Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Vikings sign Mackensie Alexaner and Matt Harmon of Yahoo! Sports talks Justin Jefferson and DeVonta Smith

Episode Date: March 27, 2021

Of course the Minnesota Vikings made a late Friday afternoon move, signing cornerback Mackensie Alexander. Do we like the signing? What do we expect from Alexander's role? What does this mean for Jeff Gladney and Cameron Dantzler? Plus Matt Harmon of Yahoo! Sports joins to talk about his Reception Perception project and why Justin Jefferson was so special and what the numbers say about Alabama's DeVonta Smith, who NFL Network mocked (once) to the Vikings Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Get Coors Light in the new look delivered straight to your door with Drizzly or Instacart, Coors Brewing Company, Golden, Colorado, and as always, celebrate. Hello, welcome to another episode of Purple Insider, presented by Scout Logistics and Symbol, your stock market for sports. Sam, we have a signing to talk about on this Saturday morning. The Minnesota Vikings bringing back Mackenzie Alexander, which will not have anyone throwing parades, but I think is a very good move, and maybe in terms of savviness and smart and clever moves for the offseason, the best that they've made to add some depth to their cornerback group that they were so severely

missing last year. I had the confetti and the balloons ready for the parade too. You kind of just kind of rained on my parade there with that. Vikings don't like doing business during daytime hours. They wait for the Friday news dump and then they drop it, but it is a pretty good move. I think there's a level of familiarity that they have with McKenzie Alexander and he has with the Vikings. And sometimes players leave, they realize the grass isn't always greener. And he had an okay, not great year in Cincinnati. It was a little hard on him because early in the season,

he had the disappearance of his father, which was very scary and bizarre. And fortunately, his dad was found and then came back and played a little bit better for the Bengals. But we haven't seen the price as of this recording. I assume this is pretty affordable and that's the kind of deal the Vikings needed to make. The latest number was 8 million and change left on the cap.

And this probably cost them two or three, I would think. So I like the depth they're creating. And I like that they didn't just settle for Cam Dantzler and Jeff Gladney, run it back and do it again. So they bring in Peterson, who we've questioned that deal. But I think that it does represent big time like status upgrade, you know, upgrade in preparation, upgrade in credibility. And obviously this move brings in someone with tremendous institutional knowledge. So they're going to make Gladney work. They're going to make Mike Hughes work if he's even able to play with his injury history. And now they're kind of back to where they were a couple of years ago,

where even their backups had pretty high pedigrees. And I think that's what Mike Zimmer likes. Yeah, I mean, I think that this offers them a parachute for if something goes wrong with any of their corners, and that includes the fact that they might just not be good. Like Cameron Dantzler last year had two games that were really highly graded against Jacksonville and against Chicago, but the rest of his season had a lot of downs and a lot of rookie moments and three different injuries. So even though I like his potential potential you can't rely on that and with Jeff Gladney he was seventh worst in terms of quarterback rating allowed last year and he was playing outside he

was playing inside it didn't seem like they knew for sure exactly what he's going to be in the future so just because he was drafted in the first round should not at all guarantee that you just get your position locked in. In fact, it didn't for Mackenzie Alexander when he was in his second year. That's when they played Terrence Newman. And so they can have a legitimate camp battle where you lock in Patrick Peterson to the number one cornerback position and say, everybody else go fight for those couple of jobs, and they can have depth, and they can have a rotation if they want to. Mackenzie Alexander and Terrence Newman at times in 2017 rotated to give Terrence Newman a little bit of a break, and I think that was good and beneficial for them.

This is the one that makes, of all the moves that they've done, the most sense for what this team needs, and you might say, hey, who's playing safety safety who's playing tackle you know and have those questions and those are proper questions to have but if you lose guys in the cornerback group and end up playing chris jones the season is over you're not going anywhere and we saw that last year if you have holton hill starting and mike hughes starting and guys who are just not capable of holding down those jobs, it can be over pretty quick. So instead now, if someone gets hurt, they actually have a backup plan.

And I think of all the positions that you need a backup plan the most for, it's corner because other teams will just game plan to throw at your worst guy over and over. And boy, did we see that last year. OK, so let's compile our cornerback room. Usually they keep six. If I were to rank them right now, I would probably go Patrick Peterson, one. Cam Dantzler, two. Mackenzie Alexander, 3A. Jeff Gladney, 3B. Mike Hughes, assuming that he's healthy. I think if he's healthy, he makes the team because he's a first-round pick. He's five. And then number six up for grabs, but I'd probably give it to Chris Boyd.

Maybe Harrison Hand, but I think Boyd is a really good special team, or even though he got pretty penalty-prone last year, I think he does have value there. Do you agree with that, or would you alter that top six? Yeah, I you agree with that or would you would you alter that top six yeah I mostly agree with that the Chris Boyd thing boy it was a rough year for him last year and when he did have to play cornerback it didn't go very well and I wonder if they look at that and say maybe the guy is just kind of a special teamer so if Harrison Hand can hold down that role they would pick him over the former seventh rounder Harrison Hand, I'll just throw this out there that I remember there's a little bit of buzz for it,

and Rick Spielman shot it down, but it was a conversation at draft time. Could you move him back to being a depth safety as part of his role as well? Because I think that there was some thought process about his size and kind of how he plays the game that he might be more of a safety long term so I'll just throw that out there as a possibility and you know he made a play when he got his chance against Drew Brees he got that interception I know that's just one play he got toasted a few times like everybody else in that game but that's more than we saw for most of the other corners all of last year I mean how many interceptions did they have as a total unit? Like three? So, you know, I'm curious to see what they think Harrison Hand might be and if there's a role change for him mixed in there. But I think you're exactly right that the battle probably

comes down to, A, who's healthy, because a lot of these guys have injury histories. And then it ends up if Mike Hughes can give you anything, then that's good for you. But I also looked at this signing, Sam, as, oh, okay, they don't really think that Mike Hughes is going to come back and be okay. And they want to have something in case that doesn't work out. Well, Patrick Peterson wasn't a slot guy, right? And Mackenzie Alexander is a true slot guy. So now you have two players of your top four that can play the slot,

and then Hughes can play both if he's able. But you're absolutely right. The deadline's coming up for that fifth-year option. I almost ensure or guarantee you that they won't pick that up. So we're going into the final year of Mike Hughes. I think it could be a situation where the Vikings start three, play four. They rotate like an extra guy in throughout the game, try to keep everybody fresh. They didn't really have that luxury a lot last year.

