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September 17, 2024 • 42 mins
Vikings Head Coach Kevin O'Connell joins the show to recap Sunday's big win against the 49ers, preview the Texans matchup, & more! Plus, a special guest appearance from Pete Bercich!
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Episode Transcript

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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Fan went deep to seven.

Speaker 2 (00:48):
Minnesota reached twenty accounting to go in the third quarter,
barby to pass.

Speaker 3 (00:55):
My catsman, He didn't really go crazy. He's having him awesome.

Speaker 4 (01:00):
Game and the Vikings have battered cropped five times, five sacks,
just like last game against the Giants. Third and fifteen,
one of six on third down, third ands well from
the Niners forty nine party back to pass.

Speaker 5 (01:20):
He's hit sacks back at the forty three yard line.
Patrick Jones with his third sack this season. He had
one sack all of last year. He already has three
this season. Second and nine for the Vikings from their
own three. Darnold under center, play action to Jones, back

(01:44):
to pass.

Speaker 3 (01:44):
Bosa picked up deep shot.

Speaker 5 (01:46):
Jefferson, He asked, cut the fifty pack, what to the
forty touch? Back to the twenty five head to the right.
He's trying to outrun the Niners to the five Touchdota.

Speaker 3 (02:00):
Seven your touchdown from stamp.

Speaker 5 (02:03):
Darnold suggestion Jefferson, pen you're Minnesota Vikings have a nine
zero lead.

Speaker 2 (02:14):
Here comes Kevin O'Connell, head coach of the two and
oh Minnesota Vikings two and oh in the NFC.

Speaker 3 (02:19):
Also and Kevin's nice enough to join us.

Speaker 2 (02:21):
The Twin City's Orthopedics Performance Center and the t CEO
Radio Studios, part of the Vikings Entertainment Network. Each and
every Tuesday, at eleven o'clock, I saw your father pregame.

Speaker 3 (02:33):
He seemed a bit nervous. He was. He was like,
I hope we win this one. And I said to him, well.

Speaker 2 (02:39):
I hope your son has a little more confidence with
it today because the forty nine ers haven't won here
since nineteen ninety two.

Speaker 3 (02:46):
And he said, I will be okay. And then you
went out there and put on a good shoulder.

Speaker 6 (02:49):
I said, don't you even come to the stadium if
you're trying to use hope as a strategy. Bill O'Connell,
you know Dave of course, and the security group they
were ready to escort him out the second. They didn't
feel confidence from old Bill. But no, he he's been
the same way since I was about eight years old,
you know, no matter what I was playing, Yeah, now coaching,

(03:10):
it's it's the same old, same over.

Speaker 7 (03:12):
He usually loved having him here.

Speaker 2 (03:14):
He probably was chewing his fingernails on the sideline at
Boyd Stadium off the strip, and yeah, I.

Speaker 7 (03:21):
Was going to throw the ball through thirty five mile
an hour wins.

Speaker 6 (03:24):
I think I completed about four passes that day, so
he's seen. He definitely has reason, especially when I was
in between the white lines to show up to the
game nervous.

Speaker 2 (03:33):
I can tell you that you you pulled off the
nailor trick again. I don't know as much about it
as you do, and quite honestly never will, but only
this time. He coyly motioned inside the tie end and
wore a bit hard.

Speaker 3 (03:46):
Uh. Jalen was big Sunday, wasn't he?

Speaker 7 (03:49):
Yeah?

Speaker 6 (03:49):
I thought he was huge. And it wasn't just Pa.
It wasn't just the routes he caught the ball on.
There were some other really. I thought, it's you know,
even the first third down where we you know, we
didn't convert our first trip down to the red zone.

Speaker 7 (04:03):
Ran a great route.

Speaker 6 (04:04):
They were playing eleven double Jefferson shocker, and he ends
up with you know, running a route versus man coverage
and was wide opening the back of the end zone.
Just a little timing, little push in the pocket kind
of threw that off for Sam and the defender from
a you know, covering another player. Actually one of the
double players for Justin fell off and kind of got
back in the play. That particular play that he did

(04:27):
score on, he just did an unbelievable job. So we're
really trying to sequence up and make that look and
really feel like a running play. You know, even how
he short motioned down in there almost was the feeling
you get sometimes of that gray area for a receiver
shorting down to block that safety wasn't really a pre

(04:49):
rotated defense. He kind of had to bait that safety
into coming down, and when he did, then he continued
his motion on in between the tight end and Brian
O'Neill right there, which then now they're in man covers.

Speaker 7 (05:00):
They're trying to figure out, okay, we lock in this thing.

Speaker 6 (05:03):
The second they decided to lock it, that put really
ward is the sea gap sea gap defender right there,
which we had run enough duos and in different runs
where we were bouncing the ball out on that corner,
putting him in a total conflict.

Speaker 7 (05:17):
So I knew the next.

Speaker 6 (05:18):
Time we got in you know, that area to run
that play, I knew that was going to be coming up.
I did not know it would come off of Josh
mattelis you know, with a fantastic interception right there.

Speaker 7 (05:28):
So it was really really well executed.

Speaker 6 (05:30):
Love the protection, great sell by Sam on the fake
and you know, made it look probably a lot easier
to everybody watching the game than it actually has.

Speaker 7 (05:39):
A lot of detail goes into that stuff.

Speaker 2 (05:41):
I mean, that was an elongated, brilliant, detail oriented answer
and we all love it listening to KFA and watching
at Vikings dot com.

Speaker 7 (05:49):
Not too elongated though, No work on that.

Speaker 2 (05:51):
Well you can talk about you can talk with Extra
mend or Jeff about that later. We happen to love
your long answers here on radio. Okay, so you can
be as long wind does you want.

