Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Some answers, more questions from Vikings conference calls this week

Episode Date: August 8, 2020

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Coors Brewing Company, Golden, Colorado, and as always, celebrate. Hi, Blue Wire listeners. I'm Greg Olson. I'm excited to partner with Blue Wire to bring you TE1, a podcast where I interview the tight ends who have revolutionized the position. Listen in as I have raw, in-depth conversations with the all-time greats like Shannon Sharp, Tony Gonzalez, Travis Kelsey, and George Kittle. We'll explore how the tight end position has changed over the last 60 years

and what it takes to be the very best. Subscribe to TE1 from Blue Wire Studios today so you're ready for the August premiere. Welcome to another episode of Purple Insider. Matthew Collar here and joining me, Will Regetts, who covers the Minnesota Vikings for Sports Illustrated. What is up, Will? Not a lot. We had some good Zoom press conferences this week.

But, yeah, thanks for having me on. You know, we found out a surprising amount of stuff through these Zoom press conferences. You hear people talk about, oh, who cares about press conferences? Nobody ever says anything. Not true. In fact, if it wasn't true, I mean, the NFL would be pretty boring since they only play 16 times a year.

So there is a lot that we could take away from what we heard. And I want to get right into with you the O-line mystery. That was how I titled it on purpleinsider.com was it's I still am not very clear on exactly who is competing for what spots and what spots are open. Now everybody seemed to make the assumption Will that Ezra Cleveland is at right guard and that he will be battling for right guard. But A, we're not allowed out there yet to see walkthroughs. We will know for sure when practices happen. But I'm also not entirely convinced that this just means Pat Elfline is locked into his spot for sure either.

So what did you take away from that? I was trying to put together the clues, who's playing where, what this could look like, and I'm still not really sure. Yeah, I was thinking a lot about it too, and it was interesting to me because, well, A, the fact that they're working Cleveland at guard in the first place, but then when Kubiak talks about him being on the right side with Dakota Dozier and Aviante Collins, and then, yeah, not really mentioning much competition at left guard for Pat Offline, I think you've got to look at where they are right now,

and he says they've got four or five starters back. So that's what they're doing right now. But I think you've got to understand that this is going to be a fluid situation. This is going to be something that changes, especially when they get out on the field and they can actually put pads on and start to really evaluate these guys. I don't think you can be too confident in Pat Elfline's job security at left guard, given what he showed last year and what he showed at center two years ago.

So I think we could see Cleveland in the mix there. It was interesting to me how Kubiak didn't mention Drew Samia at right guard with those three names, but then he did praise Drew Samia when asked. And it'll be interesting to see if Drew just has to kind of earn his spot there and if he's still a little lower down the depth chart right now. But, yeah, Kubiak answered some questions for us, but I think he also kind of created some more questions for us. I'm very interested to see once we're actually allowed to be out there

and watch it and see where everybody's lined up. So they really like Dakota Dozier, but if you look at his PFF grades and the way he performed when he started, no, not great as being pretty Minnesotan nice. I mean, it's just like it was terrible last year in terms of how he was graded by PFF, and I know that these coaches, including Andre Patterson and the conversation we had with him, they love to tell us how,

well, what you guys don't see is the real thing. But, I mean mean if you end up ranking for that week or the couple weeks that you played like 52nd out of 57 guards that means something went very wrong if you're somewhere in the middle you can tell me okay well maybe it should be a little better than that maybe it's a little worse they don't know the play calls or whatever people still say about pff but if it it's dead last, it's usually a problem. So I look at Dakota Dozier as much more of a break glass in case of emergency rather than someone who's competing for the job. Avion Collins is an interesting one.

I think it's pronounced Avion, but we're three years into this guy being around. I might be wrong. You weren't on the beat yet when we had the great Avion, Avion, Avionte mystery of 2018, I believe, or maybe it was 2017, where in the first preseason game on the broadcast, he was called Avion. And we were like, that can't be right. And then we were like, is it Avionte? And then I think it changed to Avionte. But he never plays, so it doesn't really matter.

