Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - The Vikings over/under is....

Episode Date: March 28, 2025

Matthew Coller reacts to the Vikings over-under total from Vegas and whether they are being underrated vs. the rest of the NFC North. Plus answers Vikings questions.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Hey everybody. Welcome to another episode of purple insider Matthew collar here. And we don't have a whole lot of news to talk about, which is good because that means that there has been no other things to happen regarding Aaron Rogers. Although I did see that Adam Schefter was talking about maybe Rogers retiring. I don't know. I will probably drag it out for a while, but tonight this is a Rogers free zone. Okay.

So I am absolutely thrilled to answer any and all questions jump in the chat now, because the opening thing I want to talk about is this over under that ESPN bet released. I want to get your thoughts on that. We can break that down. Intern Clay has gathered all the over unders that ESPN bet put out for the NFC North teams. He's writing an article on that.

And so we're going to talk about it. He's got some other questions, but this is a pretty open live show tonight for you guys to answer questions, but I'm not saying anything else about Aaron Rodgers tonight. A Rodgers free zone, anything that's on your mind. I also have the draft simulator ready to go in case we decide that, hey,

we just want to randomly draft Sim because why would we not draft Sim as many times as we possibly can in the lead up to the draft? But I just have said everything there is to say about where things stand with Aaron Rogers at the moment. And I don't know what else I'm supposed to say unless we have a reason to discuss him. So the draft free agency remaining lingering questions, where

the franchise is going, the NFC North, the over unders, all those things, throw it out there and I am very pleased to have a great conversation with you guys tonight. So let me begin with the ESPN bet over under for the Minnesota Vikings, which is 8.5 wins. I think the Vikings out of all teams in the NFL are in probably the category or the tier of difficult teams to predict because of their quarterback situation. If the Vikings had Sam Darnold coming back, they would put this at what? 11 and a half, right? Coming off of 14 win season, you assume that there's going to be some regression, but you know that Sam Darnold can win football games with this team. So you would have

said, all right, man, if it's eight and a half with Sam Darnold, that would be ridiculous because they had a top 10 offense. They've improved their defense, but the fact that Sam Darnold is not back and now they are turning over to a quarterback who has never played before that equals uncertainty. And that's why the Vikings have considered an older veteran quarterback. It's why they considered talking about bringing back Sam Darnold, but turning things over to an uncertain quarterback with no sample size whatsoever is always going to get a conservative estimate from the Vegas people. We also need to talk about what this means as far as if this is the expectation or if the expectation is higher and the fact that

well these numbers are great and they're interesting to talk about what if it went over what if it went under it doesn't really have a predictive nature I don't think so when I looked at this last year with the six and a half i went dug deep into past over under and how often. They were blown out of the water or how often they were accurate or how often they were too low or whatever else. And what i realized was that there were a lot of instances where Vegas was a little too low on teams and they went from six and a half to say like 10. That happened all the time. Each year that happened.

It happened to the Baker Mayfield Tampa Bay Bucks. There were maybe 20 examples over the last 10 years of where teams were thought of to be very middling, kind of out of the playoffs in preseason, and then they made the playoffs. There were very few instances, really none, of a team blowing out of the water a six and a half, the way that the Vikings did last year. That was something that, I mean,

we might not see happen again. Normally, the over-unders that were really high were very accurate. It was like the bills, the chiefs, the teams with the great quarterbacks. And even when I went back a little bit, the Packers and the Saints and the teams that have great quarterbacks,

you can almost lock them in every single year unless something super weird happens or there's an injury or a coach kind of falls apart or whatever happens but for the most part if a team is getting a huge number then they're probably going to be really good and if they're getting a incredibly low number then they're probably going to be pretty bad I mean I saw that the Giants were maybe four and a half but who can make an argument against that I would probably say that they can win five games with Jamis

Winston and Russell Wilson. But does anybody think that the New York Giants are in a position in the division they're in to be anything except for really mid and really mediocre. But when it comes to that middle, when it comes to the teams that get eight and a half, seven and a half, nine and a half, I think what the people who are setting this line are telling us is we don't really know.

Like they could be good if a lot of things go right and they could be mediocre, but we don't see them being terrible. That's what they're saying about this. And with JJ McCarthy starting, everything is really on the table. Now based on what I've seen in training camp, based on seeing him take second team reps,

but playing against the Vikings, first team defense, the development that he underwent, if he's healthy, if he gets the entire off season, by the time he gets to the regular season, he's going to have a lot of experience, not playing, but practicing pre-season. I assume that he's going to play a lot in the pre-season and all that to the point where he should be ready to play in the NFL.

And he is as well supported as anyone has been coming into the league. I ever, I mean, really, truly for someone starting for the first time, you have a difficult time finding many more quarterbacks who inherit the best wide receiver in the NFL and the coach of the year and two franchise tackles. You just don't see that. So I think from that perspective, we can at least softly guess, not with a, hey, there's no way, they would softly guess that the Vikings should be on the right side of this,

that they should be able to go over eight and a half. And the expectation is absolutely over eight and a half. I think that there will be patience from Vikings fans for JJ McCarthy in his development, but there will not be patience for losing. If you move on from Sam Darnold and you don't get that other guy who would be the win now options on a win now roster,

then you do have to win. We have gotten past the point with this team where we're talking about, oh, well, you know, they're just coming along and let's just have a fun vibe season. And I remember going into last year, Sam Monson saying, maybe it's just like a mulligan year for Kevin O'Connell. Well, it didn't turn out to be that way,

but we were all prepared last year to give them a lot of space. Well, Hey, if you got to develop JJ McCarthy or Hey, if Sam Darnold's got to play this whole year and you win eight games, nobody's going to call for heads. We're still going to look for contract extensions for everybody and still going to think that this train is on the right track, but what 14 wins did is it accelerated that even more. Now I think no matter what year two of JJ McCarthy injury or no injury play or no play was always going to be. This is the year. This is the one that we've looked forward to. This is the one that we've talked about for a very long time,

going all the way back to probably when did we really start talking about this? When Cousins signed his contract, we all knew, especially because Mike Zimmer said it at the combine, but we all knew that, hey, when you spend that much on a quarterback, you have a very small window to win because you got to do it with this group. You can't really add to the group. And I think it was really after 2018, we started having the discussion, uh, after they missed the playoffs.

Like, can you really win with this group with this, you know, not being able to add much in free agency, but then it was 2019 to 2020. When they lost what seemed like half the roster and then won seven games that next year. That's when it really became, you can't do this. This is not going to work to put this much money into this quarterback and then try to win. And we started that discussion of, Hey, it's the 2020 draft.

