Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Will Brain Flores's defense be even better this year?

Episode Date: June 6, 2025

Matthew Coller is joined by Cody Alexander of Match Quarters to discuss Brian Flores's Vikings defense and whether the improvements on the interior of the line can help the D be even better in 2025.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Hey everybody. Welcome to another episode of purple insider, Matthew collar here, and welcome back to the show from match quarters.com. Literally one of the most popular sub stack newsletters on the entire internet. Cody Alexander, former coach who is here to break us down some Brian Flores defense. Cody, I mean, this has got to be an exciting one for you to be looking at with what Brian Flores could do with this defense this year. Yeah.

He's been a defense that I've studied pretty intimately for the past couple of years, um, just through a connection with a Caleb Evans and then obviously knowing the whole Vikings beat. I feel like you guys are all my friends but the the kind of the icing on the cake has been that Brian Flores coming back from kind of his kind of often to the you know his sabbatical at the Pittsburgh coming back and having a bunch of different ways and kind of really being the Model for how the trend is flipping in on defense in terms of the NFL or how the trend is flipping in on defense in terms of the NFL. Well, you have had to be our go-to guy

because this is not a very simple defense to understand with Brian Flores. And what I think is so interesting about Flores and his defense is that it's never the same week to week, year to year. It's always morphing, it's always changing. And then this year, there is a very significant personnel change upfront. Let's start there.

Jonathan Allen, Javon Hargrave, they come in and replace Jerry Tillery and Jonathan Bullard. You couldn't find two more different players. Hargrave being an undersized lightning quick guy, Jonathan Allen more of an all around player, but a mammoth human being, but more of a pass rusher than he is a run stuffer and in Bullard and Tillery, those guys were just stuffing gaps, just holding on for dear life to allow

linebackers to get into the backfield. Do we think that Brian Flores is going to take his hand off of the blitz button now that they have more talent to rush the passer defense tackle? I don't think so. I think that that's the new, pretty much the new standard in the NFL. We saw it at the Buccaneers joined last year with it.

I mean, the big thing with them is blitzing on early down. That to me is where they're ahead of the trend. If you go and you look, they blitzed almost 54% of the time, meaning that there were five rushers or more on early downs. A lot of that has to come, and Forrest has mentioned this in a lot of press conferences, that's really built on structure, but it's purposeful. Tampa Bay, Denver were also in that over 40% on early downs.

And really, Minnesota is crazy because where they're different than everybody else is if you look at first down, second and long, second and medium, second and short. So essentially all first and second down regardless of distance, it's over 50% blitz rate. Nobody is doing that. The closest that you can get is Tampa Bay. I don't think that it's necessarily going to change because of that's essentially where we are in the NFL. Now I think all blitz rates on early downs, you're setting the tone early, then you're playing pass coverage late. We know that if I can get a stop on first down, I can win third down. Everybody focuses on third down, but to get to third down, you have to get to

first down and that's where I think they're very much different and I don't really anticipate a huge change going forward. So how could they change the game for the Vikings then? Because I mean, clearly those guys are going to have different roles upfront than you would have from someone like Jonathan Bullard, because Harrison Phillips explained to me last year, because I was talking to him about some PFF grades and things like that, as I of course would do.

And he was talking to me about how sometimes his role is to just move a blocker. And Jonathan Bullard was the same way where he's not necessarily trying to get a sack on the play. He's trying to take a guard and slide him one way or the other. And those guys were big and strong and then allow for gaps for linebackers to shoot in there, whether it's a run or a pass, or they expect, that's what you mentioned, you know, the short yardage.

It's like, they don't care. Just get guys firing into gaps. But that's not going to be a role for Jonathan Allen. So how specifically did those guys with their skill sets change the game? So first off, this is, I'm going to now start winning one on ones instead of having to manufacture everything, which is strenuous. And you see, you saw this really in the past two years, Week one through 10, Vikings look like just, how do you even move the ball on them?

