Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - What will happen with Anthony Barr? What should the Vikings want from their quarterback? Plus fun Super Bowl props

Episode Date: February 3, 2021

For this week's Tuesday Morning Left Guard, Matthew Coller and former Viking Jeremiah Sirles talk all things related to any Kirk Cousins trade, why Anthony Barr is viewed as being extremely valuable by Mike Zimmer, how offensive linemen view a good quarterback and what's the biggest thing to watch in the Super Bowl. Plus, will a fat man score a TD? Will there be a trick play? Will Mahomes win Super Bowl MVP? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Get Coors Light in the new look delivered straight to your door with Drizzly or Instacart, Coors Brewing Company, Golden, Colorado, and as always, celebrate. Welcome to another episode of Purple Insider, brought to you by Scout Logistics. Matthew Collar here. It is Tuesday morning left guard here with former Minnesota Viking Jeremiah Searles, who cannot stay still in his seat. He's so jacked up for the Super Bowl. And also, who knew the offseason would start early, Jeremiah?

I mean, usually it's like we wait for the Super Bowl. This is normally the most boring week of the year, and yet with all the conjecture and an actual mega trade, it's not. It's not the most boring year. This has been very exciting, actually. Oh, yeah, and I think that it's like everyone's just, it's like a hurry-up hurry up and wait game right now. Everyone's kind of like hurrying up for no reason and then throw stuff out to the media.

Let's run with it. Let's look at it. And then Detroit just was like, screw it. Let's just do it now and see what happens. And now I feel like every other team's like panicking a little bit. Like, should we wait? Should we do it now? Are we behind the eight ball? Because everyone's just looking for that little bit of advantage, right?

That little bit of edge. But I feel like now the Vikings are like, well, maybe we should do something. Like Detroit did something, so is it our turn? And every team across the league besides the Bills and the Bucs are thinking that exact same thing right now. I may have mentioned this. I'm not sure if I did on the show or if it was on a radio hit or something. But a commenter on the website said, hey, if your neighbor sells his house for one hundred thousand more than you would have expected, you're going to call your realtor just to see.

Right. And I think the same thing goes for the Vikings situation. But I can't figure out like which team the Vikings are in that trade are the Vikings closer to the Rams that have to kind of pin an extra bit of value with the trade to take the contract or are they the ones that have the quarterback that people think is really good that someone else is giving you two first round picks for I can't figure out who they're supposed to be and the same thing goes for rumors for Jimmy Garoppolo Garoppolo's contract is so much better than Kirk Cousins in terms of when you can get out of it that it's odd to me to see people saying, oh, the 49ers will give a first-round pick and Jimmy G to the Vikings for Kirk Cousins.

I'm just not seeing the value there for the 49ers. Yeah, and I think a lot of it, too. People, I think, also underestimate it too people I think also underestimate like Matt Stafford was doing Mahomes things before Mahomes was Mahomes the problem was he was stuck in Detroit and like he wasn't on a big stage and I mean and I have good buddies actually I just went hunting with in South Dakota this year this weekend that are from Detroit and they're like dude we're the ultimate talent wasters of all time like yes we get these studs up there and then just piss their careers down the drain and so i think that people really undervalue what matt stafford is and what he can

do now can he still do all those crazy things that mahomes does no but is he still better than jared goff absolutely in my opinion i look okay let's compare the contrast now jimmy g with kirk cousins and i've seen everything all over social media and I was talking about how great Kirk Cousins so I think San Fran has like some friends on the Instagram world that are like plug in how great Kirk is to try and blow them up a little bit yeah because they're like fourth quarter passer rating red zone passer rating it's like yeah numbers stats all that's great but if you just watch every single game from this year Kirk is an absolutely roller coaster like he's not the

definition of steady he's not the definition of true calm poise in the pocket delivers the football on time like he's a roller coaster of elite and just like what are we doing and everything in between so I think that you kind of nailed it there that if the Vikings want to move Kirk Cousins it's not the other way around it's not someone's going to come try and take Kirk Cousins from the Vikings. They have to work to move Kirk Cousins based off of what his contract looks like and what he thinks or what people deem his skill set would be. Right. And that's a great point about the roller coaster. And I think that's where sometimes those box score stats can be really, really misleading when you look at just touchdowns, interceptions, passer rating,