Him being in the mix of this, and he's been mentioned multiple times by coaches. Kubiak has mentioned him like two or three times this offseason, so that's really interesting to me. Right. Is he really in there? Because when you go back to his combine, which now feels like forever ago, but he was crazy athletic. He was one of the best in terms of benching and running the 40 and stuff,

and he was sort of trending towards someone who could be in the mix before he got hurt last year. So I don't know if he's really actually in this. And I also don't know, Will, if Ezra Cleveland is actually in this or if Ezra Cleveland is just getting familiar with the position. Because there is a line in there from Kubiak like, well, we know he can play tackle, but we want him to know guard. So it's like, is he actually competing for the guard spot,

or is it they want to be sure he can step in at any of these positions? Yeah, it's a good question, and I think they might just be wanting to get him in there, familiarize him with that, kind of maximize their options going forward because he hasn't played a lot of guard, any guard really, at Boise State. And obviously I think one thing that some people might be worried about, but I don't think they should be, is that he's clearly a tackle through and through going forward in the long-term picture.

That's why he was drafted as high as he was, and that's where he can provide the most value. And despite Kubiak saying that he is a huge fan of Riley Reif, which was a fun quote, Riley Reif's not going to be the left tackle in Minnesota for too many, too much longer, I guess we'll say. So Cleveland will be there in the long term. But yeah, for now, they want to just get him comfortable moving inside in case that becomes something that they want to do to get him on the field this year. Because I think he could,

with his athleticism, he can help them out as a rookie if he's able to kind of get up to speed quickly. And that could be at guard where he could definitely be a presence in the run game. You could tell Gary Kubiak is a mastermind of talking to the media with what he said about Riley Reif. He is well aware of the shortcomings of Riley Reif, that he is much more of an average tackle, and anybody who's a speed rusher can blow by him. But what good does it do for Gary Kubiak to say,

yeah, you know, we really want to replace him next year, so we'll see. I mean, Gary just laid it on thick. Oh, he's a great person. He's just the best guy ever. And I love, now this is a key point, that managing players and personalities is important. Reef has a lot of respect from the other linemen because he's the veteran who got $57 million or $54 million,

and he's been around. And I guess inside the room, he's really helpful to those guys, though not so much a media guy. So if you're Kubiak and you know that, then saying, hey, you know what, his problems last year were more on us, and we've got to fix those. Like, it's just really well done in terms of managing your personalities. But let's talk about Reef for a second here.

If we're playing a little game of, like, good idea, bad idea, is it a good idea to just lock Riley Reef into that position, or should they have considered a move to guard? Well, it's interesting to me that Kubiak really just ruled out moving Riley Reif inside, because if you look at Reif and Cleveland and some of the other tackles, I think Riley Reif's skill set, that was really an intriguing option to me all offseason with moving him inside the guard, because he can play well kind of in a phone booth, and he has good hands, and he does some things well that I think

people anytime they heard that they thought back to the whole Mike Remmers thing and were like no please don't move a tackle inside but Reef and Remmers aren't the same player and I think Reef would have been better suited to do that than Remmers would. Reef played some guard at Iowa going back to 2010 or 2011 or whenever that was so but I mean I guess Kubiak wants him locked in out there. I don't know if that's just Coach Beaker. It seems like he was pretty serious about Reif being the guy there. So will that be a good decision? I don't know.

We'll see. Hopefully he can have some better results against Zaria Smith and players like that. And the Bears have obviously Khalil Mack and Robert Quinn now. So we'll see, but it would have been interesting to see if they would have gotten a little more competition there. I agree with you that where your backup talent exists is at tackle and not at guard. We were just talking about Dakota Dozier, who's next man up and could barely manage last year when he was asked to step in. You're talking about a couple of players, a second round draft pick, but also Ole Udo who played really well in week 17.

