Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Star Tribune's Andrew Krammer sees a huge swing game for Vikings vs. Jets

Episode Date: October 4, 2024

Matthew Coller talks with Star Tribune Vikings reporter Andrew Krammer about how the Jets will attack the Vikings' defense and a concerning stat about Aaron Jones's workload Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of Purple Insider. Matthew Collar here and Andrew Kramer of the Star Tribune as always joining us here on a Friday leading up to Vikings and Jets. But I gotta tell you, Andrew, there's a different place we need to start in the National Football League before we get into our hardcore breakdown. Were you having like twitches last night? Like something's happening in the universe that is messing with my brain what is it let me turn on amazon prime oh that's why that weird feeling was striking me because off in yonder distance kirk cousins was throwing for 500 yards against the tamp Bay Bucs. And after the game, Andrew, how many deja vus were there in a row?

The chart of win probability. The other team had a 0% chance of giving it away, and somehow they gave it away. Just 20, 22 things were happening to Kirk Cousins last night for the Atlanta Falcons. What a wild game. Not only that, there was a one point when the game was very much in balance and Atlanta was down. Obviously, it's second, third quarter where I'm thinking, like, look, it was a one-score game. And it still could have been B. John Robinson territory.

And Zach Robinson kept making it the Kirk Cousins show and the Kirk Cousins offense. And they had a good plan to attack pits down the middle of the field, London down the middle of the field. It's just, you're right. It looked very much in, you know, no coincidence. Zach Robinson comes from the same Los Angeles Rams coaching tree that Kevin O'Connell was a part of.

And you could just see Kirk looking comfortable. And I guess it took five games for him to start dealing. But you're right. It was so weird because 500 yards career high for him. We've never seen that in a Vikings uniform, but then I saw some stat that this is what we did start to see from him. He's now a winner on prime time. I think he officially has a winning record, at least in his last like 15 or 16 prime time games, which is just flipping that narrative completely on its head. And of course he went from a guy that didn't have very many comeback wins, didn't have all that many clutch drives and was maligned for that to all the

sudden you can never close out Kirk. I mean, he throws the interception and then Tampa Bay should just end the game right there and everybody should go home but in very much 2022 type of fashion it reminded me of the Buffalo game in 2022 also the game that they beat the Lions at home where Dan Campbell just needed a first down and kicked a field goal and missed it and if you are now another team that melts at the end against Kirk Cousins, he's going to come back and beat you. I think there's something about Kirk against defenses that are playing it safe.

Maybe it's because he is just really accurate with the football that he could take advantage. And then somehow he drags that Achilles riddled leg up to the line of scrimmage, gets the spike. I mean, what a wild game. But also on the other side of mean, what a wild game. But also on the other side of that, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers with just an absolute meltdown for the ages. So all of a sudden, that division is now really interesting to watch.

After a couple weeks, everyone declared the Saints as being great. It looked like Kirk Cousins, it was dangerous for him to even play football out there after the first two weeks. And then Bucks they go three and one and then now Atlanta's back and that is a circus in that division oh and how about the Vikings ties to it too it's Clint Kubiak running the New Orleans Saints offense it's Baker Mayfield Sam Darnold's former teammate in the reclamation project Sam wants to be running the tampa bay buccaneers and then of course kirk in atlanta so yeah it's it's i don't know let's not forget old friend adam thielen in carolina he's there too he is there too he is there right it is a wild division where

kirk if he plays like this the weapons they've got on offense for bijan robinson to be a complimentary piece in an offense that produces over 500 yards. Just an incredible performance, I thought, from Kirk and an impressive one that shows that, hey, this guy's, you know, it took some time, but he's healthier than we thought. But also, don't you know exactly what happens next, which is that they raise the bar and everyone starts talking about them and then there's the other side of that which is why he's not a viking now and it's kirk tober officially yes yes that's right

something spooky happens with this man i have no idea what it is when it comes to october so that's worth monitoring because of course the atlanta falcons are on the viking schedule late in the season and for a moment there i thought oh vik, Vikings versus Michael Penix at the end of the year if Cousins can't move. But yet he's found a way to still play really well there the last couple weeks. So relevant to the Vikings degree of difficulty for the schedule going forward. But let us get into our hardcore preview. Aaron Rodgers v. Vikings defense.

Got a stat for you, Mr. Kramer. When Aaron Rodgers this year gets rid of the football in under two and a half seconds, he is rated as PFF's second best quarterback. When he holds the ball for longer than two and a half seconds, he's only completing 53% of his passes and he is their 17th ranked quarterback. That considered, how do you think Flores approaches Aaron Rodgers? That's a great question. I do think that they can keep him in the pocket. I do think that they can take him down in a way that the Denver Broncos did.

