Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - The Vikings still going to trade people despite beating the Packers, right?

Episode Date: November 2, 2020

Matthew Coller and intern Paul break down the Vikings' win over the Green Bay Packers. What does it mean toward the trade deadline? What do we make of the fact the Vikings' best win of the year came on the shoulders of Dalvin Cook? What does this say about the Packers' chances to win down the stretch and in the playoffs? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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If the foundation isn't right, then the rest of it's going to go wrong from there. And more. Subscribe to Front and Center today. Oh, welcome to the host. Oh, my. The Minnesota Vikings beat the Green Bay Packers podcast. Matthew Collar, intern Paul here, as always, with questions to react to the Vikings' victory. I think that my head is still a little spinning here, Paul, from Delvin Cook putting up four touchdowns.

The Vikings defense coming up with big stops in the second half of an actual football game that happened. And the Vikings are now 2-5 as they head into the trade deadline, which is a big discussion coming out of this game. So you tell me. There's lots of different ways we could go with this. You tell me, Paul, where do different ways we could go with this. You tell me, Paul, where do you want to start with this one? I think just to be respectful to Dalvin Cook, he had four touchdowns today. I feel like we need to talk about Dalvin Cook, first player on the Vikings to score four touchdowns, non-quarterback, since Ahmad Rashad in 1979. They mentioned that on the broadcast several times.

But yeah, this seems to be the Dalvin Cook game. There's probably 12 by the end of his career we could point to as Dalvin Cook games, but this was the epitome of a Dalvin Cook game. I want you to just talk about the game, but the question I want to frame it around is, is there any non-quarterback that, like an offensive skill position player that's not a quarterback,

that's more valuable to any team than Dalvin Cook is to the Vikings? Because I know we'll talk about the running back and the contract and how that might not be worth it, but he is so important to this offense, and he might be the single best skill position player that just affects the rest of their team. So it's an interesting question because Delvin Cook was marvelous today. And when they put in Alexander Madison, it didn't really go anywhere. And last week against the Atlanta Falcons, when Madison was in, it didn't really go anywhere.

But at the same time, you could say, yes, he's extremely valuable to this offense because they want to win games like that. And look at him go. I mean, he just was all over the place today. 50-yard screen passes for touchdowns, breaking tackles, coming up with big plays, even on checkdowns or runs on second down and long, which there was a reduction of those I felt like today, but even a few where he still makes it work for you and he can carry the entire load. At the same time, you're two and five.

Like, I mean, I know that one of those losses comes without Delvin Cook, but in a way it sort of tells you about the value of running backs that even when you have the best guy in the entire league, which I think that Delvin Cook has a great argument for that. It still does not win you games the same way that having a great quarterback does, or even in a lot of ways, having great wide receivers. Now today, of course, this is a different game. This was wind. This was Green Bay just refused at any point in the game to stop the run,

except for at the very, very end to give Aaron Rodgers one last shot. But even this, here's what it tells you. When Julio Jones has an unbelievable game for Atlanta, they score 40 points. When Delvin Cook has an unbelievable game for the Vikings, the best part of it is that they did a lot of keeping Aaron Rodgers on the sideline, but you still only end up with 28 points and you will never see a better game by a running back in the NFL in 2020. And you scored about an average amount of NFL points today against the Green Bay Packers.

So I'm not downplaying what he was able to do or saying that you could put anybody else in there and that it would be fine. It's just when we talk about this, it's how valuable is it really? If you don't trust your quarterback, I guess it becomes more valuable, which we really saw at the end of the game. They had third and short, an opportunity to just throw a quick pass or something, get a first down, end the game, don't give the ball back to Rodgers. They decide to hand off out of the shotgun.

It goes for a loss because everybody knew in the entire world that they were going to give the ball to Delvin Cook. So I kind of go back and forth on this. I mean, he is every bit the player that everyone says he is, that Mike Zimmer thinks he is, that the front office thinks he is, that his agent, his friends, his family, everybody around him thinks he's great. It's just, is this really the way it worked today? But I'm not sure that it's really the way to win as you go forward. And we think of everything through the lens of the

future, because if they stopped Alvin Cook today, then what happens? And that is generally what they run into. The Packers have not done a great job of it in recent games against Delvin Cook. But think about in the playoff game against the 49ers. They stop Delvin Cook, and they end up easily taking care of the Vikings offense. And I think there's a reason why the Vikings are one of the only teams in the NFL that has an expensive quarterback and still tries to win this way. Yeah, I think I agree with you, though. The only thing I really need to look at is he scored four touchdowns. He had 163 yards and Aaron Rodgers still had a really good shot to beat them at the end.

He was dominant all game long and it still took a complete turnaround on the defensive side of the ball in the second half. It took them stopping Aaron Rodgers. It took him throwing a ball just inexplicably over a wide receiver's head in the middle of the third quarter, I think I remember. It took them a bunch of penalties. The Packers were sloppy in a lot of aspects of this game, and it still was only a six-point victory.

