Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - The NFL screwed the Vikings in Denver and Brian Murphy is still buying Josh Dobbs

Episode Date: November 20, 2023

Matthew Coller is joined by Brian Murphy to talk about the NFL looking into Kareem Jackson's hit against Josh Dobbs and a report that the league was not allowed to intervene because a flag was not thrown. Plus, why Brian Murphy isn't giving up on this year's Vikings despite one loss. Murph thinks they are only scratching the Dobbs surface Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of Purple Insider. Matthew Collar here. And if it looks to you on YouTube like I'm wearing the same clothes as I was at Mile High Stadium last night, the answer is I am because I left at 6 a.m. And we are recording this around 10 a.m. As I have arrived back in Minneapolis with, I would say, one hour of sleep. But I had a lot of time to think about what happened. So I get home and then I read something that maybe it's the lack of sleep, or maybe it's just the national football league that has me a little ornery this morning. So Brian Murphy, Monday morning, Murph, I want you to react as I'm going to read you a tweet from our friend,

Tom Pellicero. He tweeted this. The NFL is revealing Bronco safety Kareem Jackson's hit on Vikings quarterback Josh Dobbs on Sunday night for potential discipline. Jackson has returned from a two-game suspension, so a violation could trigger another suspension. Then he quote tweets it and says, worth noting, this is the type of hit we've seen New York, the command center, eject players for this season. But with no flag thrown on the field, New York isn't allowed to intervene. So Kareem Jackson illegally hits Josh Dobbs on national television. Everyone sees it, including this command center. But because the referees could

not spot this, which none of us really saw until we got 14 angles of it, they couldn't do anything about it. And they just had to say, sorry, Vikings, not only is your quarterback in, you know, hurt and going into the injury tent, but also the Broncos have the ball when they shouldn't. We can't do anything about it. Sorry. Too bad. Three points. Broncos.

Is that not the most national football league thing in the rules you've ever seen? If only there were anything we could do about it, but you guys saw it. Yeah. You know the rules, right? Yeah.

You could contact the refs and tell them what happened, right? Yeah. But we can't. Cause they didn't throw a flag. What? Hi, Murph. Yeah. I mean, that's the NFL for you. Overly litigious, heavily Latin, need a lawyer to interpret any. I mean, I don't even know what constitutes a catch anymore. I mean, there's so much language involved in that. You know, retroactively, if this guy gets suspended or fined, I mean, you know, that's all fine and dandy. But, you know, the moment that that play happened, the impact that it could have had immediately on that game is all lost. It's lost in the retroactive punishment.

I guess if you're upset, you know, that obviously the whole world saw what we're talking about, you ended up with Dobbs in the concussion protocol on the first series of the game. And then nothing gets done. There's no flag. I don't know how you wiggle out of that. I mean, if there's no flag on the play, New York can't review it, right? But there are certain things that New York can review, of course. Inside two minutes, scoring plays.

They are empowered to intervene in certain circumstances, just not in this one. So what you have is, again, we have 50 cameras, all slow mode, especially for the NBC Sunday night game. They can show us to a fraction of an inch, to a blade of grass, whether or not anybody was down by contact, whether a ball was out of bounds, a foot was out of bounds, a ball nose touched the grass before the receiver made the football move to constitute possession and blah, blah, blah. But they boxed themselves in with so many subsets and sub rules and bullet points. And if there's no flag, there's nothing to review. If it wasn't within the last two minutes, New York can do nothing. They can retroactively punish a player who seems to be a

bit of a headhunter, but that's not going to impact the game. So, you know, it is typical NFL because it's Monday morning and we're going to Monday morning chew on this because but for this, but for that, the Vikings would be seven and four and there's plenty of but fours we're going to Monday morning chew on this because, but for this, but for that, the Vikings would be seven and four and there's plenty of, but fours we can get to. And we will. And look, it's not the reason they lost. They were up 17, right. They were up 17 to nine and they had the football at the opposing team's 34

yard line and did not win. However, you know, at last night, I thought it was really borderline. I was thinking like, well, the rules change. There was some debate over this. The rules change when he's a runner and not just a quarterback standing in the pocket. But then when you get the replay from the other view that enough people screen captured and tweeted out, you see him very blatantly lowering the crown of the helmet, slamming right into somebody in a college football game. He would have been arrested. I mean, you see people thrown out of college football games for way less than this.

