Friday mailbag: Camp is in full swing
The Vikings are on the field at training camp and fans have lots of questions
By Matthew Coller
Happy Friday everyone and welcome to our first training camp Friday mailbag. Let’s dive right into Vikings fans’ questions…
@NsportsfanM At what point of camp is it too late for Darrisaw if he hadn’t gone full go to have a realistic shot of playing week 1 or playing at all say the first half of the season? Same q for Westbrook though since he’s not a rookie I assume he would be out in the lineup as soon as healthy
For Darrisaw to start Week 1, he probably has to be in the full swing of things by the second preseason game. I’m guessing that teams are going to treat that one like the “dress rehearsal,” rather than the third preseason contest as it was in years past. If he isn’t up to 100% by the time camp ends, then I’d be concerned about whether we’ll see him during the first half of the season. There’s also a shot that Rashod Hill plays well and holds the position. As for Westbrook, they must have believed that his timeline for return was reasonable when they signed him but it wouldn’t shock me if he wasn’t up to full speed for awhile. Players return to full strength from ACLs all the time, but we’ve seen some guys have further complications (i.e. Mike Hughes) that keep them from being ready right from the opening bell. Both players’ progress will be worth watching closely.
@nt2922__ What have you seen from Breeland within the past 2 days at camp? I like him over Dantzler starting opposite to Peterson on the outside. He is a veteran corner but CD has so much potential
Not much from Breeland as of yet. He did a little bit of team work Day 1 and nothing live Day 2 that I saw. We’re in Marathon-not-sprint mode here, so there’s plenty of time for him to ramp up. In the mean time, Dantzler does have a chance to show the Vikings he’s made strides — though Mike Zimmer brought up his confidence and durability, which are two difficult things to prove in camp/preseason. If I had to guess right now, I’d say Breeland starts when he’s a full-go.
@bigbadragz How legit is this Osborn love? Been flashing now from beginning of offseason workouts. Has this guy made a leap no one saw coming?
It’s legit as of today. He’s made plays during almost every practice going back to OTAs. Klint Kubiak challenged him to stack good days together and that’s what he’s doing. It wouldn’t be a total shock if he rose to the challenge. The Vikings drafted him for his exceptional character and it sounds like he worked really hard this offseason (Sam is going to have a feature on this soon). We do occasionally see lower drafted players emerge and that process generally starts in their second year unless they are Stefon Diggs, who shined as a rookie. But let me say this: Pads, pads, pads, pads, pads. We’ve seen a lot of guys who were good in shorts. Once the pads come on, then we’ll know.
@benjackson0812 Who in the NFC do you look at and say they are definitely better than the Vikings right now??
The word “definitely” makes this a hard one to answer.
They’re definitely better than: Philadelphia Eagles, Detroit Lions and Carolina Panthers.
They’re probably better than: New York Giants, New Orleans Saints and Atlanta Falcons.
They’re too close to call with: Washington, Dallas Cowboys, Chicago Bears, Arizona Cardinals, Los Angeles Rams.
They probably not better than: Green Bay Packers, Tampa Bay Bucs, Seattle Seahawks, San Francisco 49ers.
@alexjjlarsen Who stands out among the veteran players for still coming to camp fighting like they're on the bubble? (Not counting guys who, y'know, actually are on the bubble.)
There’s quite a few guys with previous experience that are fighting for spots. Dakota Dozier, Tye Smith, Ameer Abdullah, Chad Beebe, Bisi Johnson, Jalyn Holmes, Hercules Mata’afa, Kris Boyd and Dru Samia are the most notable. A lot of recent draft picks who are in prove-it mode.
@smccullough5 You had a great piece of analysis in the show the other day where Oli Udoh running with the 1s might be more "last chance opportunity" than "big deal". What other bubble players do you think might be having a last chance opportunity?
We’re going to find out exactly what it means for Udoh as we go along. We’ve seen the team in past years give first-team reps to guys when they’re trying to figure out whether there’s something there. Aviante Collins, TJ Clemmings, Willie Beavers…they all got shots at guard before the end of the line. Or it’s possible they decided that they like him but there’s no room at tackle going forward.
Since I named the “bubble” guys above, I’ll take a shot at which ones stay around: Abdullah, Beebe, Holmes.
@DingoDonny1 Does Kirk Cousins start for the 1998 Vikings?
Fun question. You might jump to say that he’d start over Brad Johnson, but there’s a cool Pro Football Reference stat that adjusts for era to tell us how far above average a player was in each statistical category. Brad’s best full years are 14% and 21% above average in QB rating (1999 and 2002) and Kirk’s are 18% and 20%. That might have been a close battle. Cunningham was a total shock when he dominated in 1998, so Kirk probably gets the job based on the fact nobody knew Cunningham could still do that. When Cunningham played in 1997, he looked like a pretty washed version and then he came in and went crazy after Johnson got hurt in ‘98. Does Kirk lead one of the al-time great offenses given the same circumstances? He’d be really good because that team was stacked but Randall put on an incredible performance, in part because he was willing to wing it deep.