Even if they did, the person they were rotating in wasn't very good. I think they can do a lot more of that this year if they feel like there is an injury problem with any of their guys. So the depth is now set at corner. And the final ripple effect, too, I think we can finally erase corner from first round possibility in the draft. Yep, yep. I agree. And I wasn't ready to 100% say that with Mike Zimmer and his history and only a one-year contract for patrick peterson i do think that in the later rounds or mid rounds they will draft a corner and they will have quite the competition if harrison hand stays a corner chris boyd and those guys can all fight it out

for the final spot that's probably something they're going to do looking for someone to develop but uh yeah i agree with you that it's probably off the board in the first round with so many other needs. And I would say just that they need to do this for several other positions. Find other Mackenzie Alexanders, whether they used to play for you or not, similar players that have low-key average or decent numbers as opposed to Mason Cole, who has some of the worst numbers in the league. Like, find guys who have decent and solid numbers. And that's a funny thing about Zimmer and this team, too, is oftentimes with the defensive players they like, it will match up, especially with the corners, with the decisions they make.

Not always with Shamar Steffen, but I do buy into him being a run-stuffer. But a lot of times when we talk about the numbers it will match up and then with the offensive lineman it just doesn't seem to so I think that this is the perfect type of move that they needed to make and hey rinse and repeat this three or four more times with whatever money you have left so um Sam I can't talk for 40 minutes about Mackenzie Alexander and the signing. I'm sorry. I know. So we need to get to Matt Harmon from Yahoo Sports that joined me to talk about wide receivers,

Justin Jefferson's season, and the draft wide receivers. So we're going to do that now. Thanks for your quick reaction, Sam. Yeah, you bet, Collar. Hey, everyone. Anybody who listens to the show knows that Sam and I may not be scratch golfers, but we love to have a great time playing golf. And that's why we have partnered with Birdie Golf in Woodbury. Birdie Golf is hands down the best indoor golf experience you will ever have.

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Wasn't that the bit that you asked fans to tell you who you should be a fan of, and you ended up with the 49ers? And then they make a huge trade right before we have recorded this. So are you an excited, lifelong 49ers fan, or is that changing this offseason? Well, see, this is funny. We were just talking before we started recording about COVID-impacted things in life. And one of the very, very, very, very, very unimportant things that was impacted by COVID was the fantasy show, which obviously is the show that you mentioned where for the 2019 season,

I became a lifelong fan of the 49ers. You know, previous of that, it had been like a dumb Twitter bit, right, where fans had convinced me to be, or I would would just – essentially it was like really trolling, but taken to a new level where it was just like, yeah, I really love watching the 2017 Rams. I'm a lifelong Rams fan in 2017. Or a lifelong Bears fan for 2019, which, of course, you covering a fan, like covering one team and then a passionate fan base following you

that follows a team, you know, that people just – they take this very very seriously so then uh when someone like me you know tries to quote jump the bandwagon uh during the most successful moments it really upsets people and and i find that you know to be a wonderful and endearing experience and i think everybody but the few people that get upset about it find it to be a fun experience too but essentially since we couldn't do the show in 2020 you know i i always say this man the the real art is not finding a good bit it's knowing when to um stop the bit and i think that bit has been officially retired since uh it would it would have been bad to go from having a show about this thing to then you know bring it back down to just a twitter bit so for now still, still an unsigned free agent in terms of fan loyalty.

But I'm just back to rooting for wide receivers that I like. Okay. It was one of my favorite bits, though, and the show was tremendous, and I watched all of it, and I thought it was hilarious. And so, okay, well, good luck to you then this offseason and going forward finding who you're a lifelong fan of. Well, shout out to the Vikings fans, okay, well, good luck to you then this offseason and going forward finding who you're a lifelong fan of. Well, shout out to the Vikings fans, though, because I think they were probably the one fan base that was like, no.

No. Like, don't. I think I had several Vikings fans, like, send in videos to the show. There was a guy, Luke, who sent in a great one who was just basically telling me exactly why I should not be a Vikings fan. Like, it was a beautiful, that was probably one of my favorite ones because I kept pushing them to, like, not the final few rounds. But they made it pretty deep into the process. And then finally a bunch of Vikings fans basically had to come and, like, save me from myself.

So that was, they were one of the more fun fan bases for sure. But I was just looking at this the other day, over the last 30 years, the Vikings have finished 63% of the time as either eight and eight, nine and seven, 10 and six, or 11 and five. And each time, each decade, they've made an NFC championship and absolutely got kicked in the gut every single time that happened not to mention that in previous decades they lost four super bowls and then you have many many other tragic things that go on so it's really something that you get cursed into and luckily i moved to

minnesota from buffalo so i totally got it when i moved here exactly how that would go and the curse that people have for being Vikings fans. Oh, yeah. I mean, this is kind of the beauty of the bit, too. It's like, see, this is why I freed myself from emotional pain. I remember when the Titans tried to hire, like, you remember there was in the middle of some playoff run where it was like, oh, this is a great game we've got going on right now. By the way, we're going to hire Mike Malarkey to be our full-time head coach.