This is somebody who the referees should have had their eyes on anyway, but I totally get it why they would see it from one angle where they might be standing. It looks like to his chest and he just gets popped and the ball comes out. Right. That's what I initially thought when I saw it live, there's only one command center that could tell them that that's not what happened. And it,

and it seems to me that when you have one game going on and the whole universe is watching that this would be so easy. And yet, as you said, just like the National Football League, they litigated in, you can only help so much if they throw a flag. Now, I don't need the New York Command Center telling me, like you said, hey, that was pass interference, or that was holding, or were I in the sky watching everything. Games would take 77 hours. But how many plays like that

are happening in a game? One zero. It's not many. These guys have adapted to the rules and this particular player as well should have been on their radar. But when a play like that happens, it doesn't seem that hard to be able to take care of this. And look, I have never been the, your team gets screwed by the rafts and, you know, that sort of thing. And, and then there's lots of things that they could have done otherwise,

like maybe not run that play. Cause why? But when that happens, I mean, it's just like NFL helped me out here. So I don't know. I don't know where else you want to start. I just saw that tweet and my brain exploded because I can't believe that you're allowed

to have a command center that can watch things and fix calls quickly, but can't help you when someone so obviously lowers the crown of their helmet and assaults another player. Well, and if Josh Dobbs had been lost for the game with a concussion at that point, the country would be exploding right now about that. Certainly this market would be as well. As you said, these games would be eight hours long if they reviewed everything. And that's the modern era that we live in with X amount of cameras, all high def, all super slow-mo, in the pylons, on the referee's hats, above the play, behind the play, reverse angle. You're going to find

a multitude of felonies and sins committed on every snap. Not all headhunting shots, but as you said, I didn't notice anything in real time. The referees throw flags in real time. There was no flag. The rule is you can't review, especially if he's turned himself into a runner and it's not within the last two minutes. And I don't even know what every rule is on what can be reviewed anymore. They change constantly because the technology changes, the scrutiny changes. We're in a situation where every play could beget any number of problems. The player's history here and the fact that it was your quarterback and the fact that it was that point in the game, the fact that he went into a concussion protocol could have blown up the game at that point. It didn't. It's a good talking point now.

I don't even know how you the only way you do that is you say New York can take over everything. And if New York takes over everything, then it's AI. And then the next thing you know, they're not even players on the field. So just just so that, you know, I feel like that there's got to be some level of authority left into the officials hands. And there's got to be some limitation into what you can and review. And I'm sure they go through this every every year. As blatant as this looked, as much of a repeat offender as the safety. I mean, I just wonder at a certain point, you got to let things happen on the field.

I totally understand that. And I totally understand the slippery slope element. But we already have the command center allowed to look at this play, but only if the flag is thrown. And it's a rare play where someone commits a personal foul that could be potentially an ejectable type of situation. And when it's happening that fast, that's why they have it in there is because it's really hard to tell the difference between did he hit him in the middle of the chest or did he hit him in the bottom of the helmet? Unless you're standing right there, it seems like they have already put this in to some success i would guess is being able to get a second look at these but then when everyone in the entire universe sees it happen but it can't be called on the field by people whose job it is to correct it already i just like can't understand so i don't want to spend the whole show on this

because there's implications to what happened in the actual game and analysis to get into but i would say this one get some sleep and write your congressman and it'll all be better okay well i'm not again not saying that they lost for this reason but that that is a ridiculous operation and that should be changed they should be able to, if it's going to be one of those lower the crown of the helmet, if it's going to be this type of thing, they should be able to spot it if they're watching it on many instant replay

cameras, because the referees are simply not capable of being able to see this in real time. All right. What was your reaction to the game? I think it was a game that they cut. They should have had, and I think it's going to look like a missed opportunity. But I think what we need to keep in mind here is that, you know, here's the thing with the Dobbs experiment. This is not going to be a cakewalk. This is not going to be a miracle 15-win run that's going to take them to Vegas in February. This is going to be a work in progress.

And what you had here was an opportunity to beat an ascending team now. By the way, the Broncos aren't as bad as they were three weeks ago. When we were eyeballing the schedule, Denver looked like it was going to be a walkover. But obviously, Russell Wilson and Sean Payton have gotten their act together. They've won four in a row. They're back in the playoff picture. And look, Denver's a tough atmosphere to succeed in. And Russell Wilson has the Vikings number. We've seen that in years past when he was dicing them up in Seattle, always kind of slow playing, always getting them to a point where one drive, one scramble, one play, one throw it in the back of an end zone.

And what do you know? Russell Wilson's pulling a rabbit out of the hat. So, you know, it's disappointing because it's an opportunity loss. Disappointing because, again, they lost the turnover battle 3-0, which we haven't seen for several weeks. The timely turnovers were bad. They didn't create one of their own. They had a chance with one more defensive stop to hang on to a victory.

