Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Would you bet the Vikings' over on their win total?

Episode Date: May 11, 2023

Drew Dinsick of NBC Sports Bet joins Matthew Coller to talk about whether he's buying the over on next year's win total. Plus Drew drops a hot take on who he thinks a longshot for Vikings quarterback of the future could be and discusses whether Jordan Addison can win rookie of the year Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

And at the point of time where it's been a while since we've gotten to actually talk about meaningful football. So I'm really excited to dive into some Vikings talk here. This is going to be fun. Yeah, I know. There's sort of like a refreshing time right after the draft where you're reminded that they actually do play football games and they put the teams out on there. We don't all have to watch YouTube highlights of whatever guy that our teams might draft and so forth, and we can all move forward with our lives.

The schedule's coming out. It's very exciting. OTAs are happening. Come on. Football's right around the corner. So I've made up a bunch of Vikings bets, and I want you to explain them to me because you are my kind of go to guy for anything related to gambling because I don't understand it at all. But I want to I want to start with this, just the broad how we should look at what Vegas and I like finger quote like Vegas because it's lots of different books and things like that. But the general overarching, like, how should we use that information? Because in my analysis slash reporting,

the way that I've tried to use it is like, here's what everyone else thinks of your team. It's not, it doesn't have to come true, but that's kind of just a barometer of, it's not just us being too close to it, looking too close to it. Here's kind of what the outside world thinks. Like, how should I be using this? Yeah, so if you're a fan, even if you're kind of very well connected and closely covering a team, it's impossible not to get caught up in recency bias and results-based analysis, right? What's our record? What happened last week?

How are our guys performing? The first thing that comes to mind is what did we just see on Sunday? Right. And so, uh, you know, it's, it's pretty common that the, you know, the, the, what you hear and what is talked about at sort of the, the most basic level, um, isn't entirely in tune with, uh, you know, what is predictive and what is, you know, a fair projection for a team, a player, uh, you know, an organization. Um, and so, you know, it's, I, you know, I think it's instructive. It's useful to look at the way, um, you know, the, the, the, uh, numbers and you can say Vegas, you can say the market, it doesn't really matter. Ultimately it's all the same, you know, whatever sort of the, um, uh, the group, uh, you know, group think about a team, uh, you know, whatever sort of the the group, you know, group think about a team, you know, that's pretty instructive in terms of like what's a baseline expectation for a given team, terms of fans and you know kind of people who

are close to the organization uh really got divorced from the way that the vikings were being power rated uh just in the in you know in the blind um and you know you can you can definitely point to specific games where it was like well you know the people who believed in them were right you know they got the way it wasn't pretty, but they got it. And then you can point to other examples where it's like, man, they went off as this point, many points favorites against that team really like no way. Um, you know, so it's, it, you know, it's useful in my mind, at least just to know, um, you know, what the, uh, over, you know, what the, the, the people who are putting skin in the game, the people who are making wagers at a high level, what are,

what is their opinion of this team? Because that synthesizes much more some of the predictive nature of, of how to come up with a fair price for a team on a given game, you know, given against a given opponent or over the balance of the season. And so, you know, when you look at, you know, certain odds, it, I would definitely keep a couple things in mind. Where are you looking, right? If you're just looking at DraftKings or FanDuel, they're probably copping their price from someone else.

You know, they're not really inclined to take a ton of sharp action. So, you know, if there's, you know, a player out there with a long track record of winning, betting the NFL, and he's betting 50, 100 K a pop. He's not doing a tracking as a fan door. Right. And so, you know, for the most part, you know, you kind of need to know where to look to get a little bit of where the market makers are making their opinions known. And then, you know, even beyond that, it's it's pretty obvious, at least in my experience that the market's not always right.

Like it's not the answer key, but it's a good indicator of where sort of the middle is. What's the median expectation for a team in a given game or a given, a given season. And so, you know, I think that's kind of the key as you look at win totals, it's the key as you look at your, you're going to hear in the next 48 hours, the schedule's coming out. Oh, here's the lines and all the games, blah, blah, blah. OK, here in May, there's a lot and there's a lot of noise in that.

Right. The numbers are going to move a lot between now and we get to like the beginning of training camp. And then that's even divorced from what the numbers will be once we get to actual week-by-week spreads. It's really not common for people to get down huge positions on anything because of injuries, because of the dynamic nature of the NFL market. If a line pops and it's like, can you believe the Vikings are three point dogs at home to the Eagles week three? Well, I mean, you know, there are so many things that can happen between now and week three, even that, you know, that that's not really telling you much. So, you know, in some cases, super predictive, super valuable, huge part of the conversation. And in others, you just have to take the you know, take the information and uh you know kind of with uh with the right context one of the funniest things that happened last year that

i had never seen happen before was vikings fans getting angry at betting lines uh because the betting line does not play strong safety uh you are allowed to win the game like it doesn't make it doesn't mean you lost like oh well oh, well, we're underdogs. Dallas, like, well, you have to play. Your team is not impacted by this. But it was an interesting study, though, in getting that outside viewpoint of like, no one is believing this. And I think that that was worth a lot of discussion last year because it was the one score games.

It was like every single indicator we use to find out if a team is for real, they were going against it. It was only the wins that were coming week after week. But then when you look at the second half of the season, they need a massive comeback against the Colts. They get smacked by the Packers. They were much more of that average team. They barely escaped with a long field goal against the Giants and, of course, lost in the playoffs. So what everyone was saying about them through the first half of the season, all the indicators, all the people that spend their time kind of looking at all the predictive types of things, all saw the same thing that eventually did come to fruition. So I thought that that was an interesting study, and it doesn't always happen. A team could luck their way all the way to the Super Bowl.

