells you that one great pass rusher does not make a good defense, where one great receiver, truly great, a Diggs, a Jefferson, a Devontae Adams, can really drive some success on offense. So I don't think that the Bills would do that. Throwing out all the other factors, I mean, gosh, wouldn't it be funny if they called up and said, are you sure you don't want to trade Diggs? I'm sure the Bills got some calls the other day and completely rejected those calls for Stephon Diggs.

And it doesn't seem like whatever his issue was, was so serious that he's on the way out of Buffalo. Um, but still a very confusing situation with them in minicamp. Folks, our new sponsor Oakley, maybe you've noticed it has taken our show to the next level. Oakley express yourself and build a look that is made for you. And guess what? That's exactly what I did. Just got a new pair of matte black prism sapphire polar sunglasses from Oakley. And I got to say, they are a game changer. I'll be wearing them golfing, playing basketball, training camp.

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in the stadium. Yeah, I mean, I see your logic there. I definitely see your logic there. Now, there is something to the idea, and I don't really subscribe to this logic, but we have to get inside the minds of people who just don't buy into tanking. Okay. And, uh, anybody who listens to this show knows that there's a pretty telling history in all sports about tanking that I would subscribe to. But, uh, and in this position, even with Justin Jefferson, like Julio Jones was on a team that won four games. He was on a team that won six games. It does drive the success on offense for that one receiver. But if you have bad everything else, including quarterback play, you're not going to win all that many games. Larry Fitzgerald was on some bad teams and he was the greatest in the world for a while. So it's

not like you couldn't tank with Justin Jefferson, but with him signing a contract or you want him to sign a contract that does make it a lot more complicated. But yeah, like, so I do think that they are very much against the idea of tanking. I also think that when they look at the roster and you see so much offensive talent with Jefferson, you draft the first rounder, you've drafted these offensive linemen, two of the best tackles in the league. It's really hard to say, I mean, okay, if you put Nick Mullins in, how many games would you win? Maybe it's like five, four. I mean, I think Mullins is a decent backup quarterback, but it's probably five or four. And so, okay, that does help your

draft odds for sure. But there's also this element that you could win the division because it's not that strong. And and again, you could come back with and I would agree with you. But then what? Like, are you going to win the division and go on a run and win the Super Bowl? Like, I think we've seen the best version of that tried last year and they still were eliminated in the first round. But to your point, is there an argument right now in this summertime to call San Francisco and say, are you sure you don't want to do Kirk Cousins for Trey Lance after whatever they saw in minicamp from Trey Lance or Sam Darnold or whatever they know about Brock Purdy's arm and so forth? So I think that there is a case to do that, considering where they are,

considering how much they need on both sides of the ball, because we really talk about it as if the offense is great, defense is bad. But there are parts of the offense that also are unproven. Both guards, the wide receiver position, the running back position. So that's a lot that is unproven about the offense as well. That doesn't guarantee that they're going to be a top offense again this year, just because Justin Jefferson's coming back. So if you really feel like it's such an outside chance and you've already made it clear to Cousins that he's not

the long-term answer, and especially the way he was talking. It feels like he's kind of taking the message there. Is there a case to move on from? Of course there is, yeah. And it would be weird and it would be crazy if there was a midsummer trade of a starting veteran quarterback. We just don't see that very often. The Sam Bradford situation in Philly coming to Minnesota is ish, like kind of like this a little bit because Bradford was slated to start, but they had their quarterback of the future

behind him. So they could make an easy argument for that. I don't think Jaron Hall, who was drafted this year and didn't take any reps with the ones or twos is making an argument for that. So I think that they are trying to straddle a very difficult middle where they know they could still compete in the NFC, and they know they could still be in that discussion for winning the division and making some noise in the playoffs, winning a playoff game. But then there's this conversation to be had, like, is it good if you win a playoff game and that's it? Or does that result in them saying, oh, well, we just need a couple more defensive tackles and

then we're on our way. And then we need to extend Kirk Cousins. And then we just carry on with the same thing that we've done forever and ever. So it is a very tight rope to walk. And I think in theoretical land, Ryan, where you're coming from and where I'm always coming from is sort of theoretically like let's throw out a lot of the other factors, including like what the ownership's edicts are and so forth. And let's just talk about what the best possible thing to do is. The best possible thing probably is to trade away Kirk Cousins and to start, I don't know, Teddy Bridgewater is still a free agent or something. I don't know if anybody wants to watch that over 16 games, because that's probably winning six games or five games. But is it better for the long-term health? It probably is because you're