I mean, they held the Broncos to, you know, five field goals up until that point. But this is not going to be easy. This is not going to be a run to the end of the season. They are going to have to scratch and claw to nine, maybe ten wins. Now they got, you know. Now they're on notice. You've got a really bad Chicago team coming into town that looks ripe for the picking, more so than Denver did even three weeks ago. I would be disappointed, but there are some things, again, I still like the way the defense is playing. I mean, obviously you didn't have Jordan Hicks in there. That's a major

component missing for the first time that they went a whole game without him. Calling the defensive signals you had, you know, they still limited him. They still outgained Denver by over 100 yards. They finally got the running game together for 175, I believe it was. Alexander Madison, Ty Chandler. I mean, these guys were making plays and getting five yards a carry. It felt like that looked refreshing, of course, until Madison puts one on the ground. So a lot of things here to be disappointed in, but more, I think, to be circumspect about.

This is not going to be an easy task. They are not an elite NFC playoff team. They are going to be a grind it out, get in, see what happens. But if anything, they are entertaining. They are much more entertaining. And the intrigue about Dobbs is only going to build and it's going to morph into different things. You're going to see him make mistakes.

You're going to see what he's not capable of. You're going to see what he is capable of. You're going to be reminded, oh, yeah, that's why he's on seven teams, including four in the last calendar year. So as much as everybody wants to don him with a cape and, you know, hand him his weapons and say, go save the world. It's not going to be that simple. And this was a reminder of that. Certainly did look like that was going to be the case when it was 17 to nine and they had completed a 29 yard pass to Josh Oliver. He had converted a pass to Brandon Powell for a first down and then it all comes apart. This is something I was thinking about just on the flight back a little bit.

Murph, does it ever bother you how random football is? Because this is a game you mentioned that they gained 395 yards and this was no nonsense stats put up the game was close the whole way and they outplayed them by a hundred yards and they converted more times in the red zone with two great touchdowns by josh dobbs only one time did the broncos get themselves in the end zone. They played better on offense. They played better on defense. And they also converted their field goals. They had the special teams play. So you could argue all three phases were better for one football team.

And yet the bounce of a ball, the tip of an arm, and also the bounce of a ball rolling out of bounds on a fumble by the Broncos and a number of different throws by Russell Wilson that could have bounced and tipped and been intercepted. It is the most maddening thing about this sport, because if you take that away, then we'd be talking about what a good game they played going on the road against an opponent. And as you said, who's played much better. And yet if you, uh, you know, take away that Scott Norwood kick wide to the right in the super bowl, then, Hey, what a season it was for that team. Like that's the sport that we pour so much into. And you could, I think you

could really feel it from Kevin O'Connell last night at the podium where he wanted to say, we played really well guys, but you can't say that because you lost so this wasn't a game you came away with ripping everybody for what they did but instead have to point to i in the sky couldn't call a penalty that would have negated one of your turnovers and the other two were just weird things that happened to you and that that makes this game hard to analyze sometimes but that's why we tune in it's certainly certainly why I tune in. I mean, we want every game to go down to its final possession. I mean, the league gets aroused every time it can send out a press release saying six

games went down to the final possession and nine games went down to the final five minutes for the first time since the merger. And, you know, all of these entertainment values and components, you know, the, so well coached so evenly matched on so many days and as you mentioned the oblong football the bounce of a ball the the turnover that bounces out of bounds the the punt that lands inside the five and goes into the end zone or drops dead right there the um turn of a you know i would would, here's what I'll do. You know, you were talking about the head hunting call on Dobbs that wasn't made. The flip side to that is, what are you doing running that kind of trick play

on your first series deep in Denver territory? I mean, that was way too cute, way too soon. You almost got your quarterback decapitated. You know, Kevin O'Connell, I know you're trying to make things happen. And then on the flip side of that, you say, man, what stones he had to fake that punt and extend that drive and keep that alive and get some more points on the board. This is why we tune in. The randomness, I mean, it defined the Vikings season last year where every break in the book went their way. Many of them earned many of

them fortuitous some were biblical that will never happen again you know you're a stats guy i don't want to say they're regressing to the mean as far as their performance but maybe regressing to the mean as far as all good things are not going to break their way anymore and then you have to earn your breaks as well i mean that's everybody talks about puck luck in hockey. You know, you've covered enough hockey to know. It's a puck flying 100 miles an hour on an enclosed area on ice. Random things are going to happen. You can't predict it all.