Five sacks. Morgan Moses, the right tackle, has already been ruled out for this game because he didn't travel to London. He missed that last game where Rodgers was under complete duress throughout. The right guard, Vera Tucker, just picked up another injury in practice, and so we'll see about him. I just think that Flores can kind of pick his spots here, and it was interesting talking to Stefan Gilmore this week when he mentions that Aaron Rodgers can work the play clock so well that we have to be smart about what we try to do against him. And reading between the lines, how I interpreted that is you can't try to do too much.

You can't do this thing necessarily where Harrison Smith is at the line of scrimmage and then bailing 25 yards deep into a single high alignment because you think you're going to dupe him. Aaron Rodgers might know whether you're blitzing or not at the line beforehand based on 13 other factors that are going on around you and things that he can pick up down in distance, your tendencies, your teammates' tendencies, all those things. So the vikings are going into this kind of level-headed knowing that we might just be able to win straight up we might not have to go into this with some kind of or too much subterfuge too much aggression i thought initially maybe they'll blitz the heck out of them but i don't know if that's the smartest way to go about

it and after talking to players and how much can you glean you know and guys don't want to say too much but even off the record guys are saying like this is still a 40 year old quarterback who's seen absolutely everything and he can burn you we've seen it on film this year where he can burn you downfield if you make mistakes and so i think they're going to play it safe i think you might see a lot of four-man rushes just because they've got the horses up front to beat them. And frankly, the only game we've seen Rodgers look mobile, and he was on the injury report now with a knee injury, but the only game we saw him look mobile was against the New England Patriots front that traded Matthew Judon, has absolutely nobody to chase him down.

And the Vikings have a lot more talent than that. Yeah, and I guess I am of two minds of the idea of blitzing him. I mean, in one way you think, well, if he's got to sit back there in the pocket and be comfortable and wait for things to develop, then with their offensive line, can they really hold up? And the other thing is too, is he going to get a little antsy back there with his recent knee injury with the recovered Achilles? and i know that he's as tough as they come but anybody naturally trying to protect a couple of injuries would get nervous sitting in the pocket waiting waiting waiting for something to happen but then there's the other part of hit him a couple times early on right i mean and sort of uh impose the will a little bit and

i think that denver did blitz quite a bit against him to try to speed things up. The other thing is, too, that if Rodgers and his offensive line are not on the same page exactly, and he's trying to do the whole cadence thing, but they don't really understand the whole cadence thing, so then this whole week they're going to work on getting this right with him and the snap counts.

I think they're going to be worried a lot about that but how's their communication that cadence thing to me was as much about can they communicate blitzes and identify things in order to protect him or not because if they don't and if they're having trouble communicating with their quarterback then they're going to make huge mistakes and We've seen good offensive lines make huge mistakes against the Vikings and give up a lot of quarterback hits. So I'm guessing with Flores, it's going to just be a potpourri of all different things to where you never really can get a beat on exactly what his strategy is for this game. Yeah, I imagine it being different than the second half at Green Bay where you did see

the Vikings. It seemed to me simplify their coverages and not run too much of the variety that we know that they can um i imagine it's going to be a lot more mixing it up i just wonder how much they're going to try to do the seven at the line um you know kind of force force rogers hand that way it's just it depends on how they view those individual matchups up front if they view like hey we can create enough one-on-ones we're going to dominate up front then they might do that um if they feel like they can't then it might be more of an overload kind of system um against him so i think it'll be interesting to see how they play it because the vikings secondary probably not too dissimilar from the Broncos secondary. When you look at kind of the talent that they've got, the Broncos are playing pretty well defensively

this year. So, and I think it's Rogers at this point though, is somebody that is just hasn't shown the chemistry. You talk about the communication with the offensive line. I just think the Vikings are playing so confident right now that it's probably going to be a setup where they're going to go in and physically manhandle them, which is why I think on a four-man rush they'll probably get the job done. We'll see. How did you view the second half in Green Bay from a defensive perspective? I think, for one, we saw exactly what player everybody thinks

is the weak link on the defensive side, which is Byron Murphy Jr., who was tagged with 15 attempts in his direction in that game. Also, though, he ends up getting a pick and stripping the ball at the end. I think that if your weak link is a proven veteran cornerer who's made a lot of plays in the league, then you're in pretty good shape in in that secondary maybe better than we thought um but i guess you could look at it as that they showed some weaknesses that we maybe didn't see at all at any point in the season or that they just got gassed in the game and maybe it could be something that they reassess some of the things on defense little wake-up call you're not perfect you're not just going to go out there and crush every team. I don't know how you looked at that. Yeah, I didn't see the urgency, especially in that fourth quarter, to adjust to things that were beating them. So you saw even early in the

