Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Tej Seth talks Lance, Hockenson and Drew Magary talks about why he's all-in on Vikings 2023

Episode Date: August 24, 2023

Matthew Coller talks with Tej Seth of SumerSports about why he is higher now on the Vikings than he was before the start of training camp and discusses TJ Hockenson's hidden value and why the Trey Lance idea is dubious. Then Drew Magary of Defector previews his Why Your Team Sucks version of the Vikings buy discussing how he's ....high on the team? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of Purple Insider. Matthew Collar here from Inside Circa, and I am with Tej Seth of Sumer Sports, one of the good friends of the show. What is going on, Tej? How are you? Good, yeah. Thanks again for having me on. Always love to do this show. Excited to be here in Las Vegas this weekend, hanging out with you for the Circa Million Circus Survivor Contest. Should be should be a really fun time. I know it's yeah. I was surprised that I got invited to something this cool.

And if you're watching the video version, there is a huge radio row that is sort of like a mini version of what it's like at the Super Bowl. There's a big projector screen and stage. And our friend Eric Eager's name is up there because he's going to be giving a speech at some point. So this is a really cool setup for us. And I will tell everybody about the why we're here in a minute, but we got to talk football, Tej. And I want to play a little game with you because you are one of the smartest people I know when it comes to football. Okay. And you've done so many great analysis and breakdowns and analytics and everything else. Right. But here's what I want to know. Things are always changing with the numbers in the season, but in the off season, they're not changing with the numbers.

It's only the information that we have that we get from training camps, preseason games, whatever. And we're always trying to figure out which one of that information matters, right? So I want to know from you about where your mind has changed on things throughout the offseason, even since we last talked once training camps and preseason started. And we'll just begin with the Minnesota Vikings. Has your mind changed at all from where you were, say, at the end of the draft to this moment here as we approach the beginning of the season? It has actually changed. I'm glad that you bring up the Vikings first because they were a team at the end of last year

when last season ended with that playoff game against the Giants where I was like, I'm going to be out of them last year. We know all the one-score game victories. We know the score differential didn't match up with their actual record, all that stuff. But then throughout the offseason, I've started to talk myself more and more into what the Vikings have going on. I really like the Jordan Addison pick just because throwing another secondary receiving option into already having Justin Jefferson and TJ Hawkinson and making defenses have to pick and choose what they want to do with that will be really helpful,

I think, for the Vikings offense, but also the NFC North as a whole, and especially like the and making defenses have to pick and choose what they want to do with that will be really helpful, I think, for the Vikings offense. But also the NFC North as a whole, and especially like the front runner Lions have taken a step back throughout this offseason. So the Vikings have kind of moved up by default with Jameson Williams getting suspended. And you start to see some of the cracks and maybe the Lions secondary receiving options. And we know that the defense is going to take some time to get ready with a ton of new pieces. Like I'm starting to see more of a path for the Vikings to win the division again. And it's funny because when we talk about those one score games, which come up endlessly, it's always, well, it's like a fact of nature that they'll just regress. And of course, I think we all agree that 13 wins is probably not going to happen again,

or is very, very unlikely. But that's always unlikely, even for really good teams. And the only the only teams that have ever just done that year after year, 12, 13 wins are the Patriots and the Peyton Manning Indianapolis Colts. And even the Green Bay Packers over their many years with Favre and with Rogers, they would still have 10 win seasons. They would still have 11 win seasons. It wasn't always just winning every game that maybe Kansas city will still, you know, still see 12 to 14 or 15 every year, but with almost every team that wins 13, they're going to come back to the pack. But I also think that the most repeatable thing in football is offense and

their offense has the potential with Addison replacing Adam Thielen to be better. And with taking Delvin Cook out of the equation and the number of negative runs that he had last year out of the equation, it has the potential to be better. making 61 yard field goals to win games and so forth like that. I think if you're swinging back too far the other way, you're sort of like missing the forest through the trees and focusing too much on just one staff. Yeah, no, I think that's a really good point. And we kind of saw that with the Bengals the two years ago to last year where the Bengals performance was was better in the playoffs. Like they ended up going to the Super Bowl instead of last year losing in the championship game. But like the Bengals were a better team last year so maybe the vikings performance like from a results perspective isn't there this year like maybe they end up only going eight and nine nine and eight like their team might be better and that's what

should give them uh some some hope in the future and like i think i think the dalvin cook point is really interesting i don't know if alexander madison is necessarily a better running back than dalvin cook but cook had such the the name brand and the pedigree of being a true workhorse back that would get a lot of first and second down carries. Without him there, maybe they move away and they start passing more. They lean into their efficiency. And then you mentioned all the receiving options that they have with still like Kirk Cousins being able to hit most of those guys when needed to. I think that's going to be very helpful for Kevin O'Connell's next iteration of the offense. Yeah, I think so, too. And also with Kevin O'Connell's first year calling plays and being a head coach,

I think that he would have had trouble anticipating how hard that was going to be because he had never done it before. And everyone thinks like, oh, I'll be fine. I know how to do it. But then you actually have to do it. And it is so chaotic and things are happening so fast as a head coach that I thought there were probably some times where he would have wanted a few play calls back. And now he has a much better feeling of that. But about Kirk Cousins also, I think when you look at last year, it was a pretty slow start to the season for him statistically and that kept his numbers down and then they increased throughout the season uh but now we're talking second year in the offense is it do you think it's do you believe in that like second year in the offense or is it a little

mythology or like how should we view that yeah i don't i don't necessarily know about second year in the offense being uh some type of major improvement because I think that we've seen examples of first quarterbacks and new schemes working really well in their first year, like Tom Brady with the Bucs or Matthew Stafford with the Rams. But I think that the main thing with Kirk Cousins' slow start ending up being a pretty good finish was the TJ Hawkinson trade. It increased his average depth of target. He went from bottom of the NFL, bottom five of the NFL to that, to top five, top 10, increases efficiency,

whether you look at EPA per play or some other type of passing metric. Like, I think that was the trade that really kind of spurred the offense forward. And like, you would assume that could continue relatively the same going into this year. Yeah. I mean, I think with a 35 year old quarterback,

you always do wonder about regression just in general from not being young anymore. But I think that there was a linchpin element to TJ Hawkinson that was very unique for them that essentially for the first half of the season, they had no tight end. I mean, Irv Smith Jr. not only did not fit in the offense, but then did not play well and then got hurt. And so you're out there, you know, with without him really making any sort of impact. And then Hawkinson comes in and he's just this security blanket for cousins. But also when we were talking before we went on, you made a good point that I probably forgot to bring up, but I've been on the side of favoring a Hawkinson extension.

