Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Tuesday Morning Left Guard: Signs of progress for the Vikings' offense

Episode Date: October 6, 2020

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Download TE1 today, wherever you listen to podcasts. All right, welcome into another episode of Tuesday Morning Left Guard with former Minnesota Viking Jeremiah Searles and, as always, me, Matthew Collar. What's up, Jeremiah? Oh, man, another day. Went out hunting some ducks this morning. Got to watch some football yesterday, and that was fun, too. I like the two Monday night games. I thought that was kind of fun, but just hanging out and just chilling. Okay, I saw some people say say get rid of the thursday night and have double headers every monday night how do you feel about that yeah absolutely i think thursday night's a joke i think thursday night football should just disappear it's never like

a quality game because guys don't have time to prepare physically mentally like i think i think ratings would be better if you did double monday nights and i think you'd, like, have better play, better quality of games if you went two Monday nights and just axed Thursday altogether. And I don't know how you feel about this, but even just from a journalist watching the sport, you know, Thursday night, I'm almost, like, not prepared for it myself. I was like, oh, yeah, the second quarter, like, this game is starting. If the Vikings are not playing on Thursday, every Thursday I forget, like, oh, yeah, the second quarter, like this game is starting. If the Vikings are not playing on Thursday, every Thursday, I forget, like, oh, the NFL season is still going on on this Thursday, and I'm not really prepared for it.

And we got to see Broncos-Jets. Like the number of good games. Boil it, bull. Right, just the number of good Thursday night games is maybe one or two per year. And if that's going to be the case, well, then I'd prefer it to go on a Monday night doubleheader. I mean, the best thing about Thursday night games used to be color rush. That was literally the best thing about Thursday night games.

Like, ooh, let's look what, like, Jacksonville's urine-colored uniforms or the Christmas tree game between the Bills and the Jets. I liked the Vikings, but there's very few teams that had actually good color rush teams or jerseys. But, like, that was literally the best part and the Jets. I liked the Vikings, but there's very few teams that had actually good color rush teams or jerseys. But, like, that was literally the best part about Thursday Night Football. You actually have one right behind you. I do. Your color rush jersey, yeah.

Love that jersey. I thought the Vikings did a great job with theirs. But in Buffalo, as you mentioned, that was the one where people who were colorblind couldn't see which team was which. And you have that one, too. I love the Vikings color rush. I wouldn't mind if they brought that back once or twice a year. You just look like a giant tomato, though, when you're in Buffalo.

Big, red. I'll tell you this. O-linemen don't love the whole solid color look. Not a good thing for big people. Fair enough. It looks like you're wearing a jumper or something. Yeah, exactly. I know that look is always a big thing for offensive linemen.

Oh, yeah, flashy. You know us. All right, let's talk about this game. Here's where I want to start with you because we'll get to the offensive line play. I know that's often your focus when you're watching the tape back. But Justin Jefferson, Jeremiah, last week he gets 175 yards, and you say, all right, let me know when you're in the Pro Bowl Mr. Rookie all right well he came back and did it again over 100 yards two terrific contested

catches great route running great yards after catch and he is at the moment and I know that you take these with a grain of salt but the number one wide receiver in the NFL graded by Pro Football Focus at this moment. Impressive. Are you moving his needle? Last week, I gave you the meter of how awesome is Justin Jefferson, and you were still in the blue. Like, show me. Has he moved from the blue to the yellow or the orange or the red for you?

He's in the light blue. He's in the light blue. It's progress. Definitely progress, but he did it a second week, which was awesome, but he also did it against a team that just fired their head coach, so let's not annoy him, King, because he kicked the kid as he was down, right? So let's make sure he can do it again. Now, I'm not, by no means am I saying, man, he's not going to be. I think he's going to be an incredible talent. Can he sustain this success is what's going to be really important.

I think what was really cool and what was really nice as I watched the game is his play-action shots are where he had his deep, like his really good moments. I think that's a huge thing because that was Diggs, right? I mean, that was Diggs. Diggs was the play-action, deep threat, going to make the big contested catch. I mean, shoot, he had two of them for Buffalo this last week. I mean, that's what Diggs brought to the field for them. So for them finding Justin Jefferson to be able to do that is huge for this offense. And I think it's one of the reasons they had so much success throwing the ball this week was because they had that deep threat that pulled the safety away from Thielen, or maybe he's going to open up for Irv Smith or Kyle Rudolph. You have to pay attention

to him now more on a snap-to-snap basis than you would say a B.C. Johnson or someone like that. I want you to explain how different it is when you have two of them versus just one, because Stephon Diggs at times through last year could be just that one guy, but with Adam Thielen, he's always had someone else to play off in the first two weeks. I think that opposing teams put so much focus on him that it was going to be really difficult. Now the emergence of Jefferson, when other teams are game planning,

