Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Would Star Tribune's Andrew Krammer keep Sam Darnold if the Vikings go 15-2?

Episode Date: December 21, 2024

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Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of Purple Insider. Matthew Collar here, along with Andrew Kramer of the Star Tribune for your preview of the Vikings and Seattle Seahawks. Let me start out with this, Andrew. The thing that very serious journalists like yourself cannot stand the most is making predictions, so why don't we make you do that are the vikings gonna win this conference this division what do you think things gonna happen uh i do i don't if i had to i'm sorry vikings fans to start this out like this matt's

walking out right now just quitting i'm sorry matt um so you're kicking me out oh i thought you were locked walking out i was gonna fill 45 minutes of your podcast just ranting about, I don't know, traffic circles. Actually, I'm very pro-traffic circle. I think the Vikings aren't going to get there just because of the Lions schedule. I think that's what it's going to come down to. Because I think what you're asking the Vikings to do, and winning in Seattle doesn't seem like too far of a reach. They've beaten a lot of decent teams this year.'re 12 and 2 they can absolutely win this game it's the next game it's at home against Green Bay that feels like a toss-up even at US Bank Stadium

that's the game that I feel like it's going to be tough for them to pull through with those two wins come off of that win go to Detroit and then win that game as beat up as Detroit is they can still win shootout type games and I know the Vikings are built to win those games too but it feels like too many hoops Matt for them to jump through compared to Detroit who gets to play Chicago gets to play San Francisco before that big game against the Vikings I was gonna kick you out for being the negative media where is your skull clap my the helga the helga horns right andrew thinks you're gonna lose uh yeah you make a fair you make a fair argument honestly well we just look at the schedule for

the vikings and how tricky this is uh going from monday night night football to Seattle is already hard in itself. Although my sources tell me that it is a discussion in Seattle that they have not had the home field advantage that they used to. I would have assumed that Lumen field was illuminated with a Seattle. Go, go. Yeah,

please just leave apparently there's going to be a lot of more positive uh vikings people there than yourself no i this is just my understanding that the uh road environment has not been the same for that team that they've been invaded by the opposing fans pretty routinely. Flights are cheap. Shout out Sun Country. Please sponsor the show. But that's still a difficult team if we and we'll look into how they match up.

But I think that they have a lot of the aspects of teams that have given the Vikings problems. Top notch wide receivers, veteran quarterback, good defensive line, a defensive mind on the other side, who's very blitzy and very simulated pressurey. But they've got the talent to do it. They've got corners who can play. That's not an easy game. You come home even with that win after Monday night football on the road back here and play a Packers team that's playing as well as anybody in the entire NFL. That's not super easy. And then have to go to Ford Field and play Detroit, where I think the Vikings can put up a lot of points, but it feels like it's going to be a shootout at some point there. Winning all

three would be extremely impressive. The only thing I would say is a counter argument is we keep saying it like we said it right at the beginning of the year if they go two and three guys if they just get two out of five they'll be okay and they just want all of them oh well okay and uh then you know coming out of those two losses against the lions and the rams well you know you get a you get a couple of easy games here you get back in that playoff race, and then now they're in position to potentially win the conference. So this team at every corner where we have thought, maybe this is going to get them, maybe that's going to get them,

even losing Christian Derrissaw. Well, they're done-zo now, and they go out and get somebody else who can play a tackle, and that's kind of been the story of this team all year. Yeah, and to me, it comes down to Sam Darnold getting better somehow throughout the year. I mean, I know he started off very well, throws the 97-yard touchdown in Week 2. How much better can you get? But he's been managing, quote-unquote, while being a leading force in these games.

I don't say he's a game manager. He's been much better than that. You can't win these games by just being that. But he's learned to manage games in a way that he just didn't do when he was a younger manager. He's been much better than that. You can't win these games by just being that, but he's learned to manage games in a way that he just didn't do when he was a younger quarterback and a more immature professional at that spot. And so for him to get better as the season's gone on, you've seen that development arc and it speaks to what Kevin O'Connell, Josh McCown, all these coaches have done with him where you're seeing him take continued steps and they've got a plan

and they've got areas they want him to continue to grow even while he's playing so well right now he's thrown one interception in the last 165 pass attempts for him that's i don't know but i imagine that's some of the longest he's gone with just one pick in his career seeing as how many turnovers he had coming here so to me that's the story of story of this team. When you say that they keep exceeding our expectations, they keep jumping through those hoops that we're talking about, it comes down to Sam doing that. And if he can continue to play this well, there's no reason why they can't be in all of these games. But if we're prognosticating and we're having to guess, is the coin going to flip heads three times in a row? These games feel more like coin flips than the ones they've just gone through.

