Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - The Vikings almost blew a 29 point lead against the Steelers

Episode Date: December 10, 2021

Matthew Coller and Paul Hodowanic talk about how the Minnesota Vikings put together a brilliant first half against the Pittsburgh Steelers. From the Vikings defense to Dalvin Cook running over the Steelers to Ben Roethlisberger struggling, everything was going right until midway through the second half when everything came apart and the Vikings nearly blew a 29 point lead. Who should be blamed for the Vikings nearly blowing it? Should we even worry about that at this point? The Vikings wont consider in season changes now, so should fans just root for the playoffs? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

🎵 Hello, welcome to the Minnesota Vikings absolutely refuse to have any type of normal, regular football game, and they will not, under any circumstances, no matter what happens, finish out a game without insane and completely unnecessary drama. That is where we stand as we are here on Purple Insider. Matthew Collar, Paul Hodowanek filling in for Sam Ekstrom. Sam got sick actually during the game, had to go home. So he's doing okay. But Paul filling in here in the post-game show. And Paul, I guess I'll just start out by saying that

if you were looking for entertainment value, this once again delivered. If you are an objective observer who just sat down at the old TV and said, all right, NFL, entertain me. Well, the second half certainly did that. If you were hoping that your team could actually take a 29-0 lead and just end it and walk out of here feeling good about themselves, going into a little mini break, if you were hoping that this team would show a sign of being able to close someone out

finish a game put together a complete 60 minutes on offense and defense then you were severely disappointed and i am conflicted at the end of this game because in one way they played extremely well on the offensive side and defensive side in the first half. Ben Roethlisberger looked like it was time to retire. And then in the second half, it was a complete and utter meltdown. And if the ball does not go off the fingertips of the Pittsburgh Steelers receiver in the end zone, we are talking about not only just another, wow, they're not clutch and meltdown every time. We're talking about an historic meltdown for the Minnesota Vikings in the second half of this game. And I

think, Paul, it's simple to say this is who they are, even if there are extremes to the madness of who they are. But it's always shows signs of good enough and then gives you a lot of reasons to walk away feeling very empty at the end of the day. Yeah. I think what sums it up is I was watching from home obviously. And they, they flash a graphic that if the Vikings had lost that game 29 to zero or after being up 29 to zero, that would have been the biggest comeback in NFL regular season history. And I think what is what's what's like emulates the season is I wasn't that surprised by that I was like oh okay yeah yep yeah makes sense it's par for the course at this point and and shame on me because up 29 zero I was sitting on the couch just enjoying myself oh this will be

a nice game finally and I I don't know what i was thinking i i've had 14 weeks to to program my brain that this is not what happens with this vikings team and and it didn't happen again and it i mean it's maddening i heard dalvin cook uh on the television with aaron andrews after the game saying they're still like trying to figure out how to you know close games out and at this point they just it's beyond the time of figuring it out you should have figured it out uh 14 weeks into the season you've had so many chances to figure it out so the fact that they are still hung up on it is just it's maddening and it it was a maddening night i think in both

directions because if you were a believer in what this team has has been or what it could be, you saw that in the first half. And then if you were the other way, you saw that exact opposite thing happen in the second half. And so it I mean, it's the Vikings, man. Yeah, I mean, there are extents, though, to it's the Vikings. I tweeted out earlier, like, I know all of you are going to respond with it's the vikings i tweeted out earlier like i know all of you are going to respond with it's the vikings so nothing's unbelievable and i'm just dead inside because i'm a vikings fan like i get those every single crazy thing that ever happens a lot of people will send me that message and i get it i mean you people have been wounded many times by this team and graphics like

that they show up all the time like oh you're the first team to do this and be up every game by at least this many points and still not have a winning record. And like all those little factoids that they tend to pile up on this team, you know, starting with like, you're the team that has the best record that hasn't won the super bowl and all this,

like this just comes up over and over and over again. So I get it. I get why people become jaded but to blow a 29 point lead almost is truly astonishing and there's there's no other way to be like yeah but in the first half boy they run it well i mean it's like the the bottom line of this is so much that this is the team that makes you pull out your hair more than any other team that I've covered since I've been here. And the 2016 team and the 2018 team had their fair share of these types of games where you went, whoa, like how, or even in 2019, when they were down 20 to nothing to the Broncos and had to come back from down 20 to a terrible team. Like there,

