Jeremiah Sirles: Don’t rush JJ McCarthy’s development

Jeremiah Sirles: Don’t rush JJ McCarthy’s development

Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of Purple Insider presented by FanDuel. Matthew Coller here and it is time once again for Tuesday morning left guard with former Minnesota Viking Jeremiah Sles and my friend uh everything is out now. So last week it was great and the meter was all the way in the red. You were crowning JJ McCarthy. ready to put them up on your shoulders and yell a dog in the street and then now you’re completely out. It’s No, I’m just kidding. I mean, look, uh I would But you’ve been you have been in these locker rooms on teams that were 500 and up and down and up and down every single week. I think it’s hard for everybody to figure out what exactly you actually have here with JJ McCarthy and what you have as a team when one week you can look so good against Detroit and then the next week you can look so poor against Baltimore. I mean it goes back to like I said last week. I’m not doing the crown kill thing. Like I am very much in the camp of young quarterback got to see what we can get. It’s going to be good. It’s going to be bad. The problem was I was not anticipating it to be ugly, right? I did not anticipate this week. I thought that, you know, after last week in Detroit, you saw some promise, you saw some things, some touch on the balls. You’re like, “Okay, I can see some progress.” It’s almost like it was two steps forward, three steps back this week. Like, I hate pinning it on a guy because it’s never really a guy’s fault, but like a lot of that loss falls on nines shoulders when it comes to it. And so, as I’m watching that game and I’m going, “Okay, things are going around.” I am also looking at the team exactly like you said. Okay, what else is going on? And I’m reading things like, “Oh, Justin Jefferson’s like, “What’s wrong with Jefferson?” I’m like, “What’s wrong with Jefferson? He’s a number one wide receiver in this league, getting like 50 yards a game. Of course, he’s pissed.” Like, that’s the way that these competitors go. As good as a teammate as he is, what’s Oh, the O line. I was like, some of the best protection I’ve ever seen out of this group that’s finally starting to gel together. There’s just a lot of frustration that builds because losing in the NFL sucks. It is awful. And as you continue to lose and as you continue to have veterans in the room, there starts to be tensions that grow and grudges that be become held and it just little tiny things that if you’re winning, you just kind of let roll off your back. You’re like, “Yeah, whatever.” Like the extra shove at practice. We six and two, who cares, right? But then all a sudden you get the extra shove at practice and you’re five and five and you’re like, “I’ll kill you.” Like it just it just builds. It just builds and the more you lose the the harder it becomes. The more tired people are, more tense people are. It’s just it’s very hard to talk about that locker room right now because like I said, I’ve been in six and 10 locker rooms. I’ve been in eight and eight. I’ve been in 13 and three. I’ve been everywhere. When you’re a 500 football team and there’s some good, some bad, it’s almost worse than being like a two and 14 football team. And this is something about, you know, JJ McCarthy and the environment is the idea was of bringing in JJ McCarthy that the environment would be so good that it would elevate what’s there for him. as we’ve seen from Jaylen Herz in the past, as we’ve seen for Brock Party, from a young Jared Goff in Los Angeles, and you got all the pieces and you have the good coaches and everything else. Um, but if McCarthy needs more development and is not ready to be where that team needs him to be to actually win games week and week out, that’s where I think the friction is created. And you can’t ignore the Sam Darnold and Daniel Jones element because the players in the locker room and everybody in the franchise, they have eyeballs. Like they see what’s going on with these other quarterbacks that are veterans. And I’m sure someone like Justin Jefferson notices Jackson Smith and the Jigba statline and understands that Sam Darnold throwing that pigkin is a major reason why he is all of a sudden the number one wide receiver in the NFL. And it’s not Justin who’s being talked about as there were 12 targets for Justin. One of them we expect him to bring in that he wasn’t able to grab. And then at least six to seven that are just so inaccurate that there’s not much he can do about it. And just by saying that fact does not mean equal JJ McCarthy bust. What it mean is that JJ McCarthy needs development. He needs to play. He’s going to have these roller coaster moments and these ups and downs. But I think that they’re much harder to deal with than if you’re a team like Tennessee. If you’re on that team and you know what it’s about, you’re like, “This is a young quarterback. That’s where our organization is at. Let’s try to be competitive. Let’s try to get the most out of him.” This was a team that set the bar so high. And nobody said it’s Super Bowl or bust. But also, when you get into three years, you haven’t won a playoff game. You’re in year four here. You’re That’s the goal. That’s the bar. And we know this, you know. you worked for them. The Wolves never set the bar at hey, let’s just develop, you know, a player for a year. They set it at let’s compete for a Super Bowl. And everybody knows that you’re coming short of that. And you’re saying, oh, it’s the kid who now has to get us to that point. I think that pressure is a difficult place to be with so many expensive players, so much money spent, so much invested, a 14- win season from last year. And I think we knew that if it didn’t go super smooth, that there were going to be moments like this where everybody’s looking around going, “All right, what happened from last week? We were just so good on offense last week.” It also, but it’s that’s the nature of the quarterback position in the NFL. It doesn’t matter. You look week to week, even the great teams, when when the Kansas City Chiefs struggle, it’s probably because Mahomes isn’t having a great day, right? When the Buffalo Bills get beat by Miami, Josh Allen doesn’t look like an MVP candidate. The difference is those gaps for those two guys usually close like this because you like, okay, well, he was an MVP. He has won a Super Bowl. We know it’s in there. When you have the uncertainty with a young quarterback, and you can even say this about Drake May and Caleb Williams and Jaden Daniels, it just leaves a lot to be desired of, well, is this who he is or is he the guy that I watched there? And it just creates this confusion on the fans perspective, but then it creates frustration within the locker room because in the locker room, every single one of those players is on a ticking clock. My career is on a ticking clock. I’m not going to play 30 years in the NFL. I’m if I get double digits, man, I am a special unique individual. And so as I’m reaching either the middle part of my career or the end part of my career, Allen, Hargrave, Harry, like you start to think, is this a wasted year? Is this a wasted year in my career where I thought I came here because of everything you just talked about with the expectations of hey yeah we have a young quarterback but we’re going to rely on Jordan Mason who we traded a pick with to run the football and Aaron Jones and we’re going to rely on this built offensive line with Will Fry and Donovan Jackson and Kelly and Darasaw and we’re going to rely on running the football so it’s not all going to fall on him and then we’re going to allow that quarterback to take the shots to 18 and three and Hawinson’s going to have a big year of a check down under the middle and then it’s all of a sudden such a completely different landscape when you fast forward to week 10 that you look around you’re like what the hell went wrong and it’s easy to point and go well JJ got hurt and now Carson Wentz had to come in and now he’s gone so there’s no going back to that right that’s a conversation I think is really interesting is now that Carson’s gone there’s no conversation to be had of well if this goes off the rails with JJ we can just put Carson back in and we at least know what we’re going to get it’s JJ or do we really want the other kids kid of Max Bros like and so it’s just there’s a lot of frustration that gets built with inside the organization I’m not saying it’s bad. I’m not saying like people hate each other, but when you’re not winning the NFL, it’s just really frustrating on a week in week out basis when you come in not really sure what product you’re going to get out of your quarterback on that week. And through nine weeks, the the bigger numbers of this team and of this offense are stats that we didn’t think it was possible. uh considering all the things that they have to be 27th in expected points added on offense and the only teams that are worse than you are like the Jets and the Browns and the Titans, teams that are extremely downtrodden and came in with no expectations whatsoever for this season. Just get through it and develop some players and see what you have. Whereas the Vikings came in with the expectation of getting into the top half of the NFL offensively. And those games with Carson Wentz, they’re a factor here and JJ missing all that time and all that practice. And I think what’s really made clear from these two weeks is that if you have certain things fall into place with JJ McCarthy at this point in his career, that’s not addressing the bigger picture, which as you said, people want to crown or kill after every single week and decide what he’s going to be four years from now or whatever. But if we just look at it in this bubble of two weeks, you get a 61 yard return. You’re in the red zone. You get a big run. Like you’re off and rolling from the beginning. Your first two drives scripted plays. You get in the end zone. You’re playing from ahead. Jared Goff struggling and and their offense is struggling and they’re getting frustrated and all of a sudden you build on that momentum and you can win a game where you just get a couple touchdowns from McCarthy and 143 yards. And that’s a great way to win a game. This one you have Miles Price giveth and taketh away. The kick return giveth and taketh away. like with the fumble that changes the entire tenor of the game and then all of a sudden you you could feel that they were trying to come back and and throw and throw and throw and even down 19-10 it felt like they thought that they had to throw on third and to throw on fourth and two and press I think a little too early at that point and I remember saying to you maybe it was even last week or when he came back no matter what the score is stick to the script with JJ McCarthy and they did not. And look, they had a chance with the ball and down one score to maybe have a chance. So, he was able to continue fighting and get them into the end zone and get them within one score. But when they got it was almost like after that fumble and then