You have Rashad Hill who actually when he played left tackle was much better than when he's played right tackle throughout his career. Last year he steps in against Philadelphia and goes up against some pretty good defensive linemen and didn't allow a pressure or sack that whole game when he had to step in off the bench and I know there's some shortcomings with Rashad Hill but if pass protection is your biggest issue and especially up the middle bringing in someone who's like you said far more talented than Mike Remmers just in general being a former first round pick to be able to step in and play a guard. I liked it too as an intriguing option, but apparently that is just off the table, or at least Kubiak says it. I don't think that Kubiak with something like that is going to come out

and just be completely false, like lie to us straight up. It might change, but I think when we get out there for padded practices, Riley Reif will be the left tackle. Now the defensive tackle position, we got to hear a little bit about this. I first want to know what your favorite part of the P.J. Hall era is. I've been asking everyone. I mean, just great times in our life. We'll never forget it when P.J. Hall was a Viking. But your thoughts on what Andre Patterson had to say about, quote, everyone having to learn nose tackle and three

techniques. Yeah, Andre was really interesting today. I thought he said some really, I don't know, informative things for us. Because I didn't know that all of the defensive tackles have to learn both positions. Because he mentioned that offices can kind of dictate that, that those guys will have to play that based on where they line up or things like that. So mentioning guys like James Lynch and Hercules Mata'afa having to learn the nose tackle was interesting to me. He also brought up that Cowboys game last year. It's kind of an example of why he's confident in that group, even without Michael Pierce,

having Jaleel Johnson and Armand Watts and Shamar Steffen play well in that game. He obviously had the impassioned defense of Shamar Steffen, who I have written a lot of critical things about. I'm sure you have as well. A lot of people have. Because when you look at the three technique position, we think, okay, these guys should be Aaron Donald and Grady Jarrett, and they should be creating pressure. And he's kind of saying that they don't ask them to do that. Whether that's the smartest strategy, I'm not sure, because I feel like you kind of needs some interior pressure. So the QB can't just constantly be stepping up in the pocket.

But, yeah, he said that if you ask Eric Hendricks who he would want to have out there, it would be 93, it would be Shamar Stephan, because his one job is to not let anybody, any offensive line, get to the second level and touch Eric Hendricks. So I thought his whole discussion of that defensive tackle group was interesting, and I'm not sure exactly what it's going to end up looking like. There's definitely a vote of confidence for Armin Watts, we've heard. Jillo Johnson could be a factor there.

And, yeah, unfortunately, P.J. Hall will not be a factor. The 24-hour P.J. Hall era with minnesota vikings will not be be written about in history books get back to the conversation in just a minute but first have to tell you about something very cool from our friends at soda stick you probably know them for minnesota sports inspired hats and shirts and hoodies that are screen printed in minnesota but soda stick also has artwork as well you're going to want to check out their Man Cave prints, 20 by 24 prints representing everything Minnesota sports, from awesome throwback logos to legendary plays at first base to famous disgusting acts in Green Bay.

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Every year there's somebody, every year, and this time it gets to be him. Last year it was Corey Vedvik. My favorite part of the Corey Vedvik era was him kicking a 60-yard field goal off a tee and getting a standing ovation from fans at training camp and being terrible at kicking and punting. But, you know, Spielman got all of his draft picks back, so I guess we didn't have to hold that against him. The thing about Shamar Steffen is honestly fascinating because I thoroughly believe that Andre Patterson understands

how all the mechanics work of a defense and how much somebody that can plug offensive linemen. Steffen is extremely strong and keep them from getting to the second level on runs, and I'm sure that there's a lot of value in that. Here's the problem, though. When you have six quarterback pressures in 350 dropbacks when you are playing defensive tackle, that is a lot you're losing, and Eric Hendricks isn't gaining anything on those.

So that means that there were 344 pass plays out of 350 where they created no pressure whatsoever from the middle. And in, I think, any math formula, you are going to find that passing the football is more valuable and getting pressure and getting sacks is more valuable than whether you can keep that guard from getting to the second level. And maybe Eric Hendricks would be very annoyed with you if you did let that guy get there like Sheldon Richardson did in 2018. But Sheldon Richardson had a much bigger impact on the Vikings than Shamar Steffen did by any way you try to look at it

