Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - The Athletic's Chad Graff explains the Patriots' strange season and how they match up with the Vikings

Episode Date: November 23, 2022

Matthew Coller and The Athletic's Chad Graff talk Patriots. Why is their offense so bad? Why is their defense so good? What does Chad think of the former team he covered playing well this year? What's it like to cover Bill Belichick and who wins Vikings-Patriots. Plus Matthew answers fan questions and has a fun World Cup discussion with the Always Cheating podcast hosts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Novocaine. Only in theaters March 14th. Hello, welcome to another episode of Purple Insider. And yes, Chad Graff of The Athletic is on the show. Everyone's been waiting for it. I've been getting DMs, people sending me mail, like when is Chad coming on the show to talk New England Patriots and Matt Patricia's explosive offense? What is going on, Chad? How are you? Doing well, excited to be headed back to Minnesota this week, excited to get back to US Bank Stadium, excited to see this eight and two team that i did not expect to be eight and two and you know dive a little bit deeper into the numbers this week of

is this real is it not real how good are they the nfc isn't very good so is there a chance they could kind of get on a run and make something happen it's been crazy to watch from afar and now i'm super excited to watch them in person. So I think that, did you happen to see what happened with Iowa and Minnesota the other day, where it was 13 to 10? Like, I think that's what we might be looking at here for this game.

I mean, the Vikings without Christian Derrissaw, the Patriots have a good defense. But since I started by making fun of the Patriots offense, I think that's where we kind of have to begin here. When we did this, when you took the job, I was like, Chad, you've covered some Matt Patricia football games. I mean, what? And no one has regressed harder than Mac Jones. What is going on? I mean, so the Patriots have a winning record and I follow you, of course, on Twitter. You're not muted.

And I see your tweets. And every one of them is like, this team is last in this. They're atrocious in that. This game is making me want to jump off of a high building. Like, every tweet is like that. And then I'm like, oh, that they won on a punt return. Like, what is happening? It's incredible.

Like, if you look at the numbers, defense, first, second, first, first, second, first, second, every stat, the offense, 27, 28, 30, 27, 26, 30. Mack Jones has taken such a step backward. It is crazy. Maybe that was always to be expected with Matt Patricia, but even in training camp and before that, I just thought Bill Belichick's not going to let it get that far south. Like, yes, he'll give Matt Patricia a chance. And there have been plenty of coaches who have switched sides and it's worked out.

It can't be that bad, right? It's been that bad. Mac Jones has taken that far of a step back. The offensive line is terrible, allows tons of pressures, allows tons of sacks. The running game is working to a degree, but that's also just because Ramondre Stevenson and Damian Harris are good enough that they get hit at the line of scrimmage, much like Dalvin Cook and are able to turn it into decent plays.

They have no wide receivers. They spend more than anybody in their wide receivers and tight ends. And it's a group of Nelson Aguilar and Devante Parker and just a bunch of guys. Nobody's that good, but it's a bunch of like number three wide receivers. If you could have five KJ Osbournes, that's what the Patriots have. So it's really not impressive anywhere. And then on top of all that, Mac Jones gets hurt in the third game, kind of tries to play through it at some point. It doesn't go well. He's just i i do

actually feel bad for him he's gone from josh mcdaniels who turns out probably isn't a very good head coach but as a coordinator the guy can coach um he had mac jones as the best rookie quarterback in the class last year better than fields better than lawrence obviously better than zach wilson as we have seen um but he's gone from that to Mac Jones ranks near the bottom of basically every category. I don't think it's any one thing. The receivers stink. The line stinks. But the play calling is atrocious.

The play design is bad. When you watch them, they've usually got like three wide receivers within a five-yard bunch. And it's like he'll throw some passes where you don't even know who the target was. Cause there were three guys in the vicinity. It's just bad all around. I don't understand. I mean, this seemed like from the very second it happened, a shocking Belichick blunder. Like this is not, I mean, we know that his coaches are weirdos and bullies and that's why they don't do very well otherwise but normally they're good at their coordinator positions go back to like ted cattrall and uh or was it no is that it who was

romeo crinnell charlie weiss yeah yeah yeah romeo crinnell was the guy i was thinking of charlie weiss and i mean this is like they those guys would all get opportunities to be head coaches somewhere and then they would blow it and whatever else. Eric, Eric, man, genius. Yeah. Remember that? But you thought, OK, well, he's got to have a better better plan to replace McDaniels. And now you have this atrocity of an offensive system that looks like it was designed on the back of a napkin by someone who's a defensive guy.

I guess I just don't get it. And Mac Jones must be beside himself, right? Like he must be so frustrated because last year he was thrown to open guys all the time and the personnel wasn't like wildly different. Same personnel. And they've just gone away from what worked with him. Like he's a very good play action quarterback. They ran a lot of RPO, something he did a ton of at Alabama. And then this year they were just like, no, we're good. Just drop back and see what you find.

And what he's finding is nothing because the schemes aren't good. The receivers don't have spacing. The receivers aren't good to begin with. So it's just, it's been a complete mess. It's been what you would have expected as a Vikings fan from watching Matt Patricia for a few years in Detroit. It's been kind of exactly what you would have expected as a Vikings fan from watching Matt Patricia for a few years in Detroit. It's been kind of exactly what you would have expected, which in a weird way is what's shocking that Belichick has let it get to this point. Early on, I was kind of willing to give him the benefit of the doubt just because he's earned it.

And I thought, well, he knows Patricia more than the rest of us. If he thinks he can coach offense, maybe he can coach offense. He was an offensive lineman. He coached offensive line for a little bit, very, very briefly. Maybe this is going to work. It hasn't. It turns out that the eye test of watching the Lions trumps whatever offensive line history he had. So it's been a mess.

And yet the defense has been so good and the special teams which belichick cares so deeply about they practice so much more than everybody else they have specialists which i'm just not used to after covering the vikings like remember dan chisna and turning him into a special team specialist they have like four or five of those every year on the roster here that's how much he cares about special teams and so in his eyes they're just going to play awesome defense which they have so far and then have the special teams you know be pick up an extra three yards on punt return pick them extra three yards on punt coverage and try to win the field position until they can eventually field

you to death because they also have uh the second worst red zone offense in the league. Other than that though, other than that, the everything's going totally fine as I don't see any, I don't see any problems, but here's, here's what I, I guess I'm sort of confused by, and you can clear this up. I did watch Bailey Zappy have a couple of good games. Like, was that a thing or was that just like, who knows? Or was he actually like better at running this offense? Now I remember looking

at this, they were running play actions all the time for Bailey Zappi, but they don't want to do it for Mac Jones. I'm just confused. I'm confused as well as the short answer. When they brought him in, they were like, Hey, this is a rookie. Let's do the things that make life easier on a quarterback. And guess what? It worked. It worked all the way up until the second half of the Bears game, and then he reverted back to being the rookie that everybody expected. He took way too many chances, and it showed.

And then the job went directly back to Mac Jones but it was just so high opening of why won't you do these easy throws give these layups basically to the guy who had a ton of success with them a year ago why are you changing that just at this point they they still don't run a ton of play action when they do it works um it is it's just a confounding offense that uh is super frustrating to watch yeah i think this is um you know what the vikings defense needs after giving up 40 points to a well-oiled dallas cowboys machine that's been together has a great quarterback has great weapons and this is the complete opposite of that however you mentioned the running game and it doesn't sound like Delvin Tomlinson is going to be ready to go. And if he is, he won't be at a hundred percent.