and then you go through. This year, Cousins finished with a higher passer rating than Tom Brady. Does anyone think Kirk Cousins was better than Tom Brady this year? No. PFF had Brady, I think, as their second-best quarterback this year. But that's how those stats can be misleading and especially on winning teams sometimes the philosophy will be to get ahead with the pass and then finish the game with the run so you'll see less passing

yardage sometimes not all the time depends on who it is like the bills when they were up they were still passing but bruce arians is a little old school in this way, so they get Leonard Fournette to run the ball, and yet, you know, in the first half, Brady is throwing, you know, way more than Kirk Cousins to get his team ahead, and is way more consistent, as you mentioned, from week to week, and this has always been a Kirk Cousins issue. When he plays a bad team, he beats the ever-loving heck out of them. And then when he plays a top 10 defense, I believe he still has zero wins as a Viking against top 10 defenses. So, I mean, that's kind of Kirk Cousins for you. And I think that the league looks a lot more at skill sets and things like that than they do the box score statistics. And then they have usually

analytics groups. So I wanted to ask you about this, the quarterback position from an offensive lineman's eye. Because in media, we're always trying to pick apart every statistic and things like that, look at the different skill sets, look at the character, the leadership, all those types of things. But as someone who has worked with many a quarterback give me your like what makes a great quarterback that you want to play with from an offensive lineman's perspective yeah I think for me the biggest thing is like again my range I think I've talked about on the show I've ranged from 14-15 year veterans to rookie quarterbacks right and everything in between from Case Keenum

being a backup to a starter Teddy Bridgewater in his second year, Josh Allen as a rookie, Cam Newton as a vet. I mean, I've seen it all. So, I mean, if I could say, okay, you want to play for a quarterback that, first of all, he knows what's going on on every single snap. And, I mean, I'm talking about run game, pass game, defense. He understands and he is in full control because you can't win in this league if you don't have an elite quarterback it's just very simple so that's where it all starts is the mental game of it and then as you move forward to okay physical traits the biggest thing for me is is your

quarterback getting the football out on time and that's a selfish thing as an offensive lineman right that uh hey that ball needs to be gone in 2.5 seconds dude or else this werewolf across from me is gonna be breathing down your neck because i can only keep him off for so long and i think that that's a big thing that you see rogers mahomes um well mahomes kind of when he's on rhythm or when he makes crazy things happen but you want to talk about like the old school elites right drew breeze ben roethlisberger tom Tom Brady, those type of guys, Phillip Rivers, get the ball out on time because it's such a timing thing. Whereas younger quarterbacks, when I was with Josh or when I was even with Cam and Teddy, sometimes still have that little bit of college in them of,

okay, I can hold on for one more window or I can make something happen with my feet and squeeze it in there. And eventually you grow out of that. But I think that that's one thing that as I watch Kirk is it's like he he still sometimes tries to make one more thing happen or something so for me it's about getting the ball out on time and then finally you have to trust the guy um sometimes you can be like I mean I know for me when I got to uh Carolina I felt like Cam Newton was kind of intimidating right to go talk to you you're talking about an icon in the NFL a guy I watched at college and now I'm in

the locker room with and he's very approachable and I know some guys that talk about certain quarterbacks that just aren't very approachable or I mean even the stories when Brett Favre came to Minnesota and he wasn't like hanging in the locker room with the guys or whatever it might be but your quarterback needs to be approachable by a rookie or a five-year vet or a 10-year vet because he really is the gel that keeps everything together on the offensive side of the football so really those three things a guy that is incredibly smart and understands everything that's going on all the time a quarterback in the passing game that's going to get the ball out in rhythm on time and then the third thing he's just a dude like he's just a dude he's

another one of the guys you don't put him on a pedestal he doesn't put himself on a pedestal like he just is one of the dudes and the guys that you can go to as a teammate as a brother and know that he's going to be there not big time you and this is uh some of these things as you're talking it's like well there are some boxes that kirk cousins. I mean, he knows what's going on in every single play. He knows how to operate an offense. You don't see, and this is what I used to love to watch Gruden's quarterback camps because he would point stuff like get this out on tape and then I'd start to look for it. But I remember when he was doing one with Brock Osweiler where he was like,

that running back, there's no way on that concept he was supposed to go there. Did you say something to him? And he's like, oh, I didn't notice or whatever. And I'm like, really? Because that on that concept he was supposed to go there did you say something to him and he's like oh i didn't notice or whatever like really because that's not where he was supposed to be and you just kind of shrug your shoulders you know like that you know when you look at it on tape or when you're watching the game you don't see anybody sort of discombobulated they know the play they know where they're supposed to be and he's going to get to the right reads the problem is always if the read isn't there he does exactly what you describe pat the football hang on that extra second take the strip

