Latest / The Skol Hop / A Skol Hop Gift Swap for Christmas, The Vikings Playoff Hopes and the Ongoing Quarterback Controversy for the Purple Team | TSH Ep. 20

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A Skol Hop Gift Swap for Christmas, The Vikings Playoff Hopes and the Ongoing Quarterback Controversy for the Purple Team | TSH Ep. 20 · The Skol Hop

• 0:31
  into another episode of the Skull Hop.
• 0:33
  I'm Evan. And I'm Austin.
• 0:35
  We're just a couple of dudes from Iowa.
• 0:37
  We like drinking beer, and we like talking about the Vikings.
• 0:39
  Yeah, we do school, school. And Merry Christmas, by the way.
• 0:42
  Christmas to you too. We've got some gifts here that
• 0:44
  we're going to exchange in a little bit.
• 0:46
  Yeah, that'll be fun. I'm excited.
• 0:47
  But before we do that, we got to pay the bills.
• 0:50
  So we just wanted to let you know that today's episode of The
• 0:54
  School Hop is brought to you by Big Top Ventures.
• 0:56
  To get the best rates on all inclusive resorts in Mexico or
• 1:00
  Jamaica, send an e-mail to bigtopventuresllc@gmail.com.
• 1:05
  That's bigtopventuresllc@gmail.com and
• 1:09
  you've been on one of these trips before.
• 1:11
  Yeah, I've actually used big top ventures a couple of times.
• 1:15
  Actually. My wife and I went to Mexico a
• 1:19
  couple years ago. We've got another trip planned
• 1:21
  this coming June, also through big Top Ventures, really easy to
• 1:25
  work with. I like them a lot.
• 1:26
  Check them out. I mean, worse you can do is
• 1:29
  check out their rates and if it's not what you're looking
• 1:31
  for, move on to somebody else. But I I can promise from
• 1:34
  experience you'll you'll be good with their rates.
• 1:37
  Yeah, there you go. Yeah.
• 1:38
  So thanks Big Top for helping us out and we appreciate it.
• 1:42
  Yeah, we're drinking. We are drinking.
• 1:45
  We're fans. We have to drink.
• 1:48
  That was an that was an ill advised pause.
• 1:50
  There what I was saying. But the beer we're drinking
• 1:53
  tonight is green trees. Give me the name one more time.
• 1:57
  I always. Yeah, so I think they've changed
• 1:59
  their name of this beer, what you've said.
• 2:02
  So you have gifted us tonight with a green tree brewing out of
• 2:06
  Leclaire, Iowa. Their River Bottom X.
• 2:09
  It used to be called River Bottom Red.
• 2:11
  I think it was River Bottom Red when it was first released, but
• 2:15
  they must have changed it for some reason or another.
• 2:17
  But it's a 6% red beer, and it's brewed by Green Tree Brewing,
• 2:22
  which is in Le Clair, Iowa, just a stone's throw away from where
• 2:26
  we're at. And it's a it's a microbrewery.
• 2:30
  They don't distribute. You have to go to their brewery
• 2:35
  location in Le Clair, Iowa, to get their beer.
• 2:37
  And that's what I did, Yeah. And it's good stuff.
• 2:40
  And I appreciate, appreciate that you did 'cause this is
• 2:43
  really good beer. Yeah, I think we said in the
• 2:46
  TikTok that it's a, it's no secret that I gravitate towards
• 2:51
  the Ipas, but you have really been opening me to the Ambers
• 2:55
  and to the Reds and I'm. I'm not disappointed at all by
• 3:00
  just, you know, being open to that kind of a beer.
• 3:02
  But especially this one. This one's really good and I may
• 3:06
  have to make the quick drive out to to their brewery sometime in
• 3:10
  the near future to try some more of this.
• 3:12
  Maybe we'll have to have a business meeting out out at that
• 3:15
  brewery. That be that would be a good
• 3:16
  thing. I would.
• 3:17
  I would appreciate that. Yeah, that'd be fun.
• 3:19
  And I would say to anybody out there that's wanting to know how
• 3:22
  they could get their hands on some of this.
• 3:25
  Like I said, you have to go to their brewery, but they're right
• 3:29
  off of Interstate 80, and Leclair is just a tiny little
• 3:32
  town, but it's loaded with tons of stuff to do.
• 3:35
  So if you ever drive in between like Des Moines and Chicago,
• 3:39
  it's a great place to stop. And the American Pickers are
• 3:43
  there. Or do they still have a location
• 3:45
  out there? Yep.
• 3:46
  And then there's just a ton of different little shops and
• 3:49
  stuff. There's a great whiskey
• 3:51
  distillery right next door to the brewery.
• 3:54
  Oh yeah, yeah, just lots of good stuff.
• 3:57
  I'm just typing up Leclaire. It's.
• 3:58
  Yeah, it's a good. It's a good spot and the less we
• 4:01
  have to talk about the Vikings this week.
• 4:02
  I mean, I'm OK with that. I know you guys are here to hear
• 4:06
  about the Vikings maybe. I know we have some fans of
• 4:08
  other teams that listen, so shout out JK Browns fan, but
• 4:13
  yeah, yeah, Leclaire is fun. It's nice.
• 4:15
  They always do some some cool events too around the holidays
• 4:18
  and stuff, which we're just getting out of.
• 4:21
  But yeah. All right, well, we can distract
• 4:24
  ourselves a little bit more by exchanging some gifts that we
• 4:29
  got for each other. It is a school hop Christmas.
• 4:31
  Merry Christmas out there, school hop fans, so I kind of
• 4:37
  want you to open yours first. I was gonna say I want you to
• 4:39
  open yours. You're the you are the gift
• 4:41
  opener. So we rock, paper, scissors.
• 4:43
  Let's, let's do it. All right, All right, just A1,
• 4:46
  best A1 and 123. Shoot.
• 4:48
  Yeah. All right.
• 4:49
  Rock, paper, scissors. Shoot.
• 4:50
  All right, all righty. I mean, OK, man.
• 5:01
  So I'll probably have to narrate for those of you out there that
• 5:04
  are just listening. He's shaking it and he's trying
• 5:09
  to figure out what it could be. I'm a present shaker.
• 5:12
  I sometimes I know you carry a knife.
• 5:14
  Do not use a knife. Oh, on this Just sometimes, all
• 5:18
  the time. Just.
• 5:19
  Forewarning, I don't want you to break anything.
• 5:23
  Oh man, is it? Is it breathing?
• 5:26
  Do I hear? No, it's not breathing.
• 5:31
  It's actually Kirk's Achilles. Oh no.
• 5:33
  Just kidding too. Soon, EV.
• 5:36
  Too soon? You're right.
• 5:40
  Oh man, I didn't tape it super well.
• 5:42
  You taped it a lot. Oh, there's another box in here
• 5:49
  all. Right.
• 5:50
  Sorry for all the excess noise, Yeah.
• 5:52
  It's an ASMR podcast. I have just opened the the
• 6:00
  wrapping paper of the second box, so there's a a.
• 6:02
  Box within a box, Yeah. I swear if there's another box
• 6:05
  in hero. Not another box.
• 6:10
  All right. OK.
• 6:13
  Did I do a good job wrapping? Yeah, Did did Raven wrap this?
• 6:16
  No, I wrapped it myself. Interesting.
• 6:18
  I wrapped your gift. If it was wrapped by my wife, it
• 6:20
  would have been way better, yeah.
• 6:23
  OK, well I think I'm getting closer.
• 6:25
  So I've just opened up the second box and it is wrapped in
• 6:30
  Saran wrap. I've.
• 6:33
  Seen far too many videos on TikTok this year of people
• 6:37
  giving gifts that are ridiculously hard to open, so I
• 6:40
  was a little inspired. Yeah, but you're almost there,
• 6:43
  Did. You have a few of those River
• 6:46
  Red River Bottom XS. No, I was saving it for this.
• 6:53
  This is going to sound great in your guys's ears.
• 6:55
  I did waste some Saran wrap, yeah.
• 6:57
  This is. So we're down to the Saran wrap
• 7:00
  layer, and under that there's more wrapping paper.
• 7:03
  Yep. But you're almost there, I.
• 7:05
  Think I'm getting close. You're getting real close it it
• 7:07
  feels like a clothing item. It could be.
• 7:12
  Oh, I can see just regular paper, but I think there's
• 7:14
  another, Yep, another couple of wrap arounds of Saran wrap.
• 7:19
  This has got to be terrible to listen to.
• 7:22
  I'll try to edit that out later, or at least put it on some
• 7:26
  effects to make it less obnoxious.
• 7:29
  Yep, maybe it'll be easier to watch.
• 7:31
  So we are on YouTube. You you can listen and watch the
• 7:36
  whole episode on YouTube. Hey, you made it.
• 7:41
  Made it to almost the initial wrapping paper.
• 7:43
  You know, most people would have just handed somebody this.
• 7:46
  That would have been too easy, and I'm a teacher on winter
• 7:49
  break, so you got. All the time in the world A.
• 7:51
  Little bit of time on my hands here, oh all.
• 7:53
  Right. It is a cloth item.
• 7:55
  At least I can see it's purple. There's more tape.
• 8:02
  How many rolls of tape did you use on this?
• 8:03
  Like 1. Whole roll?
• 8:04
  An entire roll. I would have guessed more.
• 8:09
  Oh, there's two cloth items in here.
• 8:11
  Oh, actually, 30. My Oh my goodness.
• 8:14
  OK, all right. It is wonderful.
• 8:18
  This is amazing. So first.
• 8:20
  To see first ever skull hop T-shirts skull.
• 8:24
  Hop T-shirts. This is awesome.
• 8:26
  So. There are three shirts in there
• 8:30
  because you never know how T-shirts are gonna fit when you
• 8:33
  order them online. So you'll have to find one that
• 8:36
  fits you. I'll find one that fits me and
• 8:38
  then we have one that we can give away to somebody out there
• 8:42
  listening to us look at. You EV, We'll put you on movies.
• 8:47
  Just say merchandising. Yep.
• 8:49
  Then we got the spectrum of sizes, and I think these, the
• 8:53
  spectrum will work out perfectly.
• 8:54
  So we'll have to figure out how we're going to give away that
• 8:57
  third shirt, yeah? So if you're out there
• 8:59
  listening, I'll let you finish. Hang on.
• 9:01
  Oh yeah. Just kidding.
• 9:05
  Yeah, you you should hit us up. We always we always promo our
• 9:09
  social media sites and our e-mail and stuff at the end of
• 9:13
  the episode. So send us a message somewhere,
• 9:16
  anywhere, And who knows, maybe we can send you a shirt.
• 9:21
  Yeah. And yeah, if you're watching on
• 9:23
  YouTube, you can see this, these wonderful shirts.
• 9:26
  I'm very excited about this stuff.
• 9:28
  Thank you so much. Yeah, this is awesome.
• 9:30
  It's our it's just, it's a purple shirt with our skull hop
• 9:33
  logo. It's been on episode art.
• 9:35
  It's been, I think it's our our profile picture on all the
• 9:39
  socials. So yeah, that's nice and big and
• 9:41
  bold. That's us.