I think that if there's one weakness here, it's that new England could run over them, but it also sounds like the offensive line is banged up as well. The offensive line is a little bit banged up, couple of guys missing there. But one of the things I was looking at, as I was just kind of trying to do my homework on this vikings team and re-familiarize myself with them they play with six men in the box or fewer more than anybody in the league they'll happily play with light boxes we know how much you know this scheme uh with brian osomawa getting

drafted likes those speedy light linebackers to basically say go ahead run it on us for a 10 play drive we're convinced that somewhere along the line you're going to stub your toe move backward it's not going to work um the patriots are one of a handful of teams with maybe the browns and the ravens that are like fine you want to take the ball and make us run it like great we don't have to have mac j throwing to Nelson Aguilar like yes please we'll give it to Ramondre Stevenson 20 times and Damian Harris 20 times so surprisingly and I can't believe I'm saying this after watching the Patriots score three offensive points last week I think they could actually win this game in minnesota by dominating time of possession

just slow methodical boring drives draining the play clock running it four yards an attempt playing good defense and trying to win an ugly like 14 13 game it kind of reminds me of the browns game from last year you mentioned the browns where they won 14 to seven and Baker Mayfield overthrew Odell Beckham about six times, which would have been easy game winning touchdown or game ceiling touchdowns. And, you know, maybe at that point, we should have known that Baker Mayfield wasn't going to be the guy. But I think that that is very plausible without Delvin Tomlinson. They're just a different team. And what Dallas did, I thought was brilliant.

They brought in two tight ends and they just loaded up on big people and said, bring in James Lynch. You remember James Lynch, Chad, bring in James Lynch, go ahead, try to stop us with James Lynch because they will put the five defensive linemen rather than an extra linebacker.

And it's just, it's just a problem. Now you mentioned that the defense and offense couldn't be any farther apart. I mean, is this just sort of like classic Belichick stuff? Because I mean, I knew Matthew Judon was good for them, but they always have some dude who has like 10 sacks and you're like, really that guy has that many sacks and he's that guy. For a normal Vikings fan, I bet you could name probably just one I'm trying

to get how many defensive players probably two with Devin McCourty you'd probably get McCourty and Judon and outside of that like it's a bunch of misfit guys who were drafted the middle rounds it was a cornerback group that people were super concerned about saying who the heck is going to play cornerback for this team now they're the best pass defense in the league. They regularly play with three safeties as a way to both try to load up in the box with somebody bigger like Jabril Peppers coming up to try to stop the run, but also still be good in pass defense. It's just incredible what he's done.

Obviously, you know, the super bowl speak for themselves and the success speaks for itself the way that he has taken this defense with dietrich wise and lawrence guy and godshaw and bentley like it's just it's a cast of players who you would not normally think of on a number one defense and he's got them truly playing as the best events in the NFL. Now, big caveat is they benefit statistically. Their last three games were against Zach Wilson, Sam Ellinger, and Zach Wilson. So sure, the stats are awesome. I am curious to see if this is a great defense as they've played or if it's just a good defense that's benefited from playing some really bad offenses. The thing about what happened against Dallas that should be concerning to everybody

is that Justin Jefferson only had three catches and that was because Kirk Cousins was getting sacked constantly and when I look at this team in New England there's a lot of pressure on quarterbacks that does come I'm sure from Zach Wilson bringing on himself because he's awful. But, I mean, Kirk Cousins does that too. And they're without Christian Derrissaw. That's going to be a huge L. It seems to me like it kind of starts there with their pressure that maybe allows the cornerbacks to do their job.

But the Jefferson matchup is just always pretty much the definitive thing for whether the Vikings can move the football against an opposing team or not. And obviously one of the ways that Belichick has separated himself is he is so good at taking away an opponent's best weapon. Like think back to that clip of him going up to Chad Ojosinko before a Bengals game and just saying, hey, you can take the day off. I'm going to, I got a coverage. You're not going to touch the ball of the day. We're always going to have someone over you. And sure enough, he doesn't.

So he's very good at that. But one thing that I don't think I realized is I was looking at the pressures today because I thought Matthew Judon and Dietrich Weiss, the two edge rushers for the Patriots who I think could have a big day given Christian Derrissaw is not going to play. I assumed that they would be the best pass rushing duo in the NFL, just based on how good they are. The Vikings with Danil Hunter and Zedaria Smith have the only duo that's been better.

And that is one spot where I was so wrong about the Vikings in the off season. I said over and over, this roster has not changed. People are way overestimating Z'Darrius Smith. He's always hurt. He's getting older. He's not very good. Oh, my God. He has been incredible.

He's a monster. Yes, he is an absolute beast. But, I mean, I thought, you know, when we talk about how the Vikings went 8-2, which I would love your outside opinion of, like, it is sort of like going back to your hometown. You're like, oh, wow, they built a Walmart or whatever. Like, you know, they're like, oh, eight and two, excuse me. Like that, you, you would have guessed what their point differential is right in the middle of almost zero, but you would not have guessed necessarily the record.

A major part of that is like, what if I told you 30 for 30 music that Zedarius Smith did play like 2019? Like that's every sort of fan offseason question. Hey, what if he plays like 2019 and all of us go, well, maybe, but probably not. But he has. And then Patrick Peterson, it's been like 2016 again. And the guy has just been absolutely phenomenal. And that's the thing with this game is that I think there's a reason to pick the Patriots

because of how the Vikings just looked and not having Derrissaw, the weakness. But the one thing is that the Vikings will take the ball away. And I think that Mac Jones, if he starts to press at all, they will catch it. Unlike some other teams where it just bounces off. They have Harrison Smith and they have Patrick Peterson. These guys will catch the football. But there isn't something else that I should mention for everybody that Kevin O'Connell said today is that Andrew Booth Jr. might not even be healthy for this game. The Vikings might be down to their fourth corner in

Duke Shelley, who just came off the practice squad and joined the team. So there is like, there is the major injury element to this, but I just think it's interesting to get like your perspective on the eight and two team when that was probably not what you had as your expectation when you left to bandwagon the Patriots definitely not uh the expectation that I had and yet at the end of every Sunday like it's often hard to watch the other game which um is kind of one of the downfalls. And as my buddies give me crap for being horrible fantasy every year, like I see one team, I don't get to see the rest of the league. And so I would check the score of the Vikings because I was still interested or I'd see the tweets of the number of Vikings reporters that I still follow. And just and I was curious. I wanted to see what Kevin O'Connell was going to do because I was super impressed through the offseason. But it's one thing to be impressive in OTAs as a coach and a whole nother on the sideline. And as it started to roll, I kept thinking like this is exactly what they need. They just needed to be better in tight situations, one score games. This is perfect. Four and one, five and one. God, he's so good at this.

And then as it starts to creep up, six and one, seven and one, eight and one, that's when you start to think, okay, maybe this isn't quite so sustainable. I appreciate that there is a difference and having a better culture and having better game management can help you in those one score games that the Vikings have been in so many times over the last three years. But at a certain point, you know, it goes beyond, hey, we're 4-0 in those. That's really good. And a nice turnaround to, hey, we're 7-0 in those. We're 8-0 in those. Now we're talking about unsustainable territory. So it's been fun to watch. I think this week's been fun to dive into the stats and learn a few things, including we covered over the last five years a number of atrocious interior offensive lines, at least based on the stats I've seen.

This one might be worse. Ed Ingram has been horrible. Ezra Cleveland, I thought he was going to be good. His numbers are terrible. Third most pressures allowed. Garrett Bradbury's up there with the most pressure is allowed among centers. That is an area I thought they would be better just because if you're going to draft a day two guard, I thought Ezra Cleveland was good.