That has absolutely happened before. But I thought that last year was a great example of how we can use it, what it can tell us. And maybe what it would tell us is just your team needed more changes or what, you know, maybe even though they got away with some things in the previous offseason, they didn't actually have the right process because they were never that good to begin with or whatever it might be. So I like to use it as an information source to tell me something that is from the outside world.

And I think that it did a great job of doing that last year. Yeah, I think that's well said. And I think you can point to specific games where people were probably like, we should be getting more credit. We have double digit wins. How come Vegas thinks we should be two point dogs on the road at Detroit? Well, you didn't cover, you didn't win.

So they were right. And even in that, they were probably not adjusting you down enough. They got bet against pretty aggressively down the stretch. And if you look at what an opening price is to what a price closes at, and you look at ones that were getting kind of relative aggressive moves against them,

that's telling you that there's somebody out there who's skinning the game, taking strong positions against a given team. And I saw a lot of pretty heavy action down the stretch against the Vikings. And yeah, you know, up until ultimately beating the Bears week 17, you know, they didn't cover any of those final four, you know, those final five games.

And then of course, as three point favorites against the Giants in the playoffs, this, you know, didn't, didn't manifest a, you know, a trip to round two. So yeah, it was, it was pretty interesting the way that the Vikings got that last year. And, you know, as we step, you know, I don't want to step on the overarching prep in the conversation here and get too far ahead of ourselves. But almost certainly the fact that the advanced statistics would tell you

this was much more like an eight and a half, nine win team and that 13 wins was overperforming, you know, that gets baked into the next year's win total. And so you see a win total go up like eight and a half and you scratch your head and be like, how in the world did they, we went 13 games last year. Now you're going to put eight and a half up there. This is an easy smash to the over. Well, I can tell you there's probably already

some decent bets that have been made on the under. People definitely use that, you know, kind of as more of a signal. And I'm starting to feel like we're at the point now where this has gotten so beaten to death and we've oversold the Vikings a little bit that I'm going to be a Vikings bull on this show and really throughout the entire preseason. Okay, well, let's go down that road then, because I wanted to start with some of the obvious sort of bigger picture ones and then maybe get a little more ridiculous as

we went along. And one thing that is hard, though, for someone like yourself to try to predict this is that things can still happen in this off season i don't know that delvin cook maybe being released or traded would move your opinion at all but daniel hunter might and zedarius smith might because then you go from being an elite pass rushing team i saw mike clay of espn had them as the top duo of defensive ends which i think is fair they were both in the top 10 by PFF and pressures last year. But if both are not here, then that who's rushing the passer like Marcus Davenport, who plays 500 snaps a year. Right. I mean, I think that this is a big challenge because you I can see why you're bullish on them because they're bullish because i forget what bullish and bearish are but um

so you know what i mean uh i can see why you would look at them and say oh maybe we've overdone they were frauds and maybe we've overdone the look at those lions and bears type of thing so i feel you on that but if you're trying to get in now on the numbers that just came out I think it's a little tricky for an over-under. Oh, yeah. And I think that's entirely a fair point. I definitely don't lock up capital in May on football. Limits are a little bit lower. So if I want a decent-sized stake on anything that I'm going to really plant my flag in for a regular season, I tend to wait until closer to, you know, week one. And in general, my philosophy for preseason betting is I don't want to,

I don't want to bet something that's around a coin flip. Like I want something that's going to have a little bit more meat on the bone. Like give me like, you know, $100 to win 5,000 type of stuff. Like there's, there's not really a ton of interest in for, for me, at least in, in getting, you know super over your skis and like you know vikings over or under eight and a half wins this year um and your point is very fair like not only will there still be roster uh you know roster shuffling um but you know pre-season injuries tend to shape these markets as well and while i don't think you're looking

at a very high risk with the kind of the current Viking squad and who matters, you know, you still really don't know about that. But yeah, it's fascinating to hear you talk about the edge depth in particular, because it's clearly the strength of the defense as rostered. And, you know, I would, I would be very, very inclined if they make a move to hear an explanation as to why. Like, what is this ultimately providing to you in terms of roster building flexibility that you have to have going forward? Like if you're going to cut, you know, or, you know, if you're going to move on and try to save cap and then roll that immediately into like a Justin Jefferson long term deal or something like, OK, like, no, no complaints. Like that's that makes total sense to me here. So but at the same time, if you're literally like, well,

we need to do this because we don't know what we're going to do with the quarterback next season. My answer would be, guess you just thought about that last off season, like really, and truly, you know, take, taking the keys of the franchise like this, like you had a tough decision to make about what to do. And you took this path and you can't kind of, kind of compound errors if you think you now want a different path. So it's going to be a real interesting test for this front office this season, particularly if, you know, just variance bounces against them in the opposite way that last year bounced in their favor.

Yeah, a few things on that. One is so you guys wanted Bryce Young, according to Tom uh tom pelissero to which i responded i wanted a magical pony to ride to the stadium as well but it was never going to happen but but if only we could figure out how the team got the number one pick how was it was it by winning uh you know having a mediocre team and winning just enough games to lose in the first round was is that how you get bryce young i'm just just baffled to figure that one out. And I can't figure out why that would be let out there. Like, is that to say to Kirk, like, we'll replace you.

You should sign your extension. Or is it like, Kirk, please demand a trade. We would just want, we want to tank this year. I can't really tell why they would have interest in putting that out there. Also, as far as the, but I don't want to stray from your question about the defensive line, because are you a chess player? Do you ever play chess? Of course. Yeah. Okay. So, you know, so you know what forced moves are, right? Sure.