sack I think somebody sent me the stat that he has like 15 more fumbles over the last three years than Matt Stafford like that's a lot that's like you know I mean one every other or every three games um you know more fumbles than the next best quarterback. So there's, I think with Cousins, he falls into the category of a guy with a lot of strengths and a lot of weaknesses, and he is paid like a guy with no weaknesses. And that's where you run into, if you're trading him, you're not trading him because he's trash. You're trading him because his contract doesn't match up

with what he can actually bring you versus your other contracts and how you're supposed to fit all of these pieces together. If they had a team full of rookie contracts like 2017, they would actually be able to do this. But, you know, that's where they don't have that. Harrison Smith makes money. Daniil Hunter, if they want to bring him back. Anthony Barr, if they want to bring him back.

Eric Hendricks, Delvin Cook, Adam Phelan, like all these guys, and Brian O'Neill's going to have to make money. That's where it becomes difficult, and that's where the case for trading him comes in, I think. Yeah, absolutely. And it has nothing, we're not sitting here saying like, oh man, you know, Kirk Cousins, Ben DiNucci, one and the same, right? Like, we're not saying that, but there is something to be said of you have to play up to your contract level

because if you don't, you're really hurting the team both on the field and off the field financially and not being able to put pieces around you to elevate you to where you need to go. And so I think a lot of times people are like, oh, the cousin trade chain, like you're just dogging on them. It's like you've got to look at it from a wider lens. Like you've got to put a bigger lens on it and look at it from a business side, like Spielman and company up there looking, going caps, going down.

We got issues. We can't score without Dalvin handed Dalvin cook the ball 400 times. He's a running back. That's going to be Todd Gurley in three years. If we keep doing this to him. And so, okay, we have a quarterback that we're paying to throw the ball like Josh Allen and throw it a billion times a game,

but he's not doing that. You've got to meet in the middle somewhere. You've got to compromise somewhere. And if that means you've got to trade that quarterback and say, you know what, we're going to ride Dalvin Cook for the next three and a half years with a middle-of-the-road quarterback that we're not paying a gaudy amount of money to and we're going to rebuild or draft and try and develop in that regard. Fine.

But it's got, it's just, you have to match everything up together right now. And it feels like there's a lot of square pay ground holes for this Vikings team right now. And the other part of it is maybe, and I don't know this, if you're in the front office or you're in the coaching staff,

at some point you have to say, it's kind of on the quarterback whether we win or not, and we haven't won. One playoff game, it was a great game. I was there. It was one of my favorite things I've ever covered in New Orleans. It was incredible, but it's one game as a sixth seed, and that's all you've won since you've been here, and I know that this is like a big debate with analytics people and things like that about quarterbacks and winning. But I mean, a three year sample with good teams,

especially the first two years with top five defenses, he had good teams in Washington. Like eventually you get to a point where you go, okay, I mean, how big is the sample size need to be? And how many times do we have to say, well,

they didn't have this this year, so you can't win. I mean, how many times does it ever go perfect across the board? And if you need that to happen, that's tough to happen with him. The problem, though, is, Jeremiah, if you move on and it's not a trade for Jimmy G, because San Francisco says, sorry, we're not going to trade, you know, Jimmy G for Jimmy G who's more expensive. If that's not it, then what is? I mean, that's the problem that I run into.

Like, I'm sure Indianapolis and a team that's in a position to win, I'm sure they'd be like, yeah, here's a second round pick or something for Kirk Cousins. But then what? Do you, I mean, are you supposed to play gardner minshu next year i mean that that's where it gets very very tricky is not having an answer there at all yeah it's not like they're the packers where they have jordan love a first round pick sitting there right we're ready to take the reins whenever rogers passes on like we got we don't have an established veteran, an established young guy that we're developing to turn into a good football player. And I think that that's where it does have to start is you've got to start looking two, three years in the future now whether Kirk Cousins is here or he's not.