A lot of his production, we can look at yards per reception, but it was on third down. It was getting past the sticks. It was getting a lot of first downs for them. And I think when so much attention is drawn away from the tight end, from the number two, number three wide receiver by Justin Jefferson, that becomes even more valuable. And maybe we shouldn't focus just so much on that. What was his yards per reception? Yeah, no, exactly. I totally agree with you there. I think it's the second order effects of training for Hawkinson where instead of third and six, Jefferson having to run the seven yard in or seven yard dig to get the first down,

Jefferson could instead run a deeper route because Hawkinson was taking over that route and you could rely on what you had there instead of Ir because Hawkinson was taking over that route and you could rely on what you had there instead of Irv Smith or Adam Thielen running that route. That became Hawkinson kind of giving you more confidence that you're going to convert that. And so we saw Jefferson be able to run a lot more posts and goes and the really things that stretch the defense and would put two guys on him and it would open up underneath. So it's like you kind of can see the synergy of all of these receiving options together. And especially when you throw Addison in there, rookie receivers are, are, you know, hit or miss 50, 50 coin flip. But if you do get that,

that hit side, then you start to stress out defenses from a pass cover standpoint, because they wouldn't be able to cover all three of these viable receiving options. Yeah. And I think that there has to be a price on Hawkinson that we all kind of say, all right, that's too much. But there are things that are sort of hidden beneath the surface of context. When we try to analyze these things statistically, how much would you pay TJ Hawkinson them? Yeah, I mean, I think it's a great question. I think when we were talking about this earlier, elite tight ends, top five tight ends are probably underpaid relative to their production when you compare the amount of receiving yards that they provide or their contribution compared to receivers. When you look at like a Christian Kirk extension compared to what Travis Kelsey

and Mark Andrews and TJ Hawkinson are about to get paid here. So, you know, I see I wouldn't necessarily reset the market with Hawkinson, but I could see him coming in that 14 to 16 million per year range where he's getting fairly compensated like a Mark Andrews type player. And because of inflation, he will get a little bit more than that. But he's not necessarily that level of top two tight and. He's more of the three to five range. And I think that Mark Andrews is a really good comp because he could go down the field a little, but he's not a downfield threat like Darren Waller was at his best. And I think that Travis Kelsey is a downfield threat at times as well. And he's not a dominant blocker. He's not

going to just like truck over people and yet still a very useful option who can move around in a lot of different places. And I think gives a versatility to the offense that a traditional tight end that just stays in line would not necessarily be able to do. But if you're pushing 18 million dollars a year, then we all have to have a price. There's also an element sometimes as a general manager, common sense wise, you have to just say, you know what, let's not be Pennywise pound foolish here. It's pretty important to your head coach that he has TJ Hawkinson. It's pretty important to your future quarterback, probably right to your locker room that I think really loves TJ Hawkinson and the way that he's fit in. And if you're saying one more million dollars is probably not going to destroy your salary cap,

if you know what you're doing. Yeah. And I think, I think this, this regime with, with Kweisi and with Kevin O'Connell, they want to show, you always want to show that you're, you reward good performance. And like, I think Hawkinson should get rewarded for that in a sense where maybe you, like you mentioned, you do have to give an extra million over what you wanted to give him, but yeah, what kind of message does it send younger players on the team where they know that if they come in and they can pick up the playbook as quickly as Hockinson did and kind of fit in and, and produce well,

like they will end up getting comments as well. I think that's a, it's a really good motivation element to, to kind of what you're, you're doing by giving these extensions out. All right. How about this? Has your mind changed on the Vikings defense?

Because we didn't know what it was going to look like. And I'll fill in some gaps for you because obviously I've been at training camp and you haven't. But number one, they have two very inexperienced cornerbacks. And I mean, very inexperienced, like basically never played before. And yet they have been driving offenses in joint practices and the vikings own offense insane with the amount of aggression that they've had with brian floris he has turned the blitz button to 11 and i'm curious like is there a way we can kind of uh quantify what that means to be that aggressive also countered with if you're that aggressive and you're leaving

corners on an island that could be really difficult right so like how do we put that all in a pot and has if i tell you that they've been i think very good in training camp as a defense would that change your mind at all from where you would have been maybe after the draft yeah there's a there's a really good analyst that goes by Steven Padden, Padden Analytics on Twitter. And he has a play caller rankings where he uses all these kind of elements to predict what your performance should be with a normal coordinator, an average coordinator, and then what it actually is. And he put together a good piece that showed there was no bigger defensive coordinator jump than the Vikings going to Brian Flores this season out of all the changes around the league.

So I think you can be confident about what Flores has to offer as a coordinator. I'm still hesitant on buying into the Vikings defense and their average outcome this year because I think it's going to be such a big systematic change with, like you mentioned, like a lot more blitzes, a lot more aggressiveness than they saw last year. And the inexperienced corners kind of getting thrown out there and having to figure it out, I think is going to be a big, big and steep learning curve for them. So if I were to buy into the Vikings defense for next year, I'd be all in that because I trust Flores, but I still think this year we're going to see a lot of growing pains on that side of the ball. Yeah. I'm really of two minds when it comes to uh the brian floris and the blitzing and everything else because in one way i think this

is your only shot uh you're gonna have to create explosive plays and turnovers interceptions sacks uh and especially in big moments on third downs and when i was looking at floris's numbers in miami which is not fair because they were far more talented especially at the cornerback position when when you had Byron Jones and Zayvon Howard playing extremely well. That's not what the Vikings have right now. But on third downs, they were really, really good. And I think that that can turn the tide a little bit because like when you think about it again in the context of a real game, you can give up some first downs. You could even give up an explosive play on a drive. But if you get a big stop and cause a field goal or cause a turnover that kind of can even it out and last year they did get some of that but i also thought that the general scheme and play calling was so

poor that eventually the levy just broke and it was like oh well we're doing ben not break no no you're just breaking just over and over. How about this? Has your mind changed at all? And I don't know where you stood on this. I don't know that we ever talked about it, about the idea of the Vikings trading for Trey Lance. Did you like it before? Do you like it now? Or are you out on it now that we know that he lost the job to literally Sam Darnold? Yeah. I mean, yeah. I mean, I think, I think it's, it's interesting. The Trey Lance issue is, is really interesting because, yeah, because I think there's so much signal in what the 49ers are telling us, making him the third string quarterback.

Like they are saying that even if Purdy were not to be able to play this year, whether it was due to injury or performance, they would rather have Sam Darn, one of the least efficient quarterbacks since entering the league of the past couple of years, start over Trey Lance. But I think if you are trading a fourth that could become a third or some type of conditional pick because of that, and we've seen Kweisi want to buy low on certain players before,

I'm more into the idea of Trey Lance becoming Minnesota Viking. I would rather see him in an area where he could start this year and gain reps, like if he were to go to Tampa Bay or maybe even Atlanta, depending on how they were feeling on Ritter or Arizona while Kyler Murray is coming back from injury. But I could see the possibility of Trey Lance returning to where he was from and playing for the Vikings. He's from Minnesota. It hasn't come up on the show at all that he's from here. No, I get it theoretically, but I also went through and I wrote down, maybe I could pull this up.

I wrote down all the names of the quarterbacks who did not last into a fifth year. And I'm going to read the list to you and then maybe see if you change your, or, well, I don't know, it's changing your mind. Cause you kind of laid it all out there, but like would change anyone's mind about this. Where did I include these names? Okay, here we go. Baker Mayfield, Sam Darnold, Josh Rosen, Mitch Trubisky, Paxton Lynch, Johnny Manziel, EJ Manuel, Brandon Whedon, Jake Locker, Trubisky, Paxton Lynch, Johnny Manziel, EJ