And even though he looked dominant in so many different areas at so many different times, they punted three times in the second half when Green Bay really knew they were going to go to him. They gave it to him a couple times that last drive to, like, finish off the game, and he couldn't get them. And it's not even necessarily his fault. It's the offensive line. It's everything else that they need, which they got a lot of good run blocking um most of this game they didn't really need pass blocking uh kirk cousins only had 14 pass attempts um so yeah he needs so many good things to happen around him for him to be successful but when that

happens we just saw what what is the outcome and it makes you want to say well god we really should be investing in the offensive line that can pass and run block because we'd have this option all of the time. And yeah, the Packers defense isn't where it was last year in either of the games that they played in them. They just don't have the same pass rush coming out from the outsides. And yeah, as much as I liked Alvin Cook, it still needed a DJ Wanham strip at the end of the game for everything to kind of work out for him. confirmation to Mike Zimmer that this is the way to win. That when they do win, oh look, we ran for

this many yards. Look, we didn't turn the ball over, which is all valuable. Of course, you want to be able to curb stomp the other team when it comes to handing off. Who doesn't? The 49ers didn't have to apologize in the NFC Championship for running over the Green Bay Packers the same way that the Vikings did today. And you can win like that every once in a while. But in terms of how you want to build your team out going forward, how you want to win games going forward, this is generally not the way. And like you said, it still ends up coming down to the Packers having a chance to come back on you, despite the fact that you dominated them for most of the game. And we've seen the Vikings do this multiple times this year, and it's really cost them, where they get ahead,

and then they have drives that stall after they get ahead. They can't put a team away. They get conservative. They check down. They run the ball. And they think, oh, well, we've got a two-score lead. We should be able to protect this. And today they almost didn't protect it.

And in the other two games they didn't, which is why I never really bought into the, hey, they only lost those games by one point. Right, but you earned those losses by blowing two-score leads, and they almost did it again today. Now, I'm not trying to poo-poo the win because they played about as well as you can play. The offensive line created some humongous holes. Great block on the 21-yard touchdown by Delvin Cook by Irv Smith. Ezra Cleveland looked like he had a great block on that. Kirk Cousins, when he did throw the ball, did not have a lot of pressure.

And I'm going to make a statement right now about the Green Bay Packers. They're not going anywhere in the playoffs. Nowhere. First round out. Write it down. Put this on the whatever you do there with the clips that you put on Twitter. The Green Bay Packers with this defense are not good enough on offense. They do not have enough weapons when they're throwing to Equinemius St. Brown on key third and fourth downs to keep up with the best teams in the NFC. And unless they get an extremely favorable matchup in the playoffs, they'll be out pretty fast. The way that they played today, the way that they played against Tampa Bay,

I think that Green Bay is more or less a paper tiger, even though they're going to win this division more likely than not, and not really a legitimate Super Bowl contender, because there are just answers for them. There was answers in the second half when Devontae Adams was not annihilating the Vikings as he was in the first half, and there were answers by handing off. There were answers by the fact that Green Bay goes from one year being one of the best pressure teams in the NFL to this year, Kirk Cousins on all 14 dropbacks.

I mean, I'll be surprised if PFF has one pressure on Kirk Cousins, I'll be surprised because I didn't see it. And so I think that that says a lot about who they actually are, that they lost the game the way that they did. And I have a really tough time seeing that team as being great as they go down the stretch, more of one of those sort of mid-pack, regular, good type of teams. So that's kind of where we're at with that. I do feel like I was, you know, being critical to start off of Delvin Cook and of the philosophy, but for one game and one day,

I should also say this, that the Vikings attacked the Packers perfectly. And this is one of the reasons why I think the ownership of the Minnesota Vikings likes Mike Zimmer so much, is that there have been many of these games throughout his career. And in this case, their defense was completely decimated and still found a way to come up with some big plays. But in terms of the right game plan for a big game, they have had the answers a lot of times against the Packers. They had the answers against the Saints in the playoffs last year. And I can just see them watching and saying,

this is why we want him to be our coach. And it's also why another team would trade for him if you ever decided to do that. So that's kind of the prevailing big thought is if you rely on Delvin Cook all the time like this, you probably will have troubles when you can't rely on him and the other team stops him. Packers, definitely not a Super Bowl team as of right now. And Zimmer, still good at his job, still knows how to coach. I know some people want him fired.

I don't know if he's the right fit for what they want to do as they go forward long-term and rebuild, but I think he proves again today that there's a reason why he's had a lot of success in the win-loss record. Yeah, I'm not sure any Packers fans actually listen to this podcast, so I'm not sure any of them are going to come back and clip it for you when they win a playoff game. But yeah, presently constructed. They were a little bit easy to solve there in the second half, albeit without Aaron Jones, their kind of version

of Dalvin Cook. He probably would have made a bit of a difference than he did in this one. He obviously made a difference week one, where the Green Bay offense just torched the Minnesota Vikings. and that's kind of what I want to go to next because it looked like it was going to be maybe another one of those days after the first half only had 14 points but they only had two meaningful drives other than the one to just end the half they scored on both of them they methodically went down the field on both of them and at halftime I was thinking I don't think this is sustainable for the Vikings to keep scoring every drive like they have, but I think it is for the Packers, the way they just kept going down the field.