And there have been a lot of close calls the last two weeks, though, not so much. And this is where we're always trying to figure out which way the wind is blowing with a football team, which can be tricky because when they had the one score wins, it was, oh, well, you know, they didn't beat this team or that team by enough points, which I don't like to complain too much about, but that is part of the analysis. I look at the overall point differential more than one individual week, but it's part of the analysis, not being able to crush the Jaguars, not being able to run away from the Titans. And even last week, they ended up winning by three scores, but there was a lot of sloppiness in that game that if you have four penalties on your left tackle against the Seattle Seahawks, maybe it's not going to be as easy. You get a punt blocked. You give an extra possession from running into

the punter, which an unnecessary attempt to try to block a punt there when your team is playing way better than the other team. That's been the story of the special teams this year is it's just a non-factor and maybe they should just leave it that way uh but when it comes to this team i think when we watch every single play of every single game this is the other side of it you can nitpick a lot and go well you know the guards haven't been picking up those simulated pressures enough. And I'll tell you, that's going to be a problem. You know, I mean, that's sort of the nature of what we do. And I'm always trying to be on both sides of that, be very specific about what we're seeing, but how much is it all projecting something? And so as we go into these final three

games, I look at all three teams. They're going to play as having a lot of talent like the Vikings do, but also imperfect like the Vikings are. Seattle's got some problems. Their offensive coordinator is not very creative. Their quarterback's knee is injured. Their line can't really block anybody. Even when you look at Green Bay, not perfect. Detroit banged up, not perfect. So I think that you're right to talk about it in

a coin flippy way. I think that coin is ever so slightly weighted toward the Vikings for these three games because they play at US Bank Stadium against the Packers, but it's not weighted by a lot. So I don't know, some mathematician in the comments, please explain what the odds are of 50%, 50%, 50%. But I know that it's not above 50%. Yeah. I know that. You do know that. Okay. Let me ask you for another one, another prediction here.

This one's even hotter. If the Vikings go 15-2, I mean, I i don't know we just quit like we never saw this coming at all just what all right somebody next year after kirk cousins got benched and they go 15 and 2 with sam darnold you might just shoot off into the moon am i pulling the puppet strings of the national football league many people are asking this so uh but i just i just mean it will never cover a better season than that see you later but uh if they win 15 games do you have to bring back sam darnold even if they lose a playoff game no no no no no i think what he doesn't we talked about this even before the bears game

how much is going to hinge on what happens in january and that's not just talking about the season finale that's talking about what happens in the playoffs. If you can go 15-2, you could win out. You could even win out convincingly and get, let's say, a number one seed. But if you lose in that divisional round, that first playoff game, and you don't go anywhere, style points are absolutely going to matter. It's going to matter how you lost. It's going to matter how it looked like. I feel like we're going to know based on just how it feels

with Sam Darnold in the postseason. You're going to know, is the team that close? Did it feel like you were just one or two pieces away? Or do you feel like now we need that 40 million in cap space every year to continue to build a better team because Detroit is that much farther ahead of us, or Philly is that much farther ahead of us, whoever it's going to be. I do not think that a 15- 2 record I don't think Sam what I'm trying to say is Sam cannot lock up his future in the regular season he has to do something in the postseason I think that that is both very fair and very unfair at the same exact time how's that unfair well it's unfair because let's say you play let's say you

get the one seed and you play I don't know in the second round the tampa bay bucks i don't if if that's the wrong team that they would face based on tiebreakers don't assault me uh but let's just say they play the tampa bay bucks sam darnold is very good in the game and they lose 28 24 or something like that they just can't run the ball as well as they'd like to there's a couple of breakdowns up front or something like that. They just can't run the ball as well as they'd like to. There's a couple of breakdowns up front or something. Darnold overall does his job. Defense can't stop the run. Baker Mayfield lights them up. They lose 28-24 and get upset in the playoffs. How can you say after a 15-win season where he is a top five quarterback and you lose by four points in the playoffs with

a positive performance by Sam Darnold. Hey, that not good enough, pal. The next guy is going to do better than that. You answered it yourself. If you are not able to beat, for instance, a Tampa Bay Buccaneers team, and if you can't run the ball, you can't stop the run. Sounds like you need money to go fix a bunch of problems. Sounds like Kevin O'Connell should be trusted to raise another quarterback, come in and give you that production with less pay, much like Sam's doing this year. What does that defense look like if Sam's getting paid $45 million this year? It's probably a piece or two fewer. They can do a lot of creative things to make a lot of contracts work, but it's not going to be the same cash spending that they would have done if they've got Sam on 10 million like they've got him this year.

