Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Spinning the wheel of Minnesota Vikings quarterback options

Episode Date: February 9, 2022

Matthew Coller and Sam Ekstrom discuss the most bizarre insult Matthew has ever received online and then dive into the Vikings' options at quarterback with our new wheel of quarterback options. We spin the wheel and it lands on a rookie, a veteran and one young QB who might be on the trade block. Also the NFL 100 gives us an idea of how many players the Vikings have to build around in comparison to a team like the Rams. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Folks, before we get into the show, I wanted to tell you that you can save 15% at SodaStick.com by using the promo code PURPLEINSIDER at checkout. That's S-O-T-A-S-T-I-C-K.com for your Minnesota sports-inspired hats, hoodies, shirts. Use the promo code PURPLEINSIDER at SodaStick.com. Hey, everybody. Welcome to another Purple Insider slash Bring Me the News live stream. Matthew Collar here along with Sam Ekstrom from Purple Insider. And I want to start the show today. I'm going to get into quarterbacks. There are top hundred voting lists that NFL films tweeted out that I want to talk about, including one that had a hilarious former Viking in the top 20. There is a, if we get time to talk about it, the XFL kickoff,

any time that I can push for the XFL kickoff, that's on my list of things to potentially talk about as well. But Sam, there's some serious controversy in Purple Insider land that needs to be addressed. It needs to be addressed today, right away. Do you know what I'm talking about? I have no idea. I mean, I could hazard some guesses, but I don't want to spoil it or I don't want to bring something up

you're not prepared to discuss. So why don't you lead us into whatever waters you want to wade into? Okay. It's a very sensitive topic and I feel like it needs to be talked about because it created a stir online and i've been fired is this the end of me not yet uh this is uh it became a controversy of accusations against me that i need to address okay so i got this direct message from someone named phil newman who sent me a dm yesterday that said this please stop reporting for my team you're're not smart. You're ugly. Now this is totally fine. This happens all the time. But the next sentence is your hairline is rapidly receding.

No one likes you. You're a sad individual. If I wanted a piece of bleep to report on my team, I could visit a local porta potty. Now, all of that stuff is pretty normal. When you talk about Kirk cousins all the time that people will attack you. I mean, it's not unusual. It's boilerplate stuff, really.

I mean, it's really standard stuff. You're stupid. You're ugly. All these things. That's fine. This is even when I was covering another team before when I lived in Buffalo, I got tweets that were like this. If I said that a Buffalo Sabres prospect wasn't the next Sidney Crosby. I would get your stupid, stop covering my team. Why do you hate my team?

You always get, this is very standard. Every reporter gets this from random accounts. However, this is the first time I've ever been attacked about the hairline. Now we are doing this in part on video. I would like to lean down and show you that, well, this is not exactly the same as it was maybe 10 years ago. Rapidly receding, I think, is a mischaracterization of my hairline. And I would also like to say that I have no idea what that has to do with football. But a ruthless and savage attack came in my way and created a stir.

So I would just like to show everyone, and if you're listening, I'm showing my hair right now. What do you think, Sam? I mean, would you describe this as rapidly receding? Well, first of all, thank you for your vulnerability to address something of this nature. It takes a man to show up the next day and show off said hairline for all to see. I think it takes, honestly, a lot of security and self-confidence that you're good with this hairline. And I've known you for five years now. I'm not sure there's much more recession now than there was when I met you. So rapidly is a very accusatory and

inflammatory word here that I think it's just irresponsible, frankly. And, you know, what's ironic about this is that this comes on the heels of my own hair trauma, where my wife was picking out gray hairs from my from my head yesterday as well. So this kind of aligns with your timeline of having certain accusations thrown your way. In my case, it's more like, yeah, you're getting old. And in yours, I guess that affects your ability to analyze a football team. Yeah, no, it really does. In fact, all football men have very thick heads of hair. I can't think of anyone with a receding hairline that has ever coached football.

I will say Vince Lombardi, what a head of hair. All-time great hair in football. Joe Namath is number one, right? All-time legendary best hair in football history. Is that right? Yeah, yeah. Modern football, you know, the Jared Allen mullet, locally at least, probably some of the best Vikings hair that we've seen. Um, but they're not hockey players, not by a long shot. I mean, you're

not going to get a lot of, um, you know, Barry Melrose hair dues around, uh, around these NFL locker rooms, right? The time that, uh, Randy Moss decided to go with the fro and when his helmet came off it just afroed everywhere what what a legendary look for uh Randy Moss so maybe he qualifies as that all-time great hair I'm not going to critique Derrick Henry's decision I will say it's creative and memorable but um yeah so the accusations I would say are fair only that every person in their mid thirties starts to look at their hair and find grays or starts to notice a little more forehead going on there. But I will say that I don't believe that as I slowly recede into Frazier crane, that that

will change anything about how we do the show. So an important and a heartfelt statement that comes from me before we talk about quarterbacks, it is, can I just say this, that of, of at any point since I've covered the Vikings and you have had this too, there will always be people on the internet who are giving you a hard time. This is going to exist for anyone, But I really feel like the recent Jim Harbaugh thing combined with reports that Kirk Cousins might not be traded have just upped the angstiness of Vikings fans. Have you felt this? Like, I know you're less online than me, but I have felt an increase in the angstiness of Vikings fans where every single day I usually like to go on Twitter to see what