they score off of it that everyone kind of freaked out a little bit and lost the thread of what you need to do to have JJ McCarthy succeed. And this is where, you know, I think a lot of fans want us to scream to fire KOC or something and say it’s all his fault. When you watch the tape, it’s very hard to say it’s the guy designing the play’s fault because there’s so many options there. But I think at this point in McCarthy’s career, he’s not that guy who can do that. And you have to just stay on the schedule that you want for him and hope that it works out. Not just completely abandon the run game and put that behind and say, “All right, well now just throw throw throw like your Kurt Cousins at 32 years old.” Yeah. You know, it’s for the the parents in the world that have the analogy like I have my three-year-old, right? My three-year-old watches my six-year-old and goes, “I can do anything he can do, right? I can ride the bike without training wheels. I can jump off of the couch.” And you’re like, “No, you can’t. He He can, right? He can do it, but you can’t. And then he gets like and freaks out. I think this is a little similar situation where KC wants him to be six, but he’s three in his development in a quarterback situation, right? He needs the training wheels. He needs the bumpers on the bowling alley. Like, he just needs those reps in real time with a little bit of protection. And that’s okay with a young quarterback. But then the the quote that sticks out to me that I feel like KC misses the point on some is on third and one he throws, “Hey, we got a one-on-one with Justin Jefferson. We’re going to take that match up 10 times out of 10.” I go, “Yeah, with the six-year-old, like that’s great, but with the three-year-old, you hand the ball to 27, you get a new set of three downs to try and go make something happen.” And that’s the part for me that’s frustrating is because as much as that throw, you can say, “Hey, Justin fell down,” or whatever you want to see, why take the risk? The riskreward there is catastrophically far apart, right? The reward, great, huge play to Jefferson, kickstart things. The risk is bad interception and now he can’t even go for it on fourth down. Right? If I’m in that realm of KC and I see my young quarterback who I know can practice the scripted plays that he’s got a lot of reps in all week, stay with that, fight to get another set of three downs to try and make something happen with a matchup. It just seems like at times Kevin just wants to sprint when you got to crawl. And that’s just the nature of having a young quarterback. And I think that’s hard for for Kevin being a former quarterback, having some great quarterbacks that have been able to execute his schemes very flawlessly from Kirk Cousins to Sam Darnold, like being able to do some things with Josh down or Josh Dobs and Nick Mullins. And then to have this piece of clay that he has to mold into being one of those guys. I think it’s the first time his career he’s had to do that. And that’s and again, it’s just like everything. People are human. People make mistakes and people have to adapt and learn. And so, I’m not on this fire KOC. I think he’s just kind of learning as he goes here. And as things get deep into the game and moments get big, sometimes I forget he I think he forgets that that kid needs some training wheels early in his career here so that we don’t have to sit there and go, gosh, why did JJ throw that ball? The question can become, why was he put in the position to throw that ball? So, here’s the drive that I’m talking about. They after they go down 19 to 10, they get a 13-yard run on the first play with Jordan Mason and then they commit a five-yard penalty, which we will definitely get to. What the hell was that? We will get to uh all right, but then a sevenyard completion and then it’s pass, pass, pass, and turnover on downs. And that was to me where you just got a big run with Jordan Mason. their run defense seems to be cracking a little bit. They were actually succeeding with some of the bigger personnel. Ben Sims got bunched up or bumped up from the practice squad. He gets out there and Hawinson, I think, is actually blocked really well this year. Not that, you know, people from the fantasy world want to see that, but he actually had some really good blocks in that game. And that was where it’s third and two. And the the third and one, I understand, I’ve seen a million coaches take that shot before. If you’re going for it on fourth down, I get it. You never expect Jefferson to to fall. But this one was all right. You already threw an interception on third and and one and now third and two, you’re going to do it again. You’re going back to that passing well. And this is where it feels like you’re asking him to do more than he’s capable of doing. But I want to ask you about the technical elements of JJ McCarthy throwing the ball because I know that uh you are not a quarterback. You just blocked for them. However, you spent a lot of time in practice with the likes of Sam Bradford. great great great thrower Cam Newton Josh Allen when he was young and eventually developed into a much better Philip Rivers an all-time great thrower from what you saw from those guys versus where he’s at like what’s the what needs to change there? What’s the gap? It’s Yeah. And I’m not going to sit here and pretend like I am a quarterback guru, but you know you hear about it a lot and it’s how quick is the release, right? How fast is the ball from a I’m throwing it to where I’m going. And then the biggest thing with him is his anticipation. The anticipation in the NFL has to be there because windows close very quickly. And you know, you have to know if that’s an 18 yard dig, I can’t throw it when he’s open. I have to throw him open. Right. I think Jared Goff is one of the best. Matthew Stafford and Jared Goff are one of the best in the NFL right now of anticipation throws, right? throwing that ball before the receivers’s out of his break, right? And as soon as that receiver whips his head around, ball sticks on him, right? Right now, it looks a lot to me, and this is this is what happened with Caleb Williams last year, too, is he has to see him open before he delivers the ball. And if you see him open in the NFL, the safety also sees him open. And the nickel and the linebacker dropping into coverage also sees him open. And they see him open and they close that window very quickly. And so now it’s hitch hitch hitch or it’s throw it way or whatever it might be. And again takes time takes reps. But he also didn’t have to do a lot of that in college, right? I look I mean I remember watching Michigan all it was was throwing it to eight yard wide open wide receivers of Roman Wilson and all those guys after the play action and the safeties got caught flatfooted and he’s created a bunch of separation. So he’s already open when you throw it. That just comes with reps and time. The bigger issue for me is why he looks like a big league pitcher at times. the way he throws it and just swings that leg in front of him. And I mean, it literally to me sometimes feels like he is trying to fastball it so hard that the mechanics just fall apart. And people were I was reading about his accuracy getting worse and worse as the game goes on. I think a lot of that’s because he’s pressing more and more. It’s I have to make this throw. I have to make this throw. And when the pressure builds like that, I can see for a quarterback’s perspective of, well, to make that throw, I just got to throw it harder, right? to make that throw, I got to get it there faster, right? And all those things. And I mean, Philip Rivers did not have a laser cannon for an arm by any stretch of the imagination, but he could put the ball exactly where he wanted it at any given time. And so, the more that I think that you can rock and roll with him going, okay, that’s where he is right now from a mental standpoint. How do I get him early in the game of confidence of good feet, ball out, good feet, ball out? And so, that’s where you have to go as a play calling standpoint. But KOC can’t throw the ball for him. Just like I can’t take a rep for my clients anymore. Coaches can’t take reps for the players. The co the guy has to just go out there and trust the fundamentals for 60 minutes. I don’t know if we’ve seen him do that for a full game yet, right? To just fully fundamentally put together a clean game. And when you’re unfundamental at the quarterback, drastic mistakes happen. And seeing the field at this point in his career four games in consistently is a very it’s a very hard thing to do. And uh I was watching Malachi Starks talk about his interception and he said that McCarthy just telegraphed exactly where he was going with the football and he knew and he broke on it and jumped the route and made the play. And I think that there is a slow element of this and he’s throwing the ball too high. He’s throwing the ball hard and those things I think could be corrected over time. And you saw early Josh Allen. Well, when you played with him, he did not throw the ball like he throws now. He has shortened that that so much because he used to bring the ball way down and then it would fly on him, too. And I’m sure that that’s something that McCarthy with his QB guy and with a full off season because he couldn’t improve these things last offseason. He was trying to get ready to be QB1. He didn’t end his season in mid January and then have months and months and months of working on one specific thing of throwing the ball. But when it comes to that decision making, it’s so fast out there and you have to make those decisions so quickly. And when you are kind of hitching and hitching and climbing the pocket and this is why some of those balls got batted down because you’re getting closer to the offensive line, so then you’re not seeing it as well or having to release it higher or, you know, just throwing it directly into the hands of somebody. And I think it’s a lot of things at once, but the biggest is probably if you can see into the future because you’ve had a lot of throws that you’ve made over your career. Sam Darnold got way better at this, insanely better at this from early in his career where it was the same sort of thing. And then by the time he arrives here, he’s seeing a cross route and by the time the receiver is behind the linebacker, the ball is already traveling. And we saw with McCarthy, he has to wait till he clears the linebacker to start winding up. Then they see him winding up. They see where the routes are playing out. These safeties are freaks with their eyes. They like eagle eyes. And so they see what’s going on and then they can jump around there. So I think that there’s a lot of development that needs to happen. And if this were under different circumstances, I think we’d all be saying, “All right, well, this is point A and he’s got the physical tools and the flashes to get to point B.” But the pressure on everyone in the organization is now, bro, you better get to point B real real fast. And I think that’s where it’s hard because you can’t just whisper somebody