I think that matters. If that exact scenario played out that you just laid out, to me, I would say that team is not good enough. If it wasn't the quarterback's fault, that team is not good enough to compete with a Sam Darnold making that much money. And to me, putting the entire decision on one football game. That's the NFL. Daniel Jones just got, not to say that's the right decision, but these,

what happens in the post season matters. And that's what it gets people paid. It gets, it's changes careers. It changes the paths of organizations, franchises. That's what matters. How are we,

how can you argue against that? I'm sorry. What, what did you say leading into that? Not that it was the right decision. Well, results don't necessarily set up bad processes. The processes could have been correct in that situation. Maybe they weren't, but you can't necessarily just look at one result. I'm saying that the process of playoff success leading to paying people and look at Sam's

overall... I know you don't like to do this. You have to take into account his entire body of work i feel like you have to i don't know why you have to do that at this point because even going back to 2022 he was very good at the end of that season with a horrendous panthers team won four out of six games that played well down that stretch and then when he got in the game in san francisco he played well. I mean, this is like saying Andrew Kramer freshman year is the same kid as Andrew Kramer senior year. That's maybe the same height, but that's not. If someone wanted to pay me however millions, I would understand if they held something against me for a long, if they wanted to look at the big picture, I just get it though. It's about the team. And I feel like we're going to know if this team's close enough. And you painted a scenario to me where the team wouldn't be close enough. To me, it's much more about the team. And I feel like we're going to know if this team's close enough. And you painted a scenario to me where the team wouldn't be close enough.

To me, it's much more about the player that Sam Darnold is, where this year, if he had sputtered his way through this and they had the number one defense in the league and he had just kind of gotten away with it. And we've seen this happen before in 2017, where Case Keenum just got away with it each week. And even in 2022, they got away with it each week. That's not how Sam Darnold is played. If all the metrics, you know, I'm going to follow the numbers. All the metrics this year on Sam Darnold are that he's been a top five to seven quarterback. The idea about paying quarterbacks has always been, if you can get top five to seven play, then you can work around that.

If you can win 15 games with top five to seven play of someone who's 27 years old and nothing will change on offense to next year, Jefferson, Addison, Derrissaw returns, KOC, Wes Phillips. I mean, maybe there's a different running back, but you can improve the offensive line still in the offseason. And your defense was good enough with its current pieces to be a top five-ish type of defense this year and win 15 games. I don't know how we're looking at one game against the Bucs and saying, nah, throw out all that other stuff. This is not in a vacuum, though. Not every franchise has a

10th overall pick 22 years old that they can picked not every friend or 21 right now not everybody has that and i would understand if sam were somehow affordable i would understand if sam were somehow keepable in a certain level but this is a franchise that shows you they will draw a line in the sand of where they're willing to go on these guys and they'll do the same thing on sam they're not going to say blank check whatever, Sam, you just did it for us. This is what we need. No, Kweisi is going to have that line. And I feel like they know and they're bracing for the fact that other teams are going to be so frothing at the mouth to get somebody like that, that another Kirk situation might happen.

Not that the Vikings wouldn't be more in on keeping Sam than they were Kirk, but another team might come way over the top. That might happen. So to your point, I could see the Vikings wanting to keep him after this season, even after a first round playoff exit. However, I think he needs to win in January for that number, for their number, for their line for him to keep going up to meet where I expect it's going to be. I just think these quarterbacks get paid such a ridiculous amount come March that he is going to be such a sought after product as a guy who was just raised by somebody else. Let's just go get that guy. We don't need to worry about raising them like Kevin O'Connell just did. Let's go get them. I think another team is, to me, it comes down to where I think his water level is going to be at, where I think that salary will be. And I think it'll be

so high that the Vikings line is just not going to be there. So, and they've got somebody else in tow. They don't need to be desperate. That's also a key component to this. My key component would be, you can always play somewhere in the middle of this and try to bring him back for next year on, even if it was a deal that is a three-year deal, but more like two or more like one. And you could always, the thing is that if you, if you even signed Darnold to a three-year deal to mess with the cap, to make sure he had a low cap hit and let's say next year, they win nine games and he plays. Okay.

