Why Minnesota Vikings offense is struggling early at training camp

Why Minnesota Vikings offense is struggling early at training camp

Purple Daily is daily Vikings entertainment. Do you just want the Vikings to win a Super Bowl before we die? I will ride with this group. Seriously, man. Please. And away we go. Welcome to another edition of Jud’s Camp Notes, everybody. Jud Camp Notes. Yeah, the kids love them. The kids love them. Yesterday was a little lower key because they weren’t in pads, right? Yeah. Rain or shine though. Rain or shine. Yesterday was actually in my opinion, although I think the temperature was not as high as it was for the full padded practice on Monday. I think it was muggier. It was a more uncomfortable day actually than Monday was. And they were in Yep. shorts and shells. Uh because they will be back in full pads today. They’ll be off on Thursday and then they’ll be back in full pads. I I bet a couple times Friday, Saturday, Sunday. Uh at least two of those days. Yeah. So, we’ll dive into uh Yeah. So, it sounds like they’re going to ramp up a couple more of these like you said maybe today. I’ll be out there with you today and then but we’ll there’s some stuff from yesterday we’re going to dive into here. This is your daily home for Juds camp notes, intricate observations about the backup quarterback battle, the if you’re looking for uh second string defensive line notes, you’ve come to the right place here in addition to daily JJ McCarthy updates. But uh Jud’s camp notes are powered throughout the next few weeks by Minnesota Renaissance Festival, which is just around the corner. Open weekends 9:00 am to 7 pm August 16th through September 28th and Labor Day as well. And uh it’s just a fun place to take your family. Over 50 games, rides, and attractions. You can throw axes, wield swords, watch live armored combat jousting, real Vikings with beards and stuff. It’s pretty cool. Tasty turkey legs, Nordic meatballs. Again, bring your family starting in a couple weeks. Renaissancefest.com sponsoring Jud’s camp notes here. All right. We want more camp notes football. Where do you want to start here? You’ll get more camp notes. You’ll get more camp notes. So, it was a rather uneventful practice as far as the pace. I actually thought it was a little bit slow. I I would have liked it. Look, I understand they’re not going to be in pads constantly, but I would have liked a little bit more intensity, which I didn’t think that we got. Now, there were a lot of veterans given yesterday off. Harrison Smith’s been off a lot, which I’m not surprised by. Uh, but defensively, Jayvon Hargrave, Jonathan Allen, there was a pretty lengthy list of guys that were uh not asked to practice. So, that did create some nice work for guys who are going to be backups with the first team. But, I want to start as we always do with JJ McCarthy. It’s the uh talking point of camp and it will continue to be. So, day six of training camp for the Vikings. Shorts and shells. JJ McCarthy. Here we go. And just as a starting point, I thought it was his worst day so far of camp because while the end of the session in full pads, uh, the team drill, the the two-minute drill on Monday wasn’t good, he didn’t have a bad day like like he’s had and and just to be just for context, a lot more ups than downs for a guy who’s going to be starting for the first year. So, this is certainly not panic panic alarm stuff. Uh, but I just thought it was his most uneven day so far. The stats, the unofficial stats, the Zolad, the Juds Camp Note stats tracker, 11 on 11 yesterday in a couple of different situational drills or or situations. Six of eight, which not bad. 41 of 51 now in team drills in camp. Um he was and we’ll get to this as well here quickly in the seven on seven red zone drill which they’ve now done twice in camp. So this is a passing drill. Um and we’re talking about the deep red here. Deep red. Two of five. He is now five of 10 in that two 205. Five of 10 overall in five of 10. Oh two different periods so far in a couple of practices. What’s Ryan Tanahill’s number? Oh no. And now in seven in seven on seven overall, he is now 15 of 25 in camp. But it’s kind of interesting. He’s been he’s been in terms of just camp completion percentage. More accurate. Now that accounts for very little context all due respect to Jud’s camp notes. We’re not tracking a dot like average depth of target. We’re not tracking yards per attempt. All these things. Uh but he but he’s over 80% completions in the full team drill where there’s a defensive front and he’s you said 15 of 25 in the seven on seven where there’s no pass rush. There’s two garbage cans sitting there in front. Yep. And keep in mind too in the red zone drill that we’re talking about in the deep red first of all it’s must pass and second of all there is and this is goes back to what Okonnell’s talked about there’s very little in in the big picture things very little real estate to work in. It is real estate is not bountiful. It’s a tighter part of the field. Yeah, it’s not. Okay, so let’s go. There were two different uh sessions where it went McCarthy Howell McCarthy Howell in this red zone sevenon seven drill. So let’s go to them as far as McCarthy goes. Okay. Okay. Okay. Um working from near the goal line. So we are talking very deep red. He missed uh Jordan Addison on one pass um in the back of the end