#530: Tom Brady SHOWS LOVE to Justin Jefferson! Should Vikings FRANCHISE-TAG Sam Darnold?

Speaker 1 (00:06):
Welcome into the show today.

Speaker 2 (00:08):
I've got some loaded topics to get to and I'm
very excited to talk about them this morning. I'm gonna
touch on Sam Donald and his long term availability or
potential with the Minnesota Vikings in just a little bit,
so stay with me. But first I want to react

(00:29):
to some comments made by arguably the greatest quarterback that's
ever lived in the NFL. And he was asked a
question and he does this whole little Twitter x YouTube.

Speaker 1 (00:45):
Fan mail thing.

Speaker 2 (00:47):
And Tom Brady was asked, if he had to throw
to a wide receiver in the NFL, which wide receiver
would he choose? You think the best ones Tyreek Hill,
Jamar Chase, Poka Nakula. He goes past all of those

(01:09):
players and picks the best non diva wide receiver in
the NFL and gives praise to mister Justin Jefferson.

Speaker 3 (01:23):
Hey, what's up everyone?

Speaker 4 (01:24):
Time for another NFL on Fox fan mail bag where
I answer a question from a fan.

Speaker 3 (01:32):
I love this. It's been submitted on social media.

Speaker 4 (01:35):
In today's questions from Zachary Wartzel, I'm a lifelong pass fan.
I'm wondering which current current receiver that I never played
with would I most want to throw to?

Speaker 3 (01:48):
And why? Great question, a couple of tough choices out there.

Speaker 5 (01:51):
I know Jamar Chase what a year he's having, But
I'm saying Justin Jefferson he can do everything from any
spot on the He goes deep, he goes short, catch
the ball, catch and run touchdowns third down.

Speaker 3 (02:05):
He's a ridiculous player. It reminds me so much of
my former teammate and Viking Randy Moss.

Speaker 5 (02:11):
So if it comes down to choosing only one, he
would be the one right now.

Speaker 2 (02:16):
It's fun to see Justin Jefferson statistics this season because
he has not necessarily gone off for a massive one
hundred and eighty one hundred and ninety two hundred yard
game for the Vikings this season. He really has only
had multiple games over one hundred yards this year.

Speaker 1 (02:38):
Let's pull up his stats. Justin Jefferson game lock.

Speaker 2 (02:41):
He had one hundred and thirty three yards against the
forty nine ers, and then it's not until the Rams game.
How many weeks is that later? One, two, three, four,
five weeks later he has his next one hundred yard
game against the Rams one hundred and fifteen. The following
week is one hundred and thirty seven against the Colts,
and then it's not one, two, three, four, five weeks

(03:02):
later until this past week against the Atlanta Falcons, he
has one hundred and thirty two yards. So if it
is possible to contain Justin Jefferson to some limited amount,
opposing defenses have actually done a pretty good job of

(03:23):
that because he hasn't necessarily gone off this year. Now
he has won two, three, four, five seven touchdowns this season,
and the two touchdowns against the Atlanta Falcons were his
first touchdowns since October twentieth, so it's been almost two

(03:46):
months since Jefferson has caught a touchdown pass and that's
something that we haven't necessarily seen in the past, which
also goes to the point of it being extremely important
that Sam Darnold doesn't have tunnel vision towards Justin Jefferson
because defensive coordinators are locking in hunt him, and now

(04:11):
that he's spreading the football around and targeting Addison more,
you're seeing more offensive success from the Minnesota Vikings. But
back to Justin Jefferson, He's still having a stellar year.
He still already has over one thousand yards catching, he
still has seven touchdowns, so even though he's limited this
season in how much production he's had, he's still better

(04:36):
than ninety nine point nine percent of NFL wide receivers.
And the thing about Jefferson is is that his most
important trait, or one of the most important traits, is
not seen on or in statistics, because there's no stat

(05:00):
that says Justin Jefferson draws three defenders on this play,
which opened up Jordan and Adison down the field. There's
no statistic that says Justin Jefferson drew two defenders. A
safety came down here who was supposed to be guarding

(05:20):
Addison down deep.

Speaker 1 (05:21):
He was threatened by Jefferson, so.