game before Christian Watson went out, they had the Vikings run so much Tampa 2. They run a lot out of two deep coverage, high safety alignments, whether it's quarters, Tampa two. And so the Packers come out and try to attack that. One of Jaden Reed's biggest catches in the first quarter was Christian Watson clearing out the linebacker, Reed coming underneath. Those kinds of things they went back to in the fourth quarter and the Vikings didn't have the same counter punches or go to those counter punches seemingly in the fourth. So to me, it just seemed like more of a kind of a apathy on the side of the players on the field. You saw that.

I felt like a little bit in Byron Murphy, too, where there just wasn't that urgency in zone coverages to attach to his guys the same way there was early. So to me, I don't think this is like a thing where you need to worry about, oh, gosh, the Jets are going to look at the fourth quarter they're going to copy a bunch of things and then the whole game the Vikings are going to be in a blender that was more of just I think an amalgamation of a 28 nothing lead a team that was pretty confident that they had just walloped the Packers and then kind of got caught sleeping in a moment and Flores put it on him in the press conferences but when you talk to players

it was pretty obvious that he put it on them behind the scenes because of the way that he treated it I think Jonathan Grenard said we kind of treat this like a loss the way that we fell apart in the fourth quarter so to me that was more of a player's issue and I do think that Flores didn't try to force the issue until it was a six point game halfway through the fourth. And that's kind of how I view that one. I also looked at it a little bit like maybe a simple explanation was there and just that they were tired because in the second half, the beginning of the second half, they had some three and outs. Then you get the strip sack late in the game. You get the interception in the red zone I mean there were just a lot of times where they were out there

and the receivers for the Packers are running down the field and I think it was Kamu Grugier-Hill said they thought that they were just going to dink and dunk and instead Jordan Love was whipping it all over the place and and I guess that's part with Rodgers though is that if you think that he's just going to dink and dunk well he's still got thegers though is that if you think that he's just going to dink and dunk well he's still got the cannon to be able to throw it wherever he wants on the field but I just don't think they're going to be up 28 to 0 and we're going to have to talk about this too much anymore the other thing is too that combining that with the Falcons game last night I think offense is okay in the NFL. People acted like offense had just

gone away, disappeared. It's going to be 1987 again or something. If you give any team an opportunity like that, they're going to take advantage of it. So I guess they need to keep in mind that even if they get ahead, Aaron Rodgers can come back from two scores or more if you let them. Yeah, and that's why I do think they're going to play it safer i do think we're going to see a lot more of that similar off coverage that we've seen this is again this is an older viking secondary that does not play a ton of bump and run we see gilmore get into situations like that where they do want him to press but most of the time they're having all these guys play off giving you the underneath stuff and if rogers is so wired to take everything that the defense

gives him the vikings i think will willingly give him that underneath stuff and with love if they were expecting that and i remember just watching back that fourth quarter he was making plays too on the run off schedule having to move away from pressure i just don't think rogers is at that stage where he's doing plays like that. That's frankly what Love did in the fourth quarter is what I expected C.J. Stroud to do to them in week three, and he just couldn't do it. They kept him in the pocket and had such a plan and a focus to keep him in the pocket that they did that, and that just broke down against Jordan Love. And with Rogers, I think it's going to be pretty easy to do that. What do you think the Jets strategy against this Vikings defense will be? Because I was looking at their run game thinking that they want to get Brees Hall going.

He's only averaged 3.1 yards per carry, which is, I'm sure, has fantasy football people who drafted him in the first round devastated that someone named Braylon Allen has averaged 4.8 yards per carry and has been much better. I think running game is going to be a place where they really want to start. I also think that Garrett Wilson in this game in the first quarter is something to really keep an eye on because the way that game ended against the Denver Broncos with Rodgers looking at Wilson, Wilson looking at Rodgers, what are you doing, what's going on,

that they're probably going to spend the week trying to figure that out. This is one of the best receivers in the NFL. We saw him, and I know everyone did this, but we saw him cook the Vikings in 2022. He's a super talent. And for him to have, hold on, what is it, 20 catches for 191 yards? I mean, that's nothing so far for him versus the expectation. Yeah, and we'll see if the greasy wheel or the squeaky wheel gets greased,