Speaker 3 (06:01):
I would prefer to lay it out as you pulled
the nailer trick off again with the fake run or
whatever he did, and there was a mark, you found
the mark and it worked. It was just beautiful Cordelle
flowed into whatever. But all right, so so here's what
I love all right about Jalen.

Speaker 2 (06:14):
All right, because this goes back to like when we
were talking organized team activities.

Speaker 3 (06:19):
Then through training camp.

Speaker 2 (06:21):
Then you know we're doing the simulcast during training camp,
starting with the Raiders and and with Bursa and or Libra.

Speaker 3 (06:27):
I'm kind of like, wow.

Speaker 2 (06:28):
I mean, Kevin's opening things up here in preseason a
little bit, some different type of plays. You know, I
don't know what the plays are, but they were longer
than than like your first year or two in preseason
and Naylor you and then you said in one of
the pregame interviews with me, we're going to feature Naylor today. Yep,
well so so all right, so he's healthy and and

(06:48):
then Addison gets the ankle at Cleveland and then and
then the other ankle against the Giants.

Speaker 3 (06:53):
So now the guy you featured, you're.

Speaker 2 (06:55):
Raising the one I know you're fond of, the one
who's gifted, and now the one who's put in a
spot and the one who comes through.

Speaker 3 (07:03):
Yeah, those are just awesome stories.

Speaker 2 (07:05):
That you just don't see a time at least, I don't,
you know, in my course of of the NFL.

Speaker 7 (07:10):
Yeah.

Speaker 6 (07:10):
I think the first point you made Pa is he's healthy,
and there.

Speaker 7 (07:14):
Has not been one. I can remember.

Speaker 6 (07:17):
Jalen Naylor's rookie mini camp when he was out there
and we're just like, man, like, we knew this guy
had talent, but holy cow, he's gonna be able to
help us, and then there just seemed to be one
little stumbling, stumbling block out in front of him after
the next, and he's just consistently put it all together.
He's had a great, you know, complete process of the

(07:38):
spring training camp. Even getting the ankle late in training camp,
you thought, okay, is this gonna derail his.

Speaker 7 (07:44):
Momentum right now? And he works his way back.

Speaker 6 (07:47):
Was not even one hundred percent for that opener versus
the Giants, but declared that he wanted to go, and
he went out there and had a huge impact. And
now he's got momentum on his side, he's got confidence
on his side. But I can tell you the confidence
for me is never wavered. I just knew we just
needed to have him available for him to have the
impact he said.

Speaker 2 (08:04):
You love when I say things like and you opened
it up a little more than usual in the preseason,
right because I have no idea what I'm talking about.
I'm just the announcer watching the plays, thinking, hey, wow,
Jaron didn't get any play action or any boots in
these spots last time, but he did here and somebody okay, anyway.
Three two Kevin O'Connell, coach of the Minnesota Vikings each
and every Tuesday nine to noon. Well to land the

(08:27):
plane with Naylor. So you had one of the biggest
plays of the game was that third and eight late yep,
and just how you drew it up. You got Sherfield here,
Brandon Powell there, Johnny Munt here, Jalen Naylor are there
in your tailback CJ Ham And it did big grab
by Nailor yep, because Darnold found him, was not afraid
to go to him. It was a little low or

(08:48):
either or Nailor went a little far, but he brought
it in for a massive third down conversion.

Speaker 6 (08:53):
Yeah, and really, Sam's placing that ball on a route
where Jalen's actually reading coverage. So that route would look
completely different if the coverage declared differently, whether it was
man to man or single high zone, fire zone, whatever
could have been. So he's reading that route making a
really smart read on coverage. Because they did try to

(09:13):
we call it twenty two mask. It basically means they
try to present all their man matchups and then they
play two DP zone out of that look. You know,
Brian Flores does that often with our defense, and we've
seen it. Have a real negative effect on opposing quarterbacks,
just the extra confusion.

Speaker 7 (09:30):
Hold it one click longer? Can the rush get home?

Speaker 6 (09:33):
And what I loved about that play was really the
decisiveness of Jalen and Sam kind of working together. What
I mean by that is Speedy reads that coverage, puts
his foot in the ground and hits the gas north
and then Sam, feeling his body language being as decisive
as it was, He's able to now kind of place
that ball on the back hip of Jalen away from

(09:53):
the defender, away from the defender and high enough to
get over any underneath coverage. It ended up having, you know,
we had about three people on Bosa on the backside
on the play just to ensure it. And the best
part about that whole sequence, PA, that whole seven almost
seven minute drive, is there was literally Keenan McCardell piecing
together where who was going to be and I was

(10:14):
calling for, Hey, I need Speedy to be the X
on this play. Okay, Speedy's the Z, Sam tell Speedy
he's the Z here.

Speaker 7 (10:21):
Hey, Speed, he's the F here.

Speaker 6 (10:22):
Wow Surefield, Tristan Jackson and BP kind of just playing
musical chairs and still making an impact, catching the football.
BP had a huge conversion, nice little pick play versus
Manda Man. Just the execution when we had to have
it because they had clearly coming off of you know, Aaron,
you know, we have a very unfortunate play. We should

(10:43):
be in the end zone celebrating. Ball comes out, all
Pro makes a play Fred Warner and then they go
ninety nine the other way, you know, pretty methodically, kind
of taking the air out of us Bank Stadium there
for a little bit. There's a little feeling of uneasiness.
You know, it's not just our fans. We're feeling like, hey,
NFC champions and we just allowed them back in the game.
We got to go make a drive happen. We got

(11:04):
to go make some plays. We don't have Justin, we
don't have Jordan, we don't have tj. We're about to
come to life. The quarterback is going to make some plays.
My confidence was high as long as the execution was there,
and it was and I was pretty darn excited about it.