You had about as good of a team as you're going to have in 19. Maybe you should draft quarterback also kind of turned out that that quarterback draft was awesome and it was two and it was Herbert and it was Jordan Love and I'm missing somebody but there was a bunch of different was at Borough maybe number one. There was a bunch of different, really excellent quarterback prospects. They miss out on the draft that year. Oh, Jalen hurts was Jalen hurts is the other one.

So there's just like all sorts of great quarterbacks in that draft. They decide not to draft one, even though they could have had love or Jalen hurts. Now they got Justin Jefferson, but they had two first round picks, didn't spend the other one on a quarterback. They go back to that same model and that's where this began.

So five years ago, you guys have been talking about for five years this season that's coming up right now. And you can't tell me that eight wins is fine when this is the season that you've been talking about and thinking about and looking forward to and they've been building and building and building for and. That they just went out and they just spent all this money on eight wins they got a cut it missing the playoffs a cut it not when you. when you did everything you could to stack this roster, to build up the interior O line with a very expensive guard and an older center. And you go out and spend on two defensive tackles that are in their thirties. And I think it has to be a relevant part of the conversation of the average age of this team. They just don't have that many young players. Some are developing, but they don't.

And to me, that's perfectly fine because that's how you do this. If you look at a lot of the teams that have been really good around young quarterbacks, it's not a bunch of young players all the time. There are young players on the Philadelphia Eagles, but there's a ton of veterans that are around Jalen Hurts, Saquon Barkley, AJ Brown, Dallas Goddard, Lane Johnson. There's just a bunch of guys who have been in the NFL for a long time and they have their young players. But a lot of times veteran teams win the Superbowl or go deep into the playoffs.

The Rams in 2021 with Stafford, I know he's an older quarterback, but that roster with Vaughn Miller and Odell Beckham and all that, right? I mean, it's usually experienced players that know how to go deep into the playoffs and win. That's what they're trying to do with this team around JJ McCarthy, which means this is not a let's just see how it goes. Let's just see if he develops. Let's see if it's art. No, this is a massive decision to move on from Sam Darnold just because everybody agreed with it.

Doesn't mean that it still shouldn't be analyzed. The decision to move on from Sam Darnold, somebody who threw for what 4,300 yards, 35 touchdowns. I mean. To let that go out the door to not franchise tag him and not force him to stay. And then go to somebody who's never played before that that person has to work and this is probably why there is the nervousness inside of the building that would cause them to talk to certain people but. It has to work. it would cause them to talk to certain people, but it has to work.

Eight wins doesn't work. So I think it is a bit of a line of demarcation. I would slide it one more. If we were sliding a, this is success. This is not success. If they don't win 10 games. And I know the schedule is hard, but you're trying to win the Superbowl. You're not just trying to get there and survive. And we've been through that.

We've been through all the years of, wow, darn that schedule. You know, it's pretty hard. Right. I mean, this is not that mentality anymore. So you have to draw the line at. You have to be better than nine and a half wins. You have to be better than hopefully they're in the race. Like you're showing up to try to compete for the Superbowl right away

with your young quarterback. Now, if they don't win the Superbowl and JJ McCarthy has a good season and whatever that now I'm not going to sit here and say, Oh my gosh, fire KOC or something like that. One team wins the super bowl. Everybody else goes home disappointed. Uh, the arrow has to be pointing up, but I agree with Matt who said, you know, anything less than 10 is a disappointment.

So I think that this number is drawn in a way for Vegas specifically to hedge on not knowing what JJ McCarthy's going to be. You move at one win more and you're almost insinuating like this is a playoff team with a quarterback who's never played before. And that's probably tough for them to make because there's so many potholes there, there's so many potholes with someone who's never played before. So they're splitting the difference a little bit between normally if you had a rookie quarterback, they would not be taking over a team like this.

And inexperience would matter so much. And you would put them lower. You'd put them at six wins, but because there is so much around JJ McCarthy, because of who his coach is, I think eight and a half is the benefit of the doubt. For JJ McCarthy from the Vegas gambling community. But for me, the fact that they moved on from Sam Darnold raises the level of where you need to get in order for this to be a successful season. So that's my take on eight and a half wins. When intern Clay pops in a little bit later, we will talk about the rest of the NFC North.

He's got some other things from around the NFL gathered as well, but let me scroll back up to the top of the comments here and we can have a conversation about whatever is on your mind, except for Aaron Rodgers. No Rodgers zone tonight and hopefully forever when he makes the hall of fame. Hey, how about that? The next time we talk about Aaron Rogers, when he makes the hall of fame, that will be great.

Let's do that. Uh, yo MTV wraps says, do you think JJ will see reps in the preseason? Oh yes. A hundred percent. Yeah. He needs them. He needs to play in the preseason. I wouldn't want him playing three quarters

But I would like to see him play quite a bit I mean, I've always been of the mindset that you should not play Starters in the preseason, but when it's somebody like this, you can't keep him on ice Like he's got to learn how to play. He has to get every developmental rep he can get. He has to go out there and lead a first team offense, even if it's just three series. He's not a veteran player. He needs to be out there playing football.

I'd prefer it to be at least a quarter in each one of the games to get him into that mode of like, this is how you play in the NFL. Even last time he came off the bench, he throws an interception and then he gets into his groove and I wouldn't take anything away from how excellent his preseason game was, but it was against the second team and it's not even a good team, second team and it's at home and it's in a nice environment. And like everything was kind of laid out for him there.

You'd like to see him go on the road and see what that's like and play against a different team and see their starters for a couple of seriesers have higher odds in the Vikings. Bears are just below the Vikings, right? We'll talk about that a little more in depth later, but I think it's fair. Where they have it is fair. I mean, if you're trying to take a guess and what you're shooting for is the median outcome, you're not shooting for, Hey, here's what we expect. Like we just talked about, or here's what you're hoping for. In your guys case, here's what you're hoping for.

You're hoping that you're better than those two teams, but they have quarterbacks where you can look at and say, well, Jordan Love had a pretty rough year last year and they still made the playoffs and the Lions won 15 games last year. These teams deserve higher odds than the Vikings. And as far as the Bears go, they are, I think almost as big of an unknown, probably an even bigger unknown than the Vikings are right now. Sean says they're fine undervaluing the Vikes looking forward to proving them

wrong again. Uh, yeah, I mean, when it comes to something like this, it's it, the Vikings used it last year to prove the haters wrong. And there was a lot of people that projected them much lower and that may very well happen again. I just think it's fair. And it probably was to some extent last year. I thought they were way too low.

I mean, six and a half is just six and a half. You have to be a complete joke to be under six and a half. You got to be the giants. You got to be the Browns. Like you're, your team has to have the wheels flying off it. Your bus has to be on fire. You get, just everything's got to go wrong to win fewer than six games. It's happened before in Vikings history, but not many times. I mean, usually, they are at least a mediocre team and with good coaching how many times you ever see a well coach football team win less than seven.