zone and then he hit him on another pass, but it was out of bounds. Addison caught it. Official there motioning out of bounds, so it didn’t count. The pass was complete, but that’s not the point. The point is, can can you score a touchdown? Interestingly enough, in the third um in the third play of this particular drill, Lucky Jackson, who’s becoming a favorite with Justin Jefferson out, a lot of guys are getting time now to work in Deshaawn Jones. Lucky Jackson. Lucky Jackson’s becoming a favorite of McCarthy and um he caught the one pass in this particular drill for a touchdown between the two Addison incompletions. Okay. 81. Keep your eye if you go out to camp, keep your eye here on on him. Jefferson’s out there. He looks fine. They’re not practicing him. I don’t blame them. Um Okonnell did say, I think it was our friend Kevin Seafford from ESPN yesterday basically asked, “Are you going to mothball him for the rest of camp?” He’s like, “No, we’d like to get him out here.” And and with the way he’s moving, I think he comes back at some point pretty soon, I think. But anyway, Lucky Jackson, who’s been on the practice squad for two years, so he certainly knows the system has looked good. He’s very fortunate to be getting these opportunities. Yes, he is. Yes, he is. Yes, he is. No, very Yes, he is very He is very fortunate. Fortunate Jackson. I I’ll change his name. Um, red zone part two. JJ McCarthy yesterday because there is no minutia too small for Jets camp notes on the first down pass. So, this is the first play of the second part of the drill, and this is where you knew JJ was was not having his best day. He drilled a pass into the center of the field for Josh Oliver, and it was even too high for Josh. I think it went off his helmet and then hit the goalpost. But Josh is what, six foot five? Is he 6’5? I mean, he’s he’s at least 6’4. Yeah, he’s a big dude. I’ve got it right here. I’ve got the roster right here. number 84. He’s listed at uh 65. 6’5. Yeah. Yep. He’s listed at 6’5. So, that pass went too too high. Now, the good thing is McCarthy did come back and completed a touchdown pass to Addison. Um and then he completed well he was on the precipice of completing another pass to end that drill. The third play uh for Addison as well. It was nullified because the defender grabbed Jordan’s jersey from behind and basically did not allow him to complete his route. Yeah. But um so yeah, this is an area where again it’s must pass. It’s an area that you don’t have a lot of room to work in. It’s not surprising. Uh but they are definitely trying to accomplish some things. Now from the deep red, if you are skeptical of Jud’s camp notes or of sports and say, “Well, yeah, but that’s why they got Jordan Mason to run the ball there.” You’re right. So that I fully expect that in similar situations, I don’t think you abandon the pass, but um every time they run that drill, it’s sort of a reminder of Detroit last year, right? Where you didn’t trust your run, you didn’t trust your interior offensive line. And so you’re like, Sam Darnold, you got to pass the ball. And Sam’s like, well, today I can’t hit the broadside of a barn, so that’s going to be a problem. So it is a reminder of why you went and improved your offensive line. It’s it’s why you went and traded for Jordan Mason. Uh but nonetheless, it’s part of Jud’s scam notes. Yeah, there’s a I think there’s a temptation to to maybe look at these last two practices and sound the alarm a little bit about the offense and and and you’d love to, right? you’re you’re watching football and you want to see free flowing offense from your favorite team and you show up to training camp to watch a practice, but the reality is this offensive line is still down for the majority of these like in the full team drills anyways is still down 40% of its starters. Like Darasaw and Fry aren’t on the pup list. They are mixing in Fry more than Darasaw, but they’re generally not integrated into the fabric of the offense yet. First year starting quarterback who’s getting these first team reps. He did not get the one versus the one reps last training camp. So, what you’re seeing here, and you didn’t, and they didn’t run pads at all, too. They didn’t yesterday either, but like they didn’t run pads in mini camps and OTAAS. So, what you’re seeing right now is a a temporarily depleted offensive line. Jefferson also out. First time JJ McCarthy has with pads one offense versus one defense. And that defense just added two awesome interior pass rushers to an already top five units under Brian Flores’s toutelage. And uh and so from from that perspective, the first week of training camp practices, the defense should probably be dominating the offense. And I would say there’s c there’s been certain chunks over the week where the offense has held its own pretty well. We’ll see what this thing looks like. I think the joint practices are going to be very telling, especially if you can get either Will Fry and or Christian Darasaw back by that point. Maybe Jefferson, but I my guess is they probably play it safe through the joint practices. So this you’re just going to whe if you show up or you’re consuming Jud’s camp notes remotely, it’s very likely that you’re going to get a lot of defensive highlights and some mixed bag with the offense. I just want to put that disclaimer out here as we continue to push forward with