fans are saying. I get a lot of like very thoughtful messages and had have great back and forth with people about the quarterback situation all the time. But what I see in that is every time you talk to somebody like, Oh, we're having a reasonable back and forth about the quarterback situation. Then there's like 18 people who fly in who don't even follow either of you who seem to be searching Kirk Cousins all day or Jim Harbaugh all day and scream at each other. And, uh, you know, I just feel like it's become a very uncomfortable situation for Vikings fans. And this is not a reason to want to trade Kirk Cousins. Okay. But only that if you hit a complete reset, everybody can sort of move forward. And I think that this is, this is a reason for the,

for trading Kirk Cousins, not that fans are yelling at each other, but because these debates that are happening also exist within the team of some people probably think that there's this path for him to become Matt Stafford in the Super Bowl. There's probably people who think, no, he'll never win anything and this can't happen. And what you don't want is what you just had, which is a general manager who seemed to still believe that Kirk Cousins could get the job done because he gave Cousins the extension and a head coach who never believed in Kirk Cousins from day one job done because he gave Cousins the extension and a head coach who never believed in Kirk Cousins from day one. And they were paired together and it created a lot

of tension and discomfort. And if you don't think that there's some light switch to flip on that will make this vastly different, it's not like Mike McCarthy leaving and bringing in a new coach for Aaron Rodgers, where you know what the ceiling is resetting everyone to get on the same page with a new quarterback and a, and a, and a path at the quarterback position, I feel like is important for their organization, for how everybody feels about it, as opposed to having the Kirk cousins, um, you know, debate that is, it just seems to exist all the time surrounding your team. You're saying that polarization isn't limited to political conversations and socioeconomic issues and sports too, because we're definitely experiencing it firsthand. And I agree that

having an organizational shift where everybody is on the same page, huge. Is it going to solve the petty social media beefs? Probably not. We're going to have four different camps here in the draft, Camp Powell, Camp Willis, Team Strong. There's going to be more polarity, but the Cousins thing is so out of control because we're in the era of where you've got a lot of people saying, well, follow the data, follow the science. But then with Cousins, you look at the numbers or certain numbers and you can still make your case. And then the other side says, well, look at these other numbers. And the numbers kind of tell these different stories, too. And it's impossible to win.

And trust me, I consume more Twitter than I'd like to. I see the polarity out there, not always directed at me like it is at you, Mr. Big Forehead. I jest, I jest. I'm part of the Big Forehead Club too. But at least having a new subject to direct our angst might be a little refreshing, might be a little fun. And I think we're going to get into a little bit

of that here with a quarterback activity that you've dreamed up. Maybe the hardest I've ever laughed on Twitter is when my joke about the hairline thing was it happened to LeBron folks. And someone was like, how dare you compare yourself to lebron and they were serious i was like that yeah that's what i'm doing they were not no way yes no i'm not kidding no yeah i said the same thing this is there is no limit to what people can take seriously on the internet because one of the things i said yesterday to someone was they were asking about this jeremy fowler report that goes along with the Adam Schefter report that the Vikings like Kirk Cousins or Kevin O'Connell does, and they might want to work something out. Very vague stuff.

And I said, Josh Rosen is our guy, which is what Cliff Kingsbury said after he took over as the head coach in Arizona. And then they traded him for a second round pick to Miami and drafted Kyla Murray. There is nothing you should believe right now. That is just the truth. Kevin O'Connell is preparing for a Super Bowl. They have not made a decision about how they're going to approach this yet. I'm sure it was a conversation in the room when they're doing the interviews of what would you do at quarterback and that kind of thing. But to have this definitive nature about this is what they're going to do is ridiculous. And why would you ever say, oh, yeah, dude, we are done.

So we are out on Kirk. But hey, does anybody want them? Like, yeah, we can't stand the guy, but you should like that's not a good sales pitch. There's another thing to point out here, too, and what you were just talking about in throwing stats back and forth. Here's one stat we can all agree on okay that scoring points is the way to win football games correct so uh there's a a chart that was put out there uh by a guy who was an intern at pro football focus who does a lot of like cool charts and stuff. And it shows offensive and defensive rankings for the teams that reached the Superbowl and 19 out of the last 22 have been in the top 10 offensively.

That's no surprise at all. Kirk cousins in his career has one offense that was top 10. And that was in 2019 and they were eighth. And I guess like, I think we can all agree that the whole idea of a quarterback, like why we look at the statistics, what we're looking for is does this stuff point to you scoring points, which means winning games. Like sometimes we lose sight of all of this. Like, what does it all mean? Like quarterback rating and everything else. Tom Brady, by the way, has a worst quarterback rating every single season than Kirk Cousins since he's been in Minnesota. Does that not tell you a little bit about quarterback rating? But the whole point of trying to use these stats is points. And when you have a big sample size of not scoring enough points to be a Super Bowl contender, that is to

me a definitive factor in making this decision is with this person at the helm, you have not been able to produce enough points. And if you think that changing coaches is going to change that, that might be true. It's possible, but he's worked with a lot of coaches in a lot of situations and sometimes good offensive lines in Washington and good receivers and all these things. And it just is really hard for me to think that a guy with a numbers background like Kwezi Adafo-Mensa is going to miss the most important number that exists, which is how often does your team score points with this person operating your offense? I just have a really tough time thinking that they're going to miss that. And that's where I think that with all the

reporting and everything else, it's hard to say this, Sam, but I think people just have to be patient and let this play out because I still lean toward, despite those reports, that Kirk Cousins is more likely to be traded than not. Yeah. And I'll back you up on that until the day that it is official that he's not being traded. And I'll eat crow and I'll say all along that what I believe to be correct is not guaranteed to align with this new GM and coach. But we're giving the information. We're telling you why, based on past results, it wouldn't be smart to retain him.