And then you get to that back half of the year and there's just, just attrition. People start figuring it out. You know, a lot of these guys were playing a lot of reps because Florence is essentially an all 11 player. You are playing with your best 11. You're going to get your, I mean, we're looking at D tackles with 800 plus

snaps. We're looking at both of our defensive ends with a hundred, 800 plus snaps. Guys, go look at teams in the NFL. If you're playing 800 plus snaps as a defensive lineman, that is a lot. So, what are we doing? One, I think it starts with, we have dynamic players that can now, if I'm gonna present you with five defensive linemen, I'm going to now match up with your five offensive linemen. If they're all good, then we're going to win a one-on-one somewhere. Then you have and just now Van Ginkle can be

even more of a hybrid. So I think it's one of those like you're addition, you get addition by addition. You're almost like multiplying what you can do because now he can, he doesn't have to necessarily always be kind of that dropper all the time. That was one of the things last year that you saw was Granard was always gonna rush. Van Ginkle was always gonna be the dropper. Now you didn't know when he was gonna drop,

but that was really kind of the only little guessing game that you had. I think also it allows you to really lean into what you talked about at the very beginning. Flores comes from the Vilacheck tree, meaning that these are very curated defensive game plans week to week. It's basically the Shanahan style of calling a defense. We may be a nickel base, so we're four down linemen and we're going to have, we're going to throw Murphy down. But then the next week we may need to be kind of a penny base, meaning we're going

to have our five defensive linemen. We're going to have Cashman in the middle and Metellus is going to be that big nickel, right? Now we can do that with the front structure where, Hey, if we need it, we need to have a, just a, you know, I think the Rams under Shula last year did a really good job with their cheetah package, right? One of the things that the Vikings did more than anybody, even the Rams was play dime, meaning that there were six D.V.s on the field.

Well, now we can get Dallas Turner involved. We can get Hargrave, who's one of the best quick threes in the game. He's essentially a pass rushing defense tackle. So I think it's more multiplicity, right? We can do different things, but I think fundamentally we, if when we're in base defense on first down and it's my five against your five, we are going to win somewhere along the line. Well, right. And that's what I'm really curious about is whether Hargrave and Allen are on

the field all the time together, because I've been so interested to see around the NFL where you have these five man defensive lines. And that is something that under Mike Zimmer, we never saw it was just always four down, very traditional to defensive ends, to defensive tackles, Lindvold Joseph over the nose. Like, and that was every single play all the time. There's so many different looks now with Brian Flores,

but having those five guys down, I feel like it throws me back a little bit to some of the three, four defenses that we grew up with where Jonathan Allen and Hargrave, like they're not exactly defensive tackles. They're more of those three, four defensive ends. And for a long time when people would ask me about, Oh, why are we playing a four, three or a three, four?

I'd be like, ah, you know, those things are kind of dead in the NFL. They don't really exist anymore, but it kind of exists here. Right. And I'll give you, I'll give you a good example of a team that I think that the Vikings are probably watching this off season and saying, Hey, these are some things that we can do. You now have Mattelis, who's a big nickel, meaning that you have a safety and that he's essentially been that kind of, I don't know what you want to call it, but he's been that

special player for them that can blitz, play coverage, play down near the box, like a linebacker. You have Murphy, who you can now kick inside and who really is a good hybrid corner that can play inside and outside. So a team to look at is kind of what Seattle did last year of when they would go in their big nickel package, they would have Leonard Williams inside and they would have two edges. So they would be able to kind of say, look, we've got a bigger guy. We can kind of, we don't necessarily need to go big, but hey, if we put, you know, Devin Witherspoon out there,

now we can go with this kind of big five, I call it a big five, now Leonard Williams is bumped out. This is what you can do now with Hargrave, you can do with Allen is say, hey, we're just gonna bump you out to a five, we're gonna have a solid edge that really protects our nickel, who is really a DB, he's really a corner,

and not necessarily somebody that I want to get in the box. I think too on top of that, what I said about the multiplicity of now we can get into multiple front structures. We don't have to live in that bare front, which is essentially two edges, two guys in the B gaps and then a nose. We can now do a lot of different things. I also think it helps you with Alan, with Phillips.