they have to pay attention to that. They can't just say, oh, well, we'll just take him one-on-one, and that will be it. Absolutely. I mean, so the way it works on offense, defense, special teams, whatever, at the beginning of every week, you have your scout meetings, you have your, like you have your like install personnel meetings and offense and defense both put a big star around what we used to call game wreckers meaning like this dude can ruin the game individually if we

let him i mean you're talking to aaron donalds and those type of guys but then the defense does the same thing like okay who are we going to take away like that's the way defenses look at it defenses will break down all the tape and so they're like okay we're going to take away like that's the way defenses look at it defenses will break down all the tape and so they're like okay we're going to take away adam feeling and we're going to make everyone else beat us and then you structure your game plan around that like okay if you're if you're game planning the vikings the first quarter of the season here your first thing you're going to say is okay we're going to take away adam feeling and we're going to limit dalvin cook because you're not going to take dalvin cook away you're going to try andvin Cook. Because you're not going to take Dalvin Cook away. You're going to try and, like, limit him, like, right, put the reins on him. And so that's what they were doing.

And so now you emerge Justin Jefferson. So now they look at it and go, okay, who do you want to take away more? Because they're going to have to choose. Because if they just say, well, we're just going to try and play both really well and do this thing really well, then you're going to happen what happened to the Texans, which they didn't stop either one of them, right? Both of them had field days. Both of them had really good days.

But that's because now you can't have your number one corner just match Thielen. You can't have your nickel guy always matching the inside slot. Like, you now have to have a safety help over the top and understand that this guy's on the field. It can't just be an afterthought, right? You're not just like, oh, they're in 11 personnel. Okay, where's 19?

No, it's like, okay, they're 11 personnel. Where's Jefferson? Where's Thielen? Like, where are they going? What's the route concept? So much more for a defense to look at and focus on, which is going to allow the run game to open up and all those things. I think the emergence of two star wide receivers on an offense right now is where you're seeing offenses around the league have a lot of success. So very interesting to me that Houston loaded up on an eight-man box this is next-gen NFL stats for you Houston loaded up eight-man box against Delvin Cook a third of the snaps which is really high like if you did that for a full season that he'd be up there top in the league and he's over 20 percent of an eight-man box in general which is still very high considering

they had some garbage time games which would lower that um if you load up an eight-man box in general, which is still very high, considering they had some garbage time games, which would lower that. If you load up an eight-man box against Delvin Cook, and he beats you anyway, but that means that you've got a safety down, and that means you can only put a safety over the top of one guy. And I think that we went through this with when Jarek and Latavius in 2017 were running so well, or early in that season season with Delvin Cook as a rookie breaking out that if you play a single high against the Vikings with Diggs and Thielen that somebody is shredding you that day,

and now it appears like it's going to be the same thing with Justin Jefferson. And I wonder how teams are going to handle this, if they're going to try and just play two safeties back and say, all right, you can get five or six yards to carry but then they'll just let him do that and he'll dominate the same way he has the last two weeks yeah I mean I think one thing I'll say is we are lucky Delvin is not good but he's elite I mean he he made a lot of chicken salad out of chicken whatever you want to call him and that was a Tonyism right there I mean and he did it a lot of chicken salad out of chicken whatever you want to call it I mean that was a Tonyism right there I mean and he did it a lot I mean so I think that teams are going to look at that and be like okay how often can he actually keep the free runner coming out and make a miss and gain six versus okay we just got to tackle better and we can only play a seven man six man front

and I think that that's probably going to be the game plan because you can wrangle Dalvin Cook and let him get four and five. And what was killing Houston is the 30, 40-yard gains of Thielen and Jefferson on the play actions. I mean, that ruined Houston's defense. They had no answer for it because they played that eight-man front. But at the same time, it's really a pick-your-poison game. But if I'm a D coordinator looking at the Vikings right now, I'm i'm looking at them going okay we can't let the ball over our head we can get to the quarterback because they've had success i mean i don't know i don't think there was more than a couple sacks this past game but he was pressured a lot i think you're gonna say the good teams are gonna say we're just gonna have to beat

you with our front five front five guys middle linebacker and then not let the ball fly over our heads keep everything in front of us and make them go 12 plays 11 plays however long can't have the sixth play with the explosive play in it i think you're going to see a lot more of that of safeties backing off and making the vikings offense go the field and earn every piece of it i also think if you're still doing the eight man box thing that maybe you might be a little antiquated in your thinking because like what you said the big plays in terms of expected points added come on those throws down the field for 30 and 40 yards they don't necessarily come on eight to ten yard runs it's like if someone passes for eight yards you go like oh that was an okay pass play if they run for eight yards it feels terrible it feels like everybody's screwed up but the actual impact of an eight yard run isn't that much uh and the other part of it too that i notice is if you