Why, based on the current salary cap situation, it wouldn't be smart to retain him. And why keeping him in the future would not be intelligent for your roster. I mean, there's really no, it would be a tough decision if you were getting these results from a quarterback that was cheaper or on a rookie deal. Cause you'd be saying, well, the wins aren't here, but the salary's right. So, you know, do we stick with this? Probably, but you'd still have to think about it. It makes it easier because of the salary. That is the

kicker in all of this. Everyone has to consider that what you're getting is not equivalent with what you're paying. And it's not just the Vikings. There are other teams too, a good number of them that are paying quarterbacks and not getting results and they're stuck. And the Vikings would do well to try to get out of this mess. So let's wait a month, six weeks before making any snap decisions on, well, Kirk's their guy. I don't know if Kirk's their guy. I'm not too sure about that. Well, it was just a couple of weeks ago. Think about the things that we thought were going to happen based on reporting recently. We thought that Rick Spielman was going to be president of football operations from one of the same reporters that's saying that they're going to extend Kirk. So think about that. We also were given the impression that

Jim Harbaugh was going to be the head coach of the Vikings. It is Kevin O'Connell. It is not Jim Harbaugh. These things have to play out because as we've said all along that, and this is, goes to a fundamental belief that sometimes no information is better than bad information. I like to say this to people who are Vikings fans that talk to me about cousins, like you've watched though, right? Like if you watch every single game of a quarterback, your assessment's going to be better than a snapshot statistically based on some gathered box scores. Like that's just like, you could give a better assessment more likely than not. If you care about football at all by just watching every game of someone. I mean, think about even this, that these lions people who watched every single

game of Matt Stafford and thought that he would do this in Los Angeles, they probably had a better idea of Matt Stafford than I did because they watched every single Matt Stafford game. I did not. I saw a couple per year. I looked at the numbers and here we are. So I really believe in that, that bad information does not do anything better than just your basic assessment of something like that. And I think that with the reporting, when reporting does not match up with what you just think by looking at the situation you have to wonder is this really going to be accurate did it really make sense that rick spielman would stay with this team and become the president of football operations no not after uh

the situation that was created here and ultimately i don't doubt that that conversation happened and that rick may have been under that, but ultimately it didn't play out. But I do have a fun way to think about the quarterback situation. I have a game I've created here called the wheel of quarterbacks. Okay. Are you ready for this? So here's what I've done. Are there going to be sound effects like in the post in post-production?

I know you don't have them right now, but will you add like a wheel of fortune thing or a wheel sound? Yeah, maybe. I could just sort of play some game show music. That would make me happy if you did. Sure. I could sing some games and be like, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do.

Let's spin the wheel of quarterbacks. Okay. So I have 22 quarterbacks that could potentially start for the Vikings next year, including Kirk Cousins. And we're going to spin the wheel and talk about whether it's a good idea. Okay. So here I go. I am spinning the wheel.

Tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, Oh boy. It landed on like the worst one. Daniel Jones is what it landed on for the first one. So this is, this is the rule. We have to talk about it. I don't think Daniel Jones is reasonable, but Hey, the first one. So this is the rule. We have to talk about it. I don't think Daniel Jones is reasonable.

But hey, by the way, what do you think the coach of the Giants said about Daniel Jones? He's our guy. We love him. They'll say this about anyone who is the court. I remember. How about this? I remember my first day in Minnesota on the job when I moved here in 2016. I covered a Spielman press conference

in the press box after Bridgewater had gotten hurt. And he talked about how he believed in Sean Hill as the starter and then traded for Sam Bradford like four days later. That happened. So just so you know, like about people saying they believe in people. All right. Kirk Cousins for Daniel Jones. Is that a good idea? Yeah. So I think Daniel Jones has some serious Sam Darnold vibes. He's three years into a New York career that has gone nowhere. Sound familiar, right? So Darnold in New York had 45 touchdowns, 39 interceptions. He was a 60% passer, and Carolina thought that it was going to be better with them. It was not.

Daniel Jones in his career has 45 touchdowns, 29 interceptions, so a little bit better of a ratio, and he's a 63 percent passer um I don't think they're very different I mean Daniel Jones has maybe a little more physical ability than Sam Darnold but I mean if if you're three years into this thing and you're not getting more out of your team like if if and yeah the Giants haven't had great rosters, but that's kind of not the point. If you can't elevate them above a bottom five team for three years, I have a hard time buying into you. So it seems Darnold-esque to me.

And I don't know, is Darnold on your wheel? Because I think I would have the same answer. I would say, he feels like Daniel Jones like I think they're kind of the same person okay I'll give a quick thought and then we'll spin the wheel again because that one doesn't seem super reasonable although here's the argument to do it for the Giants though are you suggesting a trade like a trade straight up or yeah it would have to be a trade straight up Daniel Jones for the Giants have been so bad for so long. Like they should be on the list of teams that should want to trade for Kirk Cousins.

