Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - What Jeremiah Sirles has loved and hated from the Vikings' start to the season

Episode Date: October 12, 2022

 Matthew Coller and former Viking Jeremiah Sirles talk about the crazy calls in NFL games and whether there's a solution to roughing the passer. Then Jeremiah talks about what he's seen as major positives for the Vikings and things that have left him scratching his head.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Purple Insider presented by Liquid Death. Go to liquiddeath.com slash insider and learn about the Tallboy can, which actually has water. Find out where you can get it near you at liquiddeath.com slash insider. Hello, welcome to another episode of Purple Insider. Matthew Collar along with former Minnesota Viking Jeremiah Searles. Jeremiah, as an offensive player, were you okay with Chris Jones being penalized

for stripping Derek Carr last night, falling on him, and getting a flag? I mean, absolutely not. But I might be more upset about the Grady Jarrett one. The Grady Jarrett one against Tom Brady on Sunday was just, it's so bad. And now you even have guys calling for like, well, they have to replay, replay, rough the passers. It's like, no, it's very obvious when you rough the passer or not. Like, it's very obvious. We're making this way harder than it needs to be. oh there's no question yeah and anthony bar is responsible for doing this oh yeah 100 falling with his body weight onto onto aaron rogers and injuring him then caused this preposterous rule where your body weight can't fall on the quarterback but chris jones even reached out his arm and he tried to stop his body weight even though the ball was already out the ball was in his hands he had already cradled the

ball he couldn't if he would have put both hands down to brace himself he would have fumbled the football like i don't know what do you want from the guy like it was absolutely and then now it's like but you can't land on them but you also can't like swing them to the ground either but you can't two-hand push them to the ground you just can't even touch them like it might as well be like you just kind of shoulder bump them and if they fall down great if not great because it's just it's gotten so far out of hand now and the thing is that there is some like reality in it that i think is good like you want to protect quarterbacks you don't want injured quarterbacks because we've seen that this year and it gets pretty bad when you get a bunch of backup quarterbacks in there okay so that's fine and i agree with that i remember when

they first started implementing these rules that all the players were like i'm gonna quit playing football before i can't you know gouge the guy's eyes out on the way down you're like okay well relax pal just tackle them normally uh the follow-through hit was totally unnecessary when we were growing up it used to be like releases the ball one two drills the quarterback anyway nobody needs that that's a late hit it's a very common sense thing it's very much like know it when i see it i know that man did not do anything to intentionally try to hurt derrick carr or to put derrick carr in danger and i and i love tom palacero's tweet last night he's I know that man did not do anything to intentionally try to hurt Derek Carr or to put Derek Carr in danger.

And I love Tom Palacero's tweet last night. He's like, first guy ever flagged for this while holding the football. Yeah, that's a new one. But I just feel like this is such a common sense thing to be able to litigate. Yeah, it's not hard. The thing is, I think that refs are so concerned about it now that they're probably more scared about getting dinged about not calling it than just erring on the side of caution of like,

let's just call it and see what happens. You know, it's got it. I don't know how you fix it either. You know, they tried to do the whole reviewing of the pass interference thing, but it just paces the game so slowly. Like when you're reviewing a penalty like that it's like the targeting rule in college like when you're just like and uh potential penalty under review it's like okay well who's reviewing it like some guy in new york being like

well do you hit him really hard or in slow-mo here does it just look terrible like almost every tackle in slow motion looks like it's just the most aggressive thing of all time but in real time like it's so simple to tell like was it late or did he hit him in the neck or head or below the knee like that's really all it should be is if it's an egregious late smoked him if you hit him in the head or if you go below his knees like those are really the only times that i think you should throw a rough in the passer and i don't like the idea that they're trying to make football soft i mean i know that trey been implied that last night that was not the right thing to say troy don't be doing that uh i think what it is

is there's just too many complicated rules for the referees to follow how can a referee himself standing back there evaluate in real time all the things that are happening and did he put his weight on him is just impossible i mean even standing on the sideline at training camp you cannot believe how fast things happen and i know that these guys are are very well trained and they're supposed to have eyes on certain things but stuff just happens like the guy grabs the ball from him as he's falling on him like i don't know he just saw it wrong i mean i for one summer i did uh umpiring for like you know teenagers games and i blew some calls because it was hard to see right it was hard to see i remember one time a kid ran kind of a little out of the baseline and another kid was reaching to tag him and i didn't see the tag

but the outfielder was like, oh yeah, we tagged him easily. And I was like, well, I don't know. I can't see from that angle. What do you want? I was like, that was hard. So imagine this. And then the NFL just keeps pouring rules and pouring emphasis and everything else. And like, I don't know. I think that, that, that the referee sort of had his mind in the place where he was supposed to be for the NFL. So we're blaming him specifically, but it's like, well, that shouldn't even be a thing to begin with. Yeah, you can't ask someone to be, I mean, especially like Chris Jones beats the O-lineman. So the O-lineman is now between the ref and Chris Jones and Derek Carr.