And they just, like, snuck that news in there. And, you know, I remember so many Titans fans talking to us, you know, back at the NFL days, like, wow, what do I do now? I was like, just break up with the team. That's what you do now. Like, you're in a bad relationship. They don't care about you. Stop caring about them.

But I admire you Vikings fans for putting up with this for all these years. Yeah, there is something very specific to being a Minnesotan that goes along with it. But there are defectors who have gone to our east in Wisconsin and decided to be Packers fans. So that does happen. But the reason I brought you on, Matt, was not to talk about your previous bit, but your new thing, old thing, new way you're doing your thing that you've been doing for a while, beautifully stated. Reception Perception, you and I have been doing shows talking about Reception Perception for a long time because I love it, where you watch all the routes

from receivers and you chart them and you chart their success of different routes that they run, how they run them against different coverages, and now you've put it at receptionperception.com, so it's easy to find. And you've made specific player profiles that are very easy to click on and look at all of this data. And of course, anyone who listens to the show knows how much I like this. But before we talk about some of the different players there that you've charted and posted, how about that Stefan Diggs, huh? How about that?

How about that, Stefan? Yes. Shout out to Stefan Diggs. It is – I feel like last year when we talked, it was kind of like the writing was on the wall that our time of doing our annual celebration of Stefan Diggs was unfortunately coming to a close in terms of the whole Vikings part of it. But at the same time, man, I mean, talk about just basically – was unfortunately coming to a close in terms of the whole Vikings part of it.

But at the same time, man, I mean, talk about just basically for the two of us, really, like very validating and for reception perception, putting that stamp on exactly like this is why – this is essentially like why I do reception perception, which is to tell folks that like Stefan Diggs is out there performing at an elite level as an individual. And he's been doing that basically since the 2017 season. Now he finally has the statistics, has the type of season where now everyone is like, well, yeah, of course,

Stefan Diggs is playing at a top five wide receiver level. And oddly enough, speaking of reception, perception.com, there's actually a video of a conversation I had with Stefan on the homepage. I figure that's a nice little, like a back pat, a testimonial for the series. But, yeah, I mean, how about Stefan? It was awesome to see him, you know, coming from the situation that he was in in Minnesota, getting that fresh start, and really doing what basically no one, even myself, like, I might be the biggest Stefan Diggs fan out there outside of Stefan himself, but I never expected him to go to Buffalo and have the type of season that he had, pretty

much because I never expected Josh Allen to have that type of season, but he does. He was incredible, was really just putting all the things on paper that we've always seen out of him, which is separating being that top elite level receiver that they flowed everything through. They were a wide receiver driven offense there in Buffalo. And even with the release of John Brown, they go and sign Emmanuel Sanders. I think they're still going to elevate Gabe Davis and maybe Sanders is the

fourth receiver, but whatever, like that is a team built on its wide receivers and, and the John, the Josh Allen, Stefan Diggs connection was absolutely electric. And, you know, no shade to Kirk Cousins, but it was definitely awesome to see a quarterback take all of to do with listening to Stefan Diggs, whose big beef was that they weren't centering the offense around throwing the ball to him. And then he ends up in an AFC championship game as the driver of that offensive success. And

your data and your analysis really shaped my opinion on Stefan Diggs because eyeball test was every time they throw it to this guy, he's open and he's catching the ball. But I think what you shined a light on is he's even open more than that, more than they're targeting him. And the way that we often look at a wide receiver's success is just basically like how many catches, how many targets, how many yards per reception. And now we've got the pro football focus grades and things like that, too. But those don't tell us specifically how somebody won and what different areas they were successful in. And I think that really showed us your numbers really showed us Diggs is right. Like Diggs is not just making this up because he has a massive ego. I'm sure everyone thinks that they should throw the ball their way every time.

But he actually had this right and so you know I just I think it was um an interesting study and kind of how the team was approaching it versus what the numbers were telling us about how they should approach it yeah Stefan at one point he and I were talking he was saying like you know all receivers lie right and they say they're open all the time we're're not open all the time, but he, as he said, I like to believe I'm, I'm, I'm open more often than I'm not. And I, basically what I told him was, yeah, the numbers, my numbers here would prove that that is true. And, and, and you're right, right? Because he was really correct in that assessment. And this is, again, come back to why I want to chart these receivers out and try to isolate them from the other variables, because all those stats you mentioned, yards, catches, even targets, those are all dependent on other variables.

The quarterback is obvious. Like, is the quarterback good? Are they accurate? But is the quarterback able to read the field and find that receiver open? Does the quarterback know how to function in offense? an offense. I mean, you look at Dwayne Haskins. I hate to bag on Dwayne Haskins, but in Washington last year, just couldn't even run the offense functionally, like throw the yards and the stats or whatever out there. Like you just saw the difference when even a guy like Kyle Allen or Taylor Heineke, like these guys that, you know, this is another thing that football Twitter bags

on all the time, but sometimes it does make sense. You know, those guys knew the system. They could run the offense. They could make checks at the line. They could get to that second read, knew the route progressions, knew the route depth. And then you saw that offense play a lot better when, like, those two guys were on the field. And, of course, Alex Smith as well, despite the fact that at this point, I think Alex Smith is a very, you know, shell of his former self,

unfortunately, because of that injury. So that stuff makes a big difference. And that's just the beginning. You know, the offense has to, like we say, pass the ball more. It has to open up for these wide receivers. They're just so – wide receiver production is almost just – it's like fake. Like it's so – there's so many other things that go into it to the point that, yeah, I think the only way that you can really evaluate the one thing that the

wide receiver can control is, of course, they've got to catch the ball when it comes their way. But first and foremost, they got to run good routes. They got to get separation. And there's a reason that a player like Stefan Diggs and even current Vikings receiver Adam Thielen, there's a reason these guys came from the ranks of like the third day of the NFL draft or the undrafted completely off the radar range when you're talking about Adam Thielen. It's because of hard work. It's because of technique. You know, we're sitting here like, why did Stefan Diggs fall to the third day of the draft?