Because if you do that, Brian Dable is the coach there. They do have some weapons. Guys were hurt last year. I mean, they probably go in that division like nine and eight, right? Which for the Giants, considering how bad they've been, that's what you want. Uh, you could also argue, and I don't know if I would make this case or not, but Daniel Jones with some Ryan Tannehill vibes. And remember the Tennessee Titans acquired Ryan Tannehill as a backup quarterback to Marcus Mariota, and they decided to make the switch. Uh, and then Tannehill became like a semi-franchise quarterback of the level of Cousins.

Now, maybe you don't want that because you want to draft a quarterback as a bridge with some potential upside, or at least somebody who maybe with a good organization, a good coach. Remember Joe Judge, Mike Zimmer was probably the 10th, 12th best coach in the league, 14th. Joe Judge was like 31 the only guy who's worse is urban meyer the big difference there uh and also you know i think the offensive system justin jefferson all those things could make for a competitive season with daniel jones where he would drive us crazy with interceptions and fumbles that he's not supposed to do and

but you would not have to lock into him that would be the case for me is if you're talking about a pure bridge quarterback and still drafting someone, I would do that trade for that reason that it would be interesting to talk about whether Daniel Jones could make a case for himself, whether he could be sort of the Jimmy G or the Alex Smith that is here for a year. And then you move on. Uh, and if he has a good year, you trade him to somebody else. And then you've got draft capital twice, and then you move on. And if he has a good year, you trade him to somebody else, and then you've got draft capital twice from one guy. I actually like it from that perspective. I don't like it from the idea that he suddenly becomes a great start.

Yeah, no, and I was thinking it more like just from a vacuum player evaluation perspective. I think that from a salary perspective, it makes sense. You would have to make a bit of a tricky call on his fifth year option, which is coming up now, like in a couple months. And yeah, you could pick it up. You could not pick it up. Either way, you get him for a year cheap. And yeah, and I've always said that if you're getting rid of cousins and all or most of the salary, it's probably a pretty good deal. So from that perspective, good. From a performance perspective, I'm dubious.

But again, not locked in and you would fail cheaply. And that's kind of the name of the game if you're trying to figure out your quarterback spot. Hey, by the way, do we need to add Kyler to the list? Because he unfollowed the Cardinals on social media and there's a big stir. Again. I mean, this is, this is super bowl week, right? Is we end up with reports that are vague about people's futures and we end up with, uh, who even figures that out? I never understood that. Cause everyone always knows when, when that happens. Yeah. I've like,

is there some kind of program that like tracks what your activity every day? It's weird. I have no idea. Two things for the people watching on YouTube. I appreciate Stephanie saying she'd rather take my hair from Aaron Rogers hair. Thank you. Also what I'm drinking. Here's diet.

Dr. Pepper, not, not, not pounding a beer during the show, nor do I really I'm drinking here is diet, Dr. Pepper, not, uh, not, not pounding a beer during the show, nor do I really drink at all, but, um, diet, Dr. Pepper is my lifeblood. So, uh, all right, let's spin the wheel again. First one came out like a little man.

Okay. Desmond Ritter. Oh, I've started to do the tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick tick tick tick tick tick tick tick tick tick that's the cincinnati quarterback who i watched in the senior bowl and i have to say that uh he did some impressive things i think he's got some arm talent uh he moved around in the pocket pretty

well and i sam well you could give your reaction but i will say uh yes i mean if that's the guy that you land on and you think he's the best quarterback at that position, then yes to Desmond Ritter. I like this quarterback class through elaborate research. I mean, I'm reading scouting reports. I'm looking at numbers. I haven't done a lot of tape grinding on these guys, but I don't mind a lot of these profiles.

And I think I look at Desmond Ritter and everything i read about him is nfl ready processor like a lot a lot of them the red flag is they're not great when they get off their first progression they're not very you know good at working through their reads that's not the case with ritter yeah ritter supposedly is the best processor of all of them has four years at c at Cincinnati, kind of had a nice little linear improvement. He's big. He's 6'4", and he's got mobility. So he kind of has the pieces in place. It's obviously not going to be all perfect at this stage,

but I'm good with that. I'm good with Desmond Ritter. Whether it's first or second round, I think we're going to see about four or five different guys reported as the number one quarterback. Don't you? This feels like there's enough parity in the top of this quarterback class that we talked about unreliable reporting. There's going to be a lot of unreliable reporting in the next two and a half months.

By the way, the chat has already gotten excited about this if kyler murray is on the trade market then you are trading for kyler murray like you are you are in that conversation today well sorry i just kicked my laptop but today today today and every day you want to be on on that um but i you can't make anything of somebody doing something on social media and with the harrison smith example he hadn't ever followed the vikings and people said he unfollowed them and it was like nothing ever happened um so yeah there's a case to be made for maybe four or five guys to be starting quarterbacks from this draft or first round

picks as far as ritter goes, I have my trusty PFF draft guide up here. And the biggest thing is that for their criticism is ball placement. And maybe he struggles a bit with that and that he's going to have to refine some things technically. But like you said, the report is that he could step in, play day one, be a starter. I mean, I'm interested in that because everyone's always looking for Mahomes. And I think that if you get him, you get him. That's great. You can't just aim for that necessarily because you never know when that's going to be. If the NFL knew Mahomes was going to be this good, he would have gone number one.