And all you see is big red body going down on top of Derek Carr so it's like probably a penalty and you just chuck it like you can't blame the refs you can't you're asking them to do too much you're asking them to try and do what the NFL asks them because if they don't they're gonna get fired they want to keep their jobs too like they're gonna ones they're the ones that'll lose their jobs if they don't call it versus it's a lot easier to be like yeah probably shouldn't have called that versus the other way of like oh shoot, shoot, I just got Derek Carr hurt. So I'm going to get dinged by the NFL. And it's just there's no right answer to it.

Right. Because those guys are graded to by the league. Yep. And so they're evaluated and they want to make sure they get them right by throwing the right penalties and so on and so forth. And if like you said, if it's a quarterback injury then everybody's going to be talking about oh well that quarterback was injured they didn't even flag him like with the aaron rogers play uh but and and the other problem is if you try to leave it to the discretion of the refs was he really trying to hurt him or not then that opens up a whole new can of worms of like oh we're just leaving it in the hands of Billy the ref. So I think it's, I think it is difficult, but the answer does seem there, which is someone in the booth who is

watching the broadcast in real time, who can see what happened and buzz down quickly and say, when something is egregiously wrong, just say, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no no no no no no no no no no wrong change that and then they can just change it instantly how many calls per game would you say are egregiously wrong two yeah one or two yeah it's not that many if if sky judges up there and just buzzes down you're wrong then you can fix it quickly and look that they've got the money they've got the money for one more ref and the technology and there's enough cameras dude there's cameras freaking everywhere like you just need to have like the master controller up there that's just got like 20 computer screens that just has every camera view and he can just look i think that's not a

bad thing but i wonder if ego gets in the way of that you know where it's like wrong and the side judge is like bs he held him we're calling it he's like nope we're not calling it and he's like this is stupid and then like i can see that get coming at issue too it would only really have to be on plays that were like pass interference and can we get rid of the under throw pass interference oh it's the best it's the best are you kidding me the underown ball is the absolute best pass interference of all time. Go back and watch an old game, man. They couldn't even figure out who was out of bounds, right? They had no idea before they had the replay and stuff, and these refs are better than they've ever been. I just think that they've made it too complicated,

and with every game being as watched as it is, there is a solution there. So anyway, well, I wanted to play a game with you regarding the Minnesota Vikings, and it's a game that people who've listened to us are very familiar with. It is love to see it, hate to see it. But it is for a full episode of love to see it, hate to see it regarding the Minnesota Vikings. So where would you like to start?

Would you like to start with a love to see it or a hate to see it? I'll start with a love to see it. Okay. You want to go first? You want me to go first? I'll go first. I love to see Christian Derr start with a love to see it okay you want to go first you want me to go first i'll go first i love i love to see christian derisaw throwing dudes around i mean not just like oh i'm blocking dudes but dominating individuals and he had some unbelievable blocks i mean

pancakes throwing dudes like around he was just playing at an all pro level yesterday and i'd love to see him and his growth and we've talked about him a lot on this show but i mean it's so nice to have a bright spot at that position you know when you have a bright spot at the left tackle position you can do a lot of really good things and it's showing why we're winning football games you know so he is a love to see it in a big way of his development his physicality and just his level of play that he's at right now and and this one uh yeah i feel particularly good about because i was standing on the sideline and i feel that i have used my uh my training for years of alex boone and jeremiah searles listening to you

guys talk about what to watch for looking at tape with you guys and things like that and during training camp i've sat there and watched darisaw quite a bit. I was like, this dude looks like he's really getting it. Like every day against Zadarius, he's not getting beat. Like what is going on? And then I sat down with Christian to talk about it. And the guy just seemed like in a really good place because last year was so hard for him going through the injury, missing all of training camp. And we had a really good discussion about it. I wrote about it and I just came out of that thinking, I think this guy might be like ready to take that big step. And so you love to see that coming to fruition for a young player to be drafted in the first round. And it just clicks the way it's supposed to after he got off

to such a tough start. And anytime as a rookie you get up and you didn't exactly go through this without expectations in your career but if you know of this with first round picks though it's like by game three if the guy's not a star it's just what is going on with this first round pick and so with derisaw not playing right away then all of a sudden is he going to be hurt all the time and i think that it's fair to say that he is becoming one of the best tackles the entire league. Yeah.

I mean, I think that when you talk about, especially in the division, I mean, he's probably number one or number two left tackle in the NFC North by far, you know, back to our, he's still kind of getting himself back to where he needs to be and he's up there, but you look around and he's definitely up there when you have to talk about top five tackles overall. He's absolutely got to be in that conversation just with the consistency of his play you know i think that when you're evaluating alignment the number one thing look for is has he done it week in and week out against high level competition he's played against some really high

level competition in these first few games you know he's done a fantastic job so just continue to see him to continue to get better and better. I'm looking up right now and it may be like freezing my computer. His PFF grades. He is number two overall graded in the entire NFL by PFF right now. Christian Daris. So the, the only one hires Andrew Thomas of the giants. So that's a,

that's a pretty good start to the season. Not a bad way to go. Yeah. Have I ever asked you about how you uh feel about the pff grades they didn't hate your game they thought you were decent they thought i was okay you know if i would have been playing off pff i got played a lot longer i think you know i think pff's very good at what they do as far as with the limited knowledge that they have i think it's really easy to say hey hey, oh, PFF doesn't know this, doesn't know that. It's like, yeah, you know, the thing, but they can tell if you got beat or not.