When the viking said everything go wrong with their quarterback they fumbled the ball million times in twenty twenty three and they won seven. Give a well coach team should win seven but i mean if they want to use it as a motivation, then. They, I mean, that's fine. Yeah. They did it last year. They'll probably have some of the same message again, like, Hey, why is everybody doubting us have to be one 14 games? And it kind of worked for him last year.

Uh, Kurt Ploppy says, looking for financial advice, thinking of betting his second mortgage on the Vikings over, please advise. I will never advise you to spend, uh, significant amounts of money betting on the national football league because we, uh, see so many things happen every year that we could never have predicted that I would not do it, especially on this team where you never know what's around the corner. However, I would go over as well. I think that we can separate even what a likely outcome is from, like there's, of course, there's the, if your quarterback gets hurt, well, everyone's screwed if your quarterback gets hurt. So let's throw that argument out. If JJ McCarthy plays the whole season, it's hard to see them winning eight or fewer games. Eight, I

think is possible. Eight is actually possible, but less than that is pretty tough to see. So if the minimum for even when they had to play Dobbs and Mullins and Jaren Hall, if the minimum that this team is going to win with a veteran team with a ton of talent with Justin Jefferson, with O'Connell is seven. I think that we can look at it and say, well, it should at least be nine. And my question is, is beating it enough with where they're at? I think that's no, I don't think that just beating the over under is enough. Sean says, let's see Ben Johnson lead a team

before we crown him in Dennis Green's voice. Oh, we don't remember. We don't crown people on the show. Last year, we were accused of crowning people from Brian Flores, and I'm just kidding around, but he was saying about somebody in training camp, like, hey, let's not crown him yet. And I was like, whoa, hey, I would never, I would never not this

franchise, not with a Denny greens history. We're not, we're not, we ain't, we ain't crowning people here. So, but I agree with you that Ben Johnson is the biggest question mark. The only thing that I might say to that is they couldn't be coached worse. The, the Chicago bears last year, that was one of the all-time bad coaching jobs in the entire NFL. That was a team that was winning games, at least to some extent, it was fairly

competitive and at least Caleb Williams had had some moments. And then the guy forgot how to call timeouts. He lost the team on a hail Mary. Everybody turned on Eber Fluss. They fired him and then they never won again. It just was like hideous. It's as bad as it gets. Sean says, I cannot believe they rated the Vikings this low and the thinking they will be fourth in division. Chicago will be better, but they will be like last year with holes.

Yeah, I mean, that's the hard thing about this. When you have two second year quarterbacks and we've seen Caleb Williams, so we think we know what Caleb Williams is historically speaking. We don't. Like I looked this up when Gino Smith emerged. This was what? 2022. And I looked up at what point do we usually know what a quarterback is going to be, how many starts, how many years. And it was like, when did Eli become good? When did Stafford become good? When did Matt Ryan, Matt Ryan was good pretty much right away, but usually the cutoff was year three for a young

quarterback. So we still don't really know just because Caleb Williams was bad last year. And I have major question marks myself. It does not mean that he's just going to be as bad if he is coached a lot better. If he makes progress. If last year was a little bit of a wake up call to, Hey buddy, what you did in college and ain't gonna work here. He certainly should have taken that away. I'm not saying it means nothing when someone gets sacked 68 times. There are red flags on that and intern clay did a good article

on that if you want to check it out at purple insider dot football about like a lot of those first round picks that got sacked a ton. It didn't always work out for those guys. Like they continued to have sack problems even if it wasn't as aggressive. Still worst coaching job you're ever going to find. I can see why Chicago is getting bumped up. I also think that Chicago is sort of weirdly for a team that never does anything. They're they're more of a benefit of the doubt team. I don't know why. Like the Vikings almost always have a better record than the Bears.

And when it comes to Vegas, there's always this idea that the bears are one step away from excellence. And that might be because they get more coverage than the Vikings do. They're a, you know, it's Chicago. It's one of the three biggest markets. And so they get more conversation on TV for more people are talking about them and there might be more enthusiasm for whatever they're doing and they get pushed a little bit that way because of that.

I know that's not how it's supposed to work, but I don't think anybody's immune to that. I also don't know how the algorithm works exactly to decide on these numbers either. Sean says, if you could go back in time to the quasi press conference, I was only yesterday. If I go back in time to the quasi press conference, I was only yesterday, I go back in time. I wouldn't pick that. What question do you wish you could have asked him? Well, that's a good question. Where would I go back in time?

That's another good question. I don't want to go back into any time where there's mysterious diseases or anything like that. Anyway, that's a good question. Yeah. I think probably, probably the question that I've enjoyed asking quasi-dolphin meant over the years, because it's really in his wheelhouse is about the timeline stuff about, like, did you create a two year window for yourself here?

And I'm not sure how I would have phrased it, but just where does it fit in with the timeline to have a quarterback this young with a roster this old? Like, what do you think of that juxtaposition? Uh, and because I know what you're implying, like so much was on one 41 year old quarterback and a contract situation. And there are, I guess, time limits to these things, but I mean, I'll, time limits to these things.

But I mean, I'll get another chance someday to ask him about that. It's not like he'll never speak again. And I'm going to the owner's meetings and we'll, I'm sure. Well, I know we'll talk to Kevin O'Connell, so I'm curious about what his answer is. But the quasi-daful meant to, I mean, I think it's really been his strongest point is understanding how to have everything aligned at the right time, that there were years that were transition years. And even last year, you know, he talked about it before the season.

He said, well, I could see a world where everything clicks in and we went a lot of football games and they did. And that's what happened. But I, that was the first question I asked him after the season. I asked him about how he kind of dealt with that, like a reality, because I'm sure his numbers pointed to, Hey, this should be a competitive team, but probably not a 14 win team. And then it happened. Does that throw off the timeline? Is, is that, you know, unexpected, but now that we've, the other thing is like, now that we've reached the point where this was your aim, like this was where you wanted to go when you got

here, what does that kind of say or, or how do you feel about that? I think I would have liked to have asked him, uh, you know, something along those lines, but that was not the press conference for it. Just, uh, you know, I said it yesterday. When you have somebody like that involved in the discussion with the team, it's just going to get a lot of questions. And also there were some of you kind of going after the reporters kept answering the questions. So you're going to look for more and more information.

And by the way, credit to quasi Daphne Mensah, he gave the answers. He was transparent. He was transparent. He was open. He told you how it is. He told you exactly how it is. I would never criticize somebody in charge for going up there and saying what the truth is. The truth is they talk to him.

