Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Vikings Predictions and Projections week: What if they go 7-10? What if Cousins throws for 5,000 yards? And many more (A Fans Only podcast)

Episode Date: June 14, 2022

We begin Predictions and Projections week on Purple Insider by first answering Fans Only questions about the least athletic stars in the NFL and where Kirk Cousins ranks on that list and what players' day is like during the season and then get to Vikings fans' projections, including one that simply says "7-10" and others that are more specific about backup running back production, Irv Smith Jr. and the Bears surprising everyone. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hello and welcome to another episode of Purple Insider. Matthew Collar here, and this is a fans-only slashed predictions and projections week podcast where I take a look also at some fan projections that people have sent me on Twitter or through email or through direct messages, and we'll talk about them. I think a lot of really good ideas and really fun angles from people about their predictions, but I also have leftover fans only questions. So I'm going to get to both of those things. So let's just open the diet, Dr. Pepper, let's jump right in and have some fun. If you want to send me a question for fans only, or if you want to send a prediction that we can go over and I'm going to get some other people involved. So if

you send them, we're going to do a lot more of them. So we'll have Paul Hodowanek when he gets back from vacation and so forth. Other guests, I'll throw some of your predictions at, and we can have a good time with those. So feel free to keep sending them whenever you like. Same with the fans only podcasts. And I appreciate everyone who participates. I never run out of questions because I always have people sending them and there's just so many good ideas that it's always unique and interesting and I really enjoy it. So let me open the diet, Dr. Pepper here. All right. Let us get right into it. Okay. First question comes from at rat trapping on Twitter. Hey, collar fans only request here. It's a bit of a deep data dive. Who are some of the players with the lowest relative athletic

scores to have the longest NFL careers? Ever since you were talking about relative athletic scores with Chris Trapasso during draft season, I've had this question on my mind. So relative athletic scores, we did talk about those a lot in draft season, but just for a refresher, there's a website called Relative Athletic Scores that takes how people performed at the NFL combine combines them with height and weights to form a and their position to for to form the percentile of athlete that a player is so they're weighted by your position and what's important to success with your position but also combines just you know for a receiver, your 40, your three cone,

you know, things like that, and then height, weight, and then it normalizes it to a percentile. So if we say Justin Jefferson, and this is true, is a 97th percentile athlete. Well, I mean, that means that he's pretty good. That means of all the people that performed at the NFL Combine, he was in the 97th percentile, meaning only 3% have ever performed better versus their height and weight than Justin Jefferson and combined with position or normalized to position. So it kind of gives you a snapshot of someone's athleticism. And I'll give you an example here. Uh, Kirk cousins is an example of someone who has overcome a very poor relative athletic score. So, you know, he ran a four,

nine, something 40. And I was looking at this the other day and the only comparable quarterbacks who have had really recent careers that were in that percentile of athleticism were Nick Foles and Andy Dalton. And below that, I couldn't really find anyone who has succeeded, which says a couple of different things. I mean, one, it really speaks to that off schedule nature that we talk about all the time, the escapability, like it does show up, but it also shows Kirk Cousins and how good of a thrower of the football he is, how hard he works to overcome that because most quarterbacks, and that's why he was a fourth round pick who are not great athletes and don't have great size, like a Tom Brady or a Phillip Rivers that are 6'5 or 6'6 or a Drew Bledsoe from back in the

day, like Cousins doesn't have that either. So most quarterbacks are either incredibly athletic or very big. He fits into neither category, but is still built out a very good career for himself. So there's an example. So what I did here was I wanted to go recent. I mean, all time, I'm sure I could get that information. It goes back to 1987 on this list, but I thought recent was probably a little bit better to give you some names of some of the over performers that are not considered to be great athletes in the

NFL. And the list is, this is kind of amazing. I mean, some really good players. So what the relative athletic score website gives you is whether someone made the pro bowl or not. So I looked from the time Kirk cousins came into the league, 2012 to 2022, the worst athletes to have at least made a pro bowl. And the worst one I could find is Vontaze Burfecht, who was in the not 20th percent in the second percentile two, um, and yet, uh, carved out a career for himself and also kind of carved the career right out of himself by being such a violent player and really crossing those lines. So, uh, James Winston is another quarterback that's in cousins ballpark. He's bigger, but I think slower Zedaria Smith is actually in here as a 37th percentile athlete. Kirk is a 41st if you were wondering. Um, but Zedaria Smith

did not have a great NFL combine and he's really done it with, I think just how strong he is and how technically good he is and versatile. Um, I think those are the things that have played into it because it isn't this incredible quickness, but it is a lot of strength for him. Some other guys you would recognize DeForest Buckner has turned into a really good player. Tyron Matthew. I remember this was a controversy at the time. Tyron Matthew did like no reps with the bar. I forget what it was, but it was, it was an incredibly low number of reps that he did in terms of lifting. So he ended up with very bad scores. Delvin Cook did not end up with a very good relative athletic score under 50th percentile. And the crazy thing about Delvin Cook is that his explosiveness and his speed, and this tells you

about the underwear Olympics, the NFL combine, his explosiveness and speed numbers at the combine were not good. I don't know why maybe he was dealing with some injury, but he didn't run an incredibly fast 40. He did not have a great three cone. I think I, and I, I mean, he, I don't remember exactly with that, but I remember the jumping the three cone. I'm not a hundred percent sure. I'd have to check, but the jumping was so pathetic that he was getting like made fun of on the internet. Like anybody could jump as high as Delvin cook. And yet he's become one of the best running backs in the NFL.