Speaker 3 (11:18):
Oh, we were happy the air was taken out.

Speaker 2 (11:19):
I mean after you had the air condition excuse me,
after it they was so steamy and well, I mean
Trent Williams, I mean last time we saw Truent Williams
was Monday night football.

Speaker 3 (11:28):
He was walking to the locker room for an ivy.
That's okay, so big people get tired, you know, And
it was not in there.

Speaker 6 (11:34):
Man may have gone into you know, our decision to
have the doors open, you know there in the end zone.

Speaker 7 (11:40):
It may or may not.

Speaker 6 (11:42):
I cannot confirm that, un but I know, uh, you know,
I always you know, I talked to Dexter Lawrence a
long time after the first game because I always liked
talking to the.

Speaker 7 (11:52):
Real elite players that we play.

Speaker 6 (11:53):
Against, and just you know, it's it's awesome for me
to get that immediate feedback, you know, I get let
them know how much I respect I have for him.
And the hours upon hours I did not sleep preparing
for players like a Dexter Lawrence, Nick Bosa, all the
guys that you can go a warner, you can keep
on going ward with their defense, Leonard Floyd.

Speaker 7 (12:14):
But you know, I talked to Bosa.

Speaker 6 (12:16):
After the game, and he's always he had that same
look on his eye last year, and he doesn't like
when we go fast.

Speaker 7 (12:21):
He likes to you know, the.

Speaker 6 (12:23):
Great players in our league play really hard on every
single snap, and they've got a decision to make when
we use tempo. Are you going to stay in the
game and keep playing to your same standard, and normally
the answer is yes, or are you going to go
out for one or two plays? And if that happens,
we would like to keep them over on the sideline
as long as possible.

Speaker 7 (12:42):
So the doors being opened may have had something to
do with it.

Speaker 3 (12:45):
Y and big people get tired. What what do you
like about Chandler's game?

Speaker 2 (12:49):
And because you will talk about quarterbacks mostly about about
a quiet mind. Well, I know I'm not getting too
far out of my lane here and trying to be
Vince Lombardi. You roll your eyes at me again. But
he's playing with a quiet mind, isn't he. He's comfortable.

Speaker 6 (13:04):
Yeah, you know, I'm glad you asked about ty You know,
in a game that we saw a lot of played
ninety seven yard touchdown and Sam making some big time plays.
But what I liked the most about Tye's performance is
he understands that we're going to really try to feature
Aaron Jones. He understands we're going to try to feature
different aspects of our offense. But ty has a huge role,

(13:26):
explosive power, He's got great vision.

Speaker 7 (13:29):
I thought he had some great reads when to bounce,
when to.

Speaker 6 (13:32):
Hit it up inside, when to get north and south
running through tackles. Loved the wide zone we ran late
in the game, kind of down towards the end zone
where he ends up one on one with the corner
with about you know, three four yards to go to
get the first down, and he ends up getting the
first down by about five yards and staying in bounds.

Speaker 7 (13:49):
What a love for him to stay in bounds.

Speaker 6 (13:51):
Uh, you know when we we we we attempted a
little bit of a trick play there, but Ty and
you know what it was. It was it was totally
on me because I had talked to the officials before
the game about that play, but I needed to remind
them in the moment because that's past interference when you know,

(14:11):
as it doesn't need to just be the quarterback that
is throwing the football to elicit a pass interference penalty.
So as Johnny Munt was trying to, you know, kind
of sneak his way through there and should have been
standing by himself Naylor like in the right corner of
the end zone to kind of put a bow on
it for the day defender at the last minute kind
of sniffs it out and just kind of gets a

(14:32):
flipper out there on Johnny throws his momentum off and
then the whole play is pretty much done from there.
But you know, aggressive play call for sure, we did
want Ty to stay in bounds if he didn't make
the throw. I thought he did a great job making
a good decision getting north for any positive yards we
could get. But Ty was huge love Todd Chandler, and

(14:52):
he's getting better every single time he goes and plays,
and that's gonna be huge.

Speaker 7 (14:57):
For Aaron, It's gonna be huge. I think both Aaron and.

Speaker 6 (15:00):
Tire well over five yards five yards of carry right now.
So I've been really, really pleased with both those guys.

Speaker 2 (15:06):
Well, we have a talk back for you occasionally. We
did a text last week, but we had some people
go to the free iHeartRadio app and lead fifteen to
thirty seconds speaking of a confidence and poise and a
quiet mind. Aaron from Cottage Grove left this what's.

Speaker 8 (15:22):
Up guys, Hey, coach O'Connell. I just had a question
from more of a psychological analytical perspective in how do
you as an NFL coach, just remains poised and in
the present and calm on the sideline when us as
fans on the couch, not even in the stadium with
people screaming. My heart's pumping out of my chest. So

(15:43):
I just wanted to get your take and perspective on
how you remain calm on the sideline and execute.

Speaker 7 (15:48):
Thank you.

Speaker 6 (15:49):
Yeah, that's a great question, and I think there's two
parts to that answer. I think the first and foremost
is I believe true leadership shows the most poise, the
most common.

Speaker 7 (16:00):
You know, when when the you know, when the when the.

Speaker 6 (16:03):
Temperature is hottest, when it's bullets, when the bullets are flying.

Speaker 7 (16:07):
When the moment of the game.

Speaker 6 (16:08):
If you allow that to overcome your ability to make
a decisions, ability to you know, ultimately be a calming
presence for your football team.

Speaker 7 (16:18):
That will have a negative effect.