Like, yeah, they can't tell if it's a weird scheme, it's a trap scheme, and you go split one way and someone goes the other way, and, like, you don't know all that. But overall, I think PFF does a nice job as far as just saying, like, win-loss percentage and that thing. The one thing that I don't understand is how they grade the pass blocking efficiency because a guy can have 75 pass snaps and he gets beat on three of them and his grades like a 55 it's like well you know okay but like yeah you're gonna get beat

eventually like not everyone's and so that's the one thing i have for o-linemen but i think they do a really nice job i'll tell you this i got a chance to work with a guy who had pff ultimate um and what they do as far as how they break that down with win percentages and pass rush and pass rush move and all that stuff is outstanding. And it's all tied into the video as well as my understanding. So every play, they've got all the analytical details statistically, and then you can go look at it. So I did talk to an offensive line coach. I know this is a tangent away from love to see and hate to see it. An offensive line coach who would use it to identify the negative plays.

So instead of him having to watch every single play, he would look at what their negative plays were, because those are pretty easy to figure out. Right? Like you talk about what they can know, what they can't know. Well, if somebody just gets roasted, then you could pretty easily figure that out, even if you don't know the play call.

And so he would look at those for teach tape to go back and analyze it. It would just save them a bunch of time. So it's really interesting. And I don't think that people know exactly how it's used, but it was funny. One of my favorite moments with our friend Alex Boone was when Alex was like, PFF, they don't know me. And I was like, Alex, they said you were like the best pass blocking guard

or whatever on the team in 2016. He's like, well, I bet they don't know how many pressures I had because we chart them or whatever. It was within like two or three from what Tony had charted and what PFF had charted. what pff had charted he's like well fine then so yeah and arguing with him is like arguing with a wall yeah that is true uh i wasn't going to push it too far but um to just to the point i think the whole offensive line would be a love to see it on the on the other side though one of the things you like to see is when a player

goes through and this is similar to derisaw goes through some moments where you don't know if they're going to go one way or the other and cam danzler was one of those players you can't beat out bashad breeland at a tough camp still even this year people are saying does he have the techniques down and i think there's still some some issues there but to see him make plays and go in that right direction uh you just like you just like to see that for a young player where you're really not sure are you going to lose confidence and fail or are you going to you know kind of take that next step I think for him maybe the new coaching staff was really important when we talk

about like players who needed that confidence boost as opposed to someone who was criticizing everything they do so cam dantzler's emergence as a good corner love to see yeah and you know i think i can remember when he was a young young player i mean even two three years ago when you're just like he's just not big enough like i can remember julio jones just like boxing him out in the end zone and he's just literally behind him and he just plucks the ball like well that's gonna work over and over and over again and you know to see that he's overcome a lot of those things and the thing that really has impressed me this year with him is his his want to and his drive to tackle you know like he got a little Trey Waynes in him where like you know if their balls come around the edge he's gonna stick his nose in there and

try and turn it back to the inside to his the the troops rallying to him or he's going to go out there and make a good play so i agree with you love to see a young player that's really coming into his own in a back end that was a huge question mark going into this season and they still have weaknesses i think that the adjustment for cam bynum has not been what maybe they wanted to be. And Shannon Sullivan, now he gets beat on the long catch from Darnell Moody. That is a Odell Beckham catch, but still he's their weakness in that secondary. But if Dantzler continues to play this way and Peterson plays this way and they stay healthy, it's serviceable much less than it was. We thought it could be disastrous if Cam dantzler didn't work out and

so now it comes down to and i'd love your opinion on this what they're doing schematically i think is a is a big question because they're not really blitzing anybody and they're just kind of sitting back and sitting back which is kind of the the way of the world these days but they're not really blitzing at all and you saw justin fields look as comfortable as he has ever looked in the National Football League last week is that the right strategy to try to keep everything in front of you or should they be more aggressive it's hard to say because we're winning you know like I want to say no I want to be like no get after the quarterback but it's him it's like well we're also four and one in first place in the division. So it's hard to argue with strategy when it's working,

because I think that especially with the old regime, they could almost get a little too ahead of themselves and be like, oh, well, what if we do this? And what if we do that? Versus I think with O'Connor right now, it's like, let's just stick with what we're doing. It's working. We're winning.

And until it rears its ugly head and it's not, then we'll just stay with it. So, you know, I think the idea of making teams go the long way and not stepping on their own you know what's is kind of the mentality right it's like well eventually they'll make a mistake and then when they do then we'll be there to basically pick up the pieces or we'll have enough guys in coverage that will intercept it or whatnot versus i think a lot of times defense is press and try and make them make a mistake and it's like we're gonna blitz and force the sack fumble.