Like, how was he able to overcome those odds? It's not because he's a freak athlete. Like, he's definitely fast and stuff like that. It's hard work, it's technique, and it's mastering that craft. And I'm just, in some way, I'm just glad to be able to shine a light on that with reception perception. And I think that that's what always impressed me about Stefan Diggs and Kirk Cousins too, raved about it. And I remember Kirk Cousins doing an interview shortly after they traded Diggs and he seemed pretty sad.

Like I don't think that this has been lost on anybody who's been around Stefan Diggs. And that's why it was sort of puzzling about how they handled that situation. But when we talk about Stefan Diggs, we also have to talk about Justin Jefferson and how he stepped into the limelight just from your studying receivers for, I think going back to 2014 is when you started reception perception, right? So, I mean, how impressive to you was it what Justin Jefferson was able to do as a rookie? Because a few years ago, we were having these conversations about, man, rookie receivers like Josh Doxson and Corey Coleman can't step right into the league and make a difference.

And then now some guys have done it, but he did it at even a higher level where his efficiency was incredible, but also his playmaking when they threw it short to him. I mean, he was checking off all the same boxes or a lot of the same boxes as Stephon Diggs. Yeah, it's funny. This whole situation, the Diggs to Jefferson transition, I think sparks, and just Jefferson himself as an individual, sparks so many interesting conversations because it's basically widely accepted and regarded as like one of the most win-win trades in NFL history right at this point because Stephon went to Buffalo and was great.

Justin came to Minnesota and, I mean, he legitimately played like a top 10 wide receiver. He produced like one in reception perception. I said this on Twitter earlier this offseason. I think he had basically Odell Beckham's rookie season just without all of the flash and all of the national media attention because, you know, the Vikings were just kind of a middle-of-the-road team this year. He didn't have that national catch against the Cowboys on Sunday Night Football where Chris Collinsworth is losing his mind and Al Michaels' brain is melting out of his ears.

There was no that moment for Justin Jefferson, but I think anybody that watched him would say he had that. So in some ways it was like this trade was such a win-win. But, man, just imagine an alternate universe, and not to put any extra pain on Vikings fans because you all don't deserve that, but, like, imagine an alternate universe where Howie Roseman knew what he was doing and takes Justin Jefferson in that draft video where Mike Zimmer and the guys are like all pumped up because they didn't take Justin Jefferson and the Vikings are left with Jalen Rager it's

like a lot of other things had to be you know and who knows if they would have taken Jalen Rager what they would have done right but like so many other things had to break right for this to happen for the Vikings so in some ways it's like, yes, it's a win-win, but it's almost like sometimes it's better to be lucky than good. And I think the Vikings in this situation ended up being very lucky, although they crushed the player evaluation. Because like I said, Justin Jefferson, unbelievably good. In his rookie season last year,

he's one of the few non-veteran free agent guys I've charted so far for reception perception. He's not on the website, but I got details on when those will be released. 76.4% success rate versus man coverage in reception perception through reception perception history, which as you mentioned, goes back to 2014. He is one of only four rookies to clear the 90th percentile in that metric during their rookie season the other ones as i mentioned odell beckham tyler lockett calvin ridley and justin jefferson those are four obviously really good players and one in beckham that was on a superstar trajectory before things started to change from and i think even the most impressive um metric is jefferson posted a 90 this is the

guy that people were thinking i mean it's still like I told you before we started out. I'm watching Jamar Chase over here, the 2019 LSU offense, and I still can't believe that folks thought Jefferson, because he played in the slot in college, was going to have to play in the slot as a pro because you see all the routes having the release moves, and that, again, is personified in reception perception. 96th percentile success rate versus press in his rookie year obviously 2014 Beckham is the only one that's higher than that I can't give enough

praise to the player that Jefferson was as a rookie and I believe too firmly that he is on that superstar trajectory well let's talk about that for a second, what we can learn from some of the analysis of Justin Jefferson. Now, I actually listened to a podcast with you and Matt Waldman years ago where you guys talked about how the slot thing becomes a criticism sometimes and really shouldn't be. And when receivers are only on one side of the field in college, that's when you should be a little nervous because what NFL offense leaves a receiver on one side of the field? I mean, this is like 1993. I mean, to answer that, Cliff Kingsbury is the NFL offense. Right. Yeah, that's right. And that's why in 2022, somebody else will be coaching that team. But, you know, like what is this, Elvin Harper and Michael Irvin on each side or something?

I mean, nobody does that. So, I mean, you've seen Stefan Diggs, Adam Thielen. These guys move into the slot, move into condensed splits. I mean, they do a lot of different things. And if you're doing that at the college level, I think you could do it at the NFL. And the whole idea of, oh, you have to be able to destroy man press, like, yeah, I guess so, but not all the time because they're scheming ways for you to get free releases.