I should say, with him because he's been complaining to the media about his usage and the routes. And I don't think that's the way to get into Rodgers' good graces. But we'll see. This is what I think. I think Robert Sala had to have opened this week begging the offense, give us a lead. This team, this Vikings team, has not had to play from behind since the first quarter against Daniel Jones and the New York Giants. Give Aaron Rodgers, give that Jets defense a lead against this Vikings team. They have to be preaching a hot start. I agree with you. I think the run game throughout is going to be important. The Vikings have outrushed every opponent they've faced so far. Beating them on the ground is going to be a way to do it. But to me, it's going to be that first drive, absolutely pulling no punches if you're the Jets. Whatever play you think is your best play, whatever you think is going to

get you the big chunk down the field, you have to pull it out in that first drive and force Sam Darnold to feel pressure of a deficit. He just has not done that yet. So if I'm the Jets, I wouldn't be shocked if I'm coming out with Aaron Rodgers deep down the field shots, just trying to find something downfield. And if it's a turnover, whatever, because at this point, the Jets defense is playing fairly well and has since the San Francisco opener so I think they've got enough talent that they could make things an issue for the Vikings on offense it might not be a smooth game this might be a 20 to 10 kind of game um so if you're the Jets just give us a lead and and that's kind of what I think has to be a priority for them.

Well, let's go over to the offensive side of the ball. The New York Jets have a giant fat man who's really good in the middle of their defense named Quinnen Williams. This is a concern, and I will tell you why. You already know why. Garrett Bradbury and Ed Ingram rank both as the second worst graded past protectors at their positions by PFF. I think Bradbury is maybe 31st and Ingram is something like 61st out of 62. These guys have been by far clearly the weak link of this team. And I'm not sure when Dalton Reisner is going to come back because they haven't opened his window to get back to practice to potentially come off of IR.

So if we're looking at Hawkinson several weeks from now and they're still not opening the window for Dalton Reisner, there's nobody coming to save you, especially not in England. So this matchup begins there. They were able to contain Kenny Clark. When you looked back at the film, it was not a full containment. There were definitely times where he was throwing bodies around, but since they were up by as much as they were, then it really didn't hurt them. And I think that's been the story of the season so far

with the interior offensive line is if you get up on the Giants by a couple of touchdowns, it can't kill you that Dexter Lawrence is throwing bodies. Or if you get up on the Texans as much as they did, it can't hurt you with the pass rush that they created. But in a tight game, I think they have to be very concerned about Quinn and Williams. Yeah. And Kenny Clark did not have the game that Dexter Lawrence had, but I know it's definitely not. Yeah, I know what you're saying though. Um, because yeah, in the run game, he blew up the Vikings run game multiple times. I felt like he was more of a factor there in pass protection. The Vikings just continually double teamed him. You saw the running back chips, Aaron Jones, Ty Chandler gave a lot of help up the middle. Um, speaking of the game last

night, did you see the snapper Bijan Robinson had to block Vita Veya up the middle? The Vikings didn't have that issue at Lambeau where there was more of a help that Aaron Jones could give a shoulder into Kenny Clark and it helped. But you can do that when Christian Derrissaw, Brian O'Neill are on either side, one-on-one solo blocking Rashawn Gary and Preston Smith the way they did. We just don't even need to talk about them because of how great they've been for the most part on the outsides. And so I think that helps when you face a guy like Quentin Williams, where if it's Bryce Huff or whoever the Jets have on the outside, I think Jermaine Johnson's hurt. I'm not even sure who's playing for them right now. You can do that. Not Hassan Reddick. That's who. Not exactly. Not the guy they traded for and botched a front office negotiation with. So I think the Vikings are set up to coach through it.

It's just a matter of you have not been able to run super effectively without double teams and power blocks up front, without playing duo, without kind of forcing the issue because they cannot single block people. And you see it every time they get into short yardage, every time they get into the goal line, every time they need to, a defense forces the issue and says, you need to single block everybody because we're doing a bare front, whatever. They can't do it. They cannot win up front. And so I don't, Dalton Reisner is not fixing that either. He didn't fix it last year. He's not the answer in terms of that. That's why Blake Brandel is the guy. They wanted him to be the bigger guy. He's six foot four. He's bigger than anybody else on the interior they've got.

They wanted him to step in there and do that. And he's done a good job, but an old line is only as good as your weakest link. And they got two guys who you mentioned in the run game, kind of get consistently flattened or get misaligned or don't have the right technique. And at Ingram's case, there's a lot of things coaches talk about that, that just are headaches for them with those guys. And so the good thing is, is that they're smart enough to scheme around it. You see Sam Darnold sitting comfortably in the pocket, trusting the protection because since Dexter Lawrence, it hasn't haunted him too much up the middle. And so I think the Vikings can win with this.