Manuel, Brandon Whedon, Jake Locker, Blaine Gabbert, Christian Ponder, Tim Tebow. Those are the quarterbacks whose teams did not keep them for at least five years since 2010. I mean, if a team has that much of an opportunity to look at somebody and decides to move on, this could just be a Paxton Lynch thing where the guy has great physical tools, but we act like those tools will just magically turn into something eventually. And I, people were roasting, I think it was Troy Aikman. People were roasting Troy Aikman for saying that like, Hey, everyone gets obsessed over these big arms and athleticism, but like, that's not what playing quarterback is. He's completely right. Like I've seen a ton

of great athletes speak horrible. I just watched Malik Willis play quarterback for a couple of days at joint practices. I just have trouble buying that. That list tells me that these football coaches are usually pretty good at their jobs. And if they've decided, especially that coaching staff, that they just want to get rid of somebody. I'm not sure that picking up somebody's trash at the side of the corner is a good idea. Yeah. I mean, I think, and I think this is, this is public now, but like, I heard from a couple of people that pretty early on into Trey Lance's first training camp with the 49ers, Kyle Shanahan and like kind of the staff was realizing like that they might've made a mistake. Like it was, it was pretty evident early on. And there was a story that came out about this. I think,

I think this morning about like how they realized that it was going to be such a long process. And they, they had this roster that was ready to win now, but a quarterback that might not be able to do that for them. So, and then he like, he just doesn't get any reps his first two years. He only plays in, in four total games. So I think think just the lack of experience makes it a tough pill to swallow for why you would want him as your starting quarterback if you have a roster like you do with the Vikings. That's why I said if I was a team that was projected to be pretty bad this year, why not throw out a fourth round pick for him? But I do agree that it's a lot tougher for the Vikings toings to make that trade because if if cousins were to go down or if cousins were to leave next year like i don't know if you'd want to have this roster that's worth about eight nine wins in the eyes of the market

have a quarterback as unknown as trey lance yeah and even just as a backup then you're using a year of his contract and then if he's even okay for you you have to decide whether to pay him and then you end up in the packers jordan love situation who will get to and then you know or the daniel jones situation where you just end up overpaying a guy who's not that good because he had a really good year in his contract year or i shouldn't call it a really good year he had a real two really good games against the Vikings in his contract year, and that ended up getting him paid. But none of us think that Daniel Jones is taking the Giants anywhere

because they're locked into that. So I don't love that idea because I think that the absolute best-case scenario, the, wow, he became Josh Allen, is basically impossible. And the, wow, he became Daniel Jones, to me, doesn't do anything. It's just Daniel Jones is probably the, wow, he became Daniel Jones, to me, doesn't do anything. It's just Daniel Jones is probably the best comp, even though you don't think of him because he's, I don't know. It's funny how he ran prolifically last year, but he runs like a 4.8. I don't really understand Daniel Jones. But anyway, Jordan Love.

He had an amazing preseason. I never put any stock in the preseason. In fact, it went from zero. Is this possible to be below zero? It is, I think, in percentages. No? Mathematically, no. It doesn't work.

Okay. I like the thought there, yeah. It is zero. But the stock I put in it has gone even down, even if it was 1%, because teams are playing even fewer starters. So even if Trey Lance had looked good against starters, I would have said that this is nothing in preseason. However, he has done enough for the Packers to not have look at him like Trey Lance, which is something on its face right there. Has your mind changed about

Jordan Love at all over this spring, summer, whatever it is, late summer now. Yeah. I mean, I've, I've always treated Jordan Love, even going back to last year as one of the most important players in the league this year. And I don't mean important from like a value sense. Like obviously that's Mahomes and Allen and Herbert and Burrow, but like, I mean, important as in he could totally sway the outcome of what happens in the NFC, depending on his play. If he lives up to his draft status and then some, and we get top 12, top 10 quarterback play from Jordan Love, Packers probably win the NFC North and they're right there in the divisional round competing for the champions of the NFC. But like if we get bottom five performance because he hasn't played football at all since being drafted in the one

game that he played the full game. He didn't do that well. Then that totally changes how the Packers have to view maybe a rebuild mode that they have to go into, even though they have some nice young pieces like Rashawn Gary and Christian Watson. So I think I'm still on the train of he has a super wide range of outcomes and nothing he's done so far has really swayed it i like how you mentioned preseason remember when romeo dobbs last year was supposed to become the next great receiver because of preseason and didn't end up doing much so um i i still think that like his his range of outcomes is just so wide this year yeah i remember going back maybe a couple years ago and looking at the preseason statistics for all the quarterbacks and just

dying because there were so many bad quarterbacks who had great preseasons. Well, think about this. Once upon a time, Nathan Peterman beat out Josh Allen for a starting national football league job based on his preseason performance. Now, of course, Allen was a rookie and I understand why they kept it slow, but still like Nathan Peterman played so well in the preseason performance. Now, of course, Allen was a rookie and I understand why they kept it slow, but still like Nathan Peterman played so well in the preseason. That's why this man still has jobs in the NFL. How does that guy have a job? Because every preseason and training camp, he knows where to throw the football, but it's completely different, obviously, when they're game planning for you and so forth. With Jordan Love, I think that there is a safe bet to make. We're in Vegas. We should talk about bets to make. There is a safe bet to make that he throws like 24 touchdowns, 14 picks or 10 picks.

It's like 4,100 yards and PFF ranks him 15th. And I think that that actually might be the closest thing to right. I think he does have some really good tools. But I also think just even going back to when he played and when he was in college, I don't know that he sees everything that well. At least that's how it looked to me. And when guys his preseason games, as great as his numbers were, you still saw some like, Oh, okay. What, huh?

Why? And, but I think that the upside can actually be okay. What I'm curious about what you think is the supporting cast, because they didn't go out and sign a big wide receiver. They drafted a receiver. They've been developing that group around him with draft picks. And I think Christian Watson could be quite good. Or according to Packers bloggers and stuff, that group around him with draft picks. And I think Christian Watson could be quite good.

Or according to Packers bloggers and stuff, he has a higher ceiling than Justin Jefferson. I remember that that was the peak of the offseason when someone tweeted that Christian Watson has a higher ceiling than Justin Jefferson. But what do you think about what he has to work with? Because I went into the offseason thinking this is horrible that what he has to work with? Because I went into the offseason thinking this is horrible, what he has to work with. And I think that my mind has changed a little bit based on what you see from training camp, from their wide receivers coming out for Packers reporting,

that it might not be that bad, but it's not like he's dropping into a Vikings offense where you just have weapons on weapons. Yeah, I mean, first of all, between George Pickens and Christian Watson this year, Justin Jefferson has had enough bulletin board material to... to that's real quick. That's how you know, that's how you know, you're number one. Yeah. It's like, is this guy the next Mahoney? Like when I was growing up, this is a old man coming for you, but it was, is, is Tracy McGrady the next Jordan? Like, no, everyone was the next Jordan. So I'm sorry to interrupt. But this has always been a thing. I'm sure that after Babe Ruth hit 60 home runs,

there was some guy coming up for the majors where they were like, well, he'll be the next Babe Ruth. And no one was until Shohei Otani. But anyway, sorry. Carry on about the Packers and their situation. Yeah, I mean, I think the Packers, again, are so interesting this year on offense because it's entirely like the supporting the supporting cast is, is all like very youth focused,

like between Christian Watson, who I think is going to be really good. And you could see that last year based on just some of the explosive plays that he broke off and kind of his like advanced stats, like his yards per out run being, being pretty high on a lower sample size than, than some other receivers last year. But like the tight ends that they drafted and kind of the, and then Romeo Dobbs being, being like a secondary receiver, like it's just, there's so, there's so much young potential on the Packers offense. It'll probably be a little hard for it to all materialize this year because there's so many moving parts. I think Matt LaFleur is a good play caller and he showed that in the the two MVP years with Rodgers but last year was the first time we kind of saw him make some mistakes from a play calling

perspective and kind of make some mistakes from just like how he organized the offense in general it was hard for him to deal with life after Devante Adams while we saw someone like Andy Reed deal with life after Tyree Kill a little bit better so I think think that this is a big year for, for LaFleur, especially in like, how can you get all these new pieces between love and the tight ends and, and the two new receivers that are, that are in their sophomore year now and, and figure out how to make this all like coexist together.

