Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Vikings sign a defensive tackle and will send everyone to see JJ McCarthy

Episode Date: March 19, 2024

Matthew Coller talks about the Vikings signing former Rams DT Jonah Williams and reports that the Falcons were trying to trade up to the top 3 and got rebuffed. Plus the Vikings plan to send Kwesi Adofo-Mensah, Kevin O'Connell and their QB coaches to JJ McCarthy's pro day. Is he the guy? Is that good for the Vikings if they can't land Drake Maye? https://surfshark.deals/PURPLEINSIDER Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of Purple Insider. Matthew Collar here. Great to see everybody again. And now I had planned to jump right into the Vikings reportedly sending everybody to see J.J. McCarthy. And I want to talk a lot with you guys in the chat tonight just about J.J. McCarthy and how you feel about that potential idea as we do have to deal with the reality that the Vikings might not be able to get up to the top three but let's start with a little bit of Vikings breaking news which is that they have added a defensive tackle by the name of Jonah Williams and I thought where

have I heard that name before oh yeah he's aneman, uh, for the Bengals and signed with, I think Arizona, but I also heard it before because he was once upon a time with the Minnesota Vikings for a bit. And he ended up with the Los Angeles Rams where he has spent the last three seasons and Jonah Williams numbers are not spectacular. If you look them up on PFF. He has grades that are below average, did not create a ton of pressure when he was asked to chase the quarterback, and grades as above average tackler. He goes along with another guy that the Vikings brought in, which is Jerry Tillery, and I haven't talked a lot about him either. He played for the Raiders last year, had a little bit of a breakout

year and the Vikings also brought back Jonathan Bullard as well. So I think what a lot of us were thinking going into this off season was that the Vikings would be going after Christian Wilkins and they would be trying to put all their eggs in a defensive tackle basket, just go all in with Wilkins to try to fix their defensive line. And instead they are going to go with kind of a rotational type of approach where they now have four guys at defensive tackle who are all proven, but none of them is spectacular. So Harrison Phillips, I think we know is a pretty good player. And I really liked what Jonathan Bullard did last year for what he was asked to do in comparison for what he was asked to do. He was not a big time difference maker, but he was a gap stuffer. And you know,

if he's playing more like 400 to 500 snaps, he's in a better role than being asked to be an every down type of player. And Jerry Tillery is an interesting one because he was a first round draft pick and then really struggled in his first location with Los Angeles and then with the chargers. And then he goes to the Raiders and actually has a pretty good season where he was able to get after the passer a little bit more and started to show a little bit more signs of being that first round draft pick. And now they bring in Jonah Williams, who is a, not a journeyman, but you know, kind of a role player type at 28 years old, drafted back in 2020 from Weber state

go wildcats, not a guy who's necessarily huge. He is tall, six foot five, and he's played just over a thousand snaps in his career. Last year was the most that he has ever played by far when he played over 600 snaps. So rather than putting all their eggs in the basket of one defensive tackle, now they're rotating. It looks like a bunch of different guys and we can't forget about Jaqueline Roy as well who is also part of this mix they drafted him last year so this move does not preclude the Vikings from drafting a defensive tackle at all but I also think it's a little bit of a signal that shows us like hey all right they're probably not going to be able to get that big time defensive tackle.

So rather they have to work on kind of second wave type of free agents that can fill spots and play specific type of situations for the Vikings on defense next year. It's not ideal. It's not the dream. I don't know if the Vikings are going to stay with 11 and 23, probably not. But if they did, then maybe they could get one of those dream defensive tackles. And we're going to talk a little bit more about that tonight as we go forward, that possibility that what if there isn't a trade and they just end up drafting two first round players and whether we would be

unhappy with that or not. So the Vikings get Jonah Williams, not a difference making type player, but he was fairly okay in his role for the Rams. And you could say the same for all the guys they have at defensive tackle at this moment. But I do think after signing two defensive tackles and bringing back Bullard, it would now be a pretty big surprise if they went somewhere else and got another defensive tackle outside of drafting one in the late rounds and maybe trying to develop. So it's not the thrill that we were looking for at the defensive tackle position. And it'll probably be something that they have to look at in the future because I still look at that spot and just think that it is one of the most valuable things you can have

in the NFL is a difference making defensive tackle. And I don't think they have that still with the signing of Jonah Williams. But if they're rotating in, these guys are gap stuffing, stopping the run, allowing players like Andrew Van Ginkle to move around, rush the passer, then that's okay. It's just not the ideal scenario for the off season, kind of the best they could have done after losing out on Christian Wilkins. But when you think about that money that went to Christian Wilkins, it ends up going to some other more versatile players, going to Blake Cashman, going to Andrew Van Ginkle,

and that's okay. This is going to be a work in progress. I think that this is a reminder that the defense is still under construction and probably will be for at least another year. I mean, this is going to be another season where Brian Flores has to kind of fight tooth and nail in order to make this an above average defense. Now with this position, mostly filled, still looking at wide receiver three. And I know they have Brandon Powell. They brought in Trent Shurfield. I'd like to see someone else. I'd like to see a Hunter Renfro. I'd like to see someone else. I'd like to see a Hunter Renfro. I'd like to see them look at a couple other guys that are out there to compete for that wide receiver three spot. And, uh, you know, maybe DJ chart. There's, there's a few other guys that I think might make really good fits there at wide receiver three, the left guard

position continues to be kind of a mystery. Uh, in a guy that has been kind of a backup, a rotational player, but nobody is a starter yet. And Kevin Zeitler just signed with the Detroit Lions. So we're running out of guards. Also, I saw that Connor Williams' agent tweeted out that he's still dealing with a knee injury and isn't planning on signing anytime soon. So we are running out of potential players that could play left guard for the Minnesota Vikings. Are we going to have a Blake Brendel, Dan Feeney type of competition here? I don't love that idea because I think that was one of the things that they needed to accomplish is to get a guard who could be a difference maker, but the prices have just been so high that they might not be able to do that. And I guess you can't get everything that you're looking for in free agency, but I think they need

to go and get probably at least one or two more guys to compete for that left guard spot. And then of course, cornerback would be good as well, because I think they're solid at corner, but they're certainly not great. So there's your kind of depth chart where we stand after the signing of Jonah Williams, but I see already in the chat, you guys want to talk quarterbacks. So of course we will let's get right into that with JJ McCarthy. So the Vikings are sending everybody to Michigan's pro day to watch JJ McCarthy. So Josh McCown is going to be there and he's going to watch a guy who kind of looks like him in the face. And, uh, he, uh, they're going to send Kevin O'Connell, presumably, um, you know, other people as well. Uh, Kweisiia daful mensa is very likely to be there

so they are putting you know all their effort into going to watch jj mccarthy and my question for you guys is are you okay if it ends up being jj mccarthy or would you prefer the vikings where they are now so here's your options let me this out there and you guys can comment on this. Here's your options. Would you prefer, if I said you can't get the top three, they are off the table, they are going to the top three teams, those teams are not negotiating with the Vikings anymore, and the best you can do is number four with the Arizona Cardinals.

That's the best you can do. Would you prefer to draft J.J. is number four with the Arizona Cardinals. That's the best you can do. Would you prefer to draft JJ McCarthy number four or go after either Bo Nix or Michael Penix later in the first round? Which one would you rather do? Because I think that there's a good argument for both of those things. I mean, first of all, when it comes to JJ McCarthy, his name has been pushed into the top notch quarterbacks right along with those other three guys throughout this process. Now, the question I have is, is that actually true or is that a little bit smoke screeny? Because we have seen it in the past and we've talked about Will Levis and Malik Willis and being

wrong on those guys. But also, I mean, not only that, but Mac Jones was projected as the number two or number three overall pick. And Mac Jones ended up being the fifth quarterback taken that year, if I remember correctly. So we know that not always is the hype train reflective of how the league actually feels and teams actually feel. So are you okay with that possibility? Could it be a smoke screen that there's all this hype around JJ McCarthy? And I guess where I'm landing on this is I'm having a bit of a tough time deciding because what we do know is historically,

there really isn't any rhyme or reason to first round quarterbacks that sometimes if you are the fifth quarterback taken, you become a two-time MVP like Lamar Jackson. And a lot of you are very confident in your draft opinions. And I like that because that makes it fun, but I am not always all that confident based on history, right? Where there have been quarterbacks I've really liked that have failed and quarterbacks that I really didn't like that succeeded. And so there hasn't really been a good predictive measure for first round quarterbacks in the past. So if you're giving me the choice between say Michael Penix or Bo Nix at 11 versus McCarthy at four, at least where my wheels turn is, well, wouldn't it be better to have number 11 and number 23 to draft that defensive tackle

we were just talking about, or maybe a top-notch type corner to continue to rebuild this defense. But at the same time, if Kevin O'Connell goes to J.J. McCarthy's pro day and he stands there with Josh McCown, two giant square-jawed quarterbacks, and they're talking and they say, this is our guy. Look at him throw the ball. Look at the improvements that this guy has made. And they sit down with him at his pro day and they talk with them and they say, look, this guy gets it. He knows ball. He's going to be able to run our offense. He's got a good arm.