The truth is the door is not completely closed. All right, great. We have our answer. Now we know where it stands. That's, that's great. I think that was good. It took a lot of questions to get it. But the fact that we know where it is, that's the goal. That's what we show up for. Try to get as much information as possible. But yes, I would like to hear what he thinks of having a quarterback this young with a team this old and this expensive soon. I mean, next year they do become quite expensive.

Steve says, I'm high on McCarthy, but in all reality, no one has seen him play one snap. Right. That's and that's why you can't do the like WV Walker says it's disrespect disrespect. I mean, you can do that inside the locker room. I mean, you can make anything disrespect if you want to, uh, you know, there's plenty of KG and Michael Jordan stories about them making up stuff and making up disrespect, you could do it if you want to, I mean, it's fine inside the

locker room, but if we're being objective about it, it's not a disrespectful number, it's a number this over under of eight and a half that says, we're not really sure. We're not really sure. We think McCart to me in eight and a half numbers as, we're not really sure. We're not really sure. We think to me, an eight and a half number says, we think McCarthy is going to do pretty well. But what's what's he actually going to do? And I'll be curious. Maybe I can look this up.

What Mike Clay thinks. Let's see. You know, Mike Clay does this really cool thing. It's a PDF looks he does projections. Let me see if I can find the Vikings real quick. I'll have Mike on the show eventually. That's 2024. I'll have to see if I can. I'll see if he's got his 2025 projections up.

Because I'm curious about what he thinks McCarthy's going to do. I'll do a show with him later on this year. Yeah, I can't. Oh, there's his projections. Okay. Everyone stay still while I find. Okay. So here's what Mike Clay thinks that JJ McCarthy will do this year. And Mike is ESPN's fantasy guy is good at this at projecting players as anyone I've ever seen in my life. And he puts so much effort into it. So I love bringing them on the show and giving them a hard time about them. So he's got JJ McCarthy as throwing for 3,700 yards, 27 touchdowns, 14 picks,

and getting sacked 39 times, which I think is a little high for, for him. And running for 200 yards. And he has the Vikings at 8.8 wins with his projections. So of course his projections were as wrong as anybody's last year. Everybody was wrong last year about what the Vikings were going to be. I mean, it was a very strange year in comparison to any other time in the NFL. I mean with that over under being hit the way that it was, but I think that that's like all that's really fair. It's what everybody does in projections is tries

to kind of hit it down the middle. Um, you're because if you're doing projections, you're not doing wild predictions. Cause I think those are two different things. Anyway, uh, Andre says, uh, revisiting the collar vibe from yesterday when the media asked similar questions like with Rogers, is that because every reporter is trying to get their own take? No, I think what you're trying to do when it's multiple questions, if you go through that press conference, it's to try to get as much information about this as possible. At one point, Quacey said it's up to him. He said the words, it's up to him.

You can't move on to another question. You gotta go back and be like, wait a minute, what did you mean it's up to him? And then he clarified and said, what I mean is that if he signs with another team, he's obviously not signing with us. Oh, okay, all right, good. Because if it's up to him, whoa, wait,

are we waiting on, you know what I'm saying? So there were a lot of things that were thrown out there by Quacey in his early comments that left gaps. So like who talked to him? Like how much did you talk to him? How serious is it? Is it still a possibility? Like when the questions were being answered,

but not given the whole amount of information, then you're trying to get the whole. And I think that we got the whole amount of information yesterday. And I think that everything was, was fine when it comes to that. I don't think there, there's not something where, you know, this person, I, Oh, let me make sure I'm involved. Let me make sure I'm involved. I don't think it's like that. It's just as you're listening to him give answers, there's still holes in the information that you have to try to fill

in on a subject like this. It's different from any other press conference from the approach, not only because a lot of the press conferences are not as well attended as one that Aaron Rodgers is involved in in some way. Right. So you have a lot more people and everyone is listening to the answers and thinking, well, how, how can I add to this more? How can I get more information on this? Not, oh, I got to make sure I'm involved or at least I don't think it's that way. I haven't gotten that feeling.

I'm sure some medias are, but it's I don't think it's that way. I haven't gotten that feeling. I'm sure some media's are, but it's, I don't think it's like this cartoonish Disney channel. Tell us the truth, crazy. Like he was. So look, I would have preferred that we got some more time and some more questions about other stuff. And we could have gone a little more in depth on some of the actual signings, some of the reasoning behind bringing back an older running back or why they wanted Byron Murphy so badly. But there's, it's not the only press conference in our lives. We'll get more information on that stuff. It's it's actually, and I know I promised to know Roger's own, but if you've been listening to the show, you know, it's my biggest frustration is that I want to talk about how to project this team, how to set

expectations for this team, where JJ McCarthy fits in the roster, build the bigger picture, the guys they brought in and Rogers won't let me. And so that was kind of like yesterday. But I don't blame anybody for trying to get more information about somebody of that magnitude. Sean says last year going into the season better than previous year lost. Yeah. Lots of question marks, tempering how good this team or tempering how good they could be. This team is significantly better than late last year on both sides of the ball. So I agree that on paper, the Vikings are a better team like right now than they were last year. And it's really not that close. I mean, Jonathan Allen and J von Hargrave and Will fries and Ryan Kelly, the

upgrades are enormous. Uh, Jordan Mason, the upgrade is significant. And that's with all respect to how good cam makers is, but it's a significant upgrade and bringing back Murphy, adding a little bit of depth there, adding depth at the linebacker position at the corner position, something they really didn't have. They had to bring in Fabian Morrow at the last minute. Everywhere you look, it's better. Even like Rondale Moore could make it better. Potentially they might add another wide receiver. I saw guestling float it. We're going to, I'm going to talk with guestling at the owners meetings for the show, but people are catching on wide receiver.

It's interesting in the draft. I'm just saying. Uh, but so yes, I agree with the statement. The thing is that you don't run the same track every year. It's not like track and field where they lay it out. You're running a thousand meters off you go. It's every year that thousand meters of an NFL season has different things. You run to last year, Jonathan Granada, Andrew Van Ginkgels,

the phone, Gilmore, Harrison Smith, Aaron Jones. All these guys stayed healthy and they played the AFC South and you just had free wins. And Sam Darnold stayed healthy and Justin Jefferson and Addison after he got back and all those things. A lot had to go right for them. And how many game winning drives was it for Sam Darnold that the get five maybe five game winning drives like a lot of times he came through in the biggest moments in the clutch for them i know not at the end but. Throughout the season that you can always count on that i mean sometimes you get to game winning drives in a year sometime i mean the kicker. Did not hurt them at all when he missed a couple times but the kicker was unbelievable throughout most of the season hit the clutch kicks it just sometimes. You get injured sometimes you fumble more they had the top takeaways and one of the top.