talking about drafting higher and, you know, making your answer clear that it is not Kirk Cousins for the future. So I, yeah, I think you make a point. And I guess it's funny because when you say less than 1% chance of winning the Superbowl, I kind of go, is that really true? Less than 1%. But if you, if you were to kind of adjust it based on Vegas odds, like what's the percentage chance that the team would be, I think their 16th or 15th best Vegas odds to win the Superbow actually wins it, it's probably not very high, right? So I don't know. Yeah, that's something that in theory makes so much sense in practice is not something that they're going to do. So at least I think. Now, Kweisi could surprise. He really could because if they've gone this far already, getting rid of so many other players,

I would not count anything out. So I don't want to say for sure that they're not going to do that. It just seems like everybody's gotten comfortable with the idea of playing out this year, seeing what they have kind of like Washington 2017 in their last year of cousins. And then of course, you have to hope that it doesn't turn out like Washington, but they had some absurdly bad luck with the Alex Smith thing. So I don't know. But the point just being that where you're coming from, I think is a smart place,

but maybe not what you can convince ownership to do. I think you could go as far as convincing them to get rid of a lot of the players that weren't worth it anymore, that were getting paid too much versus their production. But can you convince them to play Nick Mullins for an entire season and say, we believe in Nick and win four or five games and then go from there? It might be better long term, but I don't know if you can. If they did, I would give them all the credit.

I think that the outside world would lose its mind if they did that. And I would say this is the smartest thing they've done in a long time. This question comes from Tom. This is an interesting one, Tom. Would you rather have a team of current top 25 players or all timetime players age 35 and older would, I don't know if I want to say wipe the floor with the top 25 currently, but I mean, if we're, if we're making this relative to today, like assuming that all their talent is relative, this isn't like, you know, Babe Ruth wouldn't hit any home runs today. Of course he wouldn't. He played in the twenties. Like,

but if you gave Babe Ruth all the advantages of today's game, he would still be one of the best players of all time. So let's just make it relative to what they did then. So you get Reggie White in the latter part of his career. You get Jerry Rice. You get Tom Brady, 35 plus. You get Anthony Munoz on the offensive line. You get, I don't know how long Orlando Pace played, but let's just take Andrew Whitworth, who was into his 40s, an all-time great tackle. Yeah, I think that the age 35 guys are probably better

because if you're talking about Tom Brady and Jerry Rice, just right from there, and then I don't know, how long did Terrell Owens play? He's one of the best of all time. I don't know what Randy Moss was like late into his 30s or if he went over 35, but I know Terrell Owens was still in great shape at that point. So if you had, and I'm sure there's other receivers like that,

but those guys come to mind as playing into the latter parts of their career. An offensive line, there's a lot of offensive linemen who are all-time greats who played past the age 35. Where you would really struggle, though, here is the secondary. It is hard to find. You get Daryl Green, Rod Woodson, a little bit difficult to find too many more cornerbacks who went that deep into their career. Maybe Aeneas Williams. I'm not sure what he was like that far into his career if he got to that age, but I think he was still pretty good when he was playing with what? Was he with the Rams late in his career?

So I think the age 35 guys probably win that battle, but the current top 25 would give you Justin Jefferson and Patrick Mahomes versus Tom Brady and Jerry Rice, age 35 and older. I don't know. Also, the edge rushers, the speed, the defensive tackles, and also you basically don't have a running back, right? Like who's your running back at age 35 plus, uh, not too many that could speak of, uh, that were good after age 35. So the answer is probably, Oh gosh, that's a really good question.