But it's not unbelievable. You could always trade him to someone else because he's still going to have on his resume, really good quarterback play, then trade him in that contract to someone else. You can't tell me that by the end of 2025, there won't be desperate teams. There's going to be at least 10 desperate teams. At that point, tag him. Why pay him? Yeah, at that point, just tag him. The reason would be to do the shorter term contract is so you could trade him in the future, but also so you could make it the smallest possible cap it. So let's say you sign them to a three year deal.

It's really like two years of guaranteed money. And the first year's cap hit is like $14 million. And everyone's like, oh, they paid him $47 million a year. But it's really $14 million for that year. So they can go out, they can get the top guard, top defensive tackle. And then you stress the window out a little more so if you only win eight games the next season you trade him for a second round pick and then move on to mccarthy i totally get that i do but cash matters and a three-year deal for sam

is going to be a lot of cash and that's still cash they have to put up it's a signing bonus you're right it can be spread out cap wise you can make it all work but this is still a wolf team that and wolf ownership with a front office and a team that has a lot of cap space going into next year. They have a lot of money to spend. If they intend to be spenders, how much of it are they going to put on the quarterback? If in your scenario, like you're saying, they want to keep him for next year with the possibility of trading him, just tag him and see if another team wants to trade for him right away and come pay you for it and then you maybe even get some draft pick compensation for it depending on how desperate a team wants to be if you're selling high on him which it might be after this year so i think the

tag would would make a lot of sense and i just think the cash matters i think fans don't understand that that and we get it like these teams have so much money to spend. They have to put guaranteed money generally, if we believe the funding rule with the PA. They have to put money into escrow if they're guaranteeing it. Yeah, that might not be a real thing. So maybe teams might just be using that to get out of paying a lot of big guarantees. But they're still spilling money over the bar for a lot of these teams or a lot of these players. And that cash still matters in terms of how much an ownership wants to show out gifting is hard but here's a hint give the gift of connection from us cellular not sure what that

means here's a slightly more specific hint you can choose four free phones and get four lines for 90 a month from us cellular your family wants new phones how do we know they told us the good news is that compared to wrapping presents you are great at getting hints so take a hint and get them four free phones and four lines for 90 a month us cellular built for us what i would say is the last time this team had chances real chances to win the super bowl they went out and paid the most guaranteed money to any quarterback ever in kirk cousins at that time and well a lot of different salary cap situation it's true but there's also a lot more cash flow coming into the nfl i mean billionaires in america are struggling so there's a GoFundMe set up for them. Uh, but my understanding, my understanding is that,

uh, they're doing okay. As far as, uh, Netflix is getting involved. We'll see if the streaming actually works on Christmas day, but I don't think there's going to be less cash coming into the NFL. Uh, so they could work something out that way. My, my point to kind of draw back to it is that what you have here to work with is at least a four game sample, if not five or six or seven game sample on Sam Darnold versus only great teams in only big moments. So this whole thing will matter. But for me, if you got past the hard, one of the hardest parts of it, which would be Seattle, Green Bay and Detroit, and this guy played well enough to beat those teams, then we have a now sample going back to the end of 2022 of this guy just playing elite football among all quarterbacks in the NFL. And I look around the league and I go, I don't know,

people said that the Eagles couldn't do anything if they pay Jalen hurts, but they're probably the best team in the NFC. And Jared Goff has been paid from the lions during this entire rebuild. And I, Seattle, they paid their quarterback, Tampa Bay paid their quarterback. It's, it's not impossible to, to run it back and take another shot. And just before we get more into the game here, are we like sure that JJ McCarthy is just a great quarterback? I mean, I was impressed and you were impressed in training camp, but I mean, the history of these quarterbacks still is a 50,

50 split and KOC quarterback whisper. I get it. It's all true. At the same time, we don't know for sure if that's a Super Bowl caliber quarterback. I would prefer to see another year of Sam Darnold

before I decide. Yeah, then again, if that's the case, I would tag him. I think that's the prudent move. I also think the prudent move if I'm Casey is to tell Kevin to do it again.