Sack numbers in the league like that doesn't always happen so they are better in each. And I think what they're trying to do there is make it more regression proof that that's what you're trying to do is you're trying to get it to the point where even if there is regression that and this KMAC is touching on this that, you know, even if there is regression, you're a better team to be able to survive it. That's what they're looking for. KMAC says regression to be had from the turnovers forced and positive overall benefit of penalty. That's what they're looking for. K-Max says regression to be had from the turnovers forced and positive overall benefit of penalty. That's right.

I didn't even talk about the penalties. The penalty gap was, was pretty big. Along with McCarthy being unknown, tougher schedule too. That's right. So you try to add to the roster to get as, as much better as you possibly can be because you just don't know how much regression is on your way. And I think they did a really good job of that. I really do.

I think they did a really good job of covering up the weaknesses and making it to the point where even if they don't get as many interceptions, maybe they do get more sacks or more pressures or it's a more diverse pressure and maybe if they don't throw the ball as well, because I mean, Sam Darnold was a top 10 quarterback, so that's a high bar to set for JJ McCarthy to match last year, but if he's the 14th best quarterback, but you run way better, you can even out some of that. That's what they're trying to do.

And that, that number, my clay threw out of sacks. Like it better not be 39 sacks. Cause that's, that's going to hurt them a lot. Like that was another thing they got. They did have a lot of sacks that they could improve for next year. Ryan says, how is the Bears at eight point five wins? They can burn water. Is that a saying? I've never heard that before.

They can burn water. I've heard like pound sand. I've never heard they can burn water. There are way more questions about them than the Vikings and the Vikings have a better team around the quarterback. The under rating, underrated rating continues. Well, yeah, I mean with the bears, they have as much uncertainty. They do not have as good of a roster, but they also don't have a terrible roster for a team that won the number of

games that they won last year. Like their roster was better than their wind total because they had the worst coach in football or at least like bottom three coach in football last year. And they blew so many games at the end. The Vikings won most of their games at the end. The bears lost all their games at the end. They have an argument to say we are way better than what our record was. That doesn't mean that they're going to be better than the Vikings though.

But I think if you're, if you're trying to project and this is why it's fair with the bears, if you're trying to project and you look historically, all right, teams that drafted this high, what did they do? Did they take steps forward? Like look at the Jags, like withvor lauren so i know is not turned out to be great but his first year total clown coach awful to joke urban myers kickin people is weird as heck. Alright next year there in the playoffs they hired a coach who is a little more competent not for very long but at least for that year. And they send so you're always projecting teams that draft high and then spend money like they did. They went out and traded for Joe Tooney.

They traded for Jonah Jackson. And all of a sudden you're talking about a stronger team there in Chicago as well than they were last year. Son of a beavers. If Ty Chandler does not make the roster, who would be a good RB three slash kick returner. So this, uh, also is interesting because, uh, down at the owners meetings, they are supposed to take a look at the idea of moving the touchback out to the 35.

You know where I stand. If you listen to the show for a long time, I am very pro kick return. I enjoy kick returners. I enjoy kick returns. I don't like team scores, a touchdown, everybody in the buildings jacked up. And then we all wait until they kick it out of the back of the end zone and the Vikings, they just decided last year, you know what? Screw it. We're not, we're not going to let these guys return kicks. We are going to just take it at the

30 yard line. We're going to let them have the ball there and go on with life. But if they move it to the 35, that's harder to do. I mean that you're talking about two pass completions and you're kicking a field goal at very least. I mean that's almost midfield at the 35 yard line. That is 15 yards past where the touchback used to be and it's almost a little bit Too much for me to try to emphasize it to this point Although there was some talk that the real reason the owners want to do it They still expect them to take the touchbacks. They just want more scoring which I guess could be the case This guy thought the scoring was fine last year

I didn't think that was a problem, but you know, owners always want more. Anyway, that's not your question. Your questions about RB three kick return. There's no reason to move on from Ty Chandler. He's under contract for one more year and he is a good kick returner. He's got a lot of juice. I just think it means you're going to see him a lot more. I wouldn't be looking to replace Ty Chandler.

I mean, it's if unless he's got some issue, but have him continue you're going to see them a lot more. I wouldn't be looking to replace Ty Chandler. I mean, it's, if unless he's got some issue, but have them continue to be the kick returner in depth. It's true that they don't trust him. That's been made very clear. They don't trust him, but as far as a returner goes, I think, I think he's very explosive. Um, if not though, all of a sudden that's an open competition and Rondale more would be in the mix I would definitely say that Rondale more would be in the mix for Being the kicker Turner if he's healthy if he makes the team all that stuff, right?

Sean says add in trade deadline saying if McCarthy is the real deal You can spend to get one or two pieces of depth and difference makers. Yeah, I agree with that. I agree with that. I mean, if that's like a reason. So here's what I'm interested in, because you're speaking to a point that catches my attention, which is last year, the seas of the NFL parted. It was the real contenders over here.

And what are you doing with your franchise over here? There were more bad teams last year than ever before. And I counted this up at one point, teams that had four or fewer wins or something like that. And it was twice as much as it had been in the previous four or five seasons last year. My question is, does that keep happening or has there been pressure on some of those teams they've improved or whatever? Because I think a lot of it is just that teams understand timelines now and they tank a lot more than they used to. So if you're all in, you're making every move. And if you're not, and if you think we're kind of in a rebuilding phase, teams before would sign free agents just to try to be like a little bit better.

And there's some of that with job saving stuff, but timelines are so in focus now in the NFL that I think teams who know that they're not going to be good midway through the year, they're like, forget it, let's make sure we get that higher draft pick there's more maybe tanking than we've seen before, which could open the door to something like you're saying. And when you put an eight, eight and a half, it's like the teams who are trying to win should get tens just because they're trying to win. At least if it's like it was last year, maybe it's not. Maybe now there's more teams than there have been before that are trying to win, or at least that there was last year.

Mike says the only way 8 wins is even moderately acceptable is if they lose Jefferson for the season, McCarthy is hurt for an extended period, they're shooting one of their bullets this year. Yeah, so of course, and that's why I said I can't really say it like, well, if McCarthy gets hurt, then I mean, because we just don't know and it's unpleasant to talk about that possibility. But you're right to say that the only way that less than nine wins or 10 wins would be acceptable

is if something catastrophic happened. And Jefferson is the main thing and Jefferson is the main thing. McCarthy is the main thing, but assuming everybody is healthy, then they should be in that mix going into the playoffs, 10 or 10 or more wins because that's how good they've built up their roster. And that's how well they're, they're coached. You don't get coach of the year and then sign a huge contract right after the season and all that stuff.

And then we go oh yeah eight wins is fine no no no no doesn't work that way you don't get a pass just because there's quarterback uncertainty because they didn't have to have quarterback uncertainty. They chose quarterback uncertainty i'm i'm i'm on board. I'm on board look they decided we board. Look, they decided we're not going to franchise tag Darnell. We're going to believe it to JJ McCarthy. This was the plan. This is the plan that was promised. Okay, great. I'm on board.