And that's what is going to be the big challenge for him. Folks. There is no crazier time in my schedule than the fall season. And let me tell you, it is tough to find myself a good and healthy meal. But that is why I have Factor, America's number one ready-to-eat meal kit that can help me fuel up with chef-prepared, dietician-approved, ready-to-eat meals delivered straight to my door. Give it a try. It'll save you time. You'll eat well and you'll stay on track with a healthy lifestyle. Trust me,

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That is so helpful. I can't even tell you. The options are crazy. The number of different ways that you can customize this just to you. If you're looking to be calorie conscious, they've got that too. Try delicious calorie smart meals with around or less than 550 calories per serving. Head to factormeals.com slash purple 50 and use the code purple 50 to get 50% off. That's code purple 50 at factormeals.com slash purple50 to get 50% off. I do think there might be some value

in just running the offense with a quarterback, not a quarterback who thinks he is the head coach, offensive coordinator, general manager, owner, and also health coordinator as well. I think that he at times was a detriment to matt lafleur last year where of course all that stuff when he was doing better before he started drinking weird teas and stuff in 2020 and 2021 was probably helping lafleur prop him up a little but i think you saw the once rogers some of those physical skills weren't as great when once the receivers

weren't as great that that strategy of just saying I am the captain now is not great. So I think LeFleur is a really good offensive mind and that could benefit Jordan Love. But how far that takes you is a question. OK, last one. And then you got to go. I don't know. You're doing shows over here. You're coding things.

I don't know what you do at Sumer Sports. Has your mind changed at all on Justin Fields? Yeah, I mean, this is another great topic. I know that Haley English, who used to work here and I was at the Lions, would love to hear us talk about Fields today. I'm still at the same spot with Justin Fields as well, where I think DJ Moore is going to help the passing game from a production standpoint. But I still don't know if Justin Fields, as good as his rushing ability is,

as good as his accuracy was in college, is going to be capable of being a top 10 NFL quarterback because he still needs that passing ability to become NFL average. And I still think he can throw the ball really well. And we saw that multiple times last year. It's really the sack rate that was really bad last year. I think he took a sack on, I think it was like 15 to 70% of standard dropbacks last year, which was the highest rate in the league. And the offensive line didn't do him many favors, but we know that the quarterback can control a lot of his sack rate.

So I'm more of a wait and see with fields as well, where if he can lower that sack rate, it'll probably come at the expense of lowering his scramble rate as well, because we usually see those things go hand in hand. So does he want to take away his explosive scrambles to make sure he's not getting sacked as much? Like I could, I could see that, but you're also losing like what made you so special last year so i i still don't know with fields where i'm still like if i had to pick one way or the other i don't know if he would be the bear starting quarterback in in 2024 just because of the uh the sack avoidance and some of the passing ability but um i there's the potential obviously still there i i do buy a

little bit reports from training camp because i think when you get to see a sample size of a guy practicing day after day after day you get a pretty good feel of what it's looking like and at least from bears reporters it feels like it has taken a step forward now it's very similar to the trey lance discussion how far is a step forward enough to pay that man eventually, right? And when Chicago drafted him to save jobs, they drafted him at a very bad time to draft a quarterback in your progression because the team was going down. If the team around you is going down as you draft your quarterback to try to save your butt, then you're going to end up wasting a couple of years, which they have in Chicago. So I do buy that he can be the second half version closer to that and that they can be better offensively and that he's going to make dynamic plays and that he can actually have

someone catch the ball when he throws it to them and DJ more. But it's hard to see it being better than mid pack. And that puts you in that same discussion that we're always in even if uh it has been raised up his level of play in the passing game with a little bit better options and weapons and stuff like that so that's uh but my mind has been changed only a little bit on that but i was never as aggressive as hayley hayley she was really against justin fields and his future i guess i want to hedge a little bit more than that um Tej, we are here for the Circa Million and Circa Survivor Contest, which you can sign up until September 9th at 2 p.m. They've got the exact time.

You have to come here. It's worth it to come here. This place is amazing. We took a limo here. Did you know we were getting a limo? I had no idea. I think my limo driver didn't like me because I had to amazing. We took a limo here. Did you know we were getting a limo? I had no idea. I think my limo driver didn't like me because I had to take a picture of the limo. I took a picture, too.

I saw your picture as well. I'm like, I have to take a picture with the limo. Like, I don't know if I'll ever ride a limo again. And then I was doing all, like, the childish things. Like, I was rolling down the window and, like, looking out and seeing Allegiant Stadium and seeing the rest of downtown Las Vegas. He's probably thinking, like, this guy. Like, this guy can't even control himself in the limo. But it was a very cool experience to

be in that and to be here where you can, you know, hang out at Stadium Swim. Like I'm sure we'll throw on our bathing suits and go out and watch some college football this weekend if we want to. And then just like to be with everyone that's here in general, like I think it's gonna be a really good time. I'm just gonna go ahead and say that we probably didn't cause the limo driver as many problems as other people have in that limo. You know, like I was sitting there inside of it thinking like, what's happened in here? You know, like if this limo could tell stories.

But anyway, that's what we're here for though. We're here talking about the Circa Million and Circa Survivor Contest. And so if you come out here and spend some time here, there is my room looks down on this, what, 100 yard video board that is playing all these games and ESPN and everything else. Stadium swim is unbelievable. So if you're a Vegas person or even if you haven't been out here, this is a place to go. And I've been wanting to get out here anyway, just because I like Vegas. But being able to out here, this is a place to go. And I've been wanting to get out here anyway, just because I like Vegas. But being able to come here for this is great. The Circa Million contest, you pick five teams against the spread every week. The winner takes home a million

dollars. Very cool stuff. And so you should go to CircaSports.com and check this out. The Survivor contest, eight million guaranteed to the winner. Are you serious? That's okay. I did not realize that until I just read this off the sheet. So you pick one team straight up every week to win. And if the team loses or ties, then you're eliminated. You know how survivor contest works. But this one has like some serious life changing money involved.

So if you're making a trip to Vegas, make sure you come to circa and check out the the Circa Million and Circa Survivor contest. So we'll be talking about that for the next couple of days as well. And the game theory of Circa Survivor is super cool because you don't just want to pick the Chiefs and the Bills and the top teams every week. You kind of want to think about the strategy of everyone else is going to pick those teams. So maybe I could go off the beaten path and like if this is the week that the chiefs get upset, like they did to the Colts last year, then you're one of like the 10% of people left remaining. So it's super cool to kind of think about the game theory and in that aspect. And like, I hope people are able to come to Vegas and sign up and play

and hopefully get a portion of that money. I, yeah. And I think that survivor contests are just the most intense of maybe like any type of contest uh but you sign up here but you can you know play from anywhere so you sign up you get ready and then obviously you'd be you don't have to come to vegas every week to submit your team yeah so you you could submit your team from home but you have to come here to sign up so anyway uh tage great to have you uh actually uh real quick you're uh you got a new podcast right yeah no i mean thanks for having me on letting. Let me do this as fun. And yeah, I will have a podcast during the season called Stats and Scheme with

my friend Sean Syed, who also works at Sumer Sports with me. We'll do three topics each week. I'll come at it from a stats perspective. He'll come at it from a film watching scheme perspective. We'll kind of go back and forth and it should be really fun. You know, I talk, I talk football with, with Sean and you know, it's as much fun as talking football with you. And so I hope, I hope that the show will turn out well and people can tune in. That sounds very cool. All right. Tej Seth, great to see you again. Glad you're out here. We're going to hang later as well. So I really appreciate your time and we'll we'll hang again soon, man. Thanks for doing this. this thanks welcome back to the show one of my favorite writers in the entire world drew mcgary of the defector first drew i

mean the why your team sucks series is out so that's one of the reasons you're here and then of course we have to talk about your viking takes as a hardcore vikings fan but i want to say to start the show i am so happy to see what has happened with Defector. As independent media myself here, the way that Defector has continued to grow and is thriving out in this world, I'm very happy about it. So love to see it. Love to have you back on the show. What's going on, man? Yeah, you're happy. I get health insurance, it's nice like we uh you know we started three years ago it'll be three years ago at the beginning of next month so like right around like september