into development. It’s going to happen at their own type of speed. And JJ is being asked to go develop super super fast. And I guess that always leads us to the is there something that KC is supposed to be doing otherwise? Yeah. And that’s the thing is development is never linear, right? Development in the NFL is never a linear where you’re just like every week he is exponentially better and better and better. Like development in the NFL, I hate even saying this and my buddy Ike Bucker was listening. He’d laugh me hysterically, but Sean McDermott used to throw the Kaizen chart up in Buffalo all the time, which is a chart of like ups and downs and like it’s here and then it’s there, but as long as it’s still steadily moving in the direction, then we’re going to be okay. And we used to joke like, “Oh my gosh, it’s the Kaisen chart again, right?” But that was that was when we were six and 10 and a lot of it was about Josh and how Josh is moving and there’s gonna be games where he’s be really good and he hurdles over Anthony Parr. It’s amazing. Then we go play the Jets and he throws three interceptions. You’re like okay like that’s just part of it. The problem was you know they drafted Josh Allen to save the franchise, right? And so you’re going to give that kid a lot of grace early in his career. JJ McCarthy’s linear development is not going to happen. It’s going to be up. It’s going to be down. You can’t speed development up. Development is not something that you can say, “Oh, he’s going to take a giant jump this week.” It’s like, “No, he’s he’s going to take a jump, but it might be 10 steps forward, eight steps back, but at least it was two steps forward at the beginning.” Like, that’s how development the quarterback position and really any position happens in the NFL. I mean, my first start in the NFL as a rookie. I wasn’t looking at safeties rotating. I wasn’t looking as that linebacker topped over the defensive end. I was like, “That’s freaking Allen from his arms are humongous. Like, I better not get bull rushed. Oh my god, that’s Don Terry Poe, right?” like you there’s a lot. But then as I get into year six and I throw up there and I line up and I go, “Okay, safeties are tough to cover one. Okay, where’s my DN?” Like it just takes reps and it just takes time. And I think the biggest piece too is after my first year in the NFL, I was able to look at myself and go, “Okay, I now really know what I need to work on this offseason, right? Like I got to work on strength and I got to work on my timing with my hands or else I’m going to get cooked in this league.” JJ didn’t have that. JJ didn’t have this year of self- scouting to go back and look at his film and go, “Okay, my first year in the NFL taught me X. My first year NFL taught me that I wasn’t healthy, right?” And so, this is where he’s going to have to look at all these games and now it’s in my second year. Well, I wasn’t healthy for a lot of that, too. So, how much is this making up for the injury or not? It’s it’s just a lot of question marks. But, we just all have to understand is as a Vikings fan base that this is going to be the long road. And no one wants to hear that. No one wants to believe that. Everyone wants to think that this kid’s going to flip the switch next week and look like Drake May. It took Drake May 20 games, 22 games to really look like, oh, he’s got it, right? Even Caleb Williams, you’re like, look some specialty here. It’s just going to take some time. And it’s just unfortunate that we built this roster that set an expectation, but then the rookie quarterback’s doing exactly what rookie quarterbacks do. And uh from a coaching perspective, I think there’s a sweet spot there of pushing and saying we’ve got to have you do these NFL things and learn how to do them. And in order to succeed, you have to like there’s no you can’t just run like a bubble screen. This isn’t Oregon, right? You can’t just like run a bubble screen every time and a play action and then hand off 47 times if you’re going to beat Lamar Jackson and the Baltimore Ravens. It’s just probably not going to happen that way. I don’t think anyone’s actually asking for that. But also, if you’re going to say, could you just be Matthew Stafford for me just like for a few minutes? You know, I mean, that that I also feel like at times has happened. I don’t I think that when KOC talks, it never sounds like that’s his theory, right? and he was saying to about McCarthy on Monday that there were checkdowns that he wanted him to take, but you also if you dial in five eligible wide receivers and you’re like, “Yeah, check down is like your fifth option.” So you go one, two, three, four, check down. It’s like that might be a little hard for him right now. you might have to make the checkown the first thing or one of the first things to look for is hey this play is supposed to go underneath even though everybody’s running deep because it seems like if you have plays where everyone’s running 15 yards plus that’s where he’s going to keep his eyes as long as he can and try to fire it into those windows and that might have to happen sometimes but you don’t have to do that all the time. Uh, but it’s I think it’s the hardest thing in football for a coach to figure out how far can I take it with my quarterback because there’s also 10 moments this year where they run a complicated play and he makes a fantastic throw. So, it’s like when it doesn’t work, we say, you know, hey, what’s wrong with you? Um, but putting on the training wheels is also not going to help him learn how to play in the NFL. So I and I also think it is okay that I think I think putting on the training wheels no one learned how to ride a bike without training wheels. I mean well now they have the strider bikes but whatever. In my generation like you didn’t learn how to ride a bike before you put the training wheels on and you got the basics like okay break turn and then you’re like okay now we take these off and you might fall down right it’s like okay I but at least I have the structure of how to do this. JJ was not a polished quarterback coming out of college. hate me, love me for saying it, whatever it might be, there was question marks about could this dude from my throwing it 40 times a game need to, could he do it? And so if you want to get him to that point, you have to build him to that point. You can’t just drop him in the fire and say, do it. You have to build him up to that point. And so that’s where I’m saying with the training wheels aspect, kind of like you were saying with the route concepts, hey, let’s build some route concepts that are low to high, not high to low, right? Hey, crosser first, safety jumps, crosser. Now we get to the deep dig, right? Versus a lot of it seems like it’s, hey, deep dig first. If it’s not there, then try and get yourself back down to the crosser, right? That’s training wheels. Like I think that for me is the way that I view training wheels or hey, if it’s cover one and you have a one-on-one, take the slant. It’s okay to take the slant instead of trying to take the fade, right? Like those type of things are training wheels in the NFL where you’re trying to give answers to the test pre- snap and then letting him then have to figure it out as you go. And as he gets comfortable with that, then you add more and you add more and you add more. That’s just how it works. And so you can have all these wonderful concepts and awesome ideas and guys running wide open over the field. But if the kid doesn’t know how to use the brake on the bike, what’s the point? Like what’s the point of putting the training wheels off if you can’t even slow it down? And so there’s just a lot going on there from the development standpoint that again I think KOC is trying to rush him a little bit just based on the fact that you need to win. And you can’t win in this league. And to your point, you can’t win in this league with total training wheels, right? But you can lose a lot of games with just throwing the guy out there and helping it. So, it is a fine line and that’s why you paid and that’s why you got your extension and that’s why you have HBC head ball coach on your hat. You have to make these decisions and then you have to be okay with being chastised for him every now and then. And just understand this is just the nature of the quarterback head coach relationship in the NFL for every coach and quarterback that’s ever come since the dawn of time. I also want to throw something out there uh with just the way that we go forward here and the way that we think about this is from a global perspective. Minnesota Vikings, they were supposed to be good this year and when they lose games and we break down the reasons why they lost the game. If your quarterback completes under 50%, I had the stat yesterday. What does this stat mean? This this is not a hard one to figure out what it means. the last two years in the NFL, if you’re under 50% completion percentage, you win 25% of the time. You can’t win by having your quarterback complete that few passes. You could blame whoever the heck you want. Here, do you want to know how many times, by the way, I think, what did Kirk start? Maybe 80 games for the Vikings. Yeah. How many times do you think Kirk Cousins was under 50% in his career out of 80 games? Six or seven for the Vikings? One. He was under 50% one time. So the point is when we evaluate the Ravens game, the defense gave you a chance to win and the special teams unfortunately screwed you over, but the offense did not give you a chance to win the game. The quarterback play was not at the caliber to win that football game. That is a different conversation from saying JJ McCarthy will never make it 100%. Everyone is screwing up everything with JJ McCarthy and his development. And that’s what I I wish that Vikings fans would separate is every single criticism of a quarterback in an individual game where he was very very good against Detroit and not very good against Baltimore is not an indictment on everything that he’s going to be in the future. Which I guess leads me to ask you how long like is it by the end of the season? Does it need to be into next season? It’s into next year. I mean, I I think you have to give because here’s the thing. He won’t even have a full season of starts under his belt by the time 2025 season is over. He won’t I mean, he will not have started a full 17 games. And that is just I mean, again, I look at the references from some of the young quarterbacks, right? Drake May, like Jaden Daniels was kind of an anomaly, right? Came took the thing by storm like but he’s even struggling this year. Caleb, just take last year’s class. Caleb Williams, Drake May, Bo Knicks, like all of them had moments in their rookie years and all of them had some like, oh crap moments as well. But this year, you’re starting to see some separation. Drake May is starting to really separate himself, Caleb Williams. But it wasn’t until weeks five or six that we started to see that separation. And so for me, I’m not going to render judgment on this guy of Boomer bust till probably around week seven or eight next