Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - What makes this season a success? Jaren Hall is QB2 now?

Episode Date: December 15, 2023

Matthew Coller and Manny Hill talk about Matthew's article about what would make the Vikings' season a success and Josh Dobbs being relegated to QB3 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

everybody welcome to another episode of Purple Insider. Matthew Collar and Manny Hill. And Manny, I've got to share with you a text that I just got from a friend who is a big Vikings fan. And my friend declared that the Vikings defense must be the greatest of all time, considering that the Las Vegas Raiders are now scoring points against the Los Angeles chargers and it is 21 to zero. So as you know, after we got burned by Jake Browning, I try not to make a very serious declarations as we're watching these games on the show, because sometimes that can come back to bite me, but I'm going to declare that. Yeah, the Vikings defense

pretty good, but also i'm not sure that the los angeles chargers will have the same head coach tomorrow after giving up 21 points to the las vegas raiders in the first half so uh yeah that's what that's what's going on how are you man i'm pretty good yeah i i kind of before tonight I had a thought, well, Brandon Staley's probably not going to be the Chargers head coach after this season, but he'll probably, you know, maybe he'll finish the season and then he'll just get fired on Black Monday or something like that. Three or four days after being shut out by the Vikings defense. Yeah, he might be on the unemployment line tomorrow morning. The way this is going. Yeah, obviously, you know, just because of what happened last week versus this week, we can play that game where we can spin ourselves in circles. Well, this team lost to that team and this team lost to that team.

And that must mean this. And if they just did this, then what does it look like that we did that? We love that in football, Arizona beat the Cowboys with Josh Dobbs this year. Maybe that game doesn't work exactly right. Maybe the Raiders look themselves in the mirror after what happened against Brian Flores, or also maybe Brian Flores' defense is really good, which I think we already knew, but that was their best performance. Shutting out any NFL team these days is incredibly difficult and he deserves to get the credit for what happened against the Raiders. But I think that the Chargers are in maybe a much worse spot than the Vikings are defensively. And, you know, this is one of my big takeaways for this season, though, Manny, is that in

previous years, not that I didn't think defensive coordinators were important. I always, of course, have thought that and goes back to, you know, Bill Parcells, like dialing up the Giants defense and all that. But, you know, Billy Parcells had that Lawrence Taylor guy. Like, usually it comes down to the talent that you have that determines where you are as a defense. Not that the Vikings don't have talent, but they have maximized a bunch of guys that,

from their raw talent perspective, where they were drafted, what the NFL saw in them, that we really didn't see coming. It's not a bunch of first rounders. It's not a bunch of expensive free agents. And that makes it so much more impressive. And then seeing how Brandon Staley's group has fallen apart when they have gone out and gotten free agents and they have drafted people, they have Khalil Mack on their football team. It's it's really clear now that the defensive coordinator position is a major part of the success or failure of that unit. And of course, Ed Donatell should be, you know,

talked about in this way as well. It may be increasing. It may be increasing with how creative you can get versus how much you can stop offenses from doing the easy stuff that gets them a lot of easy yards. So I think we're really seeing that shine here with Brian Flores in charge. Absolutely, especially in today's NFL, where it is, you know, I know scoring overall as a whole has gone down a little bit this year compared to, you know, the last handful of years. But overall, you know, it's much easier to score points in the NFL today versus 15-20 years ago and you know with the way the league is played now to see what a lot of these defensive coordinators are able to sort of dial up defensively and get

creative with some of the schemes that they're that they're doing on a week-to-week basis is really impressive. And I think it really shows the value of that position, that that coaching position is huge. And if you don't have a guy in that position that can put together good schemes, then you're just going to have a tough time. We saw it last year where Ed Donatel just didn't do a very good job. And that was a defense that had veteran players on it that had been in the league for a while, and they were just constantly out of position.

And a lot of that had to do with just the scheme that was being put together. So Brian Flores has done just a remarkable job with what he's been, you know, with the cards that have been dealt to him. And I don't know if we might have even talked about this before if there is like an assistant coach of the year award he's got to be the front runner right now considering the job that he's done this year i don't know if there is maybe that like we love to give out awards to just about everything and anything so maybe uh i was going to ask you and I know that I didn't send this to you before the show,

but it just sort of hit me about Brandon Staley and probably getting fired. And if it was probably before, it's definitely now. How many teams do you think will interview Brian Flores? Like where do we expect him to at least get a phone call? So I'll just try to start off the list and we can make it on the fly. If Pittsburgh fires,

Mike Tomlin, he has the connection there. Maybe they would check in with him though. I think they would go with an offensive coach after having a defensive coach for so long and maybe try to get the most out of Kenny Pickett or something, but maybe since they have the connection with him, New England, of course,

if they let go of Bill Belichick, trade them, fire them, whatever they're going to do. And they build a new team there. Uh, Brian Flores is what I would call a card carrying member of the Patriot way. I mean, he was there through the whole run, uh, in one capacity or the next Washington would have to be a team that considers him. I would imagine Ron Rivera is out. I don't think the chargers will. I think that they're going to go on the offensive side as well. A lot of these coaches we're talking about are more defensive minded. And what we know is that they always go the opposite direction. So that's where I'm, I'm having trouble figuring out like if it's not new England and they could kind of, I want to say,

get away with it. Not like they're actually doing something bad, but the whole lawsuit thing. So like Rob or Robert craft could probably do that. So I don't know, like who am I missing here that might get fired? Yeah. I, I,

I don't know. Like I don't see Carolina as a team that would do it with a young quarterback that they're still trying to develop. It feels like they would go the direction of an offensive guy, even though they just fired an offensive guy in Frank Reich. Who else are we thinking about that would be changing coaches? I mean, is Todd Bowles going to make it in Tampa? Maybe, maybe not.

Yeah, I don't know. And I'm not even sure that they would go the direction of another defensive coach as well if they move on from Todd Bowles after the season. Yeah, I mean, New England makes a ton of sense to me. Not that I really think about it. I hadn't really thought about if he's going to get a job you know if new england would be a spot because you just don't you don't really envision like bill belichick and fired as this you know in the same sentence but that's that's a reality i mean that's we're hearing the reports now the rumors are out there that that they're

going to actually go on and and move in a different direction it seems like because of his ties there that that would make a a sensible spot for him if you know if the if the phone call is made so yeah i'm not sure i'm just trying to think off the top of my head other teams that are going to be looking for coaches i don't know the were the raiders were the raiders bring him in? Maybe. Maybe. Maybe. It would be going. I mean, they'd be taking another coach from the Patriot coaching tree back to back, so to speak, after McDaniels.