But the point about his performance against press coverage, even in his first start, which was against Tennessee in week three, one of his best routes is on just a go ball where he destroys the corner off of the line of scrimmage. And that was the thing they worried about. So I wonder what you see in college that you should have picked up on, not you specifically, the NFL, should have picked up on with Jefferson that instead someone took Jalen Rager. Like how did they pass up on someone just because they played in the slot in college? Well, I don't even know how to speak to what the Eagles did

at that wide receiver position. And this is unfortunate because I think Rager could end up being a good pro. I liked him a decent fit as a prospect, but I thought Jefferson was right up there with the top receivers, you know, like C.D. Lamb last year, Jerry Judy. Like I think you could easily argue that Jefferson was a better college prospect than Jerry Judy was last year. And I think it was basically like, number one,

if you're the Eagles, this is such revisionist history and I hate to do it, but it was something I was saying at the time. Like he was a perfect prospect for them because they just needed instant impact. Like it didn't matter if he was a vertical receiver, a slot receiver, a reliable possession receiver. They just needed someone that could come and hit the NFL field from day one and be really good. And we know that Jefferson wasn't just really good for the Vikings. He was great. But I think even the like median expectations for him was he was a pro-ready guy. Reminds you a lot

of the conversation about Rashad Bateman this year, another guy that I think is pro-ready coming out of Minnesota. Like he'll hit the NFL field day one and know what he's doing. And, you know, then the sky, you know, could be the limit beyond that. We'll see. That was the deal with Jefferson is that at the very least, I think you knew you were going to get a solid pro. So I don't know. I really don't know what the Eagles are thinking.

It's crazy. Even in hindsight, even if you liked Jalen Rager, there was no way he was a better prospect than Jefferson. And there was no way he made more sense from a guy that you needed instant impact from. So, you know, when the Vikings took him, it just made so much sense to me because, sure, you could watch or you could look at the numbers about where Jefferson lined up his final year, but he also played outside earlier in college.

It reminded me, and this is a comp I did make at the time, not like a skill comp, but it reminded me a lot of A.J. Brown, the Titans receiver and the Ole Miss college prospect. He was the guy that people were comparing to Juju Smith-Schuster coming out of college because he was a big receiver who lined up in the slot. Talk about kind of whiffing on both evaluations in a way there if you made that comparison. Like, Brown, to me, had all the characteristics in college because of the way he would get off the line of scrimmage, because of the way he could separate at his size, he was going to be a star X receiver in the league.

He has become a star X receiver in the league. And I think Jefferson showed all that same route savvy, the ability to separate at his size in college. I think, Mike, I don't know if this is the right comparison for Jefferson as a player now because he's shown so much more vertical ability than this guy has put on the page but his the way he separates and the way he was he built it was built always reminded me of Keenan Allen and I think that again that's sort of just like a baseline like I think that's at worst he'll be Keenan Allen the rest of his career and like a faster Keenan Allen. Yeah, exactly.

Exactly. And the thing that stuck out to me when I was looking at his LSU games last year, I watched the tape back with a former NFL receiver. And one of the things that he said was, you know, when the guy gets the ball in his hands, he's just a baller. Like he looks like he just has this natural running ability. And speaking to your point about someone who could step in right away and be great, even if his route running wasn't perfect which it was very very good and even if his releases weren't perfect like even if things went wrong for him or needed development he could make an impact right away which is one of the reasons he was so perfect for the Vikings now here's my question for you though how does this project forward because i think we always expect someone when they break

out right away to just keep going um but i mean i don't know like what what does your data say about how sustainable these things are and how much that some of them can even be improved on well when you look at the um reception perception number numbers those are very stable like once someone gets to the nfl and and they establish themselves as that guy, they really only ever, unless there's an injury or something like that or some sort of chaos hits their career, they're going to stay stable at those numbers or maybe even take some slight percentage point jumps. I think the three guys that I talked about earlier that have hit that 90th percentile mark

in their rookie season, along with Justin Jefferson, are good instructive examples. We all knew that Calvin Ridley was a good player when he hit the NFL field. He produced right away and looked pretty good. But he's gotten better every single year, but he's always been that type of separator. Basically, it was like, all right, when are you going to give him more playing time? When is he going to get more targets? When those things happen, he put up the type of season that he did last year, really as Atlanta's 1A receiver for most of the year with Julio Jones being hurt. Tyler Lockett's developed into a great receiver, too.

He's been very productive for Seattle's offense once he started getting that playing time, once he started getting healthy. And we know Beckham. I mean, Beckham sustained superstar-level individual play basically from his rookie year to 2018 obviously there was injuries mixed in there things have gotten me a little bit weird in cleveland uh of course since then uh so i would say as long as jefferson stays healthy as long as all those other variables that we talked about with wide receiver production stay afloat for minnesota uh maybe if they they air out the football just a little bit more. I don't see any reason

why he can't continue to produce as a clear top 10 receiver in the league. What he showed as a rookie, I think he was the better receiver than Adam Thielen last year. That's crazy because Thielen's a really, really good player, but that's how good Justin Jefferson was. I think he was just incredible last year. rises. Go to symbol.app, that is S-I-M-B-U-L-L dot A-P-P. Sign up using the promo code purple and get a $10 deposit bonus if you're a first time user and then you are off and rolling. Here's how it works. You buy stocks of your teams and when your team wins, you earn cash payouts that are instantly deposited. If you sign up for Symbol, you also get updates emailed to you directly with the trends on which teams are on the rise. So check out SimBowl.app or follow them on Twitter at SimBowlExchange

and check out the Marketplace for Sports today. Folks, the football offseason is off and rolling and SodaStick has you covered with Minnesota sports themed gear. Some of my favorite football designs that you have to check out include the Chuck Foreman spin doctor gear. You can commemorate Randy Moss's disgusting act on a shirt or a hoodie. And if you're old school, check out the purple people eaters design as well. Go to SodaStick.com and check them all out. If you use the promo code Purple Insider, you can get free shipping on all your Minnesota

sports inspired gear. out if you use the promo code purple insider you can get free shipping on all your minnesota sports inspired gear all of their apparel is screen printed here in minnesota on super soft super comfy shirts and hoodies you will love it plus keep your eyes and ears out for our giveaways going on on this show as well on social media follow them at soda stick co on twitter and at sodastick.com for your original Minnesota sports-inspired goods. Code PurpleInsider for free shipping. I think toward the end of the season, what you saw was the coverage start to shift more toward Justin Jefferson. And that actually helped Adam Thielen at times who had a barrel of touchdowns.