there are those games that every team has each season, which is part of the reason why people watch the NFL. Like stuff's crazy and it's super weird and you never expect what's next. But this was really something else. I mean, this was a complete meltdown in ways that they have not even done this year. I mean, this isn't even as bad as like Carolina

that was kind of a back and forth game. They took a lead. They let one bad drive happen for Carolina, even last week against Detroit. They're down. They come back again. Whoever had the ball last kind of ends up winning. This was, you should end this game and you didn't. And it was all the sort of same culprits though. And that's why I think a lot of people will watch this and say, yeah, this is who they are and this is why they can't go anywhere. And I would agree with that. I mean, that this is why you can't go anywhere because you have the capability to throw to Justin Jefferson, create big plays, score touchdowns. They ran

the football better today than they've run the entire year they have the defensive talent to cause sacks pass breakups big plays like they did in the first half but the cornerback play is so poor with this team and in clutch situations they could not pressure ben roethlisberger and it's like this is just how we sort of wrote it up in our minds of like if pittsburgh keeps this close and if they play well offensively at any point, it'll be because Roethlisberger is not pressured. Their receivers aren't terrible and the Vikings corners absolutely are. And then this is a weird thing to have 36 points and 450 yards of offense, but then look at the quarterback's performance and say, uh, that's three weeks in a row from cousinsousins.

He didn't play particularly well for a big portion of the game against Detroit, had his worst game of the year against San Francisco, and then this might have topped his worst game of the year. It was interceptions, there were misthrows, misopportunities that they had to go up by even more. I mean, they had 29 29 point lead and they still settled for field goals several times in this game on drives that you thought you really should not have settled for field goals on those drives. And so not being able to ever offensively stick the dagger in anyone is, is another part of it too. And then sort of, we do this thing where we bounce back and forth and we go, well, yeah, the defense couldn't stop anybody, but well, the Vikings had third back and forth and we go, well, yeah, the defense couldn't stop

anybody, but well, the Vikings had third down and eight and cousins overthrew a pass to KJ Osborne, where he was open enough to make a play and get a first down and end the game. And I present you your 2021 Minnesota Vikings. And so Paul, I think this game isn't necessarily a referendum on anything. It's not necessarily one that we learn who they are or we were taught some sort of magical lesson. This is the exhausting nature of who this team has been all season long. It's kind of who they've been for years, where you can't really trust them to put a bow on a game

or you can't really trust them to just put together 60 full minutes when they're given those opportunities. And if you're going to make any statement, it's look, if you do this against the playoff team, should you get to the playoffs, which we'll get to that in a minute, then you will absolutely lose like no quarterback in the playoffs. Tom Brady, Kyler Murray, et cetera, is not playing the way that Ben Roethlisberger did in the first half of this game. You're not going to get the opportunity to go up 29 to nothing against those good teams. So if you do play like this, then it's going to be a short trip to the playoffs, even if you make it. And I still can't trust you to beat Chicago. And I definitely can't

trust you to beat the Rams or to beat green Bay. And so we're still left in this limbo of like, did I change anything I felt about this team today? No, I don't think that I did. No, I don't think I did either. And I, I was, I just took time after the game to look back on their wins and just try to count which ones I left feeling more confident than I did coming into the game. And I think there's two, I think it's Seattle, the Seattle game and the Packers game are really the only two games that I left after they won and felt much better about the team than I did when they came in and they've got six wins. So that means four of those games they got through and you didn't even feel any sort of reprieve.

And I think that was what made this one difficult because after a half, you thought you were going to feel that reprieve. You thought, okay, we're going to go into a long week. Bears coming up two of the next four weeks. You feel really good about that. They just smoked the Steelers. It looked like you just out-prepared them.

They didn't look ready to come into this building. Like it just seemed like they, they had beaten them from all angles and you know, you then can talk yourself into momentum. They're only a game out of the playoffs and then they just have to, they have to shoot themselves in the foot. Somehow they have to put doubt into your mind. And yeah,