I still kind of lean toward Tom Brady and Jerry Rice winning that battle and the offensive linemen still being great enough. The defense linebackers past the age of 35, that might be pretty tough to find. And of course, if you have the top 25 players now, you get like Fred Warner and the best in the league. So I don't know. It probably is the top 25 currently, but there certainly is an amazing list of guys who went 35 and older and were still all-time greats. That's a fun question. That's one, you know, you can debate that one in the

comment section. From Florian says, once camp starts, how much influence does draft position take in terms of practice time? I assume you make in terms of practice time, it would seem that after the draft, everyone is competing and all should have an equal shot. Yeah, I think that that's sort of true. But the thing is that like if you're drafted in the first round, you have more natural talent than someone who's drafted in the fifth round, because I think that the NFL is very good at deciding who has the most natural talent. And that's what oftentimes you're drafted on the fifth round, because I think that the NFL is very good at deciding who has the most natural talent. And that's what oftentimes you're drafted on. I mean, sometimes there are players like Andrew Luck who are the complete total package where they are all ready to play

in the NFL plus physical freak shows. Right. But most of the time it's based on projection, right? So it's like you're taking someone who is physically gifted, naturally gifted, and then trying to project them, which means that they might not be ready in the same way that a fifth rounder might be a little more experienced or understand the game a little bit better, but doesn't have the same level of physical gifts. So there's, that's how you look at ceiling and floor. So somebody who's drafted in the fifth round that played up four years of football and is 24 years old, like that person's going to understand football better than a 20 year old, like say Daniel Hunter, when he was drafted, who is the ultimate ball of clay. Right. Uh, and if you're the coaching staff, you're going to look

at those physical tools and you have to kind of make those comparisons of who is going to have the higher end performance here. But to your point, I think that they're going to play mostly, most of the time, the guy who's going to get them closest to winning week one, week two, week three, week four. Now, I mean, long-term, it's going to buy you way more slack long-term that if Laquan Treadwell had shown up as a fifth round or sixth round pick in 2016, he would have been cut immediately, but he was a first round talent. So he was going to get every opportunity to have it all come together and become a really good player because we do see that from time to time. We saw that with Garrett Bradbury last year where you knew that the talent was there,

the experience, the system, the fit, and then when it all came together, he was good. And we've seen it many times with players developing in that first year and then the second, the third year. They really take these big jumps forward. Christian Derrissaw, another recent great example that just based on his performance last year, you would not have said, oh yeah, Christian Derrissaw is the franchise tackle. Not last year, I'm sorry, his rookie year. His rookie year, you would not have said that. But you know the physical gifts and the physical talent. So you give him more opportunity, you give him more slack, you're

going to give him probably more playing time based on that. But if this is a Louis scene question, it all is relative and it's all situation by situation because for one, Brian Flores didn't draft Louis scene. And that matters too. If you're the guy who was pounding the table for a specific player, you might be a little more apt to give that guy more opportunity than somebody who didn't draft him. The other thing is that one that one thing across the board, no matter how much physical talent or experience or whatever else,

draft status, across the board, if someone can't understand what their assignment is and can't click into the defense, can't read and react quickly, you just can't play them no matter who they are or where they were drafted. That's why I think we do see, I mean, think about like a defensive end might be the type of position that would be a little easier, right? But a safety, you know, offensive line, like a lot of times if you can't read and react and you don't understand your assignments and how the defense works and all the

moving parts, linebacker would be like this it's going to be really difficult to put you on the field so of course draft status connected to talent so it isn't just draft status who's out playing who it's like who could who could be the best player not always who the best player is right now but if lewis scene cannot master brian flores's defense to the point where he can be trusted on the field at all times, then they're just not going to be able to have him on the field over someone like Josh Metellus, who has a lower ceiling, and Cam Bynum, of course, does. I think the Bynum versus Seen is a good way to look at this because, of course, Cam Bynum does not have as high of a ceiling.

He doesn't run as fast. He's not as big. He's not as violent. But the guy has to understand where to be or you're just going to get smoked all the time. And I think we saw that from someone like Cam Dantzler where last year that defense didn't really fit all that well with him and his skill set. And he couldn't quite master it. And when they had miscommunications, it was a Jamison Williams touchdown. It was a, what was it? Quez Watkins, somebody like that who had the touchdown against Philadelphia where there's just these miscommunications and it can't happen. So it's a great question. It always is this debate. And I

think that fans always want the first rounder to get a chance. So we've seen this in the past where you'd get the like, well, you know, Mike Zimmer is just too hard on these rookies. He doesn't like rookies. Well, Mike Zimmer is trying to win games. So he's going to play the guys who are going to win him the games and try to develop the other ones and hope that they sort of come into their own eventually. And I think that that's what most coaching staffs ultimately do. And we saw last year from Louisine. All right.