It looks like my camera feed has gone kaput here. I'll work on that. You still sound great, though. You still sound great. So you can. completely totally fine yeah that's right so uh well we'll work on that but as long as people can hear you then uh we're totally good here uh hunter brings up the chicago bears i don't actually know that they're gonna uh fire matt eberfluss after the way that they have turned around the way that they have. So that's another one that's off the list.

If it's not the Raiders, and you're right, would they go back to a Patriot Way guy after they just completely crashed and burned with a Patriot Way guy? And that's why I keep thinking that Flores is going to be here next year, that he's going to get opportunities, but he is ultimately likely to be here. So I, yeah, I think of course, not that this game means a whole lot to it. What's happening right now, but just the accumulation of what they've done and how they've done it should earn him interviews. It's just how different is he than some of the other coaches that would be potentially

getting fired? You know what I mean yeah i mean i i think you know the the the whole you know the lawsuit thing i think is a is a real thing and i think that's that's going to come into play but it's just it's hard to ignore just the incredible job that he's done this year, though. I mean, like, if you take the lawsuit thing out of the equation, it's almost like I almost feel like it's guaranteed he's going to get a head coaching job next year somewhere because you can't do as well a job as he's done with his defense and turn things around as quickly as he has. I mean, I thought when they brought him in, I thought, okay,

eventually Brian Flores is going to really turn things around with his defense, but it's going to take some time because they're kind of rebuilding it. They're going to have a lot of young players. You know, it's going to take some time to kind of really build this thing into the mold that he wants it to be. But the way... Very well played there. Yeah, I put it on this for audio listeners.

I put it on the screen. That's Manny, but his camera died. So we're still hearing you loud and clear, though. This is weird. Yeah, yeah, it is really weird. I'm actually sitting here sort of fiddling around with the wire on my external camera here, and it's just not responding. I don't know what the issue is.

Okay, maybe I can respond to a couple of comments, and you can see if you can fix that. You want to do that? Let's try that. That should work. Okay, you log out and fix that real quick, and I will read a couple of comments, and then we'll work on it. Did I mention the chargers i yeah i did uh but i i can't help but think that any team that has a defensive coach uh will go with an offensive coach the next time around that might be different from the chargers i might be wrong about that

because their defense has still been really really awful awful. And they might be looking at Brian Flores saying, this is exactly what we need. But I also, I mean, you know, and they have Kellen Moore. So would they just elevate Kellen Moore or were they not happy with Kellen Moore either? Maybe they could go with a defensive coach like Flores or Bill Belichick and then, you know, keep Kellen Moore in his current position. But when there's only a limited number of teams that would be completely shifting away from what they already kind of had in a defensive coach, then that might make it harder for Brian Flores. If it was a bunch of offensive coaches that failed, then owners would be like,

oh, our defense is bad. We need to hire a defensive coach. Maybe that could potentially get in the way. Scott says, can you get Matt S I don't know who you're going to clarify who Matt S is on the channel to ask you about two years and $60 million for Kirk cousins. Hard to believe he gets less than car and Jones. Love to hear his explanation. You got to tell me who Matt s is but uh two years and 60 million makes no sense whatsoever um for kirk cousins because look at the state of quarterback

play in the nfl it is a calamity and there are a lot of teams that feel like they are on the edge of being great and specifically in pittsburgh and at had Kirk cousins this year, I mean, they are a serious contender right now. And instead they're just grinded away with Desmond Ritter, hoping and praying each week that he doesn't throw three interceptions. That, that is a pretty, uh, hard thing to believe that there wouldn't be four or five teams that are negotiating with Kirk Cousins, maybe including the Minnesota Vikings, depending on how they feel and that his price tag would go up beyond 30 million a year. I mean, 30 million just makes no sense. Like when you compare it to what Daniel Jones got, what Derek Carr got. And hey, look, Manny's back.

Hi, Manny. I see you now. I don't know what happened there, but we're good. We're good. So let me ask you, oh, Brad Spielberger. Brad Spielberger. Okay. Yeah, I'll have to talk to Brad about that

because it just doesn't make a whole lot of sense. I think there's going to be four or five teams that will be interested in, um, Kirk Cousins services and that it will raise the price beyond that. So yeah, as much as I of course, respect Brad and he's right about a lot of things that price in my mind is going to be higher than that. Uh, Manny, I had a question for you. I wrote an article and I'm going to read it the whole thing to you quietly now about whether this season is a success. No, I'm not really going to read it to you. I'm just kidding. But the impetus of the article is thinking about realistic expectations when you have four quarterbacks play is most of the time.

If you just told someone, hey, our team had four quarterbacks play, you'd be like, oh, what'd you win? Like two games. But instead, here they are in the driver's seat of making the playoffs. Do they have to make the playoffs to be a success? If they make the playoffs, is it an automatic success? Is it less successful in your mind because they hurt their draft status? How will you deal with the last couple of games and what the results end up being it's it's a great question i think that requires a lot of nuance because if you're thinking big picture like you know we've talked about where this team is at big picture going forward you have to wonder you have to really question if it's a success because

big picture you want to find that franchise quarterback in the draft that you can grow and develop. And that can be a part of your team's future for, you know, a decade. And every win that they have from here on out, the rest of the season really kind of hinders that opportunity to find that guy, you know, like in the top 10 of the draft, let's say next spring. Now we've seen guys get drafted in the second round. Jalen Hurts obviously is one of the best quarterbacks in the NFL and the Eagles drafted

them in the, in the second round. You know, guys like Drew Brees were drafted late in the first round. Obviously we know the goat was drafted in the sixth round, et cetera, et cetera. But you know, if you're, if you're looking at, you know, you want Drake May or you want Caleb Williams or if you want, you know, Jaden Daniels, you're going to probably be picking in the top five to have a chance to, you know, add one of those guys. And the Vikings are not, especially if they make the playoffs, they're not going to be in a position to really move up into that.