these great camp notes by the way. Yeah. And the seven on seven red zone stuff too again most importantly is a reminder that you have to run there. Like you can’t what what the Vikings try to do. But they don’t in seven on seven, right? That just Yeah. Yes. Yes. You are. It’s a passing drill, but the point the point is it’s a reminder that you’re going to have to run there. And it’s it’s also again to me it hammers home the Detroit game and flaws, which is if Sam Darnold goes haywire, which he did in that game, what are you going to do? And the Vikings are like, well, we still have to pass. So, yeah, that one is and and I mean the floor is defense is going to give you looks you don’t see, which is great. Ultimately, I think it’s going to help him. All right, let’s go to situational drill. So, first time we saw this camp football. So, uh on Monday, as we just talked about in full pads, two-minute drill valuable. This is again in shorts and shells, situational drills. What does that mean? It means you’ve got a play well third down play and you run that play and then you bring on Will Riker or Ryan Wright to punt or kick. Uh, and so the situation was for the first one, third down, defense is 47 yardd line. I think the first downs are all, and it’s hard to tell from our perch, I think the first downs here are all pretty makeable, but the point is they’re still going to just run the situation that they desire. So, actually, if you get the first down, you’re still going to go to what your situation is. Okay, so third down, defense is 47 yd line, just the ball just over midfield. McCarthy completes a pass to Aaron Jones. And now the situation is this. We bring on the kicking team. 53 yardd field goal. It’s all in the line. It’s all on the line. The clock is ticking. Fans are watching, waiting anxiously. Will Will Riker. Boom. Ball going towards the goalpost. It’s going, going, going. And that sets up a a 53 yard field goal attempt that hits the left upright. Doink. [Music] Did Did they boo him? Did they boo him off the practice field? He we turned pretty quickly on kickers here. He started to cry. He started to cry. Yeah. And we’ll get into we we’ll get into We have been tracking every There’s been two days now of of uh content on kicks, which we will get into in full at some point here. Situational drill two. Fourth down. Ball at the defense is 40. McCarthy to Jordan Mason overthrow where on the field or like where uh sorry what was the the route that Mason was running like where was he on the field? Uh I think he was along I believe he was along the he was headed towards the sideline so it was kind of a little like a swing kind of pass situation. Yeah. Yeah. Yep. Yep. So anyway, and it’s a windy day, too. It’s a windy day. The wind is, but no, he didn’t hit the pass. He didn’t hit the pass. Uh, so that’s the second one. Situational drill number three. Third down, defense is 40 again. Um, McCarthy’s pass, this is the worst pass of the day, but I don’t know whose fault this was exactly. McCarthy’s pass for Jaylen Naylor falls incomplete and Naylor is like nowhere near where the ball is. So either he ran the wrong route or McCarthy got confused, but it was probably the most um the most emotion we saw from JJ on the day. Uh because he was upset with himself, grabbed his helmet, clapped his hands, and that’s something else here. Um so just to get done with this, it forces a Ryan Wright punt. Uh but that’s something else that we saw yesterday, too. He JJ McCarthy is not afraid to sort of confront things. And there was a time when a drill I think it was in a walkth through there because uh the period right before this was a walkthrough and it was going sort of slow and the whole day was sort of just slow. It was hot. It was muggy and it was just sort of slow. And JJ JJ’s like let’s effing get going here like like so he took some control. Sneaky fbomb dropper by the way. Don’t be fooled. Don’t be fooled by the clean shaven baby face big smile. This is not old Kirky boy here where he’s gonna stop short of an Fbomb. Shucks. Except for that one time. This is in front of his dad when Kirky said, “You effing like that in training camp.” And his parents started crying. Yeah. He’ll he’ll drop a little fbomb here here and there. You know, he’s also clearly and players have talked about this, but you don’t see it a lot. He’s also asserting himself. McCarthy is, but this pass was it it was sort of like the Jefferson passes but worse, which is I I think the I think it’s just the wrong route. And I don’t know if that’s the receiver ran the wrong route or McCarthy threw to the wrong spot, but they were but this one was uncatchable. It didn’t get picked off, but it was just uh it was it was nothing. Yeah, like it was a play. These are like first week of camp things or I guess now we’re kind of getting into technically second week of camp things where you’re they’ve got certain adjustments that they make. The wide receiver and the quarterback have to sort of telepathically, you know, look at each other or based on this look defensively, this route is now this or maybe you’re making an actual check. And so there’s there’s a ton of like verbal and non-verbal communication stuff that you have to work through and and I don’t know because we don’t know exactly, we can’t hear the communication. We we’re we’re left to sort of surmise some of these