This is what you should do. This is the swing. This is the real big swing. But if it doesn't work and Sam Darnold's in the playoffs and you're not like that's bad. So we still need to hold them to that high expectation. Will, with an interesting question, says, would you call the season a disappointment

if you don't win a playoff game? So that's tough because if you told me that JJ McCarthy went 10 and seven and they had to go to, let's just say Philadelphia, they had to go to, let's just say Philadelphia. They had to go to Philly. And they do exactly what Jayden Daniels did last year, except for maybe they play a little better defense. Let's say they lose 27 to 20 at Philadelphia in the playoffs. And McCarthy went 10 and seven and played as hard as he could in the playoff game.

I don't know about calling that a disappointment. It is a disappointment since you have coach of the year with the huge contract having no playoff wins now after X number of years. That's not good. And that's where the heat starts to ramp up a little bit and would set the bar even higher for the next season. I was like, you got to win playoff games, but you'd be hard pressed to tell me if they're, if they're in that mix and they have a tough playoff loss and JJ McCarthy plays well, because this year is about winning, but it's also about how good JJ McCarthy is going to be going forward. And if he played well in a playoff game and they lost by a field goal, I would say, yeah,

no, that's a successful season and a bad break at the end, kind of like Tampa Bay a couple of years ago with Baker, where what they came close with the Lions and just barely lost the Lions, right? How could they call that? Not a success. They were going to, although they did win a playoff game that year, but you know what I mean? How, how can you say that's not a successful season when you have a

quarterback this young now, if that's 20, 26, then that's a little different, but I don't want it to be too much of a sliding scale when they chose this. I don't want it to be too much of a like, Oh, it's okay. Or whatever. I think we would walk away and say, all right, well, you knowing, Oh, I'll give you a good example. Here's a good example. Josh Allen's second year in Buffalo.

They went to Houston to play a playoff game and he blew it at the end. Like he played well. He caught a touchdown, I think, and they got a lead and then he botched at the end, he fumbled or something. I forget. I was watching it in a hotel room in New Orleans. You couldn't tell me that that wasn't a successful season for Buffalo to be in the playoffs with Alan to be right there and then just let it slip away

because it was pointing toward things to come from their quarterback. So it's a little bit of a sliding scale there that I'm sure those fans were unhappy, but they also want to. Yeah, I think we got our quarterback, though, and that's I think the only time there's a silver lining to losing in the playoffs, but still for Kevin O'Connell, the bar is high. The bar is you got to start winning playoff games. You can't, I mean, you just can't have it go this way where you win 13. You're a darling.

Everyone loves you all that stuff. And then you go into a playoff game and get out coached. And then we all just go okay well fun season I guess. You don't get too many more of those before the heat starts to ramp up. Jacob says if JJ is even average this roster and coaching staff is an 11 win team. I agree with that. That season that Mike Clay projected was JJ McCarthy with 27 touchdowns, 14 picks and 3,800 yards. And he had them as a nine win team in that instance.

Um, that's factoring for the schedule. He's definitely factoring for the schedule there. Uh, but I think that if that's the type of season McCarthy had that we would expect them to win 11 games and you do expect this team after they've done it. So many times you do expect this team to be the one score win type of team that that ekes out a little bit more than their opponents. But again, we don't know exactly how that's going to go. Brian says when they drafted JJ, I set my sights on 2026 is the year to make that run. I'm still in that camp.

I look at this year the same as I would if JJ didn't get hurt. Whatever happens is good enough. Well, it's that for me, it's definitely not whatever happens is good enough. I think your expectation for 2026 as being the like, okay, it is time to go chase the Super Bowl. If you don't get there, it's disappointing. Okay, that's fair because we haven't seen McCarthy play, but I'm not going to go with, Hey, whatever happens happens. Absolutely not. Not after they made this choice to move on from a 14 win quarterback and not after the head coach has taken their them to the playoffs twice and they have melted down in the biggest moment against a pretty mediocre Giants team and then no showed in Los Angeles or Arizona against Los Angeles.

And then they chose to move on from that quarterback and they chose this path. Like you can't just go, that's fine. Like he's young. It's cool. Like, no, that's not, that's just not going to be acceptable for me. That doesn't mean I'm going to be ludicrous about it and say, if you don't win the Super Bowl, you're all fired. But I think it's fair to put that marker higher than,

Hey, if you win eight games, it's fine. If you win nine games, it's fine. I think it has to be more than that. Kerpluppy says, my take is that Sam Darnold and DJ Dimes left not because we didn't want them or offer them contracts, but because they are so impressed by JJ. Okay. Well, there's a spin. There's a spin. Uh, Sam and DJ didn't want to compete with him. There you go.

There's a spin. I think that Daniel Jones didn't want to wait around because he had an offer to go compete in a place where he could win that job. And I think Sam Darnold wanted his team and he's right. He was right to do it. If I was advising Sam Darnold wanted his team and he's right. He was right to do it. If I was advising Sam Darnold, I would have said, yeah, go to Seattle. Don't go to Cleveland, but go to Seattle. It's a good franchise, good players.

I don't know about their coach just yet, but they were right in the playoff race last year. Like, yeah, I had good fans, good stadium. Like go do that. Make it yours. I don't think that he wanted to compete with JJ McCarthy for a spot in as a starter when he just won 14 games. Very fair of Sam Darnold.

And I think that, that Daniel Jones didn't want to wait around for them to make their decision and got a better offer and just took it. It's a, it's a better offer in Indianapolis to win the job, knowing that Anthony Richardson has had so many problems and injuries. Stephen says, I was high on Sam, but his history was with the Jets and Panthers, so I get last year's projections. Right, yeah, I mean, last year's projections, I thought they were too low based on what the team had just done with backup quarterbacks for half a season.

But if you're, if you're plugging these things into the numbers, you can only use what's happened in the past. And what happened in the past was all extremely bad for Sam Darnold, except for 2022 and then what he did in San Francisco. But I think they were looking at the bigger picture saying, I just, you know, don't see it with this team. They also couldn't have expected that Van Ginkle, Grenard, Cashman, they were all better than they had ever been. And that's, you know, Brian Flores, of course.

We think that we think that hey, when you get Stefan Gilmore, we think well, we've seen Brian Flores elevate everyone. He'll probably be better than he was last year. And he was we think. Well, hey, the Granada guy is probably going to be better. But if you're on the outside, you can't do it that way. You can't be like, Oh, well, you know, they like their defensive coordinators, so they think he's good. So let's up it a few wins. Like, it's just not how it works.