They can win with Ed Ingram and Brad Bradbury. It's just a matter of do you stay healthy enough on the edges or do those guys continue to play well enough? And then when you have bad moments, can Sam Darnold not fold and get affected by that play after play yeah it's been really clever the way that Kevin O'Connell has schemed around this issue in past protection it's been bootlegs which he's used effectively in play actions but also having Aaron Jones and sometimes CJ Hamm chip or provide an extra blocker what I wonder about Robertala is a really smart dude

when it comes to defense. Are they going to send some stuff that forces them to get one-on-one? Like blitzes up the middle where you take away that fullback or that running back and ask him to protect to allow a one-on-one because they're just not winning those one-on-ones. And if you create interior pressure, I think for any quarterback, that's the one that affects them the most. I think sacks off the edge, strip sacks, things like that are clearly the hardest.

But when you talk about just on a play-to-play basis, not being able to step up and Darnold has navigated the pocket pretty well, but there's been too many times where he's had to kind of shuffle backwards and then just torque his body and whip the ball because he's got a beast arm, but it's not what you want. You don't want him shuffling backwards or leaning back. There's been too many throws where he's kind of had to be leaned back as he's throwing it. Yeah. And I, we should also mention speaking of coaching and how they go around this, um, is the screen game too. That has been a revelation I think for them this year, Aaron Jones has helped, but so has the timing of the calls. So has the individual blockers actually getting to their guys. Um, it's so it's working so well that you can do it to Josh Oliver and get an eight yard

gain in a critical moment at green Bay, like they did. Um, and Aaron Jones obviously had three or four of those catches too. So I think that's helped. They've called it to just a great moments where defenses are clearly pinning their ears back and they're able to catch these guys. So you've got to credit Kevin O'Connell and Wes Phillips for how they've done that. But yeah, the moments that get your heart rate going, if you're a Vikings fan or a coach is when Darnold is wrapped up in the backfield and he's still looking to do something and you're like no just go down and I can't remember if it was the Texans game or the the uh Packers game but when he flips the ball to Aaron Jones you know as he's going down and it's I think it was the Texans game

and the Texans defenders jump on it and you their possession, but it gets ruled an incomplete pass. It's those kinds of things that, or when he rolls out of the pocket and the Packers drop an interception on the opening drive, those kinds of things kind of get your heart rate going. There was another one where he, before the strip sack, where he scrambled and then got twisted down by his knee and kind of got up and was shaking his knee. And you're like, don't do that. Don't do that. Because he will try to extend a play and make something extra happen

when he's getting that pressure. And that is, like you said, something you'd rather have him just spike the ball. By the way, Iowa State fans were yelling at their applications when you were not bringing up Will McDonald IV, who has five sacks. So shout out to our Cyclone friends that he is going to be someone to watch off the edge here. Now, I have a disturbing stat for you, so I don't know if it's too early in the morning for you to be disturbed, but I'm going to give it to you anyway. I'm ready. Aaron Jones is on pace for 272 carries this season over 17 games.

His previous career high happened in 2019. I think actually all of them were against the Vikings that year. And that was 236. So that's like two games worth of carries over. Now here's the disturbing part. So he's averaged five yards to carry. Well, that'd be great. Oh my gosh. That's like Sean Alexander back in the day or something or Adrian Peterson. But, um, in 2022 through halfway through the season, Delvin cook was on a pace for 270 carries an average five yards a carry the second half of the season he finished with 3.8 yards a carry Delvin Cook 2022 it is disturbing to me that

Kevin O'Connell has leaned on Aaron Jones at a pace that would give him 272 carries I don't I don't think they could continue to do that yeah um the only thing i would counter with um especially with dalvin cook is that he had such an i was just pulling up aaron jones's um game kind of log to see just how much he's played because he hasn't missed a ton of games there are a ton of time to injury the the way i know last year he had an injury but um dalvin cook had chronic shoulder issues that went back to Florida state. His shoulders popped out. The labrums kept getting torn.