But if you do enough of the little things, some of the good bounces are going to end up going your way because you're in the right place at the right time. But the Vikings, they have to play mistake-free football. And this is the penalty you're paying for starting 0-3 and 1-4. You don't get to have games where the breaks just don't go your way and but for a call or but for this turnover or but for this particular receiver not, you know, K.J. Osborne not getting offensive pass interference, Garrett Bradbury not getting nailed for a hole at a critical time. All of these things, you know, you don't have that

margin of error anymore because you dug the hole and you have to own that hole. And I think the Vikings are, you know, I think, you know, just breezing through the comments yesterday, I think they were disappointed. I think they felt like they left something on the table. But as you said, you could sense that they knew they played well. They knew they played well enough to win in a tough environment. And if they play like that next week against Chicago at home, I think you could pretty much put that W in ink. You get a bye. Maybe you hold on to Jefferson a little bit longer. You come out of that bye. You've got two challenging road games against the Raiders, or I don't know what kind of team they are now with their quarterback situation,

and suddenly Cincinnati doesn't look as daunting without Joe Burrows. There's still a pathway for 10 wins. There's a pathway to nine, and then get in. So I feel like they're figuring out who they are, what they can do to be successful. There's not going to be a lot of changing in that. They can maybe, you know, they can get aggressive. They can fake a punt. They can do things here and there to put themselves in positions to come away with wins.

But they're going to have to protect the ball. And they're going to have to basically come up with key plays defensively at the end of games. And that's putting a lot on that unit. But Brian Flores has really kind of reshaped this unit into his identity. He even had Wilson guessing a lot with those looks last night. And I feel like, you know, if anything, Dobbs is going to be who he is with, you know, a little bit of wiggle room on glory and wondrous moments and, you know, head shaking. Is he going to get himself killed? What's he doing back there?

All of that is going to be contained on offense where they're going to be successful, I think, and make any kind of statement anywhere is going to be defensively. They're getting better. They're not getting healthier, but they seem to be, they found their identity. They found ways to, to befuddle. And I think this is going to be as much Brian Flores, his team going forward as it is Kevin O'Connell and what he, how he can shepherd Dobbs to the finish line here. Folks. I hope you've enjoyed listening to us talk about prize picks this year, but if you've it here's how it works you go to prizepicks.com and it is simple you pick either more or less between two and six player stat projections and that's it now you're playing so if it's x number of yards for a quarterback you just decide are they going to throw for more or less than that number of yards but it works

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prizepicks.com slash purple the code purple daily fantasy sports made easy what you're talking about here of analyzing the game through the bigger picture of how did you actually play on a play to play basis and not the random things that can go your way or not go your way, which includes penalties and includes turnovers. And there's other things that can happen. But that's why we kind of look at metrics. That's what the DVO a metric that people talk about is the adjusted yards and, you know, where you actually performing better. And if you're actually performing better over a long period of time, the idea is that you'll win. Of course, there isn't a long period of time, like in a hockey season where the randomness

does even itself out. And if you command the puck more often, if you get more scoring chances over 82 games, then it's going to work out for you. People love Babip in baseball, or at least they used to, because it was like, well, you know, if you're hitting the ball on the ground, sometimes they field it and sometimes they don't. You don't have a lot of control over that. And sometimes it's lucky, right, or unlucky. And you can get hot or cold based on that. It is remarkable, though, Murph, how much the

pendulum has swung with the Vikings. They start off the season with historic fumble rates, and then it goes back the other way. And in Carolina, they take one back for a touchdown. And in Chicago, they take one back for a touchdown. Even last week, the New Orleans Saints are making some plays. And then winston throws you a couple of interceptions that are completely senseless and and that we usually don't talk about those breaks for the team that wins as oh yeah well that really worked out for you we only talk about it when they lose and we say well they kind of got the bad breaks i tend to agree with you though that the analysis of this game should not be that everybody did everything wrong.

It should be that they really missed an opportunity because of some huge mistakes at the worst times they gave up the game. That said, how would you look at this game through the lens of Kevin O'Connell? He has gotten so much praise this year, deserved, from going from 0-3 to where they are now. As you said, still in the driver's seat very much for a playoff spot. But last night, there are a number of things where we could kind of go, I don't know about that, man. The first drive and the pitch to Dobbs, yeah, okay. I think everyone's on the same page about that one.

Let's not tell the whole defense to run at the quarterback at the same time on a play. Cause you might get them hurt or he might fumble. That's not one that I would try again, but there's a lot of other things. I think that fans are wondering about when it comes to third down calls that didn't go their way. And maybe some of the overall approach. Didn't see as many play actions from them last night. It seems to be an ever-evolving thing with O'Connell and how we feel like he manages the game and calls the plays. Where did you stand on that last night?