I mean, they could, but you'd be giving up a lot of draft capital to do that. And then you have to kind of wonder, like, are you going to have enough draft capital to kind of continue to build the roster around that young quarterback that you take? So if you're, if you're, if you have the viewpoint of, well, they won 13 games last year and they won the division and they made the playoffs,

they were so much better than what a lot of people expected last year. And you want to build off of that and kind of continue that, continue on with that train. Then I guess if you, if this team makes the playoffs, then I guess you view that as a success, but I think it really largely just depends on, you know, how you view where this team is at and where you want to see this team go. Because as we've talked about a million times, sitting in the middle is the worst place that you can be.

And it's kind of where this team has been really ever since they got Kirk Cousins back in 2018, where you've had a couple of playoff seasons, but really neither one of those seasons were you ever really truly a Super Bowl contender because you were just never going to beat the team. Even if the Vikings had beaten the Gi giants in the wild card round last year they weren't going to go into philadelphia or um who was the number two that uh san francisco you weren't going to go into either one of those places and and win and win in those places it just wasn't going to happen so i think you know if if you're looking at you know big picture and wanting to see this team start over with a new young franchise quarterback, then you're saying, well, this season has been fun, but it's not exactly what I envisioned, what I had in mind.

But if you're trying to say you want to build off of last year, then making the playoffs, I guess, would be kind of a success because you will have made it two years in a row, and Kevin O'Connell was a playoff head coach his first two years with the franchise. So it kind of really depends on how you view where this team is at going forward. Yeah.

So here's the difficult thing for me. And I think that's very well set. And I agree with everything you said there is that your perspective might be entirely shaped on whether you look at this year in a bubble as look what you had to overcome or whether you're a big picture type thinker about the super bowl and like everything revolves around that quarterback position will you get closer to the super bowl if you play yourself out of where you could potentially draft a quarterback and then if they make the playoffs, you're kind of grumbling thinking,

well, they're going to lose in the first round. So how did this help us at all to be able to do that? We didn't really get closer to a Superbowl. And there's another point too, that when you look at last year's playoffs, there are a few teams that you could argue would be very happy to have made the post season, but then what did it matter including the new york giants who thought that they were on their way oh look at all the foundational pieces we got we're just going to add darren waller and run it all back and we'll be just as good and better next year and instead that did not happen even the los angeles chargers although i think that a catastrophic loss in the playoffs probably hurt them. The Pittsburgh Steelers made the playoffs. They just grinded it in. And then everybody said, oh, well,

you know, the Steelers are building around that young quarterback and they'll get there. And they did not. So just getting to nine and eight doesn't really do a darn thing as far as guarantee where you're going to be in the future. But I would still argue that if you're looking at the trend of where this team is at, you would have to look at it as making the playoffs as an upward swing because you have flexibility at the quarterback position. And there have been plenty of teams who have dropped quarterbacks into good spots and had them take right off and make the playoffs right away. I mean, even CJ Stroud, like we don't think of the Texans being a good spot, but then it turned out that it was, we already know that the Vikings are

going to be a good spot for a quarterback. Dak Prescott is another great example of this. He shows up in Dallas just in time for the Tony Romo era to be over and he takes over and he's got a great offensive line and great receivers and a good running game and everything else, a good defense, and then takes off right away. This team feels like it went from being super uncertain at like 11 positions across the board to all of a sudden, what, what is going to be different here? Like they're going into next year. What roster wise, if they lose the Neil Hunter and free agency, I don't know that they will, but then everything else you have an opportunity to bring back and improve the running back position, maybe improve the pass rushing spot on defensive Hunter returns.

And I, I mean, maybe, mean, maybe we could argue about the coaching and did they put the quarterbacks in a good enough position with Kevin O'Connell? But overall, when you look at the man's record over two years, you can't be too disappointed about that considering what they've gone through. So I look at it as you could almost argue already going into this final stretch,

having a chance at the playoffs because so many young players emerged that that would be a success for you. Is it not a success if Brian Forrest leaves because he was too good at his job? Like that makes the season a failure. I don't know. So there's the part of me that's sort of cynical about teams that go nine and eight and get crowned as like Seattle did last year team on the rise and then they weren't they were just an average team again that would be the thing i'm concerned about but the fact that they have a chance to change quarterbacks here does open it up for believing that this was a transition year from stuck mostly in the middle to potentially contending year after

year well and think let's let's take the New York giants, for example, because you know, you brought them up, like, think about if you're a giants fan right now, and if they hadn't given Daniel Jones that, that large contract and they're still having this type of season, you know, they're five and eight. Think about if you're a giants fan,, you know, they're five and eight. Think about if you're a Giants fan, how you would, how you would feel this about this situation, because even though you're having a worse season

than you had a year ago, you're not, you don't feel stuck with this Daniel, this massive Daniel Jones contract. And Oh, by the way, he's injured and out for the season. And before he got hurt, he wasn't playing well anyway, so now you feel like you're kind of stuck with him. If you didn't have that sort of big Acme anvil weighing down on you right now, you would still feel pretty good about your situation because you know, well this has been a bad year and we've got you know this devito kid playing quarterback for us right now and found a way to beat the packers and that was kind of fun but like we also know like hey this team's going to be likely picking in the top 10 of the draft and they're going to have a chance to get maybe one of these young quarterbacks if

they you know move up a couple spots move into the top five or hey, maybe they'll lose enough games to where they'll end up in the top five anyway. And they don't have to move up. You know, if you're a Giants fan right now, if you don't have that Daniel Jones contract, you're actually feeling a lot better about where you're at. Even if you're in the same position record-wise and still having this same type of season. And I think this is where I just caution the Vikings about, you know, if they're thinking about bringing back Kirk Cousins. And I know that's probably a topic that they are discussing right now. I just think that they have to be very, very careful about doing that. Because if they do, and this is not, again, this is not slamming Kirk as like a bad quarterback. And obviously he's much better than Daniel Jones is. But if you decide to bring him back

and you pay him all of this money, where are you, where are you really, what sort of position are you really putting yourself in? Are you really putting yourself in a position of where you can contend for a championship next year and even the year after that, because it's probably going to be a multi-year deal? Where do you really view yourself at on this sort of prism of championship contenders, because you're not, your roster is not there yet. You've got some really nice pieces. You've got a coaching staff that has done a nice job overall