year. But that means he has to stay healthy. Yeah. because the more he gets hurt and the longer that timeline pushes out, the margin gets so much smaller. So much smaller because now you’re going, dude, we’re in year three of your rookie contract and we’re still trying to see you take that jump, right? So, I mean, unfortunately, it’s going to be in next year before we actually can see, hey, can he stay healthy and can he turn into the guy we hope you all can become. But again, development, you can’t speed it up. It’s one week at a time. Explain to me how cadence, snap counts, etc. motions day one OTAA install. You ready? You open the playbook. All right, there’s the cool little Vikings logo. Okay, next play. Okay, snap counts and cadence. It’s the first thing that you install when you’re in day one of phase one OTAAS. And that stuff is inexcusable. I don’t care if you’re a first year quarterback. I don’t care if you’re a 12 year, 15, 16 pick it. Inexcusable to have cadence issues. Like it just can’t happen. And then you compound it with a young quarterback and now you’re going first and 10 to first and 15. You might as well punt. Like you might as well just punt. And so I don’t know what the hell happened in that game with cadence and tempo and the whole bit. But my goodness, son, what was it? Eight. Was it eight allstar penalties at home? Yeah. I don’t even know how you I don’t even know how you address that. Like I really don’t like where was I don’t know who had the issue. I mean, I tried to listen like I kind of went back and listened to the TV cover like what was and you can’t really tell, but I think a lot of it was maybe he was checking in the middle of his snap count or maybe he was just early or late, but like you have to have a rhythm and a tempo as a quarterback that your O line becomes very friendly with. Like think about Dak Prescott, right? Here we go. Hut. Like you get really comfortable with that. Or even Cam Newton’s wide 80 80. Like you just get you get really comfortable with that cadence. And so maybe there’s some of that. Hey, JJ’s first game back was in Detroit, right? And you’re hitting the defender and the snender goes like this, then you snap it. And JJ’s first game was in Chicago and that was silent. And then you have the Atlanta game which was kind of a disaster. And then you have Carson Wentz and now you’re first back at home. JJ’s back. Cadence can be wonky when it comes to just rhythm and tempo and timing of hey, how does he get through the color number color number set hut? Hey, what color number is he on? Are we on one? Are we on two? Are we on the check with me where it’s, hey, we’re going to go through it and then we’re going to have a dummy signal and then we’re gonna like there’s so many nuances to it. But it’s day one install stuff. Day one install stuff. And if you can’t get that stuff right, then I don’t really have any faith for you as a quarterback. So, if that continues, everything I just said about development and all that, I’m I’m gonna wash that away because if you can’t get operation of play call, huddle, snap count before the balls even snapped, you’re dead on arrival. So, how does that work? First of all, what what does the color number combination mean? Okay. Yeah. So, there’s there’s I mean, I’ve been on a lot of different teams. So, you have your base color number sequence, right? So, whites, greens, blues, right? And this is kind of a generic. You’re like, so white, any number, any number set hut is your base base cadence, right? So, you can go white, green, or blue is just, hey, on one, right? 180, white 180, set hot, you can go, right? And then we have like we’d have a black, right? Right. And so a black cadence was usually came with, hey, we’re going to go black 80. Black 80 said hut. And then I’m going to let you know, hey, we’re good. We’re good. We’re good. Or we’re killing it. Right. So that was your d that was your double cadence, right? And so you go, hey, black 80, black 80, white, white, hot. And then you come back up there. Okay. White 80. White. So you go black to white. Right? And then you have your we had our brown cadence, which was our, hey, we’re gonna just keep going on brown and try and get them to jump. Brown 18. Brown, right? You’re just trying to get them to jump. Brown told the O line, “Don’t freaking move, right? Like, don’t move unless they move.” And then once you hear me say Delta, which is your hurry up, right? Hey, Delta, hurry, hurry, Omaha, back with Payton, right? Hey, Delta. That was on next sound. And so you have these base cadences built in, which is on one, on two, check with me, on the hurry, and everything in between. And so when you ha, you have to have all those cadences because if you don’t, those DNs are going to kill you, right? If you let those DNs get a like a bead because those guys, I tell you this, they go listen to the TV copies. Oh, yeah. Like they all go listen to the TV copies and they listen to the quarterback’s cadence. Go, okay, if it’s on white, it’s on green. Which is why we had three colors of on one, right? So, hey, white 80 white set. And then we’d switch them with the veteran quarterbacks. Like when I was with Phil, man, every week was the first thing you’d hand out to us on Wednesday morning was the snap count cadence for that week. Hey, green is this this week, red is this this week, black is this this week. and you’d have, okay, I better not screw this up at practice or Phil’s going to kill me, right? And so when you have all those cadences in and then you compound it with young quarterback, new center, there can be some miscommunication on there. But to have eight of them, I I mean, I just I don’t understand. I I really just don’t understand how that’s even physically possible in a home game. So, what what element is the the killing plays and the motions go into that? Like could they have thought he was saying different stuff when it came to the kills and the motions or orin this happens a lot too with with young quarterbacks and this happened with us with Josh a few times is hey gun tricks right 64x dino y cross kill 96 power and it’s supposed to be on the black and he comes up and he goes hey and then he finishes with on the white ready break and so you go up to the huddle and all you heard was on the white and so then he comes up there and he goes hey black 18 black he said hut but heard him in the huddle say white and so in your brain you’re going well this is on one and so you’re already locked into as soon as he gets color number color number I’m gone and then you get back in the huddle you’re like dude didn’t you say that was on the white you’re like ah yeah that was on the black right and so that that communication just very simple because there’s a lot of information that goes into those play calls like that was a pretty short play call that I just parked out like a lot of them are gun f moves it trips right and you’re just like okay okay get to the point dude right and we’re going there because all of us only listen for two letters in that thing like everyone’s listening for different things and if the quarterback has a brain fart and he calls it on the white when it’s supposed to be on the black or he calls it on the black when it’s supposed to be on the white and all week you’ve worked that stuff that’s just miscommunication in the huddle which can lead to disaster. Playing quarterback’s not easy. There’s a lot there’s a lot going on there. There’s a lot. Meanwhile, you got someone yammering in your ear for the first 25 seconds, right? Hey, don’t forget if this if the safety comes underneath like you got to throw it here and like if the def technique watch and the pitch and you’re like okay I can think black 15 like it’s just it’s so much being a quarterback is so difficult. It’s why they make $60 million if they’re really good at their job. It’s also why it takes a while to become good at one which I think we are watching uh in front of our own eyes. Uh, I need your analysis of the offensive line in this game because I was watching and I felt a tad emotional at times because the clean pockets had the quarterback standing there for 5 seconds and I thought we dreamed of this. Jeremiah and I, we saw a utopia where Darasaw and O’Neal, they were healthy and they were dancing with unicorns and the firstrounder, he looks like he can play. And the the the fat guy on the right, look at him. And even Brandle all of a sudden had a pretty good game. Uh I think so by the numbers they had their second best pass blocking game in terms of PFF grade as a team uh over the last two years. So considering that they were down in the game also where the other teams pinning years back and running blitzes and stuff. The one thing I think we do know is that if this line continues to stay healthy, McCarthy will have time to throw the football. because I’ve been very impressed when we’ve seen even four fifths of what this is supposed to look like with this offensive line. Yeah, I I thought they played one of their best games of the year and maybe their best games as a unit up to this point. And I mean it helps when Matabuk is not there and like they’re missing some of their key edge rushers. They don’t have a Davon Clowny on the other edge. Like they don’t have a key marquee pass rusher. They don’t. And that helps because it seems like everyone in this league does. And so when you don’t have that, you have to take advantage of it and you have to show I’m the better unit, which is what the offensive line for Minnesota did this week. I thought they opened up holes well in the run game when the one game was called. They gave JJ plenty of time, right? So much criticism of his Atlanta game was like, “Yeah, you see Justin school get out there getting killed.” It’s like can’t say that this week like Darasaw eliminated the left side of the like right side. And that’s why he could step up, step up, step up and then throw it into the back of the head of break or whatever it might have been. like he had plenty of time. And so that’s where you’re going, okay, that’s step number one is let’s make sure he’s not getting hit early and often. Well, he wasn’t. This offensive line played very solid as a group. I think they’re jelling really well together. Blake has stepped in in a huge way in the front there and getting everyone settled and lined up and going. Heard Kelly might be coming back soon. That’s a whole another conversation for a whole another day. I think that with Blake Brandle being there and settling things, that gives us a little more leeway to make sure that Kelly’s brain isn’t completely broken and make sure we get it out there and treat him respectfully as a veteran that he is. But overall, man, I’m really excited about if this line can stay healthy, they’re going to look like the line we all thought they were, which could be a top five offensive line unit in the NFL. They have moved up despite all the problems on the rankings to the 10th highest graded line. And that’s really based on just the when they’ve gotten their healthy guys back because they were certainly nowhere close to that when they