• 9:43
  Yeah. We've got this flag here too.
• 9:44
  That was kind of part of the same orders.
• 9:48
  So we're actually on T Public. So if you go to T public, that's
• 9:52
  where these shirts and this, they call it a tapestry, this
• 9:56
  flag come from. So you can check us out on T
• 9:59
  Public the school hop. I would also like to make a
• 10:01
  quick plug for my wife's T public store.
• 10:05
  It's A&J Creative and she's made some pretty cool stuff, non
• 10:12
  Viking stuff, but then she's also made some really cool like
• 10:17
  ladies Vikings designs. So if you're out there and
• 10:21
  you're a Vikings fan and you've got a lady in your life that
• 10:25
  could benefit from some really classy looking Vikings gear,
• 10:30
  head on over to A&J Creative on T Public and you can check out
• 10:35
  her designs I. Might have to do that because I
• 10:37
  do have some ladies in my life, Yeah, that I have told our
• 10:40
  Vikings fans. And they've been bribed with ice
• 10:44
  cream. Yeah, no ice cream this week.
• 10:46
  No, no dice. No ice cream at all, but.
• 10:48
  We're not gonna talk about that yet.
• 10:50
  Yeah, we're gonna prolong the inevitable a little bit later.
• 10:53
  And another gift, right? Evan, it's your turn.
• 10:56
  Your wrapping was way more intricate than mine.
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  I put it in a bag the. Problem I have with this is it's
• 11:03
  green and the moment you walked into my house we talked about
• 11:06
  it. Well, yeah, I didn't really
• 11:08
  realize the color of it until I walked into your house and
• 11:12
  showed you that I had a gift and I was like, Dang it, it's it's
• 11:14
  in a green. It's not really Packer green.
• 11:16
  No, no, no, it's OK. It's more of like the main green
• 11:19
  is more like a light green. We'll call it football grass.
• 11:24
  Sure. Yeah, it's got Christmas trees
• 11:26
  on it. Somebody who gave me or my
• 11:30
  family members a gift this year may recognize this bag.
• 11:34
  It probably came from that we we like to reuse bags it.
• 11:37
  Feels round. Oh yeah, OK Kind of.
• 11:42
  Or oddly shaped. OK, I don't know.
• 11:45
  We'll see. Or maybe is it?
• 11:48
  Is it multiple pieces or is there there is?
• 11:51
  One item in one bag? Yeah, you should quickly be able
• 11:57
  to realize what it is. I do know what this is.
• 12:03
  No way. Yeah, this is awesome all.
• 12:06
  Right, so I'll do the narration. Evan has just opened a custom
• 12:11
  skull hop mini helmet. It is a Rydell Riddle mini
• 12:17
  helmet and it has on both sides the the Norseman skull hop logo.
• 12:24
  So it doesn't say the skull hop above it.
• 12:26
  I kind of tinkered around with that.
• 12:28
  I I should say this is all thanks to my wonderful,
• 12:32
  beautiful, amazing wife who will never hear these words ever.
• 12:37
  She. She was the one who was the
• 12:39
  mastermind behind putting the logo on on the helmet.
• 12:43
  That is, that is cool. And that's going to go like
• 12:46
  smack dab in the middle of this. And here's what's cool about
• 12:49
  this. I had a little extra money from
• 12:52
  Christmas sitting around, so I was perusing on Amazon and I
• 12:56
  actually bought a Vikings mini helmet.
• 12:59
  Oh nice. So we can do like 2 helmets like
• 13:03
  right next to each other. I think that'll be really cool.
• 13:06
  It's like a 70s era with the Gray oh.
• 13:08
  That's. Cool face mask.
• 13:10
  It was on Amazon. It was like 38 bucks or
• 13:12
  something like that. Cool.
• 13:14
  Yeah. It should be here later this
• 13:15
  week, so hopefully show the next episode.
• 13:18
  Yeah, if you're watching on Spotify or YouTube or wherever
• 13:22
  you're watching us, you'll have to keep an eye out for some of
• 13:25
  the changes we're making to the old school hop set here.
• 13:28
  Yeah, so yeah, this is awesome though.
• 13:31
  This is super cool. Merry.
• 13:32
  Christmas. I do have one just like it.
• 13:35
  I kind of we kind of tinkered around with the size of the
• 13:37
  logos. So the sizing of mine is a
• 13:40
  little bit different, but outside of that it's identical.
• 13:43
  That's cool. I'm going to put it on the
• 13:44
  shelf. Nice.
• 13:45
  Nice. He's gonna find a good spot and
• 13:48
  it'll probably change you up once you get that that old
• 13:51
  school helmet. There you go, right in Victor's
• 13:56
  lap. And then I'll just take my my
• 13:58
  beer back. Sorry, Victor, you don't get a
• 14:00
  beer tonight. No beers for Victor, but that
• 14:02
  just looks cool. Yeah, that's awesome.
• 14:05
  That looks great. Well, Merry Christmas, Merry.
• 14:08
  Christmas. Those were good gifts.
• 14:10
  Fun. Yeah, they were.
• 14:11
  It's. Cool, all right.
• 14:13
  I'm tempted to put my shirt on right now, but I think that
• 14:15
  would ruin the flow of the the episode here.
• 14:19
  We'll try them on afterwards. Sounds good.
• 14:24
  Well, we we have to. This is what we do.
• 14:28
  We. Always talk.
• 14:29
  About the game We've made a commitment to all of our many
• 14:33
  fans out there that rely on us for all of the hot takes when it
• 14:37
  comes to the Vikings. So we gotta recap the loss to
• 14:43
  the Lions 24 to 30 on Christmas Eve.
• 14:46
  It was a whiteout game. A lot of anticipation for this
• 14:51
  game. And a lot of frustration and a
• 14:55
  lot. Of frustration, and it ended in
• 14:57
  heartbreak. It it wasn't a blowout, It was
• 15:00
  close, and it was within the Vikings grasp.
• 15:04
  Even at the end of the Vikings got the ball with two minutes
• 15:08
  left. No timeouts.
• 15:10
  They moved the ball down the fields and Mullins threw his
• 15:13
  fourth interception of the game with like 40 something seconds
• 15:18
  left on the clock. He was trying to hit JJ and just
• 15:23
  under threw him. Yeah, I think the defender read
• 15:26
  it perfectly. I mean.
• 15:27
  And the ball was kind of a duck. Yep.
• 15:30
  So just everything that could go wrong did go wrong in this game.
• 15:34
  Not only that game ceiling interception, but the injuries
• 15:39
  were just piling up Mullins through 4 picks.
• 15:43
  Yeah. I I have two philosophies when
• 15:47
  it comes to my opinions on football and decisions I would
• 15:50
  make if I were ever and nobody should ever put me in charge in
• 15:54
  a decision making capacity for a football team.
• 15:57
  But if I ever were, I've said my first one on the podcast already
• 16:01
  and it involves running backs don't pay running backs.
• 16:05
  They just they put on too many miles.
• 16:07
  They get hit too much. Very rarely are running backs
• 16:11
  worth the money they get paid if it's a big contract 'cause they
• 16:15
  just get injured. So that's my first one and we
• 16:20
  can we can fight about that in the comments if you want.
• 16:22
  My second one is never give a guy the chance to throw a fourth
• 16:29
  interception. Never, ever, ever, ever.
• 16:32
  I don't care who it is or what kind of day he's having.
• 16:35
  If he throws 1/3 interception, you pull him, the next guy's up
• 16:41
  because for whatever reason, the defense has figured something
• 16:44
  out or his confidence is completely gone.
• 16:48
  I don't care who it is. I don't care if he's thrown for
• 16:51
  500 yards already that game. If he throws a third pick, sit
• 16:56
  him down. I'd like to point out two things
• 16:59
  #1 just to reiterate what you've said.
• 17:03
  You texted me 'cause we were watching in separate places
• 17:06
  because it was Christmas Eve. Anyways, you texted me after
• 17:11
  Mullins threw his third and said exactly that.
• 17:14
  Don't ever give a guy the opportunity to throw 4 picks.
• 17:17
  Take him out. And obviously the Vikings
• 17:19
  didn't. When he threw that Game Ceiling
• 17:22
  4th interception, you screenshotted your text and sent
• 17:28
  it back to me and said see. And I agreed with you
• 17:32
  wholeheartedly. The one thing that I would like
• 17:34
  to say, just playing devil's advocate a little bit, is I'm
• 17:38
  pretty sure Kirk Cousins threw 4 interceptions in one of the
• 17:42
  first three games of the season. How did the first three games of
• 17:45
  the season go? We lost.
• 17:46
  But I mean, I guess the point I'm trying to make is we've
• 17:49
  talked about the length of the leash that you give these guys.
• 17:53
  Kirk Cousins I think has to have a much longer leash than a Nick
• 17:59
  Mullins. And if he throws 4, you just
• 18:02
  kind of got to keep rolling with it unless he's hurt.
• 18:05
  Yeah, but I mean, we saw it in the the 49ers Ravens game last
• 18:11
  night. I don't know if you watched it
• 18:12
  much. Brock Purdy got pulled.
• 18:14
  Well it was. I think it the the motivation of
• 18:18
  him coming out of the game was absolutely for injury.
• 18:20
  He he needed to come out. I don't know what it was.
• 18:23
  If he was in the concussion protocol I'd he he had to come
• 18:28
  out. He got hit and he had to come
• 18:29
  out. And I think that drive ended
• 18:33
  with Sam Darnold leading the Niners to a touchdown.
• 18:38
  And at that point the game seemed to open up.
• 18:41
  This is now a Niners podcast, I guess for the next minute.
• 18:45
  And then, you know, the offense was on the sideline.
• 18:48
  The TV announcers were saying like, who's going to go in?
• 18:51
  And they showed Shanahan talking to to Brock Purdy.
• 18:55
  Shanahan had his his mouth covered with his play call but
• 18:59
  Purdy he he he was being told some disappointing news you
• 19:02
  could tell by his face and it for a minute seemed like the Sam
• 19:07
  Darnold switch was going to work in that game.
• 19:11
  So even if you are someone who this year, before that game
• 19:16
  Brock Purdy he was in the MVP conversation.
• 19:19
  I think now he's he's kind of inched his way out of that
• 19:22
  conversation after last night. But yeah, his leash got to the
• 19:28
  end of it. And ultimately, I think, like I
• 19:30
  said, it was a decision motivated by injury.
• 19:33
  But then it was easy to say now we're going to stick with with
• 19:36
  the hot hand at the moment, which was Sam Darnold.
• 19:41
  It is Sam, right? Yeah.
• 19:44
  But yeah, like you said, Kirk had a way longer leash.
• 19:48
  And I'm not sure I don't know enough you.
• 19:50
  You're probably right. Kirk may have thrown 4 picks in
• 19:54
  that game earlier on this season.
• 19:55
  I don't remember specifically. But yeah, I you just you can't
• 20:00
  let someone get the chance to throw a fourth pick.