I know Kevin probably doesn't want to hear that. I'm sure he's tired of raising up these quarterbacks just to see him walk out the door however we drafted J.J. McCarthy do it again because that's that's how you pay Christian Darisaw that's how you pay Justin Jefferson that's how you tell Brian Flores you don't need to take all those head coaching interviews you will pay you whatever you want plus we'll pay your defense whatever it wants well that can't happen as Mike Zimmer would know. If you're paying a quarterback what he's worth, market value, it doesn't always work that way. So I don't think you can pay everybody. You mentioned all these teams, Detroit and Philly especially, they draft incredibly well year after

year. This team doesn't. Kevin O'Connell knows his front office doesn't draft that well and hasn't at least those first two years. So we'll see what happens from here on out, but they don't have a ton of draft picks. Their aggressiveness in the trade market lends itself to also not having a ton of picks. So when you've got TJ Hawkinson, you might have to deal with a rookie or young quarterback stepping in on a rookie contract. So no, there is no guarantee JJ McCarthy is going to be even as good as Sam Darnold. There's no guarantee he's going to be worth the 10th overall pick, but you've got to bet on your head coach who's getting all this coach of the year discussion talk for good reason because he just got done propping Kirk up

to not to take away too much credit from Kirk, but to bring Kirk up to play some of his best football of his career before that injury to Sam Darnold, obviously playing the best football of his career right now. gotta bet on kevin to do it again and he has earned that benefit of the doubt i also watch the way sam darnold throws the football and go it's real nice i don't know man that's real nice i don't know man the bills paid josh allen for throws like this and they're okay right maybe your quarterback is just so good that you'll keep winning uh are we sure he's josh allen are we if it's not we're asking are we sure about things are we sure he's like that feels like a he made one throw that was josh allen like no he's made

he's made a few 12 throws in terms of the mobility the touchdown to jefferson was this type of josh allen throw where you dodge multiple people throw off platform like that he's made beautiful throws while standing on platform but that that's the kind of special throw i'm talking about the way i would put it is josh allen is a dan marino a john elway a peyton manning a tom brady like he's you could put him in the Hall of Fame right now where I think Sam Darnold has been this year would be more in the Philip Rivers, Eli Manning type of range where he has been elite ish. He not astounding all time great performance, which I don't know how many Eli Manning ever had in his career, but it was always your team is in the playoffs. You're one of the top quarterbacks in the league. If the guy's got a good defense and good receivers, then he can take you into the playoffs and potentially get hot. Joe Flacco in his prime. It's not the A1 all-time Terry

Bradshaw, Johnny Unitas. That's where Josh Allen's going down. So when you compare anybody to him, but has it been a Roethlisberger-esque type of performance for this year where he's throwing the ball, making great plays, there's some mistakes mixed in, your defense is good, your coaching is really good good and your receivers are really good. And that helps you. I mean, that's kind of where I would, I would put them. I look at the other quarterbacks in the league and how they've performed this year and throw out anything

from before, but just this year. And I go, who's that much better Lamar again, all timer, Alan, all timer. What is the list over at that point? Decidedly, clearly, blatantly better than Sam Darnold this year. That's a rare error. You don't win 15 games without that. Burrow has been. But yeah, you're right. There's not too many.

Look, Burrow's incredible. His team's been losing all year long. That team is butt. It's real bad. I have flashbacks about big stats when losing. That's fine. I'm not going to compare him to Kirk. Not saying he should be benched. You can't compare Burrow to Kirk.

You know what it reminds me of is Breeze when they had those those like 32nd ranked defenses for three years and won seven games. Phillip Rivers too. Burrow is incredible. But is it wildly better than Sam Darnold? I don't know. Like if it has been. That's that's the whole point. When you get into that echelon and you're the third draft pick

and you have those physical talents, those throws that he makes where Jefferson's not even in the screen and he whips it to a spot and he gets it or that out route from Jordan Addison or the 97-yard touchdown where it looks like he'd even try to throw it that hard. I mean, these are things that truly fantastic quarterbacks have physically that is hard to replace in the 97 yarder. I remember afterward, somebody, I can't remember who it was. Somebody had mentioned after that throw, Sam came back and said, that wasn't even the hardest. He said, I'm glad I didn't throw it the hardest I could have. Cause then I would have overshot him like

what that wasn't even the hardest you could throw that football. Yeah. There's some of the stuff he's done is just incredible. And the fact we are having this conversation about him in December next to all these names, it speaks to Sam's talent. It speaks to Sam's growth and development and why people shouldn't hold too much against him from what he's done before. But it also speaks to Kevin O'Connell and it speaks to this offense. He wouldn't be the same quarterback right now if he were doing this in, in Las Vegas, he wouldn't be the same quarterback. If you're doing this in Jacksonville, Carolina, any number of places that were these QBs just go to die, their careers die. So I think it is, it speaks to all that we did the last podcast. We did that pie chart of like, how much credit would you give? Who, when you have so many places to give credit,