So you should always pay attention to what they look like on the field more than the relative athletic scores. But he's certainly overcome that Cooper cup, only 50th percentile. Same with Deandre Hopkins. You do not have to be among the greatest of the greatest, but it certainly does not hurt. And if I take you all the way to the top of the list, those are the guys that stand out the most to me. If I take you to the top of the list of pro bowlers who have a great athletic scores, I mean, you get miles Garrett, Luke Keekly,

Marshawn Lattimore, Lane Johnson, our friend Latavius Murray, TJ Watt, Brian Burns, Daniel Hunter, Andrew Luck. I mean, it's a pretty good list. So you would always bet on guys who are more athletic, but it's not a guarantee if someone is not an unbelievable athlete that they will just immediately fail. Okay. Let's get to the next one. I'll try to move on quickly through the fans only and get into the predictions here. Uh, at this is a fantasy six. If Mike Zimmer was magically the Vikings defensive coordinator, how would we feel about the draft specific specifically scene and booth? Thanks. Love the show. Good question. Um, well, I would say that if they had drafted two defensive backs and Mike Zimmer had still be in charge in any capacity, we would have said typical Zimmer.

What is he doing? Drafting more corners after they've had corners go bust, just caring about his secondary and not the offense. I mean, of all the things that have been surprising this off season of which there are numerous ones. And I wrote the other day about imagining this scenario of if Baker Mayfield was the quarterback and Jim Harbaugh was the coach, like what a clown show this would be, but also it would be really interesting. If Zimmer was still the coach, whether his head coach or defensive coordinator, we would definitely be looking at this and saying, they're just doing the same thing over again.

Same old, same old. I mean, drafting a safety is different for them, but all they just want the secondary and Zimmer's clearly calling the shots and won't let Kevin O'Connell do what he needs to do. We would have been saying all of that stuff. And I think that them not improving the offense in any real way, aside from drafting a guard in the second and picking up Chris Reed and Jesse Davis, a couple of guys who are kind of, you know, middling guards that you hope can maybe over-perform what they've done in the past. That is by far the most surprising thing to me still that I look at the roster and think, gosh, they just, they're going to go to a situation with three wide receivers more. And they didn't add a receiver aside from Albert Wilson. They didn't draft a receiver until the

sixth round. They did not go out and get a new center. They didn't go out and spend their money on a game changing guard. I'm still surprised by that. And they're really putting a lot of emphasis on just Kevin O'Connell being better, but for sure we'd be saying typical Zimmer and why can't he help the offense? And he's got to take all the draft picks, which isn't exactly true. They did spend a lot of draft picks help the offense? And he's got to take all the draft picks, which isn't exactly true. They did spend a lot of draft picks on the offense, Ezra Cleveland, Christian Derrissaw, Justin Jefferson, Irv Smith, Jr. Garrett Bradbury. Like these are all top draft picks that were spent on the offense, but because of their penchant early on in Zimmer's career, but also with, uh, Gladney and Hughes. I mean, we often said,

oh, they just want to draft corners. But, you know, we would also probably be saying that Zimmer will get the most out of these guys. And I mean, Ed Donatel most certainly could too, that they're going to have to be relied upon to fix the defense in some ways. I don't know about Booth and if he's going to be asked to be a starter at some point. But you figure corners get hurt a lot and he's probably going to have to play at some point. So they will need Lewis scene and Andrew Booth to be very good. But, you know, Zimmer's track record with those defensive players in recent years wasn't

as good as it was early in his career. But I think that a lot of things, I mean, if Rick Spielman was still in charge, when they signed Albert Wilson, we would have said, Oh, you mean Kendall Wright and Jordan Taylor and Tavares King and Tajay Sharp, who came up on the last podcast. And we would have run through that whole list of kind of wide receiver fours or fives that they brought in and said, Oh, this guy will be the slot receiver. And then it would just never happen. So yeah, I mean, that still remains one of those things that I look at and go, wow, no real changes to the offense, huh? They must think that last year they were really

clueless when it came to the, the whole X's and O's part. So, uh, this one comes from Kyle fans, only question, Matthew, could you please talk about what a typical regular season work week looks like for an NFL player? What days do they get off? How long are they at the facility? What do they consist of travel days in the day before the game? Oh, okay. Uh, well they always, let's say it's a Sunday game so on a Sunday game they show up at the stadium probably want to say eight o'clock nine o'clock depending on the guy probably closer to 8 8 30 uh then they go out for warm-ups that happen through 10 you know maybe maybe into the 11 o'clock hour and then they come back out play the game game, do the post game interviews,

all that stuff in the locker room. And then they finally walk out of there. I would say probably five 35, five 30, somewhere in that ballpark. Then they're back at the facility on Monday morning. They go through the game. They go through the meetings. Let's just assume it's a home game because travel would normally be involved, but travel these days is not that huge of a deal. Unless maybe even from the West coast, you're talking like a three hour flight. So let's just say, you know, home game, they're back Monday morning and they have meetings and they go through the game and they review the tape and they start putting in, um, well, they don't start putting in the game plan yet, but they go through the previous game. And then after that, they have Tuesday off. And then when they come back on Wednesday, that's when they start putting in the game plan for their Wednesday practices and things like that.