But you would see in the red zone that teams would have two guys with eyes on Justin Jefferson and there's Adam Thielen getting wide open. So they, he continues to benefit from playing next to an elite wide receiver, even though he is very, very good himself. I was going to ask you about the run first thing though, because it's something that I think frustrates fans quite a bit. And if you look at Justin Jefferson's first half versus second half not

of the season but of actual game splits it's kind of mind-blowing like early in games they just weren't throwing him the football and then they would get behind and then they would start throwing him and he would dominate in those situations and I'm not saying that he was garbage time because there was a lot of clutch catches and big situations that kept them in games basically because Justin Jefferson was so dominant. And I think the Jaguars game they won essentially because of him taking over. But how often should you throw the football to an elite wide receiver? I think is a good question.

I was looking at maybe it was like David Boston who had like 180 targets one time. I mean, there are guys who have had in that range, 170, 180 targets. I don't think that there should be any limit to how often you throw to Justin Jefferson. And going forward, he should be the centerpiece of the offense, not Delvin Cook, as much as I respect Delvin Cook. I completely agree. And I think the Bills are a great test case for that with Stephon Diggs is, you know, they threw to him at a really high rate you know obviously the most targets that he's had in his entire career and great you know great things happen like good things happen when you put the ball in the hands of your good players it really is is as simple as that sometimes it even felt like many times during Beckham's career I

remember like man that when the Giants would go into a slump it's like just throw this guy a slant and like see what happens and there were times when that was all they could do with the Eli Manning offense. So, you know, I definitely think there's, there's some argument to be made about predictability. And I think that, you know, at different times, maybe the Falcons offense has, you know, what they were really craving that kind of number two target, which is why they went out and drafted a guy in Calvin Ridley to be that. And I think it's made their offense a little bit more dangerous. So, yeah, I think there's some discussion to be had about, like, you know,

predictability and everything like that. It's always good to have a second punch, but to funnel your offense through an alpha number one wide receiver there's there's there's really no limit you should put on that yeah I agree and I think that if you're passing to set up the run it only benefits Delvin Cook as well that you know I mean he's already a five yard to carry running back but if you're forcing teams to play two deep safeties because you're hitting on everything passing game then then he's getting big gains anyway. So, you know, I mean, there is a, I guess, long debate over run set up the pass or pass set up the run.

But I think after last year and the last couple of years, we're really leaning toward the best passing games are driving the success more than maybe they ever have before. Speaking of which, this wide receiver draft is preposterous i mean yeah uh it's ridiculous and i know that you've started to dive deep into the receiver drafts i have been i've called myself the conductor of the wide receiver three train because i feel like even history tells us this like go back to washington when they were great. I mean, not the, you know, John Riggins Washington, but like early 90s where Mark Rippon somehow leads one of the best offenses in history for the time, and they've got three elite wide receivers. The Vikings come in in 1998 and have three deep and are one of the most dominating offenses of all time. Like, I

feel like you're one more guy away from being almost unstoppable with your, with your weapons. And I don't have any confidence that the Vikings will do this, but based on the draft picks that could be there, what do you think? I always, I always advocate for, for drafting more wide receivers and obviously going after position. I mean, look at what, like what Russ is talking about in Seattle right now. He's got a lot of complaints, and I think one of them,

sometimes I think Russ could be a little more introspective and wonder if he contributes to some of those problems up there in Seattle. But they have one of the best wide receiver duos in the NFL. I think you could make an argument that perhaps DK and Lockett are top three, maybe even top one at times this year. I think you could have made that statement. Obviously, Minnesota has an argument that they should be considered the best wide receiver duo in the NFL. But the drop-off, I think those two teams really perfectly personify what happens when you have that drop-off at the wide receiver three spot.

Because, like, you know, who is Seattle's wide receiver three? It was like David Moore they've moved they've moved on from him he's now replacing Curtis Samuel in Carolina uh the Vikings depth chart is really barren after um these top two guys so I think adding a wide receiver three is is smart again it's just making yourself less predictable and giving you more options you know not only of course, if injuries happen, but just when you're able to spread the field and attack in different ways, because then you can move Justin Jefferson inside.

And it's not about, he needs to play the slot, but you know, when the Falcon for some reason, keep coming back to the Falcons today. I don't know why, but the Falcons would move like Julio Jones inside sometimes it's like, well, that's just unfair, you know, for even 24% of his routes or something like that, he's always going to be – there will never be a matchup in the slot that Julio Jones is not the favorite on. I think you could say the same for a guy like Justin Jefferson

or even Adam Thielen as he ages into his career. He's played that slot receiver position plenty of times. Maybe he is a 70%, 80 percent slot player the rest of his career if they get a really good burner on the outside so i think it makes complete sense you're of course going to irritate anyone in fantasy football that that wants to draft justin jefferson really high because there's just not a lot of competition for targets there but being deep at wide receiver does matter and there's there's a lot of depth in this class there's been so much depth in the last two or three classes like we all we all expected 2020 Justin Jefferson and the crew to be really good.

