Latest / The Skol Hop / Hazy Forecast, Hanging out with Dustin Baker, Justin Jefferson Contract Extension | TSH Ep. 43

Transcript

Hazy Forecast, Hanging out with Dustin Baker, Justin Jefferson Contract Extension | TSH Ep. 43 · The Skol Hop

• 0:24
  All right, Hey, Vikings fans, welcome into another episode of the School
• 0:27
  Hop. I'm Evan, I'm Austin. There's a couple of dudes from Iowa.
• 0:30
  We like drinking beer and talking about the Vikings. Yeah, we do.
• 0:33
  And another edition of the Mystery Beer tonight. I'm super excited, and
• 0:38
  you brought it, so I'm excited to try to guess what we've got.
• 0:41
  I think you're gonna like this one. Oh man? All right, well
• 0:44
  I already have a guess, but we'll save that for a minute. Should
• 0:48
  we do a pre guess? That's totally unfair because all I have is I
• 0:52
  think you're gonna like this one. Well, I won't tell you one way
• 0:55
  or another, but you could. I mean, that's the beauty of recording
• 0:58
  is we can go back and you can that's true, that you were right
• 1:00
  or wrong, that's true. What's your pre guest? How a man pre
• 1:03
  guest? Just off the way that you said that, hazy ipa and don't
• 1:10
  give me anything, all right, I'm not giving you anything, all right?
• 1:12
  Just off just because you know, like if you talk to somebody about
• 1:17
  pizza, we're gonna have and you know, dude loves pepperoni. Pizza and
• 1:19
  you're like, hey, man, you're gonna love the pizza tonight, Like,
• 1:22
  okay, I guess we're having pepperoni pizza. I guess you'll have to
• 1:23
  find out, So maybe a hazy ipa before we find out, though,
• 1:27
  we do have to thank our friends at Big Top Ventures, So shout out
• 1:30
  to Big Top Ventures for sponsoring today's episode. They can get you the lowest
• 1:34
  rate possible on several all inclusives in Mexico or Jamaica. Big Top Ventures step
• 1:41
  right up to your next big adventure. If you're interested in checking out what
• 1:45
  pricing they can give you, go ahead, and Evan's pointing down at their
• 1:48
  email address. If you're watching us on YouTube or Spotify, you can see
• 1:52
  it, but go ahead and send them an email letting them know you're interested.
• 1:56
  Their email address is Big Top Ventures LLC gmail dot com. Again,
• 2:00
  that's Big Top Ventures LLC at gmail dot com. And I'm just gonna keep
• 2:06
  saying it until I'm there. I'm going in less than a month now where
• 2:10
  t minus a few weeks, so I'm super pumped and it's all because of
• 2:15
  Big Top Ventures. So thanks guys. Here you go, all right,
• 2:17
  should we crack these open and see if you're right. Yeah, we'll see
• 2:21
  if my hazy I p A guess is right. I will say, Evan,
• 2:27
  you still have a pretty decent tinfoil job, but this is probably your
• 2:32
  least performing tinfoil job. They were a little condensated, okay when I got
• 2:38
  them home. Okay, I've said from the get go, you are a
• 2:44
  much better tinfoil rapper than I am. Okay, well I accept that.
• 2:47
  I don't quite agree because your other ones have been great. But let's open
• 2:52
  these up and give them a try room for improvement. Hey, get better
• 2:55
  every day? Oh man, all right. Definitely smells really good. Oh
• 3:04
  there it is. I'm seeing very so. It's not quite orange, but
• 3:13
  very citrusy looking, maybe what I would consider like a grapefruit looking, maybe
• 3:19
  a little orange now that it's all poured in there. Definitely an I p
• 3:25
  A. All right, let's uh, let's give this a try school.
• 3:37
  What do you think that is good? That is good? That is a
• 3:43
  it's a hazy I p A. It is a hazy it is a hazy
• 3:46
  I PA. You have correctly identified. Well, when you tell somebody who
• 3:51
  loves hazy I p as, you're really gonna like the beer tonight, and
• 3:54
  I had nothing to go off of. We've never had this beer on the
• 3:58
  show. As far as I know, you've ever had this beer ever.
• 4:00
  I'm pretty I'm pretty sure this is a limited time release. I'm not one
• 4:05
  hundred percent sure. Okay, so you purchased this one close by, right
• 4:10
  at our normal spot. Yep, Devil's Glenn Hivey, we love them.
• 4:15
  Talk about sponsors, we need to get them on board. They'd be perfect
• 4:18
  sponsors. We get they provide all the beer except for the skull hot beer.
• 4:24
  We did that ourselves. Thanks for ust. All right, so last
• 4:29
  week you had me guess the type, the ABV and the brewer. Yeah,
• 4:33
  so I will say the flavor is crisp and refreshing and light. It's
• 4:41
  not a if you hate I pas. I don't think that you would turn
• 4:45
  your nose up at this one because it's not a hoppy flavor that's going to
• 4:47
  punch you in the face. It's a nice, light, refreshing, hoppy
• 4:51
  flavor. It's still there, but it's not it's very citrusy. Yeah,
• 4:56
  it's very juicy. Yeah yeah, juicy, that's that's the right word I
• 5:00
  think. But yeah, a light flavor in the best way possible. Man,
• 5:06
  what was it type ABV Brewer so ABV. Just so I'm kind of
• 5:14
  conflicted here. You said you got four of them, and usually when beers
• 5:19
  come in four packs, specifically twelve ounce cans, that means they run a
• 5:27
  little bit higher on the AVV. So, just going off that, if
• 5:30
  it was just the flavor, I would guess like five and a half to
• 5:34
  six. But just knowing quantity because I've seen some of the four pack,
• 5:42
  you know, I pas at our favorite Devil's Gun high V and they get
• 5:47
  up there into the nine, ten, eleven, twelve. Yeah, so
• 5:50
  I don't think it's twelve. I'm not getting that that punch in the face
• 5:56
  of you know, stupor. I'm gonna guess seven and a half. Finally
• 6:03
  answered, finally answer seven point five. You're a little high. Oh okay,
• 6:08
  your deduction skills are strong, but not maybe quite a Sherlock type of
• 6:12
  Okay, deduction. I think I think, and this is my theory,
• 6:18
  could be wrong, but I think the four pack is due to the limited
• 6:23
  release, okay, okay, not the alcohol percentage. So it is a
• 6:29
  six percent okay, alright, six point zero So okay, So your initial
• 6:33
  kind of taste test, I think was more correct. So, yeah,
• 6:39
  that's right. What did I say five and a half to six if I
• 6:41
  was guessing just off the taste? But either way, my final answer was
• 6:44
  seven and a half. So I was wrong on that one brewery. Have
• 6:47
  we had this brewery before? We have had this brewery before. Yes,
• 6:53
  local brewery, not hyper local, not one that we frequent or one that
• 7:00
  we go to or could go to like right now. Okay, it would
• 7:05
  take a little planning to go there, but we might be planning to go
• 7:10
  there soon. Actually, interesting, would it take us more than two hours
• 7:14
  to get there? No? Okay? Hmmm? Is it? Is it
• 7:19
  big growth? It is not big growth? Interesting? Dang it. You
• 7:23
  nailed it last week. You had you had the brewery right off the right
• 7:27
  off the bat in Peace Tree. Well, I was looking through our beer
• 7:30
  list, and I'm looking at our beer list again, right, because we
• 7:32
  we track all the beers that we've had, and this is beer number forty
• 7:38
  three, believe it or not, Yeah, this one is. I was
• 7:41
  trying to look. I thought you were talking. Oh sorry, I'll pull
• 7:44
  the list up. All right, it's in here somewhere. That's not the
• 7:47
  full list. But is it back pocket? It is backpack all right?
• 7:50
  All right? Back pocket? Good one we've had? Which one? Do
• 7:55
  we have their gold coin now that I'm seeing it? Old coin? That
• 7:58
  was a good one. So this is back pockets hazy forecasts, okay.
• 8:05
  And I liked the can art too. It is a juicy, hazy ipa
• 8:09
  that is more reliable than a feline meteorologist. And it's a cat predicting the
• 8:16
  weather. All right, it's cheesy, but the can art is really cool,
• 8:20
  Like it's not just your your normal regular can art. It's really cool.
• 8:24
  And I think it's a playoff of like Iowa weather too, because like
• 8:28
  one day on the forecast is negative eighteen and then it's seventy six and everything's
• 8:33
  great, and then it's one hundred and twelve and the sun is really angry.
• 8:35
  So that definitely describes Iowa weather. Yeah, it's definitely bipolar and some
• 8:41
  days it's great and some days it's not. And I feel like this beer
• 8:43
  would taste good on any of the three examples that they list on their can
• 8:48
  So I like this a lot. What do you think I like it too?
• 8:50
  Yeah, I saw it on the shelf and I'm like, he's gonna
• 8:54
  expect me to bring an amber. I gotta mix it up. And I
• 8:58
  read the description on the canon. I was like, yeah, yeah,
• 9:01
  this is a good one. We're doing it, and I really do think
• 9:05
  this is an IPA for everybody, not just people that love IPAs, because
• 9:11
  the flavor, and maybe if we handed this to my wife and had her
• 9:13
  try it, she'd make a terrible face because she hates IPAs. But I
• 9:18
  really think most people would at least not hate this one. I really like
• 9:22
  it because I like IPAs and it's a nice, you know, refreshing almost
• 9:28
  like pool side or lakeside ipa. But yeah, it looks really nice.
• 9:31
  I like it a lot. I'm excited to get a better opinion of it
• 9:35
  after a few more There you go, School's school. Well, we've got
• 9:41
  some news that we have to discuss because today is Monday, June third,
• 9:48
  and one of the bigger dominoes that we've been waiting to fall in the Vikings
• 9:54
  off season has finally fallen. You're right, Dalton Reisener did sign back with
• 9:58
  the team that was last week. Then you what do you mean of what
• 10:03
  are you talking about? Brett Farve is coming back? No way now that
• 10:09
  would be a story bigger than what actually happened today. Tell us ofv what
• 10:13
  happened today? No, what actually happened today probably what eight o'clock, nine
• 10:16
  o'clock this morning. It was eighteen when he tweeted it out, Adam Schefter,
• 10:20
  that is right, No, JJ, he wanted to do it himself,
• 10:24
  Justin Jefferson last week and first opportunity I totally muffed it. Justin Jefferson.
• 10:31
  So Justin Jefferson has officially signed his contract extension with the Vikings. It's
• 10:37
  been a long time coming. We even talked just a few weeks ago about
• 10:43
  well, maybe the Vikings wait another year and see how things developed. Well,
• 10:46
  but then we realized we were wrong on the length of his contract.
• 10:50
  We were thinking at the time, Oh, they've got this coming season and
• 10:54
  next season under the current country, they still had this season. Yeah,
• 10:58
  but that would have been it. He would have been in a Kirk Cousin
• 11:01
  situation where his contract would have expired in March if not for a restructure or
• 11:07
  resign, which thankfully today this morning they announced that it happened. So what
• 11:11
  were the official details of the contract. So it was an extension, so
• 11:18
  he was already signed through twenty twenty four. For his it was this fifth
• 11:22
  year option, so I think somewhere just shy of twenty million dollars for this
• 11:26
  year, but fully guaranteed. And the contract he signed or that was made
• 11:30
  official today is an extension on top of that. So he signed a four
• 11:33
  year extension for one hundred and forty million dollars with something like I'm pretty confident
• 11:39
  I've got the right number eighty nine million dollars guaranteed at signing. So all
• 11:46
  that to say, he's locked up contractually with the Vikings through the twenty twenty
• 11:52
  eight season, so five more seasons because this year still counted. They didn't
• 11:56
  rip up his current deal for what what is it? Almost two hundred million
• 12:01
  dollars for five seasons? Well worth it, well worth it. And I
• 12:07
  think I even saw this isn't super important, but I think I saw that
• 12:13
  his cap number for this season ended up going down by like ten million dollars,
• 12:18
  so it opened up a little bit more space for the likes. I
• 12:20
  think his cap number this year and next year still like a million dollars.