Go look at what the Chargers did last year with their light box run fits. And all light box means is there's really just five or six guys in the box. They play a lot of times with two noses. And so what you do is you just put those guys on the guards and I'm just going to, it's a one-on-one. I'm going to press you off the line. I'm going to put my head in a gap. I can move to the other gap because we're talented enough

and strong enough. We all know that Harrison Phillips is a monster to block. So you can do different things now. So going back to the curated game plans, the multiplicity off of that, it's just he is now expanding the playbook without necessarily adding plays into that said playbook. And when you talk about moving them out to the five,

you mean the five technique, which is right over the offensive tackle, right? Outside shoulder, yeah, sorry. I just should have said that. Outside shoulder of the tackle, nine technique is typically what you see your edges that are stand up and the wide nine stuff has become really popular because of the wide zone.

But that big five is like, instead of being inside or head up, we just move him outside shoulder. So what I can't wait to see them manage is Dallas Turner's reps with Andrew van Ginkgel's reps with Jonathan Grenard's reps. Turner last year was very much flashy, but not consistent and not on the field as much as maybe we expected him now. I did not expect Andrew Van Ginkle to be healthy enough or have the endurance enough to play near a thousand snaps. That was pretty crazy. And the same thing for Jonathan Grenard. Those guys had never really done that before.

So I thought there would be more of a rotation. But as you said, Flores with guys like Harrison Smith or Harrison Phillips or Andrew Van Ginkle or Granard, he's just gonna play them every single play. And that's how it's gonna be. And that makes a lot of sense. You know, you're trying to win, but at the same time, I think a rotation would help a little bit with those guys

because at the end of some of the games, Jonathan Granard at one game, they had to call a timeout just to get him a little bit of a breath so he could go back and rush the passer for a key down. I don't think they want to do that. So is it as simple as just rotating though? Because I was a little surprised that they wanted Dallas Turner dropping back in coverage

as much as they did last year. And then he picks off a pass against the Seattle Seahawks on an awesome play. And you go, okay, I guess I understand it. Um, but how do we foresee the role that he can take on as a rotational type of a edge rush? Well, and I think that this is where we see a disconnect between fan and coach brain fan brain sees first round draft pick. Why is he not playing every single snap? Why does he not have 10 set the sacks after his rookie year? disconnect between fan and coach brain fan brain sees first round draft pick.

Why is he not playing every single snap? Why does he not have 10 sex after his rookie year? He must be a bust. Whereas the coach brain is saying, look, then Ginkgo and Granada are essentially like pro bowl players almost on the cusp of pro bowl players like why you I'm not going to just put some kid in there just because it's like, well, we gotta get some plays. And if you've noticed Flores track record, if you're a younger player, you really have to earn the right to play.

And so that is, hey, we'll put him in on third down. We'll give them some kind of things where, hey, we can put him in with Ben Gego and really he's just a vision drop, which is very simple. You literally are just backpedaling, looking at the quarterback, find the ball. And so I think to me, the expansion of that should be in year two of now you become a rotational player that if we need you to rush the passer, we can put you behind Renard and you can go sub in for him so that he stays fresh.

If we need you, we want to, we need a hybrid guy. If Van Gekel needs a breather, we can put you in there and you're that swing edge for us. And then now we can, now we have rotation inside. We have rotation outside. Everybody's fresh, which means that our pressures are going to sustain through a 17, 18 week, a 17 game season, 18 week season. You know, we've got to make sure that when we get to week 18, that we are just as fresh as we were in week one, just because we're not giving like you said, 800 to almost 1000 snaps for some of these guys. and went along. As you mentioned, they were as dominant as any defense had been in a long time over those first seven, eight weeks. And then we saw as they started to go along and you know,

you play different competition, different offenses, and they start to figure some things out. But I also think that if you're asking, and I felt this way about Harrison Phillips for a couple of years, if you're asking him to push seven, 800 snaps, well, the best PFF grade of his career was when he played 493 snaps, which I think is much better for him. And they've got some other guys that they're going to have to work into those positions that they have been developing. They might be able to bring Buller back if they really want another nose tackle. But just going back to that nose.

