Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Vikings loss to Steelers: Too much freakout? Or just right? (Part 2)

Episode Date: September 30, 2025

Matthew Coller talks about reflecting on the Vikings' loss to Steelers and looks at some favorable results for the Vikings. Then Manny Hill and Brian Murphy join. The Purple Insider podcast is brought to you by FanDuel. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See https://pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

How are we doing tonight, Manny? How are we going? Pretty good. I'm going to get D. Pretty good. Okay. Mani, why don't you start answering that question and we'll get MIRF set up here. But give me, give me a number. Give me a number on the panic. How high should the panic ratio meter, whatever it might be?

Where should that be set? Oh, sorry. I just, I just, I just screwed up and threw Murph in there. My bad. I'm flustered, Manny. I'm flustered by special teams. Let me get, let me get this right. I got, I got my team flags falling down and all sorts of stuff. Okay, now you're back on. Now I'll get Murph in there. Okay, go ahead. So we're going to like a one to ten panic scale here or something like that. Yeah, yeah. So go one to ten panic scale. I think with the injuries on the offensive line, I know you were just talking about it with

with the listeners and the viewers. I think with the injuries on the offensive line, I think we're probably at about a six. Just because the offensive line being fully healthy, and we just really have not seen a lot of that this season. You know, we thought that was going to be a unit that was solidified with the moves they made in the off season, getting Darrasaw back from the injury,

and having O'Neill kind of book-ending and feeling really good about those two guys and solidifying the interior of the unit. And now that that's been kind of banged up and now you got O'Neill banged up. Yeah, I mean, it doesn't matter who the quarterback is. If your offensive line is in shambles, it's going to be really hard. Particularly for this offensive scheme,

it's going to be really hard to move the football consistently. And so I think until they get this unit back to full strength, and I don't know with the Ryan Kelly stuff, if they ever will get back to that. Yeah, it's going to be tough sledding for this offense. I'm at about a six now. Not a full 10, but probably about a six. Okay, Murph.

Oh, I'm a lot closer to eight. This feels systemic, and it feels like we've seen four games here. So that's a quarter of the season. That's plenty to get a really intelligent snapshot of where this team is. what makes it successful and also what it can't afford to do. And I think we've seen all of that on display throughout these four weeks. And what's concerning to me, clearly the injuries, clearly the foundational injuries on the interior of the offensive line and the lack of continuity, which mirrors the lack of continuity at the quarterback position and the lack of continuity on play calling and productive drives, third down conversions. there's a ton of penalties, and they're all mostly offensive, mostly on the offensive line.

There has not been a sense of putting together two quarters, let alone four throughout a game. So I don't know where this gets better because it depends on what we're going to learn. I mean, I've seen some MCL sprain headlines we can get into on Brian O'Neill. You know, Ryan Kelly, again, we're talking about a concussion prone, 32-year-old who plays arguably the most, you know, concussion-prone position on the field at center. So you've got to wonder where that is going to go short and long-term for him and the club. And again, we haven't resolved a quarterback conundrum that is only deepening kind of by the week because we just, we have no idea what this offense is.

So as Mani said, I'm not sure anybody back there yesterday would have been able to pull out of victory because of the protection issues. So where to begin? I would say an eight. Yeah, the protection issues along with when you get into third and long, the running problems too. I mean, because they were in third and long a lot because they couldn't run the football, which is not having Ryan Kelly, I thought Kelly struggled when he was in there, which may be connected to his injury, but they couldn't run the ball and they couldn't finish drives in part because they were taking sacks, some of which was Carson Wentz's fault, some of which was the lines fault, some of which was KOC not giving him the options or plays that are pretty suspect. I talked a little bit earlier about having T.J.

Hawkinson try to chip T.J. Watt on a play and then have Watt run free at your quarterback is not a way to help Carson Wentz play better football. And some of that stuff, you're like, yeah, I bet on the whiteboard, that made a lot of sense. But in practice, with that guy coming off the right side. I don't think that that made a lot of sense. The same as when you're facing third and 11 and your nearest wide receiver to you is 15 yards down the field when you're getting sacked. That's not having really anywhere to go with the football. So it was really a combination of everything. I think what this ties into all of it, all roads lead back to the discussion about the quarterback situation. And we were

having this discussion last week saying, look, you guys might have to prepare. yourself for a little Carson Wentz here. And we've seen that movie before. I think everybody was uneasy about that idea to be polite about the actual opinions about a lot of Carson Wentz because it was a winnable game against Pittsburgh. And if they won and then they beat Cleveland, then they might not make that change until they had to. I think losing to Pittsburgh Manny changes the math on when to bring back J.J. McCarthy. I don't know if I'm entirely at, hey, just put him back out there. But if Wentz struggles against Cleveland, then I will be at, hey, just put him back out

there. And while Philadelphia does have a really good defensive line, it's not last year's defensive line with Milton Williams in there, murdering people. So I think that I'm standing probably on almost no matter what Carson Wence does over there against Cleveland, it's J.J. McCarthy time when they get back stateside and then back after the buy. And I would rather just see where that goes because there's no way to prove to me this Sunday morning that you deserve to be in the conversation for the NFC North. And that's the Fanduil question the day, by the way.

The Vikings dropping to plus 1,000 to win the division. Well, Detroit and Green Bay are at plus 100 and plus 125. So their opinion of this team has hit the panic button for sure and dropped them entirely out of that discussion for the NFC North right now. even if they win 41 to 13 against Cleveland, I'm completely fine with McCarthy coming back and going from there because I think we know that Carson Wentz is not going to have the magic fairy dust that we've seen in the past from the Case Keenham or the Sam Darnold.

Yeah, no question about it. By the way, as you were talking, I was to your point about offensive linemen playing special teams. Very quickly looked up the side of bringing this up Vikings fans. Gary Anderson's missed a kick in 98 against Atlanta. Why would you? David Dixon, Randall McDaniel, Corey Stringer, and Todd Stozy were all out on the field on that field goal.