You know, not being such an X's and O's guy or even somebody who's out there every day, I just feel like he's working with kind of like a big ball of clay right now with Dobbs. And I think he's trying to figure out at certain points in a game, you know, when can we turn him loose? When is he going to freelance? When can we put him in positions to make, you know, when can we turn him loose? When is he going to freelance? When can we put him in positions to make, you know, the responsible play? When can we protect him? How does that look? Can we roll him out? Are we going to let him, you know, ad lib as much as he wants? Can we rely on that going forward? I really thought he was dedicated. You know, he's been talking about this for weeks, about getting the running game going. And it didn't hurt, it didn't help to lose cam acres a couple weeks ago either but i think that you know with madison's fumbling

issues earlier in the season there might have been a reluctance uh to really stress that and if it if if it didn't hit early on they tend to do abandon that even with cousins well i think now that's that's an escape valve and and look the broncos were the worst run defense in the league, so it's no secret why they went at it. And when you're getting five yards a carry, it felt like there were drives that were even drives that didn't successfully come up with points, still picked up first downs, still ate a considerable amount of clock, still protected Dobbs. And that's what this is going to be about going forward.

How much more are you going to load up with Dobbs? Week by week, game plan by game plan, how much is he absorbing? How much is he getting overwhelmed? What is he going to be able to, you know, they went to Hawkinson a couple of times, but it seemed like Denver was all over Hawkinson. So that was a valve that was no longer there. The running game did help Dobbs, but you can still tell, I mean, even to the untrained eye, he's got happy feet back there. This is a guy that is still in a lot of ways lost and, and for obvious reasons. So I'm going to, you know, I want to see how much he's going to keep leaning on the running game. I want to see how much, you know, against a Bears team that is really, you know, I know Fields played a little bit better against Detroit and they kind

of made it competitive in Detroit and made Goff a little uncomfortable at times. But this is obviously a game that they have to have. I want to see how much is he going to feel comfortable turning Dobbs loose a little bit, both with his legs, maybe a bit more downfield. Is Jefferson going to be back how are they going to manage jefferson's return that changes the offense clearly uh when you have that weapon available i i i look at o'connell like you know he wanted to be aggressive and and and maybe make something happen early on in that series with the pitch that obviously could have ended a lot worse than it did. And it gives you an opportunity to second guess.

I sort of like the mindset, though, that we're going to have to do some off script things here to both keep drives going, but keep defenses honest, because we're not just going to be able to win with Josh Dobbs' arm and legs all at once. We're going to have to mis once. We're going to have to misdirect. We're going to have to keep units guessing. I like that in a way. Again, every week, it's sort of a new experiment for him. How much can Dobbs absorb, not only in the Vikings' grand scheme of things, but is what they're going to be trying to do for that opponent. So I'm all for anything that keeps Dobbs upright and feeling comfortable. And however that looks, if it's trick plays,

if it's leaning on the running game, if it's trying to get, you know, Oliver in because Hawkinson's been taken away, if Jefferson suddenly is back in the lineup, you know, what are we going to see from Dobbs arm? I mean, can we see some real downfield passing or are they going to keep it conservative? That's what I'm watching for is how he manages Dobbs week to week, how he manages the opponent week to week and how aggressive he wants to get and when he wants to get to get aggressive. That's what's intriguing to me. It was very clear to me that the Broncos were not in the business of letting them go downfield. That was the thing that they did not want to do. They were willing to let them run the ball

successfully. They were not going to load up the box. They were going to put a couple of safeties deep. And as you said, they were going to try really hard to take away Jordan Addison and to take away TJ Hawkinson. And this was, and of course it's a winning streak before. So, but this was the first time where you went, Oh yeah, this is different with Justin Jefferson. And that's how it always works in the NFL. There are certain things you can survive for a couple of weeks. And I remember Rick Spielman one time taking us through, this is even part of the evaluation with players where it's, can this guy start every single week or could we just survive with them for three or four weeks? This is any position,

even a cornerback or something, or if we have to play this guy, are we screwed? That's the levels of players. It's kind of the level of missing a player too, is can you survive if you have a weaker part of your schedule without Justin Jefferson? Sure. But can you win all the biggest games without him? Can you have a night where things go wrong and you need somebody to make an unbelievable play and bail you out? not always right probably not and as they get him back and integrate him in this would be the reason not to overreact to this loss as far as but i kind of think of like what is an overreaction to the loss that's another question there you go what's an what would be an overreaction because i think if you're saying oh actually they played great and we should just pat them on the back well i'm not gonna go there because they scored 20 points. I mean, and they gave up, you know,