He's quick. And, and that's the only guy we want. We don't want Bo Nix. We don't want Michael Penix. Then McCarthy is our guy. Then from my perspective, I would say trade up to number four, forget the other first round draft pick and make sure Kevin O'Connell gets his quarterback. Do not saddle him with somebody else because of economics. And from Kweisi Rafa Mensah's perspective, he is the guy who's thinking analytically and analytically speaking, it would be better to take either Bo Nix or Michael Penix if those guys are actually first round prospects and then keep that other first round pick. That's analytically speaking based on the odds of the past and the value that you have

and so forth. But do you really want to go with that with the economic approach if your head coach really likes JJ McCarthy? And I saw Lance Zierlein tweeting about this the other day, and this is where I have a very difficult time. So what Lance Zierlein from NFL.com, if you've ever looked at draft profiles on NFL.com, he wrote them. So this guy has watched a lot of football players over the years. He's actually been quite good at spotting the Fugazi prospect, uh, because he was not high on Will Levis. He was not high on Malik Willis. He was kind of one of the few people that didn't buy into the hype, but he tweeted, uh, the other day that he had been talking to

someone in the NFL, a position coach who had sort of taken him through some of the reasons why JJ McCarthy should be considered a top prospect. And if you look at his write-up on NFL.com of McCarthy, it's not a very confident write-up. And I totally understand why, because I felt the same way watching him and especially watching the end of his season into the playoff and, uh, you know, the conference championship where it really did feel unspectacular with JJ McCarthy and what Lance tweeted was kind of like, Hey, I, I might be wrong about this one. Uh, I might've had my mind changed because of what I'm being told about JJ McCarthy versus

what he watched. And that's the tough part for me is what I watched of JJ McCarthy to me did not say, dude, this is a guy you trade up for. Like I didn't feel that way when I was watching JJ McCarthy. And when I watched him at the combine throw the ball, there were a few times where I thought he really let it rip, but I didn't think he threw the ball as well as Michael Pennix. And so I was kind of like, Oh, again, where I liked the, how he threw, I'm not saying that it was bad at all. All I'm saying is I wasn't wowed.

And I haven't really ever been wowed by JJ McCarthy. But if Kevin O'Connell tells me we got to draft him because of X, Y, and Z, how am I going to say, no, no, Kevin, listen to me. Penix, buddy, that's your guy. So that's where the back and forth and the struggle kind of goes. And there are things that I can really see from JJ McCarthy that are factors. And I agree with this as being one of them that, you know, he's a guy of a guy says that he is, you know, four years younger than Penix. And that is true. That is the case. You know, the fact that he is so much younger. It does matter in,

in as far as the development. I mean, you know, I Wrigley says that, you know, age is pretty irrelevant. Well, I guess the way I would look at it Wrigley is that when you're a coach and

you're looking at guys that you're trying to develop, right? Because you know that none of them are a finished product. When they get there, the age would be a factor as far as which of these things can get better. So like, take, for example, let's try to, let's try to superimpose it into a pitcher, like a baseball pitcher. If somebody is 24 years old as a baseball pitcher and they're throwing 88 miles an hour, it's pretty unlikely that you're going to be able to tweak their mechanics or you're going to be able to get them in the weight room and they're suddenly going to throw 95. But if someone is 19 years

old and they're throwing 88, they are going to grow much more into their early twenties. And that's why you would consider it a factor. Now, Joe Burrow was 24 years old and turned into an elite quarterback very quickly. And so I am not completely out on guys because they're older. I guess what I can see is just from the perspective of a coach, can I develop this? And one thing that coaches know that we don't is what you can fix and what you cannot fix. They know better than we do about that. And that's probably why Malik Willis was a third round draft pick because you couldn't fix the fact that he wouldn't get rid of the football, that he would hang on to it and hang on to it, that he took a lot of sacks in college and that he just didn't see the field very well in college. We've seen how bad that can be with Justin Fields in the NFL. And so that's one thing I would say for a lot of these quarterbacks in this draft is they don't hang on to the football forever.

Daniels kind of does, but he's an elite runner, so it's a little different. But there is that still same concern that he hangs on to the ball for too long. He did improve his sack rate last year, but that's the biggest worry with him that I see from people is just, you know, when somebody does not throw on time in college football, they probably won't learn to do it in the NFL. So JJ McCarthy did that, did not hang onto the ball forever. Didn't make a ton of terrible turnover worthy plays. It's just, it was, to me, it was not seeing like that big time prospect, you know? I mean, over the years we've seen that guy,

we've seen Cam Newton come through and, you know, this isn't a guy who looks like Cam Newton. It's not the super prospect that, you know, even from last year with somebody like Anthony Richardson, where it's an athletic freak show. And you're like, yeah, okay, give me that. That'll work. We can work with that.

McCarthy, it takes a little more squinting. It takes a little more like, all right, I got to look for some of those things that Kevin O'Connell would think he's going to develop. Is the faithful says JJ's numbers under pressure against top college teams are elite. You know, the thing about that is that he was probably only under pressure about what, 60 times the entire year. That's what makes McCarthy so hard for me is I see what you're seeing. I see that when there's a rush and he has to roll and he throws on the run like a shortstop kind of going to his

right turn and throwing he's good at that he really is uh but i also see a lack of kind of touch on the football where i mean even and i know bringing this up always triggers everybody but like rick spielman was talking about in college he didn't what they call layer the football, which means that everything was kind of a fastball. It wasn't like a lot of touch in the same way. And I noticed, you know, some people are really down on Drake May. And I don't know why that is, uh, because he was really capable of doing that with a much, much harder situation than McCarthy. And that's the thing that I think you're most concerned about with McCarthy is, and I'm not making this comparison because one guy's a better athlete than the other,

but is it Mac Jonesy? Is it, Hey, this guy had so much around him. The receivers were open. The running game was great. The defense was phenomenal and he just didn't have to do a whole lot. So that would be my concern is that he didn't have to do a whole lot. And now you're asking him where this guy has had great teams. He's barely ever lost in his life. He never had to do a whole lot. Now you're in Kevin O'Connell's world where the quarterback is throwing 700 passes. And can you get there?

Can you be that guy who has to do that? Now, Aaron Jones certainly helps for next year, but this is always going to be a pass first team. How are you going to react to that situation? And you know, on the other side, you could say he's been on big stages and he's won. So for every point, there's always a counterpoint and I'll get around to the conclusion, but I want to hear more from you guys here. Troy says, stay where we are and take Knicks. Keep all of our draft picks. Plus we are getting two third rounders of comp picks and about 130 million under the

cap. That's for next year. So take Knicks if he's there at 11. The, uh, the comp pick thing is a constant frustration for me because I wish the NFL would just say what it is right away. Just not wait till the beginning of next year. But that's not really decided yet. I know that that was put out there by a lot of people yesterday when KJ Osborne signed

with the Patriots. But if the Vikings make another signing of significance, it could change that. So it's not, it's not like set in stone, but that that's not really the point. What you're saying is that you could take Bo Nix at 11, draft another guy at 23, get another pass rusher, defensive tackle at 23 in a draft. That's got a few very likable defensive tackles, load up around this guy, and all he's got to do is execute. And, you know, I see the argument for that. I don't think that the league is going to love Bo Nix a lot or it's going to be really split on Bo Nix.

I can't figure out if he's going to be a first-round pick or not. Some very dialed-in draft analysts really like Bo Nix. Some former quarterbacks really like Bo Nix. But I don't know that the Vikings are going to love him because I don't think he's got quite the tools that J.J. McCarthy has. And also, I mean, it's hard to look away from the pedigree, from a guy who played for Harbaugh and a guy who won. And the upside is what coaches love.

Bo Nix is probably what Bo Nix is going to be. Air Beastie says, McCarthy's third down throwing percentage makes me really want him. The thing about the statistics in general, and one thing that I really like is that you guys are using analytics on the show. I appreciate that.

That's great that you're putting value analytics on the show. Appreciate that. That's great that you're putting value in these statistics because they are meaningful. And third down throwing is a big deal in the NFL. I, you know, I, I, it's, it's, it's good for sure. Uh, there has been other things like completion percentage over expected, but I even saw one of the top analytics people out there, Tash Seth talking about how Justin Fields had an amazing completion percentage over expected in college. And so did Zach Wilson. It actually got brought up in the Jets draft room when they were picking Zach Wilson, that he had this amazing completion percentage over expected

number. And of course, Zach Wilson turned out that way. I think the best argument for JJ McCarthy, if the Vikings were to trade up to four, because keep in mind, this is our option. It's trade up for, for McCarthy or stick at 11 and see what happens is probably his mind and his demeanor and how he handled playing under. I mean, look, it was a great team, but there was some uncomfortable circumstances with Jim Harbaugh being suspended. It's a big stage. It's a lot of pressure, the super high expectations, and also a lot of NFL style stuff. I'm always a little wary about the NFL system, the pro style, because there's really no such thing. But if there's somebody who's getting close, it's Jim Harbaugh

and the way that he runs his offense, how many college quarterbacks are under center? Like that doesn't happen very often. How many college quarterbacks are asking to run those play actions and bootlegs off of the run game? I don't see a whole lot. I see mostly RPO, RPO, RPO, and that's just not really how the NFL operates. I mean, there's a lot of shotgun, but it's not just a bunch of run pass options or spreading it out and running bubble screens and stuff like that. And that was a criticism of Bo Nix. So, you know, I mean, I think that with JJ McCarthy, your argument is that this guy is a really good communicator and leader. There is no question about that. I mean, he has a natural presence to him that you saw at the

combine that is really required for a quarterback. I mean, it's not something he's talked about a lot, but I think you really have to be somebody that your teammates galvanize around and they are gravitating to, and you can tell who the man is on the team. It's that QB one, like that's a relevant thing. It's important. And McCarthy has that. He has that naturally. I think the Pennix has it as well. I, you know, you saw that I think with his team overachieving, but Pennix being so much older and having the injuries, do you really want to put this whole thing on Penix? Or would you prefer to put it on a guy who just won the national championship, who is much younger and is a really good athlete?