• 12:24
  Yeah, it's pretty reasonable. I don't know exactly what it is, and
• 12:26
  we could probably pull up over the cap or I don't know if anything's officially
• 12:30
  official yet. I saw something. Maybe I'm wrong, but I saw something
• 12:33
  that said it was a million this year and a million next year. Oh,
• 12:37
  that's his base salary for the next two seasons. But his cap hit
• 12:41
  is eight point six million this year and fifteen million next year. Okay,
• 12:46
  So, and I'm pretty sure his cap hit before this restructure or extension for
• 12:52
  this year was going to be close to that twenty million dollars. So they
• 12:56
  saved I thought I saw somewhere around ten million cat for this season, which
• 13:01
  I mean that's a that's a starting level player. If your you know,
• 13:09
  first team left tackle goes down, then you can try to go out and
• 13:13
  sign somebody who may be out there. That was just a quick example.
• 13:16
  I don't have any idea who who's available at left tackle in free agency right
• 13:20
  now. But they already had a little bit of wiggle room in cap space.
• 13:24
  I think even before this they had something like sixteen ish million dollars in
• 13:28
  cap space for the coming year. Yeah, and their vikings are up to
• 13:30
  twenty seven point seven nice in cap space now. And yeah, we're not
• 13:35
  we we did talk with Dustin Baker, which this our conversation with Dustin Baker
• 13:41
  will be coming up here in a few minutes, but we did talk about
• 13:43
  potential guys that could be signed. We've referenced his articles in the past few
• 13:48
  weeks about potential free agents. So no big move for a free agent is
• 13:54
  probably gonna happen, but at least they have some cap space if a doomsday
• 13:58
  scenario happens where somebody goes down and you have to quickly pay a lot more
• 14:03
  than you would have for a free agent that's on the street right now,
• 14:07
  do you think the vikings and this would actually be a really good question for
• 14:11
  Dustin if we were gonna record coming up with him, but we recorded in
• 14:16
  retrospect a few days ago. But do you think that now that there is
• 14:20
  more cap space, do they restructure anyone else to maybe put a little bit
• 14:24
  more on this year so that they're not as liable to future question and maybe
• 14:31
  one that would be more prevalent if we knew because next year, and of
• 14:37
  course this was before the Justin Jefferson signing. Next year, they were looking
• 14:41
  at quite a bit of cap space available for free agents and guys like Darris
• 14:46
  Saw and other big name guys that might be coming up, So I don't
• 14:50
  know. I think they're doing pretty good and I wish I knew exact numbers,
• 14:54
  you know, the way they sit. But I think even for this
• 14:56
  year and definitely for next offseason, the Vikings are doing pretty decent, so
• 15:05
  they might be in position to sign a big name free agent in March,
• 15:09
  like they did this past season with Jonathan Gernard and the insurance policy with Sam
• 15:15
  Darnold, who is cheap for a starting quarterback, but wasn't the cheapest option
• 15:18
  out there. They could have gone way cheaper, So I think cap space
• 15:22
  wise, the Vikings are looking pretty good. And yeah, maybe there's some
• 15:26
  development that needs to happen, but on the field wise, for this year,
• 15:30
  there's a lot of things to be excited for. So agreed, I'm
• 15:35
  very excited. We should all be happy. JJ Justin Jefferson is locked up
• 15:39
  for the next handfull of years, and the outlook of this team is looking
• 15:43
  pretty good. Young, maybe not so experienced right now, but in future
• 15:48
  years there's a lot to be excited about. Yes, yes, a lot
• 15:52
  to be excited about. I think I think Quacy has really proven himself this
• 15:58
  year. I think this offse and was kind of the make or break year
• 16:00
  for him. You get stuff right this year and you keep your job for
• 16:07
  the next several years at the very least. But you get things wrong,
• 16:11
  especially something like this with Justin Jefferson, and now all of a sudden,
• 16:15
  you're on the hot seat yep, and you're you know, on the first
• 16:18
  plane out of Minneapolis because you lost your job. Yeah, exactly. So
• 16:22
  I think this deal really solidifies that this off season was arguably Quacy's best,
• 16:33
  definitely since taking over as the GM for the Vikings, and maybe the best
• 16:37
  that he's had in the NFL. Yeah, I mean, think about it.
• 16:41
  I think I said last week or the week before that the Vikings very
• 16:45
  well could be sitting in a similar spot right now that the Raiders are sitting
• 16:49
  in Right now. The Raiders, they're looking at a QB one of either
• 16:53
  Garnerman Shoe or An O'Connell. They have not a lot of big name play
• 17:00
  on their roster. They did just get a pretty looks like a home run
• 17:03
  head coach signing, But the Raiders there's not like a bunch of exciting things
• 17:07
  to be happy about for them, and the Vikings very well could have been
• 17:11
  in a similar spot if they've totally flubbed the quarterback situation, which we can
• 17:15
  argue back and forth if you wanted to really about they needed Kirk Cousins and
• 17:19
  because they didn't sign him, it's a bus But either way, they solidified
• 17:22
  the quarterback position with QB one and quarterback of the future depending on how you
• 17:27
  see Darnold and JJ McCarthy. They locked up Justin Jefferson, which that's enough
• 17:33
  to they got it right, And yeah, he's expensive, the highest paid
• 17:37
  non quarterback in NFL history right now, but you'd be hard pressed to find
• 17:44
  anybody that says Justin Jefferson is not worth being that highest paid player. Maybe
• 17:48
  weird Cowboys fans who think Ceedee Lamb is way better, but whatever. Well,
• 17:53
  I listened to a few of the talking heads today and they were saying
• 17:59
  that now that this deal is done, Ceedee Lamb is now going to find
• 18:03
  himself under what JJ got. Yeah, not too far, not too far
• 18:08
  under. But like there was kind of maybe this game of chicken going on
• 18:14
  between the Cowboys and the Vikings of who's gonna go first, and obviously the
• 18:18
  Vikings have but they made it pretty clear the talking heads on ESPN that Ceedee
• 18:25
  Lamb will be below Justin Jefferson in terms of the clout in the contract the
• 18:33
  dollars behind the contract, so again not too far below. But Justin Jefferson
• 18:40
  should feel pretty good that he'll be the highest paid wide receiver for a long
• 18:45
  time, at least this season. I don't know who's going to overtake him.
• 18:48
  He might be the highest paid wide receiver for a while. Yeah,
• 18:52
  And he will hold for at least this year the highest paid non quarterback.
• 18:56
  So yeah, I would guess Ceedee Lamb. Because Justin Jefferson got an average
• 19:03
  of thirty five a year. With this extension, I would guess Ceedee Lamb
• 19:07
  his contract will be an average of something like thirty two thirty three a year.
• 19:11
  Maybe he's really good. Any team, including the Vikings, would be
• 19:15
  very happy to have him, But I'm glad we've got Justin Jefferson instead of
• 19:18
  him. I'd take him both, but if I could only pick one,
• 19:22
  the obvious choice is Jefferson. Yeah. So very exciting and just a nice
• 19:27
  little cherry on top to a pretty good offseason so far for the Vikings.
• 19:33
  One more note on Justin Jefferson and I think you'll agree with me. And
• 19:37
  I think I've hammered this point home a couple of times before. But how
• 19:41
  amazing did he handle publicly all of everything in the last really couple of seasons,
• 19:48
  being asked basically every time he goes in front of the media like hey,
• 19:51
  what do you at least somebody will ask him once what about an extension?
• 19:53
  Where's that at? He's always given quality, solid, police, correct
• 20:00
  answers, always has been nice and good to the team, has never tweeted,
• 20:06
  you know, weird poems about hating life. He's always the NFL Mark
• 20:11
  puts him in the front of the franchise and the league as far as marketing
• 20:15
  goes, and he says the right things and does the right things and vikings
• 20:21
  fans should be very happy that he's on our team and we can. I
• 20:25
  would buy my kids his jersey, like he just seems like a good dude.
• 20:27
  Yep. And he he will. If I'm if I could make a
• 20:32
  bold prediction right now, he'll find his way definitely into the Ring of Honor,
• 20:37
  Oh yeah, at us Bank Stadium when he's done playing. And I
• 20:41
  think if he continues on the trajectory that he's on he'll easily be a first
• 20:47
  ballot Hall of Famer. I think he's already made the case for Ring of
• 20:52
  Honor. Like if he it's not, it won't happen. But if for
• 20:55
  some reason tomorrow he woke up and physically couldn't play football ever again, like
• 21:02
  his legs just melted overnight or something, I think you could make the case
• 21:04
  already he is Ring of Honor worthy Hall of Fame. No, probably not
• 21:10
  with his current numbers and longevity, but already for Vikings Ring of on her
• 21:14
  you can already pick out where they're going to put his name, Like that's
• 21:18
  I think that's a given. Yeah. Well, again, really exciting Cherry
• 21:22
  on top of what's been a fun off season to kind of track, and
• 21:26
  now we're getting into the thick of June and July and we get into mini
• 21:30
  camp and we get into training camp and all that kind of stuff. So
• 21:36
  definitely some more stuff on the horizon, absolutely as we go through the summer
• 21:41
  months. Yeah. So the rest of the episode basically we've got we recorded
• 21:47
  with Dustin Baker. It was midweek last week. It was actually the day
• 21:51
  the Vikings re signed Dalton Reisner, which was really cool to talk to Dustin.
• 21:56
  However, obviously at that moment, Justin Jefferson had not signed his deal
• 22:02
  yet, so I think we do talk with him a little bit about what's
• 22:06
  going on here. Should we be worried? Should we not? And if
• 22:08
  I remember right, Dustin was very confident saying it'll get done, like,
• 22:12
  yep, I don't think we need to worry about it. I think I
• 22:15
  may have even started to ask a question about like, is this a quasy
• 22:18
  thing? Should we be concerned about quacy? And again Dustin batted that down
• 22:21
  too, So really good, really good conversation with Dustin. I do want
• 22:26
  to point out, since it is a little outdated, an article on Dustin's
• 22:30
  website Vikings Territory. It's an article by Janick Eckard, but it basically just
• 22:36
  says that Justin jefferson saga is finally over. So go check that one out.
• 22:41
  We can link. But it's a good article, just kind of outlining
• 22:45
  everything that's been going on and what happened and why we should be excited for
• 22:48
  the future. So yep, go read that one on Dustin's site by Yanick
• 22:53
  and uh yeah, that's that's all I had before we toss it over to
• 22:56
  dust yea, So we'll switch gears and we'll get you into our conversation with
• 23:00
  Dustin and then we'll catch up with you all at the end. Yeah,
• 23:04
  school schol All right, welcome in, school Hoppers. We're joined by I
• 23:11
  think it's very safe to say friend of the show now, Dustin Baker.
• 23:17
  Thanks for coming on yet again. This has gotta be what your fourth or
• 23:19
  fifth time coming on our show. Oh yeah, We're not gonna stop until
• 23:23
  you, guys stop the invitations. And as we say every time, we
• 23:26
  will never stop the invitations. We only have a blast when you're on.
• 23:32
  So thank you really quick, just before we get started. You can find
• 23:37
  all the Dustin's stuff on Twitter at his personal Twitter account at dust Baker.