things, right? But Brian Flores’s defense shows some crazy different looks and you might have to make little adjustments on what you’re doing. And so it’s not entirely shocking that you would mess some of these things up the first week, week and a half of training camp like that’s you don’t just hit the ground running in your the 1998 Vikings offense the first five days on the practice field. Yeah, we call them corrections coming up. Okay, corrections are coming. Cor some course corrections. Yep. Situational drill number four. This is the final one of of this period involving JJ McCarthy. Jordan Mason um takes a handoff from McCarthy. He is well he breaks away because they don’t tackle in uh in no pads, but he’s given a three- yard gain. So now the ball is at the defens’s 37. So it’s fourth down though. They go for it. They go Lions full Lions here. McCarthy then comes back and completes a pass to Naylor for a first down. So that’s a good sign. Yeah, that that’s a good sign. So, it ends on a for JJ McCarthy, it ends on a positive note, but again, as as you can see, the situations are field goal. Okay, we didn’t get something, we punt, and then this last one was a uh Dan Campbell like we’re in a good territory. Let’s just go for it. How do you feel? You You observed this with him. We were talking off microphone. you observed something kind of similar to what I observed just walking off the edge of the practice field with him two days ago, which is he, you know, not not the best if he I think in his words like not the best performance offensively and there’s some throws that he’d want back and some reads and stuff as he’s trying to figure this out. uh that even though he didn’t feel great about large portions of the last two practices, he’s walking off the field with a big positive attitude and let me at him again tomorrow. Um yeah, that’s how he should be. What Yeah. What do you What do you make of that? Yeah, I make of it that yeah, it’s it is now what six practices in. Today, today is one week since they took the practice field. He’s starting for the first year. I would be very concerned if this kid hung his shoulders and said, “Oh, man. This is tougher than I thought.” Yeah. No, he’s confident. He’s confident. And things are going to go wrong. I mean, things are going to go wrong in games. Things are going to go wrong. I mean, the Vikings are going to lose games and JJ McCarthy’s probably going to have some bad games. There’s there’s an aura as Yeah. Well, he’s got to be confident. And if he’s not, you know, if he’s coming off the field saying, “Oh man, I was I was terrible. God, did you guys see that? Please don’t rip me.” I’d be very very concerned. So, he has I and I’ve said this from uh day one until I’m proven wrong. He has the quarterback mentality, which is, okay, yeah, I wasn’t great, but you but you know what? It makes me better not to be great. That’s the thing people don’t don’t get. Failure is what helps you succeed. If everything is on an upper trajectory, well, eventually when you hit failure, you don’t know what to do. And quarterback, I mean, if you watch watch the quarterbacks, watch the great ones, too. There’s a lot of plays that don’t go right. There’s a lot of plays that end up in picks. They end up in simple, hey, the rout’s not there and they spike the ball. Like, there’s a lot of things that go wrong. And I I mean, it’s the one thing about great it’s the one great thing about sports is how do you handle it? Because a lot more it’s like baseball. If you get a hit three out of 10 times, you’re good. So, you got seven at bats there to process where you weren’t good necessarily. How do you process that? If everything is, well, I was always great and it’s going to to be great, you’re lying to yourself. So, what I want to see is does he keep his head up? Does he stay confident? And that includes getting into teammates or himself. Can I add just I was going to save this for feedback Friday, but feedback Friday is is likely going to be also although they don’t practice on Thursday, so we’re not going to have as many camp notes on Friday, but I I do want to spoil one of the feedback Friday things here from uh the the YouTube comment section. Also, thank you to those of you who have clicked that subscribe button and the like button on the Purple Daily YouTube channel. We’re getting close to 60,000 subscribers here. So, if you haven’t done so, if you’re enjoying these camp updates, click that like button, the subscribe button, and then on the audio side, a fivestar rating and a positive review can help us keep growing this community. You guys are just the best listeners and viewers and fans. We love you guys. Um, and Lazy Television chimes in with a critique, which critiques are welcome as well. And he said, “Imagine the coverage of these last two practices last year if it was Darnold struggling instead of McCarthy. Also, all of McCarthy’s quote unquote highlights so far are against backup defensive players. Unequivocally, that second part is not true. It’s a lot of one versus one offense versus defense. But the point he’s making here is if it was Darnold struggling for a couple days in practice, which he did last year, too, and it was well documented in Jud’s camp notes, the inaccuracies, some of the interceptions that were giving. I’m assuming I’m extrapolating here, uh, lazy television. So, apologies