You know, during the regular season, I believe the way that it works would be they show up, they go through their meetings in a walkthrough. And then in the afternoon, I don't know if the walkthrough is every single day or not, but then in the afternoon, because we're never really present for that, but the meetings for sure during the day, that's when they hit the practice field, the afternoon, go through a couple hour practice, come off the field, talk to us, head home probably around four or five, depending on the player. I'm sure that some players are different than other players. And then they do that again for Thursday, Friday, it's an earlier practice. So they're home earlier and Saturday. I don't know exactly. We're never out there for Saturday. I think some players come into the facility

to maybe work out or watch tape or whatever they want to do, but I don't think that that's always required. I'm not 100% sure about that because we're never out there on Saturdays unless it's a Monday night football game. So I'm not sure because they don't have an official practice on Saturday. Some teams do. I think the Packers have an actual practice on Saturday and they take a different day off. So I think it varies from team to team and maybe it will change a little bit, but yeah, that's pretty much it. And that's why a lot of times these guys have to watch a lot of tape and stuff on their own because there's only so much that they can do there. And there's only so much practice time that they're allowed. And so you've got to do a lot of studying. I mean, if you're playing against TJ Watt and you're, I don't know, Rashad Hill,

you're playing left tackle, you've got to spend a lot more time than just what you're going to go over putting in the game plan because that's what the coaches are doing on Tuesday. They're designing up the game plan, having it ready for the players so they learn it Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, are doing on Tuesday, they're designing up the game plan, having it ready for the players. So they learn it Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and then you're off and you're playing football. I mean, once you get into the season, these things go pretty quick and there's not a ton of time to make all these adjustments and adaptations, uh, you know, to the playbook. I mean, that's

why training camp is so important because you put in all of this stuff, you teach everybody, all of these things that are the basics. So if they can master those basics, then they put in the specifics for each game. So we're using this basic concept, but this week we're doing it a little bit different and here's how we're going to practice it and all those things, but they can't really be out there for a long time in practice. I'm trying to think about like what, what time it usually would start and end. It might be like two hours is all that a, that a daily practice is going to be. Cause we would go out there to take attendance and then go back into the media room because we can't watch practice during the season and then come back out when they're done, which is usually about two hours later. So that's all you get. I mean, they got to make the most of

it and everybody's got to be prepared on their own because there isn't like a crazy amount of time for these guys. And some players show up really early at the facility, six o'clock, they start watching their film there, or they, you know, get together with other guys and do their lifts and their workouts and stuff like that. Um, so I think that it probably varies from player to player, but that's mostly how it ends up going during the season. That's a good question. Go to soda stick.com. That is S O T A S T I C K. Our loyal sponsor, check out all of their great Minnesota themed gear for your playoff run in hockey or for baseball season if you're headed out in the nice weather to a baseball game that is s-o-t-a

s-t-i-c-k sodastick.com hats t-shirts hoodies if you need them for a cool evening in the summer sodastick.com has you covered. All right. This from, uh, Jay holiday three 16, uh, for fans only. If for one season, you could pick either Jerry rice or Randy Moss as your wide receiver one, which would you pick? And why? Hmm. As, as great as Randy Moss is as truly, truly, truly great as Randy Moss is. I it's very hard to pass on Jerry Rice. Jerry Rice owns every record

by so much and not just like, because he played forever. Like that. I mean, let's, let's pull this up here in terms of wide receivers for even like single season where Jerry Rice stands for single seasons. I mean, he's got the fourth highest season ever receiving and think of when he played 1995 for single season, the only ones higher Calvin Johnson Cooper Cup last year, and Julio Jones in 2015, Jerry Rice fourth all time in 1995. I mean, he was so consistently excellent. But also beyond that, there's a volatility to Moss, especially as he goes on in his stardom. And Randy Moss, in terms of yardage, has the 19th best season ever.

That was his absolute best. You're talking about for one season, I assume I'm getting the best of the best. Now, Randy Moss's high end is the most unstoppable receiver. I think him and Calvin Johnson are the most unstoppable receivers of all time. But with Jerry Rice, it's week to week. It's game to game. Somebody would have to tell me who was maybe older than me or was more connected to the NFL because let me in 1995, it's the newspaper, it's football digest.