• 20:05
  I I don't care if it's Tom Brady and he's already got 10 passing
• 20:09
  touchdowns that game. Like if you throw 3, be done.
• 20:13
  Sit down that day, try again the next one.
• 20:15
  I don't. Disagree with you.
• 20:17
  I think there there are circumstances.
• 20:20
  There are players where you look past those things.
• 20:26
  And yeah, the Vikings were losing in the game that Kirk
• 20:29
  threw 4 picks, I can't remember which.
• 20:31
  I feel like it was one of the first three because we dropped
• 20:35
  the 1st 30. Yeah, yeah, it probably was.
• 20:39
  So it would have been the Bucks, the Eagles or who do we play
• 20:44
  week three? I don't remember.
• 20:48
  Week one was the Bucks and then we place dead Air is great.
• 20:56
  I'm not getting this right. Yeah, I don't.
• 20:58
  I don't remember. It was probably one of those
• 21:00
  first few games. Yeah.
• 21:01
  And it doesn't matter too much now, but I I guess the point I'm
• 21:04
  trying to make again is I think it's all determined by the
• 21:10
  player. Nick Mullins is not a guy that
• 21:13
  you give that long of a leash to, and I absolutely 100% agree
• 21:19
  with you. He should have come out after
• 21:20
  that third pick. Truthfully.
• 21:22
  Like he probably could have come out after the 2nd pick because
• 21:25
  he threw 2 horrendous picks the previous game and the one pick
• 21:32
  was kind of historically bad. Like it'll go down as like butt
• 21:37
  fumble worthy interception almost.
• 21:41
  But yeah, he's a he's a career backup.
• 21:44
  He's proven that he's got this gunslinger mentality and it
• 21:47
  hasn't really worked out for him other than I think late in the
• 21:52
  game when he was slinging it to JJ.
• 21:55
  And if you just put it within 5 yards of JJ, he's gonna go out
• 21:59
  and get it. Oh.
• 22:00
  Yeah, for the most part. Unless somebody jumps in front
• 22:02
  of him because it's a terrible decision to throw it to him at
• 22:04
  that point. Or they spear him in the side
• 22:07
  and he has to go to the hospital.
• 22:09
  Oh. Yeah.
• 22:11
  'Cause Mullins threw him that ball too, didn't he?
• 22:13
  And no, that was Josh Dobbs. That was.
• 22:15
  Dobbs. That threw it to him.
• 22:16
  Well, regardless, I think both of those guys have proven that
• 22:21
  their career backups they're they're maybe gonna get another
• 22:26
  opportunity somewhere. Maybe.
• 22:28
  Well, so I think a guy like Mullins, he he is a good player
• 22:36
  as a second string quarterback. He can come in and be
• 22:42
  sufficient. It's just he has proven in you
• 22:46
  know his short tenure with the Vikings and the rest of his
• 22:49
  career he he's not good when he's QB one.
• 22:53
  When he's the guy when it's all week you know he's getting all
• 22:56
  the reps When he is the one that has to lead the team and know
• 23:00
  everything and you know be best friends with the coach and like
• 23:04
  he he's not great in that role. Where he has been successful is
• 23:09
  when it's like oh crap Kirk's out or you know oh darn QB one
• 23:13
  just went down. Nick warm up.
• 23:15
  Like get in there out of nowhere you know that could you go 8
• 23:19
  weeks without touching the field and then boom you have to play
• 23:22
  most of the game. So he's proven he's good at that
• 23:26
  and that is a legitimate position in the NFL.
• 23:29
  Not everyone is destined to be you know their position #1 I'd I
• 23:34
  think I'd say the same about Alex Madison.
• 23:37
  He's always been good as the Thunder as the change of pace to
• 23:42
  the RB one. I mean, in his case, it's been
• 23:44
  Dalvin Cook to, you know, spell out the RB1 when you need to.
• 23:49
  That's why Madison looked good and why it didn't seem so awful
• 23:53
  to, you know, sign him and have go into the season with him as
• 23:56
  RB1 'cause he's always looked decent and even in a few spot
• 23:59
  starts he always looked OK. But for whatever reason, this
• 24:03
  season he has proven that he's not good as the guy, the one to
• 24:09
  get the starter reps, And I don't know why that's different.
• 24:12
  But there's obviously something with that, at least with the
• 24:15
  quarterback position and obviously the running back
• 24:17
  position too. But yeah, and I did look it up,
• 24:22
  and this is not to shove it in your face at all because you
• 24:24
  made some good points. But Kirk the most, he's the most
• 24:28
  interceptions he's thrown in a game this season, is 2.
• 24:32
  Really. Yeah.
• 24:33
  But and IESP NS not easy to look at right now.
• 24:36
  It's probably just a me thing. He may have had a game where he
• 24:39
  had a couple of fumbles and a couple interceptions.
• 24:42
  That could be that. I can't really see.
• 24:45
  But yeah, interception wise, he's thrown 2 picks in I guess
• 24:50
  just one game and that was against Carolina.
• 24:53
  And oddly enough, that's the one where we said that was his
• 24:56
  poorest game at that point. And that was the.
• 24:58
  The first win win season, Yeah. I just think I I've never been
• 25:03
  in the NFL quarterback. I've never been a quarterback.
• 25:05
  You know, most I can say is playing 500 in the backyard.
• 25:09
  So I can't really say from experience.
• 25:11
  I just got to think after throwing 3 picks, like, there's
• 25:15
  just got to be some kind of a like a mentality of like what's
• 25:19
  wrong with me? Especially if you don't, If
• 25:21
  you're not seeing things like, obviously they picked it off
• 25:23
  because I missed the street. But if you're not seeing that,
• 25:26
  like it's got to be so frustrating and then you have to
• 25:29
  play differently, right? Like you have to go out on the
• 25:31
  field and almost be like mad and make even poorer decisions,
• 25:35
  which for a guy like Nick Mullins, he's a gunslinger, so
• 25:39
  he's already making like we saw. That happen and it almost seemed
• 25:43
  like the Lions secondary was just kind of messing with him,
• 25:47
  like there was that one interception.
• 25:49
  I can't remember which one it was, but the our favorite
• 25:55
  commentator, what's his name? Vilma, get that guy off TV.
• 25:59
  Jonathan Vilma. He he's he does have a smart
• 26:03
  defensive mind and he pointed out that the the Lions, I don't
• 26:08
  know if it was a corner or a safety but one of the guys in
• 26:12
  the Lions secondary that was covering the route just kind of
• 26:17
  toyed with Mullins and then jumped in at the last second and
• 26:21
  picked him off and he baited him.
• 26:23
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 26:24
  And and I mean that's if you're the Lions that's your defensive
• 26:27
  game plan. Like hey we've got this this
• 26:30
  backup guy in he's he's a gunslinger.
• 26:34
  Let's just let's force him to make some terrible mistakes.
• 26:37
  Yeah, they, the Bengals did it last week.
• 26:40
  Let's let's make it hard for him this week.
• 26:43
  And that's what they did all day long.
• 26:45
  To the tune of four interceptions, which really,
• 26:48
  really stings. We've spent a lot of time
• 26:50
  talking about that. But there were some other things
• 26:54
  in the game. The running game was quietly
• 26:57
  horrific, totally gone 17 yards on the ground for Ty Chandler.
• 27:02
  Completely gone, I think. Did Madison end up with positive
• 27:05
  yards because he at one point was 2 rushes for -1 yard, his
• 27:11
  first rush? I texted you because it was a A1
• 27:14
  rush for -2 yards. I was like, oh, look, another
• 27:16
  great run by Alex Madison. Yeah, it wasn't good.
• 27:22
  And the the defense didn't look great.
• 27:25
  They the first drive, I thought they looked really shaky and
• 27:31
  gave up a touchdown, which was the first opening Dr. touchdown
• 27:34
  they'd given up all season. And the Lions just looked like
• 27:40
  pros. I mean they just walked down the
• 27:42
  field and put it in the end zone for six and it was easy and to.
• 27:46
  To kind of jump in for a second, to be clear, I think we can both
• 27:50
  say this. The Lions are a good team.
• 27:53
  Yeah. I mean they're they're not the
• 27:55
  greatest show on turf. But I mean they're good and
• 27:58
  we've been saying that for a while.
• 27:59
  It's it's clear to see they're not like a phony team this year.
• 28:03
  They're they're going to do something.
• 28:06
  They might win a couple of games in the playoffs.
• 28:08
  Like I'm not saying all the Lions are winning Super Bowl,
• 28:10
  but like they're good. So it's not surprising that this
• 28:15
  game ended up the way it did. It just it's very frustrating.
• 28:18
  I. Was messing around with that
• 28:20
  playoff machine again Not I don't think I'll make another
• 28:24
  video but I we can talk about how the Vikings get into the
• 28:30
  playoffs 'cause I I think that's a a worthy conversation for
• 28:33
  later on but the the the Lions, excuse me, the Lions still have
• 28:37
  a shot at the number one seed. I mean, if San Francisco and
• 28:42
  Philly lose, which they have been.
• 28:46
  They're not looking like the Giants Giants had.
• 28:49
  They're not the New York Football Giants, but they're
• 28:51
  like juggernauts that they they started off the season looking
• 28:54
  like, yeah, they. Don't look amazing lately,
• 28:57
  they've they've shown their flaws and injury has kind of hit
• 29:00
  both teams a little. Oh.
• 29:01
  Yeah, the Niners were down to literally not having another
• 29:04
  offensive lineman to go in last night.
• 29:06
  If somebody else went down, like it would have been a tight end
• 29:09
  or something. If somebody else went down.
• 29:12
  Yeah, the injuries have hit the league hard.
• 29:14
  This year, high profile names too.
• 29:17
  Like there's always injuries but like usually it's like, oh,
• 29:22
  somebody like Cam Akers gets hurt.
• 29:25
  He's a big name, but like not across the league.
• 29:28
  Everybody knows Kirk Cousin's name.
• 29:30
  That's a big injury. Everybody knows Aaron Rodgers
• 29:32
  name like it started. That started off the whole
• 29:34
  season. Yeah, he made it 2 plays into
• 29:36
  the year. Crazy, but yeah.
• 29:40
  Anyways, and And the Vikings were not immune to the injury
• 29:43
  bug either. TJ Hawkinson out pretty much
• 29:51
  indefinitely with ACL and MCL? Yeah.
• 29:53
  Right that that could be. That's going to be an
• 29:57
  interesting storyline to keep tabs on throughout this
• 30:00
  offseason. Because already my guess is he
• 30:03
  starts training camp on the physically unable to perform
• 30:07
  list. Maybe he misses like he very
• 30:09
  well could miss a few games to start the season.
• 30:12
  Could start. The game on IR, Yeah, I mean,
• 30:14
  start the season on IR if. You if you think about Adrian
• 30:18
  Peterson, his his two 2000 yard season, that was the season
• 30:24
  immediately after he ended by tearing his ACL.
• 30:27
  That was the whole magic of the story is like this guy is a
• 30:30
  monster. He's a physical freak and nobody
• 30:35
  could have ever done this because he just tore his ACL and
• 30:39
  came back and now he just did what only one other person has
• 30:43
  ever done and that's rushed for that many yards in a season.