a bunch of opportunities for the Broncos to put up more than they did. So if you only score 20 points and I can't really give you a whole lot of gold stars for that and say, you played a wonderful, incredible game and just got screwed. But what is it an overreaction to say I've got criticisms for that particular game, but my opinion has not really changed since before that. In fact, I kind of thought they might lose like this. I mean, I don't know. You tell me what's an overreaction. Well, an overreaction would be they lost to a Denver team that they should have defeated. And that that could have been a reaction we had three weeks ago. But as we said at the top, I mean, this is not the same Denver team.

You know, this is Russell Wilson finding his way and finding his rhythm with Sean Payton. This is a more difficult team. I would say an overreaction would be never hand off the ball to Alexander Madison. Again, clearly he can't solve his fumble issues. He's a disaster. That would be an overreaction as well.

I don't think, you know, I don't think this game is really warranted for overreactions because I think, yeah, you could say, well, if they score 20 points, they're never going to beat anybody. Well, on any particular week, they might be able to. It doesn't give you a lot of confidence, though, playing meaningful games against Detroit at the end of the season or even a meaningful playoff game in January. They're not going to win scoring 20 points. We get that. But as where they're at with Dobbs, where they're at as a team since losing Cousins and Jefferson, where they're at as an overall operation and mindset and identity since they were 0-3, since they were 1-4, this is a completely different team. This is almost like a team that's still finding itself.

I think it's discovered who it is defensively under Flores, and that seems to be working well. But they're still without Jordan Hicks for at least the next three games. And that was a serious injury he suffered. The guy underwent surgery for a major injury that you normally get in car wrecks. So it's not like you can just brush that off as, oh, he'll be back and he'll be back to normal. Maybe, maybe not. You had to go get Anthony Barr off the street just to plug that gap. I think they are who they are defensively.

We don't know who they're going to be week to week because the Dobbs experiment is a rarity in this league and it offers excitement, but they're going to have to be able to, if not win the turnover battle, break even in the turnover battle because you can't go 0-3 on the road in turnovers and expect to win any kind of game against any opponent or even at home for that matter. I just want to see how diverse are they going to be with running with throwing when does Jefferson get back when does jobs get unleashed to start looking downfield a little bit

more is it because if the defense takes it away we're not even going to risk having him open it up because we still know he's not you know he's still got some rust he's still got the schemes of six different teams rattling around in his brain we can't put the game in his hands every series because he's not prepared for that, nor should he be. We can put the game in his hands at the end when we need it, but you're going to see what happened at mile high. I mean, you know, he was under pressure. They decided, look, we're going to send the house. Let's see what he can do. And he wasn't able to beat the blitz. The line wasn't able to hold up at that particular moment. And that's, I think, what you're going to see going forward.

He's going to improve in certain areas. He's going to make wonderful things happen at interesting times. But the totality of his work is still going to be a work in progress week to week, series by series. You need everything working in unison. You're going to need to rely on your running game. You're going to have to have a fake punt every once in a while to buy you some time, buy you some first downs. And you're going to have to come up with some big defensive plays at the right moments. And that's a lot to ask for a team that's down a couple of key starters on both

sides of the ball and a coach who's really learning on the fly with a new quarterback who's also learning on the fly. So that's what makes it entertaining. That's what makes it, look, that was a 21-20 loss that probably will leave fans with their teeth gnashing, but it doesn't feel as catastrophic or as lost of an opportunity when you look at where this team is in context from where they were six weeks ago to where they could possibly be in another six weeks. I have not checked the statistics and what the analytics are saying about playoff odds, but I did see that the expected percentage they had to make the playoffs if they lost this game was still like 80 percent because so the Rams won their four and six. And that's like the closest team to you right now.

Washington just lost to Tommy DeVito. The rest of the NFC, that doesn't mean you don't have to win any games the rest of the way, but it does mean that you have some wiggle room here. And there's a few other things I wanted to address for what you said. I mean, one is with Josh Dobbs. These sort of dig to the root of Vikings fans and how they interpret things. There have been so many times where backup quarterbacks have come off the bench and done insane things for this franchise, whether it's Randall Cunningham leading one of the greatest offensive all time for the old school fans. Joe cap did not start

week one and ends up with his team in the super bowl in 1969. I mean, it's happened all over. I mean, Wade Wilson didn't start the playoff game against new Orleans in 87, where they blow them out. Uh, when he takes over for Tommy Kramer and goes to the NFC championship game and beats the 49ers that, and recently of course, Case Keenum. So we've seen this happen so many times that when it doesn't, even after two games of magic, it's like, oh, okay. So I guess it's not one of those. It's over. I think there are just realities of Josh Dobbs that you're going to have to accept. And one of them is that it is not going to be a smooth ride for each week. And there are going to be times where you get frustrated by the scrambles that don't work.