Those are four of your five starting offensive linemen. Yeah, it's not a brand new thing. It's absolutely not a brand new thing. So, but it's like taking your catcher out when there's a bunt play. You don't want them to get hurt or something. I just looked up Philadelphia. Landon Dickerson, who's one of the best players in the league, has played on all of their field goals.

So has their left tackle who they pay like $30 million, Jordan Milata. So yeah, every single team does this. Yep. That's, it's not new. It's just a bad break. You have like, this is not college where you have like 15 off of like. You got a roster of 120 guys. They're out there.

We're at number 36 or something. Yeah, that's right. Yep. But yeah, to your point about, you know, bringing McCarthy back. Yeah, I think it's especially, you know, bringing him back against Cleveland, I think would not be advisable just because that that defensive front for the Browns is mean and nasty. And when you've got an offensive line that's banged up right now, I don't know if you want to throw the kid back out there in that sort of environment.

But, you know, I think getting him back against Philadelphia coming off of a buy where you've got, you know, some extra time to kind of prepare for the Eagles and get him back, get McCarthy back up to speed. if you have that opportunity to bring him back, then I think that's what you have to do. Because to your point, I think the landscape of this season has kind of changed. This is, you know, if Carson Wentz had played really, really well yesterday against the Steelers, and I know he threw for 350 yards, but it didn't really feel like he played a great game. Unless he had been playing really well on some sort of Kurt Warner type of level,

I don't I don't see any reason why you wouldn't go back to McCarthy at this point. Unless he just destroys the Brown's defense next week, but I don't know that defense is really good. I know the Lions got to him a bit yesterday, but that's a really well-oiled machine in Detroit offensively. And this is a neutral sight. So unless Carson Wentz just comes back and has the game of his life next week, I think it makes a lot of sense to go back to McCarthy at this point,

just because the landscape of the season now, the life yesterday has really changed. Yeah, but the only thing for me is what's hard. And I just think that we know what Carson Wentz is, which is a good backup, by the way. Like, my thought always was if you can have a backup that, I mean, he actually has matched up exactly with my 500 theory that I stole from John Clayton back in the day,

that a good backup quarterback will get you to 500. It's only because we're here that we think, oh, backup quarterback's in an FC championship. Like, we're the only place on earth that thinks that. But, you know, okay, he's gone one and one. And the concept is that your season doesn't end with a backup quarterback. And if he could go two and one and they go back to J.J. McCarthy, then this is sort of what the plan was of having Carson Wentz,

which is that you could get to a two and one record if you missed J.J. McCarthy for three games. And then you're like, great job, Carson Wentz. What a signing by Kevin O'Connell in the front office to get a, backup quarterback because I'll tell you, Sam Howell was not winning. Well, he might have won the Cincinnati game, but he's not winning too many games as the backup quarterback. He couldn't win the training camp job. How do you know what you're going against Cincinnati? That's right. That's right. But I think that the concern is not rooted so much in in that. It's really just what is it going to look like when J.J. McCarthy returns. And that, Murph, as you talk about your panic meter being very

high. Mine would be less rooted in how J.J. McCarthy looked and more how the environment has looked, how they dealt with the Atlanta Falcons blitzes, how they set up the offense for J.J. McCarthy, how they haven't run the ball effectively except for in the Cincinnati game. They do get Addison back here, but Hawkinson has not looked like himself and he didn't connect much with J.J. McCarthy. There's a lot of things that have not clicked in the way we expected them for when he comes back. And I think that if you're going to win games with McCarthy or Wence or Sam Howell or Max Brosmer or Bubby Brister, whoever's in there, you're going to need those things working for you that you built the entire roots of your team

around. Yes, that is all true. And I would not feel comfortable with J.J. McCarthy behind yesterday's offensive line. I may not feel comfortable with J.J. McCarthy or Carson Wentz behind the offensive line that's going to be patched together Sunday in London or even stitched together coming out of the buy if they start, you know, combing the waiver wires or cooking up a trade market. But here's the thing. There's really no way to hide somebody in the NFL. And if you're really trying to protect J.J. McCarthy behind a weak offensive line and not wanting to throw him to the wolves, then why is he your NFL starting quarterback? Because this is the league we're in. And McCarthy's not going to play the Cleveland Browns in the playoffs.

He's not going to play the Cleveland Browns to get into the playoffs. He's going to play the Detroit's. He's going to play the Green Bayes. He's going to have to go through the chargers. He's going to have to go through Baltimore, Philadelphia. You kind of want to know what you have in this kid. Throw to the wolves, yes, you threw him to the wolves in March. That's already been done. And what we've seen out of the first two weeks is a very incomplete picture, an alarming picture, but a very incomplete picture. I think I know where Cartson Wentz's ceiling is. I have no idea where J.J. McCarthy's is.

And considering whatever Wentz ends up doing against Cleveland, whether he weathers that tenacious D and finds a way to put up some yards, I don't think you want to see him throwing 46 times, again, like they did yesterday, obviously in catch-up mode. He's not going to win you a drop-back game. So, you know, get out of there with a 13-10 win. have to, but you really do need to find out what you have in J.J. McCarthy. And if he has the buy and his ankle is healed and he's got the mobility, then you need to have him back out

there because you need to, A, build up his confidence, but B, you really need to know what you have in the kid that you handed the keys of the kingdom to in March. You know, buyer's remorse is really difficult right now. If Wentz were playing at a Josh Allen level, which I don't think you would ever do, period, let alone coming in off the street. And in a month, mastering the playbook enough to be thrown for three to 400 yards a game and four scores and essentially managing a killer offense. That's not what he's supposed to be doing. It's really not even what McCarthy's supposed to be doing. But the only way to figure out what we know McCarthy can or cannot do is to have him on the NFL field playing games, meaningful games, which he has not been

able to do in the 18 months he's been here. So I don't know if you can cherry pick when to get him back in the saddle. I don't think the NFL will allow you to do that. and the reality is you need to know what you have in him now. No, you know, Murph, you make a good point because trying to wait until the exact perfect time to have J.J. McCarthy come back, there probably won't be one. I mean, if Ryan Kelly doesn't play the rest of this year, which would highly advise that he not, uh, after having two concussions, but that's not ideal. They spent all summer forming this great bond and then all of a sudden he's not in there. And if Brian O'Neill,

isn't back by the time for the Eagles game, that's life. And we talked about it a little bit with the performance against the Falcons where you're like, yeah, I know they were missing an offensive lineman, but that's life. I mean, look around the league. Baker Mayfield is playing with Manny and three of his closest friends. Like they have so many people injured in Tampa Bay, but Baker Mayfield still got to go out there and play. And I think in your career for J.J. McCarthy, that's how it's going to be at times.