Like you only have one move. You have to do it. That's what this is. Like Daniil Hunter is a forced move. They want Daniil Hunter. They want him to play football. But if he doesn't sign a long-term contract extension, how can you let him play out this year and forego a potential first-round pick from a desperate team? I mean, look what Bradley Chubb got last year in the trademark. Trading for stars, right? I mean, Jamal Adams, Tyree Kill. Like, if you're trading for stars, you get a lot for stars.

So you kind of have to do that. And also the Zedarius thing is just flat out weird. I mean, he signs a two-year contract and then he doesn't want that contract anymore. But I think that's to do with the cashflow versus other players that performed like him, but the Vikings can't really do anything about it. So it might also be a forced move. in that case though like now you're rebuilding now this if you lose those guys that's rebuilding that's not really competing for this year especially when you play mahomes burrow the eagles the 49ers and that's where this is this is a situation that would affect how i'd feel about the the over under part but if i gave you a thousand

dollars of my money and i said go ahead put it put it, put it over or under, what would you do right now? Right. Right this minute, I have to play over eight and a half. And the reason is not especially complicated. You stand back and you look at the macro environment in the NFL right now. And number one, offense is predictable. Defense is not. Number two, the AFC is absolutely stacked with talent. And the NFC is not, particularly at the quarterback position. You have a quarterback that is effective enough to get you to, you know, at or above average in terms of offense this year.

You have a top five offensive line. You have a top five receiving core. You have decent support from your running game. You have an offensive minded coach who presumably in year two can take a step forward in terms of concepts, in terms of efficiency. So you're going to be in every game. You're going to be able to score your weaknesses. As I look at this roster, are you have a young, a little bit inexperienced, maybe not a great secondary. And then your run stop looks like potentially a problem.

Now, if your pass rush is as intact as it is today, if you have a lead in a game, you can let those guys pin their ear backs, pin their ears back, and you should be able to, you know, take those leads into the, you know, with your good offensive line and complimentary running game. And with, you know, the pass rush, you should be able your good offensive line and complimentary running game and with, you know, the pass rush, you should be able to put away leads and get wins. And then, you know, the one weakness of, you know, as long as your run D is like above

sort of a minimum, you know, Mendoza line sort of kind of concept, like as long as you aren't like you can't get on the field because you can't you can't get off. You can't you can't force a punt or force a field goal. You know, as long as the other team can't play keep away, then you should be able to have comeback opportunities in games. And you have, you know, the weapons in the passing game to be able to do that. So I think as I look at this team, it looks to me like, you know, a little bit above an average NFL team because of the strength of the offense. Defense, again, not being as predictable that that unit may mature, mature into a good defense or they may ultimately, you know, need still a ton of investment to be, you know, above average. But guess what? If you're an average or above average team this year in the nfc you're in like the top four like the rest of the nfc looks so so so weak that you're gonna just stockpile wins and uh you

know there's sort of this promise of the future in chicago and detroit and green bay that really has never you know you're you're banking on hope uh in a lot those cases. And there's some weaknesses. There's questions on the rosters. There's questions about sort of what those teams did in their offseason in terms of becoming more competitive, really. I mean, outside the Bears. Like, the Bears were so weak last year. Like, adding any warm bodies was going to make that team better.

But at the same time, there's still huge issues with that defense. And I would put the Vikings offense and the Bears offense side by side and tell you that there is a meaningful gap and the Vikings are better. So, you know, I think realistically that, you know, you're the Vikings still clearly the class of the NFC North. And for that reason, they should be, you know, pretty clearly, in my opinion in my opinion, able to get to nine wins, even if their variance is against them. Yeah. So I've been working on just getting ready for the schedule release and trying to figure out because, of course, I'm going to go live, pick all the games. What else is there to do? And that's always a fun time and everything else. But I've been, you know, so I've been going through looking at like, and maybe how the schedule plays out will matter a little.

I remember last year it impacted how I felt. Won the game in Miami that I thought that they would lose because they played their second and third string quarterback for the Dolphins. But, you know, that would impact like where you're going and on the road and stuff like that. And so, you know, I don't know for sure where I'm going to go, but I keep landing on nine or 10 and debating a few games and whatever with myself. And I just feel so boring for doing it. I just like, it's like I gave them a B grade for the draft. Great. Like that's a hot one. And then, you know, I'm'm gonna say that they're a nine win team

like come on give me something but i also feel like that's probably the right way to go with this team because it's hard to make an argument you look at the uh the way detroit match up with them last year for one detroit should have won the first game then really crushed them offensively in the second game detroit has built up their defense. They've really built up their secondary, which there's a funny stat about Kirk Cousins. He has like 117 quarterback ratings career against the Lions, 23 touchdowns, two picks in his career against the Lions. It's absurd, but I think that's over. Like they signed really good players in the secondary. They've drafted defense. I think that this matters a lot so I can buy everything that

they're selling they brought back their offensive coordinator and look like Gibbs is going to play and he's going to catch footballs and run with them and like he'll impact their offense it wasn't the best draft decision but that's a player who can help them right away so it's hard to convince me that the Lions aren't better but yet is it so much better that a few things couldn't go wrong for them and the Vikings end up at the top of the division? Like, I can absolutely see that. And I just can't really buy into Chicago or Green Bay as being good enough with their complete rosters and flawed quarterbacks to get to 10 or 11 wins. I completely agree with you um i think the teams as you're going through your schedule exercise um the teams that have like high-end mobile quarterbacks because again like that's kind

of the future of the nfl at least in the in the near term is um you know so many so many defenses play the too high you know safety concept and they really are like they they they asked your quarterback okay you know do the easy stuff and if you have mobility you're going to get old you're going to be able to matriculate the ball down the field and it's going to you know you're going to have success on offense um and uh but we're not going to let you beat us over the top we're not going to you know let you just you know pick us apart 15 20 yards down the field unless you are like the, you know, an elite level passer. And as I kind of look at the teams and their schedule,

like if you go up against, you know, a team that has a quarterback that can make it happen on the ground and just in general, like a good run game conceptually, now I'm a little nervous. I mean, the Eagles are probably the obvious example. And people probably remember that Monday Night Football game from last year that was like really pretty much non-competitive. The Eagles are still going to frustrate this defense, even with the new concept.