do get those guys blocked up delvin cook will still have a one-on-one matchup with someone he'll still beat that person and then there's nobody back to stop him so that's when he gets a 30 or 40 yard run himself is that there's nobody back and I feel like this used to happen with Adrian Peterson when he was in his prime everyone would be like the answer is to load up the box that's how we're going to stop him we're going to stuff him at the line of scrimmage but he gets one-on-one with someone jump cuts takes off and he's gone against an eight-man box I just don't even think it works as well against the run as people think it does yeah I mean you're gambling you're gambling I mean you're playing the odds of he's not going to hit a crease

or a defensive lineman's going to beat an O-lineman because there's not a lot of room to work in there or a defensive lineman's going to hold up the double team and the linebackers are going to be able to run free over the top. I mean, you absolutely nailed it. That's why you see so many times, like how often you see third and ones, fourth and ones, that all of a sudden it's a 60-yard touchdown run, right? Because there's no safeties, and they're in their base five-man defensive front,

four linebackers, and then literally all it takes is one crease and they're gone. So, yeah, I think you're right. I think you're going to see more deep safeties. I don't know if they'll probably play more like mid-range safeties, I'd say. I don't think you're going to see the like 18, 19 yards, but more in that like 15-yard range so that they can still play and look up the receivers for crossing routes and over the middle post routes, but also be able to play that run force position, much like Harrison does so well.

But, I mean, again, you've got to kind of have that safety that can do that, and, I mean, not a ton of teams do nowadays. So we sort of just, once we get to a certain level, we just accept players are great, and then we sort of move on to talk about other players we're not sure about. But with Delvin Cook, I mean, you were there for his 2017 training camp, and I remember everybody talking about, like, well, you got, I mean, this is going to be something. And I had a conversation with Terrence Newman about this, where he was like, I don't say this often about young players, but this is really something different with this running back.

And he's turned out to be that win healthy in the NFL. So what do you kind of remember about what that looked like early on with him? Because it seemed like everybody had that sense right away. Yeah, I mean, you get senses for guys when they come in like, okay, is this dude going to be a contributor, a developmental guy, or like, man, we got work to do. And you immediately could tell Dalvin was not just going to be a contributor, but like man we got work to do and you you immediately could tell Dalvin was not just gonna be a contributor but like a superstar like you could just tell the way he ran the football and like I remember watching him in college and you were just like holy crap this guy's really good but then he gets to the NFL and like you start seeing him carve up especially when

he was carving up that 2017 defense and I think that's why all of us knew how good he was going to be because we knew how good the Vikings defense was and also like dude this dude's making Anthony Barr miss and he's making Eric Kendricks chase him down and Harry's chasing him down and like so you watch him do it against what we thought were some of the best players in the league and one of the best defenses in the league at the time so you knew he was going to be able to do that against other defenses that probably weren't as good. And I think that was a huge measuring stick for us. But also you could just see how quickly his knack for the game was.

I mean, so many times running backs, especially young running backs, struggle with the speed and the pace of which the hole was open and now it's closed. Like in college that hole was open for a lot longer than it is in the NFL. And Dalvin, man, he picked up on that pace so quick, so fast he understood, like I can't dance in the backfield. Like it's one cut and go. And I think he's still doing that.

He's really good at getting to the line of scrimmage, and then he can make some guys miss and do his thing. But the big thing is you see young backs trying to jump cut or maybe cut it back too early still in the backfield. Like, no, the name of the game in the NFL for a running back is get to the line of scrimmage and then make the cut. I want to remind you to go to sodastick.com to get all of your original Minnesota sports-inspired goods. If you haven't seen this stuff yet, you've got to check it out.

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where there were opportunities for him to break off bigger runs. But in Delvin's first game, he goes over 100 yards against New Orleans in 2017. And then it really hasn't slowed down then except for the injury part of it and when we talk about paying running backs my thought on why they would always pay him is because it is just different with him there are only three or four guys where you say no actually there is something different about him and I don't know how this will play out with the injuries in the future nobody knows but in terms of why you give the guy his dollars it's exactly like stuff we saw against Houston you don't win that game I think with an average running back no you don't I mean you lose you don't rush for half of what he rushed for with

an average running back I mean numerous times JJ Watts standing at the line of scrimmage because he did his patented swim move against Brian O'Neill Riley Re Reif. I mean, Drew Samia, it didn't matter. He did it to everyone. He took his turn beating all those guys. And he's standing there and Dalvin's, and there's eight, right? There's seven. There's six. I mean, it's literally, those runs were incredible.

And his balance, I mean, you talk about, everyone loves talking about Kamara's balance, right? Alvin Kamara's like, oh, his balance, his balance. Like, it's incredible. Like, Dalvin's just as good. Like, Dalvin's balance through contact is incredible. I mean, you got guys swiping his feet and there was multiple times where he was one foot swipe away from taking it a distance again, as I went back and watched the tape. So yeah, I mean, there's good backs, there's great backs, and then there's elite backs. And

Dalvin, I mean, I put them right up there, Christian McCaffrey, Alvin Kamara, I mean, Dalvin Cook, Saquon Barkley, right? I mean, those four guys should all be mentioned in the names of elite running backs in the NFL this year. Let me ask you how you now factor what they have on offense in projecting forward versus what we saw in the first two weeks, which was pretty ugly. But now with a little bit of hindsight, we see Indianapolis actually does have a great defense. Not that the Bears are super impressive on offense, but they annihilated them. And now they have statistically one of the best defenses in the NFL. The first week was just a mess, but it was also the first week without a preseason.