Speaker 2 (05:23):
He left his spot Addison or Hockinson and was wide
open down the field, and that created that big play.
So much of Jefferson's value is not seen in statistics.

Speaker 1 (05:35):
And I think everybody knows that.

Speaker 2 (05:37):
Well, maybe not everyone, but I know the Minnesota Vikings
organization knows that, and I know Tom Brady knows that.
So it's really not a statistical comparison between Jamar Chase
and Justin Jefferson, because Chase, you know, he's got the yards,
he's got the touchdowns, he's got the receptions this season,

(06:00):
But does he have the impact that Jefferson has on
defensive coordinators.

Speaker 1 (06:06):
He has some.

Speaker 2 (06:06):
Impact now teams know that he's the number one receiver
and he's the threat, but does he attract two to
three defenders regardless of where he is on the football field.
Jefferson's in the backfield with Donald sometimes and shotgun and
he goes out left or whatever.

Speaker 1 (06:24):
You see two defenders already on him.

Speaker 2 (06:27):
He's in the slot and he's going towards the side,
two defenders right there, and or he's out wide he's
going deep doing a little crosser. Two defenders right there too,
which means that players that could be wide receiver ones
like Addison should be or are wide open down the

(06:48):
football field. So it's cool to see Tom Brady give
the credit to Justin Jefferson and compares him similarly to
Randy Moss. I haven't even mentioned his lack of deepness,
which you see all the time from NFL wide receivers.

Speaker 1 (07:07):
So it's cool to see.

Speaker 2 (07:09):
Brady recognize Jefferson for his abilities and for his multi
dimensional talent. He can go deep, he can go short,
he can go through the middle, he can he can
do all these different things. Plus you got to say
this too, it's a little easier to be a wide
receiver in today's league than it was ten years ago
because he hit him too high as a penalty, lead

(07:33):
with their head as a penalty, they fall awkwardly, or
there's a big hit, and it might not necessarily be
a penalty, but because of the brute force behind a hit,
even if it's led with the shoulder, although it's call
the guy a defenseless receiver. So in terms of going

(07:55):
through the middle, it's a little easier to be a
wide receiver today than it was ten years ago in
the NFL, just because of the lack of contact that
defenses can have on a wide receiver as the ball
is coming towards them. I think Jordan Addison versus Tennessee Titans,
Vikings fourth down, had the goal line and Donald threw

(08:19):
Addison the ball. He almost caught it. The Titans defender
leads with his shoulder, big blow to Addison, and everyone's
first reaction, without even really considering where the hit was
what it was led by was throw the flag.

Speaker 1 (08:37):
Throw the flag. And that was the officials reaction too.

Speaker 2 (08:39):
Why because it looked like a big hit it looked
like it could have been an illegal hit.

Speaker 1 (08:44):
Wasn't illegal.

Speaker 2 (08:45):
No, it was just a big, big hit. So credit
to Jefferson. But we also have to recognize that the
wide receiver position has changed in the past ten years.

Speaker 1 (08:59):
All Right.

Speaker 2 (08:59):
The next topic that I wanted to address is this
topic about franchise tagging Sam Donald and Ben Gesling, who's
an insider for the Star Tribune, I react to a
lot of his things because the Purple Persuasion on X
doesn't a sensational job getting information from these insiders and

(09:22):
putting it all into one place. So if you don't
follow him, now go do that. He mentioned and was
talking about a potential franchise tag for Sam Donald, and
I think the word franchise tag is a scary word,
especially for a player, for players hate the franchise take

(09:45):
But why is a franchise tag not an option for
the Minnesota Vikings. I think we view the Vikings as
a world class organization, which everyone says that they are,
and because they're a world class organization, that means that

(10:05):
they can't franchise take Sam Donald. Why why can't they
franchise take Sam Donald? So here's what Ben Gesling said,
He said that although the Vikings regime comes off as
Kumbai Yah type nature, they are a more cut throat
behind the scenes. Guessling pointed to examples such as firing
defensive coordinator ed donand Tell and drawing a line with

(10:30):
Kirk Cousins.

Speaker 1 (10:31):
One more point to make as well is last year.