You can never just set up a perfect team versus the worst opponent versus, I mean, you know, you can never just, you know, play Cleveland. Well, Cleveland's defense is good. You can never play Dallas's defense every single week and then just, you know, expect that to happen for J.J. McCarthy. He will have to face difficult teams. So I guess then the question becomes for Kevin O'Connell to answer is, are you okay if J.J. McCarthy struggles? because here's what I don't want to see, guys. I don't want to see them say, all right, Carson Wentz, thanks for going two and one.

Now we're going to go back to J.J. McCarthy. And then McCarthy throws his first interception against Philly and here trots out number 11 and they're going back to Carson Wentz. When J.J. McCarthy plays, I don't want to see anyone else play. And I don't care what the record is because at that point, it becomes about finding out as much as it is about having success in this season. and you're going to have to work your way through it.

So, I mean, I think we all agree that this injury that he suffered was a real injury. It wasn't a fake benching. Otherwise, he would have been the backup quarterback for this week. They wouldn't have had it be Max Brosmer. So not to dis Max Brosmer, everyone. I like him as much as you do. But just saying, like, he would have been healthy. So that's how I view this entire situation now.

I think it's changed. If they had won against the Steelers, then one against the Browns. I mean, then you're talking about you're four and one, like you're going. But that's just not what's going to end up happening, Manning. No, and I think, you know, to Murph's point, you know, unless you're, unless Carson Wentz is taking you on this just magical case kingdom like run to the playoffs and you go 12 and five or something like that unless you're getting an indication that that's going to happen, you do have to kind of stick with the plan, the original plan that you had of trying to

trying to figure out how good J.J. McCarthy is, how well he can sort of handle, you know, the adverse situations that, you know, like what they're facing right now with this offensive line being banged up. Because like Murph said, it's, it's not going to be a perfect scenario for any quarterback that hopes to have a very long career. There's going to be, you know, adverse situations where, you know, you're going to have two, maybe three offensive linemen that are out and banged up. I mean, we saw Patrick Mahomes play in the Super Bowl and run for his life against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers with both of his tackles out.

I mean, and that's arguably the greatest quarterback of all time going through that. And so, you know, this is, this is what the NFL is. And at some point, J.J. McCarthy is going to have to, you know, I think for us as observers, in addition to the Vikings, we have to kind of figure out how is he going to handle and manage. these sort of non-ideal situations, you know, can he sort of overcome that? We talked about for six years, we argued with people about how Kirk Cousins could not handle when the situation and the environment was not perfect for him and how he struggled at times

when there were offensive linemen out, when the offense, you know, offensive linemen weren't playing well. We want to see if J.J. McCarthy can sort of, you know, maybe do something that we couldn't really see Kirk Cousins do for six years here. Overcome, you know, your center being out with a concussion. Overcome your left guard being out for multiple weeks because he had surgery. Your right tackle is out with an ankle injury. How does he sort of handle those things?

And the only way we're going to be able to find out how he can handle that is if we actually see him on the field. I think we're all on the same page on this, no matter what Wentz does on Sunday, it's time to go back. Let's talk about the other side of the ball here. And what I mean is Will Reichard. I mean, he's just been on point, guys. Like, it's been everything you wanted.

Oh, I called it up Laramie Tunsell plays every single field goal snap for the Washington commanders, just in case. This is going to be a recurring theme. Just in case we're still wondering if offensive linemen play on field goals. The defensive side of the ball, if you had told me last week when we were trying to predict where this was going and everything else, what the game's going to look like, previewing and all that, if you had said either one of you guys, you know what I'm worried about, I'm worried about this guy, Kenneth. Kenneth Gainwell, that sounds like a running back, right? That's like having a baseball player named like Bob Dinger. Like, if that's his name, that means he's got some power. You better watch out. I never in a million years would have thought Kenneth Gainwell would have averaged over five yards of carry against this team, Murph. And I think that it's sort of the same way that we're talking about the offense where it's got its moments, but it's not to the level that it needs to be for this thing to work. So what's what's the idea?

Like what's the fix now that we've seen it be flawed? Good enough to win in every game, but also flawed. I mean, the fix is always make sure you're scoring some more points, gaining more yards, picking up more first downs on offense, because the stress, it feels like from the opening kickoff is constantly on the defense to make a play, to get some points. I mean, Isaiah Rogers just comes off the edge and blocks a kick. And, you know, you're thinking this is the kind of catalyst. This is the kind of thing that, you know, it was special teams, but it's a Brian Flores player.

and there's moments that the defense has seized these last several seasons to just pump the brakes on a game that may be getting out of hand, give the offense a time, Sam Darnold or cousins or whoever the quarterbacks were in 20, 23, to really just keep them in the game. Well, right now, the sense that they were going to control the run and they were going to be able to have these exotic looks and have these quarterbacks kind of discombobulated and out of sorts and really leveraging the home crowd. I mean, you know, they've already lost a home game.