Speaker 6 (16:20):
It may not always, you know, the guys might be
able to overcome my lack of poise if I were
to show that, and I got a lot of confidence
in our guys.

Speaker 7 (16:27):
But that is definitely part of it.

Speaker 6 (16:29):
But then the other part of it is when you
have that button on your belt where you can talk
directly to the quarterback. If you portray, if I, as
the play caller, portray any kind of franticness or stress
or that all travels through that headset to the quarterback.
And I just believe wholeheartedly my job in those moments,
specifically when we're on offense and I'm talking to Sam.

(16:52):
He needs to hear confidence, he needs to hear poise.
He needs to hear that the guy calling plays is
calling plays with the utmost amount of belief in him,
because that can be a really powerful thing. And I've
experienced it the other way. Maybe it was my playing
career when I'd hear a play call come into the headset,
I guess we're just gonna try some go balls here.

Speaker 7 (17:14):
Just go ahead and give it a shot.

Speaker 6 (17:15):
We don't think you're gonna hit it, but yeah, yeah,
go ahead and call it. I want to make sure
that a quarterback that plays for me never feels like that, Wow,
And I believe in what we're gonna call, And the
preparation would be I guess it's a three prong approach.

Speaker 7 (17:27):
Then the preparations what's.

Speaker 6 (17:28):
Allow you to allows you to feel like that I
know what I'm calling, I know what I'm seeing I'm
trying to attack as the twelfth member of our offense
when I'm calling plays. It doesn't always work out, but
we put a heck of a lot of time into
make sure we give ourselves better than good chances for
it to work out.

Speaker 2 (17:44):
Great question, though, is it nerve racking? Were right before
you got in here, I was chatting with Ben Gaslin
from the Star Tribune and we were chatting about Sam Darnold,
and I'm like, well, if you don't trust your quarterback,
you don't go play action out of the end zone.

Speaker 3 (17:58):
I mean, that's just kind of simpler, stickly speaking.

Speaker 2 (18:00):
I put it like that, and O'Neil had to give Bosa,
well done there, h MVP on that play. But so
so is it nerve racking running play action out of
the end zone?

Speaker 3 (18:12):
Period? No matter if you have Brady Darnold or whomever.

Speaker 6 (18:15):
Oh yeah, because you're you know, part of play calling
is not just scheming and designing plays versus you know,
matchups and things like that. You're also playing the game
within the game versus your your your counterpart on the
other sideline.

Speaker 7 (18:29):
They just you know, we had just run a.

Speaker 6 (18:31):
Run and and you know we got I told myself
going into that first run, if we get two yards,
I'm calling this thing yeah, because what I wanted them
to think is, hey, we just stuffed to run. They're
going to try to get there, get themselves a little
bit of a room to punt that ball, you know,
from the shadow of their own goalposts right there. So
I know, I didn't necessarily know exactly how it would materialize,

(18:52):
but I thought we would get single high, which would
elicit the.

Speaker 7 (18:55):
Look that I was hunting.

Speaker 6 (18:56):
And then also there was a chance for possibly a
back of fire zone, which you know for fans out there,
that was Fred Warner running through the A gap and
when that happened, the integrity of the underneath coverage is
now lost.

Speaker 7 (19:08):
I knew we would at least have Jalen Naylor, hopefully
in rhythm.

Speaker 6 (19:13):
And then obviously I had, you know, prepped this thing
off of a look we had run last year where
if Jets had a step that ball was going up.
Didn't necessarily know it would be ninety seven yards, but
you know that play was getting called in the game,
and especially in that situation, you know, sometimes they jump out,
jump out at the call sheet, they jump right off
at you those Those are the ones where I don't

(19:34):
tell anybody before I'm doing it because I don't want
the more conservative types on the headset. I won't mention
any names to start screaming out, coach, you know this
could happen, that could happen. I'd rather not put that,
you know, Ricky Bobby said it. Don't you put that
on me, Ricky Rby or whatever it was. I don't
let our coaches do that sometimes. Other times they know
when I'm asking for some for some help, and you

(19:57):
know they're always ready to go.

Speaker 3 (19:58):
So wait, you're living dangerously here.

Speaker 2 (20:00):
I mean, you got Bosa saying your play action out
of the end zone with Bosa single and and Fred
Warner on a blitz well and your quarterback has to
step up and throw a fifty someond yard dime and
it all worked, but you got the look like.

Speaker 6 (20:13):
Yeah, and the thing was it was it's kind of
that risk reward. Yeah, if they send the backer, I
know it's going to be open. But I also know
both Bosa's going to be singled up because if they
don't send the backer, Ed Ingram's gonna help on Bosa.
You know, fans should go back and take a look
at that play. Really two other performances on that play.
Aaron Jones really helping ed Ingram you know, kind of
got a quick inside move from the d tackle and Aaron,

(20:37):
you know, all one hundred and eighty pounds of them,
kind of fits up that d tackle and keeps him
from penetrating, allowing Sam to step up. And they here
at Bradbury you know, ends up running his you know,
Fred Warner come, you know, blitzing that a gap. He
ends up running him past Sam so Sam could step up.
There was an unbelievable effort on you know, we're ready
for the corner to potentially add in off the backside.

(21:00):
That's one of those plays that goes down where you
can stand up in front of the team like I
did yesterday and say this does not happen without all
eleven guys on the field doing their job, knowing exactly
what to do in a critical moment of the game.

Speaker 3 (21:12):
Wow.

Speaker 6 (21:13):
And that's how you beat a team like the San
Francisco forty nine. And you're going to have to make
some plays just.

Speaker 7 (21:19):
Like that to be able to do it.