And I want to get some other things with the secondary, but just to go back to that nose, when I think three, four, I think Gilbert Brown, Casey Hampton, Ted Washington, uh, these are the big giant 350, 60 pound guys. That's not what they have here. Now they're going to improve when it comes to rushing the passer, but in terms of stopping the run, it is a different calculation from when you have the guys who were really good run stoppers versus guys who are going to get the passer. There's going to be, I think, a lot of pressure on Harrison Phillips here and he's not usually the size of the type of guy we think of for that position. Yeah, and this goes back to what Flores has really designed is kind of even though that we're getting these five man,

five on five lines is that we're going to be a little bit of movement based, like we're gonna move to a gap or like, and then you highlighted it when you were talking to him, he was kind of telling you was like, sometimes I just need to move a guy. And so that little stunt or just a move instead of attacking where you would get essentially a true two gap with 360 pound dude basically just creating a block of boulder and just kind of peeking his head wherever the back goes.

Now it's like, Hey, I'm going to step to the right because the backer is going to take the other gap or we're moving something or we're sending a pressure. And so we're playing more into the fact that I'm more of a, I'm more of kind of like a G technique. So like a kind of like that's that hybrid nose. It's not really a three technique, but you're inside. And so now I don't necessarily have to sit there and take a center. I also think though, where we are now, it's really difficult for guys that are 360 and

can't really move. Now some of those guys you mentioned are just aliens, but if you're kind of this bigger guy and you can't necessarily move with wide zone and then attacking the tackles, we just don't have a lot of a gap power anymore. We just don't have a lot of a gap runs where we're trying to, you know, traps and things like that. We're really trying. So like the, the boulder in the middle doesn't necessarily, um, is as effective as it was just 20 years ago. So I'm looking at the teams that they're going to play this year.

And this is where it does get dicey for this Vikings defense. And I want to know how you think they'll handle the run defense against Baltimore, the Philadelphia Eagles. I mean, these are some of the best running teams in the league. And of course, Jimmy or Gibbs, who has demolished them in the past, almost every time that they've played him against the Detroit Lions. These are not your regular old run of the mill running teams. Even I would throw the Green Bay Packers in there where Matt LaFleur

has a pretty intricate running game that's had a lot of success. If we're talking about things that could take them from maybe a top five defense to more of a top 10 ish somewhere in there, I think that that's one of them. That could be different that there is some sacrifices that they're making with the run defense. Yeah. And I think that that's okay. I know that that sounds crazy.

Every high school coach that listens to you is probably pulling his hair out right now. But I've said it, you know, I've said this multiple times on multiple different outlets. Like an NFL coach, if you give them a four yard run, that really, it's not that big of a deal. You're now in second and six, that's a passing down. So to them, it's if I can get a pass rush and I can affect the passer, I really think like going to analytics, like that's kind of where we've seen Analytics on the defensive side really changes the guys are not just stressing out about stopping the run now

Don't give you run. You don't want to be playing the Eagles and giving up 10 15 yard runs up her play You know the Ravens giving up 10 15 yards per play. Yeah, you're gonna lose Yeah, we know that but if you know We can get a tackle for loss and then the next three runs are two to three yards, four yards, I'm gonna be okay with that. We give up one, one or two 10 yard runs, I think we'll live. Because we know now you have to pass to score, you run to win. And typically you're running the ball when you're winning.

It's game clock management, it's game control. And so to me, it's really for offensive coordinators, the running game sets up the play action. It keeps you ahead of the change when you need, hey, we just need to breathe right here. Let's just get the ball, let's run it. And so defensively, if I can amplify and really help a secondary that is kind of shaky and where we stand, but I can give a

little bit more pressure to help them out. But we sacrifice just a tiny bit. If you really go look at it, like even if you're top 10 in run DVOA, FTN's run DVOA, if you're top 10 in that, but you're also like top five in passing, you're probably a top five defense or you might even be the best defense. So I think that you give a little in the run game is fine If it means that you're amplifying that passing game to help out that sector. How about the running quarterback? because the Vikings face the best of the best this year and

I feel like what we used to do on Madden 04, take Michael Vick, run with him and it was unstoppable. It's still real that it is unstoppable. What are defenses doing? Because this trend is not going away. There are going to be more running quarterbacks coming into the league every single year. And again, the Vikings are facing Hertz and Lamar.