It's the Sunday pregame shows, but I don't remember a whole lot of drama with Jerry Rice. And I don't remember a whole lot of games where there were ups and downs with him, or there was, you know, gaps in between where he was truly dominant. You could do anything with him, but you know, that's not to disparage Randy Moss. We're talking about of all the receivers that you would take in the history of the game. It's probably Jerry Rice, number one with a, you know, just dead set there. You can't move that number one. And then Randy Moss is maybe two or three. So it's a great question. That's the only difference to me is that Jerry Rice was a less volatile person to have around your team that it was more consistent and that maybe because he was so good and he was a good

deep receiver as well, but because he was so good as a route runner and the underneath stuff that he's going to consistently drive the success over a season of your offense, as opposed to kind of, you know, having those huge games and then games where he was less effective. And, you know, the highlight reel is clearly better with Randy Moss, but maybe the game to game to game is Jerry Rice. But we're talking the slightest of edges. There's no disrespect. Don't tweet that

there's disrespect because there's not disrespect for Randy Moss here. But I think that's the only reason that I would take Jerry Rice slightly over Randy Moss. But if you were talking about one play, because I mean, think about this, like Moss only had 200 catch receipts receiving seasons in 2002 and 2003. Um, so he wasn't like the, always just like this go-to go-to even with the Randy ratio, which was, I think in those years, whereas, I mean, Jerry Rice, uh, well, Jerry Rice had four of those. So, you know, I guess maybe those are hard and a couple in the, well, no. Okay. One was 98. One was 92 when he was 40 years old. Jerry Rice, 92 catches when he's 40 years old, 122 catches in 1995. Unbelievable year after year. I mean, Randy Ma or Jerry Rice led the league in receiving one, two, three, four, five, six times. And in touchdowns, one, two, three, four, five, six times hard to take anybody, but that guy, I would say. Um, so, but it's a great question. I mean, I love the idea of comparing great versus great, the slightest of slightest edges, but fun question. All right.

This is the last one for fans only. And then we'll get into predictions and projections week, which I should have had Manny Hill do the big voice predictions and projections week. Okay. Last fans only question though. I listened to your podcast you did with someone from Buffalo and enjoyed learning about your history with sports broadcasting and lots of different sports. Have you ever considered talking about other Minnesota sports in a small segment on your podcast?

Maybe your wife could talk basketball, not after, not after the way the links have played. I don't know that she would be happy to talk about that. It's been a bit of a struggle. And you could talk hockey. Thanks and enjoy your summer. Well, thank you so much, Matt, and enjoy your summer as well. Well, okay. Few things on that.

I mean, I do like being able to spread my wings from time to time. When I was on the radio a few years back, I would get some space to talk with like Rami Maklov or something about other sports that were going on. And I could shoot off twins takes or wild takes. Uh, you know, I, I remember upsetting some folks by saying that I didn't think Miguel Sano was a great baseball player and the internet had some problems with that, but yeah, well, hasn't exactly worked out since then. But anyway, the, the only thing is that on the show, first of all, like podcasting in general is very niche. So a lot of the most successful podcasts really focus on one subject. And I think that that's right because people go seeking out Vikings

talk. If you want twins talk, there's someone else for that, right? Who knows a lot more than I do about the twins. The other thing is I really don't have a lot of space in just my life in general to dedicate to these other sports to the point where I'd feel comfortable giving you opinions on them. I mean, the reason that people listen to the show, other than the guests I have that are around the league, other reporters or PFF people or former players or whatever ESPN, you know, people, it's like one of the reasons people listen to the show is because with the Vikings, it's all I do. I mean, it's go out to that facility, go to practice, write about them, look at all the numbers, talk to all the people.

I can talk to the players, be at the press conferences, like get every bit of information that I can get and then bring it back to you. So I'm giving you something that I can learn from them and pass on to you in the show, or I'm giving you interesting discussion points. If you asked me to talk about the twins, I might be like Buxton. Am I right? Like, I can't tell you much that you don't know. Now, my wife certainly could about basketball because that's her thing. And, you know, I but I just I feel'm not dismissing it. I'm saying that I wouldn't be confident in it. If I, if I did maybe for the summer, it is a good idea. Maybe we should do like hot take of the week on some other sport. Like what were they doing? Putting Royce Lewis

in center field, shame on you twins. I don't know. Like, that's the thing is like, I just don't know a whole lot about the team. I mean, if I'm going to a twins game, I'm just going to go sit in the stands like anybody else and just watch and have a good time at target field. And, uh, the only other team that I know like inside and out is the links. Cause I go to a lot of their games and because of my wife. And so I could give you some links takes if you want, but I think, you know, you kind of came for the football. So, you know, it's, it's a, it's a fun idea though. And what I was trying to start, I remember at 1500 was this thing I was calling like off the record where it was an opportunity for me to interview people that were outside of football, because I did feel like I was just growing into one big purple football. And I wanted to make

sure that I talked with some baseball guests and interviewed other people about specific subjects. And of course, you know, the whole station kind of went under not too long after that, but, uh, it is a good idea. And I wish I had like dedicated space and time to spread the wings and do some other things. And that's why I'm trying to do like the, the purple insider book club thing. And hopefully I'll get another guest, another author soon. Like I had Doug Farrar to talk about their book. I of course have to read the person's book for first before I could bring them on. So it's not, it's hard to do like on a frequent basis, but I really liked that. I like, I like your idea of talking a little bit outside the line sometimes.