They've got the neutral site games that are helping because they're not road games. But I don't feel like there's that killer instinct. Now, Van Ginkle has been out. Cashman's been out. There's been mixed playmaking there, but that interior line seemed like it was a little bit sacrificed at the altar of Getmore edge rushing. you got to wonder, you know, the Harrison Phillips trade, you got to kind of wonder the changing dynamics of, you know, the safety's being able to come down and kind of clog up things. If it's maybe teams figuring out Flores and maybe getting a little more slashing in terms of their running, if they've been able to pick out when the Vikings are gambling with the Blitz a little bit better, I mean, I'll leave the X's and O's to you, but what it feels like is a defense that doesn't really, has. really reclaimed or nailed down its newest identity yet, and that could be a personnel issue

because of, again, the injuries, but it's also, I'm not sure they have a sense of, are we going to be a pressure team that relies on big plays in the secondary? A little bit like Pittsburgh, big splash plays at the right times, including putting points up on the board, or is it going to have to be a bend and but don't break unit that has kind of held them together over the last several years, mainly because they've been ground to a nub by the ineffective offense. So where the offense goes under Wentz and or McCarthy these next several weeks should give us an indication of what the defense can handle. But right now it doesn't look like it can handle very much at all in the running game. So I think Trona guy here in the comments nails it where

He says they built the defense to play with the lead. This is something important because I do think trading Harrison Phillips away, considering that you didn't get anything back, it's not like they brought over some dynamic weapon or something. It's just a draft pick and getting rid of his contract. I get why they did it. I mean, he lost the competition to Levi Drake Rodriguez and to Jalen Redmond, who's been awesome and graded extremely well against the run in that game,

watched it back today. I was like, wow, this dude. he might, he might need to play more than Jonathan Allen. Contract wise, I understand where they're at, but he may need to have equal snaps because he's young and spry and he's crushing people out there and playing run and pass. And we haven't seen that from Javon Hargrave or Jonathan Allen. They might, but, you know, that's hard to reduce snaps when you're paying $36 million a year between those two guys.

But I do agree that they're built to play with the lead. I also think that this is kind of the world that you live in in the year 2025 in the NFL defensively in terms of philosophy because you think about it, teams start now with the ball at the 30 to 35 yard line and you're, you need one or two, they kick field goals from the parking lot. So you need one or two first downs and all of a sudden

you're running Brandon Arbery out there and he's chip shotting a 64 yard field goal. That's really changed over the last couple of years. You also have teams going for on fourth down a lot, and the variance has changed there. And I think what they leaned into is sacks and interceptions and causing fumbles, which is going to mean sometimes you peanut punch and the ball comes out and sometimes you whiff on a running back. Sometimes Javon Hargrave, like the first game of the year, destroys Caleb Williams and

gives the Vikings a chance to get the ball back and go win. And sometimes he gets shoved out of the way because he's trying to, you know, get into the backfield. And if the opposing quarterback gets the ball out in 2.1 seconds like Aaron Rogers did, nobody's getting to the quarterback in any game in the NFL period. I think that the way that the game is kind of played is, all right, well, if you want to run all day with Kenneth Gainwell and average five yards of carry, well, that's okay. Because if we let you pass all day successfully, that's eight yards a pass.

So it's more efficient. And, you know, we're looking to get takeaways here. so you're going to play risk or reward. I think if the offense had done anything in that game, you're talking about it totally different. Then you're talking about Rogers, straight dropbacks, sitting back, looking down the field, looking flustered, having to pick apart the defense.

Instead, if you're Rogers, I'll look this up. You complete a three-yard pass. That's fine. A five-yard pass. That's fine. We just got the ball and we're winning and it doesn't matter. And that's where I think, Manny, that this defense is probably,

probably fine overall, and especially when they get Cashman and Van Ginkle back. You just can't overstate, like, those are two phenomenal players that you're missing. But it was the way, it was the philosophical way that they were put together, was not to be down 24 to 6. Yeah, it's kind of like in baseball when you have, you know, I kind of think of, it's kind of funny way to look at it. But it's kind of like the movie Major League with Pedro Serrano, that big, massive home run hitter. You throw him a fastball down the middle of the plate. He's going to crush it into left field. You throw him a breaking ball.

He's going to flail at it and look and look foolish. And that's kind of what we're seeing with this Vikings defense where they're so good at getting after the quarterback. You know, if that quarterback is sitting in the pocket for a little bit and Hargrave and Allen are really good at applying pressure from the interior. But if you run the ball on them, this is kind of the tradeoff. When you trade away one of your best run stoppers, this is what you kind of get stuck with. You get two defensive tackles who are really good at getting after the quarterback, and we saw this with their PFF rates last year.

Neither one of them were very good against the run. And this is kind of the tradeoff. And we talked about this in the offseason that, well, you know, how are they going to do against the run? If teams decide to start running the football against them, how are they going to be able to handle that? And that was with Harrison Phillips still on the roster. Now that he's not there, you're really, really taking a risk.

And that's why it's, it's so imperative because of the way this defense is built, it's so imperative for this offense to get off to fast starts, get points on the board. You move the ball down the field in your first or second possession, get in the end zone. It's like, field goals are not enough. You got to get in the end zone, your first two possessions. I mean, they did that against Cincinnati. They got touchdown in the first drive and then they had to pick six from Rogers. But they got a lead.

That was the most important thing. They got a lead. And then those guys could just pin their ears back and get after Jake Browning because the Bengals were down and their running game wasn't working anyway. I think what was so disappointing about yesterday, though, was, Carla, we talked about this on Thursday about how the Steelers had struggled to run the football at this point of the season. And to see Kenneth Gainwell, who's kind of a journeyman backup running back,

not, you know, because Warren was their top guy and he was out to see him go out and gash you for five yards of carry. That's disappointing, man. And I think that's why it's going to be so important now, like I said before, going forward, even against Cleveland, you got to find a way to get out, get a lead early, and that's going to make it a lot easier for your defense. So run defense is such a funky thing because Adrian says can't win any playoff games if you can't stop the run. I was not shocked to see when I called up. last year's who gave up the most yards rushing and the Washington commanders were third for giving up the most yards rushing and the Rams gave up the 11th most and they beat the Vikings.

Maybe a little bit matchup based, but also I think that shows you how situational running success and running defense is because there's no world where, and I know the commanders got killed by the Eagles with their run defense, kind of their old defense at the end of the day. so did KC. that was unstoppable. But how did Washington beat Detroit? They got ahead in the game. And then Detroit could not stick with Jemir Gibbs.