if I’m getting your critique wrong, but it sounds like he’s saying if this was Darnold, you’d be hammering him kind of like you did last year, but because it’s McCarthy and you guys like him, you’re giving him a pass. And I will just say Darnold came in last year with six years of a track record of being a bad to mediocre quarterback with accuracy issues. A guy who notably saw ghosts and and some of that was just he’s put into bad situations. But we had six years of this guy’s not very good. What will he look like in Kevin O’Connell’s system? And as he at some times last year looked like the old Sam Darnold, we were like, I don’t know. This is this is kind of dicey, right? McCarthy has a blank canvas right now. If like McCarthy is 22 years old doing this for the first time. So like it’s it’s not sorry it’s not a gotcha moment here. It’s we’re we’re giving a little more leeway and grace for a brand new quarterback to work through some things against a top five defense. And I think that’s fair. Did we not also talk about uh Darnold when he did struggle early in training camp last year in the context of he’s new here? I I felt like like 100% we gave him grace too. One guy we didn’t give grace to a ton was Kirk, but that’s because Kirk was a veteran who was making a ton. Like if if you if I show up today for Jud’s training camp notes and the Vikings are like, “We got a quick press conference. We’ve just given JJ McCarthy a five-year contract uh starting at, you know, guaranteed $130 million. Guess whose expectations go up a lot? Guess who starts to say, “Okay, this isn’t good.” Yeah. Well, even then, I would still say, “Okay, team, why are you doing that? You don’t need to do that.” And it’s like, it’s more correlated with what is their track record going into these practices. Kurt Cousins came in with a bunch of 4,000 yard passing seasons and 20 30 touchdown seasons. You know, he had like three really good starting seasons and he came in as a mercenary. It’s like, okay, well, you’re going to be judged on a 13- win team looking for that final piece a little differently. Now, the expectations are higher than most firstear quarterbacks cuz they won 14 games last year. The defense is ready to win a Super Bowl. The weapons are locked in. The offensive line was redone. he does have more pressure on him and higher expectations than like a rebuild situation in New England with Drake May right now. And so that’s also baked into these conversations. Yeah. I’m just not Look, we’re also talking about a guy who ideally is here for 10 years. Like I’m not going to pee on the guy’s parade instantly because he has a bad practice. Like I look pissing his cornflakes. Fully full disclosure here at the time I didn’t do that to Ponder. Like if you draft a quarterback in the first round, you got to give him the grace of seeing what the kid can do. Now it’s like year year two kind of midway through year two when Ponder started about this guy. If McCarthy bust he busts, but like there is like the resumes. It’s all in the resume. So yeah, I agree. And and this thing of him not going against the first team at all. I don’t know what Jud’s camp notes like what part you’re not hearing about this but he’s definitely has some first team reps some second team as well. Yeah or against got any more camp notes Jud come on football right after uh we shout out Standard Heating. You want to talk about the first team HVAC company? Standard Heating and Air Conditioning. That’s right. That’s right. They uh they made my life a lot easier when I when I bought my first house. They were able to get that inspection on the furnace to make sure it was all ship shaped so I could obviously uh go through with that purchase. Plus, they’re going to come back out uh next week to take a look at the air conditioning to make sure everything is still working with that. It’s an old unit and you got to make sure that thing is still working properly. So, go to Standard Heating. You can contact them however you’d like. Tell them that Purple Daily sent you. Uh you can join their smart club, too, which gives you discount on repairs plus uh priority booking, too. So, go to standardheating.com to learn more. All right, back to the camp notes here. Juds on fires. Camp notes. Come on. Football. Okay, let’s go to uh a situational drill that involved one Samuel Howell. This is not to bash him actually. It’s to well, it sort of does, but it is to praise playing the hits. Cornerback Dwight Mclawurn. Okay, now that’s what I call Jud. Third down from the defense is 31. Sam Howell drops back to pass. Sort of floats a pass towards Ty Felton. Floats, huh? I see the code the code language here. Dwight Mcloth jumps the route, picks it off. Um, I think we might be getting to the point of seeing the man that they call nudie get some first team reps here at some point. Dwight Mclathan’s showing enough like he impressed him. He came in as a UDFA last year, made the 53. He’s back. I think he might be next man up for some first team reps. And if you’re going to ask where it’s going to come from, I’m not convinced the guy yet. Like, like he’s getting a chance, but Brian Flores knows what he wants and he knows what he sees. And I don’t know that he needs to prolong things. And I’m not saying Okuda is playing poorly. I’m just saying Brian Flores um is going to know way before the season starts I think what his plan is. Dwight McGloth keep an eye out for him at some point in time. It has not happened yet to get some first team reps. I really like how he’s playing. Yeah, really just a lanky guy, right? It’s his length stands out in these practices. 