• 23:44
  He writes everything most everything on vikes now All right, sorry, Vikings Territory
• 23:51
  dot Com YouTube vikes Now. Anything I'm missing that's big. No, No,
• 23:57
  you got it all covered. All right. Well, we'll link everything
• 24:00
  down below to you so you can. If you're not following Dustin, you
• 24:03
  should be, because honestly, lately he has been some very good fodder for
• 24:10
  the skull Hop. As far as conversation goes, Dustin, I don't know
• 24:12
  if you if you've seen yet the last what three four five episodes of the
• 24:18
  Skull Hop, we basically dedicated a whole segment where we isolate one of your
• 24:22
  articles, or at least one of the Vikings Territory articles. We pump up
• 24:26
  the article. We tell everybody go listen or go read it, but we
• 24:30
  use that article as like a full topic of what we think about, what
• 24:34
  you're talking about and what you're write about. So it's been fabulous. That's
• 24:37
  because that's exactly what they're supposed to do. They're supposed for a conversation and
• 24:42
  supposed to Viking's Territory is kind of like a hybrid of news but then like
• 24:48
  fan community, community sentiments. So what folks are talking about regarding the Vikings.
• 24:52
  So I'm glad that you're able to use some of those things. That
• 24:56
  makes me feel warm fuzzies, absolutely, and really quick before we dive into
• 25:00
  everything else. I mean this as a compliment. A handful of years ago,
• 25:06
  Pro football Talk dot Com used to kind of do the same thing for
• 25:11
  me. They would they would present like a fact or a storyline, and
• 25:15
  then they would give a little bit of opinion, but kind of talk to
• 25:18
  a football fan. You know, in normal terms, pro football talk has
• 25:22
  kind of changed up a little bit. I'm not really clicking on that website
• 25:26
  every day, but or Viking's territory in the best way possible gives me that
• 25:30
  you know, you're getting the facts, you're getting a little bit of opinion,
• 25:33
  but it's more like you're talking to a buddy about what's going on for
• 25:36
  the Vikings at least. So that's why I like it a lot. Yeah,
• 25:38
  well, thank you. That is That is mission accomplished then, because
• 25:42
  in my in our space, we have to report the happenings. But then
• 25:48
  if it was bland and we give no type of analysis or opinion, it
• 25:52
  would be like, well what is this? So yeah, I'm glad that
• 25:56
  I'm able to intermix some sometimes hot takes along inside there, but I'm glad
• 26:02
  that there's some of the topics can help feed the show and more. Yeah.
• 26:07
  All right, so something big happened in Vikings world. Yeah, yeah,
• 26:11
  So we're recording a little bit early, Skulhoppers. Our episode is not
• 26:15
  going to come out for a handful of days here. But today the Vikings
• 26:18
  made a big signing. Dalton signed or Dalton Dustin who they signed. Well,
• 26:23
  I signed Dustin Reiser, they signed Dalton Reisner, and I was semi
• 26:30
  wrong about this one. I have said on this show, I think and
• 26:33
  I've written it that in terms of Reisner being back, I kept saying they
• 26:38
  probably would have done that by now, And then I listened and believed in
• 26:44
  the coaching staff's words about Blake Brandall, and so I was like, this
• 26:48
  sounds like a dude like they'd love. And so I figured if Reisner was
• 26:52
  going to be back, it was going to be in the summer. If
• 26:55
  they realized Brandell was looking like garbage and we didn't even we didn't get to
• 26:59
  that. I don't think that means the Brandles garbage, but I think they
• 27:03
  realized or found a happy medium with Reisner that hey, we're going to have
• 27:06
  a reunion. And I'm happy for Riisener in particular because if you saw his
• 27:10
  Twitter today, he had like three posts about it was like skull and there
• 27:14
  was the video. Then there was like I'm back, like from the Michael
• 27:17
  Jordan magazine in nineteen ninety five. It was like he finally had his moment.
• 27:21
  And I think as a human being that was he was craving. He
• 27:23
  wanted to be wanted, and he had to sit out all a free agency
• 27:26
  last year for unknown reasons. It was trending like that this offseason, and
• 27:30
  the team that we think he loves brought him back at a position that we
• 27:36
  just so happened to also have a roster need in terms of confidence and you
• 27:41
  know, somebody being able to be a game ready starter. So yeah,
• 27:45
  with open arms, just like the rest of you, as I like this
• 27:48
  one. Yeah. So on the skull half, we've talked in recent weeks
• 27:52
  about some individuals who just seemed to love being Vikings, not just love being
• 27:59
  in the NFL. Are good guys and like being you know, on a
• 28:02
  team and well liked, but actually like being a Viking. A couple of
• 28:06
  guys we've talked about Harrison Smith might be top of the list on seems to
• 28:11
  love being a Viking. We've talked about C. J. Hamm, and
• 28:14
  then back in the day, we had a whole, almost a whole episode
• 28:18
  dedicated to the great Jim Kleinsaucer and he was another one that seemed to love
• 28:22
  being a Viking. And I kind of get that sense a little bit from
• 28:25
  Dalton. I don't think it's that he just wants to be on an NFL
• 28:27
  team. He seems like a good dude, and honestly, like maybe it's
• 28:30
  just the excitement overall, but he seems to want to be in Minnesota,
• 28:34
  which is pretty cool. I agree, And you could tell by his his
• 28:38
  willingness to talk to reporters a at all. Last year there was something that
• 28:42
  came out that's that he was always the guy that was like, hey,
• 28:45
  come talk to me, and the reporters would oblige. And then of course
• 28:48
  he just showered Prasee on the franchise and was so grateful. And to your
• 28:52
  point, there's also guys like him that fans will circle and they'll be like,
• 28:57
  I love that guy. Going back to when I was a kid or
• 29:00
  a teenager, it was Chris Walsh. He was like this wide receiver,
• 29:03
  special teams guy. There was a Chris Covan, Oh yeah, but that
• 29:07
  yeah, that Vikings fans just kind of label and say that's our guy.
• 29:11
  Cleinsasser was one of them, and in a very short time, Reisner has
• 29:15
  become that. And I think it's because he's kind of got that you know,
• 29:19
  country western persona. You'll see some of the pictures of him in the
• 29:22
  cowboy hat and then he's energetic, and to top it all off, he
• 29:27
  is what we've asked for for about a decade. Just give us a guard
• 29:32
  who can protect the quarterback. Well, we'll figure out the run blocking shit
• 29:34
  with something, but just give us somebody who keeps the quarterback up right.
• 29:37
  Reisner does that, even if he isn't a very good run blocker. So
• 29:41
  I believe that that is why fans have kind of also overinflated him a little
• 29:47
  bit, like they like, oh, we need your Eisner back, and
• 29:49
  at times have been like why, Like it'll be cool, we don't absolutely
• 29:52
  need him back. But I like it because assuming JJ McCarthy takes the batons
• 30:00
  sometime in twenty twenty four, you're gonna have total continuity on the offensive line,
• 30:04
  and you've got a guy who's mo is passed protection, which means,
• 30:08
  in theory, McCarthy should get off to a better start pass protection wise than
• 30:14
  Cousins. Ever got sands what seven six or seven games last year. Yeah,
• 30:19
  so this might be a dumb question, but Reisner right now presumed starter,
• 30:23
  there's no question about that. It's been a hot take. Suddenly.
• 30:27
  What did he sign at about eleven o'clock or so? This morning. There
• 30:32
  were some like the Athletic and I think some of the local entities said,
• 30:37
  wait, not so fast. The team loves Blake Randall, and I totally
• 30:40
  get that. They really have said, like Wes Phillips went out of his
• 30:44
  way to say, every guy deserves a chance. This guy's basically getting a
• 30:47
  promotion. I guess they had to walk that back. So I understand that
• 30:51
  there might be some appearance of a camp battle, but this is Dalton Reisner,
• 30:56
  and I don't think that he's just gonna be a backup. They let
• 31:00
  Ezra Cleveland go, who was a really decent left guard walk, so yeah,
• 31:07
  there. I mean, there could be a little bit of generated competition
• 31:12
  from look how good Brandle looks, maybe it will be Riisner. What I
• 31:17
  think is is it's a one year deal. Brandal will probably see the field
• 31:22
  when injuries hit, and who know, I mean, because he could play
• 31:23
  tackle and guard. I think he'll start to get an audition there. But
• 31:27
  I wouldn't circle this as an honest to goodness camp battle, because otherwise you
• 31:33
  might as well just keep Brandle and then just sign some veteran swing style guard.
• 31:37
  I think Reisner will start for sure. Sweet so the Vikings have I
• 31:47
  think kind of been somewhat quiet in free agency. I mean, especially since
• 31:52
  the draft. There really hasn't been a whole lot of movement that way other
• 31:56
  than the Dalton Reisner signing. So the next question we have for you,
• 32:00
  Dustin, is are there going to be any other moves that way or outside
• 32:07
  of free agency? Do you see any sort of extension for existing players happening?
• 32:13
  I think obviously there's one obvious one that we can hit on for sure.
• 32:17
  No. I think the good part after Jefferson's deal gets done is there's
• 32:24
  not a whole lot of housework to do until we do this all over again
• 32:29
  with Darri Saw next spring and probably summer. So that's kind of the cool
• 32:34
  part of the Jefferson thing on the checklist. Once that one's done and then
• 32:37
  maybe it bleeds into August early September, is once that's done, then we're
• 32:42
  good for a while. Darisaw will be the next one. Hackinsing got crossed
• 32:45
  off the list last year, so now I don't think we'll have to ponder
• 32:49
  any more big extensions or even medium size extensions in terms of players that I
• 32:55
  envisioned. So this started off as a bold prediction formulated on some show or
• 33:00
  in some article. I can't remember that cam Akers would be back this summer.
• 33:06
  And then two days after I said that, wherever I said it,
• 33:08
  there was the video of him working out or doing his thing at TCO,
• 33:13
  and I was like, Oh, that's not gonna be considered bold anymore.
• 33:15
  I think Acres will be back. I don't know if that will be like
• 33:19
  this week, like Reisner, but Minnesota has five running backs and there's two
• 33:24
  that were really excited about. And then we have a kick returner who doubles
• 33:28
  as a running back, Willy McBride, who I don't even know if will
• 33:30
  make the team because he looks so future in the preseason last year, and
• 33:35
  then Miles Gaskin, who was good for like ten games in twenty twenty.
• 33:39
  So to me, there's a a running back deficiency at RB three and there's
• 33:44
  no better person to come aboard for cheap to fill RB three than Cam Akers.
• 33:50
  Let's face it, between Aaron Jones and Ty Chandler, one of them
• 33:52
  is probably gonna get hurt. Will hope that it's only for a couple games.
• 33:54
  It'll probably be Aaron Jones. And if you could guarantee me seven team
• 34:00
  games from each man, then I really won't care who the WR or the
• 34:04
  RB three is, but we're virtually assured to have one man get hurt because
• 34:07
  that's what happens to running backs. Fantasy football managers can tell you all about
• 34:10
  it. So I think having Acres there, who's hungry, who is another
• 34:14
  locker room guy that everybody seemed to love, at least the coaching staff and
• 34:16
  teammates. I think Acres back makes all the sense in the world, mainly
• 34:21
  because he wants to be back, and then they have the the the bruder
• 34:24
  footage of him an Egan working out, And then my personal wish list is
• 34:30
  similar to a lot of the fans. Klayas Campbell would just make my mind
• 34:34
  go like, yes, they finally get it that you can employ it.