I didn't really think that Garrett Bradbury was going to take a step, but maybe you could mitigate that by having better guards next to him. What is going on there? How have they been that bad? Well, I think that when you draft a second round guard, you feel very obligated to start him right away. And, uh, actually his training camp was pretty good in his first couple of weeks were pretty good, but I think there was a point where he got smacked in the mouth really badly in a couple of games and the confidence has just gone away. But I also think, and this is what we're

going to see, I'm sure, from Belichick, once opposing teams saw it on tape, like, oh, he can't recognize a stunt or a twist, or like, oh, if you put someone right over him to pass rush, like he's going to lose that rep. Once the blood was in the water, they just started attacking him over and over and over again. And I think that's what we've seen the last few weeks. Ezra Cleveland is like a home run hitter that one week will have a great game. You're like, wow, he was throwing bodies. And then the next game, just who knows? And he gives up seven pressures or something like that.

Yeah. I think right now Tom Compton or Dakota Dozier could come through that door and put together a better play than they have. And that's why any game down the rest of the stretch, we really have to talk about no matter if it's Indianapolis or new England or the jets or like all the teams that they're going to play that maybe aren't that impressive. You have to talk about like, well, they could kind of blow you up at any time with a nice little strip sack or

something in the first, you know, like any time. And this is the challenge to Kevin O'Connell where we're really going to find out because this is a lot to work around and lesser men have failed badly and maybe better men like Gary have even struggled with this. So, uh, and Kevin, you're great, but you're no, uh, Gary Kubiak. Most of us aren't, but even this was even a Gary thing too. Like when they didn't have guard play, it was just Kirk cousins was not able to make up for that. And there was nothing he could do the

other night with the pressure they put on. So I think that we're going to see that exact same model week in and week out of those guys getting attacked. Well, and the other thing that I was curious about as I looked through all the numbers this week and was just, you know, curious beyond glancing at the box score is I was shocked to see, given that they're eight-2, how bad Kirk Cousins' numbers are. Near the bottom in probably around 23, 24 in most quarterback statistics, which is not where Kirk Cousins ever resided. Maybe he's never been 7, 8 or something, but he's always, you could pretty reliably say, somewhere between 9, 15, 16.

I never thought this early in his career i would see him as the 27th best quarterback in epa or 26 or whatever it is in qbr like just consistently down there and i think definitely deserves some credit for being better in the fourth quarter and having more end of game moments which is what i've seen, just watching highlights and stuff, which is why I was so surprised to see the numbers that I do see now. And the other thing is I just had so much faith in Kevin O'Connell after watching him operate this off season and watching what he did with Matthew Stafford

that I thought this is a no brainer. If anybody can get Kirk Cousins to be the eighth best quarterback in the league, it's this guy. And yet I'm just kind of amazed and shocked as I look at the numbers that it's gone the other way. And I don't know exactly how to balance it. Like on the one hand he's winning and that's, you know, I've knocked on him plenty for propping up that he was the 12th best

quarterback while losing a lot of games. So maybe you just tip your cap and say, congrats on being eight and two, despite these numbers, or maybe it's, you know, an underlying hint that it's not sustainable. I don't know, but it's just been weird to see his numbers there. Cause I thought his floor was so much higher. I mean, we could do a lot more content on all of his numbers for sure. But the best way I can put it is that every time a team

had a chance to kind of put them away, he came up with a big throw to Justin Jefferson. And that's really how it's gone all season long is that Jefferson has just been there for, I mean, Buffalo is the best example. That game is over. If he does not make a catch on fourth and 18, that he plucked away from another man. I mean, it's been a lot of very inconsistent play, but it's almost like every week is a Kirk Cousins season where there's drives where you go, wow, oh my gosh. And then there are long sections of time where I just don't know that the offense

and how O'Connell wants to play is really quite suited for him or for this offensive line. And I think it's shown up. And the turnovers that they've caused on defense, Delvin Cook's huge runs have really kind of painted over it to some extent in some of these games. But as they go down the stretch, you just can't rely on game-winning drives

every single week from Kirk Cousins. So they really have to play better than they did in the first half of the season. And they're doing it, well, a little banged up up so how they navigate that will say a lot i think about kevin o'connell but hey if it's an inside joke if you were worried that delvin cook was going to line up in the slot a lot he hasn't at all ever thank goodness the rest of the league didn't uh catch on to that super popular trend that we hid through training camp. So I'll have to relay that on to Bill Belichick. Okay. Well, I promised that I would keep you short because

you got to run to the locker room. So just real quick, what is the number one difference between covering the New England Patriots and the Minnesota Vikings after you are now a half a season in to being a Patriot reporter? What was, and then I guess this is more trivia for you, the buzzword of the off season around the Vikings, starting with a C, that as we talked about Kevin O'Connell and Kweisi Adolfo-Mensah and this new culture, what were we talking about? With, you mean with the, I thought the answer was going to be,

not communication. What was it? Collaboration. Collaboration. That is the number one difference. There's no collaboration here. It is Bill Belichick from the minor things to the major things. Everything runs through his desk. It's a one man show. Here's what we're doing. I don't need to explain why we're doing this. This is, these are the decisions I make. This is where we're practicing. Everything is through him, about him, from draft stuff to practice schedule, to travel schedule, to what hotel we're going to stay in. It's been eye-opening to see how he's operated and how singularly focused this organization is around him. Obviously,

that has come with lots of success. And so, you know, I don't point it out to rip it or knock it. It's just been so, so different compared to what the Vikings have right now with Koisi Dofamensa and Kevin O'Connell. The press conferences, though, are fine, right? I've always heard that it's like overrated, though a couple of clips made it seem different than it really is. Totally fine. He's completely normal. If you ask him who the starting quarterback is going to be

or if the injured whatever position is going to play, yeah, that's when you're going to get kind of the funny clips that circulate through social media. The rest of it, it's not that much different from mike zimmer chad graph the athletic i am excited for us to hang at a football game again on thursday so that will be great and uh i wish you the best of travel making your way back up here and we don't have to use promo code dead again that's another inside joke i'm sorry for that uh but you know what it means chad and we will uh we'll look forward to this because it should be i mean this could be sort of rock them

sock them toward a sort of old school kind of game so it will be fascinating to cover so i'm glad we could get together and do this again man this is perfect bring your neck rolls for this game and uh and i'll enjoy having some turkey with you beforehand. All right. Thanks again, Chad. Thanks. Folks, maybe you've noticed people in your office with what looks like an open tall boy at their desk in the morning at work. Well, it's not a beer. It's more likely it's a can of liquid death, which sounds pretty crazy at first, but it's simply mountain water from the Alps. It's called liquid death because it will murder your thirst and kill plastic pollution,