Speaker 2 (21:20):
And the reaction on the sideline, you know, as the
ball was in the air. I mean in looking back
at some things now I understand.

Speaker 3 (21:27):
The A to the B to the C to the D,
and you got the whole thing to work, including a
couple of safeties on justin you know where you eventually,
but it has to play actions, step up, wait safeties
on eighteen he's going to get behind him, and he did.

Speaker 2 (21:41):
And that's fascinating how you laid that out. This is
Kevin o'connall, head coach of the Minnesota Vikings. X's and
no's and nine to noon each and every Tuesday. How
much with with your defense? And like Gilmore, you know,
just got here like a month ago or whatever, and
Griffin was here, but then he got hurt, so he
was down for like a month or whatever. But your rush,

(22:04):
how much is your rush being as good and unpredictable
as it is helping Gilmore, Griffin and maybe some others
get up to speed, get acclimated, get the football legs.

Speaker 7 (22:14):
Yeah, I think it's huge.

Speaker 6 (22:15):
We always talk about Russian coverage working together, but what
I think you're seeing more oftentimes than not. I know,
our defense has generated a lot of pressures, doesn't always
equal sacks, but it generates uncomfortable quarterbacks, and we've seen
it in two games now where there may be some
things kind of materializing down the field, some manipulators that covers.

Speaker 7 (22:36):
There's a lot of good coaches in this league.

Speaker 6 (22:38):
But if that quarterback gets moved off the spot, he
can't step into throws and he can't push the ball
down the field based upon what platform we've forced him
to move with. That can be a winning edge to
where truly the back end and the front end are
really working together. And I've just seen it. I think
Flow and his staff are doing a tremendous job. You
saw Cash on a you know, a stunt away from

(23:01):
kind of where Grenard and all these other guys are.
We're sending Cash and we're getting a pick stunt for
him to go get a sack. You know, obviously Ginkel
and Grenard's the guy that they keeps jumping out at
me because so many people focus on sacks.

Speaker 7 (23:14):
Wow.

Speaker 6 (23:15):
And he's been affecting the quarterback basically every drive we've
had since you know, his tenure here started with the Vikings.

Speaker 7 (23:23):
He's two games in a ton of.

Speaker 6 (23:25):
Quarterback pressures, unique moves, strain finish and he hasn't quite
gotten that. You know finish where he gets a guy
on the ground yet, but he's probably contributed to about
five six seven drives ending right there just by his
own personal performance forcing a throwaway or an inaccurate throw
because it's either too earlier off the spot. So I

(23:45):
want to continue to see him do those things and
the results of sacks, which are important. We'll start showing
up for JG. But he's been phenomenal for us.

Speaker 2 (23:53):
Okay, Now, by the way, we are playing the Texans
this weekend at noon, and they have some good players
in their undefeaty moment. Kevin talked about Jefferson yesterday assumingly
it's still a day to day. Got to get to Wednesday,
see how things were.

Speaker 6 (24:06):
Okay, Cole, he's doing well though, he is doing really well,
and uh you know, he's responded really well to treatment
early on to see how he's weak.

Speaker 7 (24:14):
Yeah, kind of progresses.

Speaker 2 (24:15):
The difference between a head coach into a microphone and
the announcer into the microphone is the way I put it,
is he miss and the digs game. So that's it.
Justin's not missing the digs.

Speaker 7 (24:25):
I want to discount the stingy aspect of it.

Speaker 6 (24:27):
Either those two the LSUS and he's becoming.

Speaker 2 (24:33):
One third overall pick in twenty twenty two. Of course
he picked off Caleb all right, Okay, yeah.

Speaker 7 (24:39):
That's that'll be before the end of the week. That's uh.

Speaker 6 (24:43):
Storyline might materialize a little bit between those two guys.

Speaker 7 (24:46):
I know they're close.

Speaker 2 (24:47):
We have an eleven thirty here, Okay, cool. Last one.
On the previous game, Van Ginkle almost stole another. He
almost went house slash Daniel Jones on it. This may
be an eye roll, but do you I think it
helped him that he went against the Mike McDaniel offense
in Miami, and McDaniel was the ocann was that excuse me,

(25:08):
was the offensive coordinator for Shanahan. So they run a
lot of the same stuff.

Speaker 6 (25:13):
I think, so you know, and I just wouldn't discount
Gink's previous experience inflows defense either of understanding there's only
so many answers versus some of the looks that we
present to people. So ginks seeing every bubble screen known
to man. He's seen every flare pass to the halfback.
He's seen it all, and he can feel the body

(25:34):
language of the quarterback. That was unique because Brock was
underneath the center, and he still got to play his runfit,
run responsibility critical down right there, and he just feels
it and reacts.

Speaker 7 (25:45):
He almost got.

Speaker 6 (25:46):
Another one, and that would have been even more impressive
just because of some of those factors I was talking about,
than than the Giants play that he made.

Speaker 7 (25:54):
But what an impact he's had on our team.

Speaker 6 (25:57):
And it's it's not just in between the white lines,
makes smarter, makes us tougher, more instinctive, and it just
kind of pairs with the Harry's and the Mattellis cash
and the rest of our our guys to fly around
and play fast with it with a ton of jukes.

Speaker 2 (26:12):
It would have been a longer one than the one
that met life, you know. And it also was in
the second half, so hopefully would have gotten there given
you had the air conditioning turned out. Excuse me, given
how hot it wasn't there with the doors open on
the west side and certain players got gassed. All right,
Daniel Hunter, how's he getting along? And how's he getting
along with Will Anderson Junior as the bookender.

Speaker 7 (26:32):
Yeah, these guys are Daniel's playing fast.