And whether that means you draft a quarterback early in the first or the second, probably not the first, you're going to draft an old lineman, and you go into the second and you draft a quarterback and say, okay, whether we move on from Kirk or not, this guy's the future of our program. This guy's the future of our franchise. And you've got to start developing him. And, I mean, I think the Packers said it perfectly. We believe in sitting guys so that they can develop. And you see guys like, I mean, Josh Allen was not good his first two years,

but he was great his third year. So you can play the long game and take your lumps early, but when you're with a staff like Minnesota, you don't have time to take those lumps. If you're Mike Zimmerman, you're like, we can't have 6-10 seasons like they did in Buffalo. Where Sean McDermott, he's a new coach, he's like, we can have 6-10 seasons with a young quarterback and build our way up.

It seems like Minnesota's kind of just last-ditch effort here. We need to win and win now. And I think it has to start in the draft. You can go pay a middle-of-the-road quarterback, a Case Keenum-ish type guy, for a year, draft a guy, develop him, and then kind of turn the keys over to the car to him. I think that's really your only option here. Hey, I want to take a second to tell you about our friends at Scout Logistics.

And I really mean it when I say friends. They are fans of Purple Insider over at Scout Logistics, and they reached out wanting to support this show. And I want to tell you about what they do. Scout Logistics is just-in-time transportation for perishable, non-perishable, and fragile freight from source to door. And if you're wondering what that means exactly, well, if you own or work for a company that needs shipping solutions, they're the preferred carrier of Fortune 500 companies across North America, and we have quite a few of those in

Minnesota, right? They can ship perishable, non-perishable, oversized, or fragile goods, and they have on-time delivery rate of over 99%. So, if you're like them, and you enjoy the show, and you have shipping needs, check out ScoutLogistics.com, or call 855-217-2688, extension 232, to connect with them directly to find out how Scout Logistics can minimize risk, overperform, and go the extra mile for your company. Yeah, and so my guess has been and will remain that they stay the course and they try to win in 2021. And if it doesn't happen, then they're probably drafting a quarterback, and there's a decent possibility we're talking about new people in key positions, unless it's one of those middle years. If it's 10-6 and you're in the playoffs and you're competitive, then maybe we don't see a coaching change or a general manager change. But I still think that would be set up for the quarterback draft pick for next year as opposed to this year. I want to switch gears on you because I wrote about the linebackers for the

website and I would love you to explain what Mike Zimmer means about Anthony Barr when he says that Barr brings so much more value than the statistics capture. And I, I mean, I generally agree that, you know, a PFF grade for a linebacker does not tell the entire story, you know, because it doesn't tell, you know, always how a guy is filling a gap or something like that. It's usually plays that he's involved with that are going to make that difference. And linebackers, they just got it rough, man. I mean, play actions are sending them every which way, spinning them in circles all game long.

Guards are running out and hitting them and all that sort of stuff. But I'd love you to explain kind of the value that we can't put our finger on with someone like Anthony Barr. Yeah. So the value that that guy brings is the fact that one, his versatility. He can do so many different things. I mean, the guy in college, I blocked him at UCLA when he was an outside backer and he was pass rushing, right? You get him into the NFL now and he can range as a big guy that can also rush. He can range out on the edge and cover the bubble screens and cover those things. And also, I mean, he can run with some of the best receivers in the business. Now he can run with Cooper Cup, and I know everyone's like,

oh, no one can run stride for stride one-on-one with cooper cup besides maybe a few guys in the league right and but what he brings is he is a guy that teams have to pay attention to and you talk about teams with great linebackers seattle and bobby wagner indianapolis with leonard right like your game plan around those guys you're spending time during the week saying, hey, we have to know where 55 is. We have to know if he lines up here, we can't have a running back pick him up in protection. We have to slide the offensive line and have an offensive lineman on this guy. When normally when he's not out there, it's like, okay, hey, Eric Wilson's out there or pick one of the gloveless guy. Hey, gloveless guy's out there.

You can just go running back. We can keep our protections normal you can go block that guy right well you can't do that with an anthony barker he'll run right over a linebacker and he'll destroy you in a run game it's like hey fullback lead do we want to lead him up on anthony bar or do we want to lead him up on eric wilson right so we'll swift it and maybe it's not as desirable look but you just know you have to run away from him on certain things or you have to scheme blitzes away from him because he creates mismatches. And you hear so many times about mismatches like tight end for safety.

Anthony Barr's a mismatch of a tight end versus – or a running back versus him, a fullback versus him, I mean a receiver trying to block him and a bubble screen type guy. Like he can create so many matchup problems just off of his size and athleticism that, yeah, he might not be making 50 tackles a game, but he might be preventing big plays based off of the fact that he's out there versus not being out there. Right, and I think one of the things, too, is that everybody loves to throw to their running backs now, and he is usually very good.