And I think that this team would probably like McCarthy, but there's also, I mean, there is also the smokescreen element of it. It's just, I don't think, and this is a key point. I'll get back to your comments. I don't think that the Vikings would have traded what they traded to Houston in order to sit at 11 and in order to just take Bo Nix or Michael Penix, this trade strongly insinuates. And I have my notifications on at all times from Adam Schefter and Ian Rapoport and Tom Pellicero, because it's strongly insinuates that they're going up to the top. The question is really how far and is it going to be worth it if they can't get their hands on Drake May? back and forth and Albert Breer was talking about how the Atlanta Falcons called the top teams to

see if they could move up from three to the top. And the answer was pretty much, Hey, get away from us. But if the Vikings can offer a price with two first round draft picks, would that change the new England Patriots mind or are they locked into who they want? And then there's the other scenario. We're assuming McCarthy goes forth. What if it's Drake May who goes forth instead? But I think with news of the Vikings sending the entire wagon of people to Michigan for his pro day, it was worth sort of taking a deeper dive because we've kind of touched on McCarthy here or there, but not necessarily gone all in in this discussion. What about Bob says Burrow was elite in college.

His last year was a master's degree in passing at LSU. And that's how I felt about Michael Penix. If Michael Penix did not have the injuries, would we be talking about him differently? I think we would. Now it's relevant, but I think we would be talking about him in much more Burrow-like fashion. Bo Nix, though, had insane numbers.

It just seems like he doesn't have that one spectacular skill that Joe Burrow had, which was accuracy, and he could really make something out of nothing. I mean, Nix does that from time to time, but it's just not special. Let's see. Deontay says KFC and Kweisi have private, private workouts set up for McCarthy. Any idea what happens in the private workout? So they take pool toys and they whack them, right?

Like he drops back to throw and they go whack. Did anybody watch the old Gruden camps? He used to do that and it was crazy. And I don't know what that tells you, but I think it actually is that tells you, but, uh, I think it actually is going to look like what was happening at the Gruden camp. Uh, now I don't know this for sure. I have never gone through one. Maybe, uh, that's something I can ask O'Connell when we go to the owner's meetings, or maybe I can get him to put me through a private quarterback

workout and I can see what that's like. Um, get injured, so I'm not going to agree to that. But honestly, I think that it works kind of the way that Gruden camp worked, sitting down with the guy, going over his tape. And one of the things that I hear from coaches is they will go through negative plays, as you saw John Gruden do on those. And don't you think that no player would even agree to that anymore? Because they made some guys look a little bad that they wouldn't even do that. But so they'll sit there, they'll go through, especially some negative plays and try to get answers on what happened on some of those plays. They'll go in depth about their offense, what he

understands the whiteboard, how he looks at the field, how he looks at offensive football, and I think take them out to the field and run through some of those things. I don't know that for sure though, but at least that's how it worked on the Gruden camp. But they've never let me in for one. Maybe someday, guys, maybe someday, but I don't think that's going to happen. That's just how I think it's going to play out. So folks, have you ever heard of test driving a phone network? I did not make this up. It is an actual thing. And U.S. Cellular is letting you test drive their network for free for 30 days.

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U.S. Cellular, built for us. sound effects there test drive us cellular award-winning network for 30 days us cellular built for us terms apply awards based on open signal independent data visit us cellular.com for details let's see uh r emmer says burrow was elite for one year in college he was seen as a fifth round pick before that championship year yeah so that's what I mean about how there's no real like correlation thing you can look at and say, Hey, this says that, so this player will be a success or this stat says this player will be a failure because yeah, I mean with Joe Burrow and arm strength was a question with Joe Burrow. Like go back and look at some of those, uh, those scouting reports where there were questions, even in his first year, some of his deep balls. And this is a big thing about McCarthy.

Some of Joe Burrow's deep balls in his first year, absolutely were dead ducks. They just flopped through the air and died. And then by the next year, because of his work ethic, he was able to improve that. And then he was dropping dimes. And so how can you change that? Can you improve that? Is there something that Kevin O'Connell sees, technically speaking, with JJ McCarthy

that is causing his deep balls to not be reflective of his arm strength? Because there weren't a lot of perfect deep balls that he threw this year. And then even at the combine, there were a few that were very spotty. So that's an interesting question as well. Let's see. Bron Frickin Solo says some quarterbacks make the transition to the NFL and play faster than others. Some never get there. It's always a crap shoot. No, you're, you're totally right about that, that you can never really be sure. And that's probably the best argument that

I would hear about JJ McCarthy is that you can never really be sure. So my opinion about how he played against Iowa really doesn't matter. I mean, it doesn't help me as far as hot takes go, because if I came on the live stream and talked with you guys and said, JJ McCarthy, I'll quit covering the Vikings if they draft him. I mean, that's hot. Like that's what they do on TV, but that's just not factual. And we do factual here. And the facts are that even if I

have some questions, I'm still going to be in the camp of, look, you have to play to win. And that's like, that's a play. You have to take a shot. You have to roll dice. You have to the crap shoot, you know, you have to go for it. Otherwise you'll, you won't get your guy. And with McCarthy, if it is true that he has this upside and it's true that he can be developed and he has, uh, as, uh, Jay Jizza says, uh, uh, a processor, if JJ is a processor, which is something that, um, Kevin O'Connell has mentioned on numerous occasions. If that's true and he is a processor and he can understand the game well, then the flaws of his game won't always matter that much. So here's an example of somebody I could see J.J. McCarthy being like, and I've probably used this as a comparison for somebody else,

but I'll go with it anyway. Jared Goff with some wheels. So if, and look, Jared Goff's a great quarterback. So that's a high end type of outcome. If someone could become a quarterback that can run a top five offense. But when I watched Jared Goff, I see a lot of arm strength and the ball whizzes, but it's not always perfect. Sometimes the ball placement's a little wild. He's got good receivers. They make plays and he is quick at processing.

This is what Jared Goff never gets credit for that makes him, in my opinion, one of the best quarterbacks in the NFL is that before the snap, this dude sees everything. He understands where he's going with the football and then delivers it with a lot of velo. And sometimes it's ugly. Sometimes it's not perfect, but I see that same sort of elongated wind up a little bit because McCarthy has long arms. And so sometimes a little bit here, a little bit there. Sometimes the timing isn't flawless, but how much of offense is just getting the ball to the right spot. And then what McCarthy can do is he can scramble. And so, you know, if we're trying to make the

argument, like what if he became Jared Goff with better scrambling? Well, then you've got a chance to win the Superbowl. I mean, Goff has been on the doorstep twice. I mean, that's, it's a high bar. It is, but that's a guy with arm strength and great processing and even without a very good mobility. And that's being really Midwest polite to say very good. It's horrendous mobility, but that's, you know, McCarthy actually has that. So, you know, I think if he, he can work through some of those flaws is kind of what you're banking on. The question I think is, is it worth trying to trade up all of this stuff? You have two first round draft picks.

I mean, the Vikings have, in comparison to their competitors, way more that they can move up with. Is it worth moving all of it to get the fourth quarterback uh and uh i think the answer is probably yes i do think it's yes uh let's see groovy skeptic says uh what do you make of warner's critique of drake may that he struggles with layups no i you know with drake may one of the toughest things I think to do when we analyze these quarterbacks is to put aside some things that look bad. And I know that's weird to say, but college quarterbacks are not finished products. And we were just talking about that a little bit with JJ McCarthy, that you're looking

at tools and you're looking at ceilings and what can this guy become what can we fix what can we not fix now if he struggles with swing passes out of the backfield but he can laser 25 yard dig routes over a linebacker in perfect stride to his wide receiver i'm sorry i think we can work on the swing routes right right? Like, Hey, I think the other part is the harder part. It's much harder to find a six foot four, 225 pound guy who can run for 800 yards in college football, carry a really bad team, make plays and take shots down field and deliver with that type of arm strength, velocity, and touch. So the tape has problems. It absolutely does, but it doesn't have mega problems because he was still

one of the highest graded PFF quarterbacks in college football. So there are some of those issues that you see on those short passes and those layups. Am I not drafting a guy because his timing on a swing route isn't very good. And I watched it and I know that was one of his critiques. And also another thing is too, is when we're talking about processing is important and it's, it's very hard to see with college football because things happen at different speeds. So, you know, coming back to a fourth read or something does that happen much in college football I think the answer is probably not right so you're really looking at what does the guy have

to work with and I'll tell you a quick little story uh about uh Cam Newton so uh for those again who didn't watch the Gruden camps you go back and and Cam Newton was one of the guys who did the Gruden camp and John Gruden asked him, so what, what was your favorite play in college? What was it called? Like, give me some verbiage. What did you say inside the huddle? And he said, look, we didn't really have plays. I looked over to the sideline.

I got number one, two, three, or four. And that's what we ran. And I think a lot of people at that time, imagine if that was on Twitter. Now people would have lost their minds. Oh, this guy didn't even have play calls. Cam Newton came into the league and it took a while for him to understand how to run an offense. And he was an athlete first, but when Jeremiah Seararles who you guys who are veterans of the show know jeremiah quite well when jeremiah played in carolina he said that the thing he was blown away with was cam newton's knowledge of the offense and the way that he operated it

and all those things so uh i mean players are going to grow and they're going to learn. And, you know, I just, I look at this, you know, and Jay Giza says that May has accuracy issues. See, I think that's a little unfair. I think that Drake May has accuracy issues on certain types of plays. But when you watch the big throws that he makes, the 15 to 20 yards down the middle of the field, those throws that are going to Justin Jefferson, I don't see too many accuracy issues. I see something that it's really a special arm talent. And look, there have been lots of quarterbacks, by the way,

and I'll bring up two that I'm going to compare Drake May too. And I could be totally off on this and maybe he he's the one who drops. I don't know, but Matthew Stafford and Eli Manning were both guys that were really big, super armed talents, and both could get wild on you. They could have some throws that just go crazy. We've seen this happen from Stafford a million times. We've seen it happen from Manning. We've seen baffling interceptions from both of those guys, but the size, the arm strength, the guts to make the throw ultimately is a good thing. And if you drafted somebody on their caliber of quarterback, you can win a Superbowl with it as those two guys have. And they're not perfect.