Next question is from Big Dan. With a defensive backroom having a lot of young players and some unknowns, does this group give you vibes of 2020 DB group or something different? I'm not sure yet. I'm really not sure yet because, I mean, 2020 was a pretty much a worst case scenario. They wanted Holton Hill, who they had felt really good about getting as a UDFA, and they were hoping it was just off-field stuff. They were hoping in a small sample size in 2018, where Holton Hill had done well in a couple of games, that that could be facilitated or whatever, grown, developed,

and he could be a starter and turn into a good player. Clearly, there was other issues at play. No one else picked him up. I don't think I ever heard anything from Holton Hill again after the Vikings let him go there. So that was a bad situation character-wise. The Jeff Gladney thing is tough to talk about because of what ultimately happened to Jeff Gladney. But there was obviously some major personality issues there. And then with Cam Dantzler, he was severely undersized and they called them the needle and they wanted to talk about how, you know, okay, he's on tape, he's bigger on tape, he's faster. He was also really slow at the combine, but those things came into play eventually. And I also think that he just struggled to master certain parts of the defense. So you have different human beings like,

yes, these guys are young the same way that those guys were young, but I don't know that there's the same roadblocks. Exactly. A Caleb Evans seems like a higher character guy, uh, who had some severe concussions last year, but also showed some flashes and has some great physical gifts that maybe the other guys didn't. I don't think that Gladney and Dantzler really had great physical gifts. And when you go back and look at their combine performances, which aren't everything, but they weren't huge. They weren't imposing. They didn't have the longest arms or the wingspans or the fastest forties or anything like that. Caleb Evans is a very impressive athlete who I think

has a real joy for the game. So that could make a difference there. It might not, but it could. I think that's where we're talking about just different people from, you can't say, well, it's just like 2020 because it's different human beings. And, you know, I look at Makai Blackman as being, at least my understanding of him, is just a super, super competitor, clearly a bright guy to get on the field with the ones in minicamp. That means he's catching on quickly. Even if he doesn't win a starting job, that doesn't happen very often unless someone is catching on quickly.

So there's an intelligence factor. He's a really good competitor, I think, is part of the reason that they wanted to draft him was his character and his competitiveness. I'm not sure about Andrew Booth Jr. And, you know, the injuries are a serious issue. He is a little bit, you know, on the undersized side and he's just been beat up so much. And, you know, maybe he doesn't fit as well. Maybe he doesn't capture the defense as well and then the other thing is too Byron Murphy's a good player um Byron Murphy has not been like

Daryl Revis or something but Byron Murphy is a proven solid NFL corner who has uh you know 2,000 snaps or something inside and outside I I mean, this guy's played a lot of football and I think that there's even more of a ceiling for Byron Murphy because he is a young player. They didn't have that in 2020. They didn't have a single guy who you could look at and say like, okay, well at least they've got this guy as a stabilizing force. Um, we didn't, you know, see that really at all. So, uh, I think it is quite a bit different in the makeup of the personalities there. They do have a leader in Byron Murphy who's been there a while and was somebody that worked with Patrick Peterson quite a bit, which I think is a good sign for him.

I think it is a higher potential group, or at least I say, with fewer major potential pitfalls. And if you have all those guys competing and you end up with two turning out to be long pieces for the future, then I think that's a really good outcome for them. And if it's any more than that, then they've got their secondary for a long time. And I would even include safety. Like if Metellus becomes part of the future or Bynum takes another step forward from last year, if they can come away with two or three guys that can come with you for the future, then they're going to feel a heck of a lot better. But as far as the vibe of just being a total unknown, now that's the same. It is a total unknown from where they were at before. Or I

guess I shouldn't even say where they're at before, just the total unknown as it was in a lot of, well, last year, no, yeah, last year we had some knowns with Patrick Peterson. So I guess I could say that. All right. This from Matt Lehman 7511. What is the reasonable best case return for Daniil Hunter in a trade? And if you notice, it sounds like the PGA tour. Now I've sort of been surrounded by birds. Maybe that's pleasant. I hope that's pleasant. I'll have to check after, but I hope that sounds nice to have bird sounds in the background, but those aren't plugged in like they are sometimes at whatever golf course does that. Anyway, reasonable best case return for Daniil Hunter.