And every team would have tried to trade their whole franchise for Mahomes if they had known but instead he went like what 10th like clearly we don't know which guy is going to elevate rise to the challenge but um somebody who comes in ready to operate an offense i think you what you don't necessarily want for next year if you're starting this guy because this is sort of the conversation the wheel like we're assuming this person starts next year is that they're weighing over their head and they waste the year of Justin Jefferson because they're getting sacked all the time. So that would be part of it. And somebody who can operate an offense where the Vikings are going to have an offense that works for quarterbacks. That's why they hired Kevin O'Connell. Greg in the chat wants to know about Sam Howell. Sam Howell's got a great arm from what

I've watched of him and he can run a little bit, but I also don't want to pretend that I have a super hot take on any of these guys. You can see the upside and why any of them would become a starting quarterback. Howell has the arm strength to make big throws down the field? Ritter knows how to operate an offense. Willis has this ridiculous physical ability. I mean, there's, there's cases for all of these guys, pickets, kind of a playmaker and swash buckler, if you will. Uh, you know who I didn't put on the number randomizer. Tell me if this was the wrong thing to do. I didn't put Kellen Mond on the quarterback wheel of randomness for who could be the quarterback in 2022.

Was that wrong? I think Mond is your outright tank quarterback. Mond is the quarterback if you're also trading Dalvin Cook, Daniil Hunter, Kirk Cousins, Adam Thielen. Then you go with Kellen Mond and the Wilfs will offer Kevin O'Connell $100,000 per game to lose. He's your Deshaun Kaiser, basically, is what you're saying. Like someone who is just not at all close. Yeah, the patsy who you count on to to deliver the interception in the fourth quarter which which

they can't do um ron in the chat points out that you know mahomes alan herbert there's lots of criticism for quarterbacks in fact i did this once to have some fun i typed into google josh allen overrated prospect justin herbert over prospect. And there's articles on articles about how all these, you know, all these players are overrated. There's over criticism with everybody in the world trying to form a take on something that you can't really know. You know, you can't really be sure which one of these guys is going to work out. And yet we're all supposed to have opinions on them. And how could you not, right? So I i'm supposed to say i love willis more than howell but really i have no idea i think that those guys are all good options and one of them

or two of them will work out uh but let me ask you a question okay someone like willis who i think by all accounts is the next big running quarterback gigantic arm not very accurate though um and you know maybe you could see designing a huge like element of your running game with him is it irresponsible to bring in a quarterback that might not have the arm skill to get it to your good wide receivers when you have justin jefferson and adam phelan that's a hard one i mean because for every patrick mahomes and jielen? That's a hard one. I mean, because for every Patrick Mahomes and Josh Allen, there's a Jordan Love who was talked about the same way. It's like, oh, this guy, he's got the big arm. He's the great athlete and all those things. There are other quarterbacks who have had this label that have completely fallen on their face. Johnny Manziel was a great

athlete, this big playmaker and just never launched at all. And he had all of these things that people liked about his competitiveness, and he was edgy and everything else, and it just didn't work. There have been other guys that were like that that did work. So that's hard for me. I don't know if I would say that the Vikings would deserve to be criticized if Willis was there and they picked Kenny Pickett. It would be like, I don't know. Do your evaluation.

Pick the guy you like. That's how I end upett, it was like, I don't know, do your evaluation, pick the guy you like. That's how I end up looking at it. However, I am very intrigued. I mean, after watching him run the other day, it's like, wow. I mean that even if he's not like, look at Jalen hurts, not that good at throwing the football. And yet he is not as good of a runner as Willis, but able to close the gap with running ability. I mean, that's just the reality of the game is that these guys who are explosive runners,

Lamar Jackson has been sort of good sometimes, not good other times passing the ball, and yet is always able to win football games in part because of his escapability. And Willis didn't take very many sacks this year, I think, is that right? Or did he take a lot of sacks? Uh, but he, in the senior bowl, it looked like he was able to escape pass rush, which Josh Allen almost never takes sacks. That is such a huge deal for not having those big negative plays. So if you were giving me a choice, I probably would go with the guy with freakish talent over the guy who's a little more safe but if the vikings do it i'm not going to say oh my gosh because of the mac jones thing last year the whole thing last year so many people thought that they knew what mac jones was going to be and he immediately

came into the league and showed he was something different than that and that's just how this works with the evaluation it's like trying to judge a baseball player in batting practice and say what they're going to be in major league baseball. My dog's deciding to shake. I'm sorry about that. He, yeah. I think that when you've got an athlete like Malik Willis on the board, it's hard not to draw the Lamar Jackson comparisons. And that can be a little dangerous because you assume that they are the best version of that archetype of quarterback, which that's risky to assume that someone is going to be someone else. The Vikings ran into this,

trying to find the next Daniel Hunter thinking that lanky athletic pass rushers are all the same. They're not, they've got to have it like upstairs. They've got to have sort of that competitive DNA, the ability to learn an offense, all of that plays into it too. So I'm with you that I think that you have to kind of leave it up to what the team believes they want. And then we get to second guess them later. But of all of these prospects, I think there's also plenty that are athletic that are not necessarily