had their backups in there, which I think is what we were talking about for the entire time. It’s like there’s really nothing to analyze here. You need your players playing and once they have been, they’ve been the group. And also, this is a group you could build on into the future. As you mentioned, I don’t know what’s going to happen with Ryan Kelly. Um Blake Brle probably isn’t a long-term answer, but he has played really well uh over the last couple weeks anyway. Um, matchups are a big part of that, but the the other four, Fry is under contract, O’Neal’s under contract, Jackson’s a first year player, Darasaw is going to be here a long time. You can build on this in front of uh JJ McCarthy going forward. The Chicago Bears are three-point underdogs coming to Minnesota. What have you made of the Bears whose record is good and yet every game it’s like the Bears barely escape with victory which is not usually a great sign for sustainability. I mean Ben Johnson is getting this team better and better. It it is a totally different football team than they faced week one, right? And you can’t look at that week one tape and think that that’s the same team that’s going to be walking into US Bank Stadium. This offense is clicking, right? And it’s kind of a flavor of the week, right? Hey, last week it was DJ Moore’s going to throw touchdown passes and catch and then zero catches this week, but Roma Dunay goes nuts and you know Coloulston Lovelin starting to become more involved in this offense. He was non-existent in week one. I don’t even know if he had a catch against the Vikings in week one. And then Cole KT and then this Manungai guy is just I mean hammer nail. Like everything in his world is a nail and he’s just going to run right through it. And you’re seeing the the interior start to gel back together with Thoney and Dolman and Jonah Jackson and Darnell Rice playing at maybe an allp pro level right now. I mean, I watched him onehand Brian Burns and throw him into the dirt, which was very impressive. And so, you’re seeing this group start working better and better each week. And I really do think Ben Johnson’s getting them better on offense because he understands that the weak point of his team right now is his his defense is going to get him in trouble, right? They they are really struggling to stop the run. They’re really struggling to generate sacks and get to the quarterback. And so if I’m Ben Johnson, I’m going, “Okay, we’re gonna have to score a lot of points against a really talented Vikings defense, but I’m going to blitz the living hell out of JJ McCarthy because I watched him last week like sit back there and pat pat pat.” I’d rather make him uncomfortable. I’d rather try and not let him sit back there and see the field, but I’d rather rush him to see the field and maybe he throws a few more to us. But I think this Bears team is a lot improved from week one. Well, the biggest question with Ben Johnson, especially after a very strange training camp at times, although, you know, when they had their false start issues, he uh went crazy in their training camp. So, they I mean, he knows how important it is to get that down. But, uh what I saw even in week one was the same stuff that we saw in Detroit where guys were open and Caleb missed them and I think he’s hitting them much better and their run game is dangerous. I mean, Malongi is like a Leroy Horde, just like running over people. He’s uh Mike Anderson from the Broncos, you know, just like some big fullback kind of guy. Mike All like that’s kind of what he is though. Like just this big guy who’s kind of run over people, but with him and Swift as a duo, it’s a very nice combination. And here’s the biggest thing. Caleb Williams is not taking those sacks. And if he’s not taking those sacks, he is a much better player. He would have been last year if he didn’t take as many sacks as he did. I think their offense is dangerous. I think their defense is porous overall. But if you can’t find the guys that you’re looking for uh from a clean pocket, JJ McCarthy is only completing 55% of his passes from a clean pocket. The league average is about 72% from a clean pocket. He’s going to have time to throw, I think, but he’s got to be accurate. Uh and uh we’ll see what kind of game plan they have. I do think this is the type of game where he bounces completely back where it’s a defense that is not dangerous. It’s not scary. It may be a little complicated with the coverage looks at times, but um I think it’s going to be, you know, all phasers set to getting him and Jefferson on the same page. That’s everything for this week. And that they will bounce back and then everybody doesn’t have to fight each other in every comment section for another seven days. Uh but uh let’s love to see it, hate to see it. Before we wrap up here, I’ll give you a love to see it with the Nebraska freshman quarterback. Congratulations. A great win, a great performance from him. Well done. You thought the season was over. Husker football was going down. And uh I also want to throw out too that uh Matt Rule and what he said in his speech that he gave after the passing of Marshon Neland was really really well thought out and moving and important and uh so Matt Rule I I think has done a really good job overall with that team and to get a win after that um you know I thought that was a it was a really good week for uh Husker football. Yeah, we needed that one bad. I mean, now the hard part is, and we’ve lived this in this show before, too, is well, who’s the quarterback of the future off of one game against a bad ass UCLA team, right? Like, they’re not good. And so, it’s like, okay, let’s wait and see what happens against Penn State here. And I do the postgame call-in show. We’re on air from 1 to three. And I I made a meme. I’ll send you. It’s the one where I’m the Army guy, the person sleeping, and I’m like, big red reaction, Dylan Raola. Cuz everyone was just like, where’s Dylan playing next year? It’s like, please, everyone called down. But yeah, Huskers are seven wins going in before Thanksgiving. Fantastic news there. Um, my hate to see it is Brian Dable getting fired. You know, I think that I’ve been maybe a Dable Stan because I like the guy, but you know, he’s just you can’t lose football games the way he’s lost football games and expect to keep a job. I think he had a really good pitch to go into to Joe Sheen and the crew be like, “Listen, I’m down RB1. I’m down wide receiver one. Like I’ve got a rookie quarterback that’s got a lot of promise that I love and I want to build, but you just can’t have games in the 90 percentile of winning and then find ways to lose them or let the Broncos score 30 points in a fourth quarter. Like it’s just one of those things where I don’t think the Giants really had a choice. But I do think that long-term for Jackson Dart success, Dable probably was the right answer and he’ll probably be the offensive coordinator for the Buffalo Bills next year, which is going to be terrifying for everyone. Yeah. I mean, uh, as far as Dable goes, I think that it wasn’t just the losses that piled up, but also the handling of multiple concussions with Jackson Dart and, uh, you know, the whole issue with the training staff that first time that they got hammered for and then putting him back out there after it looked like it was a another concussion. I mean, those are the things that fall on the shoulders of the head coach and that’s your most valuable merchandise going forward. So, but you’re right. I mean, at the end of the day, you can’t have records like this and keep your job pretty much anywhere, even if he has a good offensive mind. You mentioned the Buffalo Bills. You talk about hate to see it. I hate to see what’s going on with their offense all year. It’s basically if James Cook is great, then okay, it looks fine, but they have no downfield presence whatsoever and the greatest armed quarterback in the world. It’s not adding up. uh the receiver thing. You know, their general manager went on my old radio station and screamed at the talk hosts for criticizing them for not getting a receiver. Keon Coleman is terrible and they can’t throw it down the field. And I don’t know if you can win the Super Bowl this way. If you can have losses like this one and Atlanta, I mean, the New England loss doesn’t look as bad now, but still like you’re one team one week and another team another week, and that’s not what you’re supposed to be when you have a quarterback of that caliber. Yeah, I mean there’s a world in which Buffalo misses the playoffs. And I’m not kidding. Like that that is a very real scenario here with how well New England’s got a couple game lead in that division now with the tiebreaker over Buffalo. You’re looking at Indianapolis. You’re looking at teams like Jacksonville. Like I know they just let one slip this week too, but you know, it’s just one of those things where you’re like Buffalo. This is what happens when you pay your quarterback 350 million and you don’t draft. Well, it that that’s just what happens if you don’t draft a good receiver. You can’t go afford a $30 million Justin Jefferson. like that’s just not how the cap works and they are the most capstrapped team in the entire NFL and they can’t stay healthy. So yeah, I absolutely hate seeing that because I love that crew. I love what they’re doing up there. But nature of the football, next man up and if the next man up’s a big drop off, then you’re in a lot of trouble. I’ll throw out one more hate to see it. You know, I feel as a man approaching 40, the age catches up a little bit. You need a little more sleep. Got to go to bed a little earlier. A long day at the stadium wears me out more than it did when I took over this job at 29, I think. And I feel Aaron Rogers is getting tired as well. That early in the season, you know, he’s throwing the ball pretty well and people are like, “Yeah, you know, he’s looking pretty good.” And if he was the Vikings quarterback, then this the other night he looked like an old man who needs a nap. And I just when Rogers comes back, you you’re always worried about and look, I mean, the whole guy and the Vikings relationship with him and all that, but you have to respect him as one of the great quarterbacks of all time, he has not looked like that in years. And in that game, I thought this this is where this is Joe Nameoth playing for the Rams the other night. This is where you’ve crossed the line to look in 2010 Farvish where you just don’t have it anymore. and he was trying the safety he takes. He’s like, I’m gonna escape the No, you’re not. Not anymore. And uh it it’s kind of I hate to see when age is catching up to everyone because it is me, too. Well, yeah. And I’ll I’ll finish with one more. Hate to see it as well. Bengals, what are we doing open Joe Burrow’s window here? I I really don’t understand this. Like unless Joe Burrow can play middle linebacker and stop the run, what what is Joe Burrow going to do differently than Joe Flacco is doing right now? Because right now they’re scoring 38 40 points and losing games. Like are you thinking, well, if we get Joe