We saw Stafford get sacked 10 times against the Minnesota Vikings once. We've seen Eli Manning, he against the Vikings, threw five interceptions in a game one time. Sometimes some of these quarterbacks with big arms who have been taking shots and risks and things like that are not always flawless. And if you're looking for flawless, I don't know who you're looking for because even Caleb Williams has problems. Andrew Luck is probably the only guy that I ever watched in college. And I was like, oh my gosh, he's an NFL quarterback. Look at it.

Look at how he's running this team. He's probably the only guy I've ever seen like that. And I don't remember. I was like 12 when Peyton Manning was drafted. So I don't quite remember what that looked like in college. But as far as lifetime watching football recently, yeah, I mean, there's just very few quarterbacks who are ever perfect.

So I still like the idea of Drake May a lot. And my choice would be May over JJ McCarthy, but it really comes down to the head coach and who he wants. So if they can't get May, are we okay with McCarthy? In my mind, the answer is yes. If O'Connell is all into that point, then go for it, man, go for it. But I will have questions that we're going to be watching for as we go into training camp and all that sort of stuff.

If he's the guy, of course they need to make this trade first. So all of us have sat here and assumed that this trade is coming and it hasn't happened yet. But, you know, when you look at the report from Albert Breer of SI, it could be a while. It could be all the way to draft night that the Vikings wait to make this, or it could be in five minutes after I finish this podcast. So we're all kind of wondering, and I don't think they're going to tell us exactly for sure. Uh, Jason says, why is the assumption of Knicks and Pennix at 11 and not 23? Fair enough. Fair point. Yeah. They could draft a defensive lineman at 11 and wait till 23. The issue with waiting is that there are other teams that are right behind the Vikings that need quarterbacks. And it would be pretty scary to, I mean, think about what Vegas did this offseason. Vegas picked up Gardner Minshew, and they have Aiden O'Connell on the roster.

Do you think they want a quarterback? I would guess so, because that's not a starter. That's not even reflective of a starter. I mean, Minshew, all respect, journeyman quarterback, awesome last year, but that's not a guy who's taking you to the next level. They want a quarterback. So are you going to see, and this is another thing that seems to be out there a lot, which is from no Dak to Minnie.

Wow, you really didn't want, was there ever a rumor of Dak Prescott to Minneapolis to play for the Vikings? I don't think so, but okay. That's a cool YouTube name. Anyway, Knicks to the Broncos is, you know, that's possibility as well. And it's exactly the point is that like, look, if you try to wait till 23,

if you have 11 and 23 and you try to wait and you end up with those quarterbacks off the board, then all of this magical offseason that they've had, all of this excitement, all of this, wow, they're going to take this thing to the next level and do the rookie quarterback contract thing. If they end up holding the bag and Sam Darnold is the starter, I take it all back. Every nice thing I said was based on drafting a quarterback. And again,

you don't make the move with Houston to move up, to send a 2025 second, to move up only a handful of spots, unless you've got a plan to slide up. The question is really, is it three? Is it four? Or is it five? Because all of those things have different implications. Three seems like you are locked into your guy unless he's taking a two, but you at least get one of the best of the best prospects. Four is a little more controversial if it's McCarthy, or could New England be very sold on McCarthy, which I am not counting out. And then it ends up being Drake may anyway, or number five, are you kind of taking the risk

that Arizona is going to draft, uh, Marvin Harrison jr. Or Malik neighbors, and you still get the fifth pick or could the giant slide up at the last minute? So many things at play, everybody. So many things at play. play i have we've been going hot on this for so long i haven't even opened my diet dr pepper yet this is a fun time is it not we are having a good time talking about football here uh miles says i personally would rather uh would take shadur sanders over any of the ones outside of caleb williams but if we are picking this year i have more confidence in drake may he's just Kyle says, I personally would rather would take Shadur Sanders over any of the ones outside of Caleb Williams. But if we are picking this year, I have more confidence in Drake May.

He's just seen way more situations. And I also like Drake May just from the tools perspective, really more than anything. Just that, I mean, he has such a great arm and such great athleticism at that size that when I think in my brain, can I think of guys like Drake May throughout recent NFL history that have succeeded? And the answer is yes. I mean, I think quite a few guys come to mind. I mean, even, even CJ Stroud.

I know that everybody right now would say, oh, I loved CJ Stroud. QB won for sure. But there were criticisms of CJ Stroud when he was coming out. But he kind of has some of the same elements as Drake May. And I mentioned Stafford. I mentioned Eli Manning. Philip Rivers early in his career was a pretty good athlete. He did not become that later in his career was a pretty good athlete. He did not become that later in his career, but Phillip Rivers, this big, tall guy, you know, who could throw the ball accurately. Now Rivers was a little different because he was insanely accurate in college, but that accuracy

developed over the years, even though he had a little bit of a funky throwing motion. That's another thing, right? Like every one of these quarterbacks had their criticism, including someone like Phillip rivers in that throwing motion. But when we were talking about the description of the, like the size does matter now, it's not everything like Blake Bortles was huge. Uh, Ryan Tannehill is huge and he was only okay. Although the Titans, Ryan Tannehill version on a rookie contract. Now you can win with that, but anyway, not the point, Ryan Tannehill version on a rookie contract. Now you can win with that, but anyway, not the point, not the point. It's just that there's a lot of NFL quarterbacks throughout history that have looked like him that have the same type of tools that had criticisms coming out of college that made big time throws that have huge arms and good athleticism. And that's really what I'm, what I'm basing the opinion on is it doesn't

take long of watching Drake may to figure out, Ooh, okay. I see exactly why he would be a top draft pick where with McCarthy, I think it takes a little more discussion, a little more of analysis and breakdown of, well, you know, he's going to do this and he's going to develop that and all those things. And that makes, I think it a little bit tougher for me to fully buy into, uh, is the faithful says I see at McCarthy, either taking the Vikings to the super bowl or a complete bust and not much in between. Uh, well, you know, uh, usually the in-between for the Vikings is somewhere between, uh, eight and 10 wins and that's what they're trying to break out of. And but look, the setup here has the possibility of, you know, really taking them somewhere. And I'll give you another example that might be J.J. McCarthy.

And I think you won't like it, but I actually do kind of like it, which is Alex Smith. Alex Smith was a great athlete coming out who had a pretty darn strong arm and was not really the most precise passer and was very, very smart and a great leader. And everyone loves Alex Smith. Now you can look at Alex Smith with Kansas city and go, Oh, the guy who that they left for my homes. Right. But you go back to San Francisco, Alex Smith, go look at the winning that they did. Go look how close they were one drive away from the super bowl against the

New York giants. They won a lot of fricking football games with Alex Smith on his rookie contract, of course. And then even in Kansas City, they had lots of shots at it. The thing about McCarthy and Alex Smith that I think is comparable is that there isn't that next gear. There isn't the next gear where you go, what did he just do? And that's what I see with Drake May. I don't see the, whoa, whoa, whoa, highlight reel, pull it back.

Let's take a look at that crazy play again. There are some nice throws for sure. And he's got a very strong arm when he can step and throw. He's thrown into tight windows. But, you know, I mean, I don't see that like, whoa, type of play happening all that often. Intrepid Fool, that's an interesting name, says my biggest concern with May is that his yards per attempt and completion percentage absolutely tank under pressure. This is a bad sign. I think that's a little bit, a little bit of a myth, I think, with him him because now I can pull this up and take a look at it. Why don't I do that since we're all here having fun with this discussion? Because the thing is that it's true. It's not like what you now on PFF. So give me a second. But the

issue with pressure statistics is that everybody is worse under pressure. And Drake may had quite a few dropbacks under pressure where someone like Bo Nix or JJ McCarthy didn't. So it becomes a very small sample size. It's loading. It's a big data page. So I'll get that up in a second for you. But I looked at this before and almost everybody's yards per attempt tank when they're under pressure, almost every, I mean, not almost everybody, everybody, everybody, uh, sorry, this is funny. What about Bob says the comp picks are determined by a bunch of drunk NFL executives with the dartboard. Yeah, I mean, it's I will say it's one of my bigger frustrations because everybody always wants to know. And I don't really ever have a sure answer for you because it's it's just really hard to figure out. So, all right, here's a very important point about Drake May under pressure.

So I pulled this up and he had the, now I set it at a certain number of dropbacks because Bo Nix has crazy statistics under pressure, but barely ever was under pressure the whole year. So if you set it at a certain number of dropbacks, like 140 or well over a hundred dropbacks, I set it over a hundred dropbacks. Drake may have the sixth highest PFF grade of anybody under pressure with that many dropbacks. And part of it was his scrambling for sure. But his passing grade was fine. His passing grade was fine. His passing grade was ninth best in college football

when he was under pressure. So I think what you see there is like, yes, everyone's production gets worse. But if someone's tweeting out that stat without pointing out that he was in the top 10 in both overall and passing PFF grade, they're not telling you the whole story. So I think he did. I think he did fine.