We're going to blitz and force the missed throw or whatever, versus just allowing teams to just, especially with young quarterbacks. I mean, let's be real. The bears are bad. And like, you're just going to allow a team like that to eventually make its own mistake. And then you capitalize off that versus trying to press the issue and maybe allowing them to get some momentum and with a big play. Folks, maybe you've noticed people in your office with what looks like an open tall boy at their desk in the morning at

work well it's not a beer it's more likely it's a can of liquid death which sounds pretty crazy at first but it's simply mountain water from the alps it's called liquid death because it will murder your thirst and kill plastic pollution, which does seem aggressive, but that's their mission, and they are donating 10% of profits to help reduce plastic pollution. The problem is that plastic water bottles often aren't recyclable because they're not profitable to recycle, whereas aluminum cans can be turned into profit. Liquid Death sent me some cases and their water and their sparkling lime are both delicious. And maybe I'll have to start pounding them in front of my friends who know I'm not a drinker just to see their reaction. So go get Liquid Death at your local Target, Whole Foods Market, or Hy-Vee or find a Liquid Death retailer near you with their store locator tool at liquiddeath.com slash insider. That's liquiddeath.com slash insider. The Vikings pass defense right now, 24th and expected points added against.

It's not good. In fact, that's quite a bit worse than they were last year. They were 15th. Last year, they were the worst run defense in the league so they did improve that against chicago a team that has run the ball successfully at times but to have faced okay aaron rogers and jalen hurts good jared goff man you know up and down and then to uh one quarterback who's very inexperienced and maybe not good and then andy dalton who's a backup and to be 24th is not great now they don't have an amazing group of quarterbacks coming up but the way i feel about it is almost any quarterback they face maybe not skylar thompson or whatever his name is for miami

so we'll see how that plays out but any quarterback they face will have a chance to have a good day against this defense the way they're playing but do they want to take the risk of sending more people and leaving someone like danciler alone leaving someone like sullivan alone maybe the last couple of weeks will give them a little more confidence they also don't really blitz harrison smith at all which i think is odd like you you kept harrison smith like are you going to use them or is it like I don't really think he's just a deep safety. So that's kind of been interesting to me, too, of that strategy of just kind of sitting there and, hey, if you're going to dink and dunk.

But a lot of these quarterbacks have had success in doing it so far against them. Yeah, you know, the other thing is Kendricks is such a skilled blitzer in the A-gap, too. He learned from the Zimmer era of the double A's and whatnot, and he knows how to work a center's edge. i'd love to see him get more involved and i think just sending five you know i'm not saying we need to dial up or we're sending six man pressures but you know i think we have enough talent on the front between like winning one-on-one matchups that if you can just single everyone up like i have pretty good faith in our edge rushers especially in hunter and smith

that one of those guys is going to win versus you're always kind of getting one of those guys double teamed you know if you're not blending bringing five you're bringing four the center's getting to the guard the guards getting out to the tackle and then now you're double teaming one of your best pass rushers you know a lot of teams oh excuse me a lot of teams are going to that just kind of 5-0 look where it's like you know what we're just going to basically turn this into one-on-one drill and you know i and i've seen that miami does that a lot we'll see that from them where they just say we're putting our five best pass rushers out here and someone win you know i saw baltimore do that um against cincy the other night like you're seeing more and more of that i'd like to see us just have a few more of those packages where it's not even

really a true blitz package it's more just a five down lineman guy or just cover all five guys up and let them get after it and see who can win and i've noticed the penny front is being used more often where you have five defensive linemen and only one linebacker which i think was actually something you could do on tech mobile three uh but i'll have to go check that we'll have to verify by playing video games uh so now to the hate to see it where do you want to go with the hate to see it i think the hate to see it's got to be basically the entire second half except for the one the one play by cam dancer right i mean i think that you really had a lot of confidence going into halftime of this game of like okay they put it all together they're gonna beat the crap out of a very much lesser opponent this is gonna be a great tune-up in

the second half maybe we'll see some young guys out there did it to all of a sudden you blinked and you're like what just happened like i can't even really put my finger on a point of like where it went off the rails but it just seemed like there was just kind of this lackadaisical everything's fine we don't have to really come out like this is still the NFL like these are still big time players whether the team's bad or not like there's really good players over there and you just can't allow teams to hang around like that and just leave it really up to fate of a flick of a ball from a loose fumble when a guy should have run out of bounds or not you know I just didn't like the demeanor I hated the demeanor of this entire football team, the entire second half of this football game. Yeah. And that really has been kind of the thing.

I mean, they were up 16 to seven in London now with the lions game that was back and forth for the entire game and they were chasing from behind a little bit more, but with this one, this seemed like the ultimate, like, show you're for real. Do what Buffalo did to Pittsburgh. Just run away from this garbage team and let them know, at least for now. Who knows long term? But at least for now, you're a real contender and they're not. Because both teams, like, this is who they wanted to be.