• 30:47
  And TJ Hawkinson tore his ACL on the same day 12 years later.
• 30:54
  So if it was that crazy for this Adrian Peterson, who everybody
• 30:59
  has always said is a physical freak and just a magical
• 31:01
  nightmare, you can't expect TJ Hawkinson to be back right away.
• 31:09
  I I I'm expecting him to miss a couple of games to start the
• 31:11
  year next year, yeah. That'll be interesting.
• 31:13
  But he wasn't the only one that went down.
• 31:15
  Oh yeah, Jordan Madison, DJ Wanham, Makaya Blackman.
• 31:20
  Who? Blackman came in with some like
• 31:22
  shoulder something strap. I don't know.
• 31:25
  I don't know what his injury even was coming into the game,
• 31:27
  but the the secondary has already struggled with injury so
• 31:32
  to see him go down was tough. It it was just a really crummy
• 31:35
  game. Yeah, for the Vikings, injury
• 31:37
  wise did. I see Addison's injury is going
• 31:40
  to not be as crazy. I guess I didn't.
• 31:43
  I haven't really heard anything about Addison.
• 31:45
  I think Hawkinson and Wanam are both out.
• 31:48
  Oh. Yeah, Wanam tore his quad or
• 31:50
  something like that. Like they're done.
• 31:51
  Yeah, he he's, he may never be the same guy again because
• 31:55
  that's that's no small injury to have.
• 31:57
  Yeah, and I mean to that point, Hawkinson too.
• 32:00
  Like, yeah, the ACL is not the career ender it used to be, but
• 32:04
  that's still not a great injury to get.
• 32:07
  Like, yeah. It'll be really interesting to
• 32:11
  see how these last two games of the season go too, with a really
• 32:15
  depleted roster in general. And just probably a sense of I
• 32:22
  don't want to be over dramatic, but like a sense of the air out
• 32:27
  of the stadium. You know, like despair was the
• 32:29
  first word I could think of. Like what do you do now?
• 32:32
  Like how much can one locker room take?
• 32:36
  And how many speeches does KOC need to have to, like, keep
• 32:41
  these guys motivated, especially if you keep losing.
• 32:44
  And now as we sit and record on December 26th, we have no idea
• 32:51
  who the starting quarterback is gonna be in this this weekend
• 32:55
  against the Packers, KOC said. They're going to explore all
• 33:00
  options. To me, that includes exploring
• 33:03
  the idea of putting Dobbs back out there, which that seems
• 33:06
  crazy. I don't know.
• 33:07
  I I don't. Mullins just seemed like he's
• 33:11
  not the right answer. Jaren Hall, we've seen almost
• 33:16
  two full drives of him. I I don't have an opinion on
• 33:19
  that. I just I I don't know who's
• 33:22
  going to play I. Think you put Hall in if your
• 33:24
  season's lost. I think if you go to Detroit and
• 33:28
  it's pretty certain that you're not going to make the playoffs,
• 33:32
  If the Vikings have dropped this coming game against the Packers
• 33:35
  at home on New Year's Eve. And I think Seattle and the Rams
• 33:42
  also win. And that kind of pushes the
• 33:45
  Vikings down in the playoff hopes a little bit, which again,
• 33:49
  we can talk about that in a minute.
• 33:50
  But I I think if you get to that Week 18 game at Detroit and it's
• 33:56
  just like you have a 3% chance to make the playoffs or
• 34:00
  something like that, you need both the Rams and the Seahawks
• 34:02
  to lose and you have to win. You just, you put Hall in and
• 34:09
  give him the keys. Show me what you learned this
• 34:11
  season and let's see what happens.
• 34:15
  To some extent, he's maybe interviewing for a backup job
• 34:21
  with the Vikings next year, or a backup job somewhere else next
• 34:24
  year. Who?
• 34:26
  Knows I Regardless, I don't think the Vikings have a healthy
• 34:30
  quarterback at this moment that will be a starter potential next
• 34:35
  year. I think next year your starter
• 34:38
  is either Kirk Cousins. If you somehow work out a good
• 34:43
  deal, which I don't know how I'd feel about that, just age and
• 34:47
  injury wise, or it's going to be a rookie or a free agent.
• 34:52
  Like it's not going to be one of the three guys currently in the
• 34:55
  loop for the starting job this coming week.
• 34:58
  Do you? Think I think we should talk
• 35:00
  about that for a second. Yeah.
• 35:03
  Sorry, my brain kind of like went three steps ahead.
• 35:06
  So I have to back up a little bit.
• 35:09
  So resigning Kirk, right, If we talk about that probably gonna
• 35:17
  cost a lot and probably going to mean letting other guys walk,
• 35:23
  then those are gonna be hard decisions to make.
• 35:27
  And the frustrating part about the NFL right now is you can't
• 35:31
  necessarily have your cake and eat it too, right?
• 35:33
  Like you. You have to make those tough
• 35:35
  decisions when it comes to the salary cap.
• 35:38
  But I've heard. I don't know concretely what
• 35:42
  this means, but I've heard the salary cap is on its way up it.
• 35:46
  Always rises every year. I think there was one year maybe
• 35:50
  like 2021 due to COVID or whatever that was like the first
• 35:55
  year. It didn't rise, but it always
• 35:57
  goes up a little bit, which they know.
• 36:00
  They. I'm sure whoever the money
• 36:01
  people are with every team, they know that they can expect a
• 36:05
  certain percentage of increased cap dollars and they probably
• 36:10
  plan out their contracts that way.
• 36:12
  But yeah, it always goes up a little bit.
• 36:14
  It's never anything that's like, oh, they just doubled the salary
• 36:18
  cap. Like I think it's usually like 5
• 36:21
  to 10% more. So I guess with all of that, if
• 36:28
  you're quasi. Thank thank goodness I'm not our
• 36:32
  all Vikings fans are. Should be very glad that I'm
• 36:35
  not. That's the.
• 36:36
  Beauty of what we get to do, we get to just sit here and
• 36:38
  speculate and kind of pretend like we are in his chair for a
• 36:43
  moment so I can take a turn as well.
• 36:46
  But if you're in his chair, what do you do next season?
• 36:51
  I mean, it depends on what you think you can do.
• 36:54
  If you think this team can continue that competitive
• 36:58
  rebuild and be someone to kind of hit reset and still be a
• 37:03
  contender, then I think all options are on the table.
• 37:07
  If your guy is Kirk, if you're like, Nope, we are set.
• 37:11
  Everywhere else, we can make the money work for one 2-3 more
• 37:15
  years. Kirk's our guy.
• 37:17
  We're running, we're going for this championship with Kirk.
• 37:21
  Then if that's their mentality, they have to do it right.
• 37:24
  Like they have to jump in and go for that full force.
• 37:28
  If they're thinking Kirk's not their guy, like just he's pretty
• 37:34
  old, which for what 3637 is pretty old as a quarterback.
• 37:39
  I think he's older. I think he's 36 right now, 35 or
• 37:42
  36 right now. I thought he.
• 37:44
  Was closer to Flacco's age for some reason, but no.
• 37:47
  No, no, no, he was. Cause Flacco's 38, right?
• 37:50
  Oh, I don't know that I would have guessed older for Flacco,
• 37:53
  but I'm not a Flacco expert. Flacco just to say his name one
• 37:57
  more time? Or Flacco, depending on how you
• 38:00
  say it. Yeah.
• 38:01
  Who is calling him Flacco? Who is the commentator?
• 38:04
  I don't know. Somebody was calling him that.
• 38:07
  But yeah, I think if if their mentality is, yeah, Kirk's not
• 38:11
  our guy. But we're still right there.
• 38:13
  We're still should be competing for the NFC North.
• 38:16
  This roster is really good outside of injury.
• 38:19
  The coaching's really good outside of the weird, terrible
• 38:22
  calls sometimes. If that's your mindset, then you
• 38:25
  try to jump all in with a proven commodity.
• 38:30
  Herbert from San San Diego, not San Diego for his whole career,
• 38:34
  I guess from LA. Maybe he's an option.
• 38:36
  You never know. I mean, you never know who's
• 38:39
  gonna Maybe. I mean, shoot Baker.
• 38:41
  Mayfield's had a little bit of a a resurgence in Tampa Bay this
• 38:45
  year, and I don't know what his contract looks like, if he's
• 38:47
  even gonna be a free agent. You wanted Bailey Zappy from New
• 38:50
  England. Yeah, for for a little bit.
• 38:54
  For like one game. He got that one game.
• 38:56
  But I mean, you know, if if your mindset is the quarterback, I
• 38:59
  feel like the Vikings have always been a quarterback away.
• 39:03
  And if that's your mindset and you are not confident in Cousins
• 39:07
  or Cousins is just way outside of your price range, then you
• 39:11
  got to jump in and get a guy like Herbert or somebody who's
• 39:15
  who's there. And if that's not your mindset
• 39:18
  either way, apparently there's some decent quarterbacks coming
• 39:23
  up in the draft and a phrase I like to hear all the time.
• 39:27
  I think Eric Thompson says it on Twitter all the time.
• 39:29
  Go get your guys. Who cares what the media thinks,
• 39:33
  what the fans think, if your guy is Pat Mahomes?
• 39:39
  Because when the Chiefs drafted Pat Mahomes, a lot of Chiefs
• 39:43
  fans were like, what the heck this guy from Texas A&M like
• 39:46
  he's nothing. Like they just wasted a pick.
• 39:51
  What are they saying now? They're so glad that he's gifted
• 39:54
  3 Super Bowl appearances, two wins.
• 39:56
  I mean, a lot of people were upset as Bills fans when they
• 39:59
  drafted Josh Allen. Famously not Jared Allen.
• 40:05
  Yeah, that was a bad mix up last week.
• 40:08
  But like and even he's had some ups and downs.
• 40:10
  But I think most Bills fans are saying, oh man, yeah, thank
• 40:14
  goodness they got Josh Allen. I I don't know.
• 40:18
  So if the Vikings have their guy, and I don't even know, I
• 40:21
  know Caleb Williams and the the kid from LSU and I think don't
• 40:27
  the Bow Nicks from from Jaden Daniels.
• 40:30
  Jaden. Is that the LSU?
• 40:32
  Kid, I think that's the LSU kid I.
• 40:33
  Don't. I don't know the names enough,
• 40:36
  but I know there's some people out there.
• 40:37
  I mean, even JJ McCarthy with Michigan for our friend Forrest.
• 40:42
  Yeah, if the Vikings have nailed down and they think, hey, JJ
• 40:47
  McCarthy is the guy he's going to fit so perfectly, then they
• 40:50
  have to do everything to get him or whoever that is.
• 40:55
  I just that's why me not answering this question in a 3
• 40:59
  minute answer is why the Vikings are so glad that I'm not the GM.
• 41:03
  You. Are every armchair quarterback
• 41:05
  and every keyboard Cowboys like worst enemy?
• 41:10
  Because you just circled around it for like 3 minutes and never
• 41:14
  gave a direct answer. But that's OK.