because of how the game works now. So I think there's a little bit of like, hey, if you understand how this position is taught and all those things from the very beginning, Steffen is doing everything technically right. and I don't dispute that at all what I dispute is the value of what he does right yeah and I'm not going to pretend and to know more about defensive line roles and things like that than Andre Patterson because obviously I don't but I agree with you that it's a little bit questionable to me to just essentially throw two nose tackle types out there and focus on just flattening the line of scrimmage and things like that, especially on the passing downs and you still had the two huge plotters out there

and you're just not getting the pressure from the middle, I think that's not the best way to maximize your success. So Michael Pierce, they're going to miss him because it was proven that he can be one of the best nose tacklers in the league when he's healthy. But it'll be interesting to me if the absence of Pierce kind of forces them to put more of a pass rush-oriented guy like an Armond Watts out there. I think maybe you could see them end up with Jahlil Johnson and Shamar Stephan out there, and then it's kind of the same thing.

But if you do have to get Armond Watts in there, which I think he is going to kind of force his way onto the field from everything we've heard about him. If you get James Lynch playing some snaps, if Hercules can prove to have the added weight and still have some explosiveness, there's some issues there with him getting, getting washed out in the run game a lot, but maybe that won't be the case as much anymore.

So it'll, it'll be fascinating to see if Pierce's opt out kind of forces them to change up their strategy and maybe is even like an unintentional benefit with getting more pressure in the middle. Yeah, that's a good point. Although it doesn't sound like Stefan is going to play less. But here's what I would say about Stefan is that I am not saying that he shouldn't be on the team or in the NFL.

I think that his role is someone who plays much more on first down and 10 or when it's a very likely run situation, third down and two. And in 2017, he only played 388 snaps snaps which is about half of what he played last year and he was effective like he graded well against the run in those situations he graded well as an overall player for a defensive tackle like an above average rotational run stuffing defensive tackle last year when he's asked to play all the time to me that's just in over his head for what he's able to do and you're right that maybe there will be a consequence of that. I would also say, though, with Michael Pierce, I think for early downs, at his best, he can impact the quarterback.

If he gets a center that's pretty weak, he can pick them up and drive them back. And I think he's a little more of a technician. And it's not a perfect way to look at this but I looked at how often Michael Pierce per snap either got a pressure or a tackle so he was making an impact on the play and it was a very high percentage in comparison it is very similar to when Linval Joseph was at his best so I think that that is a big loss how they fill it will be uh really interesting to find out uh do you think that there is a big loss. How they fill it will be really interesting to find out. Do you think that there is any chance that they do sign someone like Snacks Harrison? Because after listening to Patterson, I say I don't think that's happening. Yeah, I agree with you.

I don't think that's happening either. I don't know if Snacks Harrison wants a one-year deal anyways, which we've got Pierce. Hopefully, knock on wood, coming back in 2021, everything will be back to semblance of normalcy, and he'll be able to do that without any risk. So I don't know. I was thinking maybe like the P.J. Hall thing made sense as a low-risk guy to add another body in there.

Maybe they could keep looking around the league to find somebody like that, maybe like a Marcel Darius even. But, yeah, I don't think they're necessarily going to add to that room. I think they feel pretty good about what they have, and they do have a lot of options there still. So we'll just have to see if any of those guys emerge. And clearly I want to clarify that I'm not arguing that they're going to be better without Michael Pierce because I think he could have been that peak Linval Joseph type player.

Working with Patterson, I think he could have even improved his contributions in the pressure area. Hopefully, that'll be something that we see going forward. Yeah, it'll be interesting to see how those two spots shake out. Patterson said today he's going to be evaluated and he's going to put the two spots shake out and Patterson said today he's gonna he's gonna be evaluated he's gonna put the the two best guys out there that can that can maximize their chances of having success so uh Harrison Smith was asked um if he what he thinks of people saying that the Vikings defense will be worse now I don't know who these people are that's always a fun game um because I have not seen anyone say the Vikings

defense is going to be trash. Clearly everyone acknowledges that having all new corners is an issue, including the team, but I have not seen anyone predict, hey, Vikings defense ranking 26 this year. So Harrison Smith on the very same page as all of us had the best quote of the day saying, I didn't know we were supposed to be bad when he was asked about that. But let me ask you where you put them in. Let's say, will they be in terms of rank, let's say points against top five, top 10, 10 to 20, 20 to 30, will you be the media will and say, no, no, Harrison, I'm saying you'll be bad. No, I definitely wouldn't say that they're going to be bad.