And, uh, I will try to do that in the future. So thanks very much, Matt, for that. Okay. Let us get to predictions and projections week. So that's what we're going to be talking about all week. Mike Clay from ESPN is going to come on. We'll get Paul back from vacation at some point and we'll continue to go through these. But again, send them, tweet them, email them, whatever you want to do.

Any prediction about anything Vikings and you will see how this works with a lot of people. The first one comes in from WX Man Kyle and he just says 7 and 10. That's just that's the whole tweet. Just seven and 10. That's his prediction. This is the hard thing about the records when people send their records, because I can't tell you that you're wrong because I don't have any idea what they'll be as their final record. And if I knew that, this would just be a gambling podcast. And I would tell you, take the under everybody. Kyle says it's 7-10. What I will say is that there's a scenario where they go 7-10.

And it's a pretty ugly one, but it's one where the offense doesn't really improve and where a couple of key guys get hurt on defense and they can't cover anybody. And they're facing a lot of good wide receivers this year. It's one where they don't start the season very well. And then you get behind the eight ball and the schedule gets hard in like the early second half of the schedule. Let's say you start 0-2 and you lose those first two games to Green Bay and Philly, which are two very difficult games. If you don't at least split them, then what does that feel like? That feels like last year with Cincinnati and Arizona, where they're just playing from

behind and there was no room for error or anything going wrong. And that's the scenario where you end up 7-10. I mean, they were this close to being seven and 10 last year. And could you see some of the same things going wrong? That's always the hardest part to predict is will you have one of those years where everything falls your way? Everybody stays healthy. You get the right matchups. The other team is playing backup quarterbacks when you play them or will you end up with one of those seasons where case keenum comes in and for whatever reason the guy is magic for that year and you know whatever else that's when you have a team that you could kind of make a case for either way and it's eight and a half wins by vegas metrics i mean it really comes down

to that sort of thing but if they do go seven and 10, and I don't know, I mean, maybe some of you would disagree with that, this statement, but I think that it would be a disaster because of the way that they set up their off season to bring it all back and did not make moves for the future aside from one trade down. But I mean, that's really the only thing we can spot for the future. If they don't get back to the playoffs, then we're going to ask, what was it all for then? What, what did you bring the quarterback for on the expensive contract? Why didn't you improve the office? Like there will be so much second guessing of last this last off season or current off season, whatever we're in the first Adolfo

Mensah O'Connell off season, there will be so much second guessing because you think about if they had moved on from cousins and this is only if they go seven and 10, but if they had moved on from cousins and then, you know, they could have had like Mariota go seven and 10. Anybody could go seven and 10. Who cares? Or that six and 11 or five and 12. Like what difference is there? Uh, losing more games would get you closer to a top pick.

That would be the only silver lining though, of going seven and 10, you're going to have a pretty high draft pick. And in that case, you are locked dead, taking a quarterback for sure. If this team goes seven and 10, because that means that there will have not been a magical new Kirk. There will not have been the offense that unlocked the keys or anything like that. And all those things that they kind of hinted at and they made their bets on will have pretty much gone wrong if they end up being seven and 10. So if Kyle ends up being right, uh, that is a big problem for the Adolfo Mensah and Kevin O'Connell starts the era this one from

Dinsio 82 Vikings make an in-season trade after week one for an offensive weapon so this is one that I could see happening if somebody gets hurt I would be really shocked if it happened otherwise because they just clearly seem to think that they've got enough weaponry on the offensive side to deal with, that they are good with Adam Thielen and Justin Jefferson and KJ Osborne being their one, two, three. And they think that Irv Smith is going to be their excellent move tight end. And the offensive line is good enough. I mean, you mentioned the weapons, not the offensive line, but you know what I mean? It's also pretty hard to swing a trade

after week one. Like I think really the last time you can swing a trade is at the beginning of training camp and anything past that. I mean, they were able to bring in Sam Bradford at the last minute, but usually that's not something that happens. Uh, Khalil Mack right at the very end of training camp, right before the season, he was traded to Chicago. So it's not impossible, but if Adam Thielen were to get hurt in training camp, then they would have to do it or get hurt in week one or same for KJ Osborne. Cause he's an important part of this. If he were to get hurt, then you would want to try to bring in someone else because Smith, Marset, Albert Wilson, if he makes the team, like these are not really viable. Number three options at this moment, Smith, Marset could certainly show me something different

in training camp. I think he has the talent, but that's the only scenario that I could see that happening. Unless there's some very bizarre situation where someone is holding out, which almost never happens anymore. And then, you know, boom, the Vikings are trading for this guy or that guy. They are hanging on to just enough cap space to not make it impossible. So, you know, Hey, it could happen, but it's, they just have shown no indication that they really want another offensive weapon. I mean, they passed on one in the NFL draft at their draft pick to trade all the way back down.