The Bears may because of just fields, you know, dynamite, athleticism, you know, maybe. But again, like your pass rush should be able to get him sacked. What, seven times, six times? I mean, realistically, like you should be able to get him sacked what seven times six times i mean you know really realistically like you should be able to counter that um and then you know falcons on the schedule with one of the more dynamic running attacks just because of sort of the nature of their their uh uh you know their roster is is intriguing to me but then besides that you know there's not a lot of teams on here that I think the defense is super vulnerable against. You're going to be in games against

the Niners. You'll be in games against the Bengals and the Chargers. You'll definitely, you know, have advantages over the likes of the Buccaneers, the Saints, the Packers, in my opinion, and the Broncos. So Panthers are on your schedule too. So yeah, I mean, I can see pretty

clearly, like if you can split your Lions home and away and if you can counter whatever step forward the Bears take with fields, I think the Vikings likely win the North. And I think 10 wins is reasonable expectation. I do have a rule that I always split them with Chicago with a loss in Soldier Field. I investigated this once. They have the funniest and most bizarre history at Soldier Field. Like they lost to Chad Hutchinson once. I mean, like we did a look at this. We even looked at the Vegas lines for the games and how they performed.

And it was just so improbably bad against Chicago. It was like, what are they, banging on garbage cans and cheating somehow? Like, what is going on? And considering how bad Chicago was forever. And my first year covering the team was 2016. So I went to Chicago thinking, oh, this is going to be a bloodbath or whatever. Jordan Howard runs for 70 yards to start the game. The Vikings don't show like, what is going on?

It's been a house of horrors for them unless they play Nathan Peterman and Tim Boyle. So I'm going to probably split that one. But let's talk about some of those that are hard debates. I think Denver is a hard one to figure out because I've seen Sean Payton coach in person a number of times. He's pretty good at it. This is not Mike Zimmer's defense.

For those guys to go toe to toe. Brian Flores, I think can improve them. But with the secondary being what it is, how much can he improve them? How, how much do we buy that Russell Wilson was Nate Hackett's fault? Like all these things I think are,

are very difficult and it is going to Denver, I believe. Right. So that's a little tricky. The punts are going to fly really far. Like, I don't know. That one is a very hard one for me to pick.

Yeah, I think if the offensive line for the Vikings holds up in that game, you got them in spades, honestly. The way that Sean Payton and the Broncos conducted their offseason, to me, screamed, we're not making a long-term investment around Russell Wilson. And on top of that, maybe their defense is top five in the NFL, screamed we're not making a long-term investment around Russell Wilson. On top of that, maybe their defense is top five in the NFL, but there are huge, huge questions

about how this offense is going to get to 24 points, let alone 20 points, let alone 24. If the Vikings can find a way to get into the mid-20s in that game, I think they win. I think that'll come down to if their offensive line can keep Kirk upright because, you know, Vikings, you know,

they've got the advantage with wide receiver two, tight end, wide receiver three, running back against the rest of the squad. Other than Pat Sertain, there's a lot of ways I think you can attack that unit. Sertain Jefferson should be pretty good. Great, great mashup. Yeah, definitely. And the other one was the 49ers.

That one is so tricky to me because who is playing quarterback for the 49ers? Is it Sam Darnold? I mean, what are we supposed to even think of Trey Lance? Like how's Brock Purdy's elbow? Is Kyle Juszczyk playing quarterback? Like what is going on?

Our pets are falling off. What is happening here? I'm still going to pick against the Vikings because they always get their faces beat in by that. I don't have an answer yet. And honestly, like if there's one kind of soul searching thing that I'm going to have to do all off season, it's going to be figuring out the 49ers because Kyle Shanahan's ability to elevate a quarterback

of lesser talent to some baseline level where they can compete and win games based on defense and their rushing attack. You can't argue with it at this point. Think about last year with like geno smith

in seattle right like reclamation project guy ends up his comeback player of the year goes to the playoffs like had a chance to win the nfc west at one point and like that was a surprise would should it surprise anyone if that's like the sam Darnold arc this year under Kyle Shanahan? Probably not. I mean, he was a top three pick, right? You know, he has the pedigree from a draft standpoint, and he's going to have Debo Samuel to work with a great set of wide receivers. Christian McCaffrey is going to be well protected with the offensive line anchored by Trent Williams. So like this, the Niners to me are kind of much more a case of do they stay healthy?

Because I honestly think that this campaign that they're going through this year, they have a win-now team that's going to be quarterbacked by Sam Darnold, I believe. I think they've, if I had to guess, I think Trey Lance maybe, you know, is looking for a job and or is traded for, you know, spare parts at some point in this offseason or in the preseason. And I think Brock Purdy with the elbow surgery is not going to be ready until like December. And at that point, if Sam Donald is clicking in this offense

and they're winning games and they're at their potential, then he probably just sees the campaign to its fruition. But I don't see these guys as world beaters, certainly, the way the market does. I mean, if we weren't living in a world where the NFC was this weak and this winnable, I don't think you would see them as sort of the second choice in the Vegas market. And, you know, there's a chance that they drift a little bit in price, too, as people kind of wrap their head around, oh, wait, this is Sam Donald.