I think Zimmer has earned that kind of respect because I think even including 2014 or maybe outside of 2014, his first year, they've been top five in either points against or yards against just about every year he's been here, and sometimes both, like in 2017. So I think 10 to 15 maybe to start, but I don't know. I can easily see them ending up as a top 10 in that 5 to 10 range defense in terms of points allowed. Patterson mentioned that you've got pro bowlers at every level of the defense.

There's not a lot of teams that can say that. They've still got Daniel Hunter. I think a lot of people look at the loss of Everson Griffin and think that that's this huge thing because they do not know the ways of Afadi Odenabo, who I'm definitely high on this year. Bias, bias. Exactly. Northwestern bias, I'm definitely high on this year. Bias, bias. Exactly. Northwestern bias, I'm calling it out.

This is full disclosure on this podcast, Will. Yeah, absolutely. So I think they have a chance to be in that 5-10, 6-10 range by the end of the season. It'll just definitely be a question of how well, how quickly Mike Zimmer can get these corners up to speed. You went to Northwestern, that's the joke. If anyone didn't get that, they think I just started randomly calling you biased about Fadi Adenabo. No, it's because you went to his...

I was there in Iowa City in 2016 when he had four sacks, and I said, this guy's pretty good. You said, that guy's going to get cut like four times, and then he'll get eight sacks. Yeah, and then he'll stick in the NFL. And he still hasn't played a three-down roll in college or the pros since high school, so we'll see how that goes this year, but I think he can do it. You know, I get asked every day about how I feel about Everson Griffin and whether the Vikings should bring him back and so forth, and I think the answer is probably no.

Like this year, yes, I agree with you. 10 to 15, you could be a shade better than that, depending on how many of these quarterbacks, let's say, don't get COVID or stay healthy or just, you know, what happens. They're playing against Wilson and Watson and Brady and Breeze and Rogers and Stafford. There's a lot going on there with their quarterback schedule. Yeah, you don't get the Chase Daniel and Matt Moore and Brandon Allen.

They got kind of lucky with those last year. Well, Chase Daniel was the better of the two quarterbacks. That's true. Chase Daniel was the worst option they could have faced on the Bears. But, yeah, so I think that 10 to 15 is a reasonable expectation considering Zimmer's ability to raise the quality, the fact that they still have a lot of stars left over. But I like the idea better for this team finding out who they have

on the defensive line better than saying, hey, let's bring it back with Everson Griffin. As much as I respect Griffin, and I think he still has it, I would rather find out, do I have a Fadi Odenabo for five more years or seven more years as my next defensive end? Because Everson Griffin's career is kind of coming to an end here. Yeah, that's a good way to look at it. I actually hadn't thought about that angle too much because I was just thinking that, yeah, Fadi Odenabo, I think he has the ability to step into that role without too much of a drop-off.

But it does make sense. Yeah, like let's find out what we have with this guy. Let's see if DJ Wanham can earn his way onto the field rotationally and see what we have in him. And if Everson Griffin's out there being an every-down player, which he still can be at his age, I think, and I think he will be, whether it's Seattle or Arizona or, please, hopefully not the Green Bay Packers,

which I don't think is a real possibility. Can you imagine our mentions when that happens on Twitter? Not good. Not good. I cannot. Yeah, I think they should find out what they have going forward because obviously you've got Daniel Hunter, and they might need to start thinking about an extension

for him before too long because he's a massive bargain right now compared to what we saw Miles Garrett and Joey Bosa get for new deals in the last month. But yeah, find out what they have in Odenabo and that's why that's a good reason why I don't think

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we're allowed to be out there and where it would make a difference if delvin cook is on the field performing or not the reason that you would hold out, or in this case, I guess it might be a hold in where he goes through everything else, but he doesn't take hard in practice, I don't know how this is going to work out. But what is your prediction on Delvin Cook? Does he sign a contract extension the night before padded practices and we all go forward with our lives and never have to worry about this again? Or does this go into those two weeks or maybe even into the season?