6’2 just Flores I mean it’s not that Flores won’t play smaller quarterbacks. Obviously, uh they have, but I think he’s the is he the biggest like in terms of just height and length. He’s like one of the two longest cornerbacks I think in that room. And so just gives him an easier chance to put a hand on a football, tip a pass, intercept something. Oh, you got the uh the roster there. Okay. I’m looking at the roster right here. Of course, with my eyesight, I got to stick it below a light to see the damn thing, which is a whole different story. Yeah. Zayavan’s 6’3. Okay. Yeah, he’s a he’s a bigger dude. Yep. By the way, Dwight Mcloth, because we we haven’t talked a ton about him since last summer, just cuz he was, you know, stashed away, wasn’t wasn’t getting uh defensive reps with the depth of his defense. But his last year at Arkansas, actually, if you combine his last two years at Arkansas, 2022 and 23, cuz he was hurt for a portion of that 23 season, right? He missed like five or six games in the middle. So 1,400 snaps between his last two years at Arkansas. And opposing quarterbacks had a 48 passer rating against him. Like 48 NFL league average is 90. Yeah. And and he had a opposing quarterback’s completion percentage was 48% with a 48 passer rating. and he had like seven interceptions, only three touchdowns allowed, 15 pass breakups. So like in coverage in the SEC, he was a dude and he winds up going undrafted. He was one of the top ranked undrafted free agents. And so yeah, I mean they’re giving Okuda a shot cuz he’s a former number three overall pick. But they’ve got there’s some guys like Vaughn and McGlon that as training camp progresses, if they keep making plays, it wouldn’t be shocking to see them maybe jump up and get some first team reps. So, I’m putting him on being the first guy if there are more reps to be had at quarterback with the first team. Nudie Dwight Mcloth. Nudie, let’s go. I think the story was he ran around as a kid with without clothes on and his sister’s like Well, who didn’t? Well, I mean, yeah, as a little as a little kid. Yeah, exactly. Oh, there’s Oh, you mean not yesterday in my house? My bad. Yeah. Yeah. Not a teenager throwing a kegger who decides to take his clothes off. No, that was not Dwight McGloth. There’s definitely more incriminating ways to be nicknamed nudie. So, that’s that’s a pretty Yep. pretty PG way to Juds camp notes. Let’s stay on the UDFA train here and let’s make a stop at Tight Endville because I got some news for you. Okay, so and we’ve talked about this guy, but I’m seeing more and more. Now, here’s the situation. Gavin Bartholomew of Pittsburgh has been sixth round pick. He has been out. He has a back problem. And as I continue to say, back problems for tight ends or any football player are not good. yesterday. Ben Urers continues, probably should have been drafted. Continues to impress. Two catches in in particular. Sam Howell pass uh in I believe it was the seven on seven red zone drill. Who goes up and gets it? Ben Urik. He also made a similar catch in a pure passing drill before they started the seven on seven or team drills. Um, if one of these tight ends, I mean, Bartholomew, I don’t know. I don’t know when he’s coming back. Uh, uh, Chaz Chamblas came off the pup list a couple days ago. So, Gavin Bartholomew is the only guy left on the pup list right now. And when you’re that late of a draft pick, if you miss like two weeks of training camp. Yeah. And is pretty tough to make the 53. And is there a big difference between a sixth round pick and a guy that probably should have been drafted but because of the circumstances of the draft class wasn’t who by the way played in the SEC at Georgia. Probably not. Ben Urisk to me is a guy to keep an eye on to make the roster and be and this is going to depend partially on blocking which I don’t know but just as far as his talents go I think he is the leading candidate right now for tight end three. Yeah, that’s what or or a name that is out there that is is a cut or a waiver guy at some point. But so like among the internal options, you think that URIsk is is flashing the most, right? Okay. Yes. And I just I just think he’s a guy I I love the resume, SEC, Georgia. I mean, and Stanford, he played at Stanford for parts of four years and then and then had the year partial year at at Georgia because he was hurt. Yep. But he’s played some big time college football and yeah, he’s he’s been he’s getting run for sure. You know, he’s definitely there are reps to go around once you get past Josh Oliver and uh and Eurosk is is benefiting probably more than just about anybody else in the rest of that room. Should I make a stop at Kickingville? Uh it’d be great. Yeah, let’s Hold on a sec. Let me give you your official little sounder here. Got any more camp notes, Jud? Come on. I’m not done. Football. Yes, I’m not done. Let’s talk some big leg bill. Let’s talk some Will Riker, who now has had two separate days in which the Vikings near the end of practice have ended with kicks. All right, practice four a couple days ago cuz the practice on Tuesday was practice six. Practice four, he goes five