But, like, 2018 and 2019 way outkicked wide receiver expectations. And I think this could be the wave of the future just based on the way football is going right now. Not just NFL, but, you know, kids want to play wide receiver. Like, no one's stupid in looking at the pro market and, like, do I want to play running back or do I want to play wide receiver. Like, no one's stupid in looking at the pro market and, like, do I want to play running back or do I want to play wide receiver? Like, maybe the receiver market catches up at some point. I don't think what happened this year is instructive in terms of, like, oh, yeah, no one wanted to pay Juju $20 million.

Of course not. But, like, Kenny Galladay still got the bag, you know, when he got out there. I think if Robinson and Godwin had gotten out there, they would have gotten it. And I think even the 20 bucks are instructive. Like they did not need Antonio Brown. Right. And even at some point, it's like this is a bad idea.

Just well, for a lot of reasons, it could be a bad idea. But bringing in a presence into the offense that was not familiar when things were pretty much going all right. You know, my buddy scott pianowski from yahoo sports he liked to call he said they solved a problem that they didn't have like scotty miller is a pretty good third receiver and they have one of the best wide receiver do is in the nfl but then when brown started cooking in the playoffs then you've got three number one receivers on the field you're pretty much like you can do whatever you want if evans is having a slow game you go to brown and godwin so i think it makes a ton of sense um you know maybe it's not a first round pick but like again talk about

depth maybe this is something we look at in rounds two three something like that if only they had their second round pick and didn't trade if only yanni kingakwe it gets mentioned every show um let me ask you about two two quick things before wrap up. Devante or Devonta Smith, going to have to get a pronunciation guide on that one. I've heard it both ways. But Smith was mocked to the Vikings by Daniel Jeremiah. What a glorious day that was for me. We threw a parade in my house that someone was mocking the Vikings,

a wide receiver. He's 170 pounds. I'll just put that under goals for myself at some point. But what do you think? Like, I think that there's been plenty of receivers that are not 210 pounds who have had success because it's more about, I mean, even Stefan Diggs, I remember reading when he came out, like, oh, he's a slot receiver. And that's him being undersized was one of the reasons that teams didn't pick him so high so I kind of don't really buy into that but what is your thought after watching him yeah um there's no way to avoid like the weight discussion you know uh

my fiancee who knows nothing about wide receivers or wide receiver build or you know other than a few of like the rants i'll go on i'm hoping she's at least like half listening to half is all i ask but you know she came in she came up here to the office the other day and i was like oh see i'm looking at the sky devon smith he was like she's like well what what's why is he so skinny i just pointed him out on the screen i was like oh he's like 170 pounds six one like that is really she's like that's crazy skinny i'm like she even she you know she does she, that is really – she's like, that's crazy skinny. Like, she even – you know, she knows that, right?

Like, and again, not – I could tell you every wide receiver is built in the league probably. I don't think she's at that level. And you know what? Really no one should be. So maybe this is back on me. But look, it's hard to – it's hard to care when you're watching Devonta Smith. And I know you've – of course you've got to care, right? Like I said, it's a discussion point and you've got think about it, but it's the reality. Like, I don't think he's going to get into the NFL and suddenly bulk up to 190 pounds or something like that.

He's at Alabama. Like that's the best of the best in terms of collegiate build. Like, I don't think his frame has much more to just pack on. So he'll probably always be a skinny player at that build, but he's already shown you that he can be an outlier in terms of that build just based on what he did. And when you break him down from a route-by-route perspective, this is the thing. You mentioned it about Stephon Diggs and size. Size is not, like, indicative of what you can do on the field.

Your play is. I mean, you look at some of the best receivers at getting off the line of scrimmage against press coverage that I have in my database. It's broken down by guys of all shapes and sizes. You know, Beckham is up there. We just talked about Justin Jefferson as one. Tyreek Hill is another one. Michael Thomas, Devontae Adams, Antonio Brown. Like, those guys guys are Tyler Lockett

those guys all span the spectrum in terms of size and and build it's like yeah you can be big you could be big but if you've got great great technique as a smaller player and you've got great quickness which I think Smith has he wasn't a guy that people could press in college you know there was at no point when you're playing in the best conference in college football, when folks would try to press and folks would try to get up on the line of scrimmage against him, he got off almost every single time. He has a great success rate versus press coverage. I'll tell you that when the profile hits receptionperception.com, people will see that. And another thing too, I made this comparison on Twitter and this is like the fifth time I've

dropped Calvin Ridley's name on a Vikings podcast, so I don't really know what I'm doing here. But Calvin Ridley was a guy that – I think these two are so similar in terms of Ridley had a lot of questions about how his frame. People thought he was too skinny. People thought he was too old. They didn't have a great combine. But when you watched him play, when you looked at his reception-perception profile, I kept thinking like he's just a you know don't overthink it type of separator i think smith is a don't overthink it type of separator and i would say right now as a prospect compared

to what ridley was as a prospect i think he's better at playing through power i think he's better like no question better at the catch point like smith bullies folks at the catch point and he plays through power after the catch as well you talked about that with Jefferson like I think you could give Devonta Smith you know touches in space as a as a NFL player and he'll find something to do with it he's much better in those two areas than Ridley was so I have a lot of confidence that he's going to be a really really good NFL player But even like with Ridley back in that draft class, and that's why I think this is such a good comp, like if folks wanted to put DJ Moore or someone else ahead of Calvin Ridley,

like I think that's fine. I didn't think he was the no doubt about it number one wide receiver. I think if folks want to like Jamar Chase or maybe Jalen Waddell more than Devonta Smith, I think that's fine. But I would be stunned if a guy that separates, runs routes this clean way, and also just wins at the catch point. Like, there are no holes in his game when you watch him. I would be stunned if that player, you know,