But if you have some listeners that like making some long shot bets, one of the only football bets I've made so far this season is Sam Darnold, comeback player of the year, 50-1. Again, kind of he fits the Geno Smith mold. And that market is all completely out of whack because DeMar Hamlin is like this enormous favorite, you know. I don't know that the Bills are really going to trot him out there and play much more than a handful of kind of celebratory,

like ceremonial snaps. You know, I really don't know that he's going to be, you know, utilized as a kind of player throughout the season. So I think that's a fun market to bet into. And if Kyle Shanahan does what he did with Mr. Irrelevant, except now he has, you know, the third, you know, draft pick number three talent and Sam Darnold, then why not come back player of the year at 50 to one? So something's going on with the Niners, but I think the Vikings is giving them a test. Well, obviously they're going to trade for Kirk after June 1st. Well, everything you got that then your Sam Darnold

bet won't go that well but uh that i mean it sounds like there's at least been some sort of discussion somewhere now they all know each other uh the vikings and 49ers from the rams connections they practiced against each other last year so whatever that combine buzz was about them asking about trey lance or asking about kirk i don't know how much was really there, but they can trade Kirk with their salary cap situation after June 1st. So I am obligated to say that now, just in case that maybe comes to fruition, which was one of the bets that I had written down to ask you about, which isn't an actual bet you can make, but this is your job to figure these things out.

That's what you're here for. Would you, would you, who would, who would you bet is the quarterback of the Vikings in 2024? Like you can just say a draft pick quarterback, Kirk, some other guy who comes from another team. Like how, how would you weigh that?

Because that is like the fundamental question that even with a season on the horizon, we are still talking about like what is going on with this quarterback situation after they passed on levis and decided to go with jordan addison and have talked to kirk about an extension but haven't gotten it done it's it's very murky you want a wild a wild one uh yeah this is so i i'll throw a little cold water on cousins to the Niners just because I think. And I mean, maybe you may know better than I do about what his contract situation status is and that. But the Niners, to me, seem like they have they're holding that they're keeping that seat warm for Brock Purdy.

Like they feel like they've stumbled upon like the diamond in the rough of all diamonds and that they're going to they're ultimately going to go to war with him in 2024. Best of luck to them i mean you know time john surgery maybe his elbows now he's the rookie of the year he's throwing the ball over the mountains or whatever but and just real quick by the way yeah in the regular season he had more turnover worthy plays of course and he did big time throws yeah just pointing that out it's it, it's more case keen on me than it was like, Oh, we found the next Brady. At least in my opinion. Right.

Couldn't agree more, but they, they seem, they, they, they seem to be prepared to go down that path. Best of luck to them. I think an interesting,

an interesting candidate for Vikings QB, because again, like, you now have Kevin O'Connell who's been through what the Rams went through, where they were like, couldn't get it done with golf. Couldn't get it done with golf. They pulled the trigger for Matt Stafford,

bring them over, uh, win a super bowl. Like, I think there, there may be a little bit of, they try to relive that history with the Rams because they have a talented enough team otherwise. Um,

and, uh, the candidate for the kind of the make the move for the quarterback is probably Kyler Murray. I think the, you know, the, the Cardinals are going to be the losing his team in football this year. I don't think this is a hot take. I mean, maybe the Colts are down there because if they go to, if they started Anthony Richardson week one and they really let him take his

lumps, it's going to take them a while to find wins. But I can see the Cardinals looking to not only, you know, lose intentionally, but like, they may not have a choice. Like it's just a very, very bad roster. And so I think realistically they're going to be in a position where they could sell Kyler Murray for a relatively low trade price and shoot, man, they may end up, you know, some team may end up kind of taking, you know, not unlike the lions did like, you know, they, they took back, you know, they, you know, they, they,

they may end up you know, doing a pretty sweet deal just to get him off the books in Arizona. If they hold the number one overall pick next year and have the likes, you know, can take a swing at Drake Mayer or Williams out of USC. So yeah, I think Kyler Murray is going to be on the move next offseason

in my opinion. I don't think they're going to try to rebuild around him considering the turnover at GM there and the fact that the Cardinals could have two top five picks in the round one next year. So I'm going to say I'm going to go with Kyler Murray. And I think I'm going to get a price on that in like the 25 to 1 range because I think you probably build out the probabilities

and it's like 50% chance they bring back Kirk Cousins. He's not old enough to think that his performance is just going to completely deteriorate anytime soon. If they make it to an NFC championship game or something this season, it's going to be very tough to let him walk out the door

instead of just giving him some sort of continue the bridge, I guess. Kirk Cousins is your favorite for QB in 2024 at like 40, 50%, I would say. Uh, and then, uh, the other 50% is, uh, wherever they land in the draft, they swing on a quarterback or they make a trade for, uh, an established vet. And, uh, I would, I would put it, uh, you know, 50% Kirk, 40% they draft a quarterback,

and then 10% that they trade for an established vet like Kyler Murray. And I don't know. I kind of think that's a decent little fit there, but we'll see. Salary cap-wise, it's a little dicey because the way they did the restructure is if Kirk leaves, they take this huge cap hit. But as Andrew Brandt will say on Twitter, if you want anything to happen in the short term you can make it happen with the salary cap so not impossible that they could figure something out maybe it's an extended trade or i don't know something could work out with