I don't feel, I mean, I guess it's hard to feel worse coming out of a loss to the Lions, but I don't feel much better after this game than I did from that Lions game. It still feels like I don't know what direction they're going in. I could see both scenarios and neither of them look like they have much of a shelf life at all. Yeah. And I think that what we've got in front of us is probably more games just like this. And then we see at the end, did you win on the last play? Did you lose on the last play? Did, you know, did you blow it

with a lead or did you have to come back in a deficit that you never should have had? And, and, and those types of things. And I guess what I'll say is that we certainly will never forget this season and the way that it's gone. But, you know, I think that there were probably some people who were like, yeah, blow the lead because that'll do it. Like last week, it felt like this is the final nail in the coffin. And then with a win, you look at the standings and you go, oh, six and seven. Other people are six and seven. Your odds sort of go to like I think that um 538 had the odds going up into the 30 percent and there are other models that have them much closer to a 50 50 shot Washington and Philadelphia they play each other twice so if neither one of those teams wins both

of those games if it's a split that leaves the door open Washington plays uh the Dallas Cowboys so that that's certainly not uh one you're super confident about this weekend and then all of a sudden it sort of creeps back in like oh they could still be in the playoffs with this team and then what happens um I you know I don't know if this is one of those signs of like hey this is why cousins can't get it done um I guess you could take it as this is the Cousins coaster, though, because earlier this season we're talking about, oh, he's played this well in this number of games and putting up these statistics

and all those different things. But then here you are in a crucial portion of the season and you get three poor performances back to back to back. And if Delvin Cook is not running the way he is in the first half, it might've been 13 to zero. And this might've been a loss with them playing the way they did in the second half. So, I mean, if we just, if we kind of go through this a little bit chronologically though, Paul, I mean, early in the game, it's so funny about how your perception or like what you're taking note of changes because on the first drive,

when they didn't go for it on fourth down, my first thought was like, what are you doing Zimmer? Like your season is on the line here. Why are you not going for it on fourth down? It was fourth and three. You kick a field goal with Greg Joseph. I know this feels like an eternity ago to anybody, you know, thinking about this game. But at the time I was feeling like this could be close and you need touchdowns, not field goals. Greg Joseph shanks it and it's sort of here we go already off the top but for the first half of that game you get a missed field goal by the Steelers Vikings score and then it's just punt punt punt from the Steelers I wrote down in my reaction column which I ultimately had to delete like whatever version of Ben Roethlisberger this is,

it looks more like Luke McCown or something or Josh Rosen than it does a guy who's going to be wearing a gold jacket. And as the first half is playing out, Delvin Cook is not being touched. Justin Jefferson isn't being double teamed. And the Steelers look like a team that couldn't possibly be a 500 football team. And the Vikings look like they're en route to the Super Bowl. I mean, I don't know that I had at all in my mind throughout that first half, Paul, that there was any chance at a comeback.

And the one thing that I was ready to hand to them and say, hey, you got to give it to them that they came out in a game where everybody was under pressure all week. And it was a short week and you came off an embarrassing loss and you put together just this monster performance and you didn't leave the door open a crack and you, and look at you and look at you and look like I wasn't going to be ready to say Mike Zimmer was making his case to stay from this one win, but if he was going to make a case that they fight and they respond to him and they haven't given up and they can out-game plan another great coach who will also be in the Hall of Fame someday

and Mike Tomlin, this would have been their day to make that argument. And if we stop it right at the first half, if like Sam, unfortunately, because he became ill, had to leave after the first half. Like, I hope he Googled what happened when he got home because because, I mean, you just wouldn't believe it. Right. Like if you left in the first half and then you got home and you looked at your phone, you'd be like, no, that's gotta be like another score from another year. Uh, so it really, it really, um, is still sort of making my head spin how everything was going right for them in the first half. And they looked like the team that has the potential to be good at any given time. And this, I think Paul is exactly why there's so much disappointment, even from like, when Mike Zimmer talks about them, but also

from fans when they watch them, it feels like underachieving. It's not your quarterback got hurt or something and you sort of scrapped your way to 500. It feels like active underachieving when you have a game like this, that you're up by so much and then it all ends up unraveling. Yeah. I mean, it's just a microcosm of the larger conversation that I think we often have or the national media has of what's the more like tortured fan base? Is it the team that gets so close and you feel like you have a shot? Or is it the Lions where you just roll over and are horrible? And I mean, that is the Vikings season. That is the Vikingsikings game by game

in in a sense it's it's so maddening because they come so close you see them um play so well and i think when they run the ball the way they did in the first half i think you you see that as sustainable going forward into the second half it's not kirk finding a couple bombs and oh we're having to rely on kirk throwing a ton it was just Dalvin, like, just let him do his thing. And so that's why it felt sustainable to me is, okay, they are just gonna be able to run the ball and they end up with 36 passes to 34 runs, I think, or maybe 36 runs to 34 passes.