of six, makes from 34, 41, 45, 50, and 54. Wide left from 48 yards. So that’s practice four. That’s couple practices back. yesterday. Yesterday, not five of six, but five of seven. So, he kicked, he got extra kicks in both, as we talked about before, situational. And then they did the end of practice field goal attempts. He hit the left upright from 53. He missed from 46. The wide left a couple days ago was from 48. He was good from 37, 43, 48, 49, and 50 yards. And then here’s the secondary part that’s very interesting about yesterday. Not surprisingly, punter Ryan Wright held for most of the kicks, but Oscar Chapman, my guy, the Australian punter, also got to hold for a couple of kicks, including the 50yard make. So there I hesitate to I hesitate to say that there is no punting competition. Oscar Chapman, I think, is at least being given an outside chance to vi for the job. But now through uh two practices, Will Riker kicking, we have 10 makes and 13 total kicks. Okay. Um it’s Oscar Chapman. Oscar Chapman number 91. I think that’s just sounds like a good punter name, don’t you think? In college, he’s an Australian kid, but he punted in college. I’m telling you, he’s got a wide array array of Australian punts. How many was um Darren Bennett was Australian, wasn’t he? He was very good. And was Reese Reese Lloyd was or was he South African? What was Reese Lloyd? Yeah, I don’t think he was Australian, but he but he didn’t he punt like one. Well, he definitely rolled out. Yeah. Yeah. Reese Lloyd. Oh, I’m sorry. He’s from Dover uh in the the UK. He’s a UK guy. Okay. So, yeah, they’ve uh they’ve got a they’ve got a rich history of going outside the the United 50 states. Bennett came here as a veteran cuz he had planned forever with the San Diego Chargers at the time and signed here late. But uh so yes. So how do we feel about the holding chemistry? Are they letting Oscar mix in on the holding or is it strictly Ryan Wright at this point? No, he’s he’s held that that’s what I’m saying. Yeah, he held. So they are mix Okay. Yes, he Ryan Wright is holding more than Oscar Chapman, but Oscar Chapman held for according to my Jud’s camp notes the 50-yard make yesterday. Okay, so it’s interesting. Um Riker though, five of or 10 of 13 so far. So, three misses, a hit upright and then a wide left on day on the his first time and then another miss that I think was wide right yesterday as well. Got it. Okay, Juds, camp notes. I think we got our first look yesterday at kick return combinations. I I’ve not if this has happened, I’ve not seen it. I missed it. But yesterday, okay, so let’s go with and keep in mind now it’s two guys. It’s a combination. It’s one guy who’s going to return the kick and it’s another who’s going to sacrifice his well-being and his health. Uh because that guy gets a running start to block guys and is most likely to be concussed. So, the kick return combinations, Ty Felton and Ty Chandler. Ty Chandler, though, the guy that’s sacrificing his health now. Ty Felton returning. Uh, Dante Fleming, a wide receiver, and Miles Price. Uh, or no, I’m sorry. Silus Balden and Miles Price. Now, Silas Balden, I think, has a chance to make this team. I think he’s got a chance. He’s sort of a Rondell Moore. I can’t see him and Rondell making it. Yeah, but he has a but but he’s got the same type of size. I don’t think he’s a regular wide receiver. I think he might be a gimmick guy at times, but he’s also a return guy. And then the last one, no chance. Trey Stewart and Miles Price on Silus on Silus Balden. Don’t cuz cuz Rond Del Moore especially if Jordan Addison is suspended for a few games like he you could trust him provided he’s healthy enough to make the 53 which you would never like you would determine that he’s out at practice right now so he’s healthy. Yep. Yep. he’s um you would trust him to actually run routes and take 15 or 20 snaps in week one. And Silas Balden feels like a guy based on his size undrafted that isn’t going to be if because when you cut guys before the final 53 is formed, the only way that you would really lose them is if another team claims them for their 53man roster. They could also decide to go sign with a different practice squad even if you offer them. But I would guess that like if he clears waiverss, no one picks him up on a 53, which seems likely that he would clear waiverss, right? I just think like procedurally, would you if you cuz if you say goodbye to Rond Del Moore, someone probably picks him up to be on the active roster, right? So you’re saying goodbye to him. Peace out. I think so. I my guess is that if both guys are healthy, Silus Balden, nice little practice squad stash that you could elevate if needed. That’s my guess. Absolutely. Uh now what was interesting is in the kick return combinations I gave you and I just didn’t see this. Rond Del Moore was not in them. So the punt returners now are Silus Balden. So he’s doing both Rondale Moore and the rest of the punt return guys working in Tuesday’s pra practice. Excuse me. I’m getting choked up because these judge captains are so good. I’m doing I mean the special teams the return combos emotional time. Daniels, I’m sorry. Sure. Yeah. Jaylen Naylor, Dante Fleming, and Miles Price. I think the punt return combin I think the punt return job is Balden Moore Naylor third. I don’t think he’s the guy though. So, I guess I am a little bit curious