That first half is who they wanted to be. Throw in to Justin Jefferson all the time. We're going to go compete for a Super Bowl versus like, oops, we lost by a million. Oh, well, right? Like, hate to see it, but our cap is good. So for the second half to allow that team that just is so lacking in talent and to allow a quarterback who's been flummoxed every week almost to look, thank you, to look as comfortable as he did and has done it i mean he was he was like lamar jackson he was running all over the

place he's making plays he's throwing to open receivers like wait a minute why does this guy look so comfortable i think the hate to see it kind of ties into what we were just talking about regarding this is that you hate to see how comfortable quarterbacks have looked against the Vikings. The only uncomfortable quarterback was Rogers and the rest of the guys, even Jared Goff, like everyone has looked like, Oh, like we could just kind of chill back here. It has not been an impressive pass rush. It has not have impressive pressure rates. They ended up with a decent pressure rate against fields but i think a lot of that was him holding on to the ball a lot and then like waiting and making plays so you might get a pressure but then he could still make a play um and i don't know if there's an easy

fix for that if you're not going to blitz there's not like oh why don't they just play jimmy like there's nobody like that that they can just play yeah you don't fix football teams in october you know that you don't fix glaring issues like everyone's like well there's got to be someone out on the streets like no if he was good he'd be on a team somewhere you know like it's got to come down to the one way to fix is you just have guys that start winning individual matchups more and more and that's what kind of what we alluded to earlier lean on your superstars but find ways schematically to help them you know it doesn't have to be because when you do blitz and you send guys off the edge and stuff you're telling your

superstars like okay you just gotta slant we gotta have gap integrity like all that stuff it's moving parts versus just turning them loose being like all right penny front 5d linemen just go win just go win you know i think that's a that's the way that i see you fixing that issue there versus trying to schematically drop pressures. You just got to rely on guys that are proven pass rushers to go out there and do it. And, I mean, as much as it pains me to say, I think Wanham's taken a little bit of a step as a pass rusher.

You know, I think that he's a guy that last year we were like, oh, my gosh, what is happening? And then this year he's sparked a little bit. But, you know, you put him over a guard. You put Smith over a guard. You leave Daniil out over and you put him over a guard. You put Smith over a guard. You leave Daniil out over, and you put those two guys on one side, and then you throw Harry in the middle somewhere there,

and you just kind of mix and match the matchups of where the weak link in that offensive line is is how you can try and generate some pressure. But you're right. Every quarterback's been able to sit back there, set their feet, first read, second read, and find a place to deal and wheel with the ball. So a question for you on deniel um now he gets a sack against fields yep kind of a cleanup sack is is he not fitting in the scheme because i don't tell kind of implied that there is a learning curve despite us being told in training camp there was no learning curve by ed donantel funny how those things switch around when it's not working uh but it just hasn't been what we expected it to be with him on that side and it's like a 30 for 30 like what if

i told you that dj want him had more pressures than daniel hunter like would you believe it like no uh in less pass rushes so is there something you can see that's happening there or do you think it is just time that that he needs i don't know it's it's kind of just befuddling you know you kind of you're just used to seeing daniel throw that long arm out there sticking into his chest then pull himself through over and over and over again and i don't know if he's just not trusting his technique or if he's just coming out of kind of that two-point stance might be messing with him a little bit or or whatever it may be like you know you expect to see so much other guy but this is the same time like i think back it's like man he missed a full year of

football like a full year like and timing is everything in a pass rush you know how if you're doing it off your third step or your fifth step or getting to the junction point and if my slower than i was last year my faster than i was like it's still in with pass rush it's weird because you never get to finish in practice you know it's always like get to the quarterback and run by get to the quarterback and duck underneath whatever and like finishing in is an art form as a pass rusher you know i just don't think that he's fully back into that finishing mode that he's been in for so many years because it's just timing thing you know i think that he will get it figured out he's way too talented not to but it's just been very strange just to not hear his name and see his number just popping up all over the quarterback by just winning

his one-on-ones yeah i do wonder about like just he rushed the same way with the same technique in the same spot for so long and had so much success that asking somebody to do something different might take a while or might not work at all um if you want to go way back in the day reminds me of the los angeles rams changing kevin green's role around and then he's like get rid of me get me out of here goes to pittsburgh is unbelievable in pittsburgh is unbelievable in pittsburgh it's like why did you mess with kevin green like maybe you should have just done the same things but coaches are like that like this is my system we can do it we can adjust and i'm not sure that one's going to take time i'm not sure if the it's going to be like rocky for

a while and then just all of a sudden click at the right time midway through the season or if it's just not going to be the same and if he doesn't fit or if those injuries have taken their toll then you know you just need to start having the conversation about that contract and even his future because they're like they're going to be here a while probably right this isn't going to be like a one or two year thing like this is the way they want to play so uh that will be something worth watching i got a little for my hate to see it i got a little quiz for you um there's only one other wide receiver on the minnesota vikings that averages more than 10 yards a catch aside from justin jefferson who is that receiver it's a it's a little bit of a trick it's a little bit of a trick question i'm sure is it a tight end it's not a tight end that's a wide receiver that's a wide receiver it's definitely not feeling nope it's definitely not kj osborne sure isn't

yeah i don't know i i who is it please tell me. It is Jalen Naylor who caught the fake punt for 13 yards. He is the only other receiver averaging 10 plus per reception. Oh, pain. Here's just the facts on this one. If that doesn't change, it's going to be tough to have a great offense. You can have an okay offense and especially if the chicago bears just let you steamroll them in the first half the way they did with justin jefferson but on a week-to-week basis there's no receiver in the league just that