I thought if, like, looking at this result, 28-22, I would have much, like, I much likely would have seen the Packers on the other end of this, Vikings scoring a garbage time touchdown, Kirk fumbling the ball, trying to throw a Hail Mary at the end. Like, if you didn't know the teams, this would be pretty easy to dissect. You'd think that it was the Packers on the other end of this. So what the heck happened to the defense in the second half where they're only forcing like one touchdown drive and punt, punt, turnover on downs.

They were pressuring really well. I think that was probably because they knew that throwing was going to have to come. But man, the defense looked completely different in the second half. It's the best half. well. I think that was probably because they knew that throwing was going to have to come. But man, the defense looked completely different in the second half. It's the best half. I feel like we've seen them play. So just a few hours after it, I'm not sure how much we know right now. We might have to go back and look at it. But from your perspective, did anything change? Did Zimmer say anything changed? Did the players say anything? Because it looked like a new team coming out of halftime. Well, I'm not going to give you the, I have to watch the tape on this one. So I'll take

my best shot at it. First of all, in the first half, I think that there were some really favorable situations that the Packers got into because they were running the ball so successfully. The first drive, they were just handing it off and getting 8, 10, 12 yards every time, and then that stopped happening in the second half, and I don't know if that was a schematic adjustment or if that was just the defensive line being really well-rested, which I think was a huge deal. So it's funny how each individual game plays out and sort of how the cookie crumbles a little bit matters to whether you win or lose. And what I mean is in the last drive of the first half, the Vikings took up like six or seven minutes. They go all the way down the field, huge, long drive, lots of plays. And Delvin Cook, I think, finishes that one off with a touchdown.

He must have because he scored every touchdown. And then in the second half, the Vikings get the ball back. And this is why the Vikings, 90% of the time, if they win the coin toss, will kick off first so they can try to have the last drive and then the first drive and you double dip, as Zimmer's called it. He's talked about this a little bit before in the past. So when you come out and then have another long drive, Aaron Rodgers is on the sideline for a really long time.

But also your defense is too. So your defense is not getting worn down. Your defense comes out completely fresh, as beat up as it was, and I think that that helped them stop the run. And it's very weird to say that Aaron Rodgers is Kirk Cousins-like in the fact that he now needs to play from ahead. He now needs a successful running game. He now needs play actions. But when you look at the other weapons that this team has, like Tyler Irvin dropped one of those pop passes

where the quarterback just catches it and then tries to flip it to him. And his throw to Equinemius St. Brown is a preposterously good throw. Hits him right in the hands. He drops it. Throws the Hail Mary or the 50-yard bomb the next play. Hits him more or less in the hands, he drops it. Throws the Hail Mary or the 50-yard bomb the next play, hits him more or less in the hands, he drops it. A receiver should be able to go up and catch that over a safety a lot of the time, and I know that it was windy, but he's just not any good. I mean, we've seen Valdez scantling, we've seen St. Brown enough times. Lazard is decent, but he wasn't out there. So, I mean, those guys, they're not good. And Rodgers not having another player outside of Devontae Adams when the Vikings, I would assume when I do look at the coach's tape, I'm going to see them putting multiple

players on Devontae Adams the whole rest of the game after the first half and be able to slow them down. But I think they were also in bad situations constantly, and they did that to themselves. And this is another reason why they're not that good. Mercedes Lewis is still in the National Football League. I cannot believe this. I must have been playing Madden 2000 with that guy, and they still got him out there playing football,

and he's holding like twice. I mean, the Packers right now should be kind of freaking out after this loss, and I'm not saying that the Vikings didn't earn it. I'm saying that at the same time, the Packers gave this away on a lot of different levels. I mean, we've seen Delvin Cook do special things on screen passes, but a 50-yard screen pass for a touchdown is pretty unacceptable for the defense, and on the offensive side I think they just really hurt themselves in a lot of different ways and then you know the first half

Jeff Gladney had about as bad of a first half as you can have I mean at the goal line he gets smoked twice the first time he's playing so far off of Devante Adams that it was an easy touchdown that that's like what you or I would look like trying to guard an NFL receiver where we just kind of like stand away from them and they easily catch it and we do nothing. And then the second time he falls for a play action because his eyes are in the backfield and he's staring at Rodgers, which is a thing Mike Zimmer has said a million times in press conferences cornerbacks cannot do is stare into the backfield. So Gladney has a tremendously bad first half, but seemed to get it together in the second half, which played a role in the entire