Either way, the fact that they were up that whole game and running and passing, they were really, really close together. And the success they were having running, they were 0.21 expected points added per run play, and they were negative 0.24 for passes on EPA. So they were much, much more efficient running the ball. And I think they just should have done that a little bit more maybe in the second half. I mean, going through the play-by-play, you don't see it in general, but to me, they should have trusted that a little bit more gone that way and maybe you just bleed this clock out

maybe you have more success because i'm not quite sure um like what happened in in terms of in terms of that but yeah it it's it's nuts i mean we're we're kind of spinning in circles just thinking about it but i think that's just the general sentiment is what is what is going on with this team they are just they can't figure themselves out and we sure as heck can't figure them out and so it's it's it's just it's it's a ride folks have you ever thought about taking a bike to work but figure it's too far or that the hills are too steep or heck who wants to show up to work covered in sweat? Well, that's why you need to check out the electric cruiser bike from my friends at Boogie Bikes. The Boogie Bike gives you all the experience of saving gas,

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basket as well. By the way, there is no risk within the first 15 days. You can try a boogie bike and boogie bikes have an industry-leading five-year warranty as well. Again, go to boogiebikes.com. Check them out today. Yeah. I mean, in one way you do have to give it to Ben Roethlisberger because he found Canton form in the second half. I mean, he was making some pretty legit throws that I did not think existed still in that man.

In the first half, he ran for a first down in the first half i was like uh there are people who are 90 years old who move quicker than ben roethlisberger does and even when he was dropping back their offensive lines seemed confused at times their past protections and he was just getting sacked over and over his throws looked like shot puts and then i don't know like if you've ever seen space jam where a Bugs Bunny gives them the magic water or something at halftime, like that seemed like what Ben Roethlisberger must've drank at halftime because he was rolling out and firing balls. I mean, at the end of the game, he whips a ball down the sideline. And of course, Prashad Breeland commits

pass interference, but his receiver goes up. I think it was Chase Claypool who'd had a horrible game before that makes the grab and they continue to move down the field. But I think you look at it much more, even with Roethlisberger still fighting his way there. And I think you can see why he's a Hall of Famer, because the guy still has even in his current state, still has a mentality that even down 29 nothing, he could still potentially win the game. And that's really incredible what we saw in the second half. But, you know, I think that we look at it much more and rightfully so as blowing it and

blowing that lead and allowing that to happen. And so I was going to ask you for a pie chart, Paul, I want the pie chart of blame of the second half of this game that allowed Pittsburgh back into it. We'll go with Kirk Cousins, of course, gets it. I guess we just go secondary and coaching and other. Other could be anything. Other could be like, well, how about other is just Pittsburgh credit.

We'll go that way. We'll go Cousins, coaching, defense, Pittsburgh gets credit. All right. Well, my math is going to be tough. We're creeping up on midnight here, so we're just going to see what happens here. To me, I was just about getting ready to say the most blame for me goes to Kirk. He turns the ball over twice. He has like three or four completions all second half.

I think they wouldn't have gotten back in those games without the two interceptions that he threw. And I think he was minus 12 completion percentage, over-expected. A couple of that was some drops. Justin Jefferson had some uncharacteristic drops in there, but just did not play well. Negative 5.9 EPA on the the day so for him i'm gonna

go 50 on kirk cousins i think it was not a good performance it was another tale of two halves for him uh just played i mean it was like the another space jam analogy it's like ben roethlisberger took whatever good play was in kirk cousins like they both touched the football and like it transferred from kirk cousins over to uh ben roethlisberger who's suddenly rolling out and throwing deep balls like uh Kirk so I I'm putting 50% on Kirk I'll go 20% on just the Steelers um playing well I think I mean like we just said Big Ben found something there in the second half. The defense, at least the Steelers defense, at least tightened up. They weren't allowing Dalvin Cook to gash them. They came up with the two interceptions.