I would say a second and a fourth. I'm just having trouble believing that a team is going to step up with a first round pick because like leverage is complicated. And part of the leverage of this whole thing is how much money Daniil Hunter wants. And the other teams have to have some sense from his agent in a trade, how much Daniil Hunter wants. And if he wants 25, $27 million a year, if that's what he's asking for, then other teams are not going to say, oh yeah, let me give you a first round pick and then use 15% of my cap or whatever it is, 10% of my cap on this one player. I don't think they're going to like to do that. I think that they're more likely to say, okay, well, we can't give you a first because of how

much we have to pay the man as soon as we get him. And there is no, let it play out for a year or something. There have been other trades that have involved like a first round pick. Orlando Brown comes to mind where the chiefs were allowed or able to let it play out for a year. And then he hit free agency, but, um, or did they franchise that?

Maybe they franchise tagged him after a year, but they didn't sign him to a longterm extension. The Vikings are not in this spot with, uh, Daniel Hunter. They're in a spot where whoever gets him has to sign him to an extension immediately because otherwise he's going to just continue to do the holdout thing. And then why did you trade for him?

So I look at it as a second and a fourth round pick. Maybe you mix in like a conditional something based on how many sacks he gets or whether he signs. Maybe there's even an idea of if your team reaches the NFC championship, and this has been done before, if your team or AFC championship, assuming they trade him to the AFC, so you trade Hunter second and a fourth, but if you get to the AFC championship, then we get a first. Something like that I think is probably the best case scenario for trading Daniil Hunter, which doesn't sound that exciting,

but at the same time, let's say you're in a spot next year in the NFL draft where you're drafting 17th and the team with the eighth pick wants a first, a next year's first, and then something else to trade up to get a quarterback. Oh, you've got this secondround pick that you got for Daniil Hunter. Then are you going to miss him? Probably not if you get your quarterback of the future. But it's not exciting to trade away one of the best players that you have for a second-round pick. And I don't know.

So far, Kweisi Adafo-Mensa, it seems, has not had a ton of success in the trades. He went through Andrew Barry, a guy that he knows well in Cleveland, to get a couple of fifths in the swap for Zedaria Smith. That's not something that you're writing home about. And they couldn't trade Delvin Cook for anything. Last year, Jalen Rager, Ross Blacklock. Like, there hasn't been, and even the trade downs, there hasn't been a trade aside from TJ Hawkinson,

which was, I think, if they sign him to an extension, unequivocally a good trade, but even then gave up a lot for a tight end, a second round pick. So there hasn't been a trade where you've said, wow, they just crushed that trade. They nailed it. They robbed that other team blind. I think the Hawkinson one maybe comes the closest to that because of how good he is and how well he's fit. He's actually been a much better fit in Minnesota than he was in Detroit,

and maybe they had a sense for that. But it's more even. I mean, giving up a second-round pick is pretty high. So that's more of an even trade. I still give it credit, but there hasn't been one where you've gone like, wow, they just absolutely crushed that trade. So I don't know. I don't know if the league is maybe apprehensive to trade with the Vikings or exactly what, but I just am. I just can't see someone lining up with a first round pick unless there's always that desperation. There's always that somebody gets hurt in training camp and that's going to be the hard thing for them is how do the dynamics play out? Like how long are you willing to wait is a

real question for this. Are you willing to wait a long time into training camp with him sitting out to potentially make that deal and, uh, and risk who knows what, I mean, if you get to the end of camp and nobody's offering you the pick that you want, then what do you do? Do you trade them for not a second round pick? Like, I don't know. This is a tightrope. This is a very tricky situation. Do you cave at that point and then just sign them to the extension? Or do they have like a flow chart of if we could get this, then we do that. And if we can't, then we don't. And then we pay him or I don't know. But this is a real challenge for Kweisi Dauphomensa. Speaking of which, Head Coach 21 on Twitter asks, do you feel Kweisi took the right approach to the roster this offseason? I think this circles back to where we started, which was with Kirk Cousins,