• 34:37
  Defensive tackle who's good. That would just make me warm and fuzzy all over
• 34:43
  again. And then Hunter Infro also makes sense a WR three. I'm convinced
• 34:47
  that when we chat about Jalen Naylor and Brandon Powell and Trent Sherfield, that
• 34:53
  is a WR four discussion. That's what we should be talking about, is
• 34:57
  who's gonna be the WR four. But no, we have made it a
• 35:00
  WR three conversation out of necessity. So I would say, if they just
• 35:05
  added one of the remaining WR three's on the market, Julio Jones, even
• 35:09
  though he's old, Michael Thomas can play for eight games until he's hurt and
• 35:14
  then hawking someone will be back and then we won't care about the WR three
• 35:15
  anymore. Yeah, I would say, Kalays, Campbell, Hunter, renfro
• 35:19
  are Ones, they should realistically, I'll probably be cam Akers and then keep
• 35:23
  your eye on roster cut down day on August blah blah blah, whatever it
• 35:28
  is, because on that sad day, like twelve hundred players lose their job,
• 35:32
  about four hundred go to a practice squad and then bot A Bings seven
• 35:37
  hundred free agents are chilling there, and I think the Vikings will probably have
• 35:42
  seven eight nine million dollars in cap space. And if they still you a
• 35:45
  WR three or they can scoop a three tech defensive tackle, I think that
• 35:50
  would be kind of a fail safe for any of these free free agency contingencies.
• 35:54
  Yeah, I hadn't thought about that cut down day time. That could
• 35:58
  be a sneaky good talk or come you know, first week of the NFL
• 36:01
  season, something that just kind of came into my head. So we were
• 36:07
  talking about extensions. Seems like in the Rick Spielman era, you know,
• 36:10
  the the obvious extensions, they just seem to happen. You would know,
• 36:15
  Okay, Adrian Peterson's contracts coming up, He's gonna get re signed. You
• 36:20
  know, we're not we're not sweating it. Since Quasy has come aboard,
• 36:22
  and I'm a Quasy fan, it feels like we're sweating a lot of things.
• 36:28
  Like I think back to a year ago, we were you know,
• 36:30
  TJ. Hockinson had a mysterious back tightness injury because yeah, ye, and
• 36:37
  then that it was healed the day he got paid, exactly which one I'll
• 36:40
  knew would happened. Do you think it's a Quasy thing that maybe they he's
• 36:45
  trying to get a little bit more experienced, that these extensions aren't as automatic,
• 36:50
  like he just wants to feel more comfortable about these things, or is
• 36:52
  it just a whole new regime. No, I don't think it is a
• 36:57
  matter of Quasy being cheap or an experienced or any like or just incompetent.
• 37:02
  I think with Hockinson, you had to find the right number to pay a
• 37:08
  position that Quasy may not, you know, left to his own device devices
• 37:14
  be thrilled about paying tight End is kind of a cake topper, Like it
• 37:17
  feels great when you have Travis Kelcey or George Hittll or t J. Hawkinson,
• 37:21
  but it's not like edge Rusher, and it's certainly not like quarterback.
• 37:23
  So I think Quac had to either rationalize internally or get Howkinson down a couple
• 37:30
  of million to make it fit within his guideline. So that is my my
• 37:34
  sheel on why it took so long. I mean, ultimately that was done
• 37:37
  well before, or at least well before anybody really started to hold out holdout
• 37:42
  with Jefferson, I think it's just a nasty beast because Cedee Lamb came from
• 37:47
  that draft class, so did Tristan Wurf's. Neither one of them been paid.
• 37:51
  So I really do believe the reporting from ESPN that says Lamb and Jefferson
• 37:55
  are in a polite, friendly standoff, because if Jefferson or let's say Ceedee
• 38:00
  Lamb signs tomorrow for thirty three million, then Jefferson can point to it and
• 38:06
  say you better beat that, or I'm you can screw off it. Doesn't
• 38:08
  sound like Jefferson's words, but you know what I mean, as agent can
• 38:12
  talk like that. Yeah. So, and it's basically them doing the Spider
• 38:15
  Man meme at each other, which one goes first because I want, you
• 38:17
  know, fifty cents extra. And I think it's that matter of respect.
• 38:22
  Plus whether it's Quacy or Rick Spielman, the deals, the ginormous ones for
• 38:28
  these these humongous personality, they always go up against it to the last minute.
• 38:32
  Dalvin Cooks was like the Saturday before the twenty twenty season started. Yeah,
• 38:37
  and there's like this unwritten rule like in Vikingville, that well, we
• 38:42
  will pay those guys, but we're not gonna do it until the calendar turns
• 38:45
  to September. So I think it. I think last year's reluctance, I
• 38:50
  don't think that was a Viking's malfeasance thing. I think it's because Jefferson and
• 38:53
  his people realized, you know, we can we can wait, like even
• 38:57
  if you're even if you break your leg, you're you're gonna get pay next.
• 39:00
  I think they realize that this year they can get their thirty three to
• 39:04
  thirty four million, basically Nick Bosa's contract, where last year you might have
• 39:07
  been able to get away with sliding it in about thirty million. I think
• 39:12
  that is why at the last minute. This is my theory, not based
• 39:15
  on intel. I think that's why it held off, and then who lifted
• 39:17
  it up. Dan Graziano said a couple of weeks ago that Joe Burrow and
• 39:22
  Justin Jefferson share an agent, and Joe Burrow's deal strategically didn't get done until
• 39:28
  late in the summer, and that's just kind of his mo to wait until
• 39:30
  all of the pieces come and then you can point and say, all right,
• 39:34
  this guy got this amount, this guy this amount, here's what you
• 39:37
  pay me. So I have zero anxiety about the Jefferson deal getting done,
• 39:43
  but I will admit it's irritating when hey, Lily, they want Malik Nahbors,
• 39:46
  so that means they don't want Jefferson. You can just search on Google
• 39:50
  right now justin Jefferson trade, and there are articles that have trade packages discussed,
• 39:53
  like by bleacher Report, And I hope that somebody has told Jefferson like
• 39:59
  that stuff. We didn't write any of that, like that's all bullshit from
• 40:01
  the masses. I hope there's an understanding between Jefferson and quacy that you were
• 40:07
  never for sale. We don't take you for granted because there are the articles
• 40:10
  about a Jefferson trade are a dime a dozen, and even if it's not
• 40:15
  true, it's just fodder for folks, you know, the speculation, the
• 40:17
  what if exactly? Hear? What do we got here? Okay? So
• 40:25
  yeah, I mentioned we've been talking about some of your articles, in some
• 40:30
  of it just Vikings territory articles in general. A few weeks ago we talked
• 40:34
  about one that kind of hinted at some of the three worst parts of the
• 40:38
  Vikings roster as it sat right then. Obviously, one big thing that happened
• 40:45
  since then, of course, was the Dalton Riisner's signing. But as we
• 40:49
  were talking about it and we had that fun conversation, we mentioned that when
• 40:53
  we got you on we wanted to kind of ask what your ir rationale was
• 40:58
  when you ranked, because in the article you ranked, how bad you know,
• 41:01
  off of those those position groups were against each other? Uh, the
• 41:06
  worst off you had was defensive tackle, and then a little bit less worse
• 41:10
  off was the interior offensive line, which today made some changes on that,
• 41:15
  and then still worse off, but not quite as bad as the other two
• 41:17
  were the wide receivers after Justin Jefferson and Jordan Addison. So when we were
• 41:22
  talking, Evan and I kind of agreed maybe the offensive line was a or
• 41:28
  yeah, we weren't too sure on the order of that, so we kind
• 41:31
  of wanted to hear your rationale on why those were ordered the way they were.
• 41:36
  So if we if in that article I singularly focused on w R three,
• 41:43
  I don't have an aggrievance with wide receiver on the whole. But because
• 41:46
  of rise and your back today, if I was going to rewrite this or
• 41:50
  repost it, I would slide offensive line interior offensive line up so it's less
• 41:57
  worrisome because less up to me ed Ingram, Garrett, Bradberry, Flake Branda,
• 42:05
  and Dalton Reisner. That won't set the world on fire, and you
• 42:07
  know you're not gonna have multiple or probably any Pro bowlers from that group.
• 42:12
  But I am okay with it because Kevin O'Connell is okay with it, and
• 42:15
  I wouldn't. I would not afford the same luxury to Mike Zimmer No,
• 42:19
  nor should anybody in terms of the offensive line. You can afford all the
• 42:22
  defense stuff, and you know that's a lot better than O'Connell's brain does.