it lends itself to not overpaying the one person the one person gets my biggest piece of the pie because he's the one throwing it so anyway uh well that will complicate things for them even further but we've probably gone past go as far as this being complicated and just to finish the point and move on to Seattle. We're on to Seattle. I will say that your points are very valid when it comes to this and the circumstances that they've created for him to be able to be at this point and the money that they've spent to be able to be at this point. And recreating that year to year is difficult because grunard has been injured in the past van ginkle's been injured in the past so is cashman all these guys are having career

years the vikings haven't been penalized very much which has come up a few times like there's been some things health-wise you need sometimes more to overcome uh than what they have this year. Anyway, the Seattle Seahawks, your thoughts? Yeah. Speaking of Sam Darnold, I feel like this is the kind of game where he could show that next step. And we've all heard kind of one of the next steps the Vikings want out of Sam as being more of that field general, the guy who can see everything before it happens, the guy who can fully anticipate not just in route patterns, but in pressures up front and where we've seen the Vikings struggle on offense especially recently I think Jonathan Gannon threw some blitzes at them that they weren't really prepared for and then trying to remember which other game recently it happened on but there's just been some times where

like blitzes have gotten the best of them and they have not been able to uh up front idea it and that does at times fall on the quarterback. As much as we talk about Garrett Bradbury and how good he is, he is crouched over, hunched over a football. He can't see everything. The quarterback needs to adjust things, needs to move people if that's necessary. The Seahawks, with Mike McDonald running that defense, coming from Baltimore, run a pressure-based system.

They like to do a lot of unorthodox, weird blitz stuff. The Vikings saw a similar form of that in Tennessee, where Denard Wilson, the former secondary coach in Baltimore, runs their defense. That was the game where the 47-yard, some 50-yard touchdown to Addison or big play to Addison, where they dropped Jeffrey Simmons and they blitzed two corners. And I remember O'Connell after the game crediting Josh Oliver for seeing a corner blitz and kind of giving Sam that extra second to throw that long ball. This is the kind of game it's going to be where the Seattle is just going to throw you junk and you're going to have to see if you can hit it. Um, and, and that's just going to be something

where the Vikings haven't always done the best job at doing that. So I imagine McDonald watches the film with this offense and thinks, you know what, we're going to catch him by surprise here with a few things. Cause that's what teams have done before the number one thing that sam darnold has done better over the last seven wins in a row well six of them is not turned the ball over since jacksonville so is that six wins since Jacksonville or five, whatever, doesn't matter how many ever wins. It's been a while that he has not turned the ball over.

He, when he's gotten sacked, he's held onto the football, hasn't fumbled. He has not thrown it into traffic and it's not luck. That's why we have the turnover worthy place that he has not had a lot of, Oh, well that corner just dropped it.

Like Harrison Smith dropping a probably pick six last week from Caleb Williams doesn't go in as an INT but it was an INT we haven't seen many of those I don't remember many instances where I went oh Sam you got away with one bro he has been very very sharp at protecting the football checking down to Aaron Jones underneath when he's got opportunities, working TJ Hawkinson, which I'd like to see earlier in the game. I think you can run against the Seattle team as well, get them moving, catch them on some blitzes or some unique looks

and break off some runs like they did last week. Lean on that, man. A little heavier earlier in the game than they did because it was succeeding against Chicago. But this is a game against a team that has some pick sixes and has taken the ball away. a little heavier earlier in the game than they did because it was succeeding against Chicago. But this is a game against the team that has some pick sixes and has taken the ball away. And they have players to get strip sacks. They have corners who can catch the football and make plays on the ball. They have some linebackers who've emerged as playmakers, and they got a lot of stuff to work with. And if you protect the ball and hit on a few shots,

I mean, I think that you can win this game but i think it's the best test that they faced in a while for does sam avoid turnovers yeah there's a reason why green bay just ran over seattle and it's not just because they're the better team but they obviously in the healthier team which they are but green bay obviously runs more than anybody in the first quarter they just establish it josh Josh Jacobs, you saw the graphic, has the most touches in the first quarter of anybody, and he was great to start that game out against Seattle. If I'm the Vikings, I'm watching that and saying, let's just do that with Aaron Jones. Let's just try to replicate that. Let's try to get Sam comfortable, not turn the ball over against a team that tries to be very opportunistic and take it

away and kind of get into a rhythm that way. Try to treat this like a game where you want 10 plus play drives, even though that typically a Kevin O'Connell likes to hunt those 50 yard touchdowns, try to maybe not take so many chances. Cause yeah, you have to expect them. Like I said, you have to expect them to throw a lot of blitzes at you, a lot of weird stuff, but also they're going to try and jump routes. They're going to try and do things. And I do expect this offensive coaching staff to look for ways to take advantage of that double moves, max protection kind of stuff,