The last two weeks you have Justin Jefferson in the mix. Delvin is playing at a high level. Phelan is playing at a high level. They still can't block anybody in the interior. That's not going to change. Kirk actually making some plays outside of the structure was something, but we also don't see Irv Smith too involved, the other receivers not too involved. So project this offense going forward more based on the last two weeks than the first two weeks. Yeah, well, first of all, I think they

listened to our podcast because there was way more motion involved this week. There was a lot of motion involved and a lot. One of the things i really loved that they did for kirk and like i don't know if it's a game plan thing against houston or what but they loved the empty formation to start and then motion the back back in again like i talked about last week those indicator formations right those indicator motions like okay we're gonna bump the back end did everyone run with them did everyone bump over okay man versus zone all that and then i thought they did some good stuff in the run game too with the motion so I think that I think Kubiak's adapting I think he I think he saw what he did the first few weeks and was like okay like back to the drawing board a little bit and I think you've seen these last two weeks a

little bit of adaptation of calling plays for your players versus just calling plays and I think that that's going to be going forward what he has to do to have this offense be success, right? Get the ball in Dalvin Cook's hands as much as possible. I love the little play they ran where they had Garrett Bradbury sprint out there and go out there and just basically like, hey, just dump it to Dalvin as fast as we can, get him a lead block. And I think he got 10 or 15 on it.

And so I think you're going to see they're going to ride Dalvin Cook like the Rams ride Gurley when they paid him, right? They're like, all right, man, we paid you. Like, we're going to ride this horse as long as it can go. And I think you're going to see a lot more of that. And I think they can keep this run game progressing. It's not where it needs to be yet, which is crazy to say Dalvin Cook leads the rushing, like, but he's earning all of it, right?

I mean, if you can get Dalvin some of these easy rushes like Derrick Henry has where he's got three or four yards before contact, this offense is going to explode. Like, it really will because Dalvin's that good. And then you start doing that, and it's like we talked about, those safeties aren't sitting at 18, they're sitting at 15, which gives Thielen and gives Jefferson that much more time to get open and get back behind those guys. So I think we're teetering on the chance of an explosion here on offense.

The big thing is, can we protect Kirk? And, I mean, we can talk about these skill guys. We can talk about all these great things. But, I mean, at the end of the day, Kirk is getting hit a lot. He's getting flustered a lot. There's still Emmys in the protection game, which makes my skin crawl when I'm watching the film. What is that? A mental error. Sorry, mental mental error like it's one thing to get beat right like

okay yeah you got beat there's grown men in this league you're gonna get beat it's another thing when you beat yourself because the center slid left and the two right dart and right tackle slid right and the nose guard sprinting up the middle of kirk like that's not good and so like there's still too much of that there's still too many free runners at the quarterback is what I call them, which is just guys that should be accounted for or not. And then Kirk's got to make something happen or he's got to roll out, which gets him off his read, gets him off his timing. So if they can clean up the protection scheme

and get a little bit more push in the run game up front, I really think this offense is on the verge of just taking off. I want you to guess where Cousins ranks in terms of pressure percentage per drop back in the NFL. Oh, man. It's got to be top five. It has to be. Number one.

Yeah, I was going to say, it has to be top five. He's getting harassed. I mean, and you watch tape and you're like, holy crap, dude. Like, Kirk is harassed back there. Like, you can see it in his drop. He panics a little bit towards the end of the game after he's been hit a few times. But you don't blame him. I mean, Deshaun Watson's got to be, like, number two or three.

I mean, that dude gets harassed constantly. Very close. He's eighth, yeah. Yeah, and you see it all the time in his game, too. Like, he gets the snap, and he instantly is looking at the line of scrimmage versus down the field. So, I mean, you can get that cleaned up. I mean, everyone likes to ride Kirk and, like, give him a hard time. And, like, I'll be the first one to say he's got to play better at times.