goes on to be a complete failure at the NFL level. Hey, everyone. I want to tell you about our friends at Scout Logistics, and I really do mean it when I say friends. They are fans of Purple Insider over at Scout Logistics, and since they reached out wanting to support this show, I want to tell you about what they do. Scout Logistics is just-in-time transportation for full tractor-trailer loads,

and if you're wondering what that means exactly, well, if you own or work for a company that needs shipping solutions, they are the preferred carrier of Fortune 500 companies across North America. And we have quite a few of those in Minnesota, right? They can ship perishable, non-perishable, FTL or LTL, and they have on-time check out ScoutLogistics.com or call 855-217-2688, extension 232, to connect with them directly to find out how Scout Logistics can minimize risk and overperform and go the extra mile for your company. So the thing that I like about his game the most,

and this is from having the pleasure of watching Adam Thielen, Stephon Diggs, and Justin Jefferson, is just tracking the football. I mean, he's just so good at it. Like one thing we don't, I mean, especially on TV, you see the ball get released by the quarterback and then the guy catches it or not. But when you're in the stadium and you've got that look from upstairs or you're looking at the all 22, you can really see how a receiver moves himself to track the football,

almost like an outfielder going under a fly ball. And I think that Smith does that extremely well. And then just snatches the football out of the air, which is another thing you're going to need to do because you don't have, even with separation, you don't have crazy separation in the NFL like you do oftentimes in college. Yeah, and like especially on high leverage targets, and I think that's such a good point by you,

the way he snatches the ball out of the air. Like there are plenty of off-target or out-of-frame passes that Smith would get, and I don't know his, you know, arm length off the top of my head or something, but that was something I kept thinking. I was like, man, this guy must have like crazy, you know, a crazy catch radius for his size because this is unbelievable the way he can he can win those passes I think that was the thing I was most surprised by given his size I expected him to be a pretty good separator whether he's a good technician is another question but he is a good technician but at his size I expected him to be

definitely like a speed guy a vertical playmaker but what i wasn't expecting was again his ability to shed tackles in the open field and win those off target passes in contested situations and he did that consistently in his final year at alabama i mean again it it's worth repeating when you watch him play when you put him through reception perception there are no screaming weaknesses from this player so if he went to the NFL and suddenly because he's 170 you know couldn't get off the line of scrimmage and I will say this too like we just read this earlier I've studied receivers since 2014 I've not found any evidence of correlation between weight height anything like that in success rate versus press it's technique it's technique it's technique as our guy stefan digs has repeatedly showed us yeah that's right i mean he's destroys

press coverage as a small receiver on the outside or on the inside uh okay last thing just give me a one to ten how thrilled should vikings fans be that kenny golladay and marvin jones two guys you tracked and are up on the website now, are not in the division anymore. Oh, my God. Yeah, I would put it at least – well, because Jared Goff would have been their quarterback, like I'll put it at least an eight. I mean, going from Kenny Galladay to Brashad Perryman and Tyrell Williams is – in the year 2020, that's a bit – or – oh, God, it's 2021. In the year 2021, even in 2020, it would have been quite a drop-off, right?

Like it's pretty wild. Obviously, I think the Lions are in just a different place. You know, Galladay, I think, is interesting because he's, like, he's kind of right on that fringe in terms of true number one receivers. Like, the Giants paid him as a true number one. I think if he hadn't had an injury riddled 2020, we'd probably all agree, like, yeah, this is an alpha receiver who you follow the offense through like we were talking about earlier um and and that will be fine marvin jones i think is an underrated signing by the jaguars like i saw some folks going well why does marvin want to go

to jacksonville like i don't mean i don't know he's going to be playing with one of the best quarterback prospects to ever enter the league that's that's a nice thing um probably better than playing with jared goff or whatever was going to happen in Detroit. But I think Jones is like the classic, like underrated number two receiver. Another guy that is one of the, people would probably be surprised to hear, you know, someone say this, but I think he's been one of the most consistent best ball winners in the NFL. Just, you guys have seen it with, you know, and him and Xavier Rhodes would go up against some of those matchups when he was the number one outside receiver before Kenny Galladay you know Marvin could play even if even if Xavier didn't give him a lot of separation

and Marvin's never been like a big separation guy he would consistently win those balls in contested situations and I'm sure that Vikings fans will be happy to see him walk out the door yeah I think the PFF grades of Vikings corners will be going up just based on that alone. So people should go to receptionperception.com, and it is great. I mean, the charts that you have for the routes are just so pleasing to nerds who like charts about routes that football men ran, right? But it just looks so good, and I'm glad that you have revamped kind of where that is because it looks great. And I really appreciate you coming on. We do this every once in a while, usually to talk about Stephon Diggs. But now for years to come, we will be able to discuss Justin Jefferson.

And you'll love to see it. Yeah, I mean, shout out to the Vikings for making that. Like, it's a win-win for us too, right? Like, we can still do the show and praise one of the best wide receivers in the NFL, talk about his great reception, perception results. We're just swapping one name for another. So shout out to the Vikings for keeping our tradition alive, and shout out to you for continuing to invite me on the show.

I'm glad that you found the website easy to use. That was the most important thing to me is I want easy use for folks. So if they're interested, check it out, receptionperception.com. The paywall will be going up soon, but everything on there is for free right now. Extremely easy to use. So it's great. And follow you on Twitter at Matt Harmon underscore BYB. I don't know if we've ever gotten into the underscore issue,

but we won't now. So we'll talk about that next time. I think. All right. Thanks, Matt. Appreciate it.