I mean, they're going to have, and Jaden Daniel Daniels to the best of the best at running the football. I don't feel like there's any clear cut answer of a if they have a running quarterback, you just do this and it also makes the running game more dangerous because you have to pay attention to that guy. But defenses are always hunting for answers. What is it that defenses try to do against these guys? Well, you play more split field coverage because it spreads your defense out accordingly. You have quarterback players on both sides of the ball for the option is essentially what you're doing. So, you build it like that. Vikings are actually ahead of the trend on this. They actually surpassed the

Chiefs who have really been the split field defensive kings for really since Spagnola probably around 2018. The Vikings now have kind of taken that flag and now they're kind of the flag bearers for the split field world. I think they're already set up for it. I think you play a little bit more quarters coverage and which you know we see a lot at the college level which is another way to do this. If you are going to run single high, you do what's called a cheat safety. You essentially, instead of pedaling that guy back 20 yards into the deep half, that's your quarterback player. So you essentially sit him at 12 and he's just there reading the mesh, which is the running back quarterback exchange. If the quarterback pulls it, he's going to dive down. Typically he's not going

to be in the blocking. People aren't going to be working up to him. Now, you have to be really, really good at tackling in open space because you have to be able to run the alley and make that. But that's really kind of how NFL teams have done this. They tried the old scrape exchange, which is send the defensive into the dive, scrape the linebacker outside. But we know a lot of times they can add a blocker with a tight end coming across that slice action. Lamar Jackson, obviously on a linebacker, I'm going to take him one on one. I think now teams are like, look, we'll just put one of our fastest DDS in the middle of

the field and then we'll just let him run down the quarterback. He's really not looking for that. And then obviously can't be blocked. So you have the split field element. You also can manufacture it with pressure a lot. Fire zones are coming back, so two off the edge, which has always kind of been the zone re-beater are coming back in both. But with quarters coverage behind it and not just the fire zone cover three that you're seeing so that we can still space everything out and play that.

And the 22 minute mark is when you got over my head. So a new record for your appearances on the show. I've been working on it. No, I mean, I tracked most of that, but I would like you to explain what you mean by the split field coverages and how the Vikings were ahead of the game on that. Okay. So split field just means we're going to have two safeties too high safety does not mean that you're going to get a cover to worry cover for coverage or quarters. You're not going to get that.

We have a lot of middle of the field disguise and the NFL is about 30%. So a third of the place split field just means our two safeties are going to stay kind of on the hatch. They're going to split the field and there's the middle part of the field is essentially going to be open. So we're going to be able to, the reason why that's good against a quarterback is because I can move the, I have a quarterback player from depth or I can manufacture a quarterback player somewhere else and he could fit in somewhere else. So in single high, we're kind of gapped out, meaning that all the gaps are filled. Well, if the quarterback's a plus one player, my quarterback player is 30 yards deep. That's a no win. The math ain't mathin' on that. So that's why you see this cheat

safety in closed post coverage, meaning that that guy's sitting there and he just doesn't really move. He's really looking for the vision of the quarterback either cutting some in breaking route or he's going to go and get that. So that's what split field is. It just means a two safety shell. And it can be covered to and it can be course. Something that we've talked about a lot on the show is when the Vikings went

into free agency, there were some interesting corners that play a lot of man coverage, Shavarius Ward, DJ Reed. And I wondered if Brian Flores would want that guy, because if you go back to some of the great Belichick defenses, and I know that innovation happens so fast in the league, it's not the same, but he would go out and get Derell Rivas or Keeb Tlaib or somebody like that, Stephon Gilmore,

to be that shut down type of corner that was either taking away one side of the field. I saw Dion Sanders and Asante Samuel, the old Asante Samuel debating this about taking away one side or traveling and that kind of thing. And we just don't see a lot of that locked down corner in the NFL anymore.