But, I mean, with what he has in front of him, being the number one pressure quarterback in the NFL is not a stat you want on your head. And so being able to do what he's been able to do with that pressure has been, I mean, borderline miracle type stuff. So I'm interested in your opinion in this because there was a study on this and kind of quarterbacks and pressure. And a lot of times quarterbacks do sort of invite their own pressure if they're not quick getting rid of the ball. So if Tom Brady has a horrible

offensive line, he's not going to be pressured as much as Kirk Cousins. And I just wonder about your sort of feel on that as an offensive lineman and your perspective, because I do think that some of it is in some of the sacks where you went. And I have not looked on every sack like if he had some place to throw the ball. But in your head, you just go throw it, throw it, get what? And you're sacked. So I wonder how it feels kind of from the offensive line perspective on quarterbacks that invite their own pressure in some instances. Yeah, I mean, I was with I was with Philip Rivers and I remember he'd say, hey, they're going to line up in this way and they're going to send this blitz. And we're going to check to this because like we know where it's going to be a weak spot for it.

I don't see a lot of that in this offense where the third down or even like a first or second down and they see a certain blitz and you see Kirk like hey let's go blah blah blah code word to this play like I don't see a lot of that from him and I don't know if that's because Kubiak hasn't given him the reins to do that I don't know if it's because he doesn't want to do it he doesn't see it like you know Kirk's smart so you know he studies it but I think that's a piece that's missing because yeah you you get big plays on pressure downs I mean that's where your explosive plays can really come. And, I mean, one thing that I used to love, and we used to do a lot in 2017 and 16 in Minnesota, was we used to check into certain runs against pressures.

Because there's certain pressures that full line slants or linebackers have to wrap. And you know, like, okay, if we can cut one guy out of his gap, like it's a huge play because everyone's moving this way and you know, like, okay, if we can cut one guy out of his gap, like, it's a huge play because everyone's moving this way and you just create a wall essentially. And so I think that that's something that you need to see more, but I don't know why. I mean,

I don't know why there's just this kind of like lack of attacking the pressure. If you're the number one most pressured team in the NFL, like attack the pressure. It's not going to stop until you do like that's the thing it will not stop until you attack the pressure so they need to come up with something of checks or something during the week but i think a lot of that has to do with the young center who still maybe can't see everything at the speed at which he needs to see and do you fully trust a rookie wide receiver to hey if we're

going to throw hot because we're going to invite this like you better trust a rookie wide receiver to hey if we're going to throw hot because we're going to invite this like you better freaking be there or else i'm going to a get killed or i'm going to throw a pick like so i think it's a little bit of that too still trying to figure out do we trust jefferson enough to understand the hot reads and feel in and all those guys the theory also of kubiak's offense seems to be throw it downfield every time. And Cousins has the longest air yards per attempt, meaning so far he's the most downfield passer-ing quarterback in the NFL. And while that might be a place they need to find in the middle of that, because he

right now is in Jameis Winston territory of throwing down the field. And I think that might be excessive, that you want to be sort of in between there somewhere, especially when you have guys like Delvin and like Irv Smith and like Justin Jefferson, who are playmakers, they get the ball in their hands. They can get you 10 more yards if you do go short. But it is sort of been amazing at times where I've looked at the tape and said, I don't think he has a check down on this play, which might be Delvin has to stay in and has to help block or Kyle has to stay in, right? I will say this, a lot of max protection in this game, a lot of max protection, especially on second and long and third and long. I mean, they have the tight end staying in and blocking,

running back, fitting up off the tight end. And so you're talking two, three man routes max. I mean, and if you're going to do two, three-round max, the ball has to come out down the field because you're saying, if we're max protecting, like, they better not get there. And so we're saying our receivers are better than your corners. Like, you got to do this. Now you start getting yourself in trouble with these max protects because then teams are just going to play man coverage.

And when those tight ends and those running backs stay in the block, then those guys that are in main coverage just call it, it's called a dog they just come they just say okay you're blocking bam and now they're unaccounted for and so then they kind of those routes have to get snapped off but a lot more max coverage full slide i mean a lot of play to do with the fact that whitney merciless jay their water incredible pass rushers but you can't make a living in max protection because it's really really hard for those receivers sometimes to get open. And if they don't, there's nowhere for Kirk to go with the football. Okay, so what do we make of a defensive performance against a team

that fired their play caller, offensive-minded coach, and who decided that when you were down late in the game by two scores, handing off inside zone to David Johnson was the answer on second and 10. I mean, it just, it doesn't get much worse than that in terms of play calling. But then there's, you know, the other element, even though they did give up a lot of yards and a lot of points, that they were up in the second half. George Iloka's asked to handle a position that he hadn't practiced all week

that Mike Zimmer just threw him into. But I still think it's a little concerning the fact that that team thought their offensive performance was so bad they got rid of the guy in charge and you still were a bobble away from giving up over 30 points. Yeah, I mean, well, I thought that the blitz package this week was much, much better. We saw back to the Zimmer staple, double mug, third third down mess with the center walk carry up bring four from a side drop everyone I mean what was really disconcerting I don't know if you caught it the first third down we had 10 guys on the field oh I did not they didn't convert

they didn't convert but I'm sitting there looking at it going that doesn't look right and so I pause it and yep we're missing a defensive tackle Like there was only 10 guys on the field. I mean, Afadi's like standing like over the guard looking at the sideline. He eventually just gets set. And I was like, oh, my gosh. Like I think that's, I mean, again, just miscommunication errors. And I think the long touchdown pass too was a miscommunication error. You see Anthony's trying to run up there and tell Eichel, like, hey,

you got to go up there. And all of a sudden he just jets of Jeff pass. And so, I mean, that's the disconcerting part for me is the mental errors again. Those are beating yourself. And this team's not good enough to overcome those errors. But, again, I thought the bright spot was the blitz package. I thought between Wilson and Kendricks and then, gosh, remind me of his name, the linebacker, the white linebacker.