runners. And if you want someone that's going to, you know, and let's face it as good as Lamar Jackson is with his legs, that does not necessarily fuel the Ravens success. It's when he's able to throw the ball downfield, get it to Mark Andrews, get it to Hollywood Brown,

like in 2020, that's when they were successful. Their running game was fine this year but they were not winning as many football games and even with like Huntley was running the ball too and they weren't as successful because the arm the passing was not as good this year so I'd still like someone if they're going to be mobile outside the pocket be able to make throws on the run behind the line of scrimmage that to me me is great. I watched some plays in the playoffs from Jalen Hurts as he gets blown out by 24 against a much better Bucs team, running out to his right, resetting, throwing from a tough platform 20 yards downfield.

And I think to myself, how many times has Kirk Cousins made a play like that, where he improvised, not by design, and like set himself outside the pocket and made a really tough throw? It doesn't happen very often. The way that I've sort of come around to think about that is corner three-point shooters versus Steph Curry's. Corner three-point shooters get the ball in an advantageous situation, usually on a drive and kick where they set their feet and

they look at the basket and they line up the elbow and they deliver a three-point shot and they shoot 42% from corner threes. Steph Curry can have the ball anywhere on the floor under any circumstances. He could be double teamed. He could be guarded by a tall guy. He could be guarded by the best defensive player in the world and he will shoot 42% threes. Which one of those players is more valuable? They both shoot the same amount. Like that's where the quarterback rating, like, yeah, I mean, Kirk Cousins quarterback rating might be the same as somebody else, but one of these guys is shooting corner threes. The other guy is shooting them from all over the floor. And that's what you want to see in their next quarterback is somebody who can create by himself when things break down. And that is what you want to see in their next quarterback is somebody who can create by

himself when things break down. And that is what we have not seen from Kirk cousins because the physical ability is just not there. So then it's always, well, what would they have to do? And how could they do that? How could they coach and everything else? They're like, well, but there's no Aaron Rogers actually described this on the Pat McAfee show.

And sometimes I want to be very sad after watching Aaron Rodgers interviews, but he talked about quarterbacks versus paper quarterbacks. Paper quarterbacks are, if you draw it up, they'll deliver it. And playmaking quarterbacks are ones that can make something happen when the play goes wrong and the defense gets it right. And I think there's a difference there for winning games, even if the statistics come out relatively even so uh let me let me spin the wheel again and dick dick dick dick click click uh derrick carr let's say josh mcdaniel said it's always been my dream to

have kirk cousins and i don't want derrick carr would you trade Kirk Cousins straight up for Derek Carr? Derek Carr intangibles, I think are preferable to Kirk Cousins intangibles. Kind of, and not even necessarily that mobile, but if you want, like, if you ask me, who do you think is going to make a bigger throw late in the game? I think I'd take Carr. I think he's a little more fearless. I think he's a pretty good deep ball thrower, which is pretty important in today's NFL. So what's his contract? Is it like, I mean, it's obviously expensive, but it's not as prohibitive as Cousins.

It's like low 30s, I want to say. If me Googling this, uh, like destroys the live stream internet here. Um, it is not too bad. Actually. It's pretty preferable. I mean,

2022, he is in the final year of his deal with a $19 million cap hit. That makes it a yes for me. He's been signed that long already. Jeez. That's crazy. Derek Carr. That's's crazy. Derek Carr is 30 years old. That blows my mind. How's his hairline? Bad. I think it's pretty bad. This, this looks like an old picture, but I, yeah, I think it's, it's struggling. I feel you brother. Yeah. I, I mean,

he's got nothing on Matthew Collins. That's why they should get him. Yes, because you have to go out there with a receding hairline. You have to have some kind of confidence. Kirk Cousins has never had to deal with that. Brady has plugs, right? There's no way that Brady is 44 years old and his hair is that good. No way. Right?

No chance. Well, Brady sold his soul to the devil like 20 years ago yeah yeah no really though because of the contract the answer is yes because i think that if you brought in derrick carr and you save yourself the vikings have to pay 10 million so you save yourself a few million bucks by trading cousins. Now, I don't think that Vegas would do this because it is advantageous, but sometimes this is the Stafford thing. Like this is why Detroit in part traded Stafford. He was getting to the end of his contract and it was either sign them to a new deal or move on from him. And so they decided they didn't want to sign them to a new deal. If Vegas said, no, we'd rather sign Cousins to a big deal.

Again, I just can't really make this work in my head, but let's just say, who knows what McDaniels wants to do? You get him here. He has a $19 million cap hit. You have to pay 10 million. So you're still paying a lot, but you could start to set the stage for the future and then decide as you go along, is this a guy that you think you can win with? You could still draft a quarterback in the first round. I think because of the flexibility of that, you could get to see how good is an offense run with someone who has, I think, a

better arm than Kirk Cousins, more physical talent than Kirk Cousins has to go along with Justin Jefferson and what Kevin O'Connell wants to do. And if you're a top five offense, then you can decide whether you want to sign him to an extension or not. Do not hate that idea. I still always will come back to drafting a quarterback and moving on and getting another first round pick, uh, is probably the best way to go. So we will bring back the wheel. Oh, quarterbacks for 2022 as we go along, but I had something else I wanted to ask you about. So I saw NFL films tweeted out a couple of the ballots for the top hundred list. Every year, this becomes just the biggest troll of all trolling time of when they put out this top

100 players. And it's always ridiculous. You and I have seen the votes get done in the locker room. They're going over to practice squad guys who fill in their own teammates. And you just, this can't be real. I saw one ballot had Yannick and Gawkway as a top 20 NFL player, which was just like, okay, this person was trolling the Vikings when they made this list.