They played them tight. So I'd go there for 20%. And then the last 30%, if we're going secondary coaching, I kind of all put it together. I think I put it more on the coaching just because I don't expect much out of the secondary and they didn't really surprise me. Maybe 20% to coaching, 10% to the secondary. I think most of this lies on Cousins and him giving the ball back to them with short fields. And what are you going to do when you're the defense at that point when you're still undermanned and you're you're then giving them the ball just i mean they they didn't have to go far

except for that 96 yard drive towards the end that they could have gotten in that zone but um there's always a 96 yard drive yeah always always gotta put it in somewhere but to me this is more about kirk than it is about the defense okay so. So mine's going to be a little different. I will go, I'm only going to go 25% cousins in part, because I think that on both of his interceptions and I'll, I'll pull a cousins here. I'd have to look at the tape because I'm not a hundred percent sure. Sometimes it can be hard to tell press box view. And then I get maybe one look at the replay up on TV like who's at fault for something like that so you tell me if you saw something different I thought both of his interceptions were kind of receiver-y like maybe he overthrew the slant but it looked like

KJ Osborne might have tripped and then the other one it kind of seemed like Justin Jefferson the ball bounced off of him and maybe that's just bad luck. That's just a tip ball that goes into somebody else's hands. Now, look, we did bring up earlier this year that cousins had a good number of turnover worthy plays that did not result in turnovers. And maybe that's some regression. You get just, you know, those tips sort of even out over a year, but I, I didn't think that cousins through like the interceptions, I just, just like these harebrained terrible throws or bad decisions or anything like that. I think that my blame on cousins is more of just,

there were a couple of times where it's like really end this man, really end this. And that didn't quite happen. And it was in part because of inaccurate throws. There were a couple of throws when they kicked a field goal to go up 29. And again, like you go up 29 as an offense, you should not feel like you did anything wrong. And this is why, again, I don't want to put a whole lot on Cousins because, I mean, they're

up 29 at that point. But there are a couple of field goals mixed in their field goal drives. You have a field goal in the first half to go up by nine. You have a field goal to go up 26. You have a field goal in the first half to go up by nine you have a field goal to go up 26 you have a field goal to go up 29 and again yeah I mean how many times can you say it but like you go up 29 this should not be a huge deal and that's why I put a lot more on the defense in the secondary I'd go 50 50 60 probably 50 uh and then I want to give you know the rest somewhere in between Pittsburgh gets

credit because Roethlisberger made those throws and they made those plays and they played much better defensively against the run in the second half, as you'd expect when the other team is leading. I just, it really feels to me like they don't have any answers. I mean, the Steelers are down at the goal line and it's either third or fourth down. Roethlisberger makes a throw. Cam Dantzler decides to grab both hips of the wide receiver and drag him to the ground at the goal line. At least Cam Dantzler knew where the goal line was this week,

but he did not know that you can't grab that receiver and drag him down. Dantzler, in any sort of clutch moment is a huge liability. Rashad Breeland the same way. Now Breeland was sick on the sideline. So maybe there's, you know, some of that that was happening with him, but you have a taunting penalty mixed in from Chris Boyd that is completely senseless of all people in the entire building who should not be taunting anyone. It's Chris Boyd. I mean, this is a guy who cannot get on the field as a cornerback with one of the worst groups of cornerbacks in the entire NFL.

But that's why that is what I think is most central to why the Vikings have had so many of these games that if you have cousins as your quarterback and he's not a put the final dagger in somebody's back quarterback and never will be, then you need people on your defense to make plays. You need a big whatever, an interception, a pass defended, a big tackle or something. And they got the interception on a tip ball from Breeland. So he did make the one play, but then it was just whatever Roethlisberger wanted to do. And I, with coaching, it's hard because, you know,

they again, did not send a bunch of blitzes at the end of the game after Roethlisberger, they got them on a couple early in the game. So maybe you could go back and say, well, why weren't you rushing him later in the game but he was also kind of balling out and you're like well usually what you think is when the bad quarterbacks you try to blitz them and with good quarterbacks you try to cover as well as you can and cover as much space as you can the first half for office burger was bad the second half for office burger was really good so i i'm not even sure that i feel great about our pie charts necessarily here because I think there's a lot to go around. Now, tell me this, Paul.

Are we overreacting to them nearly blowing it? Because end of the day, bottom line, all those things, they win this game and it was close, but I don't think any of us ever thought it was going to be a complete kill with the Steelers because they're even teams and they've had even seasons, a lot of close games, a lot of flaws on both sides, accomplished coaches on both sides, accomplished quarterbacks on both sides. So is it the order that it happened that makes people so maddened by this? And do you think that there's overreaction to like, Hey, look, you're still in this playoff race and whether everything changes at the end of the season or not,

now that this has happened, the chances of any change in season are probably out the window because you will remain in that playoff race probably until the very end. So is it like a survive and advance thing? I have a tough time getting there because of all the way that it happened. But you can tell me if you think that that's, it should be part of the conversation. I think we need to constantly remind ourselves, like this is not normal,