Like I just, what happens to players under pressure is they just get worse. R. Emmer says, I don't think Drake may had accuracy issues. I think he had a teammate and scheme issue. That is true. That was a bad football team. That offense did him no favors. It's rough watching Tar Heels film. That is true. That was a bad football team. That offense did him no favors. It's rough watching Tar Heels film. That offense was gross. So this is how I felt last year about Anthony Richardson that I thought, you know, Anthony Richardson was really good and his team

was really bad. And that's why I liked him last year. And it was all based on tools. Like that's, that's all I was looking at is leadership. How, which I don't know about Drake may, but you could tell with Anthony Richardson because his team was so bad and yet he kept grinding and he fought and he was in the game against Georgia. I mean, he w with an injury, I think during that game, he played through it. Like those are NFL things. And I just thought like, man, this guy, no, one's going to be able to stop him if he takes off. So there's a thing that I can see that I can grasp onto. And this is just how I view quarterbacks with a limited amount of information, but it was something I could grasp onto and say, there it is that run that he had against Utah. I'm talking about Anthony Richardson,

when he faked the pass, pulled the ball down. And then I think threw it in or something. I mean, it was just like, Whoa, that's exactly what I'm talking about with those wow plays. And then his team, we had to contextualize that his team was in over their heads. And so I think a lot of that was Drake may as well, but I don't know him as a person. And I don't know character wise, like, is he a guy who they think can lead an NFL franchise? Because that matters an absolute metric ton. Luca says shock. Everyone take the top center defensive interior cornerback at 11. I don't think center is a thing you draft at 11, but I'm OK. I'm following and Penix or Knicks at 23.

It is an option. It is an option. It is an option. And that's the question is, would you rather draft an interior defensive lineman or elite corner? Quinion Mitchell, the guy from Toledo, looks like an absolute freak. Would you rather do that and hang around and hope? And my thing is, you can't really hang around and hope because if you get left out in the dark, it's going to be bad, very bad. The other way to look at it would be to take the quarterback at 11 and just use 23. And as, as a option, as a backup option, as a worst case scenario, you can't trade up at all. Somebody else traded up taking Pennix or Knicks at 11 and then getting somebody else at 23

is not terrible. Like that means you have players to work with, but it would be a failure or at least that's too harsh. It would leave us with a lot more questions. Like, why did you do this? Was there someone you really thought that you were going to get that you didn't? Was there someone who had a handshake agreement with you that, you know, went back on that agreement?

Like what happened? Why would you make this move? That's going to be a huge question. And if they, if they pick the guy, a lot of you will probably bring up, you know, Christian Ponder and settling for a quarterback, but we'd have to just wait and see how it worked out. It just would feel a lot less confident than if they were drafting number four, where you're getting one of the top,

top prospects, as opposed to the guy who's in his twenties. And look, here's the truth is about the first round that, and I know there's nothing that's definitive always. But if you're drafting somebody in the range of number 20 to number 40, your odds of success, despite Lamar Jackson are way less than if it's at the very top of the draft. I mean, that's just a, that's just a reality. I think there is a cutoff and it's probably in the middle of the first round that if all the teams that didn't need a quarterback pass on somebody, it's pretty rare that we see that player succeed. But of course, Lamar is the outlier there. One before I die asks, do the Vikings make the trade with Houston? If they know New England and Washington aren't trading out, do they make it knowing that

they can only get as high as five? So this is very good reasoning by you, I think, in the form of a question. But I think what you're insinuating is, would they do this if they could only get to five? Or would they only do this if they thought they could get to two or three? That you only make this trade with Houston. If you think you can get to the top, or if you are fairly certain now that brings about the question of why has it not happened yet? That's the other part of that. That's just the other part of that, uh, is why has it not happened yet? Um, that's, that's what I, that's what I can't tell you for sure, because I thought it was, I almost didn't even do a reaction podcast to it because I thought it was going to happen

within an hour. And yet here we are days later, uh, still hanging around and waiting. David says sticking at 11 and 23 is a loss. You either have to overdraft Knicks or Pennix at 11 or risk losing one or both of them at 23 with a second rounder. You could have taken Mike Pratt at 42. Yeah. Pratt is I'm just not, I'm not into that idea. The second round quarterback. I just am not into, in fact, the NFL is not into it. I looked this up the other day and it was something like there's only maybe five second round quarterbacks who've been taken since the Garoppolo and Derek Carr year. So usually if you're not a first rounder, you're a third rounder or a fourth rounder. That's how it's typically worked. And Pratt to me at the senior bowl,

I just thought this doesn't really look like an NFL prospect to me. Kind of looks like a backup that some people are trying to talk themselves into. Maybe I'll be wrong. But to your original point that sticking at 11 and 23 is a loss, I think the way I would describe it is it takes the risk factor. So we could do risk factors for all these. Risk factor at three seems pretty low of trading up all the way up and you get pretty much exactly the guy you were aiming for. And in the worst case scenario, let's say instead of may it's Daniels. Well, that's fine with me. So that's pretty good. Worst case scenario, the risk goes up on the meter with JJ McCarthy, because throughout the entire process, until we got to the off season McCarthy was by the consensus more of a late

first round second round a grade from a lot of people and then suddenly shot up the draft boards that worries me a bit so that would put me in that a little bit of risky but not crazy because that's who Kevin O'Connell wants if you try try to draft at 11, I think there's a lot more risk. Now you're talking about the fifth quarterback. Now you're talking about reaching where a lot of, uh, you know, the draft analysis world thinks that Nick's isn't even a first round pick. Now, now your risk factor has gone up. And if you wait till 23, you are in the red, like that is very risky of overdrafting somebody uh by a lot now that said could i see michael pennix being a good quarterback of course of course i could

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Paul Simpson says, let's see, I'm more concerned by what Warner says about May than Chris Sims. Sims seems to try and be controversial all the time. If Warner is worried, then that's another matter. Well, I think you have to watch the whole Warner video because Kurt Warner is not like Chris Sims and that he's not definitive. So he's not coming out and saying, oh man, don't like Drake May. I think what Warner was giving, watch the whole video. It's a little dry because it's a quarterback just watching play after play after play, but, but it's worth taking a look at because he, uh, really goes

into depth about what he was criticizing and he doesn't get to the end and go, I wouldn't draft this guy. That's not what happens. Uh, I, he, I think talks about, and I watched this the other day, talks about the things that are really good about him and the things that he has questions about, which is a much more reasoned way of going about it than here's my rankings. Not that I'm against that. That's fun entertainment. But if we're looking for the credible sort of who can tell us a little better, it's probably not. It's probably Kurt Warner and his analysis. I just thought it was really in- better. It's probably not, you know, it's probably Kurt Warner and his analysis. I just, I thought it was really in depth. It was good. Um, so it's worth watching

the entire thing. I don't think it's if I don't think the conclusion was, I hate this guy and he'll never be good. That wasn't the conclusion from Kurt Warner. Our Emmer says, uh, defense is sold out to stop may when they played the Tar Heels and their scheme had no answers for it. I saw that as well. I felt that way as well. Yep. That's what you saw is what I saw is there were just some times where you went,

can we get Drake May something a little easier than having to make great plays all the time? That might have been some of Caleb Kayla Williams problem this year as well. The defense for North Carolina, I don't think was special. So they had to play in some high scoring games, but look, the way that Drake may ended the season was like not great. And some of his higher moments, his best moment, I think I saw maybe his best game against Duke.

And I was very impressed with how he overcame guys dropping balls and a lot of struggle. It was Duke, though. I mean, you're not talking about the best of the best, so I don't know. But nothing's a sure thing. It's just that we have to try to contextualize that Drake May and J.J. McCarthy were not playing the same game of football. They just weren't. If Drake May is on Michigan, then I think his numbers look a lot better if they would have let him throw the ball. They didn't let McCarthy throw the ball. But to have an elite running game, elite offensive line,

great receivers, great coaching, there was a lot working in McCarthy's favor. But the idea is to have those things working in his favor here as well. Miles says, I think the Patriots are going to accept our trade. The fact that we have very heavy conversations at the combine, but nothing transpired tells me everything I need to know. We went to get more ammo for our move. Um, yeah, it was, uh, was that there? Was it that the combine that they supposedly had talks or senior bowl or something i don't know um so many rumors happen that you can't keep them straight but uh to your point i just keep coming back to how would you make this trade with the texans if you

didn't at least have a very strong indication that you were going to be able to make this move. And if they do, then it is very clever. It is very clever. If they are able to pull this off to, to go get that other first round draft pick, knowing that the league values first that rounders right now, more than they do future firsts. And knowing that the Broncos can't really touch it with this, that they don't have the same amount of draft capital, that would be quite a crafty move to dip into the future, to borrow from the future, to get enough capital today to be able to move up.

And that is still my expectation. Uh, David says Pennix will be good faster, but JJ, uh, than JJ, but has a lower ceiling. I don't know if Pennix has a low ceiling. I mean, I see, I kind of think that Pennix is a little more boom or bust because of his arm talent. Um, sorry, I'm reading ahead, but, uh, I think that Penix is boom or bust because he's got a really excellent arm, but his knees could bust. And I also think he could be very wild with that arm. I really like his leadership. I like his guts. I like the way he handled last year, even in defeat. I thought, you know, sometimes I watch a guy when he's, when he's defeated and he did not play well, but he never stopped. I mean, sometimes a watch a guy when he's, when he's defeated and he did not play well,

but he never stopped. I mean, sometimes a guy throws an interception at the end of a game or something like, Oh man, well, I guess he stinks. But I thought Pennix what play, they just played as hard as he could in that game against Michigan. I never saw him get down. I never saw it look like he was overwhelmed or giving up. I thought it looked like his team was way worse, and he was probably pressing a little too hard, but that's better for me. And I saw, like, this is a Washington program that's never meant a thing. And then now all of a sudden they go, and this is a Jake Browning team. So then now they go to the national championship?