And, you know, they had that opportunity numerous times. There were other wide receivers who were out in the market. There were other wide receivers that you could potentially trade for. And they just decided that they're all good with where they are. And that's another one of those things that going back to the first prediction, if they don't succeed, then we're certainly going to say, Hey, uh, maybe you shouldn't have followed the, the Kendall Wright method, and maybe you should have gotten a number three receiver for real.

Um, so I, I guess we'll see how that plays out, but I, I'm not saying that it won't happen for sure. Just that those things often require the exact right circumstances in order to happen. Okay. Next one comes from at sky you Miku, uh, just a Jefferson. If healthy, we'll have over 1600 receiving yards, 10 touchdowns. Kenny Wong will have more yards than Alexander Madison. 8-9 record, Irv Smith and K.J. Osborne will have more yards than Thielen, but he'll have more touchdowns than both combined. Whoa, that's a lot of predictions packed into one thing, one at a time. Let's go rapid fire on these predictions.

Justin Jefferson, if healthy, over 1,600 yards. Hard to do. I was just looking at that, you know, all time record. Like let's, there's only 24 guys who have ever in a single season gone over 1600 yards, uh, or 24 seasons. Some are by the same people. So that's not easy to do, but I could see it for Justin Jefferson. Last year, he was at 1,616. That would take the season that everybody is dreaming of. Not impossible at all.

Not easy to do either, even with a 17th game. 10 touchdowns. Yeah, I mean, I don't know. That seems reasonable if they're going to throw it to him a lot. Kenny Wong Wu having more yards than Alexander Madison is a very reasonable take. Wong Wu has to be a guy that they figure out how to use in all different scenarios, get him screen passes, get him reversed, like any way to have him touch the ball. It would be a failure to not. The only thing is Madison is the trusted, he can pass block. He's actually a good pass catcher. I think actually better in terms of his hands than Delvin cook. He's the more experienced guy. I think that if

Delvin and when Delvin misses a game that Alexander Madison is probably the starter, unless he really struggles during training camp. So that one I think is maybe 50, 50 that they could discover that Kenny Wong was a better fit for them. But the, the trustee veteran Madison eight, nine record is kind of, you know, dead on for where a lot of people are predicting this team, uh, Irv Smith and KJ Osborne having more yards than Thielen would be surprising. I mean, you're basically suggesting that he's going to be used like Kyle Rudolph, like more touchdowns only just used in the red zone. Irv Smith, I will say yes to, but KJ Osborne, I would not say yes to having more yards than Thielen unless Adam Thielen gets hurt, which is always possible considering his age, but, um, a waterfall of predictions there and a good stuff, man.

So, all right, let's go to, uh, at the twos T U S E Kirk cousins, 72% completion percentage, 5,000 yards, 45 touchdowns, or we riot. Aggressive. Very, very aggressive. Well, first, 72% is pretty hard to get to. If you're going to throw for 5,000 yards, 72% would be really tough. I think that Kirk Cousins will probably rest between 65% and 68% completion percentage. That's generally where he ends up. 5,000 yards.

I mean, that really depends. Are they abandoning the run game? Because last year in order to hit 5,000 yards, the Los Angeles Rams, aside from when they dominated the Vikings with Sony Michelle, they just couldn't really run the football very well. And only Tom Brady, Justin Herbert went for over 5,000. Matt Stafford went for 4,886. I mean, that's, it's a very, very high bar. I mean, Patrick Mahomes, they're throwing the ball all the time, 4,839. Now there is a kind of a gap here where you have cousins around 4,200 yards, and then you kind of have a bigger drop off into the 3,000 yard passers. He could work his way up into the 4,500 range where you find Dak Prescott and Joe Burrow. And then even 4,800 is Derek Carr. I think that's probably the absolute ceiling, but that seems really, really high. And last year, it's not like they didn't throw the ball last year in terms of total dropbacks

for Kirk Cousins. I mean, this would be a fun party game for your friends. Like, guess how many dropbacks he had, where he ranked in the league. It was actually 11th. I mean, in 2019, funny enough, I'll pull this up right now. I've got the PFF open here. Let me pull this up in 2019, which was cousins best, most efficient year in their best offense. He ranked 25th in terms of total dropbacks. I mean, that kind of tells you when you're losing, you're throwing more, but even the fact that he was 11th in the league in dropbacks and went for