what the Vikings are doing week in and week out. I think it's become the normal that, oh, okay. They just did. They, they did it again. Like, this is just how it goes. Like, no, this is not how it goes in the NFL. You're not supposed to give up 29 point leads. It's never happened before. And the Vikings were a Pat Fryer move drop away, and then a two point conversion from it happening. And so no, I don't, I don't necessarily think it's an overreaction

because it, the switch flips so quickly. They go from a dominant team to one that suddenly like you're, you feel no confidence in, even when the Steelers get two touchdowns, they're down 15. It's like my whole Twitter timeline is just, oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no. It's like, you can sense it. And so I don't necessarily think it's an overreaction because I think it's important to take a step back and realize this is not what normal teams do. This is not what playoff teams do in a normal year. Six and seven is not close to being in the playoffs. And it is in this year where everyone's kind of mediocre in the pack so i think it becomes well oh they're still in the playoffs like this is acceptable if they keep winning and it it's not a sustainable model

as much as they keep doing it over and over again and if the seventh seed wasn't a thing they're probably not uh gonna make the playoffs if the nfc isn't mediocre like it is this year they're probably not going to make the playoffs and so yeah i think I don't think it's, you know, I don't think people need to be hush hushing this game for the way it went. Yes, they're still in the playoffs and that needs to be talked about because they are still surviving. They still have a chance. They see we see in the first half that they can put up points on anyone.

They can do that. But we say that every week and then it just always comes crumbling down at some point. And so, no, I don't think it's an overreaction to talk about it because it doesn't happen. This does not happen. And so we become accustomed to it, but we need to think about that and talk about that every week.

I think there's a sequence in here that I think is the reason it should sort of stick in you a little bit in the second half. The reason that you wouldn't just say like, yeah, well, you know, hey, got the win. That was fun. Or the reason that I think that most people won't. I didn't see fire Zimmer trending necessarily today in the fourth quarter as it has throughout the season when they've had some struggles or even some close wins like over the Lions. This kind of has a postgame feel of the first Lions win when, yeah, they came away with an exciting win and they got to celebrate it on the field. But we all went, oh, wow, that was

a win, I guess. But yikes. The sequence is so there's the interception after Pittsburgh scores their first touchdown by cousins. That one, I just thought, you know, it's kind of a bad luck. Like I said, the tip drill and then Pittsburgh gets the ball back and they go score again. I mean, that's part of it because, hey, defense, you know, can you bail them out? Like, can you just hold this 29 to 7 lead? Like that interception should not have been crushing. They got the ball. What's let's see. They got the ball at the 42 yard line. I mean, that's one where it's not like it's in the red zone. It's not like it was at the five yard line. You're at midfield. Basically you can get a stop

there. You can make a play. And they just absolutely refused to make a play there. And when you look at just even who's making the tackle on each play, it's like Alexander Dantzler, Peterson, Peterson. It's just like the corners are getting beat on almost every play. And so, okay, you give up another touchdown. Now here's where it drives you crazy because if you're up 29, 14 and you score again, or even you kill a bunch of clock, the game is over. And that's another thing. If you just have a long drive and you just take two, three minutes off the clock, this game is over. Good night, everybody. Have a good time. Thanks for showing up from Pittsburgh, half the stadium today. A lot of fans from Pittsburgh today.

And instead, this is early in the fourth quarter. It's three and out. It's run, it's run, and then it's an incomplete pass on third down and seven. And there might have been a penalty mixed in possibly or something. Maybe not. But they went basically three and out there. They only used a minute 32. And then instantly right after that,

Chris Boyd allows the touchdown and just how in the world, I think it was Chris Boyd. Maybe you can correct me if I'm wrong. How in the world does, Oh, he gives up the first pass boy does. And then like, how do you give up or the interference?