10th september 12th i'm not gonna say september 11th because september 11th doesn't sell in competition but uh since then uh we've grown in subscribers we've grown we've hired more people more editors more podcasts stuff like that so all that's been you know it's it's been great it's been great for everyone to to be part of it and it's been fun and i don't have to look for a job anymore so that's very nice yeah and i also think that you know just when you look at the model and there was an article about the business model that sort of went in depth not too long ago and I've tried to deploy that even in my small little purple insider world. I just feel like what it tells us, and I probably no one cares about this, but us, but like it tells us that it doesn't have to be this way. So many of our friends are getting

fired all the time by media companies that mismanage their money and that have management and ownership that tries to make as much money as possible. And then just ends up spending too much, then losing money, then firing people. And the way that Defector has done it has shown that it doesn't have to work that way. So anyway, we could talk about that all day, but we could do that the next time you stop into Minneapolis. Yeah, I'm here talking about the Vikings, man. Yeah, right, right, right. OK, yeah, for sure. So here's the interesting thing about you, Drew, that from now several years of you following Purple Insider and us talking. Yes. I have noticed that you both get excited and then sad,

like almost simultaneously about the Vikings. And sometimes I can't figure out which one you actually are. Like Jaron Hall will make a good throw and you'll say, I love this kid. And then, then he'll throw an interception. Now he's probably awful. And I, for the record, I haven't done, I haven't said either of those things about Jaren Hall. I just want that out there.

It's just an example. It's just an example. And I guess I want to understand the ethos of Drew when it comes to following this team. Like, is it a more positive? Is it a more frustrated? Like, what is inside of you? I mean, if you are a Vikingsings fan you live on parallel tracks right and

i don't think this is i think it's all that different from being a bills fan chargers fan if they have any lions fan browns fan blah blah blah you have to get yourself hyped up about the team you have to be excited when they win because that's boy being a fan it's fun it's fun when they win and then when you lose it sucks you know and you're almost like you're almost preconditioned to be fatalistic to soften the blow the funny thing is that it doesn't soften the blow it still sucks right like the giants game like that loss wasn't any more fun just because it was you know probable or or was more than possible at the very least. So, you know, there's not much rhyme or reason to it, but no fandom is ever really all that rational. It only makes sense when you win a bunch of crap,

and the Vikings haven't done that, but maybe this year they do. How did you view last year? Because one of the things that we talked about at the end of last season was whether it was a successful season or not. It was a heck of a ride, but we all kind of had a feeling that it was not going to end in February. And the way that it did, I think a lot of people went, okay, that was cute, but what was it all worth

if it didn't go deep into the playoffs? There are a section of fans who at this point have dealt with this for so many years of getting to the first round being eliminated or just missing the playoffs that I think that they're just exhausted of, hey, we had a fun regular season. Yeah, I don't actually don't see last year that way. I thought last year was the most fun I've had as a Vikings fan in years. I guess 2017 was more fun because they went to the NFC title game, but they didn't have games like the Buffalo game that year.

They didn't have games like the Colts game. They didn't have games like even that win against the Patriots on Thanksgiving. They had some wonderful, wonderful games. I loved every second of it. And it sucked that it ended early, but it was like, it was the first year of Quasey. It was the first year of Kevin O'Connell.

It was another year of watching Justin Jefferson do what he does. I got to see Christian Derusaw become one of the best tackles in football. I got to see the trade for Hawkinson, and he immediately became, I think, the second best tight end in football. You can argue that, but whatever. He became a great, great tight end. So it was just, it was a lot of fun to watch. The losses sucked.

But what bothered me much more than that was people just saying, oh, well, they're not real. Like, and that was not, I mean, that could be Vikings fans, but that was really more sort of the conventional wisdom outside, right? Because they had the negative point differential despite having 13 wins. So everyone's like, oh, you know, it doesn't mean anything.

And that I hate because those wins meant a lot to me. Like the whole point is for teams to win. And you can't, I don't like people who say that wins aren't a meaningful statistic because they are. Wins matter, rings matter. And look, the Vikings don't have any rings, but I honestly, I chalk that up

more as just really hideous luck than I don't think there's a curse. I don't think they're hexed. I think that they have all the resources in place and have for quite some time to win a championship. And they have, they are by far, by far the winningest team in NFL history not to have a ring. And so if I am looking at the analytics, I am saying that this team is more likely to win a title in the coming years than to look at 2022 and regard it as some dopey fluke that no one should ever respect. I think that's bad, and I hate that. Yeah, I mean, last year you can't take away the entertainment value of those games. No, not!

It was so cool. Like, the Buffalo game? Get the f*** out of here. It was great. Well, also, a lot of guys had to make amazing plays to make it happen, right? I mean, it's not like they didn't catch the ball on 4th and 18 with Justin Jefferson. Like, he caught it. He made those plays.

They had on that team a lot of guys who were sort of big moment type of players, even if you'll never repeat eight fourth quarter comebacks again. It's not like that everybody just fell down and handed them the ball and they, well, I guess in Washington, Taylor Heineke actually kind of did this, just handed them the ball. But you know what I mean? Like they had to earn a lot of those wins. They did. And they drilled for it. They prepared prepared for it I don't believe for a second that Mike Simmer was the coach of the team last year that any of that would happen it wouldn't have there's just no way like Kevin O'Connell is a really really really good coach he makes some stupid play calls and they all do right like I you know I remember seeing CJ Hamm get called on a jet sweep on third and one.

That was stupid. He's going to do stupid stuff. But in the macro, he's a good coach, and he is doing things correctly, and that's why they won a lot of close games. It wasn't blind luck. You're a moron if you think that's true. I think several of the games may have been blind luck, but you have to be in position to win the game.

No! Never! Just a couple. Just a couple. But I don't think I've ever seen before, Drew, a team win 13 games and then say, you know what, I don't think we could do that again if we tried by bringing everybody back, recognizing that everyone's going to be a year older and that though it's not blind luck, they would not be able to just repeat winning every close game, making every 61-yard field goal at the end of a game and so forth. What do you think of the way that the front office has approached this thing to not just say, let's bring Thielen, Cook, Kendricks,

all of them back, restructure their contracts, kick the money down the road, extend Kirk Cousins and so forth because that was an option that was on the table for them and I think it was very rare that they decided not to do that. Yeah and it was smart like I think that if you are you know if you're sort of removed from this team, you see those losses, Thielen, Cook, Kendricks, and those are name brand players, and you assume that they are a worse team without those players. That's not true. All of those players have fallen off, particularly Thielen, particularly Cook, frankly. They are not a worse team because of those losses. They are just as good, if not better, and they are

better positioned to get better after this. Obviously, the big elephant in the room is Kirk Cousins because they were smart enough not to extend him, but Kwesi also restructured his contract to put more dead money into the future, which he shouldn't have done. But I think we can all go, I think it's safe to assume that this is Kirk's last year. The only problem is that they don't have, you know, they they have left themselves very, very little runway at quarterback to make a seamless transition with the roster that they have now, because you put you know, you put a great quarterback in here, you know, you put a better quarterback than Kirk and I think Kirk is a good quarterback.