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Says the hardest thing about being a fan of this team for so long is that they have a hard time losing normally it seems like they either lose in extraordinary fashion or they have some embarrassing explosive accident in their pants that ruins all the goodwill that they gained why can't they lose normally it is really amazing how that happens isn't it it? You know what I think it is? Through the history of this team, they've always been good. I mean, really, like I'm sure, you know, you can go through some years, the Christian Ponder years, or you can go back to the early 80s where there were times where you didn't really feel like very competitive. But for the majority of this team, they have been very good. And each decade, they're giving you a chance to potentially go to the super bowl it hasn't happened but they're on the doorstep so many times and they've had lots

of good players and there's always been something in the way but i think that when you have a lot of good players and teams that are very competitive winning winning divisions, competing in the playoffs, all those things, what you end up having is a lot of important games and a lot of close games. And what that often results in is some losses that are real tragedies. But even think about, and I'm not asking you to give any sympathy to these people, but think about even the Green Bay Packers and how long they've been relevant but also how many times their seasons came crashing down whether it was you know the new york giants interception from brett farve or you know the onside kick from the seattle seahawks like if you talk to a green bay packers fan and you know i don't suggest this because it they'll

i'm sure make you very angry uh when they say the, you know, woe is me. But they've been in so many big games over the years because their team has been consistently good that they're going to have a lot of their own disappointments to talk about. But they're only memorable because they mattered. Right. And that is not to try to give you some silver lining on this, because I'm sure that some of these losses are really crushing, but it's the reason that they happen so much. And this comes from experience for me, because when I was in Buffalo, they missed the playoffs for 17 straight seasons, and they were so bad for so long. There was very few games that mattered. I mean, there few games that mattered i mean there were games that were embarrassing um on one game they fumbled i think it was opening night of the

nfl season they fumbled away a kickoff against the patriots that lost them a game uh they gave up a late reception to tara lowens on national tv against the cowboys and there was a field goal to win that one when it should have been going to overtime or they should have won or whatever you know there's lots of games that they lost in like a shocking fashion but none of it was memorable because who cares like they just miss the playoffs every year and you just shrug your shoulders at those things why it really sticks with you is that you went into philadelphia in 2017 with a chance to play the super bowl at home and be the first team to do that and then you come away with nothing to show for it and not even anything more than the opening drive of the entire game to show for it and you

know it feels that way with this year because you're eight and one and then you go to eight and two on the national stage with a 40 to three loss if this team was four and five and that happened you'd go oh well that's just a terrible game but i'll never remember that it even happened it is a real smack to the face because at eight and one you're buying in and you're looking around saying this team can be a legitimate contender for a super bowl and then you get knocked off that pedestal for a day and they'll have a chance you know to get right back up on that horse on thursday but i think that that's why i think that a lot of teams if not all teams have crazy losses the vikings do turn it up to 11 a bit

but i think they they all have that um it's just the nature of the beast but you notice it a lot more well when it's your team but it really sticks out when the games are of great importance and they matter a lot to you and then when you get kicked in the teeth it hurts a lot more than if your team was the houston texans like let's talk about all those memorable losses for the houston texans like i'm sure they've had some throughout the last couple of years, but does anyone care? Does anyone talk about them? Do they put them on the three 25 game?

No, you get put there, you get put on national TV. And then when those disappointments come, the whole world talks about it for a week. When you end up for the national TV game or you're in the playoffs or so forth. So I think,

I think that that's why I don't think it has anything to do necessarily with the franchise. It may be cursed. We joked about that last week. And then they lost 40 to three after we were kidding around about them being cursed. So maybe there is something to that, but I think that that is the cause. On to the next question here from at Rob Westendorf. Do you see Ed Donatel lasting only one year as defensive coordinator, given some of the

flaws with the defense? Yeah, I don't really know. I don't know about how they view what has gone on with the defense this year, because you could make an argument that the defense has come through for them in many many games i mean most specifically buffalo coming through with those huge interceptions at the end of the game but even i mean miami they get the big interception by patrick peterson they get the huge performance by zadarius smith i think that it's always the personnel that you have and there's only so much you can do with the weaknesses now they may look at what they did and go back and say you know what maybe it

wasn't the best fit but I have a hard time really pinning a whole lot on Ed Donatell I know that you know when you give up 40 points you're going to look at the defense and go what the heck just happened and tony pollard happened uh you know right and so their numbers are not great on defense overall and giving up 40 points and a ton of yards made those worse but i think that the weaknesses that they had were really revealed especially the health part of it, where we knew that this roster was just very thin. We knew that if they got down to the third corner, which is the case with most teams, but they got down to the third corner against CeeDee Lamb, one of the best wide receivers in the league, that it wasn't going to be a very good matchup for them with Andrew Booth Jr. out there. And we knew that eventually Delvin Tomlinson, who had just been fantastic being out,

would eventually hurt them. And that relying on two guys for pressure. So Z'Darrius Smith was a little banged up with his knee and couldn't get to the quarterback. And plus, they were running the ball. They were getting it out very quickly. And so they mitigated the impact of Daniil Hunter and Z'Darrius Smith. And Smith still had one pass rush where he almost

took Dak Prescott's head off but when you're relying on those two so much and you're not getting any interior pressure you're not blitzing a whole lot like that's kind of what happens I don't think you can be thrilled with the job that Ed Donatell has done because it's not reflected in the numbers I mean they've really relied so much on the other team throwing them the football, but on a play-to-play basis, they are not a very impressive defense. It might be something that they go back and look at, or it might be something that they say, we had a good scheme, we just needed more personnel or whatever.

I mean, I think that probably schematically um there's been some things throughout the year and it's hard because you watch the tape and you're like okay i get it though i get why you're playing this way because you don't want to get burned over the top because you are forcing teams to complete pass after pass and oh look they threw an interception right at the biggest time so maybe there's a correlation there. And when you look at Patrick Peterson, the way he's been playing, he's got numbers that are as good as someone like Sauce Gardner. So it's worked really well for that guy. And Harrison Smith's been making big plays.

So you look around and you're like, well, the Stars have played really well. So Ed Donatell is not holding them back. But yet why are they giving up so much yardage all the time? And I think it's part of the plan, but it can't be part of the plan to give up this much all the time and to have your superstar wide receivers just completely demolish you on a week-to-week basis. I mean, the only guy that didn't was Terry McLaurin, but we saw it from Tyreek Hill, Stefan Diggs, and then C.D. Lamb last week, and there's some other good receivers on the way.

So I guess that's to say that if you're grading the job by the defensive coordinator, you can't give super high marks, but I also don't think you can say they have to move on. They have to get rid of Donatello because some of the most important players have played really well so can you fill those spots but I mean that's a conversation for down the road I do think though it's a liability if you're not at full health their defense through the rest of the year because not everyone's going to throw you the ball Mac Jones might and uh Zach Wilson if he's still

starting might and Matt Ryan might so I guess I don't know Daniel Jones might maybe they can continue to do this for the rest of the year and just hope for takeaways because they're not playing another quarterback maybe the rest of the entire season that's as good as Dak Prescott assuming that we think that Aaron Rodgers is now finally washed but yeah I you know I think that they'll have some good moments down the stretch because of that because they don't play great quarterbacks and probably it seems like Donatello's kind of part of this group with O'Connell with Kweisi Adafo Mensah they had had a previous relationship so I guess to answer your question I would be surprised if they look at it and say yeah this is this is his fault and he's got to go on to the next question from at Kevin Delzelzel on twitter for games like the dallas game wouldn't

we wouldn't it be better off having cj ham on the field i would think that helps with run blocking and pass blocking when the pressure is non-stop seems like an opportunity for growth for koc or is our offensive line not built for power running? I think that they could power run. And I also think you can run zone stuff with a fullback. I just feel like Kevin O'Connell does not know how to use a fullback. That's my impression. He just doesn't really know where C.J. Hamm fits in all this. He talked in the offseason about wanting to use C.J. Hamm in this way or that way and everything else and talked about him as a valuable player for the offense to get the opposing team to put extra big personnel

on the field that is just really not happened and I was looking at C.J. Hamm's snap counts this year and he was used two plays in the game against Dallas. That is right, two plays. Seven plays the previous week. Six plays the previous week. He is barely a part of this team on that element. I mean, he's playing tons of special teams, but he is barely a part of the offense. Now, you go back last year, and you'll see this a lot different.