thing. And then as you mentioned, just getting one big play out of someone, and DJ Wanham came up with that big play at the end. Overall, I didn't think that the defensive line did a ton, but once Zimmer's defense is up in a game, we've seen this many times. He starts putting everybody back, and then he'll send a key pressure every once in a while. Jeff Gladney blitz on a third down, and it sort of took them by surprise, and all of a sudden, you know, you convert in a key situation. I think that Mike Zimmer is probably flying home today thinking this was the plan all along. The plan was to run like crazy with Delvin Cook and sort of bend, don't break on defense and win the situations, win the third down,

win the fourth down, win the red zone, win the final drive. and they have not done that in a lot of games, but they did that today. I'm just surprised that the Vikings fly from Minnesota to Green Bay and back. You'd think that they'd just drive, but no, I agree that there was a lot of just weird things happening from the Packers. They're running it on second and long when they're down by 14 at one point, but I don't want to get lost at the fact that the defense played well in the second half it wasn't all just Equinemius St. Brown dropping balls like he was doing that right um but the fact that you lose Cameron Dantzler you lose Chris Boyd and you're you're rolling out with Anthony Harris playing nickel at one point

Mark Fields is out there Jeff Gladney's out there Eric Hendricks has the one play where he's sprinting with Devontae Adams. So it might not have looked pretty at all the points, and they might have gotten some gifts from the Packers, but this defense played really hard, it seemed like. I was a little confused in the first half. Jeff Gladney seemed to walk right by Mike Zimmer at one point when Zimmer was trying to tell him something. If they had lost, I was going to bring that up and say are are we worried about Zimmer's like coaching not getting to the players

we might still have that discussion but they played really hard in the second half where I think I expected them to not play that well after getting scored on twice after what happened with the Falcons after what's happened all season long. They lose more corners. It had all the recipes for we're going to give up now and Aaron Rodgers is going to go take this one like he takes every other big game. And it wasn't that. They forced them into some tough situations. It wasn't just easy drops they were having. They were having to make a play. Some they made, some they didn't. So I really liked the way the defense performed. It might not have been the most stout thing, but it got the job done.

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So when you try to extract all these different things, my thought is, well, what do we come away with here? I mean, there's the people who tweeted me right after the game and said we should really be four and three like no no you shouldn't you blew those games and you earned those losses but okay I see what you mean maybe this team is not as bad as a true tank-a-thon type of New York Jets team. The Jets, of course, got murdered by the Kansas City Chiefs today. The Falcons got a win, so that helped the Vikings a little bit if you're looking for the race to the bottom, but that's one takeaway for me is this team was always too good

to go 3-13 or 2-14. They were going to win games like this. They have great players on the offensive side, at least four, I'm going to count Jefferson, legitimate superstar type of players. On the defensive side, Zimmer was always going to be good enough at scheming, and I think that that is part of it too. Now he's faced Matt LaFleur a bunch of times. He's got a good sense for what he's going to do in a situation like that and was able to find ways to limit Rodgers. And this has just been a Rodgers thing, by the way, for the last few years. When they're down in games, he holds the ball, holds the ball, holds the ball. And I can't decide if that's Rodgers or if that's no one open.

Today, though, it was the same sort of deal. He's rolling around. He's looking around. No one's there. No one's open. And then he throws short or he takes a sack or he has to throw it away or he gets hit from behind on DJ Wanham. So a little bit is like what percentage is Zimmer really scheming his butt off and coaching

his butt off today? What percentage is the Packers giving a lot of things to the Vikings in terms of opportunities? You know, I'm trying to pick it all apart for what it's supposed to mean as we go forward here when you look at the schedule you know if you're always sort of ping-ponging back around about well the last game says this about your team then all of a sudden it looks like yeah they can win some games here going forward but i also know that there's a lot of fans who are looking at that and going, no, no, no, no, no, no, that's not what you want is to be winning games. So there's kind of that, you know, being a little bit conflicted. But I think that what Zimmer really needed, though,

from him personally, was a win like this, where players who are on the younger side, they show progress and where you see them rising to a challenge and beating a team that they haven't been able to beat. And I think that if his job was teetering on the edge here, that it is now a lot more secure than it was. Now what this all means, I'm going to change the subject on you, Paul. What this all means for the trade deadline is still the most interesting question coming out of this game it just feels weird to be two and five and saying well you know uh i think that dakota dozier had his best outing like i don't know okay great fine um you give me your opinion first uh do you think that the vikings will change their course at all when it comes to the trades now that they have a win

against the Packers? I hope not. I think it could. I think everything we know from Mike Zimmer, Rick Spielman, if they're still fighting for their job, they say this is the game we wanted to play. We beat the Packers in the division at Lambeau. We can continue to do this, but if you want us to show progress this season, you can't deplete us all the way. Like, if you want more of these results, we can't get rid of Anthony Harris just yet. We can't get rid of Adam Thielen. Maybe to a lesser extent, we can't get rid of Riley Reif. Like, we just blocked really well. Now you want another hole to come out open on the offensive line like i can see that happening i saw after the game mike zimmer said this doesn't affect what what we do at the trade deadline i'm not sure i believe him i i want to believe him i hope that's