of sort of crafting this thing together and putting this team in a position with a lot of young players that they're growing and developing. But if you sort of lump in this massive veteran quarterback, you know, contract into this mix, when the team is not ready to take that next step to be a Superbowl contender yet, you run the risk of just putting yourself in that same spot that we have

seen them in for the last half decade with Kirk Cousins. I remember thinking years ago when the Philadelphia Eagles had the dream team that everything had gone right for them the year before and they were a contender. And then they added, I forget who it was, it a john jackson or maybe they already had i forget they added somebody to the mix and they were like this is all stars on their offense it's just an all-star team it's going to be unbelievable and then they fell right on their face and it hit me then that from year to year we always assume that everything that went right will go right again, and everything that was wrong will just be fixed. And that could be a fallacy we fall into if Kirk Cousins returns, as in,

well, the only thing that was really wrong was just the quarterback got hurt. And if he doesn't get hurt, then championship. And the road is still a long way to long way to, to go, to find out, you know, what's going to happen here and how far we think they are along at the end of the season. Cause this is still almost a quarter of the season to go before we have our total conclusions, but there is still construction to be done on this roster. We've seen a defensive coordinator squeeze every ounce of blood out of the stone, but they don't have Micah Parsons, and they don't have Nick Bosa.

I mean, Daniil Hunter is fantastic, but they don't have a partner for him, and they're sort of just finagling their way to these games and these wins, which won't necessarily happen every single year that you're able to just scheme and scheme and just stop all these teams and everything that's i think been the league being surprised at what florist is doing and he'll have to continue to adjust but really if you're going to compete for a championship on defense you're likely going to need more superstar talent so when you go up against three good offenses in the playoffs you can beat them and on the offensive side we're seeing some offenses in the playoffs, you can beat them. And on the offensive side,

we're seeing some cracks in the offensive line foundation. They need a better running game. Like there's things, if you want to compete for a championship, there's still quite a few things that need to be, I think, fixed because even if Kirk cousins had been here, we were expecting like 10 wins going into the playoffs, which would put you in that hole like, oh, 10 wins were sort of competitive and we'll probably still lose in the first round type of ballpark. If they bring back cousins, how does that change? The way that that could change is with money. And what you can do is I know that Kirk has this $28 million dead cap hit, but what you

could do similar to with TJ Hawkinson is sign a player with a lower cap hit the first year, have it go up when Kirk Cousins is not on the books anymore. And you also get to have that player. So there's, you know, a lot of ways to work around that. But circling all the way back to the original conversation is whether it's a success or not in part, I think there's a lot of successes to speak of so far. I mean, Jordan Addison, if you told me he'd have over 700 yards, I'd be like, bang, hit on that draft pick. He's already there. I mean, he could get to 1,000 yards with a huge end to the season.

That's very impressive to find a guy in the first round. Makai Blackman, this has been a successful draft for them. It's been successful development for them. And I think they proved even more. And this is maybe the biggest victory that they have so far, Manny, especially if they make the playoffs, the trust of the ownership in Kweisi Adafo-Mentz's decision-making, because I think he went out on a ledge a little bit saying to ownership, Hey, these players that you love, and you want to induct into your, you into your ring of honor at some point,

we actually have to move on from them because of their price tag. And if that had gone terribly wrong and they won three games, which you know would drive the Wilfs through the roof, then there might not have been much trust there. But you want the ownership to believe in the football people so the football people can make the decisions for the next quarterback, the guys you got to negotiate hard with, and how you're going to make the decisions for the next quarterback, the guys you got to negotiate hard with and how you're going to approach the rest of the roster. And this was a, oh, that 13 wins. Yeah. Fluky to some extent, but not a complete fluke because these guys were still able to fight

back from all in three, still be able to fight through a quarterback going down and so forth. And that to me has already made this a successful season from the perspective of the big picture long-term. Yeah. And you mentioned some of the individual successes. And I think that's huge. I mean, you talked about Jordan Addison being a terrific first round draft pick and Makai blackman showing strides as a young player as a defensive back i think you know turning turning josh metellus into just this swiss army knife of a defensive player um as a guy who was not drafted high and and not drafted at all i'm actually not not mistaken um metellus' sixth round. Sixth round.

Sixth round pick. So it was, you know, not drafted high. It was not a day one draft pick. And he's turned into, like, a star on this defense, a guy that you envision being a part of this defense for a really long time. That is viewed as a success. I think, you know, showing that you can lose your starting quarterback for the entire season and still remain competitive, even though the last couple of games have not gone well offensively for them. They're still competitive and they're still in the playoff mix, despite, you know, trading for a guy from from the Arizona Cardinals and throwing him in to the mix onto the field

after being with the team for like four days. And he comes in and he finds a way to win a football game for you. I mean, that shows that you can win and have success and that it's okay to move on from Kirk Cousins if you feel like you need to. And I know that sounds like I'm slamming Kirk, but listen, I think that's, you know when Kirk got hurt there was kind of that thought like oh yeah this is going to go down into the toilet they're going to end up you know probably 5 and 12 or something

like that and you know everything's going to fall apart but I think the fact that they have shown that they can win albeit not the most conventional way of winning games. You don't typically want to rely on winning games three to nothing all the time. But the fact that they were able to sort of overcome that overall as a team, I think it shows signs that, you know, even though there are question marks on the roster and, you know, people may have some question marks about, you know, some of the methods of coaching and things like that, that overall this team is in a really good spot going forward. You just have to make the right moves, you know, beyond this season and you can get things turned around really quickly and get yourself into a position where you're competing for Super Bowls, you know, for a number of years. But you got to you got to play your cards right. Clifford says that the 28 million goes away for dead cap hit if he's Kirk Cousins assigned for the end of the league year. It does not go away. It changes and is spread out, but it never disappears. That 28 den cap is dead cap forever.