That's my point about you sort of sell out to the idea that you're going to be playing from ahead because you have a good offense. And I think more than Harrison Phillips being Pat Williams, I think it was that last year they were playing from ahead. They turned the ball over really well. Sam Darnel was amazing when it came to those opening scripts and right away, you're ahead of the Giants, you're ahead of the 49ers, you're ahead of the Texans, you're ahead of the Packers, when were those teams going to run when you're leading them the whole time? In fact, San Francisco averaged five yards of carry with one Jordan Mason last year against them. It didn't mean anything because they were losing the whole game.

So I think that that says kind of a lot about that. I do want to get to some things elsewhere in the NFL because all vice. Vikings fans had a chance to stew in their rage while watching other football games. And it was a heck of a slate and an unbelievable game deep into the night between Dallas and the Green Bay Packers. But I'm going to throw out a statement here. And I also want to just remind people of that Fanduil question of the day, which was the Vikings dropped to plus 1,000 to win the division. Tell me how you think the Vikings could still end up at the top of the NFC North. Or do you think that that's just right?

that they should be far behind Green Bay in Detroit. I'm going to make a statement. I want you guys to react. You start with this Murph. I think it's just too soon in the season, way too soon, to start saying they failed at this, they failed at that, they screwed up this and that when it comes to the front office. Because every single, I shouldn't even say game.

I should say play that doesn't work out. It's that the GM messed up, the front office, screwed up. They signed all the wrong players. They drafted all the wrong players, et cetera, et cetera. And I just, I don't, I'm not in a place yet after four weeks of two and two football to start saying, oh, I have the whole picture on this. Like I, I, I've seen enough guys. I've seen enough. The offseason was a failure. The draft picks, Donovan Jackson looked kind of great. Are a failure. Dallas Turner has had his moments though. Why did, why was Jordan Addison is pretty good.

Jordan Addison is pretty good. But why Jalen Redmond undrafted free agent doesn't count? Why did he, was Dallas Turner flagged after D.K. McCaff grabbed his face mask and shook it around. And then he swiped at him that twice they got flagged on that. Anyway, that's not the point. Well, you know, they always get the retaliator. Yes.

And the retaliator also usually looks like he's doing the most egregious thing. You know, so the grab of the face mask was subtle. If an official didn't see it, no one's going to see it. Also, falling off and smacking a guy across the helmet, all eight officials probably saw that. The, uh, that, uh, scuronic failure fellow also, it should join WWE. That, that was an incredible fall. Um, that was, that was Genobley level flopping right there on that one.

Oh, man, WNBA refs would have fined the hell out of Byron Murphy. Um, anyway, other Murphy, um, react to that statement too, too early. I think it is too early to go there at this moment. We just need more information. It's not too early to panic, but it's definitely too early to give up. And those are two very distinct things because panic is really about a feeling. Panic is a state of mind. And based on what I've seen, yeah, I'm panicking.

But I'm not giving up on the season because, as you said, two and two is very salvageable. Well, I meant the, Murph, I meant the front office, like judging all the moves and all that. Yeah, sorry, I got off on a tangent. That's on me. All right. Yeah. Still too early there as well. There's a lot of bets.

still out on the table. A lot of cards still to be played. Doesn't look good early in some areas because they really did, you know, the decision to move on from Darnold, the decision to just have Daniel Jones in for a cup of coffee, the decision actually to bring in Sam Howell is one that could be scrutinized. But you got Carson Wentz kind of as the tradeoff. And I don't think anybody feels bad about having Carson Wendt start these games, then they would have if they'd have had Sam Hall. I think we were sold a false bill of goods on Sam Howell, as we mentioned earlier, couldn't even make the team out of camp. So, no, I'm not willing to, you know, Quasi just got an extension too. So what are we talking about? Shoving them out the door. That's

not feasible right now either. There are a lot of bets still out on the table, but there's a lot of risk on that table. There was a lot of risk put out there when you decided to, move on, you know, I, you know, moving on from Darnel was the right philosophical decision, but it did have ramifications because you did have decisions to make with the funds you now had available because you weren't investing them in Darnel. So where did you go out and you went out and fortified your lines, both interior, and you placed some bets on, you placed bets on veterans, you placed bets on who you felt comfortable within the locker room. You've placed bets on Aaron Jones coming back. You place bets on

Ryan Kelly. You know, again, a 32-year-old off-concussed center playing the most brutal position on the field. You placed a lot of bets, I think, you know, on Turner. You placed bets by not bringing back Phillips. Aaron Jones was a risky bet, bringing back a veteran running back with injury history now. You know, Jordan Mason is fun to watch run. I don't think he can block like Aaron Jones can block. And now you have Jones on the sideline not helping out in past protection because he's got a lot of miles on that body. So I think there'll be a way as this season plays out and these pieces are moved in and moved out. And again, it's the depth.

We talked about it last week two. Seasons usually are won and loss with your backup rosters. I mean, it's not necessarily who you're drafting, who you're signing or who you're acquiring via trade. A lot of times it's the backup guard that's going to make a key block in the fourth quarter of a week 16 game that's going to determine whether or not you're going to get in the playoffs or he's going to commit a false start. And those are the things that you can also judge front offices on. Where's the depth? Where's the development? Where is the, are you going to be able to patch this together now in the next three to six weeks on the offensive line?

And if not, are you going to look for help outside? And what is that going to cost you? and are you willing to trade assets for assets if that's feasible if that's what you see as the recipe for salvaging your season. So a lot of bets still on the table. A lot of bets still be to be made way to really to judge the front office. So just to your point, I think that what ends up determining usually how smart your front office is is how many backups you don't have to play. Because last year, other than Christian Darisaw getting hurt, everybody stayed healthy. And they won 14 games. And if we go through all the great.

Viking years. 1998, how many backups were they playing when they got to the playoffs? I'm going to say, I've watched that season back on YouTube. I don't remember too many. On defense, they were shredded. By the time they got to the NFC championship, okay, yes, that's true. And that cost them ultimately, right? So it wasn't just a kicker's fault, but 2017 is another example of that.