In fact, I'll call this up right now. From last year, he was playing routinely. Listen to these numbers. I mean, 32 plays, 21, 26, 22, 27. I mean, almost every single week, he was between 20 and 30 plays for the Vikings last year. And then he's playing two, he's playing six, he's playing seven. And they just really don't use him as part of the offense. And I am in agreement with you that when you have a situation like this, where you are getting absolutely dominated on the line, CJ Ham is a big body who can throw a block.

He can line up a tight end and offer some help with a defensive end. He can line up in the backfield and pick up blitzers. This guy can really do anything and there's a reason why gary kubiak kevin stefanski clint kubiak that they like to use him a lot because it does get the other team to think about it for a minute like do we put an extra linebacker out there do we put an extra defensive lineman out there so we don't get steamrolled by this big fullback in the backfield and then when you do run play actions and bootlegs and stuff you can have him block or you could just have him back there in an eye formation and run straight drop back that almost nobody does in the

NFL running straight drop back with a fullback in there but you know I thought that over the last few years it was one of the best things they did offensively was having these max protect packages in there with cj ham with a tight end and have those guys stay into block from time to time i know that kyle rudolph didn't like it but stay into block from time to time when they needed it and when they were getting beaten up front and have jefferson and theelin be the downfield guys on those plays but you know Cousins will have time to throw the ball and the other thing too is you know CJ Hamm every once in a while surprises you with a 20-yard catch or something out of the backfield I mean that was really a big thing I mean think about I think it was a handoff not a catch but you know Carolina

game last year how about 2019 against Kansas City late in the game I think it was a screen pass that they threw to CJ Hamm down the sideline he ends up with a huge gain and what I think became a go-ahead score late in that game ends up you know being really sparked by CJ Hamm is it something I want to be insanely critical about not using the fullback enough? Yes. Yes, it is for the brand of the show. Yes, it is. No, probably not. But at some point there has to be answers. It can't be just drop back seven steps and get sacked. I mean, without Christian Derrissaw, there has to be answers. And CJ Hamm is underutilized in this offense and i don't mean it's possible that they just really don't have in this offense that kind of package where you're running out a fullback and two tight ends and

one wide receiver or something like that i mean they want to run these receivers almost every single play i saw a stat that adam thieland's played like 98 of plays or something absolutely nuts for the number of plays that he's been out there this year. They don't take them off the field. I mean, they just run those three wide receivers most of the time. So that might need to change. Yes, I agree with you. There has to be answers, whether it's that or whether it was the John D. Filippo three wide receiver, quick screens and bubbles and stuff. It has to something uh because against dallas it was really nothing and i agreed with justin jefferson who said you know in his press conference like we

needed to adapt we needed to adjust and uh they didn't in the dallas game it was already out of hand by the time you'd be talking about adjusting but you have an opportunity to do that now uh all right next question comes from at mar delicious 23 says uh fans only question here uh what would you uh what would be considered an appropriate grace period for reserving judgment on quesia daflamance's draft class i realize that the draft is a crap shoot and the first round is probably a 50 50 shot at best at getting a good player, let alone an elite one, with Seen not even getting an opportunity to start after his injury, or you mean before his injury.

Booth looking completely lost, Ingram giving up sacks and pressures, like Dakota Dozier, Udo, and Samia before him. I'm extremely disappointed, and not one of the top three draft picks has made a positive impact. Yeah, I'm definitely not in the camp of deciding a draft class through the first year. However, it doesn't look good. It doesn't. I mean, I think that a guard especially could develop over a couple of years.

That's for sure. Cornerback, I think there's major, major concerns about Andrew Booth's health because I believe this is four injuries. It might be five. I mean, because it happened in training camp, then in preseason, then in the regular season, and now here again. So I guess that's four injuries in one season for a guy who said he had never been healthy before and he's not healthy now he had a knee injury pop up it's not even the same thing that he's had it feels like he can't go out on an nfl field without getting hurt and he couldn't really go out on a college field without getting hurt you look at his

college tape it's very impressive but if you can't go play at all and he was early in camp very impressive but if you can't go play at all without getting hurt you really can't play in the league and he's a slender guy he's had a lot of injuries throughout his career that one's to be majorly worried about and with lewis seen this injury that he had he's a young guy and so for his career um this is where i will say that i'm hopeful because you never want to see that from somebody that their career gets damaged from day one but there's no guarantee that he bounces back I wouldn't freak out about him not being able to pick up the offense right away I'm sorry the defense right away because Cam Bynum is really good at it Josh Metellus had a lot of experience so you could see why those guys would be quicker to pick something up but with with a first round pick, you really do expect them to start right away.

You really do. And historically, it's one of the easiest positions as far as an adjustment from college to the NFL. Guard is one of the hardest, but safety is one of the easiest. And then you have a linebacker as the other draft pick thrown in there, Brian Asamoah, who's a special teamer. He may be in line to play next year, but it's still kind of a linebacker that's not a high premium position um i think that this draft class at this moment it looks very rough yes it does it looks very

rough and i think that the way you judge a draft class is always what they were thinking at the time, what their process was at the time. Was it a smart way to go about it, or was it questionable at the time? This was questionable at the time. I mean, we were all here, and it just was. I mean, the Jamison Williams thing, trading down in your division, even Christian Watson all of a sudden looks like he's got something to his game and some explosiveness and they trade with the Packers as well like these are things that usually teams

don't do and when you do you put a target on your back where you better hit on it and right now none of these draft picks look like hits that can change and we have seen over the years players develop and oh wow all of a sudden this guy's really, he's really got it. And now he's a key player for the future, right? Like I couldn't have told you about Derisaw last year at this time. And now Derisaw is a superstar. way to put it and maybe maybe they overthought it a little when it came to all the trades and everything else because it's always been my thought that and it was at draft time so this is not like changing based on the results you get great players in the top 15 of the draft and this team needs great players they need more great players if they're going to win in the future and because some of their great players are older at the safety position there is one and so rebuilding the secondary was never crazy to me but trading down as far as they did without getting a first round pick that's where you go

oh i i don't know about that i don't know what draft chart says that was a great idea and so far it hasn't paid dividends but you said one thing that is key it is a crapshoot and no there's no better evidence than rick spielman rick spielman botching picks left and right and then hitting on jefferson and derisaw two dudes with all pro talent i mean is is he good at drafting is he bad at drafting i don't I mean, because some years their drafts were amazing, and some years their drafts yielded almost nothing. So, yeah, I mean, it's a difference, I think, between judging process, what they were thinking at the time,

were we questioning what they were thinking at the time, how did it turn out. But if this draft class produces nothing, that has a pretty serious impact on the future, and we saw that with the rick spielman classes that didn't yield any top players well it left a lot of holes for them to have to fill and that may end up being the case with this draft class okay this one comes from chad says for the last couple years you've been saying that if you want to win with kirk you have

to lean into the kirk so are the Vikings leaning into the Kirk? So let me clarify that. I haven't said that if you want to win, you have to lean into the Kirk. I've always wondered what it would look like if they did. And I thought that of all the potential outcomes, playing it as safe as possible would get you to only eight wins or nine wins, and that's it. And that would be the ceiling for playing it as cautious as you could with Cousins and limiting him to play actions and screens and having that be it and treating a $30 million quarterback like he was Kelly Holcomb. That does not scream championship to me. My idea was that if you lean into Cousins, push the ball down the field more often, throw more often, that you're going to run into some bad things.