Speaker 6 (26:34):
I mean you any fan could watch that game the
other night and see fifty five flying around the field,
affecting the quarterback gets you know sex, you know he's
going to generate pressures. You've got to have a plan
for him. It's not all that much different than what
we just came out of the other day, where we
had to know where ninety seven was at all times.

Speaker 7 (26:52):
It's going to be the same way with fifty five
in this game. We know him.

Speaker 6 (26:56):
I know he's going to be fired up, ready to
come back to the US Bank Stadium. Anderson happens to be,
you know, a pretty premier player himself. On the other side,
they're really fast young defense. They've got a ton of
playmakers at the second level, Jimmy Ward's and Petrie. These
guys know how to tackle. They're instinctive. This is gonna
be a heck of a challenge for our football team.

(27:17):
We've got to play well in all three phases. We
can give them nothing and hopefully have a chance to
go get our our our second win at US Bank Stadium,
third of the season. I cannot emphasize enough how important
playing at home is to me personally in our team
this year based upon last year. We're never looking backwards,
but we just know how good. We have it with

(27:39):
the best fans in football, best home environment football. We
got to keep that going because we know we you know,
we keep building upon this success, our fans are only
going to get louder and louder and louder, and we're
gonna get this thing rolling.

Speaker 9 (27:52):
So it has.

Speaker 2 (27:53):
Nico Collins always been beastly good, just unbelievable like this
he has.

Speaker 6 (27:58):
You know, you go back to I studied him a lot,
come out. He was always the big body, kind of
contested catcher. I mean, this guy has really developed his route,
running runs the whole stam in breakers, outbreakers. He's as
competitive as they come. He's really come on there. I
think they've done a great job with him.

Speaker 3 (28:15):
Last one.

Speaker 2 (28:16):
What were the chess matches like with Demico the two
years you were in La and he was in San Francisco.

Speaker 6 (28:21):
Yeah, you know that they're going to be incredibly sound
from a standpoint of how they build their scheme. It's
not going to be overly complicated. And then all of
a sudden, you come to the line one time and
it's more than complicated.

Speaker 7 (28:34):
You're you're worrying about.

Speaker 6 (28:36):
People so much during the game, and the simplicity of
a defense, one man, one gap kind of defense, and
then he can throw something out you at any point
in time. So going back there, we got to be
careful not to have too much inventory in the back
of our minds to chase.

Speaker 7 (28:50):
Ghosts all day.

Speaker 6 (28:50):
But we got to be ready for just about everything
that they can throw at us. And it's this is
a really good defense, pa a lot of speed on
the field. We're going to have to play as physical
and fast. That was the other thing I liked about
the other day. I felt like we're playing fast, yeah,
to go along with the physicality we saw.

Speaker 7 (29:07):
So I'm gonna need all that and then some really
good football team coming in this week.

Speaker 3 (29:11):
Terrific. Thank you, Yeah, thank you.

Speaker 2 (29:12):
Kevin O'Connell, Lexes and No's and nine to Noon at KFA,
n and Vikings dot com.

Speaker 3 (29:17):
Back after this, Hey Rubes.

Speaker 10 (29:29):
This football season, Bell Bank is giving one kfan listener
each week one thousand dollars to pay it forward to
a charity of their choice. Just head over to KFA
dot com keyword contest to learn more and entry today
that's Cafe and dot com keyword Contests.

Speaker 9 (29:52):
Welcome back nine to Noon.

Speaker 11 (29:53):
Another unbelievable half hour with the head coach Kevin O'Connell
and nine to noon at the TCS studios here An
egan not without its cameos. Vikings radio analyst Pete burst
in the house.

Speaker 7 (30:05):
How you doing, Peyton good?

Speaker 9 (30:06):
What's going on?

Speaker 12 (30:07):
Just identifying some players, Pa, you know coach coach O'Connell
had mentioned Stingley and watching watching back the Bears playing
the Texans. I'm like, who's this, who's this twenty four?
We should pick on him. He looked awful really at
times against the I'm not lying yet against in my opinion,

(30:28):
it picked off Galob Yeah, but I mean I almost
think it was a deep ball, right, one of the
deep balls. Yeah, because he lasted fifty to fifty balls.
But I could I could point to four or five
plays where he just I don't know if he was off,
if he's nicked up or what. But I because when
I do film, I write I purposefully. Some guys you

(30:49):
just know, but you just write down numbers. And when
it's just a number and not a name, I have,
you know, I just I think give him more fair assessment.
And then when when I heard coach talking about Stingley,
and then I'm like who's twenty.

Speaker 9 (31:01):
Four, because that's what you should go after it. When
I saw it was Stingley, I'm like.

Speaker 2 (31:04):
Well, Connal's koy that way in chats like this, x'es
and o's last year when we did in the TV studio,
and then you would do you would do film where
he brings up something or somebody that he I think
he believes he can attack that. He believes like like
he likes when there are first round picks, certain players' names,

(31:29):
everybody's all over, but he knows he can get them.

Speaker 3 (31:32):
That's a bit of a.

Speaker 12 (31:33):
Belichick bit too, when when you're you know, you're going
out for team stretch and you walk out there and
you see Justin and you go up to.

Speaker 9 (31:41):
Justin and you're like, oh, he got Stingley this week.

Speaker 12 (31:44):
I'm gonna have to have to look to look Addison's way,
hope he's healthy, and just then just walk away.

Speaker 1 (31:49):
Right.

Speaker 12 (31:49):
That's you know, just that's a Belichick bit right there.
It's that mental game. So it's it's just getting It's
all about getting the best out of your players. And
if you have a guy who who that that that
tactic works on, right, he did it. I think he
did it to Lawrence Taylor. If I'm not mistaken that
was the guy that he checked belichicked it. Yeah, he
would just oh right, yeah, I don't.