just catches like 150 yards every week right so it's always a little up it's a little down depending on defense depending on situation and at this, they really can't rely on anyone else. And the, maybe the most disappointing one, because it was a little anticipated that feeling could become more of a possession wide receiver for them based on his last few years. But Osborne, I didn't expect him to be a different version of himself, like get way better, but I expect it to be the version of himself that we saw last year and for whatever reason maybe because more plays are really focused so much just on jefferson i don't know uh that he ends up being like a third read or something but he just has like kind of failed to launch outside of that one catch for the touchdown against detroit yeah

you know and you look at all the teams that do have just the lock in one wide receiver, you're starting to see the emergence of the second wide receiver for all those teams. I mean, Gabe Davis is a perfect example for the Buffalo bills, right? Like digs is still getting his, but you still have to worry about Gabe Davis. And I love Adam Thielen to death, but he just doesn't look crisp and fast and what he was a while ago and that's because he's getting older you know that's just part of it and you can be a savvy vet and create separation with technique and that stuff but you know when you have a you got to have another guy that can blow the roof off of a defense that over the top and we just don't have the guy I think

I mean Jalen Rager the guy's kind of that idea of what you want but he just got here right like you just got here you're not gonna be able to just get him up to speed right away with all these things so i mean you see the teams that lock in on jefferson and they lock in on him and shut him down and things go off the rails but he is such a special player that if you can just keep plugging him just keep doing it but the passing game it's a it's just it's so strange you watch it and you're like okay there's the short stuff oh there's the long stuff and then the next week it's like it's completely different you know like i don't i don't know if we can anticipate to see the exact same thing out of this offense next week and that's the hard part is just the inconsistency in the passing games

eventually come up to catch us yeah i think so as well and that's kind of what we've seen at times and i think that that's at the center of the inconsistency. Maybe, I mean, there's always Kirk as part of it. Like this is just who he is for his career, for inconsistency. And so I don't know that it's KJ Osborne playing worse or Kirk isn't looking his way or is just having those ups and downs. But when your offense is entirely,

it's gotta be Jefferson doing everything. And you can it's got to be jefferson doing everything um and you can count on him to be great a lot of times but not every single week week in and week out there will be defenses who find ways to slow him down uh detroit has a horrible defense and still was able to take him out of the game so i don't even know which weeks we could try to predict this week they're going to do it this week they're not. Can I give you a dual love to see it? Hate to see it. Yes, please.

The schedule. Love to see it. Hate to see it. Because where you would love to see it. If you're a Vikings fan is that it's very winnable where you hate to see it. Is that as we try to go on this fantastic journey together, finding out are the Vikings for real? It's just hard to know and it's

going to be hard to know for a little while right i mean who's playing when the head coach of the other team you're playing is like i have no idea who's a quarterback that's bad that's bad that's not good for them for miami i don't know who's playing quarterback on monday yikes uh so it's it's fallen their way which is really helpful for them. But do we know if it's for real? We probably won't know for quite a while. Yeah, I completely agree that, you know, you're, you and I were sitting here going, are we good? Are we, are we really good? Like, are we contenders? Like, are we in the echelons of Philly and Kansas city and Baltimore and Buffalo and all these other one loss teams? Or are we kind of fraudulent?

You know, it's really hard to say because winning in this league is hard. One doesn't matter how good you are, how bad you are. Like just getting one in the W column is a really hard thing to do. And the Vikings have found ways to do it. And they have talent enough to you're like, yeah, I think we could be good. But then there's just those moments like in the third quarter, just like what is happening? Like, is this this isn't the same team that I saw,

and that's the part for me that I just can't guarantee – I just can't lock this team in as like a really good team. They just have too many blunders or too many moments where you're just like, no, this ain't it. Like this is not it versus you watch a team like Philly, Buffalo, Kansas City, like from start to finish, there's just pedal to the floor rolling through it and then you just can tell like this team's just outclassing everyone else and every all three phases of the game vikings aren't there and they're playing against teams that just are really not there i mean if skylar thompson's playing for

miami i might take a second mortgage out on the house and throw it on the Vikings because my gosh, that was tough to watch. Yeah. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. I, and even Teddy at this point in his career, I think that he kind of had some moments in new Orleans and even in Carolina where he kind of looked like, okay, Teddy's going to come back. But it sort of reminds me of Tyrod Taylor where the injuries just piled up at one point, the guy, when he was healthy, was a pretty good quarterback. And even when Bridgewater was just coming back. But I don't know if they've officially ruled this a concussion or not,

but at least his third or fourth. I mean, there's just been a few of those and the other injuries, and he's not mobile at all at this point in his career. So the fact that he's even playing football is truly incredible and it needs to be said every time but do you think he could beat the vikings like probably not at this point um so really if they don't get to a back and that that could be another win and it's just another thing falling your way that sort of keeps us from really knowing what you are uh and just like kind of similarly along those lines, it's like,

do we know yet if like Kevin O'Connell really knows what he's doing? And I think that love to see it, hate to see it as kind of like, well, you love to see that he hasn't had any major, oh my gosh, what's going on, but sort of hate to see that we don't really have an answer yet on that.