And then when they bring back Byron Murphy Jr. they talked about how it was more about his communication, his versatility, than it is his ability to just lock down someone. And if you look at the Vikings last year, I mean, they're just not playing man coverage very often. Sometimes when Shaq Griffin was out there cause he's bigger. Do you think that that is because of how much the offenses are doing with

things like motions and all the eye candy and stuff like that and their reactions and responses to defenses? Or why is it? Because I went back and looked at the PFF numbers and even five years ago, there were a lot of corners playing just man on man at 50, 60% of the time. And then now that just does not, you don't see that outside of maybe two or three guys. Yeah. So that's been a trend. You hit the nail on the head. That's actually been a five year trend really since 2017 when the Eagles won the Super Bowl, essentially playing a college offense.

We get the basketball game between the Chiefs and the Rams in 2018. Everybody doubles down on the RPO playing man because that's the easy button against, are you asking the coach what's the easiest way to defend RPOs, play cover one because you just man up everybody and then you just funnel everything in the box. Well, the problem was in 2019 everybody got roasted. So then you go to 2020 and what do we get? We get the Fangio Staley to high revolution where we're playing everything from too high. We're playing almost 80% zone

Everybody starts getting on the bandwagon of that. So we have this shift even the Steelers who were Maturely dog one got five down linemen We rushed them and we played cover one behind it and that's what we do almost on every play. Well now what are they doing? They're almost like they're pretty much a cover three team. So I think what you've seen is a shift overall in the NFL landscape to zone. The Vikings have kind of again been ahead of the trend on this. The Chiefs have been ahead of the trend on this. Basically playing zone a lot of times. You can get man elements. I think that's a misnomer of a lot of these times we're playing what's called a match three, or playing match quarters, or playing palms,

which is essentially a match cover two. So we're getting these man elements, but we're playing zone, so we're being able to switch off. We're not gonna necessarily be locked on. I think there's very few teams that play cover one. Quinn in Dallas, Schwartz wants to play cover one as much as he possibly can, but even last year he had to switch to a more covered three,

cover two system. So I think you're seeing that because of the way the offenses are, they can manufacture a matchup. I think the other thing it goes back to, if D linemen are playing 800 plus snaps, that's not what we want. If we have corners who typically do not get subbed out,

you don't want to sub out your star corner, you want him on there. If he's going to play a thousand plays, I don't need him running a track meet on every single play because that's what the offense is going to do. The offense is going to sub their receivers out and give them a break Don't put another guy in and run you on a fade route

And if you're just gonna play man, it's gonna keep running on fade routes and there's gonna recycle guys I mean I look I my first experience in professional football was 2011 with our brows and and baby and what do we do to every single defense? We made them play Essentially 60 minutes of an absolute track meet. And that's where you get that by the end of the game, they're gassed and you're just throwing bombs because you're just rolling receivers through. And I think that's kind of where the main element of it is, is that we've got to play

more zone. Eyes on the quarterback means that we get more picks. Now I'm not necessarily staring at quarterback, but we now are kind of playing more visually. We're not necessarily with our back because that's the thing with man coverage. In man coverage, you're either gonna get a PBU or a PI. You're not gonna get a lot of picks.

These guys getting a lot of picks off of man coverage are getting them off of quick throws, whether it's an out, like Deron Bland is a great example of it. Deron Bland, if you actually go back that historic year that he had, they were all like Matt Jones throwing behind an out route and he just undercuts it, right? So it's like, there's anomalies like that,

but typically you don't get a lot of turnovers if you play a lot of man. And so that's, again, another point of emphasis on where analytics has kind of changed the game. We have a shift to man. We'll shift away from man coverage unless it's third medium when it's really tight and we want to play tight to the ball and force these throws and really and really kind of combat these throws near the sticks. Jones catching a stray here for no reason, just living his life somewhere. And you take a swipe at him. No, but we saw that last year and really last couple of seasons, but with Byron Murphy did a really good job of having eyes on the quarterback. And then he could undercut some routes.