Speaker 9 (32:11):
I don't know if you know, I'm not counting on
you this week.

Speaker 2 (32:13):
Might have to funnel Harry Carson that way. Yeah, you know,
exactly right. And it's it's just it's just smart. It's
very calculated. And you see that with you know, with
the offense. I just I love how he's like, yeah,
I didn't let anybody else know, BBoy, because I didn't
want any feedback before I called this play.

Speaker 12 (32:28):
And I'm thinking Wes Phillips maybe. But but then again,
it's it's smart because you don't want everybody to just
be a harrumph, yes sir, yeah call it type. You
want you have a thought and you want it to
be challenged and you want to you know. And the
other part that made me laugh was just you know,
being positive on the headsets and I'm like, oh, you

(32:49):
should have played for twice what I mean, it would
have been oh my god, it was hilarious. But but
it is fact.

Speaker 2 (32:59):
If you don't trust that your quarterback, you don't run
play action out of the end zone.

Speaker 12 (33:03):
Right, Well, they had two you know, you had two
tight ends in the game, and it looked like a
running play. And so it's what I do, what I
do enjoy. And this is something I know from Tom
Landry because my dad played for him. Oh wow, oh
that's right. Sixty battle was sixty to sixty three. He
has and he you know, with Landry, he was always

(33:25):
ahead two or three plays right. He wasn't calling the
offense per se, but he was always thinking ahead. And
then hear Kevin say, you know, after that run on
first down, I knew if it was two to three yards,
then they're in that meat grinder of well they're just
going to be conservative here because they don't want to
turn the ball over and get some room for a punt.
It's that thinking a player too ahead, which is for him.

(33:49):
It's got to be unbelievably hard to do because you
have to call the plays in right. And so but
that's the part to me, that that section of the interview,
which was all awesome, by the way, if you get
if you haven't heard, if you didn't hear it, then
go back and listen to it. Somehow, some way you
don't you don't get that type of info from head
coaches very often. And you know, but for his ability

(34:11):
to think ahead like that, that.

Speaker 3 (34:14):
Shows the problems.

Speaker 12 (34:15):
That's the part the feel for the game, And it's
hard to call a game from the sidelines the offensively
or defensively. Tony Dungee always was in the booth because
he had money kiffing on the field. To make adjustments,
you have to have somebody on the field that you
can trust to look somebody in the eye, make an adjustment.
Go to the DB's, go to the line, it doesn't matter.
Just go to whomever needs to needs the needs the help.
So I think coordinators are better when they're up. They

(34:39):
can get a better feel for the game. But I'm
just saying calling a game the way he does from
the field, that is not easy.

Speaker 11 (34:47):
Well how loud all jokes aside about dissension or disagreements
or pushback over the course of that, you know, it's less.

Speaker 3 (34:55):
You know, what is it?

Speaker 11 (34:56):
Twenty five is seconds you're gonna put the play in? Yeah,
you're getting it in before the uh, before the mic
drops off, and then Donald's got to go execute.

Speaker 7 (35:03):
How chaotic is it in the headset?

Speaker 11 (35:05):
If you're if you're head coach guy and your play
caller that because you're getting everybody right.

Speaker 7 (35:10):
That's got it.

Speaker 12 (35:10):
Well, that's got to be organized in a way, and
I know how we did it defensively, but it's got
to be organized in a way where as soon as
the whistle blows, somebody on the headset goes, you're responsible.
This guy over here is responsible for down a distance, right,
so it's gonna be second and seven, and then the
next guy me. Let's say, this is my job. For

(35:30):
a while, I was personnel, so I had the binoculars
like Pa does now, looking at the other sideline for
hand signals or who was coming in and out. Say
all right, twenty personnel, Okay, we're gonna go nickel. So
the coordinator goes nickel, and then someone's in charge of
making sure that the right guy goes in on the field,
and so it's very orchestrated. It's boom boom boom boom,
boom boom boom between each play, and uh, there's a

(35:52):
process there, so you can't. After the play is called,
there might be a little bit of conversation, and then
really the only conversation is if you give up a
big play or something big happens, or a play doesn't
go your way. What happened, and the offensive line coach
might chime in and say, oh, they ran you know,
they ran a spike in the guard overreach and blah
blah blah blah. Done, okay, next play, and then all

(36:15):
those all that stuff gets written down. The plays that
beat you, whatever you get, they get drawn up. A
blitz that gets you gets drawn up. And then in
between series you sit down with the iPad. Because there's
only pictures on the iPad, there's not video. People think
that they watch the video. They don't. They only get
still frame shots, which I think is great. I don't
think because in high school you get video on the sidelines,

(36:36):
right you can watch en zone end zone view of
the you know, of a game because you have a
camera sitting there. He goes you know, radio right to
your They don't do that in the NFL because it's
too it's too much. You game plan too much is
too much work. You've got to be able to see things,
and that puts it on the coaches, which I think
is a great rule that they do it that way.
But there's all that has to be hashed out during

(36:59):
the time you're on the sidelines. Right, So there's a
whole process with all with all of this, and for
him to talk about Keeny McCardell and saying, all right,
this is what I want to run.

Speaker 7 (37:09):
That sounds like a circuit we've got to.

Speaker 12 (37:12):
But all that that circus for Keenan is going on,
not going on in the headsets where Kevin can hear it.
Kevin is just saying I need this, this is what
I'm gonna run. And then Keenan McCardell goes, okay, takes
his headset off. Grab you you're at X, you're at Z,
you're at H. Go That's how you have to do it.