I'm sorry. I'm just trying to get the order right here, but like, how does anyone get behind you when you're in the fourth quarter up by 15 points? And the only way for this team to get back in it is to something like this is a 37 yard pass. Interference is a 30 yard touchdown. Like this Pittsburgh offense looked like they couldn't make an explosive play. If you gave them TNT in a match and yet still they end up with a 69 a nice for them not for the vikings yard drive that took let me check on the timing here one

minute i mean i like that right there is sort of the sign of you just like don't have it as a team any sort of killer instinct or any sort of like enough talent to put anybody away when that is what you are capable of and I think that's why you walk away going oh man like playoffs are not this is this is just tough this is just a tough thing to watch and then when you don't have the firepower on offense or your quarterback isn't playing well enough in this particular game, a primetime game for cousins, he gets the win in this one. But when you, when you're not able to put the other team away offensively, when you have a chance, just like, this is what we've been

talking about all year for why you don't have a better record. And that's why when, when we hear the, well, look guys, it's just been a bunch of close games. And if we had only won this one or that one, it's like, well, yeah, right. But this is who you are, though. You don't get to say that when you're the type of team that gives up a 29-point lead and almost loses to the Pittsburgh Steelers because of sequences like this. So I think that's the reason it's reasonable to be on the side of still kind of having a bit of a gut-punched feel after what should have been a very easy win. Yeah, and I don't love coming to the Vikings defense-defense, but I'm going to make just a little bit of an argument for them. Just towards, I mean, yes, they shouldn't have given up as many points as they did in the second half, but they did not give up a single point in the first half.

They went, missed field goal, then punt, punt, punt, punt by the Steelers. Then they come out, they punt right away again. And then they get an interception. And then it's just, I don't know. I just think the Vikings then punt or they get an interception. Then they immediately punt it back to them and they the field goal that they had they were inside the 10 they don't convert on a touchdown there either so yes I I think the point of it is both units are culpable for this and it

is not a easily fixable thing as we've seen over and over and over again and I think that continues to show you why this isn't an overreaction because it it's failures on the offense. It's failures on the defense. It's failures in coaching. It's, it's not one area that they just need to clean up and it continually is not just one area. It's every week it can, they all contribute. And so, yeah, maybe my pie chart, 50% of cousins is a little bit steep. It should probably be more even spread throughout, but I don't think any, you, you can make any argument like you could at any point this season. It can always be a Kirk argument. It can always be a defensive argument. And that was the case again today. I don't know about you guys, but I've gotten very good in my life at admitting

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made the off season or make the playoffs for the sheer insanity of it. I mean, look, I don't think, and you don't think, and nobody else listening to this thinks that you're beating multiple playoff teams when this is the kind of thing you do in a game where you played about the best you can play at this point with this current roster. But there is a part of me that thinks, gosh, the way that the game went against Green Bay, the way it went against Los Angeles, the way it went here tonight against the Steelers team, that's 500. It's kind of like looking in the mirror a little bit. You just, in whatever playoff scenario, could end up with an all-time classic because of just who this team is and what their identity is.

But then there's the part of me that says that, and there may be the fear in the back of people's minds. Well, that might mean if they make the post-season that there won't be changes. I still think that there would be. So I guess if it was up to me, I would say make the playoffs and then give us an insane game just for the heck of it. But as long as you're still talking about this can't continue as your long-term direction where, you know, in back-to-back-to-back weeks, I mean, you get kind of your tail whipped in San Francisco, you lose to the worst team in the league, and then almost blow a 29-point

lead. It's like, this is not promising stuff here, folks. But, you know, if we're going to talk about one of the most entertaining Viking seasons, let it carry on. I suppose. Now let's talk about the Delvin cook thing for a second. Delvin cook played in a shoulder harness. I think all of us kind of went, is that a good idea? But then since the Pittsburgh Steelers did not touch him until late in the second half, I guess, you know, it doesn't matter. Like his health is going to be okay. The thing that I did notice though, Paul,

is that he looked the fastest he's looked since week two. And I wonder if the shoulder injury actually gave him more time to heal the other things that had been ailing him. And as we go down these last couple of games, it's just, you know, you can always see the bears beating the Vikings. Uh, you can always see the Packers and the Rams cause they're just good teams. Uh, but if they run the football like that, they should be able to win some of those games. I mean that what, like three out of four, or at least split those games down the stretch and end eight and nine and beat the pair, the bears a couple of times and maybe upset the Los Angeles Rams. And I'm not, I'm not saying the defense is a part of this, but put together

offensive performance is good enough because I was immediately struck by how quick he looked tonight. I don't think it was just the blocking. He looked like he could take the ball all the way at any time, which is more of what we see from Delvin cook early in seasons, not late in seasons after he's been banged up. Yeah. 27 carries 205 yards, two touchdowns. I think I said this earlier, 58 rushing yards over expected according to NFL next gen stats. So ran really, really well. And in the first half, you're trying to figure out, is this the Vikings? Is it just the Steelers? Do they even have a defense? Like, what are we looking at here? But yes, I agree. That was the same point I was going to make. He looked so much fresher today. Just the running game hasn't been that successful this season with Dalvin Cook in it.