If scrambles worked all the time, then every quarterback would do it, right? There's only a handful of quarterbacks who can do it effectively. And it doesn't work every single time. When it does, it's great as it did in this game. So down the stretch, as you mentioned, there are going to be times that will be difficult, but you are still in position to make the playoffs. If you just win one more than you lose, it probably guarantees you a spot and the way that the NFC is played out. But do you think I had this thought last night, Murph, that and Dane brought it up actually on the show that Vikings fans have a sort of mentality because they have gone through so many

things that have gone against them, that when it looks like it's not going to be the magical season the miracle season there seems to be a like throw up the hands ah that one's over it's done we lost the game it's that and i don't know i don't cover every fan base but i just feel like there is a very much ah it, it didn't work. It's over sort of thing. Like it was magical for a while because it's not just this team. This happens to a lot of the teams in town that the twins win a series and we go, what a great time it was. And then they no show in the next series and they go, ah, I knew it. That was going to happen. There seemed to be a lot more of that than I thought was necessary for last night.

But yet there was a there was a lot of that. Like, oh, this is this is like that time Jeremy Lynn got hot. This is like the time the twins got hot toward the end of a season and everyone thought it was going to be, you know, this insane run to the playoffs. Then they fell off. I think that with Dobbs, it's just going to be up and down from week to week because that's who he is. I don't think that it was just this two-week thing that's over now, but you can speak to all of this. No, I don't think that at all.

I think even last week we were saying, look, this is nice and this is gravy, but no, I don't think anybody expects him to go undefeated or lose one game and march them into the playoffs with a flag flying. And this is going to be, I mean, Case Keenum redo, Wade Wilson redo, Jeff George redo, even Gus Farratt came out of nowhere and kind of led them out of nowhere into the playoffs. This isn't going to be the case with him, mainly because we still haven't seen what he can do with Justin Jefferson. We haven't seen what the Vikings can do when they play an actual complete game. We've only seen a couple of those under Cousins this year as well. I think it's just fans being defensive.

It's a defense mechanism, essentially. I'm not going to lay my heart on the line and have it stomped as it usually does. And I think that's prudent because I don't really feel like a nine and eight or 10 and seven Josh Dobbs-led team is really going to do much. But what it's going to do is at least create intrigue as to whether he could be a long-term solution at quarterback. It could show what he can do when he has a full complement of weapons, when he has six, seven, eight weeks of game planning, familiarity with him. You can really have a larger sample size and a larger first impression than what we've had so far. Everything's been a fire drill right now. It's

still a fire drill for him. I mean, so there's a long way to judge this. So I would go into it cautiously optimistic and enjoy the entertainment value, not thinking Josh Dobbs is going to be the, the, the savior we've been waiting 60 plus years for. I don't think that's fair to put him in that position. I don't think it's realistic as well. I don't think, you know, no, Mike Zimmer never thought Case Keenum was the answer. He never let him do a press conference. So I don't feel like, you know, Dobbs should be put on that pedestal. And I think fans shouldn't give up on the season, but they should give up on the notion that this is going to be a cakewalk. So that's kind of where I'm at is, look, it's going to be week to week. It's

going to be incremental progress, some regression, but I think it's going to be entertaining to watch. And it opens up a whole new way to look at the franchise and where it's going with this position, but also with this defensive coordinator. I mean, if he keeps this up, he's probably, as long as his litigation is resolved, Brian Flores is going to be probably a top head coaching candidate come this offseason. So, you know, how important would it be to retain him? What's it going to be, you know, how is O'Connell going to manage not the joyride he had last year, but the week-to-week struggle it's going to be to get to the postseason? You know, they got two of those last three games

against the Detroit Lions. We've been looking at them all season. It's like, yeah, that's probably where the division's going to come down. Well, I think it's going to come down to whether the Vikings can even get in and how are they going to perform against an elite NFC team heading into January because they may end up facing Detroit again in the playoffs or a Philadelphia, San Francisco, or Dallas. That's going to be a nice litmus test at the end of the year. Can they compete with one of the NFC's elite and take take some momentum so all of these things are worth watching they're not worth giving up on but i think it would have been unrealistic to think that josh dobbs was going to be a miracle worker from here to january feels to me like there is a wide range of outcomes here and one of them