When they started in the playoffs, they had every single player on defense that they had the first week of the season when they played the New Orleans Saints in 2017. And I think that that was true of last year in the playoffs for this team, where every player on defense was healthy through the entire season, other than Knicks and cuts, I think Cashman was out a few games in Gilmore. But when they got to the playoffs, they were playing the entire group. This year has been one of those years. And there's always this, like you have to explain because of our jobs and we're part of the

problem here. Like there has to be a finger pointed all the time. of course if an older player gets hurt it's like i knew it i knew you shouldn't have brought him back because he's older and like hardgrave and allen have played all the snaps and they're older and last year erin jones played all the snaps and played 17 games and like i don't know like who can ever predict this i think the theory was that if you have a good training staff and you don't strain these guys too much because you have some depth, as you said, that you can get away with that and you can spend that money. And even if some of the money goes bad, because you don't

think you're going to hit on every single free agent that you ever get. If some of the money goes bad, that you've still got enough there and you have a rookie quarterback contract where you're not just relying on one signing as it was during the Zimmer era, well, if Michael Pierce doesn't change the whole defense, we're screwed. Well, it's not that way, right? But you don't expect to lose half the team through the first four weeks. And that's where I think it's been a lot of bad break. But hopefully I didn't just take your points, Manny. Well, I think in addition of that, too, I mean, we talk about the older guys getting hurt. You know, your 22-year-old quarterback got hurt. Again. Yeah, again, you know, your first round pick left guard,

22, 23 years old got hurt. And he's out because you had to have a search. Now he's going to come back in a few weeks. Hopefully he continues to grow and get better and develop. But I mean, those are two young guys that got, that are key parts to your team having success this year. And obviously the quarterback wasn't playing well before he got hurt, but you know, Donovan Jackson planned pretty well. And he just got hurt. These are the things that happens. It's football.

It's a contact sport. These guys hit each other and these things happen. And sometimes when it just, you have a season where. you just get decimated by injuries and you just have to kind of deal with it and you have to try and survive. And I think that's ultimately, I think if you're Kevin O'Connell and you're Quasi Adolfo Menza, you just have to hope, certainly over these next, you know, handful of weeks that your team can just survive and find a way to, you know, find a way to beat the Cleveland Browns next week. Obviously, that's the number one goal right now in the top focus.

But you're going to have your by week after that. You're going to have Philadelphia, That's a tall order to beat that team, but you're going to have them at home. Can you find a way to win that game? Play well enough to win that game. We've seen the Eagles. The Eagles are undefeated, but it's not like they're just blowing the doors off of everybody. So there are a team that you can compete against, and if you get enough guys back and healthy enough, you can have a chance. Same thing with the Chargers.

The Chargers have lost both of their tackles. Yeah. That's a big deal. And imagine being Jim Harbaugh right now, and you've got your great young quarterback and Justin Herbert. You've lost a running back for the year. You've lost one of your tackles for the year.

The other one, we'll see what happens with Joe Alt, but that's a big, big deal for them that they're going to be facing. And can you, you know, can you find a way to take advantage of that? They took advantage of Joe Burrow being out for three months a week ago. Yeah. They beat the, beat the breaks off of the Cincinnati Bengals. makes a difference. So you just, I think right now, you just have to try and survive over these next couple of weeks, try and win as many games as you can. You get McCarthy back and hopefully

he continues to grow and get better and you just kind of see what happens. But like, I think the other thing with judging the front office too, I think people have to remember when you make changes, because we're already seeing the fire KOC and the fire crazy stuff, which is just ridiculous right now. But I think you have to understand when you make those type of decisions, those are major, major, major decisions that can drastically change the landscape of where your organization is, is, and where they're going. And right now, I think there's reason to be concerned about a few things, but if you're blowing out your head coach and blowing out your general manager, you might be blowing out this whole thing.

thing and starting over completely. And I don't think it's time for that yet. It's way too early to even be thinking about doing that. Yeah, that's where that's, sorry, that's just where the overreaction I thought. I mean, every single week, it wouldn't be football if people didn't do it. I wouldn't have as many viewers if people didn't want to react like that. But some of that stuff is just a little crazy. Murph, give me a second.

I just wanted to respond to Mr. Mr. Mayor said, uh, collar often makes it sound like UDFAs and a handful of late round successes make up for draft. WIFs. Not sure I buy that. What if we had both? Well, it's kind of like the play calling. It's like, why didn't KC or KOC just call the good plays? Why didn't KC just draft all the good players and hit on every single one of them? They had, going into this year, one of the best rosters in the NFL that's not even just coming from me. Like, look at anybody's objective rankings. Mike Clay, go to go to his rankings. And if you have the previous regime, this is another thing that's sort of funny. It's like the previous regime drafted Josh Mattelis, this regime developed him, but I guess it doesn't

count. And it's like, Jalen Redmond is not a draft pick. He's playing great and he's a young player, but I guess it doesn't count. I think that that's sort of my frustration about it. And when we talk about misses, well, we still don't know what Dallas Turner is. And what he has 11 quarterback pressures, that's two behind Rashon Gary right now. Like he's in the middle of that. And I think he's shown improvement. We don't know where he's going to be at. The big pick that they made that they'll ever make is j j mccarthy we don't know what that is they've spent draft assets to get t j hawkinson who was great then after the injury hasn't been the same they spent it on jordan mason who's great but that doesn't count like they they went out and signed at

unbelievably good contracts van ginkle cashman and grenard but that doesn't count like it's just i i get sort of tired of this like acting like the draft and not hitting on some of the picks especially from 22 is just see they're a horrible front office like i i don't think that and i do think that when you hit on late round picks it's like sorry lequan treadwell didn't work out adam theelin did let's talk about lequan treadwell just the guys who work out you're like oh addison yeah but whatever not whatever he's one of the best receivers in the freaking NFL but that doesn't count apparently like that's this is where that conversation drives me crazy because it looks like they've got a really really good left young left guard really good wide receiver two and they have a number of younger players who

that they've started to develop who are taking key roles for them theo jackson josh metellus guys like that and it's like eh but theo jackson see they didn't draft them they got them off somebody else's practice squad he doesn't count it's like i don't know guys maybe we should just look at this roster and say two things one they needed good starting quarterback play they haven't come close to it with J.J. McCarthy and Carson Wentz. Number two, half the rosters hurt. I don't, I don't know what to tell you. Sorry. Anyway, Murph, I just, I had to get the ran out at least once because I just get tired of every single bad quarter this team plays. 500,000 people have to scream that they missed on Lewesene. I don't care that they missed on Leweson.