You mentioned that that was a nightmare game in Los Angeles, the one night where Everyone had a nightmare game in los angeles the one night where everyone had a nightmare right yeah they they gave up a perfect passer rating i believe to jared goff um that night and so right now detroit lion most yeah right yeah wow he i mean the first it's funny the first time that he played against the vikings he was awful and then the second time you know he was fantastic so we'll see what he does if he can bite any viking kneecaps um well he's in detroit i guess we'll find out but to your point you see running backs come out of the backfield and bar is so much larger than them and yet is also fast so he's able to stay with them and guys who are you know tight ends running down the seam where he can run with them, and his length makes it difficult.

And what I love watching on tape is when they run crossers, and he robots around and runs back, and you're just like, wow. I mean, normally those crossers are wide open, but he's right there recognizing route combinations and things like that. And it's sort of like corners where sometimes it's the passes that don't get thrown that matter the most and that makes a difference with Anthony Barr now is it worth a 15 million dollar cap hit that's the difficult thing and Mike Zimmer thinks the answer is yes but will the front office think

the answer is yes with so many other issues to fill and I think I just to add on I think we did find out this year that bar the difference between him and Eric Wilson is quite a bit with him and Wilson. But is it $15 million worth is the question they're going to be asking themselves. I think it is. And I think that the reason it is, is you, if you really truly believe in building your team around defense, which I know Zimmer does, and you know, Spielman has bought into that well, then you've got to keep that defense together and then plug and play on offense. Until you get a new regime in there that wants to change that philosophy, you've got to stand on that philosophy. Because if you start thinking, okay, we're going to pull from our

defense and then kind of plug into the offense a little bit, then you're just a team with no identity and you really are just nothing, right? You're the Cleveland Browns of the 2000s era, right? You're just – you don't really know what to do. Now, I think that if you say, okay, where are our strengths? Well, our strengths are our linebacking core and Eric Wilson and Anthony – or not, excuse me, Eric Hendricks and Anthony Barr, right? Let's keep that together, plug and play, see what else we can do. But I don't think you can go to Anthony and be like, hey,

you want to take a pay cut? I know you took a pay cut to not go to the Jets, but you want to take another one to stay here? I don't know if you could do that. Now, maybe you can. Maybe Anthony's like, hey, you know what? I didn't play this year. I got enough money in the bank.

I want to stay here with my boys and do my thing. That's absolutely a possibility. But I think he's worth every penny. If I'm game planning and I'm looking at this defense, I'm going, yeah, you keep the stars. You've got to keep the stars on the team, and Ante Bar is a star on that defense. Yeah, and Mike Zimmer is not looking to have more places to fill on a defense that was already 29th.

And this really pins them into a tough spot with the salary cap, though, because you can convert some whatever it is, bonus to base salary to bonus. You could do something like that. But that only creates so much, and it costs you a lot of cash. And I wonder about ownership in the purse strings because in the past, they have just been, like, throwing out money to everybody who had their hand out. And, you know, that's great. I mean, that's a great sign for you have a good ownership is they're able to keep players and they're able to convert this to that.

That's going to cost them a little more money. But there were no fans in the stands all of last year. And I wonder if that changes the formula for them when they budget for these things. So that will be an interesting decision to see how they go about it, but I think that if you're putting odds on it, by far, you would say that Anthony Barr ends up staying in Minnesota Vikings. So let's talk about the Super Bowl. The other thing going on this week in football, other than trade rumors, the Super Bowl.

I know that I mentioned this to you before, that I love this matchup. But what is the game within the game that you love the most? The position versus position, the matchup, this player versus that player, that goes beyond the obvious, like, you know, Mahomes versus Brady is the thing on the marquee. Yeah, and Vikings, you're going to recognize this name. It's going to be Mike Remmers versus Jason Pierre-Paul and Shaq Barrett. And Andrew Wiley, who my guess, if I'm a guessing man, is going to move to right tackle while Mike Remmers moves to left

because Eric Fisher out with the Achilles, is going to be Andrew Wiley versus Shaq Barrett and Jason Pierre-Paul, right? I mean, these are two premier edge rushers now that have a lot of sacks under their belts, paid a lot of money. And don't forget, you've got a backup guard if you move Wiley out there going against Ndamukong Su in the middle there. So this offensive line for the Chiefs versus this really stout defensive line of rushing

the passer for the Buccaneers is something obviously I'm going to watch. But as people ask me, like, you think the Chiefs can pull it off? I was like, I'd feel a lot more confident if they had their starting left tackle in there. Like a lot more. I mean, and shoot, Mitchell Swartz, who's been out pretty much the entire year, is an all-pro right tackle. And so they've been able to win without him, but now that wins in testament to our guy Mike Remmers stepping in there.