Why can't I remember his name right now? 47 maybe? Gosh, I just looked it up too. It's killing me. Anyways, I thought that those – Are you talking about Hardy Nickerson? Yeah, that guy. Yeah, okay.

I don't think he's white though. He's not? I don't know. Number 47. I'm not 100% sure. I couldn't remember his name. I don't think so. He's the son of the linebacker, the legendary linebacker, Hardy Nickerson.

I could be completely wrong then. You're right. I think you're right. No, I'm, Hardy Nickerson. I could be completely wrong. You're right. I think you're right. No, I'm going to say you're right because I'm wrong. Anyways, I thought that those three played a really solid game as linebackers. Maybe you're colorblind. Maybe I am colorblind. Maybe you're the color rush.

Yeah, too many hits to the head. But I thought the linebackers played a pretty solid game overall. In coverage, Kendricks had some incredible pass coverage. I mean, you talk about a lead on our side of the line for defense is kendrick's and harry and again we talked about this last week like you'd rather have a bunch of really good players than just two average like two studs but i think on defense you saw the impact that harry had when he left and like when's the last time i mean i was thinking about this like when's the last time harry wasn't on the football field for this Vikings team?

I want to say 20 – well, other than week 17 when he sat for no reason. 2016 against Indy, against Andrew Luck there in the Eric Swoop game. Right. And so, I mean, you felt that hole. Like, you felt what that was like to not have that guy running around back there. And I think that needs to be a little bit more eyeopening to guys and understand kind of like how much he does and like, okay, how do we take some off of Harry's play?

Like how do we help Harry be a better playmaker? So he's not doing a billion different things. And I think some guys maybe saw that this week. I hope, I hope some guys maybe you're going to pick up the slack or not pick up the slack, but just rise to the occasion a little bit more than it was. So I think that that was overall a good performance. Again, it's hard because you're kicking the kid when he's down, right? I mean, can they start stacking better performances moving there?

I also thought Gladney had a really good game. I thought he played well. He tackled really well off the edge. I mean, there's a couple times David Johnson was jump cutting outside. He was last man of defense, and Trey Waynes was so good at it for so many years. I thought he did a really nice job, and I thought he did really well in the pass game as well. You've counted on restaurants. Now they're counting on you.

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Because he had a little bit of that in camp. And then, hey, you're an outside, but then you got to play nickel sometimes. Cause my cues heard. And then, you know, it's like, Oh, welcome to the NFL buddy, where sometimes you have to play a bunch of positions and then see what happens and figure it out. And I thought he did. I thought he figured it out and will Fuller beating him the one time, not the first time will Fuller's beat someone down the field. So good.

I thought good progress overall for him. Now projecting forward on this, Russell Wilson will be playing against you. And that's not all. I mean, Matt Ryan looked very bad last night, but Matt Ryan could still – Do you think Matt Ryan's hurt? I think Matt Ryan's hurt. You know what it looks like? I think he's got like a Cam Newton 2019 issue going where, like,

he doesn't look like he can push the ball down the field. And like we were watching the game last night. I was like, it's third and nine, and you're checking the ball down at seven yards. You're like, what are you doing? I was thinking Peyton Manning in 2015 and just how the ball is. Well, we're on video together. I'm doing a thing with him.

Like, you know, yeah, that's a great audio version of what i'm doing it's just like just sort of you know dying quail down the field it has no velocity behind it and that's and of course in 2015 manning has this incredible team around him that is not what matt ryan has a defense that can stop anyone still they can put up some numbers there you've got dallas coming up they've got a great offense you've got uh detroit matt stafford to put up some numbers there. You've got Dallas coming up. They've got a great offense. You've got Detroit. Matt Stafford could put up big gains. I mean, is there projectable stuff that you saw in this game, kicking someone while they're down, that they can continue to do as they face someone like Russell Wilson? Yeah, I think that they understand. I think it was good they got one against Deshaun Watson before Russell Wilson, so they understand.