So far, there's things that you like and things that you question a little bit. So yeah, it's like, Oh, and then even the close games are, I love to see it. Hate to see it.

I was done with my article at halftime and then I had to change it. And this is really about me. Yeah. You know, but I'll say this from a fan's perspective, like it's been a fun year yeah you know i think i think from our perspective of trying to dissect and are we good are we bad or who's doing this who's doing what like it's tough it's tough on us because it's like you want to nitpick because

things don't look at all time but the end day you're four and one but as a fan you couldn't really ask for a better year games down to the I mean, you're booing at one point. You're cheering at one point. You're stuffing your face with your fat popcorn. You're just having fun. And I think that that's something that the Vikings fans haven't necessarily had in a while. Just a fun season. Thinking that goes all the way from the top down of who's running the team and following it.

And just the overall feeling of Viking land is a good time. So I'm going to love to see it of like, enjoy it because it can go off the rails at any moment and become not fun. I mean, ask the Cincinnati Bengals, right? You, you, the Vikings could very easily be in the Bengals shoes right now. Just three games of one loss or losses right on the last play of the game. I mean, we are absolutely not far off from that. And I'll tell you,

it's probably not real fun over there in Cincinnati. So enjoy it, enjoy what we have and just keep rolling with it. And winning's fun. And I think that that it could be, you could be five and one next week and seeing it. Who knows what could happen? Yeah.

I think that these people who follow the team were really broken last year. They were broken. I mean, beaten and shattered imagine vikings fans with all they've been through being broken like but i think that was last year at the end it was just like nothing nothing is there is no sunshine god is far from this place like it just was dark i mean fans weren't cheering like even when they played the packers aaron rogers was like yeah i don't know why the fans weren't loud it Like even when they played the Packers, Aaron Rodgers was like, yeah, I don't know why the

fans weren't loud. It's like, cause they hate everything, Aaron. They hate everything. Uh, and they just wanted it to be over and it was, and now even the atmosphere of the building is, uh, much more, I think intense when it's a big moments and kind of sell celebratory when it's going well, as opposed like oh good who cares um and and that it's easier to podcast about i have to say than feeling like man how do i just not like hammer everything all the time there's a lot there's a you want to you want to have a lot of good discussions and there

was no good discussions left it was like so is this all rick's fault or mike's fault oh the answer is both oh so they don't speak They don't talk to each other? That's good. But we're having fun. Yeah, we're just figuring it out, rolling with the punches. Okay, so let's maybe wrap on this, unless you had other love to see and hate to see it.

Do you have more? I have a couple from around the league. Oh, okay. Well, let's wrap the Vikings discussion portion on this. Just that you mentioned all those 4-1 teams. There's five of them in the league. Now there's about an 80% chance you make the playoffs if you start 4-1, which means one of the five will not.

Is that going to be, if you had to put it down, you said, you know, make the bet, who would you bet on the 4-in-one team to not make the playoffs? And would it be this team? Hold on, let's roll through the four-in-one teams. It's Kansas City, Buffalo, Baltimore, and the Vikings. Is that what it is? Do you not have the NFL standings? I don't have the NFL standings in front of me.

Not at the moment. Okay. standings i don't have the nfl standings in front of me not at the moment okay it is the dallas cowboys new york giants minnesota vikings buffalo bills and kansas city jeeps oh i want to say the cowboys just because the cowboys always find a way to end it up and screw it up but the defense is just unbelievable so yeah i think i think i think it's the giants i'm gonna say the Giants. You know, I think the Vikings have a better shot because of the division. I think the division, the NFC North, is on a downstream.

So I think they could find a way to win, even if they're 10-7. Or, I mean, 11-6. They could easily win the division. You know, and so they're going to get in that way. Versus, I think Philly's going to absolutely just manhandle that division over there and the giants are i mean i love doge dayball i love those guys but that is a fraudulent football team i want you to guess how many passing yards per game the giants average oh it can't it's got to be under 200 like 187 172 yeah i mean it's they're a fraud you can only hand the ball to saquon barkley so many times and i love that he's back but like you want to kill him again like do you want to kill him again because that's the road that you're on if you just keep hey wildcat wildcat wildcat like

eventually he's gonna die yeah yeah yeah uh or just like have his career severely shortened because you grinded him into the ground to go like nine and eight uh but their jerseys are fire this year so yeah i agree with you the giants are the easiest answer they also have like some difficult games coming up or at least ones that will kind of prove whether they can do it or not i think they play jacksonville seattle like teams that are middling that if they beat then all of a sudden they're interesting uh the vikings when you look at the schedule it's just how is someone going to stop them enough or what part of the schedule other than when they play new england dallas and buffalo um but even if they lost all three like but what about the rest of the games so so yeah i think it's more likely to be the Giants.

I also do not count it out with this team, and you shouldn't either because you were on a team that had that mild issue. 5-0, baby. 5-0 turns into 3-8 real quick. Hate to see it. Okay, so what were your ones around the league? Oh, dude, my number one hate to see it is the way that the Arizona Cardinals just absolutely – they effed it up so bad at the end of the game, just so poorly managed.