But you hope that the upswing of those rollercoaster moments where the upside is higher if you're leaning into him. So when you think about like the Jameis Winston, but maybe less extreme because Kirk Cousins isn't like crazy and doesn't throw that many interceptions. But the pushing the ball down the field, throwing more often, I think that they are leaning into Kirk Cousins. When you look at how much they throw in neutral situations, they're toward the top of the league. They're not quite Joe Burrow or Patrick Mahomes,. They're toward the top of the league. They're not quite Joe Burrow or Patrick Mahomes, but they are toward the top of the league, and they have never been there with Kirk Cousins, with Mike Zimmer. So they are leaning into him. And the other part is when they're running people downfield,

now it got them sacked a lot in this last game, and this is the variance of leaning into Cousins. It does get you sacked sometimes. It does get interceptions on balls like the one in Washington that was tipped for a pick on a jump ball to Justin Jefferson. All of this is leaning into Cousins, though. And sometimes it's going to be frustrating to watch because he does have downturns in his game but I think that in a lot of instances this year throwing more often and leaning into him has been good and has gilded very good results but I also think what you're seeing is the weaknesses and the reasons why Mike Zimmer wouldn't want to do that the reasons why he would have wanted to run play action because the downfield passing has been majorly worse for Kirk Cousins this year, majorly. I mean, in previous years, he's one of the best downfield

passers in the league. That has not been the case. His percentage of throws downfield plus 20 yards has gone down by about 5%. He's barely throwing the ball ever 20 plus yards when he was you know really a prolific deep passer over the last few seasons and part of that is asking him to drop deep back in the pocket and let routes develop these are not just play actions and then you're looking for a deep crosser and trying to throw it to an open jefferson because half of the opposing defense thought it was a run play right and he can hit anybody downfield 30 40 yards open with his arm and his accuracy and all those things but he's not really willing to take the risks to fire it into traffic 25 yards down the field that's just not the quarterback you have so there have been times where i thought they're leaning into him a little bit too much and a little bit in thinking that he's going to be Matthew Stafford and make some of those throws.

And then there are other times where I've thought, yes, yes, make this throw, like make this throw to Justin Jefferson. That's the jump ball because he can make that catch. And, you know, leaning into him has resulted in being eight and two, which is pretty good, but it's also resulted in showing you what happens when you push up that number of attempts, the efficiency doesn't drop. Mahomes is still averaging 8.5 yards a pass when he's thrown the ball 400 times so far this year. But with the Cousins, it has dropped that way when they've been asking him to do those things. So there is probably limitations on it. But you know what I think too is that by the end of this year,

when all 17 games and whatever happens in the playoffs is completed, they will be able to say, this is exactly what Kirk looks like when you make him throw all the time. And the book is not written. The stats are not great right now, but the book is far from written. The win-loss is far from written, but they will have a big sample size in eight weeks, 10 weeks, however long they keep playing into the playoffs to be able to say, do we want to give him another contract extension? Is he actually perfect when you go lean into the Kirk or not perfect, but you know, good enough to win good enough to go deep in the playoffs. When you lean into him, like these are the questions that they're getting answered by

having him handle the full offense that does have a lot of these routes that go intermediate and then downfield. So, you know, I think that there's value in that way of leaning into Cousins. And I also think that if he does click in in the second half of the season to one of those high ends of the Kirk coaster, then you could very well be talking about you know getting hot down the stretch leading a team into the playoffs while he's firing on all cylinders and and putting up big quarterback ratings each week and getting some double digit wins for once like that's that could potentially be on the menu if they can block a little bit more and if he starts to get hot uh as as he has been known to do and then you're leaning into him

as opposed to trying to just isolate him and on the other side of that if he falls apart and they lose and they lose a bunch of games in the second half because he just can't handle the workload then you go into the draft and say you need a quarterback i mean i i think that there's that there's only positive things that come out of that. I mean, the negative thing would be you go eight and one and then, you know, have the season come apart because maybe you didn't put C.J. Ham on the field enough. So I guess there is that. But I still think that finding out also has value as much as, you know, the high end of it and the potential and if it blows up it blows up like what difference would that make from where you were in the past when you're just trying to protect him so that's the way i see the kind of lean into the kirk thing um maybe we can get one more here uh this from brian what in the world is going on with the screen passes i brace myself for disaster every time i know that it would be ideal to have that dimension,

but the way that they're forcing it, something is going badly and it's concerning. Oh yeah, it is. No, I completely agree. And if we're talking about the successes and failures of the offense so far, an offense that ranks in the middle of the league, as it so often does with the Vikings, the biggest failure I think is the short passing game in the screens they are one of the worst screen teams in the league it they need to figure something out there and I don't understand why Delvin Cook is not a part of the passing game really at all I mean you have slip screens you have these these you know big design screens where you can get offensive linemen

running out and they've got the guys to do that Ezra Cleveland Brian O'Neill Garrett Bradbury these are great athletes in space and to not be able to use them to get easy yards it's like sometimes Kevin O'Connell wants everything to be a great play design that has this amazing route combination where somebody breaks wide open and the timing is perfect and the ball is right on point and everything and sort of misses the forest through the trees a little that if you dial up a great screen and get 12 yards out of it, that's no different than throwing a 12 yard bullet to somebody that's a, that's higher difficulty, right? They have to figure out how to get easy yards for cousins i mean i keep

going back to stefanski but he was just brilliant at that where he just knew how to get easy yards and when you have a receiver that draws as much attention as justin jefferson it feels like you could get a lot of eyeballs on him and not on delvin cook on some screens to get him going because screens to tj hawkinson screens to johnny munt those arenvin Cook on some screens to get him going because screens to TJ Hawkinson, screens to Johnny Munt, those aren't going anywhere. Slipped screens to your tight end are not going anywhere. They're just not going to be able to do that. I mean, Hawkinson can run after catch,

but he's more of a bust that gets going and then catches the ball, breaks tackles and things like that. Not somebody who's going to go start to stop or stop to start and explode for 30 yards on a tight end screen. I think it's, it is very concerning, Brian, and it's something that needs to be fixed. And, you know, it might be one of those elements that Kevin O'Connell looks back at because it's so hard to do during the season, looks back at and just says, I miss that. Like, you know, I was focused so much on a lot of the McVay stuff that they used with Stafford that has these, you know, deeper route combinations that I miss the fact that you could just sometimes throw a screen pass.

Although, you know, McVay was really good with Todd Gurley with this actually incredible with Todd Gurley with this. So I'm not really sure why that hasn't been a big part of the offense, but Delvin cook is down to 6.6 yards per catch and his catch rate. Isn't even that good for a running back. Um, that really, really needs to change. So anyway, uh, appreciate all the questions I'm going to have. So we'll have our recap right after the game and we'll go live on YouTube which is really cool we're doing that now so if you wanted to go to YouTube and see you know let's kind of do it live of course I want you to listen to it here and download the show but if you wanted to peek in on that we're going to do that and uh we're also going to have a

little fun segment here coming up next about the World Cup so stick around for that that'll be fun but I'm going gonna get through all the rest of your fans only questions um for the weekend and we'll recap what happened on sunday and everything else probably in a hot route style it'll be pretty it'll be pretty fun it'll be a fun time and uh wish everybody a happy thanksgiving folks if you're looking for a way to celebrate minnesota's insane football season, go to SodaStick.com. See all the different designs from Kirko chains to the gritty to everything Skoll related.

SodaStick, S-O-T-A-S-T-I-C-K.com and use the code PurpleInsider for 15% off your purchase. Okay, before we wrap up the show, 15% off your purchase. Okay. Before we wrap up the show, there is a very important sporting event going on in the universe. And I wanted to understand it better. And I also wanted everybody else in our audience to understand it better. If you're not already a soccer fan,

I have made it my goal to pay attention to something else other than the NFL for even just a minute. And I want that to be the world cup. So a blue wire podcasters from always cheating Brandon Kelly and Josh Landon are here to help me understand who I should root for in the world cup. Hello, gentlemen. Are you prepared to help someone who knows absolutely nothing about soccer understand at least enough to cheer for one team? Absolutely. If we can convert just one fan, maybe it's you, maybe it's not you, and it's one of your listeners, to becoming a soccer fan, that might be one more listener for always cheating in the long run.