Speaker 2 (37:29):
Lastly, fifteen seconds is unless something, unless you see something
I don't see. They they only use two corners, okay,
they only used Stingley and Lassiter, and they used four safeties.
Two of their safeties act as Nickel, the the A
z z Alshayir and uh Henry too too. Yeah, well

(37:50):
those are the only linebackers they really used.

Speaker 7 (37:52):
They got this.

Speaker 9 (37:53):
Those number five is that who's number five?

Speaker 3 (37:56):
Uh A Petre is a safety?

Speaker 9 (37:57):
Yeah, that guy's a menace.

Speaker 3 (37:58):
He's the former Gopher Eric Murray plays. So their safeties
playing nickel. They have this Hanson Cat thirty five depth
chart middle linebacker.

Speaker 2 (38:08):
No, you know, he didn't play. He hasn't played a
defensive snap all year. I see what you're doing here
to Miko, so I want you to look at best
so we can chat about it later in the week.
It's I've never seen anything like this, only two corners
played snaps.

Speaker 12 (38:19):
The one good thing though, is it's a familiar scheme.
It's a four to three jet type, old school you know. So,
I mean that's why, that's why our guy Daniel is
just loving life.

Speaker 3 (38:28):
Because it just gets to go.

Speaker 12 (38:29):
Yeah, right, So appreciate the screens, get the traps, get.

Speaker 3 (38:32):
The you know, da da da all see the analyst.
You to see it. Pete Bursig with a cameo nine
to noon from tc O PC. You know we well,

(39:04):
Kevin O'Connell, thank.

Speaker 2 (39:05):
You for joining us. Too in a row for KO.
Two in a row for KO, two in a row
for KO. Also two in a row for B Flow,
two in a row for B Flow. He's on the
mic right now.

Speaker 7 (39:14):
He's on the keyboard.

Speaker 3 (39:17):
I think it's that was Alex with the question.

Speaker 13 (39:20):
I think it's just an opportunity to maybe what you
got to take advantage of space that you know, the
offense gives us if it presents itself playing fat, it
doesn't always present itself.

Speaker 3 (39:30):
So it's there's a little bit of a you know.

Speaker 13 (39:32):
You can't really call, hey, run that because you just
don't know what the protection is going to be.

Speaker 3 (39:36):
They're all you can pull it out. They're all playing fast.

Speaker 2 (39:40):
I mean, you got the play caller and the head
coach run in play action with a quarterback nobody.

Speaker 3 (39:46):
Wanted out of the end zone with a.

Speaker 2 (39:49):
Right tackle against a former defensive player of the year
singled up.

Speaker 3 (39:53):
They don't care.

Speaker 2 (39:53):
It's two and zero for Ko and of course he
shuts down ninety seven Nick Bosa. You got Fred Warner,
two time first team All Pro, led the forty nine
ers and tackle six consecutive years. Here he comes on
a blitz. Don't care. We got Aaron Jones to chip
and by the way, if he happened to get through,
we got to edit Ingram on a pole. So we're

(40:14):
gonna take Darnold and go play action on a ninety
seven piece out of the end zone where he has
to step up with Brian Flores. Your team has eleven sacks.
In fact, they're sacking the quarterbacks so much the NFL
has had to designate one a team sack because there
were so many people at the quarterback or at the
ball they couldn't figure out like like who to give

(40:34):
it to. So we got a team sack up in here,
and Matt Daniels, Dolman and the rest of the special
teams group. Kicker never misses. Plus sized punters PLoP on
him inside the twenty for profit left and right.

Speaker 3 (40:47):
He's way back on his game.

Speaker 11 (40:48):
How about that he takes the l on the stat
line because of the Dallas Turner snafu. But he was
fantastic yesterday, right, And that's been you know, special teams wise,
all things considered, it's kind of like, okay, you bring
in a little competition for the plus size punter.

Speaker 7 (41:01):
What's going on there? And he was terrific on Sunday
against the Niners.

Speaker 2 (41:05):
And the Alabama rookie never misses and and CJ. Ham
blocks punts. I mean, it's two in a row for
everybody in the universe right now. Yeah, they're playing so
fast right now, and so and the cohesion and and
just the way things are going and the cool thing
is is that it's like it legitimately is good. I mean,
is it going to be a seventeen to o No,

(41:27):
But but it legitimately is good because it's two and
oh for KO two and oh for b flow two
and o for block puns, don't you know? Or three
oho two and oh for three to oh. But it
the the the narrative, the the opinions formulated off the

(41:48):
well it was just the Giants. Well it was Daniel Jones.
What do you expect that that's no longer in play?

Speaker 3 (41:55):
It's the Niners, man and Niners without McCaffrey. Okay, you
know it's still they still have requisite talent where it's
very difficult to beat them. So things are going swimmingly here.

Speaker 11 (42:07):
This Kevin O'Connell thing, I don't know where it reaches
its apex. These weekly bits today, breaking down plays and
all of that, what a blasting was.

Speaker 2 (42:15):
A TCL and thanks During Bike's bites we got a
chance to hear from his agent, dan Orlovsky talking about
out thinking the thinker, which was cool. That was a
lot of fun today. Great job, that's Nordop. Thank you,
Max Fuller, and I'm Paul Allen. That's nine to noon
from Twin Cities Orthopedics Performance Center, your home from Minnesota.
Vikings football on kfa N. The Coaches Show with p

(42:37):
J Fleck is now.

Speaker 3 (42:41):
Podcast Today's Paul Allen Show.

Speaker 9 (42:43):
We're listening back to previous show and interviews

Speaker 11 (42:45):
By going to the iHeartRadio app or kfan dot com
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