really wanted kyler murray there's ways to restructure there's ways to have the other team take some cap like you can do lots of things. I think that's really interesting. And also the one thing that this kind of bizarre report about them thinking they might be able to trade up for Bryce Young would tell you that they're not afraid of a short quarterback. That even though Kevin O'Connell, a former quarterback himself, is six foot five and towers over all of us. Good point. He does not. And they drafted jaron hall too who is like very small so they clearly are not terrified of the little guy being the quarterback i think that would be insane fun uh you know even if it blew up so i felt this way about lamar

jackson because the vikings got slightly connected to lamar jackson and my thing was like look if you're going down, go down with that guy being your quarterback. Go down with Kyler, right? With Kyler. And I buy into, to some extent, that Cliff Kingsbury was a problem, that Steve Keim was a problem, and that most quarterbacks are a product of what's around them to maximize their skills.

And I don't think Cliff Kingsbury ever really did that. But, like, lest we forget that only in 2021, three quarters of the way through the season, we're like, this dude's the MVP. He destroyed the Vikings in 2021. He had an insane game against that. And it was like, oh man, he's taking that next step and everything else.

The guy plays a little video games, tears an ACL, has a bad season, and then with a horrible roster. And all of a sudden now he's like not worth it. That's a very intriguing option. I think that I might put draft a quarterback even with Kirk Cousins at the moment just because I think that Kirk is the all-time dig-your-heels-in-to-get-the-contract-you-want guy. And if the Vikings are not giving him the years he wants he's just gonna sit on it and he's gonna be like you know what somebody else will i guarantee you

somebody paid daniel jones he's not good someone paid derrick carr that's the same exact person that's a spider-man meme i mean like yeah right so if you're kirk you're like no i'm i think what did car get like a four year 150 or something like I'm waiting for that one if I'm Kirk so I think that's very very interesting okay I love all of those thoughts yeah I mean Kyler Murray to me is like this

generation's Matt Stafford just because like he's good enough to keep you in purgatory he's a health risk always and but at the same time like you get a healthy season out of him you could win a super bowl like that's kind of his ceiling so uh yeah he'll be interesting to see if uh ultimately the you know cardinals want to build around him or if they want to try to move him next season i but uh yeah the um uh the kirk cousins points you make are very

fair i don't think he's doing team-friendly anything for anyone. And the Derek Carr contract, if that is available, boy, if you're the Vikings, I think you hard pass on being the team that signs that deal. And I guess the one thing you do have for, like, as a negotiating leverage, if you're the Vikings is a lot of the teams that will need quarterbacks next year, just drafted them. So you had four,

you had four teams in the, you know, out of 32 take a swing on a guy that they think is going to be the next, you know, they're going to give them three years to prove yay or nay if he's the next franchise QB. So we're starting to musical chairs a little in terms of running out of seats for someone to really make a bad decision. And I don't think there's really anyone in the AFC that's going to talk themselves into, well, maybe we could beat the Chiefs or the Bills or the Bengals if we bring in Kirk Cousins so you know your your pool

of available suitors for Cousins is you know is maybe the Commanders and the Rams if Stafford retires and uh yeah that would be so funny I'm running out of options, yeah. Under new ownership, he goes back to Washington. Oh, yeah, hilarious. New team name and everything. In his press conference, he says, you like that, I'm back. You know, that would just be the worst. But, no, you're right about that. Although I would say that every year we feel like, man,

it seems like every team's got it resolved. And then by November, like, oh, my God, there's 13 teams that need quarterbacks so i'm always kind of it's a great point that's keeping that in mind um the other the only other like actual serious bet i had and we can rapid fire some ridiculous ones at the end um unless you think it was ridiculous to talk about kyler murray i don't know because i think that they they have they have eyes on anybody who could potentially be available. But Jordan Addison in Rookie of the Year. I like this a lot. I think a lot of the fantasy people that maybe know what they're doing to some extent have kind of targeted this as somebody who could get a lot of footballs thrown his way.

Being a good route runner, being in a system where everyone's going to put their attention toward Justin Jefferson, a conscientious head coach of players skill sets. They're going to put him in the slot like all those things. I mean, it kind of screams to me that he could put up some numbers, but you also have quarterbacks. And if they play even halfway decent, they get rookie of the year. How do you assess that, Mark? I'm prepared to toss these QBsbs honestly um not because i have like low opinions of them but just these teams are gonna lose lose lose uh and honestly like i don't we

don't really know other than bryce young we really don't know who's gonna get thrown to the wolves week one yet these guys may sit for a little while like baker mayfield kind of deal where they come in week 10 as a rookie and they just don't have enough time to make up the ground, even if they are playing well. And so I think the quarterbacks are tosses for me. The big question is, can you beat Bijan Robinson in this market? Because, I mean, I know smart people that have made cases that he's like a bet for Offensive Player of the Year. It's a very, very, very good run offense,

very good run blocking offensive line, and a very weak schedule, weak division. But then again, like, if he's a candidate for offensive player of the year and people have kind of decided that that's your vote, vote for another rookie, right? Like, are you going to get two awards? or are we going to try to, you know, share the, share the, spread the love a little bit.