But I think they did overlook that stuff. They overlook that Justin Jefferson's a kingmaker. Justin Jefferson makes Kings out of quarterbacks And if you're projecting wins based on quarterback production You have to factor in that they have the best receiver of a generation and he's always gonna make whoever is playing quarterback better Mechanized I think I've been thinking a lot lately about players. I'd be happy with it. The Vikings stick and pick at 24.

Now you're speaking my language, mechanized. You get a neck roll for thinking for, for spending your time and your day. And you're thinking, who would they stick and pick with? That's it. That's neck roll worthy. Uh, what do you think about that idea and who would you like to the Vikings for 24 good question well let me look let me do a little uh I always have my trusty draft simulator up let me look at who might be there who would I take if they sticked and picked?

I was talking to somebody today. Ready? In the league. About this draft. My, my impression about this draft is that from 15 to 50, there's a lot of guys who are good. And that has been confirmed. That has been confirmed. That's the talk, which might make it harder to trade down. So stick and pick's not crazy. The talk in the league is that there's a lot of talent from 15 to 50. And that's my impression every time we do this. So right now. On this draft, Sim, that I just pulled up just to get names, who might be there?

I would certainly take I've been I've been Kenneth Grant. Pilled that what people say like I I hadn't really considered Kenneth Grant a lot, but if he's there, I don't think he's there. I don't think he's there. But if he's there, I'd stick and pick with Kenneth Grant. I just don't think he's going to be there with defensive tackles being in vogue and With his size and his quickness combination. I think he will get taken Kelvin Banks as a guard Kelvin Banks is on the list here as a guard would be interesting

Walter Nolan is certainly in that conversation Derek Harmon gray Zabel. I Don't know that there's a corner that I would take it 24. It would probably, so right. Here's what I got on the list. I got Melchi, Starks, Luther Burden, who I might do just because it's my, it's my belief is my core belief that you just keep drafting receivers and stacking up stupid talent around your quarterback.

So Luther Burden would be hard for me to turn down. Malachi, Starks, Calvin Banks, Walter Nolan, Gray's able Derek Harmon. Who that's a that's that's why you trade down my friends. Look at all that talent. So because I'm me, I would probably take Luther Burden and then everyone would be like, what are you doing as a GM? And then we would just throw the ball all the time and be awesome. But, uh, if it's not that, and it's more of like who they would take, I think

Zable and Derek Harmon would be a tough choice and both would be a good choice. I might go, I love defensive tackles. I might go Zable there, but I love defensive tackles. Tough call. It's a great question. I love the question. Like if they, if they wanted to stick and pick, there's so much talent there, who would they take?

Because once you make that pick, you don't get to pick for a long time. So you better do it right. I might go, ah, I keep saying, I keep going back and forth. I would Walter Nolan's good. Harmon's good. Zabel's good Maybe I would go Harman if you're looking down the road because a lot of times you're trying to look down the road a year or two

Anyway, I'll move on but I could that's that's whole shows on that one because I just like that conversation It's just ludicrous how many good players are there that would fit for the Vikings? I would take Starks burden banks Nolan Zabel Harmon Darius Alexander is there that's kind of interesting You guys know I like Trey Amos Maxwell Harrison Siobhan revel is on there. I mean Nick em and war a is on the board Tyler Booker's on the board I mean, jeez if they don't trade down anyway is on the board. Tyler Booker is on the board. I mean, jeez, if they don't trade down. Anyway, Sean says Vikings were arguably arguably one of the five

best teams in the NFC, better team on defense and offense, better in the trenches, how it is. So really is how equal plus or minus McCarthy to Darnold. Yeah, we can't underrate how good Sam Darnold was in the regular season just because it went bad in the playoffs. Sam Darnold was probably the eighth best quarterback in the entire NFL last year. That's worth a lot in terms of wins. Not only that he was massively clutch for them outside of the end, but throughout the season he was massively clutch That we don't know how it's gonna go. I mean we assume it's gonna go well because

KOCs quarterbacks have done well in those clutch situations I think KOCs a great play caller at those end-of-game situations really great play caller And we saw that from Kirk and we saw that from Darnold and those guys seem really locked in and they Seem to understand where the ball's supposed to go and oh they have Justin Jefferson that helps that moves the needle in big situations having him in Addison but we don't really know and 35 touchdowns That's that's a lot. It's a high bar. So you're right Yeah, they are better in every area and it comes down to right how much he is plus minus to Sam Darnold

but he doesn't have to be as good as Sam Darnold to be where you you need him to be for this to be a success if he's 75% of what Sam Darnold was last year but plays differently I mean we do have to factor this he's going to play different not now says a rookie that hasn't played or practiced for a year eight and a half is generous. Is it though? Is it though?

Because I just looked at this the other day 11 teams with first or second year quarterbacks have made the playoff since 2021 not that long ago. I mean young quarterbacks are thriving in the NFL CJ shrouds already done it twice. It's not like he was the most experienced college player. Came in, had a good circumstance and made the playoffs. Kenny Pickett made the freaking playoffs and throw like nine touchdowns or something.

I mean, it's not eight and a half. I mean, is not a crazy number. They do have a difficult schedule. And Sam comes in with a super chat. Thank you so much, Sam. Really appreciate that. Says with the difficult schedule, I'd say 10 and seven would be disappointing, but not catastrophic. I think 10 and seven is a success with the schedule, but OK.

How they look in the playoffs will matter a lot. JJ showing improvement throughout the year also matters. So that's going to be a tough one. We're really far down the road now in the conversation. I like it, but we're really far down the road now in the conversation. I like it, but we're really far down the road as far as like getting into the playoffs and what it's going to be like in the playoffs, what it looks like and how they play there because there is now pressure on Kevin O'Connell to not be the guy with all these regular season wins and nothing in the playoffs.

You don't want to be that guy. All these regular season wins and nothing in the playoffs. You don't want to be that guy. And there is immediate pressure on JJ McCarthy to be in the playoffs and win. That's why you moved on from Sam Darnold. If you thought Sam Darnold could win the playoffs, he'd be here still. They would have made sure to keep them. They would have used the franchise tag. If you thought that Sam Darnold with a similar roster could go in the

playoffs, they would have kept him. But instead they moved on from him to do better than that. Which means getting to the playoffs and winning in the playoffs. So that's where that's where I swing back and forth because I also know the history of young quarterbacks, the playoffs, not always great. I Jane Daniels was was excellent, but I brought this up with Sam Darnold that Eli Manning went like Owen three in his first three playoff games or something like that, or it was just played terribly.