back, we’ll score 50, so we’ll win. I mean, you’re risking your franchise quarterback to come back and maybe and maybe this is a, hey, let’s see if we can beat the Steelers this weekend, get ourselves back in the divisional race and go from there. And if it doesn’t work out and we lose the next two, then yeah, put them back on IR and tankathon begins. I really don’t understand. I mean, he’s been hurt, he’s had the wrist, he’s had the ACL, he’s had the calf. Why? Why even remotely try and rush this guy back? I I just really don’t understand it. Not only that, but uh I am really enjoying watching Joe Flacco play ridiculous football. Let the man let the old man play. I actually when I saw that, I actually felt bad for Joe Flacco. I’m like, this is his last chance, man. He’s having a great time out there. He’s having fun. He’s also getting a break from his wife and kids and eating alone and talking about how much he likes that. How much he loves it. I used to think I used to feel bad for that guy. Now I realize he’s in heaven. is having the time of his life. Don’t take this away for nothing from Joe Flacco. I agree with you. Well, every week is a new journey in the National Football League. So, we will be back again next week and I think we’re going to be talking about like JJ fixed everything because the Bears can’t stop nothing. So, I sure hope so. We’ll see. We’ll see. For all of our emotional health, uh Jeremiah, thank you for your time as always and we’ll talk to you next Tuesday. Absolutely. Football. Football. All right. We welcome in special contributor to the show, Maggie Robinson, for her weekly breakdown of what’s going on around the National Football League. And uh Maggie, we’re never short on things to talk about and things to react to the minute we think that we’ve got this National Football League figured out. It lets us know that we are nowhere close. So, where would you like to begin this week? I want to take us down to Philadelphia. Okay. for this kind of bizarre game versus the Green Bay Packers. Seven to 10 win, Philadelphia wins, but it was scoreless in the first half. Both quarterbacks had these really awkward, weird fumbles. And then Philly kind of got it going. But the player that I want to highlight in this game, the trade deadline was last week. Jaylen Phillips was traded from Miami to the Eagles as an edge rusher. And when I tell you, he is the most excited person in that locker room. This man is juice. He was quoted saying, “This is literally the greatest thing that’s ever happened to me.” Sir, what? You just moved from Miami, Florida up to Philadelphia, and you’re gushing about the fans. You’re gushing about the weather. Both of which are notoriously not great. Anyway, he was so excited that he had like an insane game. Six tackles, two quarterback hits, a fumble recovery, like stood on his head. And I just want to say I think this is Howie Roseman doing some sort of black magic once again in Philadelphia. It really is. And with Jaylen Phillips, he was a guy that just a couple of years ago was one of the best young emerging edge rushers in the entire NFL. And it just hasn’t gone the same since uh maybe I think it was his second year in the NFL. But he is a high draft pick. He is a freakish talent. And adding that to a Philadelphia defensive line that already has some superstars, but also had some weaknesses uh makes them once again one of the more dangerous defensive lines in the entire NFL. But I think uh for as it pertains to the Vikings, having the Green Bay Packers melting down and asking Matt Lafleur if he’s worried about his job in the post game, uh it has gotten a little bit ugly there. And this is Green Bay without Tucker Craft, their leading wide receiver. He was just absolutely fantastic in terms of yards after catch and he’s out for the year now with an ACL. So that’s going to take an adjustment. And then Elton Jenkins got hurt for them too in this game and he’s going to be out. the Vikings play them in two weeks. Uh that’s something to keep an eye on whether they could get it turned around because that offense has been pretty gnarly. So as much as Philly deserves a lot of credit, it’s been ugly for the Green Bay Packers and there’s a pretty clear blueprint now to beat them. So it’s on the floor to make adjustments in these coming weeks. But I don’t know if they can because they just in terms of receiving options, they don’t have the horses. And you probably saw the dropped pass by Bo Meltton who was a receiver and then a corner and then a receiver again dropped a a key pass in that game that cost the Green Bay Packers. So, uh it’s gotten it’s gotten pretty bad there, but there’s a reason why Philly should still be considered a top contender for the Super Bowl because they got better at the trade deadline. Yeah, they’ve just made the right decisions consistently and I don’t really know how they’re so good at thinking this far ahead and projecting and picking the right players. But another guy that they nabbed didn’t play in this last game would have been great was J.R. Alexander from Baltimore and that was kind of a weird one in the offseason with him and we all kind of thought he was going to play in this game versus Green Bay because like oh my gosh you were just on the Packers and then you were with Baltimore but he wasn’t really put on the plane. There was maybe an injury, a little bit of strangeness there, but the internet was kind of going crazy. Do you think this is overblown or what was it? Uh, it might be one of those things. It depends on if we think that they were really playing like Ford HS or whatever. It might be one of those things where they acquired him to get as much information about the Packers offense as they could. And one of the key moments in the game was the defensive tackle for the Eagles yelling out the play call and when they needed a fourth down conversion and it turned out to be the right call and they made a tackle in the back field and the game essentially ended there. Um they made it a little more interesting than it needed to be. But you wonder how much of a sense or even is it just that they’ve gotten predictable. But I I don’t know. Jaier Alexander uh like a lot of people age and injuries in the NFL comes for them and I I don’t know if that was a particular that but that would be like next level. Let’s just acquire a guy to ask him about the Packers and not ever plan to play him and I guess that’s worth a draft pick if you’re the uh Philadelphia Eagles or maybe when he gets healthy down the stretch of the playoffs they’ll have a little more depth there. But their defense looking as good as it did is pretty scary for the NFC. That would be a crazy reasoning for Howie Roseman. I feel like, and maybe this has been done before, chat, if you guys know, let us know. Has anyone ever been drafted just because they know the play call of the team they’re about to play? Like, is that a reason to spend a couple mill? You know, I mean, there have been players who have been picked up who have been cut. That that does happen where somebody is coming out of training camp and they’re playing the other team and, you know, that he used to play for or something and they they cut him and pick him up and they’ll try to ask him everything they can. That happens sometimes. But, I’ll tell you a funny story. Mike Vrabel. One time we used to do these coaches calls where we would talk to the opposing team’s coach and the Vikings picked up a player for the Titans where Vrabel was coaching and uh he got asked, “Hey, did you pick up that guy just cuz uh or do you think the Vikings picked up that guy just because he was with the Titans?” And Vel said he wouldn’t know our defense good enough to matter anyway. Oh my gosh, that was great. That was great. That was ruthless. I was like, “Okay, I guess we know why he got cut then.” Poor guy just catching strays left and right. Did nothing wrong. That’s funny. Uh, I want to wrap us up here though with Green Bay with some news that came out about Green Bay player Michael Parsons. All right, so like the drama doesn’t end here. He actually when he left Dallas had to sign what’s called like the poison pill. I almost say settlement, but like in his negotiations, he essentially said he cannot be dealt to any NFC East rivals of the Cowboys, which I thought was quite interesting. And I hadn’t really heard of this, and the reason I hadn’t is because the last time it was used was like Brett Favre of 08 with the Jets. So, that was kind of interesting to me. Totally checks out as something the Dallas Cowboys would do of being like, “Okay, fine. We’ll give him up, but we’re just going to screw all of you guys over and make sure that you don’t get him because we’re letting go of him.” Yeah, it is a a funny stipulation in the contract, but also Brett Favre ended up playing for the Minnesota Vikings. Anyway, uh it is a long contract for Micah Parsons in Green Bay, so I don’t think it’ll be anytime soon that he ends up playing for any other team. In fact, you’d probably guess for a player like that. Most of the time when you get that guy, you just keep him forever. The Dallas Cowboys chose not to, but that’s how Green Bay usually would plan to do that. Uh but that is funny. like don’t you dare turn around and send him to the Philadelphia Eagles. Maybe that was a hint, Jerry, that he was really good at football and you shouldn’t give him up. But now there’s going to be a lot of pressure on Micah Parsons because I don’t see an answer for Green Bay to wave a magic wand and all of a sudden be a great offense. I I do think that with Jordan Love around every corner is either the hottest game or the coldest game that you’ve ever seen. That’s just who he is as a quarterback and people never could get over it. like the the media, the fans, whatever, is that that’s who he is. But with one of his weapons that kept him on schedule, Tucker Craft, who only had an average depth of target about five yards and was all yards after catch, taking that guy off, I think, makes it uh harder for him to be consistent. So, it’s going to be on the Packers defense, which was excellent against Philly. It’s going to be on their defense in order for them to win. And that battle now at Lambo, if they’re continuing to play like this with the the Vikings, uh, becomes very very interesting because that one with both defenses playing well and both offenses struggling, could be 10 to7 again. Yeah, that’ll for sure be a game to watch. And someone that just let go, got let go of in the NFL. That’s not a good transition, but we’re just going to jump there anyway. Brian Dable was fired from the New York Giants. We all saw this coming. This is not shocking. It’s his fourth straight loss. They’re two and eight. Uh but I think the thing that was most notable here was the Jackson Dart concussion. So this is his third concussion evaluation in three different starts. And he has this reckless style of prey that we’ve seen. He has like the most rushing touchdowns of any rookie at the Giants ever. And that’s awesome, but that’s because he makes these runs when they’re not necessarily