So, you know, I think Addison is in a tier with three wide receivers that you have to say are all very live. And he's probably actually maybe even just two. I would put him and Quentin Johnson at the very top of the pile for potentially producing enough in good offenses and teams that are going to win enough games, be in the mix for a playoffs that are going to get awards consideration. And so I think realistically, if you're making a bet

in the rookie of the year market, you're looking for Addison, Quentin Johnson, or you just swallow swallow your swallow swallow the uh the price and play bijan robinson right because smith the jig was just not going to get the ball enough even if he's so yeah good yeah throw it to the other guy i think they got him in part because dk metcalf signed a short-term deal and you know tyler lockett's not super young and uh they made a smart move in that but that's probably not a right now impact. The Bijan Robinson thing,

it just kind of blows my mind sometimes how with every other position, it's like, well, you know, we got to wait and see he's a rookie and we'll find out. And there's an adjustment period, everything else. If a running back is drafted high,

it's like star, superstar. He's the best, best running back ever. And it's like, do we not the best best running back ever and it's like do we not remember trent richardson or or all the other dudes who got hurt all the time that were quote generational prospects i'm not rooting against him he seems like a super fun player but it's just a weird phenomenon where if a team drafts like a defensive end it's like well you know we'll see if he can get his wingspan to match up with his quick twitch or something but with a running back it's a star he's a star everyone's drafting him number one in fantasy it's just like i don't really understand why that's so much different leonard fournette the guy wasn't even any good like he was what number four overall pick there were fifth rounders

aaron jones who were way better running backs than him i don't know i think it's the hardest position if you told me that duane mcbride ended up with more yards i'd be like i don't know maybe that's running backs yeah and i mean if if if he had landed on a team that needed that drafted running back because they've had a tough time getting the running game going like the texans was a good example like if he had landed on the texans i would have said okay let's bet this guy. But the fact that he's on the Falcons with Art Smith, and he's kind of going to slot right into a 200 carry 50 catch, 50 target at least, maybe 80. So say 60 targets, 200 rushing attempts roll.

If he's even close to what we expect and if he stays healthy, then he's going to be really, really tough to beat. Just based on production is, you know, this this this from memory, Sa who went undefeated in like seven starts and took the Ravens to the playoffs. And probably he beat Baker Mayfield, who put together, you know, not a ton of wins, but some very impressive numbers through a limited campaign. And I think there were a couple of really good wide receivers in that class too so um if you have a the quote-unquote generational guy that's just going to get volume and you know it uh they're tough to beat in these rookie of the year markets historically so that's kind of the context that i kind of look at that market with yeah i mean i think that um you the playmaker really has a better chance than the quarterback especially

since this league still beats the faces in of rookie quarterbacks. Oh yeah. And I mean, it's so funny, like Joe Burrow, there were people doing film things, breaking down. And there's only so many of them that you can trust,

but you know, breaking down, like you can see here, he can't make this throw or whatever. Then he hurts his knee. And like, oh man, this is just going to go bad.

The dude comes back and he's a freaking megastar immediately because that's life as a quarterback. You go through this train wreck of offseason and then have to learn an offense, learn to play in the NFL, learn receivers, learn coaches. You're on a horrible team. Like, it's just a mess. And then by year two, sometimes you're great, but it's hard to bet on those guys because of that.

And so I think Addison has a good chance for that reason that you could just kind of throw him in that mix. Let me give you some silly ones. Just do rapid fire here because you've got bets to make and hair to perm or whatever. So you've got things to do. But, okay, so a couple I wrote down. Over, under three and a half more years,

Kevin O'Connell is the head coach of the vikings okay i'm gonna go with over and it is um i'm assuming i'm getting even odds yeah 50 yeah sure we're not i don't even know how to do that correctly okay we'll say i get i get uh you know i gotta pick them on both sides uh here I'm going to go with over three and a half because just in general, I think the ability to win in this week NFC and kind of continue to just not really be on the hot seat because you're not producing from a wins-losses standpoint is pretty easy bet to make positively.

You have blue chip players on offensive line and wide receiver that you can continue to build around. And I think you have a front office that, you know, ultimately, they may not have made the moves that, you know, that cement this franchise as a perennial contender yet. But I've seen enough and I've seen enough pragmatism and enough, you know, kind of just, just, you know, they're letting it come to them a little bit that I think kind of later in, you know, the, the real, you know,

kind of swing years that you worry about for an over under three and a half. I think the Vikings, I believe in them to be, you know, still kind of championship aspirational, if not like knocking on the door. So I think Kevin O'Connell is going to stick around and honestly, he kind of fits the prototype and the mold of, you know, guys that are really going to be able to succeed just because he's on the offensive side of the ball. Like he's understands the concepts and, you know, somebody is going to figure out the busters for the way the defense is being

run right now. Right. Like Fangio kind of cooked up the current conceptual framework that everybody's copying. And we have yet to see anyone really come up with the busters for that. But somebody is going to. And so might as well be Kevin O'Connell with the weapons he has to work with.

So, yeah, I think I think he's going to be around for four years. And I think in general, you know, the Vikings stand out to me pretty clearly as one of the franchises that's willing to invest in other in sort of the intangibles like the training room and the like keeping everybody happy and healthy and like and just kind of in general the doing the small things right that should help you get a couple extra wins over the balance of four years so you know

that that marries pretty hand-in with kevin o'connell sticking around for the long term in my opinion yeah it is the over under number for like how long coaches usually last is like less than three years but uh that last part i think is hugely important like getting the top grade on the nflpa study i imagine their ownership was through the roof with that because they care a lot about all that stuff. Clearly, a team like Arizona doesn't since the floorboards are popping up and the Jaguars have rats or whatever. But like this is really, really important to the Vikings as a franchise owners. So it would have to be a total disaster, which is very hard to see unless Jefferson leaves. And then, you know, that's a whole other conversation. But OK, so another one that I had was Justin Jefferson last year got MVP votes over under 0.5 MVP votes that he gets again.