• 42:27
  But on interior offensive line, the moment O'Connell stepped into Egan and then produced
• 42:31
  his first thirteen to four season, then last year, the VIKNS used to
• 42:36
  rank around twenty six or twenty seven throw overall offensive line efficiency. It was
• 42:39
  like clockwork. You pull up the article at the end of season and be
• 42:43
  like, oh, yay, we're gonna be twenty seven. Oh look,
• 42:45
  we're twenty sixth, and it would just be nauseating because you confirmed your eye
• 42:49
  test. The offensive line wasn't very good, especially the pass protection, and
• 42:52
  that was that the script has flipped with O'Connell. Now it's either about twelfth
• 42:59
  best or third teenth best in terms of the efficiency. So I trust this
• 43:02
  group to either say, Blake Randall's good, Garrett Bradbury's gonna be fine,
• 43:07
  Ingram's gonna have a big year three. So I don't have a hug,
• 43:10
  especially after today now that riser back. I don't have a long standing grievous
• 43:15
  with interior offensive line. But if you look at it from an outside perspective
• 43:20
  at Ingram, Garrett Bradberry, at the time, Blake Brandle, nobody really
• 43:23
  knows who those guys are besides Vikings fans, maybe somebody remember Bradbury from the
• 43:27
  draft. So it's a roster weakness in that sense. I'm glad they recognize
• 43:30
  it and got deeper with Riisner at guard. But this, this group leadership
• 43:37
  regime, to me, deserves the benefit of the doubt offensive line because I
• 43:40
  like what I have seen the past two years. It feels like a new
• 43:43
  day. You don't have to worry about constant pressure on Cousins then and then
• 43:47
  now it'll be Donald McCarthy at WR three. The only reason I give a
• 43:52
  damn about this and considered a weakness is because CJ. Hawkinson probably won't be
• 43:54
  ready for the start of the season. I don't think Chiefs fans bitch and
• 44:00
  about WR three. They don't have to because Travis Kelsey is basically their WR
• 44:04
  one or WR two. But with Hockinson out probably on the pup list,
• 44:08
  maybe a rookie quarterback, certainly uh Donald who's totally mid or maybe worse than
• 44:15
  mid for through the duration of the screw so far. If Hockinson was there,
• 44:20
  I'd be like, all right, well you got Jefferson, Addison and
• 44:22
  Hockinson and then yeah, they'll figure out the rest. You know Brandon Powe
• 44:25
  will be okay, but you don't have Hockinson out of the gate. And
• 44:28
  for a team that has right now on paper, it's a cornerback weakness because
• 44:32
  we don't know if McCarthy's gonna be good. We know that Donald hasn't been
• 44:36
  good, so it would make sense to me that unless they have like this
• 44:39
  really secret like hey, Howkinson's gonna be ready baby for week one, you
• 44:45
  need a guy who can catch the ball at WR three and move the sticks
• 44:49
  on third down. And this gets amplified if Justin Jefferson or Jordan Addison if
• 44:53
  they tweak a hamstring or they sprain an ankle, Because if you went in
• 44:57
  let's say Giant, they play the Giants, Jordan Adison scores a touchdown on
• 45:00
  the following play, sprains his ankle, damn it, he's going to be
• 45:02
  out against the forty nine ers of Texas. You go into that game with
• 45:06
  Jefferson, Brandon Powell, Josh Oliver and you'd be like, oh man,
• 45:09
  we don't have any depth at wide receiver. So the only reason I call
• 45:13
  for a guy like Renfro is it adds the depth, It hedges the bet
• 45:16
  against Hawkinson's injury and then again or recovery, and then any other thing that
• 45:21
  could happen to Jefferson Atis because if it's just straight up and down, if
• 45:24
  it's a video game, you got the injuries turned off, you could probably
• 45:28
  be okay, but we know that's not how real life works. And then
• 45:30
  certainly defensive tackle, this is the only one. When I look at either
• 45:36
  the big board or the depth chart, I'm like, this is certifiably a
• 45:39
  weakness, and nobody in that building ever realizes it. They had an opportunity,
• 45:45
  like eight or nine defensive tackles at the exact spot that we need were
• 45:49
  available. Some of them are really expensive, them expensive, some of them
• 45:52
  are kind of right in the middle. The Viking sign none of them,
• 45:55
  and then date like Friday of the draft game, and then like ten of
• 45:59
  them went off the board in the round two and they're like, oh god,
• 46:00
  we're not gonna be able to get anybody. So we got Prospect X
• 46:04
  from the seventh round and then that's it. Jerry Tillery, Jonah Williams,
• 46:07
  all of these lottery tickets in terms of busting out into stardom, I don't
• 46:13
  like it one bit. Now if this market had been Hey, it's Christian
• 46:15
  Wilkins. He's gonna get one hundred and ten million dollars from the Raiders,
• 46:19
  and then that's it. I'd be like, all right, well, I
• 46:21
  understand it. You know. It was the market was raed nobody to get,
• 46:24
  but they could have got Eric Armstead, Grover Stuart, Leonard Williams,
• 46:29
  Maurice Hurst was cheap with the Browns, and then they got nobody. So
• 46:31
  I'm pretty convinced that once they realized Wilkins couldn't be got for one hundred and
• 46:37
  ten million, Brian Flores like looked them in the eyes and said, all
• 46:39
  right, you better get me three add rushers in if you do that,
• 46:43
  all right, I just go ahead and do it. So they're like,
• 46:45
  all right, we'll get Grenard, we're gonna get Vankinkle, and then way
• 46:46
  we're gonna draft her. And he's like, fine deal. But that's the
• 46:50
  only thing I can make sense of it. Somebody, eventually, some Vikings
• 46:53
  coach or scout or somebody is going to have to realize you can go sign
• 46:59
  a guy to play next to the nose tackle. That's good. You don't
• 47:04
  need just some guy there like Jonathan Bull or Shamar Steven Arman, Watts and
• 47:08
  Tom Johnson, like all of these guys, it's just like nobody has ever
• 47:12
  heard of them. So I wish that we would get with the times and
• 47:15
  go get Kalais Campbell or last year we used to call for Endamakin Sue And
• 47:20
  that's why we always ask for those. It's because it's like the one spot
• 47:23
  that back to back regimes are like, nah, so it's we don't need
• 47:27
  that. I wish they would change their mindset on it, and that will
• 47:30
  remain a glaring weakness to me until they fix it. We haven't had any
• 47:35
  excitement at that spot since Charif Floyd. And that wasn't even like some big
• 47:38
  bad ass. That was like, hey, they drafted a guy they care
• 47:43
  and right when he started to maybe show us some signs of figuring it out,
• 47:46
  he all of a sudden just can't walk anymore. Yeah, unreal,
• 47:50
  one bad nick of the scalpel and that that ruins not only his career but
• 47:53
  the Vikings prospects of having a good defensive line for a while. Yeah.
• 47:57
  Do you remember two seasons twenty eight and then was it twenty twenty or twenty
• 48:01
  twenty one? Sheldon Richardson got signed. That that should have been a name.
• 48:06
  We were like, oh cool, that like, but instead we were
• 48:09
  like, hell, yeah, baby, you got Sheldon. That's how that's
• 48:12
  how like deprived we are of a defensive attackle and he actually did pretty good.
• 48:15
  I remember Zimber had to use him on the edge in a couple of
• 48:17
  games down the end, down the stretch of his tenure. But yeah,
• 48:22
  that's an example that that guy is kind of like, or at least he
• 48:27
  was. I don't think he plays anymore a decent defensive tackle. He never
• 48:30
  lived up to his draft stock. But for Vikings fans that was like gold.
• 48:34
  It was like, yeah, It's like it's like this version of Jerry
• 48:37
  Tillery where you're like, hey, at least he was drafted in the first
• 48:38
  round. We'll take a week and get Yeah. Exactly. So, Dustin
• 48:45
  referencing the article once more that we kind of had a whole little segment on
• 48:53
  a previous episode about you mentioned kind of in our back and forth kind of
• 48:58
  leading up to recording right now that you had a hot take at that wide
• 49:01
  receiver three position. Would you mind sharing that with us? Oh? Absolutely,
• 49:07
  So. It came from a discussion with the Onic Eckhart, who also
• 49:08
  writes at Vikings Territory. We were talking about WR three and what the light
• 49:17
  bulb that we had was. So this is an offense first regime. That's
• 49:22
  not the light bulb. But to set the stage, we have an offense
• 49:23
  first regime. Kevin O'Connell knows what he's doing. If there's any deficiencies,
• 49:28
  that should be on the defensive side of the ball. So I don't think
• 49:30
  that they have skimmed over the depth chart, where like guys we forgot about
• 49:36
  w R thury. I don't think that's how it is. So my undercover
• 49:39
  theory or hot take is one of those guys, after Jefferson, after Addison,
• 49:47
  maybe even after Palell, Sherfield or Naylor, there is a lot of
• 49:52
  human beings on the depth chart, and my hot take is that somebody all
• 49:55
  of that six, seven or eight that guy is gonna bring out. And
• 50:00
  the reason I say that is there is recent precedent in NFL history where like
• 50:07
  WR threes, it's not a large bar to clear to be a WR three
• 50:14
  like we basically, Homie needs you to get six hundred and fifty seven hundred
• 50:17
  yards. You get first downs, and if you can throw in sixty seven
• 50:22
  touchdowns basically kJ Osborne's stat line maybe a little bit more consistency. And so
• 50:27
  when you think about, hey, can somebody on this Fiking's roster bust out.
• 50:30
  I'm not talking about Adam Ealin that good. They'd be great, but
• 50:34
  it's not gonna happen, or somebody like Stefan Diggs from round five. I
• 50:37
  don't need somebody that good. I just need somebody to do good at WR
• 50:40
  three to the tune of what fifty catches, whatever it is. And in
• 50:45
  the last ten years, undrafted guys Doug Baldwin, Cole Beasley for better or
• 50:50
  worse on him, Robbie Chosen, Jacoby Myers, Tim Patrick, Allen Lazard.
• 50:54
  All of those dudes are undrafted, and at some point they were on
• 50:59
  a roster WR eleven on the ninety nine team, and somebody's staring at it,
• 51:02
  going, who the hell is Ellen let lizard? You know that's what
• 51:06
  they're saying. So I'm thinking that there is a guy on this Vikings roster,
• 51:09
  whether it's say or Thomas who Kevin O'Connell has been complimentary of Malie Knowles
• 51:15
  that one UDFA they paid like one hundred and fifty grand Jashawn Jones. Yeah,
• 51:21
  so there there are a lot of guys even after Naylor and Sherfield and
• 51:27
  Powell that while we debate, like, hey, I think Brandon Powell is
• 51:30
  gonna win WR three and he's gonna be really fucking good at it, Like
• 51:34
  that's kind of how some of us are gung ho about it. But because
• 51:37
  they have done nothing in free agency after Sirfeld Sherfield, excuse me, and
• 51:43
  because they did not participate in a draft that was really deep at WR three
• 51:49
  and you know, you could go sign Hunter Renfro after Breakfast tomorrow, they
• 51:52
  haven't done that. So I believe that they have big plans for one or
• 51:57
  multiple of those unsung guys Christian Jackson down there, Lucky Jackson, and it's
• 52:01
  probably a guy where we don't even really know, like now, whether that
• 52:05
  is Sayer Thomas or Jashawn Jones. So that is my working theory because otherwise
• 52:09
  they have to know the thing about Hawkins. They have to know it's a
• 52:14
  reality probably that he's not going to play until late October or something. And
• 52:19
  if they're just skimming, skimming along, not caring. As Tyler Boyd goes
• 52:22
  off the board all of those really good WR threes. I think they have
• 52:28
  somebody like Keen McCardell saying we don't need any of those old idiots. We
• 52:31
  have. You know, we've got Shawn Jones. This guy can ball.
• 52:35
  We got there. Thomas, I've been telling you about it. I think
• 52:37
  he's saying that type of stuff. And therefore, by the time you know
• 52:40
  we're doing this show, maybe eight, nine, ten weeks from now,
• 52:45
  we'll be talking about, Hey, look at they or Thomas, that guy
• 52:47
  is a baller. That is my hot take is that we're we're spending maybe
• 52:51
  unnecessary time analyzing WR three as a three way race, that it's not weird
• 52:57
  at all for an undrafted wide receiver to turn out to be good to the
• 53:01
  tune of a WR three. I don't think we'll have another Adam feeling,
• 53:06
  but I bet you they can find a guy who can get six hundred and
• 53:07
  fifty yards in a single season for sure. So on our last episode,
• 53:13
  I had a whole I don't know, mental block about going back and forth
• 53:17
  between calling JJ McCarthy JJ and then talking about Justin Jefferson and calling him JJ
• 53:23
  and keep mixing myself up. So how appropriate would it be if Jashawn Jones
• 53:29
  just came out of nowhere and was Adam Feelen and turned into some prodigy pro
• 53:35
  Bowl wide receiver three, and just for the rest of like the next ten
• 53:38
  years, we have to say JJ and say who we're talking about, you
• 53:42
  know. Yeah, we'd have to figure out Jashaun's middle name, and hopefully
• 53:45
  it's something like Travis or something, because then it'll just be JTJ. Yeah,
• 53:50
  because it was already when we were just getting into draft time and McCarthy
• 53:54
  as a Viking became a real I guess possibility. I think I tweet something.
• 54:00
  The fact is like, we gotta do something about this JJ thing because
• 54:01
  it's gonna get really confusing. So I was like, therefore I'm gonna call
• 54:05
  JJ, m JJ McCarthy. And then we figured out that Jeff Jefferson said
• 54:09
  just call me jets around the building and JJ could be the real JJ.
• 54:14
  Makes it slightly less confused. Yeah, yeah, yeah, we just all
• 54:16
  have to put our foot in the sand and figure out exactly what we're doing.
• 54:20
  Yeah, well, we'll figure it out. They'll they'll have some cute
• 54:22
  press conference and tell everybody like this is what we need to do. Our
• 54:27
  YouTube video. It'll be it'll be fun. That's on top of all the
• 54:30
  letter dot j's that we already have between TJ dj J just left. So
• 54:37
  yeah, it's it's there's not there's not a shortage of those. Muh,
• 54:43
  So, I guess we got We got two more quick things here, Evan,
• 54:45
  you want to talk about the surprise cut question we got? Yeah,
• 54:50
  so you guys will have to remind me of what we decided on before we
• 54:53
  hit right four, because I can't remember exactly what we decided. But we've
• 54:59
  got five players here, and I think the plan is correct me if I'm
• 55:04
  wrong, that we're gonna rank these guys one through five based on how surprised
• 55:09
  we would be if they got cut from the team before the final fifty three
• 55:15
  man roster. So uh, I think we decided what five was least surprised
• 55:21
  and one was most surprised. As we agree on something right now that that
• 55:25
  works for me? Ye, scale that are you gonna are you gonna tell
• 55:31
  the viewers the candidates first or we just unveil Okay, so I'll unveil the
• 55:37
  candidates here and then we can each kind of just quickly run through our list
• 55:40
  kind of five through one least surprising to most surprising. So we've got Andrew
• 55:47
  Booth, Junior Lewis Sene, Jalen Naylor, Pat Jones, and Brian Asamoa.