@OldNorse Neither extension announced yet. Is O’Neill worth the newly reset market and 3rd highest salary on the team?
I’ll go my usual route when it comes to the Vikings vs. Player X in contract negotiations and say that they’ll very likely get an extension done soon because they always get extensions done with the good players they’ve drafted. Is he worth it? Well, with the current structure of things, the bar for “worth it” is really high. O’Neill is very good but the Vikings also made the NFC Championship game with a combination of Mike Remmers and Rashod Hill at right tackle. That doesn’t mean that right tackles don’t matter, it’s just that the difference in price between Taylor Moton and a player on a rookie deal or run-of-the-mill average free agent like Kelvin Beachum is massive and I’m not sure the performance difference is massive unless it’s an All-Pro vs. scrub. That’s not a knock on O’Neill, he’s really good. It’s just football economics. Now if they are out from under a certain QB contract next year, the math is different.
@mattverick Think willingness to get vaccine will affect which players they pursue to keep after this season? Especially if they get covid and have to miss games?
I think vaccine status could definitely decide who gets cut at the end of this year’s training camp. It’s really hard to say where we’ll be in nine months when teams have to make decisions on players. I hope for the nation’s sake that it’s not a thing by February 2022. If it is, yes, it could impact decisions on long-term contracts and who gets re-signed. Like it or not, teams are very worried about the risk of unvaccinated players either causing games to be forfeited or being lost to illness for long periods of time.
@scapar100 At what point leading up the season should I begin to panic if neither Darrisaw or Davis is working with the ones.
Because Hill has a lot of experience, I don’t think you need to freak out if Darrisaw doesn’t work with the ones during training camp. Brian O’Neill didn’t take first-team snaps in 2018 and has turned out to be a really good player. The panic on Davis is more warranted because of how much they need him. The Dozier/Udoh combo seems like it’s set up for Davis to run past them by the second preseason game. If we’re into the third preseason game and he’s playing in the third quarter, that’s about the time to hit that panic button.
@BD97 Is this years kicker currently on the 90 man?
The caveat to anything I say here is that I don’t believe anyone knows anything about kicking… I’m going to say no. This is the one position that truly might be determined in preseason games because it’s so hard to replicate game kicks on the practice field. Greg Joseph has looked good but I’d guess they have their eye on any proven kickers who could be cut or they’ll bring in other kickers as competition at the first sign of danger.
@smccullough5 What's the best play you've seen at training camp so far?
A toss up between Ihmir Smith-Marsette’s catch on a deep bomb from Kellen Mond, KJ Osborn’s deep catch from Kirk Cousins, Danielle Hunter pulverizing O’Neill on a pass rush rep and Stephen Weatherly throwing Oli Udoh to the ground on an interior rush. Cousins also had a really good throw to Irv Smith Jr. on the move. It’s hard to watch everything at once, so I’m sure I’ve missed things but those plays really jumped out.
@jcord8421 With the praise KJ Osborn has been getting do you think Vikings keep he and Ihmir smith given they used a draft pick on him, along with dede, does that leave chad beebe or bisi out ?
Somebody has to be odd-man out. If it’s Jefferson-Thielen-Westbrook, then the battle ends up being between Osborn, Beebe, Johnson and Smith-Marsette for three spots at most and maybe two. It would be really surprising if they cut Smith-Marsette as a fifth-rounder. So if Osborn can outplay the others, they could lean in his direction because they already know what they have in Beebe/Johnson. It’s going to be a super interesting position to track.
@tfundermann90 If you knew you could make the money work this year but you might need to do a higher end extension next year, who is the one (realistic) player you would trade for right now to help the 2021 Vikings, and what do you give up for them?
If it were possible in any way, I’d get Brandon Scherff from Washington. The Vikings would need $18 million in cap space to do it, so it isn’t really possible but his presence would completely transform the offensive line. They would go from having some pretty big questions to having a monster right side of the line and a talented/young group surrounding that anchor. Right now we’re talking about the right guard battle between two guys who have never taken an NFL snap at guard and a starter from last year who had the league’s worst pass blocking efficiency.
@KyeBaxter What does a typical Vikings camp day look like?
I don’t know exactly how everything works from the player/team perspective but it seems to go something like… players arrive in the morning to work out and go to meetings, then they have a walk-through at 10 or so, they go back to meetings and eat and then come out for practice at 2:15 and practice until around 4. I would imagine some players stay later to watch more tape or review the day’s practice before heading home. It’s a long day. That’s why you see the guys who aren’t capable of keeping up start to fade about midway through.