is that they steamroll the next few opponents of which you take a look at the schedule. That is very plausible. Or Josh Dobbs does struggle more. And by the way, I did want to say, I don't think he had a bad game. I thought that if you're asking him to lead the game winning drive,

that's a big ask for where he's at right now. If you're expecting him not to make some crazy throws that could be picked off. Well, that's who he's always been, that he's had that happen. And he fumbles sometimes and he gets strip sacks sometimes. And like that's it's been the problem with his career so far is that when he's been in, he's turned the ball over a lot. And we've seen a little bit of that through these first couple of games. That's kind of a guy who tries to make plays and sometimes things go wrong. Although the interception, there was really nothing. I think anybody throws that interception because the linebacker comes through and hits his arm.

But overall, I thought he played a good enough game to win and was right in position to win. So it's not in my mind, like Josh Dobbs became a different person and fell off the face of the earth. It says to me how tight the margins will probably be the rest of the way. And if you win these, these games that are going to be close, I'm sure some of them, and you have a chance to be scary by the end, because this could look different by the end by quite a bit than it does now. They also have a buy at what seems like a fortuitous time because of Jefferson's health, potentially, as you mentioned, Jordan Hicks, and then just having time to look at the offense

and a sample size of Dobbs and say, what do we have here? Where can Jefferson fit in? How is this going to look down the stretch? So, so in my mind, this hasn't changed really at all from what we were saying, coming out of the saints game, except for you really should have had that one. I, other than that, that's really kind of what I got. So final thought from you Murph, just on where we think, I like to take your temperature at the end of each podcast where you think they end up final record wise after seeing what we saw last night I leaned into 10 and 7 last week um I was kind of counting on this as being a victory so I think it's 10 and

7 asterisk uh like you know more likely 9 and 8, because I see them, you know, look, they're probably going to take care of Chicago next week as well. They shouldn't. If they don't, they should get roasted for it. Then you get the bye. And then you're probably a little healthier and a little bit of a different team going into Vegas. I don't know what to make of the Raiders right now. I mean, they got the bounce with the coaching change, but they're still playing through a backup quarterback they lost yesterday. I don't know what position they're going to be in. It's going to be a quasi-home game, as all games in Vegas are. So that looks like a winnable game.

Again, without Joe Burrows, I mean, the Bengals are still a decent team, but they may have gotten over their shell shock and may be able to right themselves by December 17th, but suddenly that game doesn't look like an automatic L. I want to see how they do against Detroit. I mean, Detroit is now one of the elite teams in the NFC, not just an NFC North contender. You've got two opportunities, the first one at home. You've got Green Bay in between.

There's three more wins in there. The question is, can they get the fourth? And I think the fourth win is probably a one win against Detroit. And what does that do to position you going into the playoffs? I think you need to, you know, I think you need to have sort of a signature win against Detroit because that's the standard bearer in the division right now. So I'm going to say 10 and I'm still going to stay 10 and seven,

but I'm putting an asterisk by it now after last night, certainly attainable and I don't think nine and eight is all that bad if they get you know it seems like they've got a cushion below them in the in the wild card race and you're going to have a complete you're going to have a much different Josh Dobbs a much should have a much healthier team although injuries could happen in the interim you're going to know what Dobbs and Jefferson can do, and I think that gives you a greater picture of what to expect, not just in the postseason, but going forward at that position. Somebody pointed out on the show, I forget, an email, DM,

whoever said this to me, you're very smart, but I i'm sorry i forgot who you are uh that this more than any other year has been each week seems to push how we feel about the team about the future of the organization about everybody involved more than maybe any other year because of how much is at stake with the future of the quarterback position and just the uncertainty that is going on there. And also, just in general, how strong of a team they actually are, because they were capable of starting out 0-3. And then they get going, and we assume that the going version is who they are, and not the 0-3, but we saw the 0-3 style kind of come back last night.

And I imagine it will be a smattering of both as we go forward. And guess who will be there for the whole time on Monday mornings to break it down? It's you, Brian Murphy. So I look forward to whatever it is. Except for next week, it'll be Tuesday morning. That's right. Tuesday morning Murph is not as catchy. So we'll still call it Monday morning Murph, even though it's Tuesday.

The Tuesday edition. Look forward to it then. Well, thanks for your time as always, Murph. And we will talk again soon, sir. Thank you. All right. Happy Thanksgiving, everyone.