Like, wow. So, you know, I've liked Michael Penix. I think he is more boom or bust, that he could be a spectacular quarterback with that arm, or he could be a guy that just never really pans out, which is, you know, that's not saying much, but I don't know that I actually don't think that JJ McCarthy has a higher ceiling. I think that JJ McCarthy has much more of a, like a little bit of a lower ceiling, but a higher floor

because of his intelligence, because he's handled big stages and because the way he processes the game, you know, a little bit of physical ability there, but I don't see some next gear for him, which could work. I mean, you don't need to be, everyone doesn't need to be my homes, but you know, could he become like, how about if JJ McCarthy becomes Dak Prescott and everyone doesn't need to be my homes, but you know, could he become like, how about if JJ McCarthy becomes Dak Prescott and he doesn't play for the Cowboys instead plays for the Vikings. I mean, if he's Dak Prescott, is that good? Like super, super intellectual player, not always perfect with the accuracy, good athleticism, at least early in his career with Dak more of a pocket quarterback though that would be

pretty good for me like is that a good comparison McCarthy for his ceiling as being Dak Prescott I mean that could get you to a Super Bowl as long as the guy doesn't choke all the time in the playoffs uh Cole says uh did I miss did I miss the discussion on the Patriots compensatory pick conspiracy. So is this, um, is this the thing about signing KJ Osborne to give the Vikings another draft pick? Uh, somebody emailed me that and I look, the Patriots have no receivers. I don't think that that's it. Uh, plus it's not like you can trade an imaginary compensatory pick. I know the idea is, well, it gets them back their third round pick that they would be trading to the Vikings to add into the mix.

That's a good one, but I don't think that's it. I think if the Patriots are trading with the Vikings, it's because they know that their team is not very good and needs a lot of help. Or the Patriots could trade out a three and back up. This could also be because the compensatory pick drives me crazy to talk about. So I'm going to move past that. The number three pick. Now imagine this is an interesting thought about where the Patriots fit in and why it's taking so long. Could it be

because the Patriots want the number four pick and they're fine with the Vikings trading up as long as they can trade back up to number four. So then we got to do this whole do-si-do of Vikings move up, Patriots then move back up. And there is precedent for this with the Trey Lance trade where the dolphins got whatever it was from San Francisco. Is it maybe 12 and then jump back up to six? So it does happen. It definitely does happen. So there's lots of, there's lots of different, lots of different ways that this could go

now down over the next coming weeks. Kenny says the commanders and Patriots are not moving. You know that, I mean, that's possible. That's so that's really where it comes down to the question that we've been talking about, which is, is it still worth it to go up to four if that's what they do? And, and look, I don't, I don't know you're saying it definitively, but I don't know because there has been talk, and I brought this up on yesterday's show, of the Vikings working with the Patriots. And they might eventually get there and be able to go with the number three overall pick.

So I think that that is still very much possible that they could get to number three. Matthew says, what will the Vikings gain from his pro day that they didn get to number three Matthew says what will the Vikings gain from his pro day that they didn't the combine well the combine uh is I think helpful to teams but you only get 15 minutes with a guy it's sort of the uh like they would call like a car wash or something or speed dating is the way that they talked about it where you sit down in a room with JJ McCarthy and you got everything prepped that you want to ask him and you go, all right, buddy, tell me why you didn't have more passing yards. And then he tells you his sort of stock answer. And you tell him,

and you ask him, would you rather be a dog or a cat? And he says, well, I'd rather be a dog. And you're like, right answer. Dogs are tough. And then they say, okay, great to meet you. And I hope they don't do that. They used to do stuff like that, but I don't, I hope they don't anymore. Cause that's stupid. But you, but you get like only a handful of questions for a guy in 15 minutes. We've been talking about this for an hour and 10 minutes and we haven't covered everything. Like think about how quick that is. That's not a lot of time.

So at a pro day at a private workout, you're going to get much, much more time with the guy to be around him. And I remember, I can't remember who exactly I was talking to that talked about when you bring somebody in your building, you get to see how they treat everybody. You get to see how they walk around that building. You get to see how they introduce themselves to the PR people, to the, you know, the other people in the lunchroom and all those things. And I know that sounds sort of silly, but to actually spend time with somebody is different than just a quick plus the preparation. Uh, you're, if you got 15 minutes in those rooms, you're prepping hardcore for what those teams are going to ask. Well, eventually you're out of your prep, uh, when it comes to a meeting with a team. And the pro day also gives a look at the quarterback throwing with his wide receivers. And another part of it too, is it's now been months since the college football season ended. So what you're looking for is maybe a little progress. So, all right, well, here's a thing that we asked this guy at our meeting to work on and

so forth. And is he, is he making progress with that? Is he, you know, layering the football better? Is he throwing with better touch? And so I think that all these things, it's just more information gathering. Does it really help? I don't know. Sometimes I think if you just were handed a list of quarterbacks and you were told they're first rounders, you've never heard of any of them and you circled one, you'd have the same odds as these NFL teams, but that's a different story. I think when you are, when you're going to go to your ownership and tell them we're drafting this quarterback, I think you need to have done every single bit of due diligence that you can,

because if you said, no, you know, we just hung around. We just, uh, yeah, we didn't go to his pro day. We don't care. Um, it's, that's probably not going to go over super well. Um, so I think you have to do everything you can to gather as much info as you can. And then you go from there and then you take your best shot. Paul says, all the quarterbacks have issues. The question is, can KOC fix them? We have to trust and get behind whichever quarterback he picks. You know, I agree with that. There's very few times where you would ever hear me say,

yeah, you just believe in the people in charge. What kind of fun would that be? If we all weren't Monday morning quarterbacksbacks second guessers if we all didn't have our own opinions that's that's what makes football great is that we can all have our own opinions uh and we can watch and we can all see different things and then we talk about it that's what i love about doing this but in this case i have to side with kevin o'connell for whoever they want. I mean, because they're going to him and Josh McCown are going to work like crazy on this

and make a decision. So how could I say, oh, well, they don't know what they're talking about. I know what I'm talking about because I watched his one game on television. So at very least, I can acknowledge that I might have my own thoughts about it, questions, concerns. But whoever they draft, what I realize is that historically, we have not been good at picking out on draft night. Otherwise, the Seattle Seahawks wouldn't have been given terrible grades for when they drafted

Russell Wilson. The draft analysts are bad at it. The teams are bad at it. I'm bad at it. You're bad at it. The teams are bad at it. I'm bad at it. You're bad at it. So we can formulate our takes and our observations. And I'm having a great time watching all these film breakdowns, reading the data and the numbers and all those things and getting ready for this whole thing. So very exciting. It's been a really fun time. I wish we would have been able to do it earlier to tell you the truth. But at the end of the day, when they make that draft pick, it's going to be good for the franchise. It's going to be the good

path. And so I'll have more concerns about JJ McCarthy than I might have about some other quarterbacks in this draft, but I think it will be a good pick. Uh, I agree with this uh love uh or lew dog lives um you should do the private workout with o'connell what do you have to lose yeah i mean i agree like that's you're trying to just get as much information as you can uh intrepid fool says pennix has a great arm i just don't want a pocket passer some Some liability, same liabilities as cousins, which make winning against good teams difficult in the modern NFL have to be able to extend plays today. Uh, yes, that's true. I, the only caveat I would say to that is, and look, I'd much rather after watching a

pocket quarterback for this long, I would much rather have somebody who can scoot and who can get away. But one thing I see with someone like Jared Goff or Joe Burrow, these are both pocket quarterbacks that don't have great speed is that they resolve the issue of pressure differently. Jared Goff, when he's under pressure he is terrible truly terrible and yet his offenses thrive he played great in the nfc championship game and unfortunately his team let him down but he was he was really excellent against a talented defense in san francisco and scored a bunch of points on them and moved the football well how did he do it against that pressure goff gets rid of the ball.

That's the key, right? He does not sit around and wait for people to get to him. And sometimes he makes a really terrible throw and you're like, oh, well, he was making sure that he wasn't under pressure and Penix does that. So I think if you have that solution, the other solution is pocket movement. And that's not really Penix's game, but being able to sense pressure and slide and drift and, and, and just avoid that pressure ever so slightly. Kirk Cousins, I know like watching him stand in the pocket and getting strip sacked time after time, after time again, was a frustrating process to tell you the truth, uh, over the years. And that would concern me about any pocket quarterback, but he never had that drift to him. He never had that vision to him that like he could understand the sensing of pressure because you'd sit up there. I would in the press box, or if you

were going to games in the stands and you're watching from up top and you're seeing like the pressure here, it comes sometimes TV doesn't always show it great. Like here it comes. Here's where the pressure is coming from. He doesn't see it. Oh, he's going to end. It's a strip sack.