correct because we just saw the baltimore ravens lose their left tackle they could really use riley reef though we've talked about the Titans could use Riley Reif. Adam Schefter reported Anthony Harris was open to being – or the Vikings were looking for trades for Anthony Harris potentially. We saw maybe Adam Thielen wasn't going to be one of those guys being traded. I would doubt that we see him, especially after this game. But I still think they should trade him. I hope Mike Zimmer is telling the truth and that they're still looking for shooters, especially for those guys just on one-year deals, because with the cap the way it is,

it just doesn't make sense that you'd be able to bring back Riley Reif or Anthony Harris. But I'm not sure. How do you view it? Because I wasn't expecting Zimmer to say flat out, like, this doesn't affect it. Like, that was kind of a little bit of a surprise to me. Yeah, you know, I guess I don't have a great feel for it because I just don't know how convinced they're going to be by this win that anything is different.

I think you shouldn't be. I mean, they just lost to the Falcons two weeks ago. I don't know what changed. I mean, things fell the way that you wanted them to fall. Like you didn't come out and throw a first play interception like you did against the Falcons. But still, when you look at the overall performance by the defense, you look at the overall performance by the offense, you don't look at this and say, boy, it's time for a run. I mean, this team's going to go wild. You needed four touchdowns from your running back. You needed 200-plus yards from your running back.

And, you know, that offensive line didn't have pass block at all. They didn't have any pass block, like drop back pass block situations. And so even as nice of a win as it is, and I'm sure that a lot of people in Minnesota are going to go to work on Monday and feel really good about it, like, screw you Packers, if we go 1-15, I want the one to be against the Packers, and I get that feeling, of course, for sure, especially since it hurts the Packers in their race for the playoffs, and more or less just demoralizes the state of Wisconsin, which is probably okay with a lot of people. But when it comes to the bigger picture on this thing,

you still realistically have holes all over the field. And if Mike Hughes' injury is serious, which it appears to be, if Holton Hill remains out for much longer, Chris Boyd got hurt, as you mentioned, Cam Dantzler will not be playing next week, I'm certain, and I don't know when he will be playing again after a really ugly injury which Mike Zimmer said that he returned back with the team to travel home with them which was really good news because when you see a guy not moving and go off on the stretcher it's really concerning but that means he's probably not going to play the defensive line still isn isn't pressuring people, even after today with Rodgers, who held the ball for a really long time. So it's not like you're going to snap your fingers and then all of a sudden this becomes a 9-7 team. You would have

to go crazy down the stretch for something like that to happen. I look at it much more as, hey, that's a good win for you. You should be excited about it, but you should still do the right thing for the future. Now, Ronnie Stanley got hurt today. He's offensive lineman for the Ravens. It seems like a natural fit to call them up. I mean, it does feel like you've done too much trading with the Ravens recently, but if it's not the Ravens, the Titans to trade Riley Reif there, the Cleveland Browns still need a safety you should trade them Anthony Harris and then just go forward with these young players and then actually here's the cool thing I think for fans what happens as we go down the road when these players improve they get their opportunities

they make big plays they have fairly exciting games like today like with what DJ Wanham did I think it makes it more fun as opposed to saying, well, you got a lot of players who are, you know, really kind of dragging here. And, you know, they got up for the Packers, but are they going to get up for, you know, Detroit or Chicago or Jacksonville or whatever? We don't know. Teams like this are really inconsistent. But if you put your young players in a position where they get to play a lot, I think it becomes a lot more exciting for the future.

Because I'm going to guess that a win here takes the Vikings playoff odds from about 2% to maybe like 6%. I don't think it's going to jump much with a win here. So they shouldn't change their course. And if they do and they say, well, we didn't trade Riley Reif because we beat the Packers and we believed we could make the playoffs, then I think that's going to open up a whole new door to criticism. Yeah. Fox was trying to push the playoff thing. They were showing the teams that had started or won in their first, like, six weeks.

And they were like, well, it's happened before. And I was like, okay. You've had the whole history of the league yet. It's happened three times. But, you know, when you look at the NFC, though, mean just to kind of like put that to bed i mean first of all there's a bunch of other teams with one or two wins too i mean washington and dallas we look at those teams go oh my god those teams are horrible they're just where you are and even atlanta is two and six but if you're just counting off the whole seven teams thing okay so the Bears and Packers have five wins.

That's two. Detroit has more wins than you still. That's three. Tampa Bay is four. The Saints are five. Carolina has more wins than you. That's six. Then Seattle, Arizona, L.A., San Francisco.