4,200, that tells you how hard it still is to get to 5,000 yards passing 45 touchdowns. Same kind of thing last year, he was ninth in the league with 33. And you're asking for, you were asking him to throw more touchdowns than anybody else did in the NFL last year. So it would, I know that you're kidding with the whole, like we riot or whatever, but, um, I there, I, I do think that when we talk about cousins and what he can be under O'Connell, he can have the same statistics, but if it happened in different order, you'd, you'd win more like instead of when you're get behind and then you're putting up some of these bigger numbers to come back in games and keep them close if you're right from the get-go keeping the foot

on the gas pedal and you're coming up with that big drive and then you're up by two touchdowns and running the ball a lot like that's a lot better even though that's not different statistically that's why the box score stats just don't tell you a whole heck of a lot. I mean, you can look at there's evidence kind of everywhere for that, but like, you know, completion percentages or yards or whatever, like a lot of, a lot of the good quarterbacks had big yardage totals for last year, but there have been times in the past where not great quarterbacks have played from behind all season and put up a ton of yards, but it was only because they were playing from behind all season. Um, so I think that it kind of depends more or just as much on how it happens rather than if it happens, if he throws for 4,200 yards

and 33 touchdowns, but they win more because they got ahead early and then they ran Delvin Cook to win the game. It doesn't matter what those box score stats are, the PFF grade or anything else. It matters that the passing game drove their success. That's what you're really looking for. But if he had that season, then he will, he'll overcome the 50 to one MVP odds that are similar to Jalen hurts and Tua as far as where his MVP odds are. Cause he would win the MVP with that. All right. This comes from RK 2022, seven and 10 record. Don't see that they improved on defense. Offense is going to be about the same Garrett Bradbury. Just going to take a stray here. Garrett Bradbury benched by game six. Ouch. So the seven and 10 record we talked about, um, don't see them improved on defense that

rests so much on that secondary. If the Viking secondary can just hold, can just be solid as it has absolutely not been the last two years. If they can just cover a little, not have coverage busts, not give up big plays in big situations like they seem to do every week last year. Cam Dantzler, play consistently from week to week, come through in big situations. Patrick Peterson, don't age. Andrew Booth, show something. Shandon Sullivan, tell us who you are. Like all those things. If that can happen, they can be improved on defense. Those are the guys it rests on. Lewis Seen is probably a more talented football player than Xavier Woods, but if he even gives you an average performance in his first year, that'll

be pretty good. If he gives you more than that, it's really good to go along with Harrison Smith. But it's those corners that just were getting roasted these last two years. If they can improve or even be closer to average, then the defense is going to be better. Against the run, it would be hard not to be better. But, you know, no guarantees. It would just, they were atrocious against the run it would be hard not to be better but you know no guarantees it would just they were atrocious against the run last year so i think that there will be improvement i also look at the quarterback schedule and go eh you know you got your two games against aaron rogers you're gonna have to face josh allen that's no fun but you got zach wilson and justin fields and tua and

jared goff it's, these guys are not scary. And there's opportunities there to be better just simply based on who you play. As far as Bradbury getting benched by game six, this will be one we certainly go back to over and over and over again, where we go, if Bradbury is getting thrown back into Cousins, was that not on tape? Was he not benched last year for Mason Cole? Um, I would assume Chris Reed is the backup center. Uh, that's what the way it looked when somebody was out. Austin Schlottman was a guy they brought in. I don't know that he makes

the team or not, but maybe as the pure backup center, they seem to want to ride it out. But every year in the off season, the coaching staff is, Oh no, he's going to improve. He's looking better this year. And then they get halfway into the season and the same thing is happening. That same issue that he's just not a big guy. And it's hard to keep that weight on throughout a season. And he's not naturally good at anchoring to begin with and holding down against those guys that are 320 pounds. And I haven't quite gone through the schedule,

like defense by defense, to see what they're going to be facing in terms of defensive linemen. But, I mean, you start off with the Packers and Eagles, like right away, right off the bat, you're facing some really tough guys. So I think week six is a little early for a benching but could it happen again it could it could happen again all right this comes from Tony Kobanak oh sorry Tony I know we've tweeted a number of times but I don't know how to pronounce your Twitter name. Uh, let's see the bears hit on most of their draft picks fields takes a big leap. Ryan poles makes us look stupid for doubting him. I don't know. I didn't doubt Ryan poles. Are we the doubters? Um, the lions win 10 games. The Packers lead the league in rushing

the Vikings finished fourth in the division and finally draft a quarterback. The bears part of that is a little tough to buy because they didn't have a first round draft pick. And even if they hit on their draft picks, I don't think they're a lot better. They drafted a 25 year old receiver. They drafted a receiver who is like able to rent a car, which never happens. That's always the joke about when someone's young. Well, they can't rent a car yet. They're so young. Am I right? Uh, but this guy can, because they drafted a 25 year old receiver. Like I'm having a tough time seeing that their draft picks really change who they are. They're going to be a bad team fields taking another step. Could even the score though, like, could they be, could they going to be a bad team. Fields taking another step could even the score though.