He had to get them re-repaired that I don't remember in 2019, if that was a key issue for him or 2022, you're re-referencing. But by then it certainly was. And we saw Dalvin consistently wear down as seasons went. And I think the Packers were mindful of that with Aaron, which is why he always had a good complimentary back with him, which is why Aaron or Matt LaFleur leaned on multiple backs all the time. I do think they need to tone it back with him. And I think

this game on Sunday is going to be one where you're going to see the scales tilt back because he played 80% against the Packers. That was the second most he's played in the game since 2020. It was just because it was against the Packers. I do not think that they're going to continue to lean on him like that in terms of playing time, in terms of carries and touches. It's more of a 60-40 split. The first three games, that's kind of how they did it. I think that's how they're going to do it moving forward. So I do think it'll even out a little bit. They've already played the Packers the one time they're not going to face them again till later in the season. So, um, also Matt, what do you think about the soft part of this quote unquote soft part of the schedule coming up here and how they might

have opportunities to rest guys that they're already resting, whether it's Jones or Stephon Gilmore. Yeah, just to go back to the carry numbers that 272 carries would have tied for the second most in the NFL with Christian McCaffrey for last year for a total that just gives you an idea of the workload so far and I don't think that that's ideal. I think just in general though that coaches and we saw Brian Flores talk about this with Harrison Smith because Brian Flores talked about how Kevin O'Connell had said hey we want to dial back Harrison Smith's snap count a little bit we want to keep him fresh and Brian Flores was like I don't think I will and the same, the same thing with O'Connell, with Aaron Jones, where it's the same deal. This guy is so good. And he is one of the best players that we, I have ever seen out there.

You know, we've seen a lot of great ones, but as far as complete running backs, it is astounding to watch him play sometimes, but you can't, you cannot ride this man that much. If they get into some games later on where they're ahead and they could put in Ty Chandler, but then again, Kevin O'Connell wants to get the man a hundred yards all the time, like against the giants, he's getting popped at the end of the game. Cause he's like, well, I wanted to get you a hundred yards. Don't do that. You just brought miles Gaskin back on the practice squad to elevate him him use him late in a game or something i i just i just think that this lack of trust for ty chandler and super belief in

this great player is making them tip the scales a little bit too far to one side on aaron jones as far as the full complete picture of this season goes yeah we. And we should know too, that the Vikings again, have not trailed in a game since the first quarter of week one, which means that they could lean on Aaron Jones, but then you do want to see in moments like the Texans game, maybe him play less or the giants game, the games that are in hand, maybe have him play less. You talk about trust in Ty Chandler. It makes me think about how they've used their running backs. C.J. Hamm last year, when it was a mess with Madison and Chandler, started to play a lot more third down running back. And that hasn't changed this year, which means to me that Ty Chandler has not shown them behind the scenes or in preseason games or in regular season games that he's worthy

of trusting and pass protection to know who to pick up, to have the right technique and alignment to do it and the physicality to do it and you've mentioned before how good Aaron Jones is in those settings he's such a good pass protector and you're right like you see it and you saw it against Kenny Clark and a number of those Packers defenders he knows so well he's very good and he's always in the right spot. And so is CJ Hamm. And so the drop off to Chandler is pretty precipitous. When you talk about third down work, Chandler's a good receiving back. He can get you the screen yardage, but that's first and second down type stuff typically. So we're not seeing him trusted in those third down roles, which cuts into how you can get Aaron off the field. And so then you're trusting

another almost 30 year old is CJ 30. He might be, um, close to 30 year old back to go in there and play that much more. And so I do think trust with, with Chandler is an issue. I do think he hasn't earned that trust to play more of that role. And when you look at the 40% of snaps, he's typically playing in those, in those first three weeks, weeks, it was mostly first and second down. Right. And when he's out there for just first and second down, when he comes out into the game, they often give him the football, which I think is a little bit of an indicator to the other team. Well, they don't really like this guy in pass protection. So if we send some extra bodies, then that's going to be a problem for them and if they don't trust them in pass protection they have to send them either out

in a route or give them the football and it often ends up with him getting the ball i think he had eight snaps and four carries or something like that last week that's just too much of a tell so you can't do it that often it's kind of like when trent shurfield goes out there they are running or they are running play action, and those are the only two options. They're not going to have him out there spreading out five wide, and it just is a little bit of a limitation. I think you just have to lean into him, and if he makes some mistakes,

then he makes some mistakes. He is special in terms of his speed and ability with the football, but we even saw this with Kenny Wongu over the years. If they don't trust the guy to do everything right, it's not going to be out there, which makes me think you might have to trade for a running back here. You just cannot have Aaron Jones do the whole thing as if he was 23 years old.