And there's a, there's a lot of, uh, there's a, uh, a lot of, um, quarterbacks who have struggled in their first playoff game and then have turned out to be great quarterbacks. It has happened many times. So if he doesn't succeed in the first playoff game and then have turned out to be great quarterbacks. It has happened many times. So if he doesn't succeed in the first playoff game, it's not like you're throwing back, give him back to Michigan. Like we're not going to be like that, right? So, you know. All right. Clay is going to be in here soon to talk about the

NFC North and the over-unders there. Chad says, do you think that there is a minor power struggle with the Vikings with KOC and Quace? And I don't know. I don't know. I mean, on the outside, if we just, sometimes we have too much information, right? Like sometimes knowing that Quacey is not signed to contract extension raises all the antennas. And if we get out our Sherlock Holmes, what do you call it, magnifying glass in our pipe?

And we go, yeah, what's going on there? We got to look closer into that, which is, of course, fine. And that's what we do here. And you should it should set off some bells and whistles. But if we didn't know that, would anything say that they weren't on the same page? And would there be anything that that the moves and how the roster has been built and how it's been constructed with this clear plan that they've executed and all that sort of stuff?

So I wonder if we didn't know that. If we would have any discussion about that at the same time, I did bring this up when it came to the negotiations and I brought it up, I don't even know when back into last season about the contract extensions is that when the coach wins coach of the year and 14 games, I mean, he can ask for the moon in negotiations and that might mean the distribution of decision-making power changes and favors Kevin O'Connell more, which might make it more difficult. That's all just to be clear speculation.

That's not reporting. That's not a guess of mine of what's happening. It also might be that they were just really busy in free agency and now they're going to sit down and work out an extension and we can stop talking about it, which is what I think will actually happen. But if it doesn't, then your question, we're certainly going to ask like, was there an issue when it came to who was making decisions? So when you ask a question like that, it's like, what could be, but it could, it could be nothing. And so many Viking subjects in recent years or months have been, could be, it could be

nothing. Could be Rogers. It could be nothing. It could be trading just to Jefferson to the giant giants for neighbors, or it could not be anything. And it wasn't. So I don't know. And that's a hard one to

answer because I'm not them. They know what their negotiations and conversations are like with the Wilfs but as open as Quasir Daffolmenza is about things, he wasn't going to tell us that. So I think nothing on the outside indicates that there's a problem with how this roster is being built and who has the power on the outside. Always possible that it goes the other way. Here we go. This is a neck roll worthy question. Throw your neck roll. Who is going to return punts with Brandon Powell gone? Yeah, Brandon Powell. What a disappointment for last year with the punt returning just went nowhere. I was really surprised. I mean, Brandon Powell is a very likable player.

You undersized got some great to him. Got some edge like Wiley veteran who's explosive and tough. Just didn't launch last year. I don't know what happened. I mean the year before he was good in a lot of areas. So Rondale Moore is a candidate for that. Maybe I don't know the one time Jalen Naylor tried to return a punt. It went sideways, but I don't know how much he had been practicing it.

That might be a position where somebody could emerge that we don't expect. Rondale Moore makes a lot of sense because he's done this before to be in that position, but outside of that, it's really wide open. Maybe somebody they draft. Rodney Adams is the joke answer to that. Josh, what's up, Josh? In your mind, what scenario would have to play out for the Vikings to take a running back on day one or day two?

Day two is possible, I guess, if they traded down and they had a bunch of picks all of a sudden. Like let's say they traded down from 24. Remember I did this draft sim one time where I traded down from 24 to 34. And then I think I went all the way to 50 or something and still got a good player.

But if they traded down twice and they had a bunch of picks and at the backend of the third round, they could just grab a running back. Okay. They won Ashton Gentile has to fall to them. I don't think there's any other scenario and he will not be after everybody saw the video of him working out. I don't think anybody would be upset if, uh, you know, Ashton Genti was here, but I don't think anyone's

letting him drop either. That would be the only situation if there was a gas mask bong. If you remember that for the Laramie Tunsel. Okay, maybe if that happened, then Genti could go to the Vikings, I guess. But even that I don't think so. No one cares about that stuff anymore. So that's the only scenario day two. I could see if they stacked up a bunch of picks from trades down. Uh, I am to the point where you guys are reacting to my, who would I stick and pick with? Raise able. Harmon is a good answer.

Uh, Jada Baron. Yeah. He wasn't on the draft sim, but I would do it for him. Sure. Kenneth Grant, I mentioned it's probably it for the top players. I don't know if there's anybody else that could possibly be there, but Zabel or grant you could do it for them. The reason I like, um, the reason I like the idea of gray's able is just

because of everything else that they've done on the O line. You can place a young player in there and not have to say, Hey, kids, save the offensive line. So often that's what happens in the league. Hey, rookie left tackle. Just go save. Just go be the whole offensive line. That doesn't work that way.

Mike says talking about how you're not talking about Aaron Rod for a minute or two means you talked about Aaron Rogers. You got me. I quit then. I guess. I don't know. We're trying to avoid the subject is the point. Mike, I mean, are you one of those rules stickler guys? Your foot's one inch over the line.

You said you were not going to talk about him, but you talked about how you were not going to talk about him. Steve says Brian Flores is the most underrated X factor based on national reporting. In my opinion, that is probably true that everybody knows that Brian Flores is good at his job, but I think what they don't maybe fully realize is that this defense has not been perfect. If you were to go back and say, where did I expect them to be in 2023? I would have said 20th 23rd based on their talent, and they were maybe top 15 13th, something like that.

And then last year, where do you expect them to be? I think we I'm sure we had this discussion. I probably said 10th. If they're if they're 10th, eighth, that would be really good. And they were fifth. I mean, he is consistently elevating what they have on defense. Luck plays a factor in defense. But when you have a coach who consistently elevates.

It does matter for when we're picking expectations and when we're doing the over-unders, you're right that I think from the outside you go, well, you know, their defense is good. They've got Flores, but it's like, can, can you really show someone with your hands how much he took players and elevated them last year? Josh Mattelis continues to be a great player, right? Somebody who was a special team or before Van Ginkle never had double digit sacks. Jonathan Grenard had double digit sacks, but never pressure numbers like that.

Just player after player being elevated. Stephon Gilmore, we were thought to be more or less done. Right. So yeah, I mean, and then he comes in and plays really well for the entire season. That's kind of the Brian Flores effect on the defense. And that's that's important. Sam says I stand for Brandon Powell guy knew the offense inside and out. It's what allowed him to make the roster. Well, yeah, I mean, look, I like Brandon Powell as much as anybody, but it is a performance league and the performance just wasn't there.

It just wasn't son of a beaver says, I got a tough one for you. Anyone from the international pathway program? Yeah, you know, that's just going too far. You can't. The thing is that you can't reach for the neck roll. I feel like that was a reach for the neck roll. It's just got to be natural. It's just got to be a guy saying, yeah, I spent all day thinking about stick and

pick and like, okay, good. There you go. That's you belong here. This is where you belong.