He could read route combinations. Patrick Peterson, even though it was a different defense was incredible at this because a lot of these guys who are very good at the zone coverage are really booked up. Like they really watch a lot of film. They understand the route combinations of the other teams. And I think that that's one of the reasons you bring back Byron Murphy is that he is that type of diligent, highly intelligent corner. And they talk about him, The terminology they use is hub of communication for Byron Murphy. Can you explain what Brian Flores means when he tells us that he's a hub of communication?

Yes, I'll walk you through a play. One of my favorite things is when NFL players, especially like linebackers or offensive lineman talk to you about what their priest now and I it always blows people's minds. So as a corner, I have the best vantage point for the secondary because I'm on the sideline so I can look in. So as I'm looking in, I'm seeing the huddle break and I'm identifying how many receivers do I have. So do I have one, do I have two, do I have three? I'm communicating that with my overhang, whether it's a nickel or a linebacker.

I'm communicating that with the safety, hey, we've got two, we've got two. Then on top of that, I need to then have spatial awareness. Are they condensed? Are they really tight to the line of scrimmage? Are they wide? And then why are they wide? So being wide is, especially in the NFL, is going to change things. So then I'm communicating, maybe we have a coverage check off of that.

If we get a stat, we have a stat check. I need to make sure myself and the safety are on the same page. If you have a bunch, which is three receivers close together, I need to make sure our bunch check because now I have another element involved. I have to now make sure the overhang knows what he's doing and the safety is communicating to me. When you can get a corner to be a communicator, that is a superpower for a defense. Corners are typically what I would call like a factory worker. You are, you pull the lever, you are told what to do.

You do what you're told. You don't communicate like you just reciprocate, tap the head. Oh, you're wearing this covers tap the head thumbs up Whatever it is If you can have a corner that knows what the other guys doing and this comes from him being playing nickel Because now when you're in the nickel you got to know how to blitz you have to know how to what coverage we're in How are we adjusting motion so that so all of that happens now? Okay, we've got identified. Let's say it's two receivers. They're a little bit condensed, okay, but they're not in the stack

So we're gonna go ahead and play recover. Once we've communicated that let's say one of those receivers motion How are we are adjusting the motion is the nickel traveling with it? Are we going to have to get into a different check? Is the safety gonna now have to work to the back to the front side because of change of strength motion? So all of this is happening pre snap all within a split second of each other and we all have to communicate and be on the same page. And that's what a hub of communication, one of the best examples of lack of communication last year, go watch the Panthers and their safeties in

constant bus on a bunches, you know, motion checks, not fitting where they're supposed to be kind of corners don't really know what they're doing. Like there that that to me is a communication piece. You can be an excellent coach, but if you can't get players to speak it or signal it, then it's really difficult. And that's where that hub of communication comes from, because all of this is happening within 10 seconds before that ball snap. This is something I can never get enough of football is that there's always another layer to dig down on.

And, uh, I was going to just say like simple game though, right? I was just lining it up and right. Uh, but I mean the Jimmy and Joe's point is that you can't do it if you cannot. No, I'm being I'm being funny with that. It is all about the play like at the end of the day. It's it's how good your talent is but you can exemplify that. What do you do when the talent's equal? That comes with coaching and communication and how well those players understand understand their role within the scheme. Okay, since you have gone over the top hardcore football, let me ask you a Okay, since you have gone over the top hardcore football, let me ask you a television question here,

hot take a shouty show question, which is how good are the Vikings defense going to be? How good is it going to be? Is it going to be a top five defense? Who else is competing with them in this range for being best defenses in the NFL? Yeah, I think what they did is that they are continuously saying we are going to be one of the top defenses

in the NFL. We have a top defensive coordinator, somebody that we feel is essentially ahead of the trend and ahead of the curve. I think what they did with the defensive line, bringing Jonathan Allen, Javon Hargrave. I'm a little concerned with the secondary. I don't know what McKay Blackman's gonna look like