But can you now do it without both your starting tackles on the biggest stage of all time? That's going gonna be a game and then the other one is I mean the last time you guys played Tyreek Hill had like 40 fantasy points in the first quarter so what is your game plan to stop him and not allow him to run rampant all over you as well where I am most interested is that the Bucs I think dare you to throw down the field against them which is a little different from how everyone else has played the Chiefs. Everyone else plays the Chiefs of like, let's create a little umbrella and you can throw underneath, and that doesn't work because Travis Kelsey

and Tyreek Hill just run with the ball after catch, and they'll run reverses and do all sorts of stuff like they did against Buffalo. But if you dare them to throw it deep, you're hoping to sack Mahomes, which is really tough. You're hoping to sack Mahomes which is really tough you're hoping to pressure Mahomes which is really tough and then you're also kind of betting against Tyreek Hill getting a 50 yard catch against you which he usually does if you make that bet and that's the thing about quarterbacks and offensive line and how I just view the offensive line and their success and their performance as partly the quarterback because all year Mahomes has had just this rotating cast of offensive linemen

Mitchell Schwartz is out the whole year different guys are hurt going on COVID lists all sorts of things and yet he's never getting sacked still and it just sort of speaks to when mistakes are made or when guys get beat up front by the werewolves as you mentioned he makes up for it he can move around or he's getting the ball out quick I mean a lot of times they run a little flat route and then get 15 yards from Tyreek Hill and it's like you know Andy Reid is understanding also some of the shortcomings that they have so I think they'll figure out ways to make up for it yeah I think they will I think they'll find ways to make up for it and then I think the other piece you got to flip it around and look at

Tom Brady is the opposite of that right he stands like a statue inside there so you're like okay how is Chris Jones going to affect this game with I mean you got Ali Marpet you got Ryan Jensen in the middle there you've got I mean you've got to think okay they're going to slide to Chris Jones so who's going to show up on the other side to really make a big impact? Who's going to be the guy coming off the edge that's really going to make the play of the game? Because Tom Brady, as good as he is at getting the ball out, if you kind of Kirk Cousins get in his face a little bit,

he's made poor decisions this year at times. And he hasn't as of late, but, I mean, you go back and watch the Kansas City game, the Kansas City-Tampa Bay from earlier this year. I mean, Chris Jones had his health a day. He got back there. He got in Brady's face a lot. So that's another one is, is Chris Jones going to match up well? And what are they going to do to not take away Brady's answers, right?

Brady has answers for everything as far as if you're going to blitz him or not. I think a big one is they got to take away the quick running back pass game. Like, take away Ronald Tompkins, Leonard Fournette. Like don't let them get involved in the pass game so that it forces Brady to push it downfield instead of having that outlet of like, hey, let's drop it at six yards, let's drop it at four yards and run with it, and now we're looking at second and six versus second and nine or second and ten, right? I think that that's something that the game plan-wise they're going to do,

and then obviously Honey Badger is going to make an impact some way, shape, or form. Yeah, and I loved that Bill Barnwell had a thread of where he just showed different things with the dots that Kansas City was doing. And I love the dots, man. The dots really show you kind of exactly what the defensive coordinator wanted to happen there and where guys were, and you could see coverage is easier. So it'll be Steve Spagnuolo versus Tom Brady. Spagnuolo leads that battle 1-0 back with the Giants over Brady. So I'll be interested to see how that plays out. I want to give you some sort of bets here on the Super Bowl,

and you can tell me what you think. Would you take Patrick Mahomes as MVP or everyone else? Oh, man, I'm going to go everyone else because I think Tom Brady is going to get it. Really? You think that Tampa Bay is going to win? I do. I can't bet against Brady, dude. I'm sorry.