Well, and even in a case of, you know, let's go back to 2023. They get Mackay Blackman in the third round. he's a corner that shows another injury a lot of yeah he shows a lot of real promise i was excited about him uh going into last year and then he got hurt and then he came back off of a major knee injury this camp this year and he wasn't the same guy just wasn't the same guy i mean that's that's just an unfortunate situation you know and you go back and you look at the rest of that draft until, you know, just looking at it, until you get to Pooka Nakua getting drafted in the fifth round by the, by the Rams, find me another guy that they could have taken that would have changed the landscape of this, of this, of this roster. I mean, that's just,

that's the draft. Sometimes you, you, you, you, you, take a guy and he shows promise and then he gets hurt, and then it doesn't work out. There's, there's not a whole lot you can do about that, except, you know, if you do find somebody that's undrafted, and he's, you know, and he kind of makes up for that, that's, that's a win. That's not a bad thing. And I didn't finish the sentence. I should have said, I don't care if they failed on Lewes scene. If they found someone else, which that, that was the, you know, that was the point.

So anyway, they have a good roster. They should be much better than this. They should be much healthier than this. They're not. That's the bottom line. Let's talk. One quick point. Oh, sorry, Murph.

Yeah, we've just been jumping over there. No, that's fine, because I just wanted for all the blow torch, him all, blow torch the front office, blow torch the sideline. crowd out there just know two things one that's lazy it's a cliche it's not creative at all they're not going to do that it doesn't help your franchise to blow it up in week four in any case i don't care what you're playing for you're going to wait for the hot coordinator you're going to wait for a new gm it's not going to work it's not going to play well the other thing is the wills the wills have fired four coaches only one has been in season brad shilders when the 2010 season

went off the rails they're not going to do this kind of thing they're not known for these, you know, knee-jerk, chasing the popular vote kind of moves that a lot of franchises like Carolina and Tennessee and some of the, you know, if the Cardinals for years were like that, where they're just perpetually chasing the next headline. That's not how this organization operates. And it doesn't behoo them to do that. So anyway, I just, how about we get to week six before you guys are relitigating the draft? How about actually, why don't we that in March. I just get so exhausted at the draft stuff. Um, because it's not, it's not. Just watch the games. Well, I, I mean, I, you know, I think, no, I mean, this, this show does front on high level front

office stuff. And I get it. But when in every single game has to be, did you know they didn't draft successfully one time in the 2022? And when an 80 yard catch is by Jordan Addison, I don't hear anything about how good that was. So I don't know. It's just like, whatever. They've only drafted like 20 players so far since they've been here. Levi Drake Rodriguez has a great game last week, doesn't have a great game this week. So Quasi is a genius and then an idiot. Like, we can do this all day. The goal is to build a championship caliber roster. When healthy from top to bottom with good quarterback play, with great play calling with whatever, whatever, whatever, they put a thing together that could legitimately compete with every single team in the NFL.

Like, that's the goal. And every team will have its bad drafts. And that's the whole point. It's not that I disagree. And I think, oh, what are you guys talking about? They drafted Jay Ward. Like, I'm not, I'm not gaslighting you. You're not wrong.

But they also traded draft capital for a Pro Bowl tight end and a Pro Bowl caliber running back. And they traded draft capital to try to save their ass last year when they, lost Derisaw and like this is this is how it goes uh when you're in win now mode like the things you're also not drafting that high all the time what was donovan jackson taken like 25th or something anyway not the point uh the tie last night guys i just want i just want feelings reactions um since we both cut off murph like four times um murph why don't you begin with what happened in that circus in jerry world last night. Yeah, you know, it's easy to be cynical about the cowboys and Jerry Jones and Netflix and

it's all about him and what's he doing with Parsons and all that. But it is, he is, he is the center of drama and it's fun to watch him squirm with the son at any given moment in a game that he thinks he has in hand. And the cameras are going to find him, uh, sipping his scotch and, you know, playing the boss hog role to the hilt. What I find interesting, is that neither of these teams seem to know how to play defense. So how is that going to bode well for these matchups that the Vikings come up against these two teams down the road? And also, I don't know how, I don't know how, but somehow this tie is not going to

benefit the Vikings at the end of the season. I have a feeling there's going to be some way that Green Bay is going to leverage the tie into some kind of a tie breaker, whether it's home field, a wild card berth, a notch above in the standings. I just have a feeling that any game that ends in a tie cannot help a team that's scratching for wins in a division where it really looks like Detroit is the Detroit of old. And I feel like the Vikings are in a position where they may not be able to win the division and that might get determined in the first six to eight weeks of the season. It doesn't mean they're not going to make the playoffs. But it just looks like that, you know, certainly Detroit and Green Bay right now,

have been ascending for several seasons, and it looks like they are the class of the division. That doesn't mean the Vikings can't put up a fight against them. But I think I've been kind of trending on that 9-10 victory season all year long. I mean, I'm still clinging to that, and I still think that that's not going to be enough to win this division. Real quick, I know Addison didn't score a touchdown. He got caught from behind. So he's a bust. Sorry, I was on a roll.

So I just yelled out something. Anyway, go ahead, Manny. Well, the first thing that came to my mind when that game ended in a tie last night was, since the Vikings are playing both of those teams on the schedule ahead, is when's the last time we saw a team have two ties in a season? That was the first thing to my mind. I don't know. When did overtime come in the mid-70s in the regular season?