You put, you know, a championship quarterback in in here it's a championship team like it is like they're really really strong particularly on offense right defense we can talk about in a moment but um you know I'm not I'm not seeing how they made really any wrong moves this offseason outside of kicking the can down the road at quarterback. They have to hope that they draft someone who turns out to be good next year, despite being unheralded, or they have to make a move in the offseason that I can't foresee. But the way that Kwesi has handled it, this is really his first whole offseason as a GM, and I think he's done a good job.

I think he did a much better job in this draft than he did in the prior draft. I think there's still a question as to how much juice he has in that building, but I'm not of the mind that he is just a tech sector bulls**t anymore. I think he's good at his job. Guess what I'm doing for all my road trips. I'm figuring out what other sports games I can go to. And you know, who's giving me a huge hand with this is game time. Buying tickets to your favorite events should not be stressful. And game time is the fast and easy way to buy tickets for all sports, music, comedy, and theater near you with killer deals on last minute tickets and their best price guarantee. You can stop stressing over the

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Terms apply. I mean, I think that the overall direction was the right one to go. I guess the question is always from my perspective, if you're going to go halfway down that road, should you have gone all the way down that road and completely just moved on from Kirk cousins? And I do think it was a miscalculation the way they restructured, at least it's a miscalculation that only hurts them for one year on the salary cap. So if they do draft a quarterback next year, yeah, they have to work around that hit, but then the following season it's, it's wide open and they can take advantage of the rookie quarterback contract thing. But, you know, they also had the option to potentially trade Kirk Cousins and bring in whoever to be the quarterback, which is actually kind of the history of this team is bringing in whoever a quarterback and finding ways to win.

And it's always someone else's quarterback. Well, no, that's one of the funny things about the argument of like, how can you do better than Kirk? It's like, I don't know, this franchise had the best season ever with Randall Cunningham, who was the quarterback of the Eagles when I was growing up and just showed up here for a year. Case Keenum took you to an NFC championship. Sometimes I feel like this, what are we going to do now, is a weird stance for a team that's seen so much success with random quarterbacks showing up. Yeah, I think that's true because Randall was out of football

before the 98 season. He came back to the league for that season. And when they had the Favre season in 2009, he was awful with the Jets. He was essentially spent and just sort of found one last sort of bit of magic in him so that's been my lifetime with the vikings is them you know sort of winning games getting to nfc title games with other people's quarterbacks and i think they're overdue to draft one and cultivate them because the best one in my lifetime has been

dante and dante um you know even though he had that one you know second I think he came second in MVP voting it was the year Peyton Manning broke the TD record so but right right after that you know that Dante had problems he wasn't like a perfect quarterback so they're they're overdue to do that but I don't fault them for going through the competitive rebuild as Quasey put it because and this is something i i i should have known but i i only realized that this year when i was doing my homework on the bears is that no team has gotten a ring from tanking since the dallas cowboys in the early 1990s none zero go look it up like none of them And so I'm of the mind that taking in the NFL doesn't work.

It works in football. It works in basketball. That's for sure. But in the NFL, no, like you're better off building a winning atmosphere and incorporating players into that atmosphere so that they can learn how to be a winning team. If you if you bottom out and you all go three and 13, a million years in a row, and you think that you can trust the process that way, it doesn't look at the Browns, you know, they suck. Like it,

it just doesn't happen that way. Even the Bengals, like the Bengals, like failed their way into Joe Burrow. That was not deliberate. They were just being the Bengals and they got Joe Burrow. So like that, that wasn't like a deliberate tank job.

They were just sucking because they suck. Like, so I'm not of the mind that tanking is really the way to go, and I sure as hell don't want to watch it. I was going to follow up by asking how you determined whether a team was tanking. I mean, that Colts team that drafted Peyton Manning, they knew Peyton Manning was coming out that season. I don't think it was quite a mistake, right?

But they had Jim Harbaugh as their starter that year, and Jim Harbaugh had taken them to the playoffs. He had taken them – I think he took them to the AFC title game. If it wasn't the season prior, it was the year before that. It wasn't that far – it was 1997. So it wasn't that – they weren't that far removed from contention under Jim Harbaugh. So that's the one where you could sort of say, OK, maybe they were taking because Harbaugh

the that year, the year before they got Peyton Manning, Jim Harbaugh got suspended for getting in a fight with Jim Kelly because Jim Kelly called him a baby, which is a great little bit of trivia. But like so there might have been been a spot during that season where they were like, ah, we're just going to let it go. But it was not a master plan. It was not what Ryan Pultz is doing in Chicago right now, where he's stripping everything down to the studs and trying to build it back up again with a quarterback who can't throw the ball.

So, you know, I'm not – again, I'm allowed to have my doubts about that way of going, particularly when you already have a roster that has Derrissaw, Jefferson, Hawkinson, Ryan O'Neal, all those guys on it. So I agree with you that this team is not in a position to tank if you have just a Jefferson. Even if you tried, he would probably get you, and just the weapons that you have just a jefferson no even if you tried he would probably get you and just the weapons that you have just get you enough and with an offensive-minded coach and

kevin o'connell you also don't want to bring him in if you're going to tank you should have done it the first year with him because if you're going to bring him in win 13 games you can't go back and win three uh because that's that's going to be pretty obvious and also tanking destroys the inside of a building and that's not something you want to. And also tanking destroys the inside of a building. And that's not something you want to do after. Yeah, because you kill the roster and you kill morale and you have to build both back up again. And that's hard.

Like, this is not, I couldn't do that. I couldn't do a hundredth of that job. Like, it's just too hard. You can't do it. I'm still going to call your research on that questionable because there's you know a lot of highly drafted quarterbacks who have led really good teams uh like andrew luck turning around the franchise eli manning wins a couple super bowls philip rivers was pretty highly drafted uh so you know there's no you you know i think the closest example the

best one i could think of was the eagles Eagles taking that one game against Washington a couple years ago, mainly so they could get a better draft pick. But that was one game. I don't really count that. I mean, it was like they got Peterson out of the paint. They got Sirianni. And by the way, they still didn't win the Super Bowl last year. So, like, I only grade this based on whether or not you win a Super Bowl

because that's all i give about so okay fair enough fair enough uh andrew luck's career is uh unnecessary no i'm just kidding but i think that when they got here they had an option of what direction they wanted to go they picked the competitive rebuild and now what you have is a pretty good football team but every night when I do my nightly chats, there's these debates about Kweisi Daffa Mensah. Is this team going to be bad? Is this team going to be okay? But I don't think anyone sees it as a Super Bowl contender. Is it, it's awkward, I think to me to have a sort of a team in transition for this year in the bigger

picture, like you could see a Buffalo from Tyrod Taylor to Josh Allen or Kansas city, maybe not the next Mahomes, but you know, that whole situation with moving on from an Alex Smith being similar to this. You've picked a lot. Yeah. Yeah. And yeah. And that may, and that makes sense, right. To try to recreate something like that and just hope that the quarterback works out. But we also have to play this season. And that's where it's sort of weird. Like, they're out there practicing, and Jefferson looks really good,

and the defense looks very intriguing with Brian Flores, and they've got some weaknesses. And I'm like, I guess we just sort of throw our hands up and say whatever happens, happens with this year. Well, the other thing is that in my lifetime, the Vikings have always had a great – whenever theikings have gone the nfc title game and had a great season it's always been a year where they were projected to be mediocre like 1998 they were not projected to be a they weren't projected to be a team but they weren't

you know they're usually like projected to go eight and eight same deal in 2017 same deal in 2009 kind of the same deal in 2001. So they started out 11-0 that year, but then they were terrible at the end of the season, but they still managed to get the NFC title game, and then they got blanked. So, like, the way that they, you know, their history, you know, they've had their brightest moments when they have overachieved, and this is a team that people do not expect anything of this year. If I hear the term regress to the mean one more time,