• 41:16
  I respect what you've said and I think, I think nothing you've
• 41:19
  said is wrong and yeah, we're not in their shoes, but I think
• 41:26
  every fan is entitled to their opinion.
• 41:28
  Oh, for that's why. I mean, we're fans.
• 41:30
  We put so much desire into this, so much of our our life, you
• 41:37
  know, our manhood into this and. You also pointed out it's so
• 41:41
  complex, 'cause it's not just about 1:00 player, right?
• 41:44
  It's not just about like you mentioned.
• 41:46
  Yeah, maybe the Vikings are just one quarterback away, but we had
• 41:49
  the quarterback last year and our defense was terrible.
• 41:52
  Yeah, we're the worst defense in the league.
• 41:53
  And now we started this year with arguably a a terrible team
• 41:58
  all the way around and somehow got it figured out midway
• 42:01
  through the season and won five games in a row despite losing
• 42:05
  our quarterback and and at the. Time the best player in the
• 42:08
  league and JJ so. Anyways, I'll give you one hot
• 42:13
  take. I'll take it of mine.
• 42:15
  I want you to give me a hot take too, OK?
• 42:19
  Without getting into the weeds of all the complexities of who
• 42:25
  has to stay and who has to go and is there going to be enough
• 42:28
  space in the salary cabin, Blah, blah, blah.
• 42:31
  Thank you. Bring back Kirk Cousins.
• 42:33
  OK, that's my hot take. I don't think that.
• 42:37
  I don't think that's the controversial take.
• 42:39
  It's. Not, and it's probably a little
• 42:41
  bit conservative, actually, but Kirk himself is conservative.
• 42:46
  I'm a fairly conservative guy. But I I think all of those
• 42:51
  things aside, I think he's proven that he can play at a
• 42:55
  high level. And he was.
• 42:56
  He was already silencing the doubters, and even now, going
• 43:01
  into Week 17, he still sits atop quarterbacks in terms of a lot
• 43:07
  of statistical things, half after not having played since
• 43:11
  Week 5 or whatever it was it. Was like week 8.
• 43:14
  Whatever 'cause whenever. Most of the Packer.
• 43:15
  Game. That's right.
• 43:16
  Whenever he went down. But like he played half the
• 43:18
  season basically and then went down and he's still up there in
• 43:23
  terms of stats for quarterbacks. And I I think this was the year
• 43:28
  that he really started to silence those doubters.
• 43:30
  I think he deserves, at minimum a one year extension.
• 43:36
  I don't even know what the going rate is for a quarterback right
• 43:38
  now. I think a one year signing him
• 43:41
  for one year is probably gonna look somewhere around 35 to 40
• 43:45
  million and that may be a conservative number.
• 43:48
  Sorry. Keep going.
• 43:49
  Well, I'm. I'm basically done.
• 43:51
  I just, I I think he he played well enough to bring him back
• 43:56
  for a year. Yep.
• 43:57
  He's getting older. Yep.
• 43:59
  The Achilles injuries really suck.
• 44:01
  But you know that he's going to attack rehab.
• 44:05
  You know he already has attacked rehab and we know that he wants
• 44:10
  to come back and play. He's not going to retire and
• 44:14
  he's been very vocal about wanting to come back and play
• 44:17
  for the Vikings. If you have a guy who plays
• 44:19
  well, who is a leader, a captain on and off the field.
• 44:25
  I mean, even JJ said it in his post game interview.
• 44:28
  He he said it in a way that didn't really throw Mullins
• 44:31
  under the bus, but made it very clear who he would like to see
• 44:36
  under center and who he wants to be catching passes from.
• 44:39
  And that's Kirk Cousins. Yeah.
• 44:41
  So he's gonna get money too. We know that.
• 44:45
  He's gonna get a new contract. JJ is that is Yeah.
• 44:50
  So I think you prioritize those too and see what happens.
• 44:55
  Yeah. All right, so you asked for a
• 44:57
  hot take. I appreciate yours.
• 44:59
  And I, I, as a fan wouldn't be mad if what you just said
• 45:03
  happened. If they got Kirk back for 3540
• 45:09
  million for one year, he'd probably sign like a two year
• 45:12
  deal or something like that. He's very savvy.
• 45:15
  There's no no question about that.
• 45:17
  Dustin Baker outlined that a few episodes ago.
• 45:20
  He's gonna get his money and good for him.
• 45:22
  I'll I'll say it for the thousand time.
• 45:24
  Every player should try to get every dime they can while
• 45:27
  they're playing. That includes Kirk.
• 45:31
  He he would be good. He's a good quarterback.
• 45:33
  And if he came back from that injury, the Vikings are going to
• 45:36
  do their homework. They're not going to be like,
• 45:37
  hey Kirk, are you healed? And just take his word for it
• 45:40
  like he's they're going to make sure he's good before signing
• 45:44
  him. You're going to have some
• 45:44
  competition because unless they re sign him before the end of
• 45:48
  the season, I mean, he's going to be a free agent.
• 45:51
  Like the way his contract has worked out they can't franchise
• 45:55
  him even if they wanted to they they would have to re sign him
• 46:00
  before his deal ends and it ends like it voids out before the
• 46:04
  official end of the season or whenever the quote UN quote lead
• 46:08
  year ends like I think. It's March 31st.
• 46:11
  Yeah, he will have I and I think it's like March 10th that his
• 46:15
  contract is void and I don't know why they do that for
• 46:19
  probably for like cap reasons in future years or whatever.
• 46:22
  But he will be a free agent, even if only for 5 minutes.
• 46:27
  So you're you could have competition to sign him, which
• 46:30
  only means more money. So the if he is the starting
• 46:35
  quarterback for the Vikings next year, I'm OK.
• 46:37
  I'm happy. That just means they better go
• 46:41
  all in like the future be, you know, throw it out the window.
• 46:47
  It's all about that season because if you sign Kirk
• 46:51
  Cousins, guys like Dalton Reisner, you're not gonna be
• 46:54
  able to resign. Guy is like.
• 46:57
  You know, unless they're willing to take a pay cut.
• 46:59
  Yeah, but they would have to be something like that.
• 47:01
  Like you're you're just not going to have enough money to go
• 47:04
  around for the future. You're going to mortgage, you're
• 47:08
  going to have something like the Saints did, where I think even
• 47:11
  now Drew Brees is one of the highest paid Saints, like or he
• 47:15
  had some weird crazy contract thing just to make it work for
• 47:19
  whatever year they had to make it work for.
• 47:23
  So it's just going to be an all or nothing next year.
• 47:26
  If they do re sign Kirk and I'm not an expert, maybe I'm
• 47:30
  completely missing some flaw where it's like yeah, he it'll
• 47:33
  all work out. But I think you have to be able
• 47:36
  to sign JJ to a long term contract.
• 47:39
  You have to be able to sign Christian Darasaw to a long term
• 47:42
  contract. And I just in those two names,
• 47:45
  you're probably talking $200 million, probably something like
• 47:49
  at least $80 million guaranteed. And those are probably
• 47:52
  conservative numbers in their total next contracts.
• 47:57
  Yeah, I it's going to be tough and it could equate for some
• 48:01
  dark years. But if 2024 is the year, if if
• 48:04
  it's like the Rams did a couple years ago where they just balled
• 48:06
  out and went all out and they got a Super Bowl, I'm not going
• 48:10
  to complain at all. They could go, they could not
• 48:13
  win a game for 10 years. If they get a Super Bowl, like
• 48:15
  I'm, I'm OK Who cares? Remember 2024, like that's what
• 48:19
  I'll be saying. But yeah, I think so.
• 48:24
  My my hot take would be to get a get a rookie.
• 48:30
  Just thinking about. Move on from Kirk.
• 48:33
  Yeah, just thinking about the numbers.
• 48:35
  I like Kirk. He is a good quarterback.
• 48:37
  I've been a Kirk fan for a while.
• 48:39
  There was a weird moment, probably like 2020, when I was
• 48:41
  like, this guy's not doing anything.
• 48:43
  He's making terrible decisions. He's not great.
• 48:46
  But then soon after, I was convinced he wasn't the guy.
• 48:50
  He convinced everybody that he is the guy and this year he was
• 48:53
  convincing the entire world, not just Vikings fans.
• 48:58
  So I'm happy if he's the quarterback, 'cause he was doing
• 49:01
  good things. He was fun to root for.
• 49:03
  I don't know. I I think he'd be somebody that
• 49:08
  I would enjoy spending time with.
• 49:10
  Just cause, like you said, he's a conservative guy.
• 49:12
  We're conservative guys. I I just think we would get
• 49:14
  along. I'm not saying I think I'd be
• 49:17
  Kirkland's friend, but he just seems like a good guy and he's a
• 49:21
  good quarterback, so I'd love it.
• 49:23
  But I think for the future of the franchise, it probably makes
• 49:28
  the most sense to move on and drafted quarterback #1, even if
• 49:32
  you have to trade multiple picks to get to a high first round
• 49:37
  pick, if you don't F it up the next couple of games and somehow
• 49:40
  get the 5th overall pick or something like that.
• 49:44
  But yeah, I I think it probably should be, should be a rookie so
• 49:51
  that you can keep your guys. We are on opposite sides of.
• 49:54
  But The thing is, it's interesting.
• 49:56
  I'd. I'd be so happy if it was Kirk
• 49:58
  again. I'd be concerned after the
• 50:00
  announcement, like, is he, is he healed?
• 50:03
  Is it gonna be a rough, rough first part of the season until
• 50:08
  he finally gets his feet under him?
• 50:10
  He's not a mobile guy, totally, so him not being able to run 100
• 50:14
  miles an hour isn't a huge deal. But yeah, there's a lot of
• 50:19
  question marks. What'll be really interesting?
• 50:21
  We'll be watching Aaron Rodgers. I don't think we'll see Aaron
• 50:25
  Rodgers play in a game this year.
• 50:26
  No, the The Jets are already mathematically eliminated.
• 50:31
  They're not going to put them in but.
• 50:33
  Didn't he already have a quote like a week or two ago?
• 50:35
  Like, yeah, if if we were closer.
• 50:38
  Probably he. I mean, he just tells everything
• 50:41
  to Pat McAfee, but he's always also super guarded at the same
• 50:44
  time. Who knows what those guys talk
• 50:47
  about when the cameras aren't rolling.
• 50:49
  But anyways, I think not in game, but like you know he's
• 50:55
  going to post some sort of like workout video or something with
• 51:00
  him. You know, doing a three-step
• 51:02
  drop, planting his foot and just throwing an absolute dime to
• 51:06
  somebody. If he posted a video of him
• 51:08
  doing a box jump, that would be the next three days of ESPN
• 51:12
  coverage. Like, yeah.
• 51:14
  For. Sure, I'm sure he's already done
• 51:15
  it, yeah. And there's just no footage of
• 51:19
  it. Or he's been very careful with
• 51:21
  how he wants to release that footage to maximize his screen
• 51:26
  time and the fact that sports media is just infatuated with
• 51:30
  him. But anyways, it I think it will
• 51:34
  be interesting to see how he progresses because he's just a
• 51:37
  little bit ahead of Kirk in terms of the injury and the
• 51:41
  recovery. And you know that Aaron Rodgers
• 51:45
  is gonna do everything that he can to get back on the field.