So that sounds like a pretty good deal, right, Josh? Yeah, it's an easy one to get into. I mean, for me personally, I grew up in the Midwest. I did not grow up with anyone who played soccer slash football, whatever, whatever we're calling it right now, you know, at all growing up. And then it was the, it was the 2010 world cup for me that I really got on board.

I just, I absolutely loved it. And that was a similar, a very similar time zone too. So I don't think it, you know, even though, you know, Qatar, these, these, these games are gonna be on kind of all over the place from like 6 a.m to 2 p.m uh that was the moment when i really got into it too and so i think uh if you're just kind of a general sports fan this is kind of the easiest it's like a drug it's on every day for a month it's you know it's great i don't know the game that well like i know the rules you kick it in the soccer net uh but i've never really decided to like plant my flag with the team. So that's why I want you guys to help.

Because if you have, if you have a little skin in the game, it's going to help you enjoy the experience. I've kind of been like, Oh, I'm walking through an airport and people are gathered around a TV or it's like you said, it's 11 o'clock in the morning and look,

this super intense soccer game is on my television. So how would how would one who covers the Minnesota Vikings approach picking a team to cheer for? Well, I've got one quick suggestion, which is pretty much down the middle. And then Josh has a more esoteric one that actually might strike a nerve with Minnesotans. But I think those who tune into NBC Saturday and Sunday mornings, you'll see the Premier League. It's always on NBC or the USA. And maybe you'll see an American player like Christian Pulisic, and he plays for Chelsea.

Well, why do I care as a casual American fan? He's playing in front of these crowds in West London. That's harder to relate to. Suddenly the U.S., including Christian Pulisic, are playing in a tournament representing the USA, representing America. The World Cup is your chance to actually back your boys. So it's just going to be exciting. And for those uninitiated, the U.S. actually

missed qualification for the last World Cup four years ago. So this one happening in Qatar is extra special because the U.S. is finally back in action. So just the sheer fact that we can cheer the Stars and Stripes is fun and novel. But, like to get to the core of what it is to be a Vikings fan, who's the other nation. Well, first of all, I mean, I'm a Lions fan. So like, I mean, compared to, you know, I mean, so for me, I would like, I would kill to be a Vikings fan. That sounds incredible to me. You actually win playoff games occasionally, you know,

even the heartbreak I would enjoy. We don't even get heartbreak as a Lions fan outside of going one and four every season. So I was thinking, though, about what the... I feel like the Vikings are probably the best team to have never won a Super Bowl, right? If you look at all the teams across the NFL, a lot of chances, a lot of great clubs, never quite been able to get across the line. And in the World Cup, there is a country that's sort of famously kind of like the Vikings

of international football, and that's the Netherlands. And the Netherlands are, you know, very kind of beloved country when it comes to football because they sort of invented this idea of the total football, the idea of sort of positionless play led by this guy named Johan Cruyff, who's one of the most famous and beloved players of all time, probably up there with Pele and there's a handful of others in terms of people who like really did change the game on a huge scale.

And so the Netherlands, they're kind of like a late blooming club internationally too. And they really in the lates, became really prominent. And then in 74 and 78, they made the World Cup finals both times. Both times they lost, first time to Germany, the second time to Argentina. The first year, they absolutely should have won. They scored a goal in the first minute of the game. And Johan Cruyff said it was too easy he like switched off after that uh and the germans

yeah they scored too early and uh the germans came back and won their won the world cup that year um and so and then they in 2010 um so after kind of like 30 years of being kind of just okay uh had some had some highs and lows uh they kind of reemerged and made the World Cup final. And so this year they got kind of a fun squad. It's just, you know, I'm with Brandon. I'm certainly rooting for the U.S. when it comes to the World Cup. It's kind of fun to have a second club as well. And, you know, it's also fun to root for a club that may actually make

the later rounds of the tournament. So the Netherlands will be my pick for Vikings fans. And do I have this right, Matthew? Aren't the Dutch, don't they have a huge population in Minnesota? That's what I was going to say, is that I bet there's a lot of Minnesota natives who are related to people who are playing in the game or something. There's a lot of reason.

There's probably a lot of connection in Minnesota to them, but also connection to teams that in any way sort of get close or have reason to think that they could be good and then let people down I mean you mentioned that Josh that you're a Lions fan that's is that not like the USA though I mean that's what I was gonna ask you about yeah I'd say the Lions Lions are like one, like a club that's like never like qualified for the world cup or something like we're like, uh, you know, Djibouti or one of these, like, we're like a small, you know, American Samoa. Yeah. We're like American Samoa. Yeah. Uh, you know, I mean, I think that, I mean, we're okay. I mean, it's kind of interesting. Like, even, we actually, our World Cup history is about as good as a country like Mexico,

even though Mexico kind of player to player is superior to us. But they've actually never made it farther than the quarterfinals of the World Cup either. We've done that once ourselves. So, you know, we did have one time it was in South Korea, and it was at like 3 o'clock in the morning. Somebody saw it. But we did actually make the quarterfinals of the world cup once so um i don't even know if that's realistically on the table for us this year i think if we could make it to the round of 16 i think that'd be probably a win for us yeah it's it's it's a good tournament to become attuned to

the u.s squad because we're uh one of the youngest squads in the world Cup, the U.S. So if you tune in, you like them, now you can follow the next four-year progression of this team and these players as they get experience. And that means we'll definitely win the next World Cup, right, Josh? That's right, of course. Yeah, absolutely. It sounds like the one time they got to the quarterfinals, that's like the 91 Lions actually getting to the divisional round. And they have not done that since somehow. What is, what's the, what's the heartbreak nation?

Because I think that when we talk about connections to teams, I mean, there's no heartbreak team in the NFL, like the Minnesota Vikings. They've had, you know, I don't need, I don't need to name them for the listeners. They know every single thing that's happened to them. Is there a nation like that who's gone into this tournament and had everything go wrong that is a good team that has a chance but just seems to find a way to let their fans down every time? I think England is probably a team like that.

Exactly. They won the World Cup in 1966 1966 and they are known as the nation who invented this sport so it's like you invented the game and brought it to the world and then all the other countries said great we'll become way better at you than than this and anytime england goes far they they just find every different kind of way to blow it either the squad implodes emotionally uh somebody misses a penalty kick or they just they just lose uh and england went to the semi-finals in the last world cup losing to croatia and then they made it to the final of the euros which is like the world cup for just european nations most recently and

lost again so this is the last gasp for this cycle of england like they're probably gonna have to fire their coach after this world cup if they don't win got a lot of players who are just kind of at the end of their rope so england definitely the heartbreakers 100 yeah and and they're they're kind of a fun team to root for too. And they have a, I wouldn't, I wonder if there's a Kirk Cousins equivalent for England. I mean, Harry Kane is probably a little too good to, you know, I think he's a level above as a, as a like for like comparison, but I mean, Kane would be more like the Justin Jefferson.