Because if you're a cook, if you told them you were going to hold out, that to me says I'm not going to do anything that puts me at risk. Doing walkthroughs doesn't put you at risk. Doing Zoom meetings doesn't put you at risk. But it does when you step on the field for any of those padded practices. Yeah, it's a good question. And I was thinking that maybe we would have a little bit more clarity by now and there would be a little bit more of the two sides coming together. But based on what Spielman said, I don't think we got a lot out of that. He said that we're working extremely hard, we're working with his agent.

We're trying to get something done, but he did mention multiple times. It has to be a fair thing and we have to come to a common place. And that kind of makes me think that they're not there yet. So can that change in the next week? It absolutely can. And I'd like to think, and I'd like to hope that the optimistic view is they,

they get something done the night before padded practice, like you say, and they get Cook locked up for the next three, four years, and he's happy with where he's at. He's got that security, and he's out there good to go, and he's a captain this year and all that. But if that doesn't happen, yeah, what is his mental state going to be like? If he said he's going to hold out, is he just going to be like, oh, okay, I don't have a new deal. That's fine. I'll just play the last year of my rookie contract because I kind of have to based on the CBA. I can't to hold out. Is he just going to be like, oh, okay, I don't have a new deal. That's fine. Like I'll just play the last year of my rookie contract because I kind of have to based on the CBA.

I can't really hold out. And I don't know if based on the language in the CBA if he can even technically hold in. There's probably some loophole there that he can get away with. He definitely can. He kind of has to be out there playing, right? Yeah. So I don't know.

I mean, it'll be very, very interesting to see what happens with that. So the way that I look at it is in that case, if Delvin told them, I'll go through all the meetings and the walkthroughs, but I'm not getting out there for padded practice, they could go after him with the CBA for not fulfilling the duties of his contract, but it would depend on whether they'd actually want to do that. I mean, are you really going to – Yeah, because that would depend on whether they'd actually want to do that. I mean, are you really going to just even drive things further apart?

Potentially, right. Are you going to find him or are you going to go after whatever guaranteed money he has left or void his contract? Or I, you know, I, do you really want to try to do these things even though you can, because you have the leverage or would you rather just work it out?

And I've still, I have always been in the camp that they're going to figure it out, but it really depends how much money are you trying to get Delvin Cook in a situation where the cap is going down next year. It made your position harder, and it also makes you think maybe that that deal should have been worked out before, before we all knew what was going to happen with the salary cap on Delvin's side. Yeah, well, the one thing I'm grateful with the salary cap on Delvin's side. Yeah, well, the one thing I'm grateful for right now is that Delvin Cook does not use Twitter in the same way that Stefan Diggs does because I think we would have a lot of very cryptic posts if that were the case.

Yeah, that's right. Yeah, it'll be very – I don't know. I'm curious to see what happens because, yeah, he could get that deal within the next week or he could not. I just really don't know. So we're going to have to see. That's really all I got on that at this time. Yeah, no, you're right.

Last thing for you is the wide receivers. And how well do you know your backup wide receivers, Will? Because Kirk Cousins knows all their names, and he mentioned them to us. receivers and how well do you know your backup wide receivers will because Kirk Cousins knows all their names and he mentioned them to us this is mentioned he mentioned Alex Collins and Dylan Mitchell that's a deep cut he's been doing his homework hey yeah you guys don't forget about Dylan Mitchell a seventh round pick who was on the practice squad last year now Now, beyond Adam Thielen, this is the big storyline. Everyone we asked about Justin Jefferson was kind of like, well, we'll see.