• 51:48
  Oh yeah, next year. I mean, I think if push came to
• 51:51
  shove, they'd put him in tomorrow.
• 51:54
  Yeah, but that that's not. I mean, The Jets would have to
• 51:58
  be. They're not.
• 51:59
  They're not defeated. Yeah, they're not in a in a
• 52:02
  position to do that, so it doesn't make any sense.
• 52:04
  But if like the playoffs were on the line, shoot, you might see
• 52:08
  him in there, even if it wasn't for a full game, even if it was
• 52:12
  for a couple of drives. Just to see if he can eke out a
• 52:15
  touchdown or two, give him the edge and then hand it over to
• 52:18
  Zach Wilson or whoever else, see what happens.
• 52:21
  But I think it'll be interesting to see how he progresses in the
• 52:26
  offseason and to see what comes out from his recovery because we
• 52:31
  will see something, I'm sure. From Rogers.
• 52:33
  Yeah, and that may give us a little bit of insight into what
• 52:38
  we could expect from Kirk Cousins and how he'll progress
• 52:42
  and how he'll recover. And I would expect Kirk to
• 52:46
  attack his recovery with a similar tenacity, with a similar
• 52:50
  drive of yes, I want to get back to the field, I want to play
• 52:54
  well, that's the guy. That's the kind of guy he is,
• 52:55
  yeah. Just like we've said, he's like
• 52:59
  pretty savvy and kind of ruthless in his contract
• 53:02
  negotiations. He's probably, to your point,
• 53:05
  going to take that same ruthlessness to his rehab.
• 53:08
  I mean, this is the biggest injury he's ever had.
• 53:11
  I don't know about like high school or anything, but like
• 53:13
  he's never had something this crazy.
• 53:17
  The biggest other detriment to his career was when he wasn't
• 53:19
  the starter. And you know, like he's always
• 53:22
  been attacking everything to this is Kirk to get back and to
• 53:27
  get on the field. So I'd fully expect Kirk to be
• 53:30
  an NFL quarterback. He will play more football like
• 53:33
  this, isn't it? It's just will it be for the
• 53:36
  Vikings? He did mention to kind of bring
• 53:39
  it back to him comparing to Aaron Rodgers.
• 53:43
  He was on Adam Schefter's podcast a week or two ago within
• 53:47
  the last couple of weeks and Kirk said, I Schefter asked him
• 53:52
  something like, yeah, hey, Rogers is starting to starting
• 53:55
  to peak up a little bit thinking he might he might play this
• 53:59
  season. What about what about you?
• 54:00
  Do you think that could be a possibility for you to come back
• 54:03
  this season? And Kirk said something like,
• 54:05
  yeah, my wife thinks I I could be back.
• 54:08
  She's holding out hope. But like, I mean, realistically,
• 54:11
  he said the earliest I think I could come back would be around
• 54:15
  the time of the Super Bowl. And he even joked, like if the
• 54:18
  Vikings make it to the Super Bowl, they probably don't want
• 54:20
  me to get in there because they've been playing so good in
• 54:23
  theory take to make it that far. So why mess with a good thing?
• 54:27
  But then he said, like realistically Aaron's injury was
• 54:30
  about 8 weeks before mine. So anything Aaron does is about
• 54:36
  8 weeks ahead of where I could be doing those similar things.
• 54:39
  So I think you're on to something.
• 54:41
  If we see, you know, beginning of March, Aaron Rodgers post
• 54:47
  that video where he throws a dime in some practice field
• 54:51
  setting to some unnamed wide receiver, you could think maybe
• 54:56
  beginning of may quote UN quote Aaron or Kirk Cousins could kind
• 55:02
  of be doing similar things just based off the timeline.
• 55:06
  So I don't know he the theoretically could be back.
• 55:10
  I just know the Achilles is such a big injury.
• 55:14
  Yeah, I don't. Know it'll be interesting to see
• 55:17
  what plays out and honestly like you know I agree with what
• 55:21
  you've said to coming all the way back to our original takes.
• 55:25
  You know I I think as a fan I wouldn't be disappointed if we
• 55:29
  went out and got a guy in the first round of the draft to
• 55:34
  replace Kirk. Yeah, I I mean if JJ McCarthy or
• 55:38
  Bo Nicks or Jayden Daniels or Caleb Williams or whoever is
• 55:43
  available when it's the Vikings turn to make their first round
• 55:46
  pick, I wouldn't be disappointed in that.
• 55:51
  I I will be sad a little bit if Kirk leaves, if they let him go,
• 55:58
  that that will be a sad moment as a Vikings fan because he's
• 56:02
  he's played really well. And not just that, but he's
• 56:04
  just, he's just a good guy and you said it earlier, he's just
• 56:07
  easy to root for. You know that he's not the drama
• 56:11
  queen off the field that some of these other guys are.
• 56:15
  I mean, even just watching the Chiefs and watching Patrick
• 56:19
  Mahomes whine about everything. Oh my.
• 56:21
  Gosh. Well, Pat Mahomes is his
• 56:23
  reaction to that offsides penalty they got a couple of
• 56:28
  weeks ago. It wasn't.
• 56:30
  He didn't react like, Oh yeah, I guess, yeah, technically our guy
• 56:33
  was off. He didn't even.
• 56:34
  Have the sportsmanship to like tell Josh Allen, Josh Allen at
• 56:40
  the end of the game. Like hey man, you played great.
• 56:43
  Yeah. Pat him on the back like worst
• 56:45
  effing call I've ever seen. The end the game on a offsides
• 56:50
  or like, yeah, like come on man, if.
• 56:53
  You break the rules. You should be penalized.
• 56:55
  Just like the Lions. You know, the against the
• 56:58
  Vikings, they had a guy step out of the field and then he ended
• 57:01
  up being the first guy to touch the ball.
• 57:03
  So they called it, you know, an incomplete pass because he was
• 57:08
  out of the field and didn't establish himself.
• 57:10
  But it should have been a penalty for illegal touching
• 57:14
  because he should not have been the first one to touch the ball.
• 57:17
  Again, I'm not a ref, but that's that seemed a little weird.
• 57:20
  We could go. We could have a whole nother
• 57:22
  hour long podcast on the. We've been talking for almost an
• 57:25
  hour already and we could just sit here and talk about how
• 57:27
  awful the officiating was. That was the same crew from the
• 57:33
  helmet off game was it? Really.
• 57:35
  I didn't know that and I saw. That on Twitter, it was the same
• 57:38
  crew that What team was that? What?
• 57:41
  What guy was that that took his helmet off?
• 57:42
  The Chiefs was it? The Chiefs, Yeah, I said.
• 57:44
  Put your helmet back on, yeah? That's a penalty.
• 57:46
  That's a personal foul, 15 yard penalty.
• 57:50
  And they just told him to put his helmet back on.
• 57:52
  Same crew. That really, really had a an
• 57:58
  impact on the the Lions and the Vikings.
• 58:01
  Yeah, I. Saw someone post the meme where
• 58:03
  it's the cartoon guy, like pointing at himself in the
• 58:07
  mirror and the meme was like, now you go out there and make
• 58:11
  this about yourself and talking about the refs.
• 58:17
  Man, I, I. Hate complaining about the refs
• 58:19
  'cause I honestly I do think 99% of the times the refs see things
• 58:23
  and it's like how did you even see that?
• 58:25
  And they usually make the right call.
• 58:27
  But, and it It just felt personal against the Vikings on
• 58:31
  Sunday or Saturday, it did. It did seem like there were a
• 58:35
  lot of calls that went against the Vikings and went in the
• 58:40
  lion's favor, which is really unfortunate.
• 58:43
  So. Yeah.
• 58:45
  So a quick update on the playoff outlook.
• 58:49
  Oh yeah, so I pulled this from Dustin Baker.
• 58:53
  I think this is actually slightly different, but as of
• 58:57
  right now. Well.
• 58:59
  As of right now, when Dustin tweeted this, he said the
• 59:02
  Vikings playoff chances were 27%.
• 59:04
  I think that was before the Monday night games that happened
• 59:08
  on or the Monday games, 'cause they were they weren't just
• 59:11
  Monday night. I think it's down to like 14% as
• 59:17
  of right now, recording this episode on Tuesday, December
• 59:21
  26th. So fairly low, but about.
• 59:24
  As low as it's been all season, yeah, but.
• 59:29
  You win the next two games regardless of what else happens,
• 59:34
  96%. Yeah, but which sounds big?
• 59:38
  If sounds easy but. The Lions have already beaten
• 59:42
  you once and the Packers aren't a bad team, no, especially
• 59:47
  lately. Yeah, they've really come on at
• 59:49
  the end of the season, so it's a tall task if they just beat
• 59:54
  Green Bay this coming week, 46%. OK, so coin flip a little less
• 59:59
  than that, yeah. If you beat Green Bay but then
• 1:00:02
  lose to Detroit 25% need a lot of help.
• 1:00:08
  Need you would need the Seahawks and the Rams I think to lose
• 1:00:14
  both games both weeks which is highly unlikely.
• 1:00:18
  I I actually, I wrote this down because I thought this was
• 1:00:21
  interesting. So the Vikings of course have
• 1:00:27
  the Packers and the Lions Week 17, Week 18.
• 1:00:31
  The Rams have the Giants and the Niners 1718.
• 1:00:37
  So the Niners game I think would be the one that the Vikings
• 1:00:44
  could hope that the the Rams would lose and then the Seahawks
• 1:00:51
  have the Steelers and the Cardinals to end the season.
• 1:00:57
  So the Steelers have looked better.
• 1:01:00
  Yeah, but. But I don't know.
• 1:01:05
  So to get into the playoffs for sure, the Vikings need to win
• 1:01:09
  both of their games and they need the Rams and the Seahawks
• 1:01:11
  to lose at least Rams or Seahawks to lose at least once.
• 1:01:15
  It's not a both and it's just a one of them needs to lose one of
• 1:01:20
  those games. So I think the most likely
• 1:01:25
  scenario is San Francisco beating the Rams Week 18.
• 1:01:29
  Yeah, which would be a really nail biter scenario for Vikings
• 1:01:33
  fans to be sitting there waiting to see if the the Niners can
• 1:01:38
  pull it off. But.
• 1:01:39
  Yeah, and even then, the Niners I did.
• 1:01:42
  They won their division, didn't they?
• 1:01:44
  So they've clinched. They're they're fighting for
• 1:01:46
  seeding. But I mean, that's about it.
• 1:01:50
  True. And they're not fighting, are
• 1:01:52
  they fighting for the number one seed?
• 1:01:53
  I don't know enough about all that 'cause that could be the
• 1:01:56
  the thing. If the Niners need to win that
• 1:01:58
  last game to get the number one seed, then yeah, we're
• 1:02:02
  definitely interested. I.