Like, could they be, could they be a team that's eight, nine, instead of maybe six and 11, which is where I think they are, or even five and 12. I tend to lean that they're going to be quite bad. The Lions part of this, I'm buying. I am buying that the lions could win 10 games. 10 seems aggressive though with Jared golf, but nine, eight be competitive. Yeah. The Packers lead the league in rushing. I mean, could, could see that. I mean, they have a good offensive line and good running backs. I would not buy that. The Vikings would finish fourth in the division just because of the bears, but finally draft a quarterback could see it. It's not a good scenario for the people running

the team, the one you're talking about, but you could almost like, can you hear that? What's that noise? That's people listening, saying, you know, maybe that's not that bad. It would be a miserable, miserable season if that were to happen. And the downside is, though, because this is where all of us could say, hey, just lose and draft the quarterback. But the downside is that your coach is probably awful at that point. And that's not a good thing. If they ended up running it all back and making a bet on Kevin O'Connell and then finishing fourth in the division, if Kirk doesn't get hurt and you

finish last in the division, that, I mean, that means your coach is a horror show. I would be really blown away if O'Connell was that bad that he could sink the unsinkable Kirk that you can't bring below seven games for winning. But I could see the lions beating them in the division. I just, they have all the earmarks of a team as weird as it is to could see the lions beating them in the division. I just, they have all the earmarks of a team as weird as it is to say about the lions that makes that jump roster wise. They have a lot better weapons. Their offensive line is really good. Their defense is improved. If you hit on some of those things, uh, they could be a mildly dangerous team to play this year.

The Chicago part I'm having a little trouble with. All right. Last one, uh, from S McCullough five predictions. Uh, this is a question for about predictions. You can always throw your hot takes like that. I love that, Tony. That is, I mean, that's a blazer right there. Uh, but this is more of a question, which positions will have the same starter at the

start of the season and at the end, who are they? And, uh, for the ones that change, why injury and improvement injury is really impossible to predict. Uh, I mean, I have no clue who's getting hurt. That's another one. I mean, I, I, if I were able to predict injuries, my gosh, the fantasy people would pay me a lot. And the gambling people, I'm not, I mean, the guys who you have sort of red flags on

Zedaria Smith, Adam Thielen, Daniel Hunter, even like mildly Irv Smith. Cause he got hurt last year, but not really. Cause he's young, but someone who was recently injured. You always worry about Christian Derrissaw is another one that we don't talk a lot about him because he's the left tackle, but he had multiple injuries before the season last year and then was hurt in season. So he's at like injury number four going into this year. Cam Dantzler looked pretty jacked up to me in a good way, I mean, when he was out there at minicamp. So I think he's put on some muscle

but he's one that got hurt a few times in his first season you worry about that anybody who's a little on the older side eric kendricks but like who knows so as far as benchings or shufflings arounds you know that wide receiver three position is maybe a little intriguing to me is maybe if it's less clear that there's a wide receiver three, or if it's like three, three, a three B if Amir Smith, Marset emerges, that would be an interesting development through training camp. If suddenly KJ Osborne and Amir Smith, Marset were splitting their opportunities, but that would be, you know, that's, you know, possibility. Uh, the right guard position always could change. It could start with Chris Reed. It could end with Jesse Davis. It

could end with Wyatt Davis. Who the heck knows that doesn't seem likely. Um, you know, Delvin cook gets hurt. I didn't even mention him in the injuries, but he's been injured every season. That's where maybe can I Wong Wu ends up, you know, emerging there. Corner is certainly another one where if Dantzler struggles, I mean, remember Dantzler did not win the job out of camp because he just had a bad camp last year. I think some people looked at it and went like, Oh, Zimmer, what are you doing playing Breland? But when we came out of camp and preseason, I think all of us agreed with him to play Breland.

It just worked out to be a bad decision and Zimmer should have pulled the plug on it way earlier, but for whatever reason did not trust Cam Dantzler. But if Dantzler struggles or Shannon Sullivan struggles, uh, the nickel corner, they'll have to switch some things around where Cam Bynum fits in. All of this is kind of interesting. Like it is camp because right now, and this is kind of interesting like it is can't because right now and this is mini camp so don't lose it but right now cam bynum is the one who's been taking the majority of the first team reps at safety so you know if lewis scene isn't ready right away i mean we all would have thought laquan treadwell was wide receiver one or two at this point in the offseason and it didn't work out not saying he's bust, only saying

that maybe Cam Bynum is farther ahead or where, or could he end up being their slot corner? Is that possible? If Sullivan doesn't really fit in, there's not a lot of positions that every day we're going to be going, Oh, today was this guy's day. Now he's leading the battle. Like this roster is pretty filled with veteran guys who know where they're going to be. These predictions are fantastic folks. And I'll finish with maybe the best one. This from Mitch Boisel on Twitter. The team will finish 16th in field goal percentage.

I love that. Yeah. I mean, maybe, I don't know know they just cut their other kicker is a you know you hate to see it but like there he goes it's greg greg joseph season everybody it's greg joseph back again 16th and field goal percentage i don't know there's one imagine like what do if let's say it wasn't the score but but you were, you were given a genie that came out of a bottle and told you, you can predict one thing about football and it's not the final score or the team's final record. What would it be? Give, give me, give me when they make the kicks. That's what I want to know.

16th in field goal percentage. Sure. Yeah. All right. Well, I think it probably needs to be better than that or they're going to miss some important kicks because you know this team is still going to play tight games. So this is fun. I mean, predictions.

Predictions and projections week, everyone. Going to be writing about it on the website too. Keep sending them. They're great. And we'll keep firing them off. Thanks so much, everybody for listening and we'll catch you next time.