I've done it before and it's burnt me in the butt. I can't. I don't know. There's just something about Brady in the Super Bowl that you're just like, yeah, you kind of got to do it. So, yeah, I'm taking everybody else. Want to remind you about our friends at Soda Stick. If you use the promo code PURPLEINSIDER,

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That's SodaStick.com S-O-T-A-S-T-I-C-K .com. Original Minnesota sports inspired goods. Code Purple Insider for free shipping. Okay, interesting. I think I would take Mahomes because I still feel like Kansas City

is just too strong with Mahomes and their playmakers and no matter what the Bucks can do with their defensive line he's going to find a way uh so I would take Mahomes on this would you take over under 325 yards passing for Patrick Mahomes over I think so too why run it's Bowl. Why? Why change what you're doing, right? Right. Just sling it around the yard. You're going to give it to Le'Veon Bell and whatever is left of him? No, I don't.

Yeah, I don't think so. Sling it around the yard there, Patty. We're on the same page. Now, will there be a trick play in the Super Bowl over under.5 trick plays in the Super Bowl? Over. Think so? I think we see a flea flicker from Tampa. I think Brady kind of likes the flea flicker.

Is the flea flicker a trick play? Absolutely a flea flicker is a trick play. Okay, okay. If anyone on listening this thinks the flea flicker is not a trick play, please tweet me and tell me because it is 1 billion percent a trick play. Now, reverse is not a trick play. Now, a flea flicker is. But I think that I think that Kansas City might have like a throwback, like Mahomes spits it out to Hardman or Travis Kelsey on a bubble who then spits it back to him and then hits Tyreek deep down the field.

So I'm saying we see a flea flicker from Tampa and a throwback pass from Kansas City. I could see that. You think there's two. Okay. How about this? Would you put odds if I weighted it heavily? And I don't understand entirely how gambling works. But if I weighted this heavily, let's say like 10 to 1, would you take a fat man touchdown?

No. In any way. I mean, it could be a recovery of a fumble. It could be a throw to an offensive lineman no fat man touchdown no no fat man touchdowns no it's there you don't call those plays in the super bowl there's just too much to go wrong i have discovered by the way that you can bet on punters with touchbacks in the uh can you really You can actually bet. You can bet anything. Okay, what color are you calling the Gatorades?

Oh, good question. I'll go orange. Orange? I'm going to go with red. You're going to go with red? I'm going to go with red. I mean, I feel like lime yellow would be the favorite here. It's a possibility.

Yeah, right. But if we pick the favorite, then what's the point? If we pick the favorite, then what's the point? That's great. All right. But if we pick the favorite, then what's the point? If we pick the favorite, then what's the point? That's great. All right. Love to see it, hate to see it. I love to see it that Mike Remmers is starting in the Super Bowl. Again.

I mean, again, to be honest, because, A, Mike Remmers is a pretty cool guy. I mean, I don't know if – I mean, you played with him. Yeah, love Remmer's a pretty cool guy. I mean, I don't know if, I mean, you played with him. I love Remmer. I feel like he was underappreciated in 2017 and kind of screwed over for having to move to guard in the playoffs there. And also having to move to guard just in general the next year in 2018. And this is a classic thing that we complain about. But just like, oh, yeah, just go play a different position, man, even though you're a solid player at your position. And so I enjoyed covering him. He always, I think, was popular in the locker room.

So I'm like, hey, you know, former Viking, there you go, in the Super Bowl. Love to see it. I love to see it, the classic Tom Brady just showering praise over Mahomes, right? Just like he can do so many things. And you know deep inside he's like, I'm going to kill him. I'm like, I want him dead. Right? You know, like the killer competitiveness of Brady is not, I mean,

you can't match it, but he knows exactly how to play the game of like, I'm not giving him any more fuel than he needs. He's going to like, and you just see every interview is just Tom, like he's just amazing he just he can do so he's got that arm like i used to have right you know he just does all those things i think it's incredible watching tom brady play the game knowing the ultimate competitor in him is just like i hate you i hate you i hate you i hate you hate to see it this doesn't have to be super bowl for hate to see it hate to see um just like executives and coaches being so full of it in their press

conferences post-season so uh the general manager of the Packers like I strongly deny that anyone called about Aaron Rodgers like sure you do bro I mean just like why do you insult your fan base when Sam Farmer of the LA Times one. Times, one of the legendary football writers out there, reports that the Rams called on Aaron Rodgers and their general manager gets out there and just insults everyone who's listening. I mean, why wouldn't you say, look, I mean, people call about players all the time and I don't want to go through every single one with you guys. That's easy. But instead he's got to say no no one called