but you got to be pretty picky and choosy about it. If you go out there like you did Atlanta event in that Atlanta game and just start slinging it around, we might be seeing the ball run the other way. Let's just talk about some players that are on our minds going into this game. Just a random guys who could be very interesting for this. And even, uh, down the stretch as well. I was thinking a lot about their big personnel and Josh Oliver on the offensive side, watching back the Chicago game and going, I admit this guy is a tackle. He's an offensive

tackle. Like I, if, if everyone got hurt a tackle and he had to play offensive tackle he'd be fine i i truly i truly i have never seen a tight end block this well in this era i mean you go back and they're 280 pounds and like that basically is a tackle but for a guy to be assigned in run blocking one-on-one with edge rushers and eliminate them from plays and move them out of plays to give Aaron Jones running ability. This is a player that other teams just don't have and don't know what to do with. And I, and that was a major advantage.

And I would like to see them just keep sticking with these two tight end sets. Yeah. Unfortunately for Josh, he's been in two spots where they've known exactly what to do with them. Cause he came from Baltimore where he established himself as the best run blocking tight end and football. And they, they pay him 7 million to come over here. And you hear that in March and you're like, okay, you paid 7 million for a run blocking tight end. And then you see them and then you see what he can do. And then you see, you can catch the ball too. The guy had, you know, a stretch there was 150 plus yards over three games. Uh, when TJ was coming back, he can do. And then you see he can catch the ball, too. The guy had a stretch there where it was 150-plus yards over three games

when TJ was coming back. He can be a weapon for them. They just don't need it because they have so many different weapons. So Oliver's a big one when we talk about establishing this run game. Helping out the guards is huge because, as you mentioned, he's somebody who can take on an end and allow the tackle then to block down and allow them to kind of double up and not always have Garrett have to go one way or the other. He can chase a linebacker. So they've got setups where Josh will replicate the tackle position and that you can't do that with everybody. You're not

doing that with Johnny month all the time. You're probably not doing that with TJ Hawkinson all the time, even though he too is capable of doing that, but he's got such a big role in the passing game. So they're probably going to go heavy. I imagine it'll be a lot of CJ Ham, maybe the two tight end sets to establish that running game because Aaron Jones is going to be one of the talk about people that we should be talking about. He is going to be one of the closers they need for this regular season. Aaron had five straight games with a hundred yards last year for the Packers to end their season. He was a huge reason why they had success in the postseason. The Vikings need Aaron healthy and they need him running as well as he's done against the Bears those two times. Who do you want to pick? You

want a guy? Talk about a guy. Well, Aaron was one, but honestly, when I'm thinking about this, it's not even a guy who's going to be out there. It's Ivan Pace. I'm thinking about how well or not well they've done without him against the run and how much because O'Connell mentioned something this week where he said you know maybe his return would have been sooner than we expected meaning that I think they probably reading between the lines it seems like he could have been out here this week but he's on IR so they can't bring him back yet they need him that he is so key to their blitz packages. He's so key to their run stopping. When they've been able to be at their best, they force teams into third and longs and throw them

all those curves in the pressure packages that they do. And you just haven't seen as much of that consistency or stability. I don't think Chicago is a great test of it, but DeAndre Swift still went for 80 some yards. And if they had run him even more, it might've been worse. DJ Moore had some good runs on them as well. Teams that can attack the perimeter and run the football are kind of a good matchup for this Vikings defense. I don't think Seattle can do that that well, but when Ivan Pace comes back after this game, they're going to need him fully healthy and ready because those two final games are going to be huge. So to me, that's the guy I think about because this defense is probably going to have to play just one more game without him. Yeah, it's enormous for him and Cashman. I almost think that they could make up

for anybody except them and Grenard. Grenard just takes on such a huge role. And what Brian Flores did with him last week after watching the tape back, he kept dropping him back in coverage and Caleb Williams had no idea what to do. And then when he did rush, their tackle had no idea what to do. It was one of the most dominant games you'll see in the NFL played by Grenard. The last guy that's on my mind is just Dallas Turner. And over these last few weeks, what you're seeing is the flashes that you didn't see earlier in the season. You're seeing a sickening pass rush move to go destroy Caleb Williams. You're seeing last week, he dropped back in coverage and tracked down a guy from behind where it would have been an explosive play because no one else was really around and he just chases them down or the hit on