Speaker 2 (10:38):
Was it last year? I think it was last year
when the Vikings were having those fumbling issues and there
was a camera outside of the Vikings locker room, you
could hear Kevin O'Connell yelling at his players to hold
on to the dang football. And here's the thing, you know,
Kevin O'Connell comes to the press conference and shows off his.

Speaker 1 (11:04):
Personable skills, his ability to.

Speaker 2 (11:06):
Be calm, collective, and really say a whole lot on nothing.
But every time we see that video posted by the
Minnesota Vikings about Kevin O'Connell's passion and it shows them
in his locker room speech giving away game balls, that's
who the real Kevin O'Connell is.

Speaker 1 (11:24):
In the Vikings organization. We see a tainted.

Speaker 2 (11:29):
Version of Kevin O'Connell at the press conference in the media,
buttoned up, but outside of press conferences, Kevin O'Connell is
a fiery, competitive SOB and.

Speaker 1 (11:42):
That's who he is.

Speaker 2 (11:43):
The Vikings, why couldn't they use the franchise egg? Why
is it not an option? Because as far as I'm concerned,
the franchise tag is available to every single team that
wants to use it. So why is it not a
possibility for the Vikings to use that?

Speaker 3 (12:03):
Now?

Speaker 2 (12:03):
I don't know if I like the idea of a
quarterback Sam Donald's signing for a one year, forty one
million dollar deal just because of the salary cap implications.
But if the Minnesota Vikings felt like jj McCarthy was
not ready and didn't want to waste the following season.

Speaker 1 (12:21):
Well why not? Why not one more year of Sam Donald?

Speaker 2 (12:26):
If they felt that Jajon McCarthy is not ready, Donald's
not gonna like it, Agent's not gonna lie who does
like it. They all want the long term deal, of
the long term security, but the franchise tag is their
four teams to use. Kirk Cousins got franchise tagged at
Bengals wide receiver T Higgins. I think he's franchise tagged

(12:48):
right now. Players hate it because they want that three
to four year deal. But the NFL offers it available
to teams, and Minnesota Vikings should have used that in
their favor if they feel Jajen McCarthy is not ready.

Speaker 1 (13:04):
So why not?

Speaker 2 (13:06):
Why not Minneso Vikings be cutthroat, you know, show some power,
show some moves, because all this Kubayas stuff, what's that
going to get you a nice, long term friendly relationship?

Speaker 1 (13:24):
Okay, I mean that maybe that's valuable to some people.

Speaker 2 (13:27):
But one of the odds that Sam Darnold's long term
friends with these guys. Anyway, So what does everyone say
and what do you hear from every single person following that,
following a tough deal or contract with a player or

(13:51):
an agent or a coach or a general manager, what
does everyone say? It's a business. Players say, it's a business. Oh,
this organization to get more money from this organization because
it's a business.

Speaker 1 (14:07):
Well, teams do the same thing.

Speaker 2 (14:09):
They didn't let you walk to this other organization and
they signed you to a franchise, dag because it's a business.

Speaker 1 (14:16):
It works both ways.

Speaker 2 (14:17):
It works for players that want bigger contracts, that don't
want to resign with the original.

Speaker 1 (14:22):
Team because they want a bigger role or whatever.

Speaker 2 (14:24):
The case may be, and it also works in favor
of teams that want one more year of a successful
player in their organization when they can't come to terms
on a long term deal or they don't want to
sign a guy to a long term deal. So it's
a business decision, and that's that. The NFL is the

(14:45):
highest grossing business and sports. So why couldn't the Minnesota
Vikings be considering a franchise tag with Sam Darnold. I
think it makes a lot of sense if they feel
JJ McCarthy is not ready for the big time for

(15:05):
the show to be QB one. All right, everyone, those
are the two takes. Thank you for making this podcast
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Speaker 1 (15:21):
The uh Hoakland Farm information.

Speaker 2 (15:24):
Is in the podcast description twenty percent off by mentioning
the Minnesota tim podcast Hokland Farm Get great Beef today?

Speaker 1 (15:35):
Do it? All right? Thanks everyone for going on this
journey with me this morning.