I mean, Deshaun got out of the pocket a few times. He didn't make them pay for it as bad as Russell will. So, again, like let's hope that they learn from that and they carry that over to next week versus just like washing the plate soon, right, start stacking things. Because, I mean, you saw Hercules a couple times, spied Deshaun Watson on third down. Shamar Stephan did it one time and actually really got out in front of Deshaun and turned him back to the Wolves,

which was nice. I mean, so you're going to have to do that with Russell because, man, that dude gets out of the pocket, and you're just holding your breath, right? Like, oh, where's Metcalf? Where's Lockett? Like, going deep somewhere, right? So, I mean, I think that you've got to understand and stack what you did well. You've got to do even better the next week versus like, okay, we did that well. Let's just leave that alone and we'll move on to the next thing. Like, no, make sure what you did well you get better at and then just continue to work on the little things. And I thought the blitz package, again, really good.

I'm sure they'll have something dialed up for Russell because you can't just stand there in man coverage and hope to get home on there. But the one thing that's still concerning is the pass rush. There was no real good pass rush of just four. The one big sack that they had was based off of a blitz look that they bailed out of and the left tackle took the cheese and then it was over, right? And so I think that you're still having yet to see just I'm going to line up in four-man front and I'm just going to beat you.

And you start trying to blitz Russell Wilson. It's like we talked about earlier. They are the type of quarterbacks that invite pressure. Russell Wilson is the type of quarterback that's going to study this tape and be like, okay, here's where they go. We're going right there with the football when we see this look. And that's a dangerous game to play as a defense. Question for you. Please. Do you think Ngakwe's good? Like, is he he he's a good pass rusher okay so i think he's a very one-dimensional player okay i thought that when he was in jacksonville and i think that he gets bounced around quite a bit in the run game um he's not a huge contact his run game is very finesse um like try and jump around try and not let you hit him swim move or a quick sidestep versus like setting a true hard edge. I think he's a great, phenomenal pass rusher, average defender overall,

in my opinion. Yeah, because I was thinking about this after watching this game back, and there were just times where you go, hmm, that wasn't great. Probably more times than you want. And forgive me for being used to Everson Griffin who is just the you know he's going to play 70 snaps and 79 of them are going to be hit you know hair on fire kind of thing but there are just so many times where I mean I don't want to say for sure that effort was an issue but there is one time where Deshaun is running and as soon as he kind of gets by and

Gakwe goes like okay I'm gonna just uh just take a breather on the rest of this play. And you sort of go like, okay. And I agree with you. I think that average for that position with so many elite players in the league now is probably where I'd have them. And I wonder about projecting forward now that I've got a sample of them, like how much that's actually worth versus how much he thinks it's worth. And that will be kind of put it under developing story as we go forward on that. Because I was curious about your opinion because there's just some things you see you go,

was that what that was supposed to look like? I don't think so. Yeah, I mean, I don't think he's as like, again, I think we're used to seeing Everson Griffin and Daniil Hunter, which are two elite defensive ends, not average elite. They have it both. Daniel and Everson both can play the run extremely well. You look at what, who else would you call elite? You call Cameron Jordan.

He's an elite guy. He can do both. You'd say like JJ Watt. You start going Calais Campbell. Like these dudes play at all versus you can name. I mean, I can name five really, really good pass rushers, but not great defenders. I mean, that are all across the league. And those are special situation guys that come in.

I mean, I think that that's something that if he wants to be the guy and get paid the guy type money, he's got to start playing better against the run game. So, yeah, I think that's a good theme for us to watch as the year progresses, how does he continue to develop? Because, again, this isn't an eight-year vet that comes in who's an established. Like, he's still developing as a player.

And he's still a young player, in my opinion. Okay, so you are not a ride-the-rollercoaster kind of wild swings-of-emotion guy. That's not you. Absolutely not. So how many games is this team going to win after you have seen them bring home a victory? That's my last question for you. I mean, I still think this is at best an 8-8 football team. Until you prove to me you can not beat yourself, you're not going to win more than eight games in this league. We used to say that all the time.

You can go 8-8 as many times as you want because these games are so closely decided. I mean, it comes down to who makes the most mistakes that hurts themselves. And until we clean up all the mental errors across the board, I mean, defense, offense, special teams, like, you're going to be an 8-8. I think the ceiling for this team is maybe 9, 9-7. But, I mean, you look at the division alone. I mean, okay, Chicago's struggling.

Detroit's struggling. I mean, Green Bay looks vintage Green Bay with no Devontae Adams, no Lazard. Like, I didn't know who the freaking – I didn't know who Robert Tona was until last night. He's got three touchdowns after getting tripped and tackled and does a front somersault and stands up and catches a touchdown. I mean, Aaron Rodgers doesn't look like he's missed a step. So, I mean, I think that they're winning the division.

And so the question that becomes, can we even sneak into a playoff at 9-7? I don't think so. I don't think so either at this moment. But things can change in a week. But. And they go to Seattle. We'll see, right? Seattle has allowed the most passing yards in the NFL against,

and they can't pressure the quarterback too good. So I'm excited for this game. I hope you didn't just jinx us and they're going to have like four sacks against us next week. If you did that, I'm not coming on the show on Tuesday. If they have five sacks, Matt, we'll do something else. Here's what I've learned is nothing I say has any influence over anything that happens.