There is no sweeping it under the cap rug, but you would kick it down the road. And look, how did that work out for you? Kicking it down the road in the Rick Spielman era, all it did was just squeeze them at the end of the day. And I remember going into last year when they were going to try to do the competitive thing and so forth. And one of the issues that I brought up was you still have dead cap from like Anthony Barr and Kyle Rudolph and like guys that have been gone for a couple of years. And that's the problem with pushing money down the road in order for short-term gains. And with Kirk Cousins, they would be doing it again. And the issue here is that if you sign him to a contract,

it's worth $40 million a year, and then he's got seven more dead cap. I mean, then you're pushing $50 million and yeah, are they going to try to front load it for the first year? Well, that's great. You better win the Superbowl in the first year because the second year it's going to be even more, or you're going to translate some of the money but then guess what that goes somewhere else down the road and that's going to be harder to deal with you never escape it that's the thing what you should do with the salary cap and good teams will do this and the Vikings did do this at the right time when it's time to go when it's time to put that championship ring on, you think you can absolutely win the Super Bowl if everything goes your way.

You do whatever it freaking takes. I mean, you move money, you hide it under the carpet, you hide it under the bed, you put it wherever it needs to go, and you take your shot. That's when you have Tom Brady, when you have Drew Brees in their twilight. Take every shot you can. But if you're in this position, why would you do that? And then the other thing is, too, if you take your medicine in that first year with the $28 million, in the second year, it goes completely away. Completely away.

And it's over. And then take this team two years from now and add three players to it. Like, that's how much money that's going to be worth to not have him as the quarterback. So that's, everybody knows that argument anyway. So the headline of the episode, we've been talking for 35 minutes and haven't got to it yet. Sorry for that. Jaron Hall's QB too. Now, Manny, Jaron Hall, people stand up. This is your day.

You've been calling for it for a week and a half for Jaron Hall, people stand up. This is your day. You've been calling for it for a week and a half for Jaron Hall to be, well, a lot of people want him to be the starting quarterback. This shows, I think how disgusted Kevin O'Connell was watching the tape back. So he clearly saw different things than Kurt Warner saw on tape about where Josh Dobbs should have gone with the football and what's, you know, time, you know, throwing it on time, throwing it to the right place in rhythm, whatever, obviously didn't like what he saw. And now he wants another guy who knows the offense in Jaron Hall. Do you think that we see Jaron Hall start another game for the Vikings this year? I do because I think what's ultimately going to happen is I I you know even though they found a way to to win that game in Las Vegas on

Sunday and they're seven and six and they appear to be at least somewhat in a driver's seat to make the playoffs. I just think what's going to happen is these last three games, and who knows what's going to happen on Saturday, but the last three games are just going to be really tough. You've got Detroit twice, and you've got Green Bay coming in here, and I know Green Bay just lost to a bad Giants team, so who knows with them, but you never know when Jordan Love can get hot you know what I mean and all of a sudden he might you know torture defense which has been great all year but you know I I just I'm struggling to see where this team is going to go to the playoffs now you know just

based on what we saw offensively from them on Sunday. I think eventually, as good as this defense has been, and Brian Forrest has just done a remarkable job, at some point you got to kind of wonder. You can't hold teams to just like 10 points every single week. At some point, your defense is going to have a little bit of an off day. I mean, if you're if you're a defense and you give up 17 points that's not a bad day for your defense you know what i mean so what's going to happen if brian forrest's defense gives up 17 points in a game is this offense going

to be able to do enough you know with nick mullins or or whoever a quarterback, to get them into a position to win. I think it's going to be really hard. And I think because of that, there's going to be some losses coming up here. And I think eventually at some point, they're going to be out of that playoff race. And we'll see Jaron Hall starting week 17 or 18 just to kind of get a look at him.

So yes, I do think we will see Jaron Hall start a game this season. So that's interesting. That's probably a more harsh perspective than I was taking on it. I was looking at this final four games is I think they can win too, because the defense is so good. I don't believe that in the NFL every single week, you could just win games with defense.

And we saw that against Chicago, right? If you have a bad offensive day, that even a great defensive performance can be exposed at some point. If you ask your defense to make stop after stop after stop, there will be mistakes. It should be mentioned that the Raiders completely fumbled away a clear opportunity to score a touchdown by not only fumbling, but also holding before that, that, you know, eventually led to them fumbling in a way. But even then they pulled off a big play that set them up there. So they will have to produce points. I don't know what to expect from Nick Mullins. We saw so little, I mean, just a handful of passes, a couple of nice throws,

a couple of throws that could have been intercepted. This guy has not started multiple games in a row since 2020. He was two and six in 2020. And that was not with, you know, the Browns or something that was with, uh, cause he did play a game with the Browns, but that was with San Francisco and you know, the world's best offensive coach in Kyle Shanahan. So that's the last time we have seen Nick Mullins out there playing. So your skepticism, I would say is absolutely reasonable considering his past history as a starting quarterback, five and 12 and 17 games.

Most of his best games came in 2018 when he had sort of just arrived. That go to go along with the starting running back is hurt. The starting right tackle is hurt. Jordan Addison has not played as well. KJ Osborne's having a pretty tough year. I mean, there's, yeah,

there's a lot that's sort of stacked up against them, but can they grind out to with defense? I think that maybe they can, and that essentially puts you in the playoffs. And yet I still think there's a decent chance that Hall starts because everyone's just getting hurt. And Nick Mullins, it's always talked about with pocket quarterbacks as if they don't get hurt.

We see them get hurt all the time because they can't escape. And Nick Mullins is a guy who's already been dealing with a back injury. If he takes a few hits, it's very possible that he won't be able to continue. I mean, he's, he's dealt with that the entire season and it even limited what he could do in practice until like two weeks ago. And that makes it a pretty good chance. And then the other, the other possibility is just that they're in the playoffs already. If you win the next two, you're essentially in, and then week 18 you could play jaron hall and whatever backups you have left on your team but what do we think does does this say because i think it does that

josh jobs just isn't even going to be a minnesota viking next year because that that's what it feels like to me that they decided you know what jaron hall is going to be a minnesota viking lock it in for next year nick mullins who knows he's here to win a couple games right now but the josh jobs thing is completely over over over over now that jaron hall is qb2 yeah i mean i i think i think even just him getting benched on sunday for nick mullins i think pretty much sealed the deal that he was not going to be back. I mean, I it's just crazy to think like how insanely like I we were kind of on with Josh Dobbs, especially after that New Orleans game was like, OK, well, he found a way to win that game in Atlanta. He made some throws and threw the game-winning touchdown pass to Brandon Powell.