Ten teams right now are ahead of you, and you're going to get by at least three of those. And there's a bunch of teams that are tied with you. I just, I have a really, really, really tough time seeing that work. And plus the one spot is designated for the NFC East. So that makes it really kind of more like 11 teams are ahead of you. So, or, or either. Yeah, right. Oh, ahead of you. So I don't know. I think that that's a very, very tough spot to try and convince yourself that you should do anything different. And, you know, today there's going to be a conversation, I'm sure, with a lot of people, and it's already in my Twitter mentions, of not being super thrilled that they won

because people watched Zach Wilson play for BYU and did their skull searching last night and are really thrilled about how you know the quarterback class looks and you know I don't know I mean I don't know if uh now you're in that race like now um there's a website called like tankathon which is amazing and they have the Vikings drafting ninth right now. And so where you're going to end up, or at least as of this moment, is right in the middle. You don't really want to be there. So this win makes it muddier, but I think you can still see through the muddy waters how clear it is that you want to be focused on everything future. And then how the chips fall is how they fall when it comes to how Delvin Cook plays is he healthy cousins do you win a few more games like this Zimmer

Spielman all those things but I think as far as the immediate future you should very much still stay focused on the prize yeah and I think part of my concern of whether they're going to move people is the fact that we really haven't seen many moves from them. I know last week Chris Mortensen reported, oh, trades are going to start happening earlier. People want to get them in the building. COVID, you want to get them through the protocols. We haven't seen any of that. And so I'm thinking if other teams have been trading, maybe I'm a little bit more concerned.

Like all these other teams are making moves. The Vikings haven't done anything yet, but no one's made any moves yet. So that makes me think, OK, maybe they still have some pieces to move the one thing maybe this win changes is they don't move some of the guys that were kind of like outside possibilities of being moved your Harrison Smith's your Adam Thielen's maybe if they get blown out by the Packers the Wilfs are like okay we're blowing this whole thing up we just got embarrassed by our biggest division rival for the second time in the season. This is not good. You can trade anyone like fire sale. But without them, I think they probably keep those guys. But there's no reason Reeves shouldn't be gone. There's no reason Anthony Harris shouldn't be gone. I mean, we just

saw, did you see any point in this game where you're like, dang, I wish they had Yannick Ngakwe in there. Because there was not one point in the game where I was like, oh, where is Yannick Ngakwe? And then when the highlights of the Steelers came up and I saw 91, he's running around. He wasn't doing anything. So this should show you people, or we traded for Ngakwe. He was the big trade signing. We just let him go. It didn't seem like the game was affected at all. So yes, they should move forward. My brother, it was funny, he was like, we can win this game, but then we can lose every single other game. So that's probably how a lot of fans are feeling. You want to beat Green Bay, and you'll probably suffer whatever consequences

that might matter to your draft position just to beat Green Bay. So if we're going to move from five to eight, but we beat Green Bay that one time in Lambeau and we can shove it in our co-workers' faces who are Green Bay fans, like that's worth it. So any other game, they're probably a little bit mad. This one, because of the Packers, I think people feel a little bit better about it. You know, there's another way to look at this game beyond just through the tank-a-thon or through the, hey, you got that win and it was exciting and Zimmer schemed real good and so forth. The other way to look at it is that, you know, how far away were they this offseason in terms of the moves that could have been made to be equal with the Chicago Bears and

Green Bay Packers because clearly the games that I've watched from the Chicago Bears and they're playing as we do this and I think it's not super great for them let me take a look as we're talking about this okay they're losing so more likely than not they're going to lose. And the Packers just lost today and showed all of their weaknesses. And so I guess it comes to mind, were you a couple of veteran corners on the free agent market away? Were you a guard or two on the free agent market or a draft pick who could have stepped in right away? Or even Ezra Cleveland, maybe starting week one, if he wasn't a hundred percent ready, it couldn't have been, or at least when Elfline got hurt. I mean, did you cost yourself a game by playing Drew Samia?

I think it's possible you did. Maybe two games he was so poor. I mean, he got steamrolled in ways I've never seen an NFL offensive lineman get run over. Like, he was making the rounds on viral videos for being picked up and tossed. Ezra Cleveland, even though it was not perfect against Atlanta, showed a lot to like, and I'm going to have to look at the tape, but obviously did really well today in terms of his blocking because Delvin didn't even break that many tackles.

He had a lot of opportunities where he was running free, and especially that touchdown run that I mentioned earlier. I thought Cleveland did a great job. They pounded in from short yardage, you know, right up the middle. I guess I wonder about were you, if you had focused on picking up a few veterans and maybe not trying to trade for someone like Yannick Ngakwe and maybe instead got a couple of situational rushers or free agents. I just wonder, as it is true that now they have two wins and two games where they were

very close to winning, how far away they actually were this offseason. And even though I think that they miscalculated on the whole of how good they would be, I wonder if they could go back right now after this win and say, man, maybe we should have just blank and we could be here as opposed to where they are now. Because I think down the stretch of this season, I think Chicago and Green Bay are not getting much past nine or 10 wins. So, I mean, it's just another way to look at it. I don't necessarily subscribe to,

hey, if you just had brought back Josh Klein, if he was healthy, that all of a sudden you would be four and three instead of two and five. But I guess this game made me wonder that of, well, did you miss by a lot or did you miss by a little, but the little was really bad for you in a couple of games? I mean, the answer is probably a lot, but maybe there's a case for that.