And we all turn into Tony Romo going. And that's what would happen so often. But I think that Pennix was very good at sensing pressure and getting rid of it. So as long as you have an answer, then that's good. Luca, if we trade up and draft JJ, here's what I see the local media and fans will go wild for him to start team and coaches. No, he ain't better than Darnold. I, you know,

the, the starting right away thing. I, I know that there will be fans who want him to, and I'm sure that there will be some media people who want them to, but we've all grown up in a world with green Bay, right? We all know the benefits of a guy sitting for a year, right? We know that. And I also think that there is a little bit of mythology with the sitting for a year, right? We know that. And I also think that there is a little bit of mythology with the sitting for a year thing. We have such a small sample of a handful of guys who sat for a year and worked out that we also forget about some of the quarterbacks who didn't like Paxton Lynch, who like never played ever. Uh, not every quarterback who sat out worked out. And how many quarterbacks were truly ruined by playing? If J.J. McCarthy can physically handle playing in the NFL, you just have to

deal with some of the bumps. And we saw C.J. Stroud last year step right in. We saw Anthony Richardson step right in. So I'm not really too concerned about that question because they will decide based on what they see in training camp, whether that guy is ready to play or whether he needs to sit. And Sam Darnold allows them to do that. That's the real key is that Sam Darnold allows them to be able to sit the guy or not. If Darnold is slightly better than the other quarterback, but the other quarterback is mentally there. So this is what I've learned from training camp over the years is it's really about, can you get the team lined up

and throw to the right place? Now, if you make some mistakes along the way, if you have a wild throw, if you are a little bit shaky in your drop back or your technique or whatever, or adjusting to the speed of the defense, all of that can be worked through with experience. But if you're ready to start, that means that you can hear the play call in your head, which is new for these guys because college football is insane and doesn't

have this. So you hear it in your head, you go into the huddle, you say, all right, here's the play. Here's the other play because a lot of them have kills to it. You know, have you ever seen the guy go kill, kill, kill? Like that's changing the play. So you get the play, you get the other play line up, look at the defense, read where the defense is supposed to be. Understand in your head that here are your options. Oh, there's a wide receiver who's lined up wrong. No, no, no, no, no. You got it. You got to go over to the other side.

You see Kirk doing this in training camp all the time. It's actually kind of fun to watch. So you're like, no, no, no. You you're over here over there. That's not the play call. All right, here we go. And then take the snap, drop back, identify where you're supposed to go with the ball and throw it.

If that's what you can look like in training camp, then you can play in the NFL and they'll know that. And they'll see that on a daily basis. And we'll see it from the sideline as well. And I'm very excited about this. And they haven't even drafted a guy yet, but to watch that process play out because I've seen Kellen Mond and Kellen Mond couldn't do those things. Couldn't get them lined up. Couldn't get the snap. Couldn't get his drop back under center.

Couldn't identify where to throw the football. Almost got sacked every single play in training camp. It was, it was a brutal watch. So you'll know pretty, pretty, you know, far into camp, couple of weeks into camp is the guy starting to get it or not. And if he is, then he can play right away. I don't think it's a thing that just automatically like ruins a guy if he has to play. And we've seen that many times. Uh, miles says a bigger question is what do the Vikings do if they decide McCarthy is not their guy and Drake may goes off the board. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. That would be the thing. But so my question is, they've got to be almost all the way down the road to make the trade

with Houston, right? They've got to be 99% of the way there. Unless JJ McCarthy showed up at his pro day. Let's say that he's the guy that they think they can get. And McCarthy says says you know what i actually like cats more than dogs i never told you guys before i am a cat guy i like having that strange little furry beast wander around and i don't like to be able to train an animal i like cats and they're like whoa we only draft dog guys i'm obviously joking, but if there was something that was a super red flag

about his pro day, I mean, I guess, but if you're getting to this point, you've got to be very confident to make that trade that you're almost all the way there. And I think maybe more than anything, it's contingency plans. So if they think that they're going to be able to get Drake May, they, uh, then have to know that they can get, um, you know, that they could get JJ McCarthy. They have to know because if they did this without knowing it's totally reckless and that would not be, that would not be good. Uh, Jefferson and Addison going with to the meeting. If only they could do that. But no, they're not. They're not doing that. I don't think Justin Jefferson works when he's not working. That would really be something, though, if they brought their own wide receivers.

It's a great idea. Can they, you know, bring your own receivers and see how he throws to him. But what they're really going to see is they're going to see how he throws to his own receivers, which I think is actually relevant. NoDak to Minnie says, I remember Carson Wentz looked amazing as pro day. Then at the very end, Hugh Jackson doused the ball with water and he threw a 10 yard tuck. All right. I mean, how much of this stuff is just straight up ridiculous, right? The guy played a full career of college football. Do we really need to put water on the football? Do we really need to hit him with pool toys?

I can understand wanting to talk to him. Some of the stuff I can't really understand. That's, that's very funny. Uh, that's very funny. Uh, Carson Wentz, you know, Carson Wentz is a guy that I like to use as an example. And, uh, like think about this. If Drake may became Carson Wentz, when I say that to you, your reaction is, Ooh, but I think your reaction should be like, okay. I mean, Carson Wentz personality wise was really the problem, right? But he came into the league and he won 13 games and then he had that horrific injury. And then with Foles winning the Superbowl, I don't think it ever got out of his head. Plus they didn't get rid of Foles the next year. And I think it's, it's sad in there forever with

Carson Wentz, but they won a lot of football games on his rookie contract. And that's what you're looking to do. You can't really guarantee anything past that. You can't guarantee that the guy is locked in to be a second contract guy. You can't guarantee that he's going to be Josh Allen or Patrick Mahomes. But the low end of this, even if it works out, Carson Wentz was able to win 13 games with a great team surrounding him. I mean, if that's what you end up with, then I'm, I'm into it. That would be totally fine. Uh, Jay Jizza says the, uh, Burrow has

the it factor like McCarthy Burrow had a different type of it factor. Burrow had a different type of it factor burrow had a like mccarthy has this sort of buttoned up i'm an nfl prospect like i go to michigan type of thing where burrow had swag all over him i mean just you know smoking the cigar after the championship and all that so you know it uh that's a different type of swag. Uh, Matthew says, I still don't understand how McCarthy's basically done nothing since the end of the season and his skyrocket up the draft boards. It still seems fishy. I'm not going to disagree with that. And this is where I always leave the door open to, uh, and some people are saying because he won the national championship, you mean after the national championship, honestly, like if you look at a mock draft

database is a good place to look at this. And there's another site called grinding the mocks. They both do similar things where they look at mock drafts and where players stock rose or fell. And even when you look at the end of the season with McCarthy and where it is right now, where he's being considered a top five draft pick, he was nowhere close to that when he stopped playing football. And that has always been something I've had a tough time getting over. Just to tell you the truth, again, I am not going to lose my mind if they draft JJ McCarthy. I'm not going to rant and rave and say whatever, because I think that he is a quarterback that under the right circumstances could win with

the Vikings. And that's what we're asking for. Right. Um, but does, does it, is it a little odd? Uh, yeah, yeah. It's a little odd that someone's draft stock would shoot up. And I used to have a theory about this, but it was kind of blown up by, I forget who, maybe Burrow. I always thought like the guy whose draft stock shot up at the end was always the one who wasn't going to work out. But then that turned out not to be necessarily true. Josh Allen was one of those guys where people are kind of talking about this Josh Allen guy, and then he does the combine and all of a sudden, whoa, Josh Allen's a top pick. What? The guy who didn't do anything in guy. And then he does the combine and all of a sudden, Whoa, Josh Allen's a top pick. What the guy who didn't do anything in college. And then guess what? He turned out to be

a franchise quarterback. So, uh, you know, sometimes it doesn't work that way. Uh, is the faithful don't think Denver has the picks needed for a trade and the Vikings have more valuable first round picks. So it's really in the Vikings court. Yeah. I mean, it seems like it's really an Arizona and new England's court because the Vikings have that capital. Now, what are they going to do with it? Are they going to be able to make this work? And did they already know they could make this work at the senior bowl or at the combine if they were able to get this other draft capital and if so why hasn't it worked yet one before i die matt do the vikings make the trade with houston if they already know yeah you're touching on exactly what i what i was just kind

of getting to if they already know washington and uh new england aren't trading out for two or three yeah that is a really great question is if they were told by new England and Washington, we're taking quarterbacks guys, sorry, we're not trading out. Would they still do this to get to number four or would they have waited around at number 11? Because the thing that number four guarantees you is one of the top four quarterbacks, naturally analytics right there right great insight from the football reporter but no truly there are four quarterbacks considered to be potential franchise qbs and you would be locked into one of them so the worst case scenario is that you get one of

those guys and uh that's still really good if you're going to pull that off, it's better if you could get number two or three. But if they were told you're not getting two or three, I don't think they can make that move for sure. I think they had to be certain that they could get three or four, that that's what they had to be certain of when they made that move. And it might just come down to with three or four, which one it's going to be. And that might be the holdup is, is new England. Now think about this. There's still guys who are doing their pro days and McCarthy is one of them. So does new England want to get through McCarthy's pro day and really decide, did they want to sit down with them? Did they want to have him in for a visit and really decide, you know what? We're good with not taking McCarthy or may. And so you guys can trade up because that's not our guy. I mean, that might, that might play a factor in what's taking so long is that the Vikings have to know, can they get three? And if they can't, then they need to turn their sites to Arizona. I would think that that makes the most sense for this entire thing. For what's taking so long is we're not even through all of the pro day stuff.

And maybe number three has to decide, are we really drafting a quarterback or not? You would think they would get there by now, but maybe they haven't. What about Bob? I want a quarterback with it factor chip on the shoulder, film hound and FU attitude football, Bob football, McCarthy and Caleb Williams have it not. Uh, I assume you mean not sure about may. Yeah. I mean, I don't know. Like sometimes, sometimes it's hard to see who actually has it and who doesn't, uh, McCarthy, does McCarthy have an FU attitude? I don't think so.

Um, Williams might have too much FU attitude, actually. Actually, some of, some of Williams FU attitude, I thought was a little bit showy as opposed to real. And that's just my biggest criticism of him is when you write F Utah on your fingernails, to me, you're just trying too hard to be like, see guys, I'm real. I'm real badass. I wrote bleep you to the Utah team and then you lose. That's not good. Uh, I really thought that some of Caleb Williams is look how much I care stuff was too much. Um, and I worry about him because of that, like the pressure he's going to face. And McCarthy to me was more of a fly even

guy, which can also work. Um, you know, like look at, look at Eli Manning, for example, such an aw shucks personality. Like you never really saw him throwing helmets, yelling at people. But yet when they got into the Super Bowl, he was never intimidated. When he got into the playoffs, he was never intimidated. When he went on the road to play the Cowboys or to play the Packers. It never bothered him. Is that JJ McCarthy? Is he a guy who's never going to be intimidated? And you know, I don't know with, with may, I saw some competitiveness in his game for sure. I didn't see him throwing helmets. I didn't really, to tell you the truth, I really didn't get a sense from watching TV.