And, you know, then he has this great first half against New Orleans. And then, you know, O'Connell kind of takes the foot off the gas a little bit in the second half. But, you know, we saw enough in those two games where it was like, okay. And even in the Denver game, it was like, okay, he got hit pretty hard in that first possession and the fumble. But he hung in there, and they still had a chance to win the game late. okay he got hit pretty hard in that first possession and the fumble and but he kind of but he hung in there and they still had a chance to win the game late and you know so there might

be something here that you know i was talking about him being like possibly the bridge the bridge starting quarterback for 2024 while they develop the young guy that they draft next year uh and now it's like he's the emergency quarterback for Saturday. Like it's just, it's crazy how just a couple of weeks can just change your perspective on, on everything in a situation. I cannot imagine he's going to be on the team next year. And, you know, as, as somebody that, you know, watched Josh Dobbs play a lot of college football at Tennessee and rooting for him and just hoping that he just stays in the league for a long time. I, you know, I just hope that he ends up on another team next year. And even if he's just the backup, that's fine.

You know, I just root for guys like him because he seems like a really good dude. And I think he's talented enough to stay in the league for a while. But it just doesn't seem like this is even like you know scheme wise offensively it just doesn't seem like it's a fit um he just really struggled to move the football the last the last couple of weeks and the turnovers were just too much and so I can't imagine he's going to be on the team next year. And I think even if Kirk cousins is not back, I can see them going the route of, you know, signing some sort of a veteran to maybe even if, even if they don't go the route of taking a quarterback in the first round or

second round or whatever, I kind of see them going in a different direction for whoever is going to start in 2024. Backup quarterbacks will break your heart, man. And there has been a long list of backups, just like Josh Dobbs who had their day. And I was watching something. Remember they used to make these weird random top 10 lists and they would

play them on NFL network. This is before it became this big machine with Tom Pellicero and all their other big, you know, name reporters and so forth. And they would have these like one-off 30 minute shows would be like top 10 biggest busts in football history. Do you remember this stuff? You can still find it on YouTube. And one of them is like top 10 flash in the pan quarterbacks. And when you go through the list,

it's hilarious because they were made like 10 years ago. So they're talking about like Bobby Hoying or whatever. Tim is supposed to be just after Tim Tebow. Dobbs didn't even have a full Tebow type of season. He literally just had two and a half games, but it just shows you that under any era, no matter when you're talking about, there's this guy who

has a moment and he's great and it sort of captivates the fan base and then you go bobby hoeing's not that good sorry philadelphia you're gonna have to keep trying and draft uh donovan mcnabb and boo donovan mcnabb for some reason but that's right like that's what happens it's happened many times remember well remember the year i think it was 2007 when Derek Anderson threw like 29 touchdown passes for the Browns. They won like 10 games. They didn't make the playoffs, but like, like, Oh, Derek Anderson, he's, he's pretty good. And they signed him to like a multi-year deal. And, uh, he was kind of trash after that so yes he was because he was a career backup and that's how it goes uh let me get to my prize picks here for the week and then i'll answer a few more questions and we will get to cincinnati bangles players which we have to discuss as well because this is a great a great franchise to pull up some random players but here is the prize picks for the week manny i want to tell you how uh you to tell me how you feel about these i have nick mullins throwing for more than 199 and a half

yards i have jake browning throwing for less than 239.5 and justin jefferson going for more than 75.5 yards. So Nick Mullins more than 199.5, Jake Browning less than 239.5, and Justin Jefferson with a big day over 75.5 yards. How do we feel about those? Is that bold to you? Is that a good prediction? I like it. I mean, I think, well, nick mullins is going to throw for almost 200 yards and and possibly more than that i mean i would imagine justin jefferson's

probably going to be a big part of that so he was probably have more than 75 yards um and i think the vikings defense will be good enough to to keep jake browning from completely lighting them up you know the way he lit up the the jaguars, and whatnot. So yeah, I like it. Sounds good to me. All right. Well, I'm doing it. PrizePix.com slash purple. They will match up to $100 for your first deposit. We've been playing all year long on here. So it doesn't cost a whole lot. Let's see. This is $20 to win 56 is this particular one so

it just shows you not you don't have to put down tons of money to play prize picks along with us so check that out prizepicks.com with the promo code purple all right a couple things from the comment section before we get to our all-time favorite cincinnati bangles from anthony what is your prediction a quarterback for who we will be drafting? Something tells me it will be Pennix or McCarthy. Just my gut feeling after seeing what we've seen the last few weeks, I have become much more sold on the idea of Michael Pennix and the Vikings. I think he's got the arm to do this.

And Kevin O'Connell wants an arm. He wants anticipation. He wants timing. He wants a dude to stand in that shotgun pocket and wait for those routes to develop and then let that football go loose. And this guy has, I think one of the best arms, probably, you know, of course the top two, but after that, after the top two draft picks, Penix probably has the third best arm and I've been knocking him for his mobility, but that may be a lot less important than the arm talent when it comes to what the Vikings would want.

I don't see McCarthy the same way to me. I just don't see that arm talent. When you look at Michael Penix, have you ever seen a man with bigger hands than Michael Penix? He grew up under power lines. He has the longest arms, the biggest hands. It's like someone put Hakeem Elijah Juan's arms on this man.

And he really throws a heck of a football. The Raiders have 42 points. Oh my gosh. You're kidding me. I just got an Adam Schefter update. Say the Raiders have 42 points. Dude, Brandon Staley might get fired at halftime. He might be fired at halftime.

Are you kidding me? It's 42-0? It's halftime? It's 42-0 at halftime. Yeah, because it looks like they just did a quick right before the locker room interview with him. And I would have loved to have heard that interview from Brandon Staley. It's kind of like, do you remember when, very quickly, do you remember when Alabama played Notre Dame in the national championship game and Alabama was up like 20?

Yeah. Alabama was up like 28 to nothing at halftime. And they did like the right before halftime interview with Brian Kelly. He was coaching Notre Dame at the time. And you could just see the look on his face like, yeah, this is over. This is just, this is not, this is not happening for us tonight. We're just going to come out and just, we're just going to come out and play hard the second half.