It's very hard to ask Justin Jefferson, especially when he got behind from day one, being on the COVID list, to step in and be a huge impact player. I guess, you know, I'm not surprised that Cousins would mention the deep cut wide receivers, but I think it's fair to have some skepticism about how the rest of the receivers are going to step in the role. Kubiak mentioned Tajay Sharp and the fact that he knows the offense, and this year, knowing the offense might be the thing that puts you on the field first if you're Tajay Sharp or if you're BC Johnson so I guess I came away from this week that reading between the lines can be a fun exercise and sometimes difficult but I came away reading

between the lines hey let's let's not go crazy with our expectations for right off the bat with Justin Jefferson just yet. Yeah, I think that's a fair takeaway, and Kirk was talking about it, and Kubiak was talking about it, and Jefferson's got a lot to learn. He's coming in, and he's got to build a rapport with Cousins, and they were able to get together and throw a little bit this offseason, and then I think they kind of realized that that wasn't the best idea, because some teams that were doing that had some COVID scares. So they haven't had a ton of time together.

And like you said, he was on that reserve list for a little bit, so that has slowed his progress in getting out there and walkthroughs. I still think he's clearly the most talented far and away of that trio with Tajay Sharp and B.C. Johnson. But, yeah, like you said, I could easily see those two guys having a better grasp of the offense right away, which could force there to be a little bit of a rotation at that spot. As we know, the Vikings rarely ever have three receivers on the field,

so they might have a little rotation at that second spot. But having Adam Thielen, I think, is a big thing. And having a veteran guy like that who knows the offense, has has a good rapport with Kirk and has kind of been able to, to talk to Justin Jefferson and kind of help him get up to speed. I still think Justin Jefferson is going to have a strong rookie year, but it could be kind of a, a pro a process where we see, maybe he's not, maybe he's only catching a couple of balls week one against the Packers. And then by, by mid season, he's starting to find his groove.

Yeah. We even saw that with Irv Smith last year, where it took a couple of weeks, and then once he was thrust into that position with Thielen's injury, he ended up performing extremely well. Now, I don't remember this. Were you at camp last year, or did you not start the job until after camp? No, I wasn't at camp last year unfortunately and i was looking forward to uh to being out there this year and and unfortunately that that won't happen at least to the same uh degree as a typical camp i know i feel i feel sad for you because it's i appreciate that most

entertaining times of the year when everybody starts there's 90 guys most of them won't make it so some of them are not good at all. And you're learning random guys. You're trying to write features that you think are going to be relevant, but if you think a guy could get cut, you better write it early on him. Better write it quick, yeah. Right, so that he doesn't get cut. All those things are pretty highly entertaining,

and in previous years they would spend a lot of time and i don't know if they'll do this with like drills and different apparatuses like uh this thing that the running backs would run through that would go tick tick tick tick tick tick tick like to try to i don't know practice not fumbling it's just ridiculous it looks like it came from the 1940s or something so next year will next Will. Next year you will have the joy. Did you go as a fan before, like when you were a kid or anything, to training camps? I know that I did when I lived in Buffalo.

I've never been, actually, somehow. I don't know. I went to a lot of games, but I never went to training camp. I don't know. So hopefully next year I'll be able to get out there because I think that would have been a lot of fun for me as someone who this offseason partially because of uh being quarantined I've really like dove into all the the end of roster guys and all the all the deep cuts and like today Harrison Smith mentioned uh Nate Meadors playing safety and I was like oh that's that's fascinating stuff yeah big big news like the number who's going to be the number three safety?

All that kind of stuff. I was kind of sad that Braylon Addison got waived the other day because I thought he could have been a good punt returner or something. Unfortunately, the drafting of KJ Osborne was kind of bad news for his outlook. Hopefully, I'll be able to get out there

next year and watch all the end of roster guys and all the funky drills and stuff like that. Man, I have something perfect for you that I've been working on that I'm not sure if I'm ever going to publish because I didn't know that they were cutting down from 90. So I've been working on like crazy stats about players you've never heard of. And this is just up your alley.

Let me just give you a few. I just pulled this up, and you can guess what player I'm talking about, like random guys who are definitely not stars or starters. This player went up against the Vikings in 2017 and had eight pressures on 17 pass rush snaps and then never did anything again in his whole career. Is that Anthony Zettel? That is career. Is that Anthony Zettel? That is correct.

That is Anthony Zettel. I think I would be good at this game. Yes. I'll just give you two more. This guy only caught three passes in college, and he's a wide receiver. He's on the team. Yeah, Dan Chisina, the track star from Penn State. I knew it.