Maybe there's a case for you just missed the little things. I think it was after the Seahawks game. One of our questions was, did Drew Samia just lose them that game? And it was conceivable to think that it might have been. And I don't want to play the, oh, they were a point away from beating Seattle. Oh, they were a point away from beating the Titans. Like this is closer to a four and three team than what they are right now. But if you add some of those pieces and you take away Kalief Raymond in the Titans game,

maybe you win that Titans game. Maybe if you have that guard, you win that Seahawks game. And probably you still, you lose like to Houston because that's the way the Vikings do with those new pieces. And they're probably still just three and four, but you have to wonder about those questions. And they tried to retool a little bit, get younger at certain spots. And maybe they just retooled in the wrong areas. I'm not sure.

I can't really. I think it's a fun game to play. It's a fun game to play of like, hey, if you were to entirely do the whole thing over again, I mean, you're probably not trading for Ngakwe no matter what situation we're talking about because that blew up in your face. But maybe you're closer to the winning a little bit now and competing for the

playoff spot if they had gone and taken that $13 million that they gave to Yanni Ngakwe and redid Riley Reif and spent that on a couple of veteran corners. I mean, Logan Ryan, I don't know how he's played for the Giants, but he was a name that came up all the time. I don't think he signed for that much money. There was Prince of Macamara. There was Drake Kirkpatrick.

Like, I guess you don't have to look at this thing through the lens of, wow, you botched the entire circumstance and miscalculated a lot of different things, and now you're on the hot seat. But even maybe it shows you just the thin margin of error from you missed on a couple of key pieces and they really cost you. And by the way, your quarterback still threw a ton of interceptions.

And I think that we should talk a little bit about 14 passes. I know it was windy, but it says a lot about Kirk Cousins that a couple of games where the Vikings have been the most happy with themselves after winning have been ones where Kirk didn't throw many passes and it just always makes me think like you could have paid Case Keenum 10 million less for this I mean I don't know right like 11 for 14 160 yards and I I just come back to this is the game Mike Zimmer wants out of Kirk Cousins when Kirk Cousins is one of the most expensive quarterbacks in the league, and that is the Minnesota Vikings in a nutshell. So did you have more questions?

Well, I was going to ask you, what was the Kirk Cousins press conference like? Because I was not there for it, but it must have just been like, hey, Kirk, you know, Dalvin played well. Like, tell us about that. Like, you were just kind of on the side watching. And then like, oh, Kirk, you know, Dalvin played well. Like, tell us about that. Like, you were just kind of on the side watching. And then like, oh, Kirk, like, how is this? Because it was probably the best press conference he's ever been in because no questions I would, or very few were probably like,

how was your performance? Because no one cared about his performance. I was looking just before we got on at NFL Next Gen Stats. I wanted to see, like, what his average intended air yards were because they've been super high. And then he said, we're going to dial it back. I'm not going to throw it as deep. And that was evident. And I wanted the number to back it up. He isn't even on there. You needed 15 pass attempts to be on the list. He didn't even qualify as a starter. Those are meant for like the people that come in and throw a couple passes, the backup quarterbacks. He wasn't even on there. I was like, what the heck? Maybe they just haven't reported his game. No, Rodgers is there.

What's going on? So this had to be the best game for Kirk Cousins to collect whatever game check he makes on a per-game basis. And I was wondering if we were going to even make the whole podcast without mentioning him because he was an afterthought of the offense, and he touches the ball on every single play. Even though sports took a break your business didn't you have to keep moving and that means hiring is more important than ever indeed is here to help indeed.com is the number one job site in the world because indeed gets you the best people fast unlike other sites indeed gets you full control and payment flexibility

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whether he could win this way. You can win eight or nine games this way every year if you have a good defense. They don't have a good defense, so I don't suspect they'll win that many more games like this. I also think that if you hand the ball to Delvin Cook 30 times a game, like they did today, he will get injured again. And they cannot help themselves because what they'll say is, well, we've got a great backup running back in Alexander Madison, and we want to make sure that Delvin Cook is staying healthy and all those things, so we're going to rotate those guys in and out.

Then they get in the game flow. They're like, no, run them again, run them again, run them again. You know, like the, in the movie miracle again, again, again, because he's good and he keeps succeeding at doing it. But this type of strategy, when you have a poor defense, probably is not super sustainable. And I guess I was thinking today about what I wrote for the website for Sunday, for Sunday morning, was imagining a world where they gave Cousins everything, where they gave him a pass first offense, where they gave him an offensive line, a third wide receiver, and all those things, and where they might be this year,

where they might have been the last two years, because their strategy has been like this. And this only works to a point to try and protect the quarterback from the, you know, the turnovers and things like this. It actually, this game actually reminds me a little bit of the end of 2018 where they played against, I think it was Miami and Detroit, and they switched to Kevin Stefanski, and they did this.