Yeah, that'll be interesting to see. I do think if maybe Aaron picks up a little injury or something that scares him before the trade deadline, maybe they would. We haven't heard publicly or privately. I haven't anybody saying that they still don't think air or Ty Chandler is not a special, a special talent on the field that when he has the ball,

they think it's different. And so maybe there's a way they can use him better. That isn't such a tell they threw an eight yard outyard out route to Trent Shurfield not that long ago. I think it was in the last game. So they're trying, Matt. They're trying. They are. I think with Ty, you could do some of those similar things where you –

maybe he isn't picking up the wide receiver work where you could split him out wide the way you can, Aaron Jones, because that is difficult. That's not – I think fans look at that and be like, oh, just split him out wide. Make it easy. It's like, well, no, that sometimes involves reading coverages, knowing route patterns, knowing different jobs that young guys like Ty might not know. So I think if you're that limited with him, this needs to be a situation

where he's the guy then on first and second down more often than what we've seen. Otherwise you might be right. They might need to go get help. Let me switch subjects when it comes to I've got a small pet peeve about coverage of the national football league. It's the only tiny little thing that bothers me is there is no MVP race after four weeks. That's just can't be a thing in hockey tell las vegas that i know in hockey if someone in october scored a bunch of goals they wouldn't say well he's just gonna win or if it's baseball and somebody had a bunch of home runs in april they wouldn't say oh well

the best player in the league here i don't know why we do this in football if you have two good games they're like is he the mvp you know i don't know they have 13 more games to go that seems like a lot uh it was darnold and then last night it was kirk so now i saw this morning was just kirk actually in line for the mvp oh yeah probably uh so with with darnell oh go ahead yeah i'm sorry i was gonna say i saw the actual nfl account the official like at nfl put out a playoff picture four weeks in yeah okay sure we why not i mean people people will sometimes ask me about next offseason i mean i got yeah the next draft man i'm really in uh but like maybe we could just go to this week with sam darnold but as far as the sustainability it's not can he keep winning for me because the team is so good i think that they can

and the schedule lightens up and they get hockinson and all that it's really at at what type of level should we truly expect for him because Because this is absurd. I mean, this is a MVP level that very few people have ever sustained for an entire season. Where is the bar of an average Sam Darnold type of performance? And can they win with that? Yeah, I have takes on this because they are leaning on Sam Darnold so much when they get inside the red zone where the Vikings have scored as many touchdowns as any team outside the Buffalo Bills so far through four weeks. They are a great red zone offense right now. Great red zone offenses typically run through the ground game. The other top red zone offenses through a quarter of the season are in Buffalo and Detroit and Washington.

What do all those teams have? running quarterbacks or great running games? The Vikings are there as this kind of like odd stepchild with Sam Darnold. And you're just wondering how long can they do that? And I, that's why I asked Wes Phillips this week of like, what have you thought of how Sam is carrying that load down there? And then flip side, why have you not been able to get the run game going? Or what have you thought overall about the run game? And they obviously need to get better work out of it. They had four carries, four traditional carries inside the five yard line at Lambeau field. I believe they got negative one yards and a holding penalty

on those plays. And that included the fourth down jet sweep to Jalen Naylor. They of course get the seven down or seven yard rushing touchdown from Jordan Addison. That is their first rushing touchdown since Aaron Jones at New York in week one. They're not running the ball well there. So that means it has to be Sam. So how long can he do that? Only Joe Burrow, I think has thrown more passes inside the 20 yard line than Sam Darnold at this point in the red zone. So I think he's playing so well. You see everything. You see the off-schedule rush out, you know, kind of scramble drill touchdown to Justin Jefferson.

You see the in-pocket, in-rhythm perfect pass over to the fade to Justin Jefferson at Lambeau. You see the scheme to Josh Oliver, wide open outside of a play action leak play, wide open, easy touchdown. Aaron Jones, kind of a mesh concept, same deal against the Texans. You're seeing a little bit of everything. There's going to be a point where defenses kind of pick up on it and kind of have an inventory of volume where they know what you're doing. And so it's going to be on the coaching to have a bag of tricks. That's pretty deep. And it's going to be on Sam Darnold to be flawless, continue to be flawless. Cause he's had, I believe he had the interception to Aaron Jones in the red zone on Sunday. Um, I think there was,

uh, there was the near fumble that the little flip to Aaron Jones earlier in the season. So he's had some moments where you're holding aaron jones earlier in the season so he's had some moments where you're holding your breath but for the most part he's played phenomenal and so my my long-winded take is that the sustainability of the vikings and on darnold and this mvp season is going to be how he plays in those moments because i do not think this is going to be an offense that's going to try for the 40, 50, 60 yard bomb as often as they did with Kirk Cousins. Yeah. I think with Darnold, the things that a coach can do for a quarterback, he is executed really well. So that's play action where you have a deep cross and someone's wide