• 1:02:03
  Think if if I can, I'm not gonna speak 100% intelligently on
• 1:02:07
  this, but I think I'm close. I think the Rams, the Eagles and
• 1:02:12
  the Lions are all still in play for that number one seed.
• 1:02:16
  OK, I think the Cowboys. I don't think the Cowboys can
• 1:02:20
  get it. And I don't know who who'd be
• 1:02:27
  the other team that would be vying for that.
• 1:02:31
  I don't think anybody. I think it's just, I think it's
• 1:02:33
  the the Niners, the Eagles and the Lions.
• 1:02:38
  I think those are the only three teams that can secure that
• 1:02:41
  number one seed. OK, so yeah, and it'll really
• 1:02:45
  come down to these last two games.
• 1:02:47
  And you could be right, The Niners might not have anything
• 1:02:51
  to play for. They might have everything to
• 1:02:53
  play for. So that number one seed is huge.
• 1:02:56
  And if you, I mean, we mentioned it earlier if Brock Purdy's not
• 1:03:00
  100%. Yeah, the.
• 1:03:02
  Number one seed in a BI. Could be huge, Yeah.
• 1:03:04
  I think that was mostly. I don't know who's going to beat
• 1:03:07
  the Ravens. I think they are the team to
• 1:03:10
  beat this year. I think they punched their
• 1:03:12
  ticket into being the team to beat this year after playing
• 1:03:16
  last night. They just, I don't.
• 1:03:19
  I don't know who's gonna beat him.
• 1:03:20
  Well, that's the difference too, between the NFC and the AFC, I
• 1:03:23
  believe. If I'm again, I really only paid
• 1:03:26
  attention to the NFC and how it affects the Vikings.
• 1:03:30
  But I think the Ravens are the only team that's clinched in the
• 1:03:34
  AFC. Clinched the playoffs.
• 1:03:35
  Oh really? OK I.
• 1:03:37
  Think they. And they're in the currently the
• 1:03:38
  number one, I believe and they're the only team that has
• 1:03:43
  clinched. No other AFC team has clinched
• 1:03:45
  every other. All of those other six spots are
• 1:03:48
  still very much up in the air. So interesting.
• 1:03:53
  Yeah, I could be wrong. If I'm wrong, somebody out
• 1:03:58
  there, correct me. I'm willing to admit that I'm
• 1:04:01
  wrong. But all of that to say, the
• 1:04:04
  playoffs are still very much in view for the Vikings.
• 1:04:08
  They have to win and they need a little help.
• 1:04:10
  It's not a lot of help. It's not like they're gonna be,
• 1:04:13
  you know, poking voodoo dolls of different teams and you know,
• 1:04:19
  doing all sorts of weird things to, you know, hopefully try to
• 1:04:24
  squeak into that number seven seed or whatever.
• 1:04:27
  Like they need Seattle or LA to lose 1 game in the last two and
• 1:04:36
  they need to win. They have to win both.
• 1:04:37
  Well, they have to win, essentially.
• 1:04:38
  Have to win both. They have to win both, no matter
• 1:04:41
  what I think. Yeah, I mean, you could win one
• 1:04:45
  and get a ton of help elsewhere. But yeah, you gotta, you gotta
• 1:04:50
  win both. And that's why this quarterback
• 1:04:53
  decision's so huge. And maybe with that mindset,
• 1:04:56
  they do go with they, they know a little bit more about what
• 1:04:59
  they have. With Mullins, they feel like
• 1:05:02
  they know what they have. With Dobbs, they went as far as
• 1:05:05
  to make him all the way the emergency quarterback.
• 1:05:10
  So maybe that's your motivation in starting hall, but I don't
• 1:05:14
  know. It feels like there is no right
• 1:05:16
  answer. So yeah, got to win both.
• 1:05:19
  Got to figure out a way to win both when you have all these
• 1:05:22
  injuries piling up and they're going to have two more roster
• 1:05:25
  spots open because they're putting Hawkinson and want them
• 1:05:29
  on injury to reserve. So maybe there's something they
• 1:05:32
  can do there. I don't know who's available,
• 1:05:34
  who can help. I don't know.
• 1:05:37
  It's just it seems hopeless right now, and the Hawkinson
• 1:05:40
  news today made it seem even more hopeless.
• 1:05:45
  Yeah, hopefully we're still rooting for a playoff spot come
• 1:05:49
  this time next week. I think no turnovers is huge.
• 1:05:55
  It's been the It's been the story all season.
• 1:05:57
  Can't turn the ball over. If you do, you lose and we're
• 1:06:01
  basically done. I think the running game has to
• 1:06:05
  improve. Oh yeah.
• 1:06:06
  It looked so good against the Bengals.
• 1:06:08
  Yeah. Yep. 1st 100 yard rusher of the
• 1:06:11
  season I think yeah. So we we got to improve there.
• 1:06:15
  You can't run for 17 yards and expect to win a game even in a
• 1:06:22
  pass happy league like the NFLI think you got to get the ball to
• 1:06:26
  Jji think. Which wasn't an issue.
• 1:06:29
  Well, he got his numbers. And he didn't get them until the
• 1:06:32
  third or fourth quarter though, yeah.
• 1:06:33
  Well, he had that. He was.
• 1:06:34
  That. Was it at right at the beginning
• 1:06:37
  of the second-half or in the second quarter, that big
• 1:06:39
  touchdown? Because you were texting me like
• 1:06:41
  they might make a quarterback change and then boom, you're
• 1:06:44
  like, oh, they're just. Kidding.
• 1:06:45
  I think that was in the third quarter because I think leading
• 1:06:48
  up to halftime, I'm like, man, Mullins is not playing great.
• 1:06:52
  I think he already had two of his picks before halftime.
• 1:06:56
  And that's kind of when I started to just think like, man,
• 1:07:00
  they have to. Koc has to think about making a
• 1:07:03
  change at some point. And then all of a sudden they
• 1:07:06
  come out of the locker room in the third quarter and it's just
• 1:07:09
  Mullins throwing bullets to JJ And so you have to get the ball
• 1:07:15
  to him and you know he's going to be just draped in coverage
• 1:07:20
  wherever he goes. Well, shoot.
• 1:07:21
  What was it that late 3rd down play?
• 1:07:24
  Third and long? Like 20 ish yards long and he
• 1:07:28
  had a Buffalo like catch. That catch will get forgotten
• 1:07:33
  unfortunately because it wasn't a loss but it was right at the
• 1:07:36
  first down marker. I was almost kind of worried
• 1:07:39
  they wouldn't mark it as a first down, but he went up double
• 1:07:42
  covered. And he got speared.
• 1:07:45
  Yeah, well, he got hit hard. Well, and there was a play that
• 1:07:48
  he got absolutely demolished, I think a few plays later and
• 1:07:52
  immediately stood right back up. And it was who wasn't Joseph who
• 1:07:56
  wasn't for the Lions that made the hit.
• 1:07:59
  He was rattled. He got pulled out.
• 1:08:01
  He and he came back in for a couple of plays and then they
• 1:08:04
  stopped the game again. To have him pulled out again
• 1:08:06
  like the NFL might have some the.
• 1:08:08
  Eye in the Sky was looking at him like, yeah, he needs to come
• 1:08:12
  out. Well, I think he came out and
• 1:08:14
  then he tried to get on the field himself and then tell
• 1:08:17
  anybody and then they whistled to play dead before he could get
• 1:08:20
  on the field because they knew he was trying to get on and
• 1:08:23
  wasn't cleared to get back on. Well, and if you look at that,
• 1:08:26
  that big demolishing hit on JJ, it, it was a big hit and he's
• 1:08:32
  probably feeling pretty sore. But if you pay attention, you're
• 1:08:36
  you're feeling OK that he's, he's not like concussed or
• 1:08:39
  broken bones like it was a borderline legal hit.
• 1:08:43
  It was just, yeah, just more of the defenseless receiver aspect
• 1:08:49
  of it. But I don't know, five years ago
• 1:08:52
  that wouldn't have been flagged. Like, yeah, but yeah.
• 1:08:55
  And Jji know it was probably adrenaline and wanting to make
• 1:08:59
  it seem like he's actually 100% OK He got right back up.
• 1:09:04
  And he popped back up and was Oh yeah, it was a little.
• 1:09:07
  Bit Yeah, you hit me hard, but I've made the catch like and 15
• 1:09:11
  more yards like yeah, but so I hope he's OK.
• 1:09:15
  I don't. I didn't pay attention.
• 1:09:17
  If the injury report came out that would have been tomorrow.
• 1:09:19
  The first one, yeah. It won't come out till tomorrow
• 1:09:21
  'cause we're recording early today.
• 1:09:23
  Yeah, but haven't heard anything about him being hurt.
• 1:09:25
  He played The rest of the game was inches away from making the
• 1:09:29
  game tying touchdown catch. That could have been the
• 1:09:33
  game-winning extra point. What about the Packers?
• 1:09:40
  Do we think? Do we think the Vikings have a
• 1:09:42
  chance? I interrupted a thought you were
• 1:09:45
  about to have. Well, I mean, I was just kind of
• 1:09:47
  giving my keys to the game. We talked about turnovers,
• 1:09:51
  better run game, getting the ball to JJ.
• 1:09:53
  My last one would be better blitz packages.
• 1:09:57
  And this was something I picked up from Ben Lieber as he kind of
• 1:10:01
  debriefed the game, both on his personal Twitter and then in the
• 1:10:06
  between the lines that the Vikings media team does after
• 1:10:10
  every game. And he just kind of picked apart
• 1:10:14
  the blitz packages that Flores was sending.
• 1:10:17
  And it seemed like they just weren't as clever as they have
• 1:10:23
  been. And the Lions just had them
• 1:10:25
  figured out, and it took too long for the Blitzes to develop
• 1:10:29
  it. Like, you know, the guys coming
• 1:10:31
  in from deep were were coming in too early and then sitting at
• 1:10:36
  the line waiting for the ball to be snapped and that gave away
• 1:10:39
  the blitz or you know, whatever else.
• 1:10:42
  I don't understand defense as well, so I can't really pretend
• 1:10:46
  to know what I'm talking about there.
• 1:10:47
  But like, what Ben Lieber said seemed to make sense.
• 1:10:50
  And when I look back and watch the game, it's like, well, yeah,
• 1:10:54
  it did seem like Jared Goff and the Lions knew when those
• 1:10:59
  blitzes were coming. And they knew how to adapt and
• 1:11:01
  they knew how to do, you know, a little screenplay or a little
• 1:11:04
  dink and dunk over the middle or, you know, takes a shot
• 1:11:09
  downfield when they knew everybody was coming off the
• 1:11:11
  line and they had single coverage down the field on Saint
• 1:11:15
  Brown or whoever, you know, like.
• 1:11:18
  So I I, I think the defense has to improve.
• 1:11:21
  And we, we said it early on in the episode 2.
• 1:11:23
  The defense didn't look amazing. It didn't look like the shutout
• 1:11:27
  defense against the Raiders that we saw a few weeks ago.
• 1:11:29
  It didn't even look like the defense against the Bengals
• 1:11:32
  really like, I felt like they maybe played a better game
• 1:11:35
  against Cincinnati than they played against Detroit.