They handed off to Delvin 30 times, and they won those games against two not great teams, so this is a little different. But then they played Chicago, and Chicago's defensive line slowed them down, and that was just it, and they couldn't win in the drop-back pass game. And I guess I go back and forth on what the right way to get everything is out of Kirk Cousins I think Mike Zimmer thinks it's today okay just make a few passes throw 15 passes we'll run the rest we'll defense the rest and if you just come up with those key throws then we'll win and I think that's true when you have the number one defense I don't think it's that true when you don't and you rarely do. So it's an interesting discussion to talk about.

If you wanted a quarterback like this, could you have gotten it for cheaper? And when you go forward past this, if you still want to play this way, I think you can. And if you still want to just rebuild the defense, I think you can. if you still want to just rebuild the defense i think you can but i think you need somebody really a lot cheaper as your quarterback than what you have right now so it kind of all circles back to that point about cousins and how much he gets paid versus when you play your best and you're really happy about it and you played your way that you wrote down like this is my philosophy and it includes your super expensive guy throwing 14 passes. Yeah, and this transitions well into the final question

slash thought experiment that I wanted to have with you, which is the next time the Vikings and Packers play next season, is this the same quarterback matchup? Because you talked to Jason earlier in the week, Packers reporter. Yep. He said Aaron Rodgers is going about this season like it's his last. We are, you started a hashtag about looking for quarterbacks that the Vikings might want to draft.

Zach Wilson, really fun Saturday night. Yep. And we just, you just mentioned this doesn't seem to be the quarterback that you would want if this is the game you want to play, which, by the way, has been what they've wanted to play for the past however long Mike Zimmer's been here. But they still managed to sign Kirk Cousins and give him an extension. So somewhere along the way, that changed a little bit. But are these the starting quarterbacks? Is Kirk still here?

Is he playing in the next Packers game? Is Rodgers playing? Are they both gone? Like next time that this rivalry happens, which it was a lot of indifference before this game and Vikings fans, I don't think this had much to build up. Next year's I'm sure will, as it does at the beginning of any season. But are these the quarterbacks?

I'm going to say yes, that it is Kirk Cousins against Aaron Rodgers. Now, that does not mean that our skull searching will be for no reason. That means that if there is a rookie quarterback, just as Jordan Love was inactive for the Packers, he's not even their backup, which I think is also part of this. I think that the Packers drafted someone who's not good in Jordan Love, and they probably know that already. Like, remember when Denver picked Paxton Lynch,

and they immediately knew that they had made a mistake like that, Jeff? Just, I've made a great mistake, a big mistake. What is that? Arrested development. I've made a huge mistake. Like, I think that that is how they felt in training camp about Jordan Love. And I think that the Vikings are not in a great situation to cut Kirk Cousins and hand the ball off over to a rookie quarterback. So I think that they'll just play it out with a drafted quarterback.

Where they draft that quarterback will be interesting. Will they draft the quarterback in the first that everyone's pushing for and everyone wants? Will they wait until later rounds and then hope to develop that player? I mean, we are so far away from that. I have no great feel for that at the moment. But I think that even with Rodgers, they're going to look at this season where he'll finish 11-5, say, and go, boy, that was a really good season for Rodgers. He's still got it. We can't let him go. We can't turn it over to nobody. We also don't have to admit defeat on Jordan Love.

If you think about it this way, the minute that Jordan Love leaves the lot and plays and shows that he's not good, if he isn't, I'm not 100% sure of that, but if he isn't, then everyone will see it. If Rodgers comes back, let's say they even rework his contract, have a lower cap hit, that's part of the issue, then you don't have to turn over Jordan Love. You could trade him. You could do the Jimmy Garoppolo deal where you just trade him to somebody else.

You get a second round pick back, and you say, good luck with all that. And that's the way you could go about it. But I'm going to say that both of these teams will not be able to quit their quarterbacks. If Rodgers does go elsewhere, oh, man, he's going to New England, right? Like after today, New England lost. He's going to New England. He's going to play with Belichick. There's no way the Patriots are bad two years in a row.

He's going to go play with Belichick. So we'll see. Well, this was an interesting game, and it's hard, Paul, to pinball back and forth between, hey, look, some guys who are younger actually played really well in this football game. And I think Ezra Cleveland was quite good, but even there were guys that don't make plays who made some plays,

like Jaleel Johnson made a play. Jalen Holmes made a couple of plays on the run game. And even Jeff Gladney bounced back. And, you know, like you mentioned, DJ Wanham at the end of the game. But at the same time, I think there's the fear of they're not going to focus enough on the future now. So there will be a lot to get to. Monday we'll connect with Courtney Cronin, and we'll see what happens then after we listen to Zimmer on Monday. And I think trades could get ramped up. And we'll connect with Courtney Cronin and we'll see what happens then after we listen to Zimmer on Monday. And I think trades could get ramped up and we'll see.

There could be fire sale. There could be one trade. There could be no trades. So we'll have a lot to talk about either way. So Paul, as always, appreciate your help on the post-game podcast. And we will do it again post-Vikings Lions next week.