Like he's just sort of, he can do everything. You know, for Kane, he's, he's classified as a forward, but for people who don't watch a lot of Premier League, Harry Kane is sort of considered a very complete football in the European sense player. He'll come back, he'll win the ball,

he'll pass it out wide, bring it back in, scoring. He's a really easy player to root for. I actually kind of like this England squad. I'm totally with Brandon. They are the heartbreak club. bring it back in scoring because he's a really easy player to root for and so i think um i i actually kind of like this england squad i'm totally with brandon they are the heartbreak club they're sort of and it's in their head now like you can see i don't know if you how this how you feel as a vikings fan too but they know that they've choked so many times that it's like you can see it and then the european final that brandon was talking about they dominated that game couldn't

could not win it went to it went to penalty kicks at the end and they lost, they missed three consecutive penalties at the end penalty kicks. So it's the most heartbreaking way you could possibly lose. And so, yeah, I mean, so, you know, follow them at your own peril, I guess would be, what I would say. I do know enough to know that three straight penalty kicks missing is astonishing. Like maybe you and I could get one out of three in there. That's remarkable.

But, you know, what you're talking about with the Vikings, the real thing, I mean, that it gets inside of a team's head, even with the kickers for the Minnesota Vikings. Like they sort of take on all the past, and every kicker will be like, no, I wasn't even here for that but like they know there's something to it that is psychological with those teams and i think uh whether it's like the los angeles chargers or the buffalo bills i think that vikings fans are kind of like we see you we know what you do uh now i have to ask this though who's who's the big bad

wolf who is the packers of this the team that is just you know really good and charmed and everybody thinks they're gonna win like who's who's kind of the favorite that vikings fans would naturally want to root against oh probably brazil i mean there are a few favorites right now it's brazil and argentina kind of neck and neck followed by the defending world cup champions france but brazil is that storied nation where they're the favorite sort of every world cup just based on past performance and they always have like the sexiest players the players that are silky smooth and yeah namar is is one that everyone has certainly heard of um they just have this

flair way of playing and i mean i i've never been one to root for the favorites but i'm kind of pulling for brazil here um because i do think they're probably going to be the most fun engaging team in the tournament i mean i as far as pulling for you know this isn't necessarily helps with the packer comparison but argentina the other club is pretty easy to root for too you know leon de messi has never won uh world cup they finally won a european cup last year and they have a goalkeeper that is like clinically insane and emmy martinez just really like psychotic and super easy our goalkeepers like uh kickers in the nfl josh like don't need to be in that job to be a kicker yeah that's that's a good yeah i think you're right it's like it's kind of like a kicker but they have the intensity of like a safety you know it's like the kind of

psychotic like throw your body at everything sort of you know so anyway yeah he's like he's like bob sanders that that's like to go back to a little comparison uh so yeah those are the two clubs i think are really at the top yeah well i think, I think you just, uh, proved your NFL prowess there by name dropping Bob Sanders on the show. I always loved that guy. I don't know why. I mean, it was for a little while there. He was one of the great players, but that one's a little deep in the woods, uh, for

the general NFL fan. So let me, let me ask you real quick. Uh, who do you guys root for NFL wise? You said the lions um how close how close are you watching like do you have a super bowl pick before we uh get maybe your picks for the world cup well yeah i'm a lions fan i mean i watch i i watch red zone i'm not i'm not paying for i live in new york i'm not paying for the full i don't need to see every lion's loss that that's that's a little too much but uh I still am rooting for Dan Campbell.

I watch hard knocks like everybody else, and I found him very lovable. I'm not sure if he's a good coach or not. I honestly have no idea. But people seem to play hard for him, so I'll take that. I mean, Super Bowl-wise, I've got a pretty significant bet on the Buffalo Bills to win the Super Bowl. So I guess I'm going to be biased and say that I'm pulling for them. I mean, honestly, I don't even know.

Speaking of show card, it's right there. Well, after the last couple of weeks, I don't really know. You know, interesting, they're actually playing at Ford Field now on Sunday. So I'm kind of, someone was joking on Twitter that they may now win as many games at Ford Field this year as the Lions because they play there on Sunday. Then they play the lions again for the Thanksgiving game. So it's kind of a,

it's like their new home. It's kind of, kind of unusual. Yeah. I grew up in mid Michigan too. And I was meant to be a lions fan, but Chicago teams just got really good. Right.

When my like sports third, I started opening up. So I was a huge Jordan fan followed the bulls. And I, you know, the, the Jim McMahon, Refrigerator Perry, Bears, that was my team. I totally had the Refrigerator Perry, G.I. Joe action figure in my collection. But yeah, I've moved on to other things. Josh keeps

trying to pull me into the NFL fantasy world, which I'll probably succumb to at some point and then become a diehard like the rest of you. Yeah, there are a lot of people who I don't even think root for teams at this point, except for their own team on a week-to-week basis. So you guys have talked me into Netherlands. That will now be my team. I'll get a shirt or something. We'll see how it goes. And I know you laid out the favorites but who are your picks to win it all i mean i'm just i'm going chalk on this one i'm gonna go

brazil i and if not brazil i think the the messy narrative will win all and i'm kind of like i don't know if anyone follows uh ronal. He's got more social media followers than anybody, but his whole career is now imploding, and he's making enemies with everybody. And the competition was always who's better, Ronaldo or Messi? And if Messi goes on now and wins the World Cup, Ronaldo will basically descend into the neither regions and we'll never hear

from him again which would be hilarious i hope so yeah where i think i'm i love him but yeah yeah i'm ready to be done with the ronaldo experience um yeah i mean i think uh outside of the fair this is actually a great year i think for a non-favorite team and you know i don't know that brazil or there is not a dominant favorite this year the way there have been in previous world cups uh the last germany eight years ago, France four years ago. I guess maybe Germany and Brazil were kind of tied because the World Cup was in Brazil eight years ago. Then Germany destroyed them in the semifinals kind of famously. But I actually think France has a great shot.

They also have the best kits. So if you're looking for uniforms, kits are what they call them in Europe. They're beautiful, these beautiful blue kits. But they have arguably the best forward line and great defense as well. And so they're just sort of really well put together. And they won the World Cup. They actually have won something significant, which you really can't say for that Brazil team, unfortunately.

So even though they're the most talented, they haven't actually done anything yet. Well, I am very excited to watch the World Cup. And people know who listen to the show that I have very few interests outside of football and very little life outside of it. But I'm carving space because I just love this tournament. There's no more dramatic tournament on Earth than this.

So I'm very interested to see how it plays out. And people can find all the information they need on your guys' podcast. Always Cheating is the pod. But also, you guys are going to be doing daily updates on the World Cup as well. So why don't you tell people where they can find you? Yeah, Josh, give us the pitch. Okay, I will. I was like giving it to you there, Brennan.

But yeah, it's a podcast called the World Cup Minute. We're launching it on Sunday. Sunday is when the World Cup kicks off with just one match on Sunday. Qatar, the host country, host Ecuador. So they can actually win that match, interestingly. And so it's kind of a fun way to kick things off. That's 11 a.m. Eastern time. I guess it'll be 10, probably 10 a.m.

for most of your audience on Sunday. And so, you know, you'd be fully done with that game before all the Sunday games really kick off. But yeah, it's a 15-minute podcast. We're going to talk about, we're going to record in the afternoons and evenings. So we'll talk about the matches that took place that day and then preview what happens tomorrow.

So just very simple if you want something like while you're eating breakfast in the morning like yeah what games are actually on today that's sort of what we're going to hope to do with this podcast that is awesome love it well you guys were great guests and uh guided me through the process of picking a team really appreciate again always cheating podcast brandon kelly josh landon you guys are the best really appreciate you joining the show and enjoy the tournament. It sounds like it's going to be a lot of work for you guys, but you're going to have a lot of fun. We do what we love, right, Matthew? This is great.

Thanks for having us on.