open, which they did numerous times against the Packers for their explosive plays. I think almost all of them, except for the touchdown down the sideline to Jefferson, were crossers in the middle of the field. Screen game has been phenomenal. That was something we criticized a lot. And I never thought that the running back was the biggest guy in the screen game. I always thought it was the blocking, the execution, the timing, but it might be. Because Alexander Madison just couldn't do it

last year and aaron jones is so patient and has such great vision for that but um can you rely on a screen game every single week can you rely on the play action and rollouts and bootlegs every single week there will be times where you just have to straight drop back and win a game. And that's where it's difficult. But I also think that the NFL has just become more and more of quarterbacks. There's a lot of quarterbacks who can execute it. If you draw it up correctly, if you make them play point guard, Brock Purdy still averages nine yards per pass attempt her cousins last night. I mean, he is the ultimate sit in the pocket and just throw it where you're supposed to throw it and guys will be there so far darnold i think he's done a really good job

of understanding that if he does that he's going to succeed i just wonder and and o'connell is an nfl guy it's not one of these college guys who's running something cheesy so this is all proven nfl type of concepts but i wonder how he changes it and how this has to morph because if all of your successful plays are screens and play actions at some point that stuff i'm not saying it runs out but it becomes difficult to lean on you know when it runs out when you're playing from behind yes that's that's the thing is like you can't if you somehow it's going to happen you're going to find yourself in a two score deficit, which they've not even faced this year at any point where the defense is going to play off. They're going to take they're going to give you the underneath stuff.

They're not going to be putting their ears back trying to get after you and they're not going to worry about your run game. And I think that's where the real questions are going to get answered about this team is when they get punched in the mouth early, which has not happened yet. How are they going to respond? And the Vikings have come out in these games as such aggressors wanting to do the first punching of said mouth. And they've done it every time. They've come out there and punched C.J. Stroud in the mouth and Brock Purdy and made them play from behind and made them try to win. And they've won differently. They've won in a close contested game at San Francisco. They've blown teams out. So they have, these Vikings have proven so much. It's just a question of

there's that one scenario we haven't seen yet. And that is when this offensive sauce and this kind of magic elixir and what they're doing with Darnold will really come into question of how are they going to respond in that situation. All right. What does this game mean for the Vikings, a win or a loss, 5-0 or 4-1? What's the difference to you? Yeah, you said last week, you were saying, boy, Green Bay surely seems to have a lot more on the line. And I think this time the Vikings have a lot more on the line. And I think this time the Vikings have a lot more on the line.

Because a loss to the Jets, man, that just doesn't sit well. A loss to these Jets who are 2-2, bad vibes all around, beat up quarterback, complaining wide receiver, head coach fumbling. Like, to me, look, it's possible. It's possible they lose to the Jets. I just think that would leave a worse taste in your mouth than going and losing at Green Bay to a NFC title contending team that we saw last year. This is a Jets team that you should have one up on because your roster is better. Your coaching has been better historically. And Aaron Rodgers is nowhere near the best Aaron Rodgers we've seen.

And this Vikings defense is better than any Vikings defense we've seen since 2019, 18, 17. So I think the Vikings should have the upper hand in this game. You should go in confident, feeling that you should be 5-0. And that is what's at stake, is being possibly the only undefeated team left in the NFL going into a bye week to rest up with then a huge home game against the Detroit Lions so you don't want to be coming off a loss I don't think against the New York Jets hosting the Detroit Lions out of a bye week I will go 20 to 17 Minnesota Vikings in this game. I just think that it's ugly in London, but they should win this football game. How about you? Were you asking me for a score prediction?

I was not. I was leading that up to by giving mine first. How do you, how do you feel? Yeah, no, I agree with you. I think it'll be probably an ugly game. That is, I've been telling and saying 20 to 10 kind of game where the Vikings, I think when, uh, I do think they make it difficult for Rogers. And, um, that the only question to me is, is if they somehow find themselves down early, I'm very curious to see what happens. And I don't think that they could underestimate at all this defense for the jets. They might not be as good as they were the last couple of years, but I think they still have a lot of nastiness to them. So a little knockdown drag out, I think.

All right, Andrew Kramer, Star Tribune. We do this for every game, the hardcore breakdown. This was very hardcore. We were tossing stats around. Whoa, whoa, whoa. Whose stat is that? Whose stat's that? It was crazy.

So we'll do it again before the Lions game coming out of the bye. Thanks for your time, man. As Bart Scott said, I can't wait. As I said, football.