was not really in favor of the way that they did the restructure for Cousins or the idea of extending him, which seemed like it was in the air. But since then, I have been in favor of the roster clear out, moving on from all the veterans and starting an and giving Kweisi Adafomensa a chance to build his own roster. I have been very much behind that idea. I think it is the best approach for this team. And I also think that it's the cyclical nature of the NFL is where you're always seeing teams, rosters rising and falling. And if you don't admit that your roster is falling when it is, then you get to a 2020 situation and they couldn't repeat 2020 again. That's the way I look at it is they just absolutely could not repeat 2020 again, where you go seven

and nine, you miss the playoffs. You gave up draft capital. You spent money on like Michael Pierce. You kept all the same guys around at the expense. You extend cousins, like you did all these things to try to repeat 2017 that just failed. You can't have that again. You couldn't chase last year. And I don't even know if they could have done it if they wanted to, but the cap space issues that they had. So I'm completely behind that. One thing that has to be pointed out though, uh, because of my agreement with the way that they've gone, and I've kind of been asking for this for a couple of years, is it is important to point out that it's a lot easier to go down than it is to go back up. So it is a lot easier to tear a roster down. Anybody could tear a roster down.

And we're giving Ryan Pace all this credit in Chicago. And I agree with what Ryan Pace did. But it's not that hard to trade away or cut your best players who are aging. It is hard to find all those pieces, to find the quarterback, to build up a roster that could potentially compete for a Super Bowl. And this is where Mike Zimmer and Rick Spielman deserve their credit as being kind of we could look at it as a first half and second half of Zimmer Spielman, the pre and post cousins, pre cousins. We would have said

those guys were brilliant because they made a lot of moves that worked for them and that were successful. You know, the, the 2015 draft, they found players in interesting spots, undrafted free agents, Tom Johnson's from the CFL. Anthony Harris is from Virginia playing corner at 185 pounds or whatever. They pick him up. He turns into a good player. They did a lot of good things to build up. They drafted a quarterback, put him on a rookie quarterback contract and had enough money to spend. They did a lot of good things to build up to 2017. That is the hard part. And it takes usually luck, but it takes a good approach.

And what happens next is where Kweisi Adafo-Mensah will get tested. So even though I think that he did the right thing and that he could have gone full desperation mode and that he could have won, you know, eight or nine games by bringing back Thielen, by bringing back Patrick Peterson and so forth, he could have, could have tried to do all that stuff and chase last year the same way that Spielman and Zimmer always chased 2017.

So I give credit for not doing that. But the other part of it has to pay off or then you're just bad, right? I mean, if you don't have the other part pay off, if you don't use the cap space correctly, if you don't make the right moves, if you don't play the timeline correctly and it might require some patience, then you just end up with you're not a good team and you can end up stuck being in mediocrity for a long time. And that's what's weird for all of us is that we all kind of know that this test is coming of how you guys handle the Vikings, handle their quarterback situation in the future. But yet we're going to go through a season with Kirk Cousins still a quarterback. It's very, very uncomfortable, very uncomfortable.

It's like taking somebody to the prom and knowing that you're going to go home with somebody else. So eventually that's weird. I didn't go to my prom. Anyway, two more questions. Red and Purple 77 asks, would you fault the Vikings if they extend Kirk one years, two years? What's the line for you? I would.

I would fault them. I think that at this point that makes no sense. It just makes no sense. The only scenario, and I say only as in I still don't think this scenario, but the only scenario that it would make some sense to extend him would be this. Let's say Jordan Addison is marvelous. It's Carter Moss. Let's say that these defensive players gel with Brian Flores,

and they're great, and it's not impossible, and they win like 12 games and everybody's young and everybody's coming back. And you've got a little more cap space to work with because of the moves you made this year. And they win 12 games and they win a playoff game. They're individual round. And it looks like all they need is just a couple more pieces. And everybody is back.

All the young players, Addison and Jefferson, are going to dominate for the future. Alexander Madison is the next Terry Allen. He's great out there. The offensive line has gelled. They're a top three offensive line in the league. If every perfect scenario went right, I would say, all right, it does make sense to bring him back.