And today it looked really, really good. And he looked maybe the best he's looked all season in terms of how his legs looked and how, and how he ran the ball. And I think it's a credit to him because you didn't really realize that Adam Thielen was out of this game for most of it. And I think a lot of that has to do with what Dalvin was able to do on the ground because they weren't asking as much out of the past then KJ Osborne played well in that role obviously caught the deep touchdown had a couple other good passes but Dalvin Dalvin just makes the offense go um in ways that they can't in they I mean Justin Jefferson was open all over the field but when Dalvin is running the ball like that the offense can be just really really good they can strike quickly because those deep passes open up,

and we saw that again today. And so that's one of the major takeaways. If you feel optimistic about them making a run, it's going to stem a lot from Delvin Cook looking like this the rest of the season because still what he can do as a running back to unlock them as an offense is pretty, pretty special, and we saw it, especially in the first half. Yeah.

And that's why I don't want to count out the idea of making the playoffs. I mean, you can't trust Washington. You can't trust Philadelphia. Those teams are playing backup quarterbacks. They're not very good to begin with. Even San Francisco has its flaws and anybody could fall apart here and open up the door for the Vikings if they can get ahead in games by running like they did with Delvin Cook that's one of the major things that um you know

we've mentioned of course along the way but it just like it hasn't been a main storyline that they've been a poor running team overall if you look at expected points added they're a poor running team yards per carry it's not it's not Um, but I think if you're watching it, you know exactly what I mean. Like you can instinctively see like a lot of times they're just not getting those explosive runs, those four, five, six, seven. Um, there's a lot of negative runs that they've had. That was not the case tonight. It was the explosive plays and you saw how things opened up from there. Um, and there were more opportunities in the passing game, I think because of it that on some

throws that were missed, you know, throughout. So it does add something different, but it's sort of like you gain one thing, but you take another thing away. Ole Udo got beat on a play in the red zone that I think it was Highsmith got in Cousins face. And of course he doesn't make an accurate throw because of that. Also, even though KJ Osborne caught the 60 something yard touchdown, he also only had three catches on nine targets. And that is not the type of number that you'd expect from Adam Thielen. And there are little nuances to receiver and quarterback chemistry that I don't know you easily replace. So Adam Thielen's health will matter too, as we go down the stretch. And I think from here out, we're talking much more,

unless this is a total you lose every game, I think we're talking much more about like, okay, are they going to make the playoffs? Here's what these matchups look like. And a little less about are they firing someone next week? Because now we know that that is not going to happen, obviously after tonight or after Chicago, because they'll still be very much in that race. And so we're going to see how this thing plays

out. Um, Paul, I really appreciate you pinch hitting here for Sam. Thanks for jumping in. Um, Sam will be all right, but, uh, you know, unfortunate that he didn't feel well today, but he'll be back as we do our usual podcast this week. So thank you all for listening. And man, just again, Paul, I've never covered anything quite like it. And I was already saying that like five weeks ago, and yet here we are with just every ball that was fluttering through the air from Roethlisberger. I thought that guy's going to catch that and it's going to be a touchdown and I have to delete half my story. And that's exactly what happened. So thanks. Thanks for your time though, man. For sure. I don't know the saying, I don't think goes like fool me 14

times, but at this point I think it's just, I think it's just my it's it's shame on me. It's, it's, it's all my fault at this point. If, and expecting them to hold on to a lead like I thought they were going to do, I thought 29 was enough. It turned out to be just enough, but we'll see. I mean, I'm assuming we're going to have plenty more. Even though there's four games left, there's going to be plenty more of it. And I'm excited to hear you and Sam talk about it, for me to break it down on YouTube, and it'll be a fun ride.

Yeah. And by the way, if you have seen Paul's Hot Routes show on YouTube, we're going to move some of that over here to the podcast feed as well, because you're doing great stuff. Like you're doing great interviews and fun shows. So I'm going to do a better job of having that included on the podcast feed because you're doing a great job, Paul. So thanks for your time. And thank you all for listening to this. And hopefully you didn't shut off the TV and go to bed at twenty nine and then you're waking up this morning. Listen, let's go. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. What happened? So anyway, thanks for all of your time. And we will have lots more to discuss going forward. So we'll be back.