• 55:58
  All right, Dustin, who would you be the least surprised I'm sorry,
• 56:01
  yeah, yeah, the least surprise. You're number five, Okay,
• 56:05
  the least surprising cut So that when I see, oh hey, this guy
• 56:08
  got released, I'll be like, yep, saw that one coming. Yep
• 56:12
  for me? Of this group, yeah, for me, that's Patrick Jones.
• 56:15
  And I don't have any major aggrievance with Patrick Jones. But one really
• 56:21
  cool perk of this offseason that we don't talk about enough is suddenly we have
• 56:24
  too many edge rushers. You got rid of Daniel Hunter, said goodbye to
• 56:29
  Marcus Davenport, which we didn't really feel much pain, and then dj Wanham,
• 56:32
  who was pretty damn good last year. But in return you got Jonathan
• 56:37
  Gernard, Andrew Van Ginkel, Dallas Turner, Gabriel Murphy, jahad Ward,
• 56:43
  and I think and then undrafted guy bo Richter. I don't know if he
• 56:46
  counts, but that is a lot of guys to face it to replace Danil
• 56:52
  Hunter. You can find free agents to replace DJ Wantum pretty easily. So
• 56:58
  one of the by products is that there's going to be uncomfortable roster cuts at
• 57:00
  outside linebacker. And I don't think Gabriel Murphy got paid two hundred fifty three
• 57:07
  and fifty thousand just to get cut. I still have hope and Andre Carter
• 57:09
  because he was one of the big splash of UFAs last year. So the
• 57:14
  least surprising cut from this lead listed to me would be Patrick Jones, mainly
• 57:17
  because he wasn't drafted by this front office and a good problem to have.
• 57:22
  The Vikings have too many edges. Yeah, so I guess my least surprising
• 57:29
  would be Brian Asamoa Asamoa basically just because we never saw him again after Ivan
• 57:35
  Pace overtook the field. There, Evan, what's what's your least surprising?
• 57:42
  I'll maybe be a little controversial here. I've read some things and kind of
• 57:49
  tried to understand the whole Lewis scene situation. I think Lewis scene has a
• 57:54
  pretty secure spot with the Vikings going into next year. That's just opinion.
• 58:02
  There's there's not a whole lot backing that other than uh, you know,
• 58:08
  it's a it's a position that the Vikings need some depth in. I think
• 58:13
  it's also he's not really been given a whole lot of opportunity to really prove
• 58:20
  himself. He's been kind of hampered by injury. So for better or for
• 58:24
  worse, I'll stick with lewis seen at the least surprising cut. Okay,
• 58:31
  so you're saying you would be not surprised at all if he got cut or
• 58:37
  the opposite. See, that's where these games get challenging. Yeah, so
• 58:40
  this late I go to bed about nine point thirty. My brain's playing tricks
• 58:45
  on me. I think he's the safest if we're we're going that route.
• 58:50
  Is that what we're saying, Well, you went a little backwards, but
• 58:53
  okay, I think we understand what you're saying now, all right, all
• 58:58
  right, So just to get real quick, my my fourth least surprising cut
• 59:02
  would be Pat Jones for everything you just said, d Dustin. All right,
• 59:08
  So your next least surprising after Pat Jones for you. So I think
• 59:13
  I go against the grain and I say scene here, And it's not because
• 59:19
  I am over the just overjoyed to call him a bust like a lot of
• 59:22
  the world is like there's some people that just love calling Lewis Sene a bust
• 59:27
  and I just like, don't get it, Like the guy broke his leg
• 59:29
  and we have a little human decence a year, But there are too many
• 59:32
  safeties on the Vikings roster, Like none of these guys are gonna get cut
• 59:37
  unless Jay Ward suddenly sucks or Theo Jackson is just some big mirage. They
• 59:43
  have five safeties or is it yeah, they have five safeties as is plus
• 59:47
  Lewis Scene, and then suddenly they also have a bunch of cornerbacks who are
• 59:52
  could be uncutable. So I can see Scene getting the axe, not because
• 59:57
  his career is doomed and he's the worst draft pick because they could have had
• 1:00:00
  Kyle Hamilton, but because the Vikings, even if Scene's good, where is
• 1:00:05
  he gonna play already have Harrison Smith, Cameron by them and Josh mttellis and
• 1:00:10
  so it'll be tricky for Seeing to see the field unless he really is a
• 1:00:14
  badass. But we had a long way to go before he is. That
• 1:00:17
  soul Scene would be near the bottom of the list for least surprise for me.
• 1:00:22
  Okay, Evan, you're your least surprise cut. You just said scene
• 1:00:29
  might be one of your most surprised cut. Who would be your least surprised
• 1:00:31
  actually couple of cuts here. Well, now that I now that I have
• 1:00:36
  my mind wrapped around what we're talking about, I'll stick with seeing as my
• 1:00:39
  number five. Mm hmm. I still think there's hope for scene, but
• 1:00:45
  you know, well, we'll see. There's there's a lot to be seen
• 1:00:50
  there. I would say, uh, we'll go. We'll go with Pat
• 1:00:53
  Jones as the number four. Kind of crowded in that space. I think
• 1:01:00
  he's kind of the odd man out, Okay, all right, after Brian
• 1:01:07
  Osamoa and Pat Jones. For me, I had Jalen Naylor on this group
• 1:01:10
  as the third least surprising cut for me, just because the injury history for
• 1:01:19
  him. He's kind of shown flashes. He's been the fancy pick for that
• 1:01:22
  wide receiver three spot, and he's gotten a couple of opportunities. But I
• 1:01:27
  mean, you can't can't make the team in the training room. So just
• 1:01:30
  because of that and the abundance of other players at that wide receiver room plus
• 1:01:36
  maybe a signing or two, I think Naylor might be an odd made out
• 1:01:39
  in that room at number three. So basically right in the middle for me
• 1:01:45
  is Andrew Booth, and I think this is a fair spot for him.
• 1:01:47
  There's two things that go into play. I guess the give and taker,
• 1:01:52
  the pull and tug is. I don't know if it's just me, but
• 1:01:55
  last year and Andrew Booth played, which was like one hundred cover snaps.
• 1:01:59
  The guy was good. His PFF grade was right like around sixty eight sixty
• 1:02:02
  nine, which is pretty good for a second year cornerback, you know,
• 1:02:06
  decent, and none of us cared that he looked pretty good when he played.
• 1:02:10
  I think it's because probably because he wasn't a starter and didn't play more
• 1:02:14
  than one hundred snaps. But I was pleased by the small sample that we
• 1:02:19
  saw Booth play. But the problem here why he lives right in the middle
• 1:02:23
  on the cut list is there are a lot of guys exactly like him performance
• 1:02:28
  wise at cornerback right now. Jack grifferin pretty good, Caleb Evans is kind
• 1:02:32
  of in a make or break season, Ryan Murphy's pretty darn good, he's
• 1:02:37
  gonna start, Makay Blackman was great as a rookie, and then who's the
• 1:02:40
  one guy I'm forgetting Right now? There's one other one, Kyrie Jackson,
• 1:02:45
  the new guy, he's not always so booth scene or booth. One of
• 1:02:51
  them is probably going to go, and I think it would be seen foremost
• 1:02:55
  because safety has already spoken for. I am like just one of the weird
• 1:03:00
  folks that thinks Andrew Booth played well and I don't want to see him call.
• 1:03:02
  I think he can, like, you know, emerge this summer and
• 1:03:06
  we're like, there is the guy we we always wanted. But he would
• 1:03:07
  be right in the middle of surprise. Both both of those guys seen him
• 1:03:12
  booth face face massive Make or Break seasons this year. All right, all
• 1:03:16
  right, Evan, who is your your third least surprising. We're all we're
• 1:03:23
  all kind of confusing this a little bit. Ear least I am a little
• 1:03:27
  bit now. We're just using different we're just using different language to describe it.
• 1:03:31
  But I'm on I'm on board, I'm tracking now. I'm gonna go
• 1:03:34
  with Jalen Naylor. Uh. He had three catches last year, just not
• 1:03:40
  a very productive part of the offense. And there's I think I counted thirteen
• 1:03:46
  wide receivers currently on the roster right now, so uh, three catches with
• 1:03:52
  twelve other guys that have something to prove. I wouldn't be surprised if he
• 1:03:58
  goes all right now down to my what will flip it a little bit?
• 1:04:03
  My second most surprising cut of this list for me, we said his name
• 1:04:09
  probably the most of everything Lewis scene. I think just because he does still
• 1:04:13
  have that first round equity, the excuse a little bit of that injury,
• 1:04:18
  and also contract wise, it might be you'd feel it a little bit more
• 1:04:23
  cutting him than other people here on this list as far as dead money and
• 1:04:28
  stuff. I don't know the exact numbers, but just being a first round
• 1:04:30
  pick, and I think he gets one more one more season to kind of
• 1:04:35
  show something and then honestly, his Vikings career in the future is probably not
• 1:04:41
  much after this year, but he's going to be doing a lot to try
• 1:04:44
  to show the entire league that he's worth signing, so all for that,
• 1:04:48
  I think in twenty twenty four he'd be my second most surprised cut on this
• 1:04:54
  list for me. To me, yep, my second most awesome prize would
• 1:05:00
  be Jalen Naylor and this is because a he looks pretty damn good at the
• 1:05:04
  OTAs and we spent about five eight nine minutes talking about WR three and the
• 1:05:11
  need for one. Well, you got one at home if he's any good.
• 1:05:15
  So I think Naylor's steed A couple that with he was drafted by this
• 1:05:19
  regime. You've got a giant wide opening at WR three if he wants it
• 1:05:25
  badly enough. The thing that comes the most about this is health. He's
• 1:05:29
  got to stay healthy. I'll always be sad that last year he couldn't stay
• 1:05:32
  healthy or he wasn't good, whichever one was true, because with Jefferson out
• 1:05:36
  that long, he had a golden opportunity to shine and he just really didn't
• 1:05:41
  do much of anything. So I'd be mainly surprised at this one because this
• 1:05:45
  is the year the team needs him. This is your job, is WR
• 1:05:48
  jury, go win it, and then he is one of their guys.
• 1:05:51
  And I think there's a little bit of upside that if he gets cut,
• 1:05:56
  that will mean my previous theory from ten minutes ago was really correct. You
• 1:06:00
  know, ty James from Mercer is really good or something like that. Yeah,
• 1:06:03
  all right, Evan, your most surprising cut, I think, did
• 1:06:08
  I skip any for you? No? I think yeah, I think this
• 1:06:11
  would be my second most surprising cut. I think I'm last here in the
• 1:06:15
  chain. Okay, So I think my second most surprising cut would be Andrew
• 1:06:20
  Booth. Played seventeen games for the Vikings last year, really consistent, and
• 1:06:30
  you got to have depth at that position. So I'll stick with him as
• 1:06:35
  my second most surprising. All Right, Andrew Booth is my would be my
• 1:06:41
  most surprising cut for everything Evan you just said, and Dustin, if we
• 1:06:45
  want to rewind a couple of minutes, for everything you said about him a
• 1:06:48
  few minutes ago, he played pretty well position of need, still pretty young,
• 1:06:53
  and I think, yeah, I'd be very surprised if he were cut
• 1:06:58
  as of this whole group, just because he still young. He's got a
• 1:07:01
  lot of time to show that he is on the upward track, and I
• 1:07:05
  think he's already shown the first steps of being on the upward track. So
• 1:07:10
  I'd be surprised if he were cut. So we are at for this list
• 1:07:15
  at vast odds because I have Brian Austin Wah as my most surprising cut.