And that would, of of course include him playing great. Like you're not going to win 12 games again, based on 60 yard field goals and opposing quarterbacks fumbling. Like you're going to, if you're going to win 12 games, you're going to do it by the quarterback being great. So if that were to be the case, then I would say, okay, extension by all realistic scenarios, probably not. No. And the only one that maybe people would argue for is if they won 10 games and then drafted a quarterback and played Kirk for one more season. But I don't understand why Kirk would sign onto them. Like, why would he sign on to being again, a guy that they're trying to replace? I have a tough time seeing him do that. So it has to be

realistic as well. I don't think this is realistic unless we're talking about a three-year deal for Kirk Cousins, but those are the only real scenarios where I could even have that conversation. I think otherwise there's really no situation where you say it's a good idea to tack on one more year and just try to do this whole thing again, especially since he's going to be older. I mean, that's a big part of it. Two years older, three years older from right now, he's already in his mid thirties. He's one of the oldest, not just quarterbacks, but players in the NFL. I don't know if that's a smart idea. Last question from our buddy, Josh R. Smith on Twitter. Will the offense's success hinge more on whether Madison or Addison successfully replace the departed starter at their position? I would say Addison.

I mean, last year they were a bad running game, overall bad running game. But if they were an average running game on a team that's going to run 35% of the time, if Madison is just okay and Wong Wu and Chandler are just okay and they run for 1,500 yards as a team because they're running 36% of the time, okay. I mean, that's fine because it's a pass-first offense and that's what they should be with the receiving talent. If Addison is great right away, not Jefferson great, but let's just say really good right away. I mean, you can have a top five to seven offense if he's great right away because what they got from Thielen last year was 70 catches but not a lot of yardage not a lot of deep threat there if Addison could become more of a deep

threat and then you add Hawkinson to that you add Osborne to that that has the potential to be the best passing offense that Cousins has ever had in Minnesota if and only if it becomes like a like a peak Adam Thielen and Diggs, if only they had leaned into the passing game, it's going to it's going to be Addison, because also if Addison, say, isn't good or can't play, I mean, it's possible, right? We've seen it before. If he's banged up, if he plays eight games and he catches 25 passes and it's just a non-impact player, all these scenarios could happen. Then I think that you're a very average offense with KJ Osborne is the number two Jefferson. And even if you improve the running game by a lot and they're using the big people in the play actions and so forth, it's just not enough to swing it.

Think about the sheer numbers of it. You know, the Vikings, if they had been an average running game, maybe they scored 25 more points last season. If you take a jump into the top five as a passing game, top three is a passing game. I mean, you're talking about adding a hundred more points to your offense over an entire season. And that connects directly to Jordan Addison. I also think that Madison's success will probably have more to do with the offensive line, the running scheme, than it will just him in general. So I guess unless they were to become the best running game in the league, I don't think it could be that significant.

But I do think they could take a jump forward as far as the passing game goes. If Addison, say say averaged 14 yards a catch or something like that, or instead of 70 catches underneath, it was a hundred catches underneath and a lot more, you know, first downs and things like that. Then they got from dealing a lot more of a threat to go deep, which it seemed like teams just entirely ignored any threat there. And the Vikings didn't make them pay for it. But I do think it's going to be the receiver that is a little more important. Uh, so anyway, well, great stuff. Hopefully, uh, this was all listenable despite everything going on in the background from squirrels to birds to, I think I caught an owl in there, um, to, uh, grass blowers, things flying over me.

And the fact that I, since I did not remember my power cord, couldn't plug in my external mic. So a lot of adversity here for the show, but I think we made our way through it. So thanks everybody for listening or watching on YouTube and we will catch you all later. Thanks for all the questions. And again, a reminder, make sure that you are sending those questions to purpleinsider.com. And I also wanted to bring up, too, and I should have brought this up earlier, but Purple Insider on Substack, purpleinsider.substack.com. You can get every article sent directly to you, Friday mailbags every single week, unique features that only go out to subscribers. And there is a super subscriber feature on the sub stack where you can have a little group meeting with me to talk ball a couple of times a year.

We get together in little, little groups, five or six people, Vikings fans that are super subscribers or founding members. They are called, and we all get together and talk football. So if you want to be a part of that, you can go purple insider.substack.com and sign up for that and talk football. So if you want to be a part of that, you can go

purpleinsider.substack.com and sign up for that. All right. Thanks everybody. Catch you next time.