And that includes campaigning to draft Lamar Jackson back in 2018. I'm just saying. I'm just saying. Are you on the tank for Trevor Train? No. I wrote about it, though, and it was fun to write about it. I interviewed fans about what they think about it. Oh, I did see that.

I did. It was a really fun article because none of them actually believed it would happen. And they weren't actually, the fans that I interviewed were not actually like anti-kirk uh they were mostly like pro excitement pro like this could be the guy who changes our franchise if this team looked like the jets and the coach was awful and the talent was just nil i'd say don't win a game put in your punter at quarterback just lose whatever it takes right but that's not this team I mean what are you gonna are you gonna bench Delvin are you gonna bench do you not want Justin Jefferson to play well because if Jefferson plays like that they're

winning you know at least six seven games so yeah I never saw it as realistic but if you pulled back on the big picture view long term if you were adding trevor lawrence a you know supposed generational talent quarterback with mobility and all those things to this team with these weapons it would be pretty darn good i think yeah i think in the first round next year they need to draft uh the left tackle from oregon if he's still there yeah uh sewell is his name yes yeah he uh him or the left tackle from North Dakota State. Left tackle from something. Somewhere.

I think that first round pick is a corner next year. I'm throwing all my Viking stuff out the window. Hey, they can draft a bunch of fourth round offensive linemen. It's worked out great. No. Yeah. Willie Beavers is still kicking somewhere, I'm sure. He actually is. Willie Beavers is still kicking somewhere i'm sure yeah uh tj he actually is willie beavers is actually somewhere i'm not kidding i

believe he was signed to a practice squad i am not joking that makes me want to puke i could no no i love willie great guy horrible offense line yeah yeah uh same with tj clemmings like no and drew samia and uh ezra cleveland at the moment and lots of other ones that they've tied. Let's hope Pat Afflein's healthy soon because I can't watch much more of that. Yeah, I'm concerned for your physical well-being while watching tape of the current right guard. It's getting tough.

I mean, I don't understand how the coaches watch it and don't be like, hey, we need to do something. This is where I think, like, okay, if you're going to try to win, Brett Jones knows at least where to go. I mean, I'm not saying that he's going to dominate, but at least he knows not to triple team P.J. Hall. Oh, my gosh. Okay, I have to talk about that.

Okay, before we go, last thing here. Please do. There is a rule when you are playing. Oh, I'm touching the table. You're banging the table. Throw the hands up. Hands up. Here we go, last thing here. Please do. Please do. There is a rule when you are playing. Oh, I'm touching the table. You're banging the table. Throw the hands up. Hands up. Here we go.

So there is a rule. If you are playing against an odd man front, meaning three down linemen, one over the center, two over the tackles, you are betting like, hey, center, you can block the big, fat, sloppy nose guard by yourself, right? So what would they do is they call it a duel. The guard sets back, watches his linebacker. If his linebacker drops, go help the tackles. Those are the werewolves.

Those are the big money guys. Those are those stars we were talking about earlier, the game wreckers, right? I'm watching this game today back again, and I'm looking at it, and I'm going, oh, third down. All right, double duel. Here we go. Look back. I then proceed to watch both guards drop back both linebackers drop and both guards decide hey let's go beat the crap out of the nose guard and leave Riley Reif one-on-one with JJ Watt

and Brian O'Neill one-on-one with Whitney uh Merciless you know both double digit sack a year type guys, which then proceeded to get Kirk Cousins sacked. And I'm just sitting there going, like, what are we doing? Like, that's an always rule. Like, you help the tackles. I guarantee you Riley Reeve looked at Dakota Dozier and was like, get your out here and help me.

Like, do it. Get out here now. Because that's just, those are the kind of things that make me think this is an 8-8 football team. Like, those are the little things like that where those should be full slab of ribs, J.J. Watts picking himself off the ground going, damn it, didn't get home because my ribs hurt now. But versus, like, both guys can go one-on-one with the quarterback or tackles. And, like, those are the little things that just, like, you can't win doing that. Those are just – you can't freaking win.

Yeah, I don't think it was the game plan to triple team a guy who was too fat to join the vikings like who failed his physical and was released by his team as a second round pick one year later i think that was him it might have been a different guy but i think it was pj it looked like him so i mean that's yeah it was that that was just mind blowing to me. Yeah. At least in previous years, maybe it was not perfect on the offensive line, but fundamentally it wasn't a complete disaster. And this, this has been recently. So, well, I'm glad you got that off your chest and when we're good here.

So Tuesday morning left guard, we do it every Tuesday. It usually gets posted in the afternoon. I'm sorry about that because it goes against the name. But great stuff, Jeremiah, and we will do it again after a Sunday night contest between the Vikings and Seahawks. Looking forward to it, man. Absolutely, man. We'll see what this team's really made of.

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