• 1:07:20
  And this this isn't because he played wonderfully last year, only played like what
• 1:07:25
  thirty five defensive snaps or something like that. He was a complete footnote Ivan
• 1:07:29
  Pace just came through and just smacked him and said, that's my job.
• 1:07:33
  But the reason I can't see him getting cut this year is like the Depths,
• 1:07:38
  it's him and Commute was a Kamu Grigor Hill. I can never say
• 1:07:42
  yeah, yeah, it's and that's it. In terms of veterans they've got
• 1:07:45
  like Dallas Gant or something like that, he is the other yeah, Dallas
• 1:07:51
  Gant, Abraham Boplan and then see kJ Cloyd. So I just unless they
• 1:07:58
  want to get an old Flores off ball linebacker from the Patriots days or something
• 1:08:02
  like that, I don't think there is enough depth to tell awesome, wah
• 1:08:08
  goodbye. And we saw Awesomlah play well as a rookie, so I'm convinced
• 1:08:13
  that that lives in there somewhere. It's just that I believe Ivan Pace was
• 1:08:17
  too good for I mean, he could box out anybody that wanted the job
• 1:08:21
  last year. If this was like cornerback where they had five off ball linebackers
• 1:08:28
  that were about as good as Caleb Evans and all those guys, then I
• 1:08:30
  would say, yeah, I could see that. But in terms of off
• 1:08:33
  ball linebacker depth, it's basically after the starter is awesome Wah and Gregor Hill
• 1:08:40
  and then undrafted guys. So I think awesome Wah is safe, all right,
• 1:08:45
  And I think you're the last one here. Who's your most surprising cut?
• 1:08:48
  And yeah, the only remaining one on my list is Brian Osamo as
• 1:08:51
  well. And I was agree with everything that Dustin said. It's a depth
• 1:08:56
  thing, and it's an experienced thing, and I think it's also just being
• 1:09:00
  in that Flores system now for a year, understanding how things work. When
• 1:09:05
  I've and Pace needs a break, you gotta put somebody in there. He's
• 1:09:09
  the guy I think. All right, Well that was fun, all right.
• 1:09:14
  So this next question. I had the chance to, on what two
• 1:09:18
  episodes ago the Skull Hop, ask the guys from You Bet You and breakfast
• 1:09:24
  Ball these same rapid fire questions. And at the time I gave my own
• 1:09:30
  answers for these, So I will step back. I'll just ask them Dustin
• 1:09:33
  and Evan without thinking too much. I didn't give you these these specific questions.
• 1:09:40
  There's what five of them that you just no explanation, just here's the
• 1:09:45
  answer. So, remembering that there will be probably more than two quarterbacks on
• 1:09:50
  the roster, how many starts does Sam Darnold get in twenty twenty four for
• 1:09:55
  the Vikings, barring injury, you know, assuming everybody's healthy. Dustin,
• 1:10:00
  Oh my goodness. So I have this hot take that Donald's gonna be good
• 1:10:05
  because that's just Vikings football so good that we can't play McCarthy. It's just
• 1:10:11
  and this isn't from somebody that thinks Donald is like good. I just I
• 1:10:15
  know it's going to happen. So Donald's gonna be good enough. Oh man,
• 1:10:21
  I'm gonna say until they're eliminated. So I'm gonna say about fourteen or
• 1:10:26
  fifteen, okay, Evan, how many starts for Sam Donald? I think
• 1:10:30
  we've talked about this on a previous episode before, and I'm gonna stick with
• 1:10:36
  what you've said, Austin. When I go with six games, Week six,
• 1:10:42
  the Vikings go to London and play the Jets, and then they have
• 1:10:45
  a week seven bye, I think Sam Donald starts those six games, and
• 1:10:49
  then they start to shift things during the bye week and week eight we might
• 1:10:56
  see JJ McCarthy. All right, So this is again I remind you guys
• 1:11:00
  that there probably will be more than one quarterback or more than two quarterbacks on
• 1:11:04
  the roster this year. So this could be a little hot taking, But
• 1:11:08
  how many starts for JJ McCarthy, dostin. I'm gonna go fourteen for Donald,
• 1:11:14
  So three for McCarthy. That'll be kind of that NFC North, not
• 1:11:19
  Gauntlet, but remainder of the season. And the only reason I think that
• 1:11:24
  is sometimes with Vikings football, it's almost like a missfield goal. You can
• 1:11:29
  feel it coming and then you see it and you're like, I felt that
• 1:11:31
  coming. I just feel that Sam Donald is suddenly going to look like the
• 1:11:38
  third overall pick or whatever he was in twenty eighteen because he finally got the
• 1:11:41
  coach that loves him and he's got all these weapons. So I think that'll
• 1:11:45
  keep macarthy. I cynically because I want McCarthy to play right away. They're
• 1:11:48
  not gonna let him do it, and that means McCarthy's gonna be or excuse
• 1:11:51
  me, Donald's gonna be too good. So three starts for McCarthy when I
• 1:11:54
  was all said, all right, Evan, what do you got? Yeah,
• 1:11:59
  I mean I would do McCarthy the remainder of the games after that,
• 1:12:02
  So whatever seventeen minus six is that eleven? He's English. I'm not good
• 1:12:08
  with math, but yeah, I would give him the remainder of the starts,
• 1:12:12
  barring injury. I think I'm less optimistic that Sam Darnold it will be
• 1:12:19
  as good as we hope he will be. I think right now he's the
• 1:12:24
  bona fide Week one starter, but I still think early part of the season
• 1:12:30
  it just it won't work, and they'll move pretty quickly to this really high
• 1:12:36
  highest drafted quarterback overall for the Vikings. They'll move to him pretty quickly,
• 1:12:42
  I think, and see what he can do down the stretch, for better
• 1:12:45
  or for worse. All right, okay, next step, we have yards
• 1:12:50
  and touchdowns for Justin Jefferson dotin. Oh okay, So I think he will
• 1:12:58
  stay healthy this year. He won't have somebody a steady as Kirk throwing to
• 1:13:02
  him. So what is a what does a good but not electric Jefferson season
• 1:13:08
  look like? That's probably fifteen hundred fifty yards and he finally hits ten touchdowns?
• 1:13:16
  All right, Evan, what do you got we'll give him. I
• 1:13:23
  think they're going to rely on him more, which I think means he'll get
• 1:13:28
  more targets, but maybe probably in line with what Dustin said. Yeah,
• 1:13:35
  well, we'll go with fifteen fifteen hundred yards and let's say nine touchdowns prices,
• 1:13:45
  all right? Same yards and touchdowns For Aaron Jones, oh boy,
• 1:13:51
  all right, so he's not gonna play seventeen games. We are we are
• 1:13:57
  not that lucky. So I'm gonna say, goat, what did he have
• 1:14:01
  last year? Probably something that's similar to last year. Hold on, I'm
• 1:14:04
  gonna pull that up real quick, because the reason he's playing for the Vikings
• 1:14:09
  right now is because he played like a total fiend down the stretch of the
• 1:14:12
  season. Last year. He had six hundred and fifty six rushing yards.
• 1:14:15
  I think he'll be a little bit healthier than that. Yeah, And I
• 1:14:17
  think ty Chandler, poor ty Chandler, the guy played really well for a
• 1:14:20
  couple of games, and if the Vikings didn't have these huge rushing games struggles,
• 1:14:26
  he probably deserved to. Look. I'll say, for Aaron Jones,
• 1:14:30
  about nine hundred rushing yards and now he's a touchdown score, so probably nine
• 1:14:34
  or ten touchdowns, all right, I'll give I'll give Aaron Jones a thousand
• 1:14:40
  yards even I think the Vikings are and I think Kevin O'Connell is hungry for
• 1:14:49
  some health in the rushing game. It was lacking last year obviously, and
• 1:14:56
  we tried a lot of different things, and ty Chandler did have some good
• 1:15:01
  games. But I think Aaron Jones will come in. He'll be the he'll
• 1:15:05
  be the bell cow for sure. I'll give him a thousand yards. We'll
• 1:15:10
  give him eight touchdowns. He's only broken ten touchdowns once in his career,
• 1:15:15
  so we'll give him eight. I think that's a that's better than the I
• 1:15:18
  think, what did Vikings running backs have all one touchdown this last season?
• 1:15:25
  So yep, this is this is one question I didn't answer on the previous
• 1:15:31
  episodes. So just just to give a quick answer, I'm gonna say six
• 1:15:35
  hundred and fifty yards rushing and we'll go seven touchdowns. I think they'll they'll
• 1:15:42
  really have him more than anybody else on a pitch count. They'll kind of
• 1:15:45
  hold him back until they absolutely need him. I think ty Chandler gives them
• 1:15:49
  that that affordability to to kind of switch up the room. Plus, I
• 1:15:56
  mean, I feel like the Vikings offensive line has proven to not be the
• 1:16:00
  run blocking offensive line, but you never know, with the rookie quarterback,
• 1:16:04
  they might want to rely on the rushing game too, So you never know.
• 1:16:08
  Still for him six fifty and seven, remember two. Remember two,
• 1:16:12
  he catches the ball and he scores receiving touchdowns. He hasn't cracked that ten
• 1:16:16
  touchdown rushing touchdown very often, but I think three or four times he's hit
• 1:16:20
  the all purpose touchdowns over ten. He's even more of a dynamic pass catcher
• 1:16:26
  than Dalvin ever was, so he posed, which to that point may cut
• 1:16:30
  into his you know, ability to gain rushing yards. Yes too, So
• 1:16:34
  yeah, all right, last one. It's way too early season. Training
• 1:16:39
  camp hasn't even started yet, but just final record and I'll start. I've
• 1:16:44
  got them at eleven wins. God, I have fans on every Friday.
• 1:16:49
  I try to have three, like a panel of three fans. Some of
• 1:16:54
  you guys are coming up with these eleven wins and twelve and five stuff,
• 1:16:57
  and I'm like, what do we do? We're setting the bar. Wait,
• 1:17:01
  I'm consistent. Last year I said ten and seven, but I'll talk
• 1:17:05
  myself into eleven and six this year. It's the end verse. Right now,
• 1:17:10
  I say seven and ten. But when I see the ball zooming around
• 1:17:13
  at training camp, I'm gonna be like, yeah, all right, we're
• 1:17:15
  gonna go eight and eight. So I will say eight and eight, but
• 1:17:17
  it'll be a frisky eight and eight. The Vikings what they do, like,
• 1:17:23
  minus a couple of seasons where they're downright futred bad, they're always there.