@DShepeck What have you seen Kene working?
I’ve watched a handful of his reps. It looks like they’re mixing and matching the running backs in the early going. Things will start to clear up when we get to the practices against the Broncos and preseason games. My first impression of Kene Nwangwu is: He’s extremely fast.
@jasnyder123 What 2nd-year player looks like they will take that 2nd-year leap? Also, what reporter eats the most during camp, and what is their snack of choice?
Osborn has looked that part the most but it’s really fundamental to their success that Ezra Cleveland improves. He’s in a pretty serious “iron sharpens iron” situation with Tomlinson, Richardson and presumably Pierce soon going against him every day. So we’ll have a good feeling about where he stands by the end of camp.
If you think I’m tracking what other reporters eat during camp, you’re giving my reporting skills too much credit. I eat a lot of snacks though. Chewy bars, Kit Kats, little bags of popcorn. The snack bowl rules.
@KristieProbst My son and I have tickets to Week 18 vs the Bears. What do you think are the odds that we will get to watch a meaningful game vs. watching a bunch of backups?
Super hard to say. If I had to guess, I’d say you will see a meaningful game because the Vikings and Bears will once again be fighting for playoff position at that point — whether it’s position within the playoffs or outside-looking-in, I have no idea. But I could see them both being in that spot. It’s impossible to know because teams can be locked into any playoff spot and still sit their starters. I’ll be rooting for something meaningful for Week 18 because the final game has been dreadful the last two years.
@RobDN1 I saw some articles about Chandler Jones wanting out of Arizona, is he a good fit for the Vikings and if so can he fit under the cap?
Chandler Jones is probably a good fit for anyone. From 2017-2019 he had 49 sacks. Add him to this defensive line and they’re the best in the NFL. It’s really hard to see them figuring out the cap in order to get him. I suspect Jones wants to be one of the highest paid players at his position and there’s no amount of trickery that makes $20+ million per year work.
@CarlisleKirby Isn't it football malpractice if the Vikes go into the season with Dakota Dozier as a starting OL?
I wouldn’t go that far. Football malpractice was hiring Matt Patricia and then keeping him for three years. Dozier came back on a very small deal, which suggests everyone has the same idea about his ideal fit, which is a fill-in/backup interior lineman. If he has to start for a few weeks while they wait for Wyatt Davis to be ready, it won’t ruin the season. I’m also interested to see if we get any Mason Cole appearances at guard, by the way.
@MCBoneGuy What insight do reporters get from training camp? What does a day at training camp look like for you?
There’s so much going on at camp that it’s hard to keep up. You have coaches and star players talking, sometimes for the first time in a long time. As much as people seem to snark about “coach speak” during press conferences, we learn a ton from these guys. Just today we found out exactly how Patrick Peterson is helping younger players get better. We learned about Justin Jefferson’s mentality going into Year 2 as a star. We learned about Zimmer’s view on adapting over the years. That was before we even started practice.
Once practice began, we looked at where everyone was playing and took in the lay of the land as far as first/second/third team reps and who was participating or sitting out due to injury. And then we looked for signs of guys progressing or falling behind — of which there are all sorts of clues. Lots and lots of FOOTBALL.
A typical day means showing up around 11:30, going to press conferences, going back to the media room to transcribe/write/record and then wandering out to practice, interviewing players afterward and then going home to write and edit the podcast. Finish that around 1 AM and then do it again.
@patr1ckh3 Is Jeff Gladney at training camp?
He is not. We should know soon about whether there’s any chance we see him. If he’s indicted, I’d guess we do not.
@JoshuaR_Smith Harrison Smith is heading into his 10th season. There are about 19 safeties in the PFHOF. For those of us who have watched the entirety of his career, his impact is undeniable on what has largely been a top-level defense during an era when DBs’ jobs have been made more and more difficult. But does Harry have Canton credentials? Does he need another year or two of high-level play? Would that even matter, considering how under-the-radar he’s been forever? Does he need to grow his hair long like he had it at Notre Dame and do a Head & Shoulders commercial a la Polamalu?
The objective view on this from Pro Football Reference’s “Hall of Fame Monitor” is that he really isn’t in the ballpark. He’s comparable to guys like Terry McDaniel, Roy Williams and Kam Chancellor.
The bar for defensive backs is really high. Guys who are around “average” HOFers by the PFR metric are Troy Polamalu, Brian Dawkins and LeRoy Butler (who should be in!).
Harrison only has one All-Pro. There’s only three other HOF DBs who only have one and those guys have rings. So I’d say it’s a long shot unless he gets a ring. I don’t say that to take away from his excellence at all.
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