And I don't know if you can blame – who you blame, Murray or whoever's in Murray's ear or – like just blame someone because that was so bad of game management. And then like I love how Justin Pugh comes afterwards too like at defense of the kicker like, it's justin pews like comes afterwards to like at defense of the kicker like it's not one man's fault it's like well i mean he missed it but no if you want to blame someone go blame your quarterback for sliding a yard early and then spiking the ball on third down like that was just such bad football for the nfl like you can't do

that it just goes back to the like it all circles back to like the contract where it's like they had to pay him to study like it all circles back to that and that's never gonna be a black that's a black mark on his resume forever oh yeah yeah yeah and uh i'm sure that they leaked it so they could have like plausible deniability if it blows up they could be like we even put it in his contract that you know right so like it's not mine steve kimes fall. Like, no, this roster is your fault, but that was an abomination, but also Justin Pugh. Stop it. Just stop it. Just stop it.

No one feels that way. No one feels that way. I have, trust me, I have been in locker rooms when the kicker missed the final kick. No one feels that way. They all think that guy blew it. And when that guy, and when that guy and when that guy surrounded by reporters asking why you blew it all the other players are like well we got to answer when we blow it so so should he no one thinks that that's performance art that's a that's a

dude being a phony pretend leader and don't do that that that's that's how i feel about that i wouldn't say that to his face because he's very big but i think i just thought that that was so corny i was just like oh you're trying to be like tebow leader or something like stop it yeah and then and then my love to see it you know my my love to see it is the buffalo bills i'm just gonna keep saying it the last two weeks like they they were doubted right it's like they go down they lose miami they barely do and then all of a sudden it's like oh here comes pittsburgh which is like pretty good defense you know they got a rookie quarterback and they just beat the break that's two games now in the regular season that the starting offense has not played in the fourth quarter that doesn't

happen in the nfl like i can't wait for the NFC championship, AFC championship. I can't wait. Like it's going to be chiefs bills and it's going to be just an absolute track meet. The crazy thing to me is always how the ball looks when Josh Allen throws a deep, it's just like, like, you know,

just like I live near the airport and I hear them taking off. That's what it sounds like when he's throwing the ball. He's what? 280 yard touchdowns or whatever. It's just like the velocity, the way that it travels through the air. There's like five quarterbacks ever who threw footballs like that. And if they're just going to throw bombs, there's somebody at a screen grab of Gabriel Davis, where he was clearly double team.

There's a safety over the top. Josh sounds like, nah, no, no, no. I'll throw it so far that he'll run by those people i mean that that is incredible uh i love to see cooper rush winning games because when a the dude was in the aaf yep aaf that's not even one we recognize he didn't even make it a whole season they cut him they cut him out of training camp and he's come out and he's won games he's gonna be in the league for the next 10 years oh for sure like he will be a backup quarterback for the next decade 100 unless some stupid team tries to pay too much to make him like well maybe probably he's the guy i think they've gotten smart although that actually

worked in the early 2000s where it's like seattle like matt hasselbeck or something like they would just pick up these random this kurt warner guy he could be for us right like that doesn't happen much anymore i got one more i got one more my last it's a hate love it's kind of a hate love to see it it's just davante adams losing his mind because derrick carr is his quarterback you know it's just one of those things like you're just kind of like you know what you had a pretty good one up there in green bay buddy it had you had a good thing going and you kind of blew it and now this is what you get like you have a shit sandwich you gotta eat it like and then he like i guess he assaulted a like uh photographer

who like individually took himself to the hospital and they called the police and like there's a police report filed now it's just his life's kind of in shambles out there in vegas versus you know aaron sitting back there there's like the wolverine picture where he's rubbing it like i miss you davante i miss you so much an elite meme an elite meme i'm not sure i'm not sure how i feel about well i hope the guy that he shoved is not injured because i don't even know if nfl players understand their own power like a wide receiver could kill you with his bare hands easily but like just like the guy is so jacked and so like someone someone who's six foot one or whatever and 210 pounds should look like me just sort of like pudgy and average uh not like this you know

whatever and so uh doing that you can't put hands on somebody because like you you possess power that can injure somebody and there is a part of me at the same time and i hope the guy's not severely injured if i say this but like if you were but if you were fine come on like just get back up and push him back yeah okay matt everyone's gonna hold him everyone's gonna hold him back everyone's gonna hold him back you're not gonna get hurt you gotta get you gotta get up you gotta get in his face get up and get yours just put the finger right in the chest get in his face come on come on camera guy i i really hope he's not hurt i haven't heard that like any that it's serious because i'm it's not life-threatening

injuries is what the police report okay so i can't imagine that it's if you can't imagine he's like broken arm if you have a bruise on your rear then you can't just don't file a police report man like man up come on now come on now this league man it never ceases to raise right that one camera dude who got trucked by linval didn't oh nope he didn't that was his own fault too there should have been no crossing yeah that was not linval being a jerk it was just like an accident that guy got destroyed he got back up and he photographed the rest of the game absolutely man's game be a man all right thanks for your time jeremiah really appreciate it we will do it again uh next week i'll see you later