Kirk cousins or setting the edge against Kyle pits. Like each week, there's a little more and a little more. And if you can get to the point in these next three games where you are very confident with him in the game as a difference maker, that would be like finding found money from what this defense had before. Yeah, it'd be a nice dollar in the couch cushion or something that they haven't had because you do seem to see a change from him just in terms of confidence, in terms of feeling like he has figured it out. I think it was after the Falcons game. He said that he said, I feel like I am figuring it out now. And that's when we talked to Flores and he mentioned the one on one meetings with him and all that. It just seems like he's he's not as to week. Before, he just didn't seem like a guy you wanted to approach at his locker on a Monday, Tuesday, or Wednesday or whatever. Now he seems more part of the group, more comfortable, and you see that comfort on the

field. When he is comfortable, the athleticism shows. You see why they drafted him. Another play he made, it was in that Falcons game. He chased down a run from the backside where it wasn't necessarily his guy, wasn't his gap. It was an effort play. And those are the kind of things that with his speed, he can be a game changer and somebody who really makes a difference. Even if you think about Chicago, him chasing down the kick returner on special teams. That's right. DeAndre Carter, yep. He is super fast. And I think he has had the right attitude for this year of how to soak it all in and understand.

Eventually, it seems. I don't know if he didn't before, but I don't know. Flores seemed to talk about how this guy needed a little bit of an adjustment, and they seem like they've gotten him into one. Yeah, I mean, I'm sure it's incredibly hard. You get drafted as the first rounder, and every single first round pick expects to just come in and be a star of their team,

because that's how you get talked about by the whole world if mel kuiper went on tv and was like they're going to need to slowly develop this guy and uh so check in in about a year i mean he wouldn't have a job right they would just fire him on the spot every guy is going to change every organization and they're told that and they're pumped up and they get huge money right off the bat sometimes it takes learning and that's where they're really tested i think because we've seen other top draft picks uh come in and never get it and just never understand this is how stuff works and i think he's done a good job of getting it and to be fair to dallas his role was taken away from him he started the year in like a 50 role and then that just kind of evaporated. So clearly they didn't like what they saw in that small sample size early on

and pivoted to other guys. And I think Pat Jones' emergence right away played a big part in that as well. But to Dallas' credit, I think it wasn't just like he came in surly because he wasn't involved right away. It's been up and down for him. He was part of the plan, then he wasn't, and now he is. And so I think riding those waves and being patient has helped Dallas, and certainly it should help Vikings fans with that first round

pick. Do you think they win the football game? I think they do, because this isn't Russell Wilson Seahawks. As you mentioned, this isn't the 12th field. I don't think Lumen Field is going to illuminate too much for Seattle. So I do. I think they win this game. I think Sam Darnold, this offense, has enough answers for Mike McDonald. I think they run the ball a lot. And I think this Seahawks offense continues to look as disconnected as it has recently.

They scored 13 points against the Packers, 6 or 16 or something like that against Arizona the week before. It wasn't a whole lot. They're just not living up to the talent they've got. And Ken Walker, Zach Charbonnet, both missing practice time this week at running back. Uh, they're banged up. So I think the Vikings, uh, take this win and go into green Bay at a 13 and two, which is incredible. I've been feeling like picking a loss here just cause they haven't had one in so long. And there's a little bit of mess around and find out to some of the recent mistakes that they've made that they might need a little

splash of cold water uh on some of those things just the you know the penalties on the offensive line and some of the mistakes that that they've made and often stagnating at times early in first quarters of games stuff like that. But I don't think there is good. I don't think there is good of a football team as the Vikings. I definitely don't think there's well coached as the Vikings, which usually is a pretty good edge. I'm kind of, I'm close on this one. I've wanted to pick Seattle. I don't know. The Vikings should win the game, but I just have a... Sounds like you can't do it. They're not as good.

They're not. But it feels like one of those, if I was a gambler and I'm trying to figure out, like, oh, they came off Monday Night Football and, you know, they've won a lot of these games against teams.

Maybe Seattle's desperate. The Vikings just made the playoffs. I don't know. Just, who knows? Dare I say it's a coin flip all right well uh I'll just uh the picks don't matter that's why we do them at the end of the show if it mattered and I thought I was good at it we would just spend the whole show talking about it so I'll still I'll just say Seattle by one oh who's negative who's negative now? I know. Now I got to leave.

Wow. Actually, I'm going to do that. So thanks, everybody, for watching slash listening. Don't ever take the pick seriously. And we will catch you very soon. Football. Football.