And part of this baked in is like, was it just kind of a novelty for last year? Because I could see him having the same statistical season, but it became kind of like a cute talking point of like, could a receiver really win MVP? You know, that kind of, that kind of thing. So, but you think that he,

that he gets at least one person is like JJ MVP. I'm going to go under. And because I think you're right. I think it was a little bit of a novelty last year in terms of why people went to the well voting for wide receiver. And also because the quarterbacks in the conversation this year like realistically should get almost all of the one through fives, right? You get another year forward, better offensive system around Justin Herbert. You got another year forward,

same offensive system around Joe Burrow. Pat Mahomes is always going to be in the mix. Josh Allen is going to be in the mix, likely. And then Jalen Hurts is probably going to win, you know, double digit games in the NFC and be your presumptive one seed. And so those five guys, I think, are going to lock up a huge lion's share of the voting block.

And then this isn't even counting if there's like a surprise, right? Like if there's a slow, wow, the Jets get the one seed in the AFC. We got to talk about our Aaron Rodgers is back in the conversation or I don't think that's going to happen. But, you know, if that did happen happen then he's going to get talked about uh and uh you know to hold your you know just don't hold your breath Vikings fans but uh you know definitely gird your loins prepare yourself just in case um the um uh so ultimately uh I don't think it has anything to do with expectation of production this year.

But, you know, because he can equal or better what he did last year. And what he did last year wasn't even like it wasn't even as statistically anomalous as like Cooper Cup the prior year from a wide receiver. So it's not like he did something we've never seen before. But I do think overall the quality of quarterback play is going to push him down the board in terms of who gets votes this year. Yeah, I think Vikings fans won't care if Aaron Rodgers wins the MVP as long as it's not for the Packers. He can do whatever he wants. He can lock himself in whatever dark room he wants.

He can drink whatever tea. Just be gone, I think is how they feel. Okay, last one, and you've been incredibly generous with your time. Really, really love the conversation, but I think you'll like this one, so I want to make sure I got it in. Over under three and a half fourth quarter comeback slash game-winning drives for Kirk Cousins after tying the all-time record of eight,

will he clear three and a half this year? That's a really good number. He plays only close games did did you see that stat uh the other day it was from someone that i don't really um have a lot of respect for but they had a stat that they threw out there about the double digit victories over the last like five years and the vikings were tied with the texans or something it was like they never win games by double digits in general. So there will be close games with Kirk Cousins. You know that.

Other teams are going to score. There's going to be shootouts. But will he come up with three-and-a-half game-winning drives or four-quarter comebacks? That's such a good number because you kind of hit the key point ahead at the end there. There's going to be a handful of shootouts on their schedule uh vikings are an over team i don't think anyone would disagree with that

um you know their totals are going to be in the 51 54 range for all you know especially when they're indoors and it's good you know nice weather part of the season um and so it's going to come down to kind of end of the game execution a lot for them. So they're going to get into the three to four range, I think. I don't I would be blown away if they even sniff eight again. That was that was one of one weirdness that really got them there that last year. But I will say this. The I'm going to go under after hemming and hawing there for a bit and it's only because I think that the makeup of this team

in terms of how they win ball games, assuming they keep their assuming the strength that they have right now on at the edge position holds. I think that their blueprint for them winning games is going to be

offensive efficiency through three quarters and then running the ball late and putting the ball away on defense with the pass rush. And for those reasons, I think, you know, a win for the Vikings looks like, you know, the last four minutes of the game, you're doing a lot of kneeling the ball. Yeah, I think I will go under just because no one ever approaches that again after they've done that.

You know what I mean? Like it just isn't possible. I think his career high before might've been only four. It's not a stat I ever really paid a whole lot of attention to until last year, because a dude makes a 61 yard field goal and you get a game winning drive for that. You didn't really come close to the end zone.

That one was, that one was cheap. There was a couple of the ones for the Vikingsings that i gotta re-look at their schedule but you're absolutely from josh allen and the end zone like they're oh yeah two yards away from winning the game they fumble you know whatever you get a game-winning drive so even even cousins talked about how this is a silly stat and it's like i don't know what to make of it so i would go under just because that's that's not really something that anybody ever repeats from year to year i think stafford may have had three the year after he had eight so uh but that that was a fun one i like your answer to that

uh follow him on twitter at whale capper as long as twitter still exists until i will see whatever uh let me promote you drew please uh bet the edge podcast nbc sports bet deep dive podcast as well you you're the best man like you always provide such interesting unique insights and i love getting together with you so this was a lot of fun i'm glad we could do it absolutely and i hope uh all of your prep for the season goes well. And, you know, I think I think this is the payoff year for the Vikings on the, you know, no one believes in us kind of kind of mindset, because I got to tell you, there's going to be a lot of prognosticators who are finding reasons to pick the Lions, the Packers and even the Bears to win the NFC North. And we just gotta, we just gotta be patient. And then we gotta get the best price available right at the end, right at the end of the cycle, right before they go on and when they're, you know,

10, 11 games, one person in media will bet the Vikings and Kirk cousins for MVP, just because they get super bored in mid July. Like it will happen. That is, that is my best bet lock of the century. That's already grading

that a winner. You can grade that one a winner. Thanks again, Druth, and thanks everybody for listening. Before they go on and win their 10-11 games. One person in media will bet the Vikings and Kirk Cousins for MVP just because

they get super bored in mid-July. 100% true. It will happen. That is my best bet lock of the century. It's already grading that a winner. You can grade that one a winner. Thanks again, Drew, and thanks everybody for listening.