I'm going to put my whole, I'm going to put a hit, I'm going to put my fist through a wall. Like, it's just like, I I'm looking at the roster and yeah. Okay. They're not going to win 13 games,

but they're going to win a good number of games, particularly in that division, particularly in that conference. Like I don't, I don't see how good number of games, particularly in that division, particularly in that conference. Like I don't, I don't see how they aren't the best team in that division. Like you want me to buy into Detroit as a better team. Get the out of here. It's not going to happen. How confident are you in this opinion? Like how many dollars of your own money would you spend on this?

Like that's, I'm not saying bet me. I'm not saying bet. I still have them winning 10. That's where I've got them. But I want to test the confidence of this take. That was said very confidently. Yeah. If I said, all right, you have to put $10,000 on the over. Well, look, 10 grand.

I mean. You sounded pretty confident, but now you're backing off. Yeah, yeah. But look, I wouldn't bet $10,000 on the sun rising tomorrow. I wouldn't. It's too much money. I'm not going to do it. There's always a chance.

A nuclear bomb blows up the world, and then I'm out $10,000, and I'm dead. That sucks. I don't want that. That would be bad. Okay. How about $500? Would you do $500? Let's go with $100.

Although now I have to make that $100, which is annoying, but I'll make it. But that's also not that much confidence. I mean, if you're going only 100 bucks, you're like very on the fence about how this is going to go. No, no, no. That's less about confidence than me having a brain about how gambling works. You know what I'm saying? Like, I'm confident. I think they'll win the division.

I'm going to save this for the Vikings preview, my overall take about the team this year. But I think they win the division. I think it's perfectly fine to say that I think everything sets up for them to have pretty much the exact same season they had a year ago, right? Fantastic offense, defense, goes to the playoffs. Their Achilles heels are all exposed, and they can't get past San Francisco, Philadelphia, one of those teams like that.

But I don't think the door is completely shut on them. I think that they are certainly talented enough on offense and on the coaching staff, particularlyrian flores is the dc now i think that all of that portends good things for them rather than me just looking at their point differential from a year ago and saying they're not gonna be as good like that's to me that is far more short-sighted than looking at what is actually the actual human beings involved here because i think o'connell i think O'Connell's a really, really good coach. Which I guess that we move on quickly in the NFL. It's like, oh, he can coach.

All right, now let's go worry about other stuff. But when you consider how many coaches in the last decade have been hired and turned into Urban Meyer, Joe Judge, Matt Patricia. Right. You're really locked out there. Hey, and you might have been this close to hiring Jim Harbaugh. I wanted Harbaugh.

I wanted Harbaugh. And now I'm like, no, that's a bullet dodge. I feel like that's when we became friends, is me trying to talk you out of Jim Harbaugh. Yeah, I don't think I listened either. And then KO came aboard and he was Yeah, I don't think I listened either. And then and then came aboard

and he was saying, I think I was, you know, I'm a sucker. So like I had already bought into to O'Connell by training camp because he did the thing where he didn't play the starters in the preseason games in any of them.

And last night, last night, the commander started their whole starting offense against the Ravens in a fucking preseason game and got Terry McLaurin hurt, which is the stupidest, most antiquated shit you could possibly do as an NFL team. And I liked the fact that it was clear to me that KO was doing all of the things that you're supposed to do as a modern NFL coach, and it paid off on the back end. And I don't see any reason why that wouldn't happen again yeah I a hundred percent on the preseason games they're not that entertaining to cover and I can't get that many big takeaways but it's a hundred percent the smart way to go about it and guess how many guess how many starters they've lost in the last two years

zero two preseason games and having it be more controlled joint practices where they do those evaluations and installs i think is just kind of a clever idea doing it multiple times what are you most intrigued by like i think okay so we've decided the defense is going to have its problems we think we know the offense what what is the mystery of the minnesota the Minnesota Vikings 2023 to you? Well, do you mean mystery or like worry? Worry is almost everything all the time for Vikings fans. So maybe, uh, the, you know, I mean the chief worry of course is the interior offensive line, but that's been every year since 2017. Right. So, I mean, that's, that's nothing

new. I think the, the, the intriguing mystery, the fun mystery is the secondary, right? So, I mean, that's nothing new. I think the intriguing mystery, the fun mystery is the secondary, right? Mekhi Blackman, Josh Metellus, who I think is actually I think he's a good player. He's so good of a player that it's clear to me that Louis Seane will never

catch him. I think Seane and I think Andrew Booth are both busts. I think I can safely say that now. But Metellus, Blackman, maybe Jawan Williams, although that I think is a little bit iffy. But I'll be interested to see how those safeties and how those corners play, particularly with Flores in charge. I think that the interior of the defensive line,

like the interior of the offensive line, is a worry. And so that's been the case for the past few years now, where they've been a very good team in certain spots, but they ultimately get undone at the line of scrimmage. And so the big mystery for this team is whether or not they can win games on the line of scrimmage going forward this year. If they can do that, they're a contender. If they can't, if they are regularly getting beaten on the line of scrimmage,

then they're going to have the same problems that they are regularly getting beaten on the line of scrimmage, then they're going to have the same problems that they have in the playoffs against the Giants. I think that that is true. And we have, because there's so many question marks about the cornerbacks, and I guess to some extent, the safety position and Brian Flores, when you're just coming into training camp, that we just haven't talked much about the defensive line, which looks like it's going to have Kairos Tonga playing a lot. And last year he was pretty good, but that's asking a player to go from being cut by the bears last year to now being your starting nose tackle. Maybe there's, maybe there's some Jerry ball in there, but that's a lot. And Harrison Phillips has just been a guy throughout his career,

like pretty good at the run stuffing, but not, you know, some spectacular force. And Dean Lowry has had his moments against the Vikings, but is not necessarily a needle mover. And that's the thing about Brian Flores is I've been really impressed how he takes players skill sets and he puts them in the right position,

but there's only so much you could in the right position, but there's only so much you could do is that guy. And there's only so many blitzes you can send. Like you have to have personnel at the end of the day. And I'm still kind of convinced that even as bad as Ed Donatel was at his job, that their personnel would still not have resulted in a great defense last year, no matter what he did. So that's, that's kind of the conflict of the defense for me with Flores is I think they could end up with a bad defense and he does a good job. Yeah, I think that is actually the likely thing where they will make more fun, cool plays than they did a year ago. They made a lot of good plays a year ago with Donatel,

but that was almost by happenstance. I think this year will be more by design. But you're right. This is a team that throughout my lifetime has had a really good history on defensive line. And not just on the outside with Dolman and Millard and Emerson Griffin and Jared Allen, all the guys. But on the inside, too. Henry Thomas, John Randall, the Williams wall, guys like that. They have been barren at that position now for quite some time. And even if Kyrus Tonga emerges, it's, you know,

he's not going to be the sort of interior force that you're going to get with John Randall. And if they had someone like that, oh, they would be, they'd be a very, very good defense indeed. But, you know, I think I basically have to hope for that emergence during the season, or I have to hope that Flores can do something with smoke and mirrors to make that interior more formidable than it is on paper. So you're working on your, why your team sucks for the Vikings, which is always an absolute must and just has a little more soul to it because of your Vikings fandom. That's right. I, I, I don't want you to ruin,

but I want you to tease. What's different? You've been doing this for a long time. You've said a lot of things about the Vikings over the years. But what is new to say about the Vikings when you are creating your diss track to every team? I mean, everything changes year by year, right? Like a year ago, I was dying from the trade, Kirk, right?