• 1:17:28
  In about December first you're like, oh, these guys are six and
• 1:17:30
  six, man, they can they can do it. If situation A happens,
• 1:17:33
  then they're gonna do the situation B. So I will say that there'll
• 1:17:36
  be eight and nine. It'll be a competitive eight to nine, probably involving
• 1:17:42
  a junior collapse down the stretch. All right, evan final record as of
• 1:17:46
  before June. Yeah, yeah, I'll go with ten wins. I think
• 1:17:53
  they win a few early on in those first handful of games before the bye
• 1:17:59
  week, and then they drop most of those, and then I think they
• 1:18:04
  really they really pick it up, they really figure it out after the bye
• 1:18:08
  week, and again I think the quarterback change might have something to do with
• 1:18:12
  that. It won't be great, it won't be you know, six or
• 1:18:16
  seven games in a row, but it will be enough to potentially be in
• 1:18:21
  the conversation for a wild card at the end of the season. The reason
• 1:18:26
  that the reason that I can merge or marry JJ McCarthy getting in the final
• 1:18:31
  few games, them being eight and nine, being a contender, is I
• 1:18:34
  think they're gonna somehow get out to something good. And then you're gonna see
• 1:18:39
  like a three game losing streak from Darnold and we'll be like, ah,
• 1:18:42
  right, he turned back into a pumpkin. And then Kevin O'Connell's going to
• 1:18:45
  come out and say, like on December fifteenth, like this is the time
• 1:18:48
  we're gonna we're gonna give JJ a look. You know, we're on the
• 1:18:50
  three game losing skid. We drafted him for a reason. So that's how
• 1:18:54
  I can reconcile all these wild theories. Yeah, JJ McCarthy being quarterback two
• 1:18:59
  to off with and the idea that he could be ejected in at a tough
• 1:19:03
  time kind of feels like a Mario Kart red mushroom, Like give us a
• 1:19:08
  little boose here for a little bit and see if that helps. All right,
• 1:19:12
  justin thank you so much for coming on, Welcome back, open door.
• 1:19:15
  Anytime we've we've gotten to a good rhythm of about once a month give
• 1:19:20
  or take here. Yeah, but yeah, anytime you want to come on,
• 1:19:24
  Not that you don't have every other opportunity to talk about the vikings everywhere
• 1:19:28
  else on the internet. But you're always welcome here. Anything you want to
• 1:19:31
  plug quick before we wrap it up. Nope, we did that at the
• 1:19:36
  top of the show. Let's see we talked to Walter Ross last week.
• 1:19:42
  That was fun on now. Yep, that dude was really cool. He
• 1:19:45
  knows the stuff. He could see. He there was some reports that said,
• 1:19:48
  like pre draft leed of, hey, maybe he can play guard,
• 1:19:51
  and I asked him and he said, hey, they made him play guard,
• 1:19:54
  I'll play guard. It kind of felt like he was being silly.
• 1:19:57
  He could certainly play right tackle. But yeah, so check out Walter Ross
• 1:20:00
  out on bikes. Now, I say for you, gentlemen, if you're
• 1:20:03
  available, like on June twenty fifth, for July second, I'll be in
• 1:20:09
  Norway the next two weeks. But I think ye after that we can chat
• 1:20:13
  about kind of how the OTA or excuse me, a mandatory mini camp has
• 1:20:15
  gone, and then start to review training camp school. Yeah, let's plan
• 1:20:21
  on it sounds gr right. All right, Hey, welcome back. Pretty
• 1:20:26
  fun conversation with Dustin. It's always great. I always love having Dustin on.
• 1:20:30
  I don't know if he ever listens back. I think he told us
• 1:20:32
  one time he listened back. I think him and Yonick Eckard We're going to
• 1:20:36
  the Bengals game, and they were driving there together and they listen back right
• 1:20:41
  after the first time he was on, which is pretty cool. So Dustin,
• 1:20:44
  thank you for coming on. If you're listening, just I don't know,
• 1:20:46
  send us a smiley face letting us know you're listening. But yeah,
• 1:20:49
  it's it's always good friend of the show, Dustin. I love that we
• 1:20:53
  can say that now because I started off as a fan, you know,
• 1:20:56
  just a Twitter fan of this guy, and he's on our show all the
• 1:20:59
  time, so it's pretty cool. It is pretty cool. We we spent
• 1:21:03
  but I think the most time we've ever spent with him. Yeah. Yeah,
• 1:21:08
  covered a lot of things. He was extremely gracious with his time.
• 1:21:11
  It was also the latest part of the day that we've ever recorded with him,
• 1:21:14
  which worked for us. I don't you never know with other people,
• 1:21:15
  it's like, ah, are we going too late for you? We might
• 1:21:18
  have been going too late for you have but it's definitely after my bedtime.
• 1:21:21
  Well, it's right. It might have shown a little bit when we all
• 1:21:24
  got a little confused on the question about how surprised we'd be for each player
• 1:21:28
  to get cut, and Dustin and I were completely opposite with our most and
• 1:21:31
  least surprised. Yeah, I said I'd be I don't even remember, I'd
• 1:21:36
  be least surprised if Brian Brian Osimoa was cut, and he said he'd be
• 1:21:42
  most surprised. So good episode with him, good good conversation, and I
• 1:21:47
  liked his wide receiver takes. So yeah, And we mentioned in the early
• 1:21:51
  part of our episode because the Justin Jefferson news came out just today, we'll
• 1:21:59
  link to the article that Dustin's counterpart yannaka Khart wrote for Vikings Territory on kind
• 1:22:05
  of the whole Justin Jefferson contract thing. We'll have that linked in the description
• 1:22:12
  below, so don't forget about that. Make sure you go check them out
• 1:22:14
  and check out Viking's Territory for any in all Vikings content. They always have
• 1:22:19
  some really good stuff there. So yeah, I can't remember if I said
• 1:22:24
  this to Dustin before or after we started recording with him, but I kind
• 1:22:29
  of told him, like it has become for me like a go to site
• 1:22:33
  to get not only news, but like no nonsense and common sense quality takes
• 1:22:40
  on the factual news. So Viking's Territory, they're never going to print something
• 1:22:44
  that is wrong or specifically clickbaity, but they are going to tell you the
• 1:22:47
  facts and maybe a little bit of opinion and maybe some speculation on what could
• 1:22:53
  happen in the future. But good site. Check them out if you haven't
• 1:22:55
  already Vikings Territory dot com. They're not a sponsor, but yeah, I'd
• 1:23:00
  love it if people said, yeah, I checked them out, because you
• 1:23:01
  guys said so, so it's good stuff. What'd you think of the hazy
• 1:23:06
  forecast for this? Back Pocket? This is so good? Like it is
• 1:23:10
  good. It's so I'm one that I will go for a bold flavor,
• 1:23:15
  Like I know that I can handle heavy, heavy IPA flavors and really spicy
• 1:23:23
  food and like I like bold, bold flavors. But this is refreshing.
• 1:23:28
  This is it's not offensive, it's not a hitch in the face, too
• 1:23:31
  bold of a flavor. But it's really good and back Pockets should be proud
• 1:23:35
  of it. And I hope it's not just a seasonal or a limited run
• 1:23:40
  because it's it's really good and you should definitely try it. Yeah, And
• 1:23:43
  I know I mentioned this earlier, but I don't know. They it could
• 1:23:46
  be kind of a limited release type of thing, but I don't know.
• 1:23:51
  I haven't ever seen it on the shelf before until tonight when I was at
• 1:23:56
  the store and I saw Hazy and I saw the description, and I'm like,
• 1:24:00
  Austin's gonna like that beer. Yeah. So, and you were right,
• 1:24:03
  and you hadn't even tried it yet, but you were right. Maybe
• 1:24:06
  we should hit up back Pocket on our brew hop tour that we're putting together.
• 1:24:13
  Yeah. So, I think we counted six weeks from now, Yeah,
• 1:24:17
  from right now, so maybe a little bit less time by the time
• 1:24:20
  we get all this out and you're all listening to this, but yeah,
• 1:24:24
  we're coming up episode fifty. It's going to be a monumental episode. It's
• 1:24:28
  gonna be a good one, and we're going to focus on the beer more
• 1:24:31
  than the Vikings for once. We might wear our Vikings shirts, but we'll
• 1:24:34
  be absolutely we'll be out and about and we'll be visiting places possibly like back
• 1:24:41
  Pocket, Yeah, and hopefully filming some stuff and documenting our journey along the
• 1:24:47
  way. Absolutely, so we are. We're still finalizing everything, and I
• 1:24:53
  think we talked maybe we'll kind of post out where we'll be, so if
• 1:24:56
  you want to come, come say hi to us, maybe we'll have that
• 1:24:59
  information now. But also, maybe most importantly, if you're a brewery in
• 1:25:01
  Iowa and you're interested in having us in. Obviously, our plan is to
• 1:25:08
  walk into every brewery and be you know, well mannered, paying patrons.
• 1:25:13
  But if you guys want to kind of showcase your brewery a little bit,
• 1:25:15
  we'll talk about you guys and show the brewing equipment if you're willing to show
• 1:25:23
  us anything, We're excited. If you're excited, so we'll come if you
• 1:25:26
  call us, so let us know if you are a brewery or if you
• 1:25:29
  know somebody who might be interested in kind of having some kind of content with
• 1:25:32
  the skool Hoop. Yeah, definitely reach out to us for more information about
• 1:25:38
  when specifically will be going on this little adventure. How can people even if
• 1:25:43
  you're not a brewery, how can people reach out to us? You can
• 1:25:45
  reach out to us in a lot of different ways. YouTube. We get
• 1:25:48
  a lot of We've been getting quite a few comments on YouTube lately, so
• 1:25:53
  thanks for that. Those of you that have been interacting with us there.
• 1:25:58
  You can send us messages on Facebook, Twitter. Those are probably the two
• 1:26:01
  main kind of social media platforms that we're on. Instagram a little bit,
• 1:26:06
  TikTok a little bit, yeah, TikTok a little bit. Yeah. So
• 1:26:11
  yeah, those are great places to connect with us. But you can also
• 1:26:14
  just email us the school Hop at gmail dot com and we will we will
• 1:26:17
  reply, We definitely will. Yeah so yeah. Oh and our website too,
• 1:26:24
  schoo Hop, the school Hop, school Hop, the school Hop dot
• 1:26:27
  com, the school Hop dot com. You can find links to everything from
• 1:26:30
  there. Even episodes and YouTube videos were there, and even merch. I'm
• 1:26:35
  repping our school Hop shirt. Evan had it on last week. That's right,
• 1:26:39
  it was a different one. We're obviously not sharing a shirt. We
• 1:26:43
  even have coffee mugs. Oh yeah, so even if you don't like beer,
• 1:26:46
  but you just you like a good coffee mug with a good old Vikings
• 1:26:50
  logo on it. Yep, school well our version of the Norse logo with
• 1:26:55
  the hop. Yeah. Check us out and let us know you're there.
• 1:27:00
  Yeah. Good episode, great episode, best episode. Yet we just keep
• 1:27:03
  getting better and better every time. We're like a fine wine. We can
• 1:27:06
  get better with age or a good hazy I p A or they actually don't
• 1:27:10
  get better with age. Don't don't age your hazy I P as they It
• 1:27:14
  doesn't, it doesn't go well. You can age some, but not not
• 1:27:17
  not It turns very vinegree it's not it's not good. Not a good idea.
• 1:27:21
  Drink them when they're fresh and great, like this hazy forecast from the
• 1:27:25
  back pocket And this one was yep, all right man until next time.
• 1:27:29
  School School Hey vikings fans evan here from the School Hop and we just wanted
• 1:27:51
  to say thank you again. It's so much for listening to the School Hop,
• 1:27:55
  and we also wanted to take one more opportunity to let you know that
• 1:27:58
  this episode of School Hop has been brought to you by Big Top Ventures.
• 1:28:02
  If you're considering taking an all inclusive trip to either Mexico or Jamaica, reach
• 1:28:06
  out to our friends at Bigtop Ventures at Big Top Ventures LLC at gmail dot
• 1:28:12
  com. Once again, that's Big Top Ventures LLC at gmail dot com.
• 1:28:17
  You can get the lowest rate possible on several all inclusive resorts throughout the region.
• 1:28:21
  Big Top Ventures step right up to your next big adventure and thanks again
• 1:28:27
  for listening to the School Hop. School a