about rogers like come on i mean everybody's smart enough to know that after rogers you know post game at the end of the season that they would get phone calls of course to see if you're going to trade aaron rogers of course you would you'd get you should get like 15 teams calling to see if you're going to move aaron rogers. And the other one is the Texans. I mean, calling Deshaun Watson the player and that, you know, just, I mean, what are you guys doing? And the low key, the one that was really overlooked is their new coach went on a mini rant about how he refused to call Marquise Brown Hollywood because he's got to get a ring before I'll

call him Hollywood or something. I'm like, what? Oh, you're that guy? You're like the old uncle guys? I'm not calling you Hollywood. That's for champions. Like, what are they doing? What are we doing over there?

I saw stats like David Culley's been on, like, the three worst passing, like, coordinating teams the last three years. And now it's like that should make Deshaun Watson want to stay right yes so my hate it is my guy Nick Sirianni um his introductory press conference for the Eagles was just as a person who prides himself a little bit on being able to speak in public or just being coherent in public I cringed so hard watching him try and fumble through a written statement. Like it wasn't off the cuff. It wasn't speaking from the heart. He had note cards and just, we're going to be smarter.

We're going to be really smart and we're going to not make mistakes and we're going to be smarter than the other team. And I was just like, this is brutal, dude. He's a great guy. I think he's a great guy i think he's gonna be a good head coach but you just you can't do that like you just can't do that and then my last my last hate to see it and this is i know maybe getting a little personal like what that guy i'm not gonna say his name the offensive line in seattle did to his girlfriend is absolutely

unspeakable it is something that if i was on his team I would have drove to his house and whooped his ass and he should deserve everything that's coming to him because that is just absolutely unacceptable to do at any situation at any time and that really stuck with me I mean I'm having my first daughter coming in March and I don't know why if that's maybe what made me more angry about it or not but I have been fired up about that all week because that stuff is just absolutely ridiculous to happen. Yeah. Horrifying details of that.

And this is the thing. A few years ago after Ray Rice, the NFL was like, we're going to be really vigilant when it comes to this issue of domestic violence. And then just like everything else with the NFL, it just kind of goes away. Right.

And he was like, let's do enough to make it look like we're doing something for now until everybody forgets about it. Let's write end racism in the end zone. Right? Like, let's, I mean, does that do anything at all? No. Just like having Eli Manning in a PSA saying, please don't hit your girlfriend.

Like, okay. I mean, great. Are we actually doing something here? Are we actually, you know, trying to educate players on these things? Are we actually making it so, you know, the punishments are severe? Not really. And, you know, Kareem Hunt, he's back in the league, and everybody just forgot about it and moved on.

And it's very frustrating. I mean, this one, of course, this guy won't play in the league again, I'm sure. But if he was a little better, would he? Right, and that's the question is you can't let this stuff continue to sweep under the rug. And I know I'm on my soapbox here a little bit, but it's just something that has to be said is this stuff has to stop. It has to stop from everyone, not just professional football players. But if you are in the limelight like this, you deserve to have the extra punishment that is dished out to you. And I also think that it's on not just the league, but teams individually, right, to say we don't want people like this playing for us.

Hey, Tampa Bay, Antonio Brown, they bring him back and he, you know, not to this severity, but did some things himself that, you know, should have probably left him out of the league. Anyway, so great stuff from you, as always, Jeremiah. I feel like that was like a downer note to end on. I know, sorry, but it had to be talked about. Yeah, maybe we should do hate to see it first, then love to see it. Let's do that. Let's do that.

But, hey, all season long, it has been amazing to work with you. And I was figuring we would do a Super Bowl breakdown next week, and that would kind of be our last show. But I did want to say, like, it's just been amazing to work with you. And I was figuring we would do a Super Bowl breakdown next week, and that would kind of be our last show. But I did want to say, like, it's just been amazing to get your insight. Each week I get emails and notes from people saying how much they enjoy having you on. So as we go to the Super Bowl, it has just been a super fun run with you breaking down football season long. I appreciate it. It was really fun first year. I hope to be back doing it again next year. And next year, doing it again next year. And next year,

I hope we have some fun things to discuss on Tuesdays and I have less things to break on my table on Tuesdays. Oh, the Winnebago eventually we'll move. Yep. Probably not next year though. Probably not.