I knew you'd be so good at this. The undrafted free agent class, there's so many fascinating, like Blake Lynch, the linebacker from Baylor. He played five different positions at Baylor. He played running back, cornerback, receiver, safety, and linebacker, which is just a wild combination. All right, I'm two for two. You got one more for me?

Listen to the joy in your voice. This guy made the number 33 overall spot in the athletics annual freaks list. So, like, Bruce Feldman writes this list of freak athletes from college football. He was a linebacker. He was able to bench press 400 pounds and run a 4-4. He ended up being an amazing scholar athlete as well, but did not get drafted. I got this Jordan fair from app state. Unreal.

Yeah. I've been, I've been doing a thing where just to fill content where I've been counting down every guy on the roster and reading about him. So I'm up to like, I've been doing it based on the number of days remaining. So I think today is like 37 or something. So I've gotten through all the linemen and linebackers and stuff like that.

All right. Who's the oldest corner? It's Marcus Sales, right? Man, unreal. From the Canadian Football League. Unreal. All right, last one. I've got another one.

I'm not even going to publish this article probably, but I've just been like collecting idiotic stats. Yeah, I love it. How about a guy who, let's see, let's see. How about a guy who started 25 games in college, but most like split them between three different positions on the offensive line. So like 12 at left tackle, 11 at right tackle, two at right guard.

Brady Aiello, right? Come on. From Oregon? Come on. I don't think you could stump me here. Five for five. All right. I think I got them all.

Jeez. How about, I know you'll know. The undrafted free agent guy. I don't know if I can do anything more here. Jake Vargas converted from tight end to fullback. Had like 20 catches in college. Okay, how about this one? This guy played against the Vikings in preseason a couple years ago

and was the highest graded player by PFF for the fourth preseason game, and that's probably why the Vikings liked him. Eddie Yarbrough? What? Did you hack my computer? No, I did not. I did not. When you said fourth preseason game, that tipped it off,

because I remember they played the Bills in the fourth preseason game. He could potentially be involved there at defensive end, although I also really like Kenny Willekes, the seventh-round pick. Yeah. He's a real gritty guy. Okay, this guy gave up only five QB pressures all of last year as a lineman. Blake Brandle. That was an easy one, but I'm, like, digging it.

That was actually a draft pick. Come on now. I am out. All right, one last one. This guy, he ended his college career in 2018 and has already played for four different teams, a skill position player. So the Vikings are his fourth team, and he just ended his college career in 2018. And I'll even give you the university from Oregon.

Okay. Oh, okay. I was actually going to potentially be stumped and tell that you got that clue, but that's Tony Brooks James? Man. Yeah. Yeah. Maybe I gave away too much.

Honestly, you shouldn't have given me the Oregon hint. I might have been actually stumped there. I was trying to think about the skill position guys. He's like the number six running back or whatever it may be. So what have you been doing during quarantine, Will? Yeah, a lot of this, a lot of reading about the end of roster guys. I don't know. We'll see.

They got like four more cuts to make to get down to 80, about the end of roster guys. I don't know. We'll see. They got like four more cuts to make to get down to 80, and I think I'm going to be kind of sad, whoever it is. Yeah, you definitely will. Well, you were made for training camp, and there will be next year, I'm sure. 2021. You are doing incredible work on the bottom of the roster at Sports Illustrated. Appreciate it. And very glad, and other stuff too, I think. And the top of the roster at Sports Illustrated. Appreciate it. And very glad, and other stuff, too.

I think that there's a lot more. And the top of the roster, too. Okay. So, well, you're doing great work, and I look forward to getting out there and seeing some semblance of training camp, even though even Harrison Smith had to admit, no, it's not even remotely like a real training camp. So, thank you for your time, sir. This was tremendously fun, and we will do it again sometime soon.

Yeah, sounds good. Thanks for having me on. Looking forward to getting out there. Sports are coming back. So are your chances to bet on your favorite teams and events. Major League Baseball finally kicking off, and there's no better place to start wagering than our exclusive partners, BetOnline.

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