How many Vikings though, this might tell us a little bit about where the roster stands how many Vikings do you think make the top 100 list for next year so I'm just going to process this live I think Justin Jefferson is the lock. And is there another lock? Daniil Hunter is the next best player on this team, but he's hurt. Yes. I don't think Kirk Cousins, I mean, you can't have the 10th or 12th best guy at a position. I don't think that works out.

I don't think Eric Hendricks, I eric kendrick's on his name could be in i don't think he played like it last year but i think he's in so i'll go i'll give it to kendrick's and i'll even give denille the benefit of the doubt and i would say three harrison smith is a possibility harrison smith possibly adam's been kind of fringy before feeling feeling possibly again injuries you know it's um it's a low i mean the fact that there's only one lock kind of tells you the trajectory of where they're at with talent if people are really paying attention maybe brian o'neill but it's hard to get offensive linemen on that list uh brian o'neill i thought had a tremendous year and he

deserved to be in the pro bowl when you go through pro bowl rosters, you're like, Hmm, I don't know. Some of these guys didn't really have this coming for this year. Uh, Anthony bar, Xavier Rhodes made some pro bowls where I think it wasn't O'Neill, a replacement player. I think he made it. Yeah. So, I mean, that, and that's the other thing too, is that everyone gets to say they were in the pro bowl, even if you're a replacement. Um, you know what, what I would say is probably four, um, but maybe three. And that is a great way to summarize where the Vikings are right now with their roster is that we're not even sure if you get any more other than Justin Jefferson for top 100 players.

How many do you think the Rams get like six, seven? I mean, they're going to have Stafford. Beckham has a name and also sort of proved himself here. Cooper Cup for sure. Aaron Donald, Jalen Ramsey, Vaughn Miller, possibly even Leonard Floyd, who has a lot of respect in the league. They're going to have a lot. And the Vikings might have one or two.

Johnny Hector's got to be on the list and I think yeah yeah that's right I don't even know who the kicker is for uh that's gay but but I think oh that's right that's right he because he was short on that kick in the in the the Bucks game I think that's a great way to put it though right like and how about even this how about even How many will be on this list in 2022, 2023, go after 2022? Like, is there anybody that we didn't name who has been a star before that is on the roster right now that will be on this list after the 2022 season? No, it's hard to see. It's hard to see it's hard to imagine like it's hard to imagine a this team having the

bandwidth or the audacity or you know the gumption to acquire somebody like a beckham or a miller and it's hard to see them developing a star quickly enough to be on that list in 2023 and the players that we mentioned the theolansans, the Smiths, their stocks are probably dropping just with age. So they would need to have a big year to sort of rise back up the ranking. So the number is going to be low for a couple of years here, unless there are unexpected sources, like if Patrick Jones turns in the next big thing, there's just not a lot of options. And it still it takes a couple years I think for those lists to catch up with who's actually good so the Vikings aren't going to have a great Q rating for a while I mean that the public probably is not going to know a ton of these guys two years down the road

hmm I'm struggling not to make a Q joke about the quarterback, but, uh, so, uh, anyway, um, you know, I think that Darisaw has a chance to emerge as a great left tackle. That's very possible. And aside from that, no, there really isn't anyone who's on the roster at this moment that you could foresee becoming that guy for the first time like jefferson's going to be there this year but i mean a kj osborne is more of just a guy who can play but you know isn't some sort of superstar kenny wongwu as a kick returner to see you know i don't know do they move on from cook at some point and kenny wongwu emerges i don't know but you really have to stretch reality to start thinking about that and i think that's a good way to describe what they

have on the roster right now which you know in some ways sounds really dire and i understand like when we go through it it sounds like man they are just so far away but i think that what it does and this plays into the the cousins and everything else, is it really gives us this opportunity to see Kweisi Adafo-Mensa operate. And that's what will be so interesting going forward here. How do they draft? How do they determine what type of free agents that they want to bring in? Because you can't look at free agency and say, oh yeah, well, let's get all these guys who are 32 years

old and hope they fill out the roster. But there's a lot of free agents who are more like 26. And if you have guys who are 26, 27, those are five-year type of contracts that can be around as you sort of hit your peak, that maybe you get a little more reasonably because you're giving more years and more stability to those players. So how they handle free agency and how they approach the rebuild of this roster, because it is so bare at this moment, I think is a really fascinating part of the start of the Adafo Mensah O'Connell era. Right. And, you know, are they going to prioritize big fish, medium fish, small fish that might have a good analytics profile? Yeah, you had some good fish and chips for lunch. We had lunch today.