And we're just going to try some things, but you could just tell the look on his face like, yeah, this is, this is just not happening tonight. That I mean, I couldn't hear what Brandon Staley was saying, but it looked like he was kind of in that same mindset. Wow. Yeah, I didn't mean to derail the Michael Penix talk, but we'll have plenty of time for that.

Just let me get to a couple of quick comments here. Breck says, Dobbs had a bunch of moments. Wonder if a team will give him a chance one day. I mean, there's been a lot of chances. I mean, he was a member of the Pittsburgh Steelers for a long time. They moved on from him. He was with Cleveland. They moved on from him.

Arizona started him. They moved on from him in a trade for literally nothing. I mean. He's a backup, man. And I say this as a fan of him and somebody that wants to see him do well but he he is a career backup and that's okay like you saw josh mccallan have a decade and a half long career he played for like 10 teams and made a decent amount of money and you know started some games games for teams and played well at times. And, you know,

maybe that's the route that Josh Dobbs goes. I mean, he's 28 years old. He still has a chance to, you know, be in the league for, you know, at least a handful more years, but, you know, this is probably what it's going to be for him. He's just going to bounce around and play for a few more teams and he's probably never going to be a full-time starter again. And nobody in the NFL is going to build their entire franchise around someone who has the type of limitations as a passer that he does. It's just the reality that when you need a 75-mile-an-hour changeup, he gives you a 90-mile-an-hour fastball. And when you need a 95-mile-an-hour fastball to fit in a tight window, he gives you a 90-mile hour fastball. And when you need a 95 mile an hour fastball to fit in a tight window, he gives you a 90 mile an hour fastball.

When you need to paint a corner, he throws it into the stands. And when you need to hit your back foot and release the ball, he hitches up and then throws it too late and, or too high or too, like it's so hard to play quarterback in the NFL because of the precision. And it's just not there. That doesn't mean he can't be good.

But maybe the people in the chat who compared him to like Randall Cunningham a few weeks ago, maybe we're just a little too excited. So I can see why you might hang on to that after you saw him. He did have some very good moments. All right. Before we wrap up for the evening. Oh, that's right. Al Michaels, another Al Michaels game where he's got to be. Okay.

Yeah. I'm going to have to watch a little second half just to listen to Al Michaels. Just make jokes for the entire second half of this game. You made a list of your top five Cincinnati Bengals of all time. Feel free to play along at home in the comment section. It is a franchise. The Vikings only bump into once every so often, but a unique history as a

franchise. Some great moments, some long periods of not great moments. What did you come up with for your favorite Cincinnati Bengals of all time? All right. Number five on my list, and this is a guy that I know you growing up in Buffalo probably remember this guy very well

because he played for the Bills for a little while too is uh have we figured out was it Takeo Spikes or Takeo Spikes I always thought it was Takeo Spikes I think it's Takeo is it Takeo I think it's Takeo yeah okay because I've heard like different uh John Madden would say it different ways and other broadcasters would say it. But either way, Tekeo Spikes is number five on my list. Started out his career with Cincinnati. And he was, in his early days with the Bengals, that man was a tackling machine. He was always among the league leaders in tackles and just a really good, steady, solid player.

And went on to Buffalo and was really good there too. So Tequila Spikes is number five on my list of favorite Bengals of all time. Certainly a great Buffalo Bill, and the longest neck that any man has ever had. The longest and most muscular neck of all time. Hands down. Great player, though. Great player.

Number four is one of my favorite Bengal players from some not-so-good Bengals teams from the 90s, wide receiver Carl Pickens, who you go back and you look at some of his numbers in the 90s, playing with Jeff Blake on those, I think it was, was it Dan Shula? Who was the coach? One of the Shulas was coaching them in like the mid-90s. I don't know if it was Mike or Dan or whichever one,

but one of Don Shula's kids was coaching them. Carl Pickens, really productive wide receiver, had a couple thousand yard seasons. It was like him and Darnay Scott was like the other guy on the other side, Jeff Blake quarterbacking them. Uh, it was a couple of years before I think Corey Dillon came around. Um, but yeah, Carl Pickens number four on my list. And, uh, Tim McGee at tight end as well. They had, they had the pieces. They just never had the quarterback after boomer size.

Uh, number three is, uh, Chad Johnson is uh chad johnson uh really one of the one of the all-time great wide receivers i don't know if he's ever going to get into the hall of fame but you know at his peak with him and tj hushmanzada and uh you know carson palmer and and and those guys uh a lot of fun he was kind of an entertaining guy. He was kind of T.O. light, so to speak, where he had his fancy celebrations as well. I know him and Terrell Owens had become pretty good friends after their playing days were over. Now he's on a couple of nights a week with Shannon Sharp and they just talk football and other topics as well.

Chad Johnson, really good wide receiver for the Bengals in kind of the early to mid 2000s. I would highly suggest his football life documentary. I know I bring those up all the time. I spent one summer watching all of them, and that was one of my favorites. A very interesting guy. And I just always caution sometimes when you think, you know, somebody in the NFL, because he tried to have fun or like did things that were crossing the line that you don't

always, you don't always know the whole story with them. And I thought they covered it really well in the football life documentary, but just as far as a pure football player, insane route runner, absolutely insane. i think if there was a comp for like stefan diggs even though johnson i think was a little bit bigger that's who he reminded me of the just wild detail uh that they were able to you know create separation and and so forth so yeah definitely one of mine to watch play football and number two on my list is cory d Corey Dillon, just a warrior of a running back. And obviously, eventually, he went on to New England and won a Super Bowl with

the Patriots, but just a great, great running back for some of those Bengals teams in the late 90s and into the early 2000s. And was kind of sort of the those really bad Bengals teams of the late 90s. You know, even before Chad Johnson came around, you know, Dick LeBeau had become the head coach. And Dick was a great defensive coordinator for so many years, but just wasn't a great head coach. And they just didn't have enough talent to surround Corey Dillon with. But he was always productive, man. You look at the numbers, they were there. And he had the, at one point, had the record for most rushing yards in a game.