What kind of leader Drake may really was. And I guess I'm going to have to try to find it like Michael Penix. I got it pretty clearly, uh, with Bo Nix. There weren't too many times where they faced a whole lot of adversity when they did. They, you know, didn't win against Washington, but I thought, I thought he, he played hard, but you know, McCarthy, it's so, it's so clear that this guy doesn't have those big ups and downs, the too high, too low stuff from the pressure that he faced that I think it's one of the biggest benefits of his game. David says, I think Kwesi could trade up to four or five first and then move up to three or four as a second step. I mean, that is probably what's taking so long is that there's just options. There's things they can do. And Kweisi was on K fan today and basically said that

it's very clear what they're trying to do. It's just how they're going to do it. And if they're going to be able to pull it off, uh, Trent Pennix ate Texas's lunch. Yeah. And it's a good, it's a good take from people who said if they had lost that game, that we would look at Michael Penix differently. I am not coming off the Michael Penix love. I know he's probably going somewhere else now that the Vikings have done this. He's, he's going to go to the Raiders. He's going to go in the second round. I don't know where he's going to go, but I like that dude. And maybe I'll, maybe they'll draft him in the third. And then I'll come back and say, I don't know.

Maybe I guess I was wrong, but, but I like that dude a lot. Trent says maybe considered old, but quarterbacks can play for a while in today's league. Yeah. I mean, as long as his knees work, that arm is something different. It makes running an offense look easy. That I totally agree with that arm talent is his arm talent is heart or what really sold me when a guy goes through that, those types of injuries and fights back the way he did. I mean, that's just, that's hard to do. So I think that he's out of the conversation with, uh, the Vikings, but I'm still going to like, I'm still going to like him.

Um, Bron fricking solo says, uh, it's an exciting off season for sure. Who will be the starting quarterback, Darnold Mullins hall or the rookie? Well, I'll tell you two of those guys. It won't be, it's not going to be Nick Mullins. It's not going to be Jaron hall. Uh, I mean, look, the Jaron hall era was great. And I, he goes about his business the right way. So I don't mean this in a disrespectful way, but there's really no reason to talk about Jaron hall again with this team. It's just not going to happen. It's just not going to happen. And if it, and if he proves me wrong, I congratulate him, but there are many quarterbacks who are fifth round draft picks who look totally over their head and probably are more fit for like a UFL. And I think that's Jaron Hall. So that won't be Jaron Hall. It'll probably, it'll probably be on the roster as QB

three, but I don't even know about that. They might want Mullins and Darnold in the room with their rookie quarterback, because you're not going to find a more knowledgeable guy than Nick Mullins for sure. I mean, he's super high IQ, uh, no matter who it is, I hope they are successful. Losing seasons are miserable. You know, that's a, um, an interesting comment because I really don't think losing seasons always have to be miserable because it's all about what we're trying to accomplish. Right. And, uh And so, so what are our expectations from the outside, right? What are we looking for the team to do in that particular season? Are we looking for the Vikings to win the Superbowl next year? Not really. No. I mean, we're probably

expecting them to be competitive and we're probably, and I mean, you guys as fans and me as media, like we're going to set a bar for this team. We're going to say, look, you should win eight or nine games. Even if it's a rookie, this is a lot of talent on this team. You should be good. And what we're looking for is them to be competitive and for progress to be made. And for, if the rookie quarterback is playing that you're looking like he's going somewhere. And if Darnold is playing, then we're looking for the team to appear ready to take that next step with the rookie quarterback the following season. But if they win six games and JJ McCarthy or Drake May is good, then that's great. That's great. You're not always going to win

those games with the rookie quarterback. And a great example is 2014, Teddy Bridgewater that, you know, Teddy Bridgewater, what they go seven and nine, but that was a fun season. Remember the jets win with Jarius, right? Like it was a fun season and everybody could tell everybody. I remember reading this, that off season, everybody could tell this team is about to be dangerous. And they were in 2015 loaded guitar says, do you think that McCarthy is a better prospect than Teddy was? They're different. They're different with Teddy. It was so easy to see in college why he would be an NFL quarterback. I thought his accuracy, his leadership, the way he operated his team, and the fact that Louisville had never

done Jack before Teddy. And then he had them beat in Miami. That used to matter. He had, he had them performing in ways that they had never performed before. I think Eli Rogers was his top receiver. Rogers was an NFL player, but not a difference making NFL player by any means. And Teddy was always going to have the weaknesses that he was going to have. He was never going to have a rocket. So that's where he's different, where Teddy had this anticipation that was really special. And there's lots of NFL throws where he did this, where there was one against Arizona, where the guy is breaking in on a double move and he goes back to throw it way before the guy even gets out of his break at 2015, lets it loose and leads his receiver into the football, you know, 20 yards, 25 yards down the field. He had a really great anticipation element to his game. I think

that Teddy held onto the ball too long a lot of times and would try too hard to make a play, but he also, because he did that, he would extend some plays and then find somebody. Also didn't turn the ball over very often, which was really good for them. And then was on a development path since they took him young, was on a development path that looked like that arm was strengthening. The team around him was strengthening. And in 2016 and 17, you could have seen them being a winning team. So I think he was a good prospect coming out. I think with McCarthy, you see more tools than you see, like, this is a guy who can lead an NFL team now, which is what I thought of Teddy coming out.

You see more of the, okay, he throws it really hard, but it doesn't always know where it's going. And he's really quick, but sometimes, you know, he runs himself into some trouble.

Like that's, I think they're, I think they're different, but maybe the same kind of caliber of prospect. It's just that now offense is easier. Quarterbacks are, it's such a premium plus Teddy had that bad pro day. And I think that really cost him. So I don't know, but think about this. This is an argument for McCarthy. If you draft JJ McCarthy and he becomes Teddy Bridgewater and he, his first two years are, you know, pretty good. And you build this team and you

win games, but he doesn't put up like massive stats. And then he's on the precipice of taking this big step forward. If that's what happens, are you good with that? Is that a good draft pick? That's a good draft pick. If by year three around this rookie quarterback, your team is about to take the step forward where you can compete for a Superbowl, which is where the Vikings stood when Teddy got hurt. Yeah. That's a good draft pick. Aaron says may needs to work on his footwork. Just like every other rookie. Yeah. Well, I stopped paying attention to what draft analysts thought of footwork with my homes. They hated my homes because of his footwork. They love Desmond Ritter because of his footwork tells you everything you need to know. It's that's

going to be either develop, develop it or don't. That's going to be how it is. Uh, so, uh, let's see. We've still got a lot of comments from you guys. And I appreciate that. I am running out of a voice here a little bit, and I'm working on an article at purple insider.com. Go check that out about, uh, for tomorrow about the argument for each quarterback they could trade up for. And then what if they stick at 11 with kind of this, this sort of thing, I'm looking at some statistics and some scouting reports and those types of things. So, you know, you can take a look, but, um, uh, I just, I love, love, love how awesome you guys are with the comments. I mean, just, just great, great stuff. And I'm even the ones that I'm not getting to, uh, I'm, I'm reading them through, but I got to run. It's been a great live stream.

Hope this worked out really well for all of you to run. It's been a great live stream. Hope this worked out really well for all of you guys used a little bit of a different system here. Hopefully that worked out well for you guys as well as me. And, uh, you know, we're going to be continuing to do this. This week is a huge week on this channel. Uh, we're going to have, I'm recording two more podcasts tomorrow, which will be premiered on the YouTube page. And then I got a really cool kind of surprise guest on Wednesday. So, oh, let me answer this because this hasn't even come up. So you're out on Jaden Daniels.

Absolutely not. Absolutely not. His name didn't even come up through this whole thing just because I think Washington wants Daniels. That's why. And if they're not going to move out of him. But no, no, no. I am not out on Jaden Daniels. That's why. And if they're not going to move out of him, but no, no, no, I am not out on Jane Daniels at all. If that was who they picked, oh man, you talk about fun. You talk about fun to watch a guy come in and play like that with his type of speed and his tools with the playmakers they have. Oh no, no, no, no. I'm not out on Jane Daniels at all.

I think I have like a little bit of, you know, questions about him developing and all that sort of stuff. And, you know, like how he's going to work out with the rhythm and timing and all that. Sure. Yeah. But I mean, as far as how entertaining that would be and what the ceiling of that could be, man, that could be really, really fun. So yeah, I mean, that's if they end up with any of the top four, I think you're in a good place, but if we're

ranking them, Drake may is my top fit and then Jaden Daniels, then JJ McCarthy, but all of them have the potential to be, uh, the franchise type of quarterbacks. So anyway, tremendous, tremendous stuff from you guys tonight. Great, great chat. Really loved it. And make sure you check out everything that is upcoming on this channel. It's going to be great. Look at that. An hour 45 just flies by when you're talking football.

And how about this? We have a team that is very, very likely drafting a quarterback. I mean, you can't ask for any more than that from this offseason. So thanks, everybody, for watching. We will do it again very soon with more live streams. So keep your eyes on the channel. Lots to come. Interviews, all that sort of stuff.

Next week, the owners' meetings. Purpleinsider.com if you've got an email to send me for a fans-only episode. Whew! Fun times, guys. Football.