• 1:11:38
  So. I pre meltdown.
• 1:11:40
  There are some things. Well, yeah, it was really only
• 1:11:43
  the the fourth quarter or the third quarter.
• 1:11:46
  Was it the third quarter they gave?
• 1:11:47
  Midway through the third quarter, it started melting down
• 1:11:50
  against the Bengals. Yeah.
• 1:11:51
  So anyways, it's it's just been a bad stretch for the Vikings
• 1:11:55
  defense. I think they need to iron some
• 1:11:57
  of those things out, and if they can do that, the the Packers
• 1:12:01
  aren't a perennial powerhouse. They've proven that Jordan Love
• 1:12:05
  has started to figure some things out, but he's still a
• 1:12:08
  young quarterback who's had to sit behind Aaron Rodgers for how
• 1:12:11
  many years? Now I think the defense, that's
• 1:12:15
  gonna be the key. If you're gonna win this game
• 1:12:17
  against the Packers, you're gonna need to make Jordan Love's
• 1:12:21
  day miserable. Which here's an interesting
• 1:12:24
  wrinkle for us. We play each other in fantasy
• 1:12:28
  I've. Given up on fantasy this year.
• 1:12:31
  Well, we're we're playing for 5th place so.
• 1:12:34
  It's not first year last. We're in the consolation
• 1:12:38
  bracket. I'm just playing for as high of
• 1:12:40
  a spot as I can get, but Jordan loves my starting quarterback.
• 1:12:43
  You're you. Hey guys, next episode, it's
• 1:12:47
  just going to be me talking. Evan can no longer be a part of
• 1:12:51
  the school hop if he starts a freaking Packer at his
• 1:12:54
  quarterback position. And it's not even Aaron Rodgers.
• 1:12:57
  Like Sam Howell, go with. Howell, I'd go with that hurt.
• 1:13:02
  Go with and then there. Was a bye week in there?
• 1:13:04
  You could. Probably pick up Jaron Hall.
• 1:13:07
  I'll pick up whoever the Vikings are starting.
• 1:13:11
  No, I'm sure they're all available here.
• 1:13:13
  Here's what I'll say on that front.
• 1:13:15
  I would be more than happy to take 6th place if it means that
• 1:13:21
  Jordan Love has a miserable game on Sunday.
• 1:13:25
  I. Just I can't believe I would.
• 1:13:27
  I think I have in that league 2 pretty decent quarterbacks.
• 1:13:31
  I will trade you one just so that you you.
• 1:13:34
  Can. Let's make that happen and we'll
• 1:13:37
  screenshot it and we'll put it out there and.
• 1:13:39
  I'm the Commissioner, so there is no whining at that, so.
• 1:13:43
  You can push the deal through under the table, yeah.
• 1:13:45
  There there was one point in this season, I think in our
• 1:13:48
  league it had to have been 'cause.
• 1:13:50
  That's the only one. I'm the commissioner of somebody
• 1:13:54
  who is a die hard shoot. What is he, a Dolphins fan?
• 1:14:02
  I have Tua on my roster and they were playing.
• 1:14:07
  I think Mahomes, like the Dolphins in real life were
• 1:14:12
  playing against the Chiefs and his quarterback was Mahomes And
• 1:14:16
  he was saying like, you know, I'm a Dolphins fan.
• 1:14:20
  I can't in good faith in fantasy start Mahomes.
• 1:14:24
  Would anybody want to trade me for one week a quarterback so
• 1:14:28
  that I don't have to have that on my conscience?
• 1:14:31
  And I was like, you know what? Fine.
• 1:14:33
  He reached out. He's like, hey, tua for Mahomes
• 1:14:36
  for one week and then trade back after that week.
• 1:14:39
  I was like, you know, I can respect being being a die hard
• 1:14:42
  fan like that. So I did it, and I and I needed
• 1:14:45
  a little bit of my commissioner powers to push it through.
• 1:14:49
  But yeah, for one week I traded away too, and got Mahomes.
• 1:14:52
  I didn't even start Mahomes. I don't remember if I won that
• 1:14:55
  week or if he won that week, but after the games, we we swapped
• 1:14:59
  right back. So yeah, some people would be
• 1:15:02
  mad about that. And if it were a money league, I
• 1:15:04
  would have never done that, 'cause that just seems shady.
• 1:15:07
  But this is just a fun league. Like I said, it's just for fun.
• 1:15:12
  So I can't believe you're starting you and you had Aaron
• 1:15:15
  Jones on your roster all season. You traitor.
• 1:15:19
  He's. Been hurt most of the season,
• 1:15:21
  yeah. Good.
• 1:15:22
  I mean, sorry, I mean, I don't want anybody to actually get
• 1:15:25
  injured, but darn it, you can't have a pants.
• 1:15:28
  On your roster fantasy. I mean, all of that was ruined
• 1:15:31
  for me when Brett Favre became a Viking.
• 1:15:34
  Like before that there was this glass ceiling that had never
• 1:15:38
  been shattered of. Like Brett Favre is the worst
• 1:15:41
  human being on the face of the planet.
• 1:15:43
  I hate his guts. I never want to see him again.
• 1:15:46
  And then all of a sudden he becomes a Viking and he wins a
• 1:15:49
  few games and then he leads you to the NFC Championship and
• 1:15:51
  you're like, I love that guy. You know that we've talked about
• 1:15:56
  kind of putting some recording some episodes and having them in
• 1:15:59
  the can for offseason weeks where we don't have games to
• 1:16:03
  talk about. We could just put out one of the
• 1:16:04
  pre recorded episodes. Maybe that whole 2009 season
• 1:16:09
  could be a good talker. Well.
• 1:16:10
  That was fun for us because we were in college together that
• 1:16:15
  year. Living in the same dorm like we
• 1:16:18
  we watched a lot of games together and watched that
• 1:16:21
  infamous NFC championship game. The the Bounty Gate game.
• 1:16:26
  Yeah, and that was the one year I subscribed. iTunes did like
• 1:16:32
  this whole Fan Pass thing where you could pay.
• 1:16:36
  It was like 20 bucks at the beginning of the season and it
• 1:16:42
  collected after every game. It collected like 5 minutes of
• 1:16:48
  highlights from the game and then a couple of highlights of
• 1:16:52
  press conferences for after the game and then it pushed it out,
• 1:16:57
  you know, that night after the game or the next morning.
• 1:17:00
  So it was like, hey, if you missed anything or you if you
• 1:17:03
  want to keep following along and I think it was on my iTunes from
• 1:17:07
  2009 and I still have that, that could be something we could like
• 1:17:11
  watch and then record a recap that.
• 1:17:14
  Would be really of 2009. I'd be interested in that.
• 1:17:16
  I didn't know you had that. Yeah, it's cool.
• 1:17:18
  I didn't even know it was fun. To watch, Yeah, I'll have to.
• 1:17:21
  I'll find it and I'll, I'll send if I can, I'll send you some
• 1:17:24
  stuff. That would be fun.
• 1:17:26
  Well, we should probably wrap this up, 'cause these are
• 1:17:28
  getting pretty low. Yeah.
• 1:17:30
  And we're we've been talking for a while.
• 1:17:34
  Yeah, hopefully, Hopefully People have been listening and
• 1:17:38
  we haven't said anything to make people encouraged for the rest
• 1:17:41
  of the season, but maybe we kind of took the took the sting out
• 1:17:46
  of that loss. There's still there's still a
• 1:17:48
  shred of hope. There is glimmer of hope and I
• 1:17:52
  want them to win. I'm never going to be lose for a
• 1:17:55
  draft pick guy. I'm intrigued by the idea, but I
• 1:17:58
  want to watch my team win. Like, even in the preseason I
• 1:18:02
  want to watch my team win. So we got two more chances at
• 1:18:05
  least. Let's make that happen.
• 1:18:08
  My kids want ice cream. They haven't had victory ice
• 1:18:10
  cream for weeks now. Give the kids the ice cream and
• 1:18:14
  I'm. Not going to cave.
• 1:18:15
  Come on, I'm not going to cave and give them ice cream.
• 1:18:18
  Maybe in the offseason? All right, well, if you're not
• 1:18:24
  already, we would love it if you'd like and subscribe to us
• 1:18:28
  wherever you get your podcasts or on social media.
• 1:18:32
  We're pretty much everywhere you can be found.
• 1:18:36
  Spotify and YouTube are kind of our primary spots, so you can
• 1:18:39
  find us there. But of course, there's a million
• 1:18:43
  different places you can listen to podcasts.
• 1:18:45
  So find us wherever you like to listen to your podcast.
• 1:18:48
  We've. Got a giveaway?
• 1:18:49
  Do you want to recap that a little bit?
• 1:18:51
  So Austin opened up his gift and we've got an extra shirt here.
• 1:18:57
  I intentionally ordered three shirts, one for each of us and
• 1:19:01
  then one for a lucky fan out there.
• 1:19:04
  So if you're interested in a shirt, reach out to us, send us
• 1:19:08
  a message on any platform, and let us know.
• 1:19:11
  And even if the shirt that we have isn't the right size, we'll
• 1:19:14
  get you the right size shirt and we'd love to send it to you.
• 1:19:17
  And thank you for supporting us and supporting the school hop.
• 1:19:21
  Should we put a time limit on that?
• 1:19:24
  Let's just say before the Super Bowl.
• 1:19:26
  Yeah, OK, does. That work?
• 1:19:28
  Yeah, I'm good with that. So before kickoff of the Super
• 1:19:31
  Bowl, send us a message and let us know too.
• 1:19:35
  Like, hey, whatever you're gonna say in your message, but also be
• 1:19:39
  sure to say, like some version of I wanna submit my my name in
• 1:19:46
  for the shirt. Some some sort of sledge.
• 1:19:48
  Not in the shirt. Yeah, and we'll keep tallies.
• 1:19:52
  And right at the Super Bowl we will.
• 1:19:54
  We'll figure out who wins that and then we'll contact you from
• 1:19:57
  there. But yeah, sounds good to me.
• 1:20:00
  Yeah, this was fun. It was fun to exchange some
• 1:20:03
  gifts and drink some good beer and talk about the Vikings, even
• 1:20:07
  though it's been hard to be a Vikings fan the last couple of
• 1:20:10
  weeks. This is this has always been
• 1:20:13
  good therapy for me, even before we started with the the podcast
• 1:20:17
  and the microphones and recording everything.
• 1:20:19
  Just hashing things out about the Vikings with you has been
• 1:20:22
  good therapy for this fan that cares way too much.
• 1:20:25
  Well, and hopefully it's the same for, yeah, all of our many
• 1:20:29
  listeners out there as well. Yeah, all right, man.
• 1:20:33
  Till next time. It's cool.
• 1:20:35
  It's Vikings fans, Evan here from the
• 1:20:57
  School Hop and we just wanted to say thank you again so much for
• 1:21:00
  listening to the School Hop. And we also wanted to take one
• 1:21:03
  more opportunity to let you know that this episode of The School
• 1:21:06
  Hop has been brought to you by Big Top Ventures.
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