I think it was 277 that we eventually saw Adrian Peterson break and Jamal Lewis as well. But Corey Dillon, great running back, is number two on my list of favorite Bengals of all time. Yeah, I remember listening to that game on the radio that he went for 270. I mean, just and, you know, he actually was one of the few running backs who continued to have a good career onto the New England Patriots where he was pretty solid. But he was the whole team. It kind of it was like a worse version of Barry Sanders because Cincinnati was so bad. They weren't even mildly competitive in the same way that Detroit was with Barry Sanders. It was much worse than that. Did you freeze, Manny, or are you really excited looking at me?

It looks like Manny froze. We went through the whole show. His camera was working just fine until it just froze. Who was number one on Manny's list? Oh no. We're going to have to, I guess I'll give you guys some of mine. If you have any more questions and I'm sure Manny will pop back up. I don't know if I should leave him sitting there. Let's not, let's, let's not leave him sitting there looking weird at us. Uh, sorry about that, but we'll get Manny back in just a second, right before the number one, maybe this is his way of teasing it.

Willie Anderson is one of my favorites ever. Just a great right tackle. Somebody who absolutely belongs in the Hall of Fame. But this was something I wrote about in my book, Football is a Numbers Game, if you guys want to check that out. Hey, look, it's Manny. What a tease. What a tease right before the number one

i i hate technology i really do it just drives me crazy it just drives me crazy but i but anyway i didn't i didn't hear your core i didn't i missed your cory dylan story oh no just about listening to him on the radio when he got that record breaker and how cool that was and uh you know that's where like the announcers are going crazy. Like he's getting closer, he's getting closer, that sort of thing. And I was mentioning Willie Anderson and how in my book, football is a numbers game available on Amazon or anywhere you get your books. So Willie Anderson is a product of the previous generation of offensive linemen

who were only judged on pro bowls and all pros, but PFF has given us the ability to understand exactly how good, or at least by the numbers, which no numbers are perfect, but by their numbers, how good these players are. So if Willie Anderson had those numbers on bad teams where he wasn't getting a lot of attention, he'd be Joe Thomas of that time. He would have like been, that's how everyone knows how good Joe Thomas is. And Andrew Whitworth is the same way. He's going to go to the hall of fame and don't take my word for it. Their offensive line coach, Paul Alexander told me that for the book, he said, PFF is going to get two of my guys into the hall of fame. And that's one of the reasons that I love it. So I was mentioning some other guys uh but i'm not sure if they were on

your list so who is number one on yours number one is pretty easy and it feels like i'm cheating a little bit because he's just like the coolest dude ever and he plays for them now he's not playing right now because he's injured now for the season but joe burrow man like he's number one the guy's just the one of the coolest dudes on the planet he's been um obviously he was a great college quarterback at lsu won the national championship and took this team to the super bowl in just the second year in the league and um just a just a remarkable uh leader and he's really tough. I mean, he was dealing with a calf injury earlier this year, and he was still out there gutting it out and playing,

and then obviously the hand injury, the wrist injury is what ended his season. But just all the intangibles you want. Obviously, he's got the physical skills to the arm talent and all of that stuff, but he's got all the intangible stuff too. And just I think as long as they have him and he's got the physical skills to the arm talent and all of that stuff, but he's got all the intangible stuff too. And, and just, um, I think as long as they have him and he's healthy, they're going to be in the mix in the conversation competing, you know, it's going to be interesting to see how they handle, you know, paying all, paying all the talented wide receivers that they have. But, um,

I think as long as they've got him, that they're going to be in the con in the conversation every year. So Joe Burrow was number one for me. There's a few more that could be thrown out there at the quarterback position. Even Boomer Sison, I think was a cool quarterback back in the day. And Carson Palmer wasn't his fault. What happened with that team? Gino Atkins could go on your list. One of the most dominating players in the middle.

I see James Brooks has entered the chat that I mean who the other guy with the icky shuffle icky woods got all the attention but James Brooks was really the great running back for that team Ken Anderson one of the all-time great what yeah one of the all-time great quarterbacks that probably would have went to well let's see no i mean he went to the super bowl in that year where they beat the chargers in the cold and you know he's not far away from winning the super bowl there and like he's that close and i think it's ken anderson he's not in the hall of fame right like i think he would i don't think so if he wins that super bowl if they

get a stop on defense against the 49ers he's in the hall of fame i'm sure of it um yeah so i mean there's a there's a lot more we just start naming random guys but those were a couple of to bring anthony munio oh yeah i thought about two great great offensive linemen yeah yep for sure and uh gosh there was one more i was uh scrolling on their all-time list trying to find because they had oh brian simmons was another guy a linebacker had like a big neck roll he was another guy that i think you know they had uh a few guys that just sort of went completely under the radar uh because of those bad teams like on their defensive side and everything else and clifford brings up chris collinsworth speaking of my book i interviewed chris collinsworth for it's about him owning pff so football is a numbers game go to amazon i'm

just saying it's a good present you can get it there for your uh football loving family member before christmas if you want so anyway well who do you think's gonna win manny i'm gonna take the bengals i think i think jake browning's playing really well i don't think he's gonna light up the vikings defense because i think it's good enough to kind of slow him down a little bit i just wonder if the vikings are gonna have enough offensively i know they're gonna have justin jefferson you know back and and everything but i think it's just gonna be really hard for them to move the football i don't think they're gonna have enough offensively and And I think the Bengals are just kind of a better, better overall team. Even, you know, I mean, they're playing a backup as well, but they've got,

you know, they've got Jamar chase and they've got, you know, T Higgins and some of those other guys too. So I'm going to take Cincinnati in a close game. I think it'll be close, but I'll take the Bengals to win. I think that's a very reasonable pick. I'm taking the Vikings, but i don't know when backups play it's hard enough when starters play to pick these games when backups play man only the football gods know what will uh happen i mean look at look at this week like 42 points and a half for the raiders who just got shut out. What does it like? Nothing makes sense.

Nothing makes sense. So I have no idea, but I think the Vikings are going to win like some sort of gross 1714 type of grind it out. They intercept Jake Browning for a pick six at some point or something, but I don't think it's going to be a barn burner, but it might be anyway. Well, we'll talk next week. Great stuff, Manny, as always.

And thank you all for watching slash listening slash participating. And all of you whose cameras didn't freeze while you were watching. Congratulations. No, I'm just kidding, Manny. But we'll yeah, we'll talk again next Monday. And thanks, everybody, for coming on board.