Couldn't wait for it. Like I was like, I was so annoyed that Quasey gave him that little extension. I was like, it's like, you know, it's like finding out you're gonna spend another year in prison, right? And then last year happened. And of course, you know, Kirk balled out like he was fails. And like, I know everyone's gonna say oh you know the fourth down behind the sticks giants game yes i understand i was at that game i saw the pressure in his face i was at the angle right i'm not gonna make any more excuses for kirk than that but you know if you

watched last season and you watched him on quarterback where he had 9 000 cracked ribs all season long because the interior of the line sucked. You know, it was hard not to be fond of him. And to know also that it's more likely than not than whoever replaces him will be worse. That's just sort of the law of averages, right? They have to replace him, but the likelihood of them finding someone as good is by its very nature going to be low it's good it's going to be very hard for them to do i think o'connell is a kind of coach who can get the most out of any quarterback

that he has he did kirk a year ago he'll do it before he again this year but you know i'm in a different spot with kirk this year where i you know it's just like kirk for him to finally go because i think he's gone after this year but for for me to be a little like, aww. So there's that, and then there's also, I've genuinely had enough of my own fatalism with regards to the Vikings. I think last year sort of cured me of that. It's much more fun to believe. Even if you end up with your heart broken, who cares? When you believe, and when stuff like the Buffalo game happens, forget it. It's as good as it gets. I enjoy it. I'm a fan for a reason.

I don't sit here and be like, well, why am I a fan of this team? I have honestly enjoyed being a Vikings fan more often than I have not been a Vikings fan. And I know that sounds like, well, why are you doing that for why your team sucks? Trust me, there are so many fans who are Vikings fans who are not like that. And I think I've had enough of them. Yeah, I mean, I think from my perspective, a myriad of fan opinions is always good because then I can kind of gather them all. But the most frustrating is when it's August and you have someone in the comments that says, the GM sucks and this team's going to be horrible.

And you're like, okay, I guess we should just, I guess I'll just not talk about the rest of the season then. Cause it's already over. I mean, that's a hard place to be for, for any team right now. Right. I mean, that's why the NFL nation ESPN reporters always pick their team to, you know, the, the total of the teams to win 50 more games than is possible right because hope is springing eternal uh going into the season well that's the fun that's the point the point is to hope and it's like there is value in that even if it is not realized at the at the end of it right it's it's just enjoying the idea of a bright future in life and that's like that's a good way to live your life if you live your life as oh everything's gonna go wrong oh the world's a terrible place

uh there's nothing to look forward to go die like you're not you're not getting anything done like what's what's the point why are you here like you you may as well keep your chin up see how it goes because this is a fact the Patriots when I was growing up were dogs they were an embarrassment and no one in New England cared about that team no New England cares about them now of course but they turned it all around there's there's so many sports stories like that that have proven the curses aren't real exes aren't real a team can get together at any time and surprise you, the Bengals could win a Super Bowl

with Joe Burrow at the helm. It happens. And you have to know that innately. And if you just discount it, you're depriving yourself of a lot, I think. I mean, for me, it was the Saints. Mike Dicka, their coach. They were an embarrassment.

They were a disgrace. And that was true of the Golden State Warriors, right? The Golden State Warriors didn't mean anything in the 80s and 90s. They are now the preeminent face of basketball. They made a bad year last year. So you have to understand that these things are cyclical. They don't stay the same. Things evolve.

Things change. And particularly Minnesota, which has ownership that is committed to the team. They have the stadium. They have the personnel in place. They have good players. I think you're a fool to sit there and wave all of that off just because Ed Ingram can't pass block like you know like it's like you have to you have to see uh you have to see the forest for the trees you know

so how so what do you got 10 wins 12 wins 14 after that at least 14 i think they're i think there are 10 or 11 winning i think they, and I think they can make a run. I think – I don't – particularly in the NFC, like, the best team is San Francisco. Well, they got quarterback problems. Like, as good as Brock Purdy was a year ago, he's hurt. I was not – you know, no one was sold on him by the end of last season, even though he had played very well. Trey Lance is a bust. He's such a bust that no one would trade for him this offseason. And then you got Sam

Darnold, who's the other quarterback, and that's Sam Darnold. So that team has a pretty pronounced weakness. And then you have the Eagles, who I think are demonstrably worse than either of them. And then you have, what, the Cowboys? I mean, come on, man. Get the f*** out of here. I'm going to buy into Mike McCarthy andarthy and dac prescott just because like they're cooler just because dac is cooler than kirk like i'm not buying it i think i think the vikings this year are division champion and i think they can go on a run i'm not gonna guarantee any of that but i'll go bet the hundred dollars now and put my money where my mouth is so you can say all right drew's not foolish

i'll actually make the bet all right we will keep track of that uh your hundred dollar bet on the vikings well drew i can't rate uh wait to read why your team sucks obviously you are one of my favorite writers in the world i read everything every fun bag that comes out every week and get inside your twisted mind so i suggest highly suggest that people get uh on board with defector if they have not done so go find it it's absolutely phenomenal and i'm glad we could catch up before the season starts and you have anything to be sad about yeah no let me and let me uh let me uh return the favor this is purple insider is like the dominant thing i read every week.

Like, of course, I read Defector, but I work at Defector. And I, you know, I'm automatically going to like Defector, right? But when it comes to like appointment reading, the second something comes up in my email inbox from you, that's what I read because there isn't, I have been reading about the vikings my whole life really uh you and purple insider are by far the best vikings reading that i get to do so thank you for that thank you for uh answering my texts even when i send them when i'm stoned it's like eight o'clock

on a friday night that's very nice of you. And also, I got to plug the distractions, the podcast I do with David Roth every week. And we talk about football, but we also talk about sandwiches. Well, I appreciate the kind words. And I do enjoy the text messages, in part because the rollercoaster ride of your Vikings mind always is entertaining for me.

So thanks again, man. Really, really appreciate all your support through the years of purple insider and means a lot for you to say that stuff. So thanks for taking the time to come on and we will get together again, maybe to keep tabs on how your confidence level in that a hundred dollar bet is going. We'll see each other at the Superbow. It'll be fun. Oh, that's right. Yeah, that's right. All right.

Thanks, man. By the way, tell O'Connell to sign Risner. All right. Let's get on with that, okay? Okay. Well, see, you had to be the guard guy just before the end. Had to be. Bye, Drew.

See you.