Rond Del Moore not on kickoff returns and if that’s going to be something that that we see eventually. Uh, but I did find that to be the one interesting thing. But I’m with you. I think Balden probably clears uh clears the waiver process signs to the practice squad. So Rondale Moore would be Rondale Moore would be my favorite to return punts. And I guess what that would mean and it makes sense given how they did this yesterday that Ty Felton is your primary kick returner. That punt returning was again let’s go back to the um the Warren Sharp episode from yesterday when he I think I mean there we can talk about that feedback Friday. It’s it is funny that people like if any sort of push back at all that the Vikings are going to be a 13- win team, and there are people that get pissed about that, but he brought an analytical sense to what needs to happen this year. And he and he I thought he did a good job of balancing it with, hey, this stuff is probably going to be hard to replicate. So, what is the counterbalance over here to okay, what’s going to improve if this is going to come back down over here? Well, one area that can drastically improve in the margins is punt returning for the Vikings. So, Brandon Powell among qualified punt returners was dead last in yards per return. Seven yards per punt return. Marvin Mims at the top, 22 years old with Denver last year, 16 yards per punt return. Marcus Jones, New England, 15 yards. Khalif Raymond with Detroit in your division, 14 yards per punt return. And I could keep going down that list. So, can you find someone that A isn’t going to muff a punt? That’s the most important thing. But B, that can maybe double your average yards per return and give you better field position with a young quarterback. So, that is that I know it’s kind of like this is the doldrums of camp when it’s we’re a week in and the excitement has settled into the grind and you’re monitoring Jud’s camp notes is monitoring punt returning. But this is where that’s a major area for improvement from last year’s team. This is how we construct the team. So what I would say right now is the favorite to return kicks is Ty Felton. The favorite to return punts is indeed Rond Del Moore. Love it. I know you have to go because you have to get out there for the uh the media availability here and I will join you. Can I give you one more? Sure. Because it’s gonna because it’s going to it’s going to resonate with Phil Mackey. Mhm. So, a bunch of guys, not because they’re hurt, but because it was a practice after a full p of practice. A bunch of guys, as I mentioned earlier in the episode, had a day off. Bunch of veterans that included Ryan Kelly and Brian O’Neal for some snaps. So, who took their positions on the first team? It was interesting. Michael Jurgens, who’s the second team center, who of course was in camp last year and then was on the practice squad. He is he was in working with JJ McCarthy with Kelly watching and the right tackle replacement was none other than the ultimate king of swing Blake Brle. So Blake Brle now has played right guard. He obviously started at at uh left guard last season, but he has now played right guard with when Will Fry was not set to practice yet. He is back at practice. Pancake a guy yesterday. Very nice. and he was football Blake Brandle at right tackle for a few snaps. Nothing’s wrong with O’Neal. Nothing is wrong with Kelly as far as I know. These are all just sort of take a day off and then we’re going to see what we have. Yeah. So, so, so that’s good context. Like JJ McCarthy behind essentially a backup offensive line against the number one defense. Context today. I think pads are back on today. Is that what you’ve heard too? Pads are back on today. Yeah. and yesterday and and yesterday to to be clear like the defense wasn’t it it wasn’t doing much so like that had nothing to do it definitely impacted McCarthy on Monday and it’s going to be curious to see what type of strides have been made there um but yeah the Jurgens thing to me is cuz the one thing is Ryan Kelly’s health is going to be a question mark and can Michael Jurgens if he has to play for two weeks three weeks or two months can he play there because that becomes an incredibly important thing because obviously The addition of Kelly was a massive massive in the Vikings mind upgrade in I think for Garrett Bradberry. Juds Camp notes. That’s all I got. More tomorrow as part of Thor’s day. So it’ll be a Thursday Jud’s camp notes. Check it out. Already got the practice, the date. Wow, look at you working ahead. Add the curve there. Right. 11 periods is my guess. But I will uh I think I’ll say 12 periods. We’ll see. See, I think they’re going to add an extra one in there. Y So, I’ll see you out there on the perch. Uh if you’re out there as a fan, say hi to Sports Dad. Say hi to me. If you see us, talk some football. And we’ll see you guys tomorrow on Purple Daily, where we just want the Vikings to win a Super Bowl before we die.

Minnesota Vikings camp notes! Vikings QB JJ McCarthy’s toughest day of practce yet; Vikings WR Lucky Jackson is making the most of an opportunity; Why the Vikings offense should come with a disclaimer; Viking special teams update; Why McCarthy has a blank canvas with the Vikings offense; Plus, Vikings cornerback battle and more on Purple Daily.

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