needed, when they’re really dangerous, and they’re maybe not the right choice. They’re the gritty choice. we can give him that. He’s going to put it on the line for his team, but he’s also putting his body on the line. And I think Brian Dable, in my opinion, did not do a good enough job of managing that and kept giving him plays in which he could get injured. And that after seeing him go into the concussion evaluation tent, try to get him out early. Just felt a little murky there with all that. Right. because this was not, as you mentioned, the first time that they’ve already dealt with an issue with Jackson Dart and him going into the tent earlier this year was a fireable offense in itself. And then not dealing with it correctly this time. Although I will say, I mean, in some ways in Dable’s defense, there’s supposed to be somebody watching at all times for concussions that can signal down and have the player pulled off the field. And uh was that person eating a sandwich at the time? I mean, it seems pretty clear that he needed to be evaluated and it’s always difficult with quarterbacks because you take them out and Russell Wilson has to go play. Nobody wants that. But, uh, they have not done right by Jackson Dart this season and that was a fireable offense. But, also just shocking number of times where they were ahead in games, had chances to win and in this one they had a a great chance to beat the Chicago Bears, completely fall apart. The one against Denver was one of the craziest losses I’ve ever seen a team have. So, it it was obvious that Dable had lost control of this and was not able to close out games. Uh, I saw that they kicked a field goal at the one yard line. Like, are you serious? Um, so, uh, in the year 2025 in Roger Goodell’s National Football League, you’re kicking a 18 yard field goal. Like, what are what are we doing here? So, you know, he I think was looked like a little in over his head these last few years and didn’t have plans that worked for the quarterback. The only unfortunate part of that is, and is the Bears have screwed this up. Many of teams have screwed this up, you should fire him before you get your quarterback so you can pair the new coach with the quarterback. Not, and this just goes on the long list of coaches who have they’ve drafted a quarterback to save the franchise. The kid can’t do it right away and the coach gets fired. Then he’s got to learn a whole new offense and everything else. Not very good management, not very good timing. And I remember saying when last year John Mara said, uh, well, they have to win next year. Everybody’s going to be gone or whatever about Dable. It’s like, if you’re thinking about breaking up with somebody, just break up with him because you’re eventually going to get there anyway. And they finally did. Yeah. You got to rip the band-aid off. And if he sounds like he knew earlier on, and I did read a quote from Mea where he was saying, “Yeah, in 2022, Dable was coming off coach of the year. He was riding really high, but especially in a place like New York, you cannot ride that high because you are going to fall off that cliff just as fast as you got up there. And that’s exactly what happened. He had that outstanding 2022 season and then just couldn’t find the pieces again. And there was some back and forth with Mike CFO like you get play calling responsibilities. No, you don’t. Just kidding. They’re back to me. That’s confusing. That doesn’t put a lot of trust in your staff. Also, your staff is up and leaving because they don’t like working with you. That feels like a telling sign of maybe there’s some personnel issues here. Yeah. And I think that there are some people Josh McDaniels is this way who’s having a ton of success again in New England who are made to be coordinators and not made to be head coaches. And it’s just such a different job. It’s not just pick up a, you know, the whiteboard marker and draw plays and install offenses and things like that. It’s managing and being the CEO of an entire franchise. And it did not seem that that was really Dable’s strong suit. And I’ve also never seen someone squeeze so much goodwill out of a nine- win season, which is what they had in 2022. They beat the Vikings in the playoffs, but I believe they were 96 and one. and he probably should have won coach should not have won coach of the year uh in that season considering that the Vikings won 13 games that year with new coach Kevin Oonnell. So uh yeah, I think uh Dable kind of showed that he will be an offensive coordinator I’m sure again but head coach I’m not so sure about that. And just to add one more layer of speculation onto this, so they kept the GM Joe Show. They came in together, Dable and Shoen. Is that someone that you see sticking around or is he getting the boot soon, too? So, I actually think that from a perspective of team building, they’ve done a good job. Uh, they have a young quarterback to work with. Clearly, Dart can play. I don’t know what his ceiling is, but he could play. They’ve drafted some defensive players high. They’ve built a really excellent defensive line. Uh they made some key signings in the off season. Malik Neighbors has been out. That’s really tough for everybody, but they have Malik Neighbors to build going forward. Cam Scataboo is going to come back. They’ve got a lot to work with with the roster. I think that this is actually despite being New York, it’s I think it’s actually a favorable job to take over for a head coach. Who do you think in in the the sphere of coaches who are floating around is going to get that job? It’s obviously Bill Belich. No, I’m just kidding. Um, oh my god. I I I don’t know. Uh, I I think that when you start to look at which teams are succeeding, this is always the pretty clear model to be able to do it. Who’s succeeding? Whose offense is good? And then hire from there. And uh I don’t know like who’s working on the staff of the Indianapolis Colts. Let me look this up. Who is the Indianapolis Colts uh offensive coordinator? Because you know that might be somebody. Who is that? That is Oh, actually that’s Jim Bob Cter. Probably unlikely to be. He’s been around forever and has the funniest name in sports. Is that actually his name? You’re kidding. That is truly his name. His name is Jim Bob Cter. He used to work for the uh Detroit Lions for a while. Probably more of a coordinator type of guy. Maybe uh I don’t even know who’s doing the Rams. Who’s doing the Rams the because everyone loves hiring the Rams offensive coordinators as we’ve seen here. Uh Mike Laflur. Okay. Maybe. Maybe. I don’t know. Yeah. Usually that’s how what what you’re going to do could be Michael Flor. I wouldn’t be surprised by that. What you’re going to do is you’re going to look for somebody just like the Bears did with Ben Johnson to lock in with your young quarterback and have those two go forward together. So, whoever it will be is going to be an offensive coordinator, a QB coach or something that’s going to work really closely with Jackson Dart. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. And let’s actually look to the LA Rams in the NFC West. We had a NorCal SoCal showdown with the San Francisco 49ers and the LA Rams. And the Rams beat the ners pretty handily 42-26. Now they’re sitting at 7-2, second place in the NFC West. And player of the game, Matt Stafford maybe having his best of his 17 seasons. Dare I say, you’re not you’re not crazy right now. I think if you were doing MVP, it’s Jonathan Taylor and it’s Matthew Stafford where, you know, I I’ve covered a lot of Matthew Stafford games against the Vikings. And for him to progress the way that he did into his 30s, I mean, I don’t know if that speaks to McVey or speaks to just him uh getting I think a lot smarter or actually the funny thing is now that he doesn’t want to get hit as much. I think he makes much better decisions. I’m sure in his older age where he’s got, you know, the spinal issues or whatever it is with the back that he doesn’t want to get knocked down all that often. So, he’s getting rid of the football and making good decisions where he used to try to scramble around and be hero and make all the plays and get sacked and throw a lot of picks. Now, he’s playing extremely safe. And uh right now on FanDuel, the Rams are plus 700 to win the Super Bowl. The third highest odds of anybody in the NFL. I might pick them today to win the Super Bowl. I think they are top tobottom the strongest team right now in the entire NFL. And also shout out to Kyle Shanahan for getting this much out of M. Jones. That defense is completely uh crushed with injuries and it’s really hard for them to be competitive with half their players out. Bosa’s out, Warner’s out. But uh the fact that they were in that game competitive, he went 33 for 39. Like they’ve done a really good job there with him. But, uh, I think the Rams, they’re a beast and they’re going to be really, really tough down the stretch and into the playoffs. That is high praise. But, I do think it’s warranted and that is a good shout. This is not the full strength 49ers team by any stretch. They’re kind of limping along with the crutches on right now, just throwing together whatever they can. And it is Mac. Jones, who none of us really thought had that much going for him, and he he’s turned out better than expected. So, you know, both those head coaches doing a great job with the players they have, namely the quarterbacks. I did read a quote from someone at the Ringer, and I apologize, forgot his name. He said, “Watching Matt Stafford is like watching Adam Sandler play pickup basketball. He’s an older white dude who’s balling out.” Okay. I thought that was just hilarious, so I had to share it because that’s a great analogy. I I was uh struggling to figure out what the punchline was going to be there. Uh but as far as from a statistical perspective, uh Matthew Stafford is currently the highest graded PFF passer. 