I remember and Royce always told me the story about Bud Grant's first year coaching the Vikings. They went three, eight, and three. back in 1967. So I don't know when the last time a team had two ties, but that was just kind of the first thing that came to my mind. I did think it was interesting how the Packers, that clock management at the end of overtime was a little bit weird because that clock was ticking down.

And like if they're getting ready to run a play and throw to the end zone here, if that ball gets like tipped up in the air or something in the end zone and there's no time left on the clock, the Packers lose that game. Yeah, it was very close. At one second left when the play was over. So, yeah, that was kind of, kind of weird, kind of surprised me that Matt LaFleur would

kind of manage things that way because normally he's usually good with that stuff. But, yeah, I think it kind of showed, though, that the Vikings do have weapons. And I think with the Cowboys defense being largely just Swiss cheese, all, you know, pretty much all of last year with Micah Parsons and now even worse without him, certainly the Vikings will have some opportunities if they're healthy enough to move the ball on the Cowboys. And even with the Packers defense, which has largely been good up until last night, I think it kind of showed if, again, if the Vikings are healthy, that they'll have a chance to compete against the Packers later on in the season. But again, they're going to have to have as many

tools in the box offensively as possible. There's been a theory and a little. politically speaking, which, you know, you could pick apart in one way or another, that coverage is more valuable, not necessarily corners, safeties and how much you pay them, but how you play as a coverage unit is more important than whether you pressure the quarterback. Now, of course, all quarterbacks are worse, and it helps the secondary and they play off each other, and this is not a, it's not baseball where it's pitching and hitting and those two things are completely separate. But I think we saw that, though, because Prescott was under pressure from Micah Parsons. He was great the entire time. And if there was one reason to have some skepticism about the Michael Parsons trade, it was, okay, well, who's in their secondary? And are they going to be able to still cover people, even if he is pressuring all the time? And now, Dak Prescott was unreal. Every ball he threw up to the top of the Jerry Dome came down in the hands. He literally threw just like a pop fly that if any of us had just heaved the ball straight up in the air, George Pickens would have caught.

it because he was just on fire last night and, you know, they couldn't stop him because of his size and his contested catchability. So I don't think every team's going to do that to them. But it does kind of show you that there might be some limitations to what one player can do because when you look at Parsons performance, he had 10 pressures, which is insane. I mean, if you get six, you've had a great day. And he was amazing in the game, but there's only so much one guy can do. And so then the Packers feel a little bit vulnerable in that way. It's sort of like the Steelers, where they pressured Wentz all day. And yet Jefferson had catches of 29, 22, you know, and the catch from Madison.

Like, they gave up big plays because their coverage was, it was actually baffling how they covered sometimes in that game. And it just tells you you can only pressure probably 30, 40 percent of the time. And you need to be able to cover the Vikings have this same issue when the quarterback gets the ball out pretty quickly. ties are what they are. If you're going to have both teams, though, touch the football, you might end up having this more, you know, a guarantee to have both teams touch the football.

I saw the Packers folks were melting over the way that Matt LaFleur handled that. And I thought it was deserved, which just kind of tells you, we all think highly of Matt LaFleur, we all think highly of Kyle Shanahan and they blew a game yesterday against the Jags. We all think highly of McVeigh. He's blown games. It does happen. but I think they feel a lot more human.

A lot of the teams that the Vikings are facing coming up, bottom line, feel a lot more human. Just wanted to also respond to Thomas said the Vikings let a Pro Bowl quarterback go out the door so they could sign a bunch of aging, injury-prone players and start a glorified college handoff specialist at quarterback. Interesting, though, I didn't see Thomas in the comment section anytime this offseason declaring that this would all not work. but also they're two and two. I do want to say this, though, that when we talk about that decision with Sam Darnold,

because I saw a little bit of that, and I appreciate, as you guys know, Sam Darnold a ton for what he did last year. And I think he's just a really dang good quarterback who's going to probably, you know, compete for a playoff spot this year. But it's not just Jonathan Allen, Javon Hargrave. It's a lot of other things. It's a Justin Jefferson extension. It's a Christian Darrasaw extension.

It's Jonathan Grenard, who they pushed his money into the future. Andrew Van Ginkle pushed money into the future. Blake Cashman pushed money into the future. It's Will Fries, who I think has not lived up to expectation so far, but I think that he's a good guard overall. It's Jordan Mason. The trade had to go along with a contract extension. It's extending Josh Mattelis.

It's signing Eric Wilson, who has been a savior for this defense, with Blake Hashman out. That's a depth player that they would not have been able to sign. Like, there's so much more to it than just. That's a great example. Great example. Isaiah Rogers. Like, there's a lot more to it than just like, oh, well, they signed Ryan Kelly. Who's hurt and the rest of them? Oh, how about Byron Murphy? Like bringing him back on an extension. So there's a lot of things that they were able to do to build a complete team. thus far, they have not been able to play with that complete team. And that's the trouble.

But Byron Murphy is not old. Christian Derisaw is not old. Justin Jefferson, Jonathan Grinard, Blake Ashman, those are players and Jordan Mason, who are here multiple years who are in their primes, that some of those guys, you have to decide, we can't have that guy because you're franchise tagging someone at $41 million. So it's a little more complicated than that. but, you know, we'll have to see where all of this goes. I am withholding judgment on a lot of things for the front office stuff until we get more

of a sample size. The Vikings will play the Cleveland Browns. What a time to be alive in London. I appreciate you guys for the great conversation. Manning will be back on Thursday. A lot to go with our coverage this week. Will Raggitz is locked in. Dave Campbell.

The crew of us that didn't make the trip over to Ireland will be. podcasting stateside this week. So thank you, Manny, thank you Merv, and we will see you guys later. I appreciate it. And thanks everybody for watching slash listening. And if you're rewatching, remember to answer in the comments, the Fanduel question of the day. How do you think the Vikings could still end up at the top of the NFC North on Fandul right now, plus a thousand to get back?

It's a long way to go. We'll see how it goes. Thanks, everybody for watching. Football.