off of an injury. I know they're really high on Theo Jackson, but again, he's kind of somebody that hasn't played a lot of downs. Harrison Smith has yet to fall off the cliff. We know that the cliff is going to come at some point. Hopefully, it doesn't come until he retires after this year maybe. So that's always... I think the other concern there too is like with Metellus, you don't necessarily want him playing back. So I'm really, I'm really interested in kind

of the development of Jay Ward and Theo Jackson and how that's going to go. If you look at the corner room, not necessarily a big fan of Jeff Okuda, though he's somebody that can come in and play man coverage. And then obviously with Byron Murphy, who's a hybrid guy, can kind of solve some issues back there. So I'm really high on the front end. I've got some question marks. I think they're about middle of the road on the back end. But as I stated earlier in the show,

if the pass rush is there and just nobody can run the ball on you, it doesn't really matter. Cause now when the DBs know it's a pass, it's just so much different when everybody on the field knows it's a pass because it's second and 10 or it's third and seven, third and 10. We know everybody's passed and they're not going to hand the ball off. So I do think that this is easily a top 10 defense that I think can continue with sustained success with, and the way that Forrest approaches it, you really don't know.

Because if you even go back to last year, what they were doing in week one was not what they were doing in week 17. And so to me, you can see that evolution and it shows. So no one really knows what they're going to get. You know, you're going gonna get a lot of pressure. You know you're gonna get some more split field coverages, but what those percentages are and when they're gonna use them, you just don't know.

And I think that they've set themselves up to be a top 10 defense and definitely continue that trend of being a top five. One more thing, Jalen Ramsey. I love it for the Vikings. I think it would be a great idea. I know contracts and maybe he'll just get cut and they'll be in a bidding war with about 20 other teams

who would love to have Jalen Ramsey on their football team. But does he still have the type of impact that Jalen Ramsey has had in the past? I think he can still impact you. I think he can be very much what's, I think he can be a better version of Stefan Gilmore I think we got I think that the what the Vikings got in Stefan Gilmore was a guy that was pretty much He was pretty much done physically, but just was so instinctual

He was really good in the room with it with the with the young guys and just really in general you talk about a Communication hub it's somebody that for us could literally go and game plan with and kind of communicate with. So to me, you bring in a guy like Ramsey, who's probably in a little bit better condition in this part of his career. He's also somebody that you can throw in at nickel, giving you another pinpoint of flexibility. I mean, you essentially have two guys that are hybrid guys at Murphy and Ramsey. So I would be, if they, like to me, I've told you this, my biggest question mark is going to be in the secondary. If we get Ramsey, that really alleviates

a lot of pressure on me. I feel a lot more comfortable because we can kind of figure out the safety part if something were to happen to Harrison Smith, we have two young guys that we like. Like if we can be handled the nickel and outside, I think we'll be fine. So to me, I think it's, it's something that I would pursue if I was like, I feel the same way. They like the guys that they have. They like Isaiah Rogers.

They like McKay Blackman. Those are guys that Flores has brought in. He drafted one of them, brought another in as a free agent. It's not the same as having one of the 10 best corners. I mean, truly one of the 10 best defensive players probably of the last decade. And then, you know, we see this from Jonathan Allen. We see it from Hargrave on the offensive side. They bring in Ryan Kelly.

I think it's part of their theory that, hey, an older player is gonna get overlooked by a lot of people because he's on the older side, but intelligence experience, knowing how to stay on the field for 1000 snaps. Even if you're on the older side, like these guys have certain elements of their game. And I think Ramsey, I mean, last year, PFF had him still in the top 10. Yeah. So I think he could be that piece that pushes you over from, Hey, this defense is really dangerous, to this defense could be completely dominant. But again, there's a lot of competition,

I'm sure for his services and salary cap stuff and everything else, but I love the idea. Cody Alexander, matchquarters.com. Go there, check it out. You've written a hundred books about defense, especially, I think you guys can hear this, if you coach football or you want to understand defense more in depth, I highly highly suggest it.

I was just looking at matchquarters.com 19,000 subscribers. That is a lot of people who are reading your newsletter, Cody. So thank you so much, Cody Alexander for coming on again, and we will do it again very soon, sir. Thanks for having me on man. Really appreciate it.