67% of his passes complete, 25 touchdowns, two picks, and he has 23 big-time throws to only eight turnover worthy plays and 14 sacks. The fact that he just isn’t having negative plays anymore is wild to me after watching him with the Lions. And uh right now pass a rating of 114.8 eight only behind Jared Goff and Sam Darnold. It’s Yeah, he’s playing great football. And it’s so funny because in the off season there was a very real discussion about whether the Los Angeles Rams could trade him and then maybe they would have signed Sam Darnold and things could be, you know, so much different than they are now. But Stafford went I thought I actually thought he was going to retire. I was like, “Ah, come on, man. You know, it’s probably over.” Uh I was definitely wrong about that because he’s playing amazing football. He’s getting the last laugh for everybody. And honestly, good for him. Welld deserved. He He has four kids. He’s a full family. Like, he can pack it up whenever he wants, but he’s still going and still getting better. So, whenever he leaves, he’s going to leave on the highest note versus a lot of people leave when they’re forced to. I feel like he’s going to leave when he wants to. Yeah, it does look that way. Uh the fact that he cannot take hits like he used to, I think extends how long he could play that maybe it’s not even just this year. Although, if he wins the Super Bowl, he’s got to pull a John Elway or a Pton Manning. I think I think if you win the Super Bowl now, you got to say, “All right, that’s two Super Bowls that would lock him into the Hall of Fame.” And that’s actually a funny thing about Stafford is that when he went to Los Angeles, I thought, I don’t think he’s a Hall of Famer. And even when he won the Super Bowl, I was like, I’m not f like he’s a great quarterback, but I’m not fully there yet. Uh, if he continues this way and is in the MVP discussion, I think he’s got a great chance to go to the Hall of Fame. Yeah. I mean, what a way for him to write his own story towards the end of this. Let’s look at someone who’s in his rookie year. This is kind of shocking to me. They always put up rookie of the week and you get to vote on it. It’s like a Pepsi sponsored something through the NFL. All right. Dylan Gabriel was nominated as one of the potential rookies of the week for a loss to the Jets. I’m really confused on the panel that selected him for this. He completed 17 of 32 passes for 167 yards. Like yes, two touchdowns, but but like worst game arguably of their season. What? Yeah. I mean, there’s a lot of nominations for worst games of their season. Uh 53% completion percentage for 167 yards is not what I think of when I think rookie of the week. Um so I don’t I don’t know. I mean, look, JJ McCarthy, and it was exciting for him to come back against the Bears, but he won player of the week, offensive player of the week in week one. Like, there’s no way that he played a good enough game to win that award. I don’t know how you’re the one who used to work in the NFL front office. I don’t know how any of this works. I just assume, here’s what I assume, that they have a sponsor thing and the sponsors are very, you know, a big deal to make sure that they hit those, but they’ve got a lot of other things to do when they’re running the nation’s largest sports league. So, they’re like a couple of interns. Who do you think? I don’t know. Like, and then one of them may be a Browns fan and says like, “Let’s just give it to Dylan Gabriel or something.” I really don’t know. it feels like it’s pulled out of a hat or the fact that you know that there really I mean this year haven’t been a ton of explosive rookie performances. Cam Ward has really struggled. Travis Hunter is out for the year. I don’t think Mason Graham has been special for Cleveland. Maybe they’re just struggling to find rookie performances. That’s the best I could do because that is insane to have a terrible loss to the Jets and not play well and then be named rookie of the week. It’s got to be somebody better. That’s gonna be like my next investigative piece is like pulling back the curtain. Who’s making these decisions? Who do I need to contact and figure out? That’s really funny. But on this list of people, four potential rookies of the week is Tayvon Henderson. And I think he gets my vote. Oh yeah. 150 scrimmage yards and two rushing touchdowns for the Patriots. I think that’s got to be the guy. The rest people not see Tyler Shook is on here. I mean, he won, I guess. How well did he actually play? I didn’t even really look at that game because passes for a 70% passing rate. 200 almost 300 yards. Oh, that’s pretty good. Yeah, that’s pretty good. I I would say that’s Yeah, 128 rating. Yeah, I mean Tayvon Henderson probably had the most exciting game, but Tyler Shook with that performance is deserving. And you know, I’m sure that they’ll be declaring him to be like the guy in New Orleans now, just like they did Spencer Rattler a few weeks ago. But at least that gives them something to be interested in. Uh for Tyler Shook with Trayvon Henderson, it was fascinating that they weren’t playing him at all in New England and suddenly they get some injuries and they’re forced to play him and then oh, he’s amazing. Like I were you guys missing something there that actually if he continues to do stuff like that makes New England even more dangerous. But hey, good for good for New Orleans. I would just suggest to all their fans, soak it in because next week your young quarterback could throw three interceptions and then you’ll all hate everything again. We’re kind of dealing with that here, Maggie. Yeah. And I mean, it’s a roller coaster, isn’t it? You you can never relish the good moments for too long because you know the other shoe is about to drop. It’s like that with good quarterbacks, much less young quarterbacks, but uh we we ride that roller coaster uh here for sure. So, yeah. No, I I mean, look, uh, for those guys, for those two, um, neither one of them had done much to this point and then having breakouts, it it is really worth watching for New Orleans because if if Shook can look good, they’re a rebuilding team. They’re probably going to have the number one, two, three, four pick, they might be a team that’s trading out of that if somebody else wants to trade up and try to get a quarterback, though, I don’t know who that is in this year’s class. That’s a good point. I had not considered that. Yeah, if they like who they have, then they just build and find the personnel around him versus being like, “Ah, we need a replacement.” And maybe we didn’t give him enough of a shot. There have been a lot of quarterbacks who come out of the draft and we’re like, “They’re not that great.” And then they turn out to be the really good ones and the overhyped guys are exactly that. They don’t deliver on what we’ve expected of them in the college game versus the pro game. It’s just so different. So maybe he’s one of those sleeper picks. I’m I’m not going to say that. Or maybe he just played the Carolina Panthers. It’s just so hard to know. Uh let’s jump now to someone who’s won a lot of awards in his career and is actually extending his career. So Rob Gronowski just signed or is about to sign a one-day contract to retire as a Patriot. If you remember, he retired and then unretired, followed Tom Brady down to Tampa Bay, won a Super Bowl, and now he is retiring as a Patriot, which feels very fitting. It does. And uh I I know some people get cynical about these like, oh, it’s just a cheap PR or something for the team. Look, I mean, give your fans an opportunity to celebrate that player one more time and have them do a press conference, get them in the news and and that sort of thing. I I’ve been a part of uh a number of these types of press conferences when a player officially retires, a Viking like Kyle Rudolph or uh Brian Robinson, and I think it’s great for them. It also like it’s hard to have your career end. Even if Rob Gronowski is doing other stuff, it’s difficult for them. And I I think for the player themselves, it could offer a little bit of closure, which not everybody gets. In fact, very very few people get to sort of go out. I want no one ever goes out on their own terms because their own terms would be playing forever, right? But, uh, just go out in terms of, uh, being able to go back to the franchise that loves you, the fan base that loves you. So, uh, I will always be a massive appreciator of Rob Gronowski. I think he’s the best tight end in NFL history, considering his receiving and his blocking, his impact on that offense. So, good for him. And I also want to add one thing that I don’t know if your audience will know. He’s doing this because one of his mentors, he was very involved in the community and charity space in New England. Did a lot of volunteer work. And a philanthropist that he worked with just passed away from cancer, and she was the one to kind of talk to him about this. So, he’s doing this in her honor, which is really nice. Her name is Susan Hurley, and it’s just a very feel-good story of like, wow, this guy is doing something very impactful, and he’s done a lot of work in the New England community. That’s awesome. We should recognize that. And I think that’s that’s Grank, too. I think that’s who he is, which is a really nice thing about him. Like the the big overenthusiastic type of character, I think, is a big heart with him as well. He comes from Buffalo and so do I, so I followed his career very closely. Um, that’s yeah, it’s a that’s a great story. I did not know that before you said it, so I’m really glad I wasn’t like screw him. Who needs a one year one day contract, but uh that’s very kind of him to do. Yeah. And then not to end this pod on a down note, but I do want to take a moment to acknowledge Commissioner Tagle and just how much he impacted the modern National Football League as we know it. He grew the league from 28 to 32 teams. He was commissioner for 17 years. He helped negotiate a new CBA. There were no player strikes underneath him. He had a very good relationship with the players uh association and with everyone he worked with in the front office. Implemented the Rooney rule, was big on diversity. He just did a lot to shape the NFL as we now know it and we view it. You remember NFL Europe? That was all him. And now the NFL is playing its final international game in Madrid this week and who knows what’s coming next. He just had such a big impact and no one’s downplaying it, but I just wanted to take a moment that the NFL as we know it today would not be the same if it was not for him. I totally agree and uh this would be like my childhood commissioner. Can you have a childhood commissioner? But he was uh the commissioner of the NFL as I was growing up and watching the league and to see the the steps that it took. I think Pete Rosselle will always get credit for taking the NFL from where it was, which was kind of in the background in comparison to another sport like baseball and then emerging as America’s game. But then Tagleu picking up on that, moving the game forward, getting it to the place where Roger Goodell took over um was a massive accomplishment for him. And I think that in terms of its national popularity, it started to reach its peak where it has remained under uh Paul Tagalibu. So, uh, rest in peace to a great commissioner of the NFL and, uh, there you go. I mean, it’s it’s the NFL, I don’t think, gets to this point, uh, without him. Absolutely not. I mean, his handprint is all over that front office, and it was it’s a sad day. So, did we really need the Jaguars, though? No. Could we have to take them? We have enough teams in Florida. Come on now. We we just didn’t we just didn’t. No one needed that. We’ve never needed that outside of when Mark Brunell was playing there anyway. Uh but something we do need on the show is you each week dropping in with your look around the NFL, Maggie. So great stuff as always and uh we’ll see you next week. Sounds good. See y’all. Football. Football.

Former Viking Jeremiah Sirles joins the show to discuss the Vikings’ loss to the Ravens and the ups and downs of J.J. McCarthy’s development as a young quarterback. Then, Maggie Robinson joins for this week’s Robinson Round Up.

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