I think that we're going to learn so much. And we've said this before, but it's important to reiterate that this first glimpse, it's a pretty big glimpse because not often are you at a crossroads with a quarterback making franchise QB type money. You know, you are inheriting a, I wouldn't say a burning situation, but there are embers, there's smoldering, there's smoke. Like this could turn into a fire sale. And how do they approach that and how much respect do they have i guess for like well you've been here a while you're an institution with this franchise how much does that matter to us um there might be some cold-hearted decisions there might be some sentimental decisions it that that's all going to be pretty interesting to see but

decision making seemed to be awfully sentimental in recent years for the Vikings. And I think striking a balance to move, you know, at least move away from that is going to be pretty critical. Let's wrap on this point. Who would you have in your top five? If you were filling out one of those ballots, which I think they should give to the reporters who cover these people rather than the players, because the players only see who they see, who they play against. They play 17 games. You got the division. They see one third of the league and they're supposed to vote on who the best hundred players are. And it feels like the people who cover the league nationally really should make the top hundred list, but you know, maybe it brings more cache to be able to say oh these are the players even if it's not everyone who actually plays that is getting a vote but who would be on your top

five nfl players and we'll just do on best players like regardless of position because obviously the most valuable position is quarterback yeah and yeah it's hard to choose which quarterback like if i'm trying to limit it to one, I mean, Joe Burrow is certainly the future of the NFL. He was statistically great this year. So it's not even a stretch to say it's Burrow. I mean, I think Rodgers has a case. I think Josh Allen has a case.

I think Tom Brady has a case too. It's just that Brady is retired and Burrow might have 20 years left. So Burrow is like the most, you know, one of the, like Bill Simmons used to do the trade value piece, who would have the most trade value in the NFL? It would be So Burrow is like the most, you know, one of the, like Bill Simmons used to do the trade value piece who would have the most trade value in the NFL. It would be Joe Burrow. So he's probably in the top five. Cooper Cup is probably in the top five. Aaron Donald certainly would be there. I don't think a running back makes it, you know, one of the dominant tight ends,

Kelsey or Samuel. I mean, Samuel is crazy versatile as well. Toss some names in. I don't want to steal them all. Well, I, for me,

it would be Patrick Mahomes is the best player in football still. Sorry. He had a bad second half of a game that that also we could give cincinnati credit for and they should have won that game if they just hand the ball off at the end russell wilson feels your pain uh there's to me that's patrick mahomes and then there's a gap even between number two but number two is aaron donald who is the best defensive player of the entire generation um and i don't even know if there's a number two behind Aaron Donald. I don't think you say it's Aaron Donald, whoever, like this guy can win MVP of the league

every single year. He's the Lawrence Taylor of this era. And maybe if he got, well, he's going to get attention this week. So people will, will recognize that beyond him. I think Devante Adams is the best receiver in the NFL. I would put that up there and then it becomes a little tricky. I mean, your, your point about Debo Samuel being the most dynamic player, uh, and like Trent Williams, I would say for, for right now, not projecting forward. Trent Williams is probably the, he's the best left tackle in the league. I would probably throw him out there. Ah, man. projecting forward trent williams is probably the he's the best left tackle in the league i would probably throw him out there ah man is there a dominant a dominant like future hall of fame

corner in the league right now other than ramsey yeah ramsey's really the name yeah but there isn't a uh durell revis um and so forth and you know that the chat is pointing out that mahomes was ranked 13th by pff again this tells you something about numbers right like i mean you guys know that i use pff for everything but you have to you can't just look at a number and be like that's all the facts I need is grading a certain part of his game this year versus who the best player in the NFL is. Like, that's just not how this works. That's how sports work. Um, it's there's, there's no one number that gives you all the answers. If you are telling me who you would draft number one overall in the NFL by far,

it's Patrick Mahomes. the answer for every single football team in the nfl is patrick mahomes who you would draft number one overall it's not even a conversation it's not even a debate if you put that out there every single person is taking patrick mahomes the guy's team has been to an afc championship four years in a row do you know how many times the vikings have been to the championship weekend? Four times since what? I was born. And hosting it too. In Kansas City.

Hosting it. And how many times have the Vikings done that? Is it, gosh, once? 98? 98 the only time? I mean, I agree. I agree. Go back to the Super Bowl teams.

They probably did. Well, right. I mean, since I was. In the modern, yeah, like the last 40 years since i exist right once um ryan in the chat brings up micah parsons he's on his way he was a phenomenal player this year but you know who's going to get all like trayvon diggs is going to get a ton of attention for this and i just like i don't know i feel like interceptions are kind of random that might be that might be who gets brought up to for shutdown corners for the future i look at him as more of a gets picks but doesn't necessarily shut people down so you know that'll be fun to have people angrily yell at each other about when we get to that top 100 list i just

thought it was great that yanni kagakue ended up on one so we'll continue the uh conversation as we always do and uh look forward to talking again next week where we'll have a super bowl result and possibly by the next time we do this bring me the news purple insider stream sam we will have um a head coach press conference maybe by next week um so that will be interesting to hear what kevin o'connell has to say so i appreciate your time sam and all of you who took the time to watch and also didn't make fun of this hairline. I'll just keep going back to that. So, but anyway, so if you are listening to us for the first time, watch on YouTube or Facebook, Purple Insider is the podcast. We talk every single day

there and purpleinsider.substack.com or follow us on Twitter is a great way to see our written work. Follow Purple Insider on Twitter. That's a good way. So we will catch you all next time. Thanks for coming along.