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00:00gets into that end zone. One of the Niner guys could get like a pat on the back at the end of it.
00:04It's unbelievable. And Jim Marshall, Jim Marshall kind of looks around like,
00:08oh jeez. Oh no. Iconic moment. Oh no. Well, let's go behind enemy lines. We're going to go to
00:13Matthew Collar, who covers the Vikings for purpleinsider.com as we go behind enemy lines
00:19here for week number two as the Niners take on the Minnesota Vikings this Sunday at 10 a.m.
00:24When you need to learn about your opponent, you have to go behind enemy lines.
00:31Learning what we need to know about the 49ers next opponent.
00:40Oh, I like that. I like that. I feel like a wrestler's going to come in and show a bunch
00:45of pyrotechnics. Matthew, good morning to you, brother. Matthew Collar joins us here on the
00:50River Island's guest line. All guests on 9570 game appear on the River Island's guest line.
00:57Isn't it time for you to discover the islands, River Island's,
01:00Matthew, how are you doing, man? Good morning. I'm doing well, you know, actually kind of pretty
01:06jacked up for this game after the Vikings blew out the giants, you know, San Francisco gets a
01:10blowout. So let's see how good everybody really is. Right? Absolutely. Now, do they talk about
01:15the Jim Marshall play in Minnesota from way back in 1964? Do you know about that play?
01:21Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. You could not live in Minnesota and not be aware of the Jim Marshall
01:26play. I actually think it might be one of the reasons that he's not in the Hall of Fame,
01:30which I personally think is kind of a travesty that he's not. I mean, he was a captain for the
01:36Vikings for 14 straight years and Bud Grant's favorite player of all time. And I think that
01:42that being his main highlight that everyone thinks of, plus playing on the same line as
01:46Alan Page and Carl Eller probably gets overlooked and people go back to those Pro Bowls, which is
01:52really unfair because all the other Viking defensive linemen were getting those Pro Bowls.
01:56I mean, all time great NFL player, but certainly the quintessential NFL blunder as well.
02:02Wow. That's hell of that's some good knowledge right there. Wow.
02:05Not even the Hall of Fame. Jim Marshall was unbelievable. The Purple People Eaters,
02:09of course, back in the day in the 60s and 70s, of course, the Vikings had a powerhouse out there
02:14going to four Super Bowls. Unfortunately, didn't win one. But Niners and Vikings got a nice little
02:18history. I just brought up the eighty seven game divisional round upset the Apple car. Bill Walsh
02:23almost got fired from that game. We say Niners and Vikings because we are jacked up about it.
02:27And we understand that I'm in the belief that this could be a close game. It's tough playing
02:32in that dome. They got the horn going on. But when I say Niners and Vikings, what do you think of
02:37here, Matthew? Yeah, well, the first thing I think of is just how the Kirk Cousins era Vikings always
02:44struggled so much. But now, you know, now it's kind of a new opportunity to play better against
02:50this team because it felt like every time Kirk Cousins would play the San Francisco defense,
02:56they were able to shut down the run and then they would force Cousins to be a dropback quarterback.
03:00And that wasn't very good for him. That wasn't ideal. I mean, if you talk about back in the day,
03:05of course, eighty seven comes up. But I think of all the talent that these two teams have run out
03:11there, I mean, especially wide receivers, the Randy Boss team, the Jerry Rice team.
03:16How about John Randall going at it with Steve Young throughout the years? I mean,
03:19the histories of these teams, I mean, are incredible. When you look at really,
03:24there's a great stat that all Minnesota fans know, which is that the Vikings have the highest
03:29regular season win percentage of any team without a Super Bowl. So when you look at those
03:34teams that have won a lot of games in the regular season, of course, San Francisco
03:38is up there on that list as well. So all the great players throughout the seasons.
03:42And then you look at this game that's coming up here. You've got your Justin Jefferson,
03:46your Nick Bosa, your two highest paid players in the NFL at their position. So I think almost
03:52every time they play, it's just superstar talent all over the field. Yeah. And you reference
03:56Justin Jefferson. We watched him in the receiver dock and, you know, everybody plays fantasy
04:01football. Now that's kind of how the prism of knowing every team is. And everyone knows he's
04:05a stud. Sam Darnold, however, at quarterback, we have a little bit of familiarity because he was
04:11here backing up. Brock Purdy played in week 18 and, you know, you ask 10 people about Sam
04:18Darnold, you get 10 different answers. So what's the feel on Sam Darnold? It looked like he had a
04:23great week last week. Yeah, he had a phenomenal week. I don't think anybody would have guessed
04:29that he would have had, you know, that, that high of a completion percentage for a guy that's
04:34rarely been over 70% in games in his career. I think I looked this up that he had only had
04:40five games where he had completed 70% of his passes or more. Wasn't that like Steve Young
04:45in 1994 was completing 70% of his past. That's not, that's not exactly that hard to do these
04:54days that Darnold has rarely done it, but you know, what we saw from him during training camp
04:59was Kevin O'Connell working so closely with him about rhythm and timing of an offense.
05:04And I think that in his past, when you go back and look at the receivers that he played with
05:08and the offensive lines that he played with in the past with, with the jets and with the Carolina
05:14Panthers, there was very few opportunities to play with rhythm and timing. And you saw
05:20three-step drop, hitch, throw the ball, five-step drop, hitch, throw the ball
05:24at end receivers are there and they're open. And I think they have a very good
05:29offensive Miami, Kevin O'Connell, who took some pages out of Kyle Shanahan's book with some
05:34really interesting motion. There was a 22 yard pass that Darnold had where they put the full
05:39back in motion and you know, Kyle use check would be pretty proud to see that. And you know,
05:44it kind of took a defender out of the play. The tight end ends up wide open stuff like that.
05:49When I would watch a Sam Darnold back after the Vikings signed him with some of his previous
05:54places, you just didn't see a lot of open receivers. You saw a lot of instant losses
05:59on the offensive line. And this is a team that has two of the best offensive tackles in the NFL
06:04in a Christian Derrissaw and Brian O'Neill. And that just helps a lot. I mean, I don't have to
06:10tell you guys how good a left tackle I could do for your offense. And the fact also, I thought
06:15the real key was Aaron Jones running for 94 yards at almost seven yards to carry.
06:21He was so dynamic in this game and it allowed Sam Darnold to play from ahead, play comfortably.
06:27And if things weren't there, he completed 12 of 13 to tight ends or running backs. If it's not there,
06:33check it down to Aaron Jones. He'll make something happen, throw underneath.
06:36And I think for at least one week, he adopted that mentality. Now, if he goes back to,
06:41it's a tight game or they're losing. And now all of a sudden he feels like he's got to do
06:45everything with the arm. That's where you're going to get those interceptions and sacks and
06:49mistakes from him. Matthew Collar breaking out of Minnesota Vikings here on the River Island's
06:52guest line. Matthew, covers of Vikings for purpleinsider.com, a wealth of knowledge when
06:57it comes to all things Minnesota. Sounds like he knows his football very, very well. All right.
07:01Vikings move on from Kirk Cousins. What other reaction to that? How did Vikings fans feel
07:06about Kirk Cousins moving on to Atlanta where Viking fans basically done with Kirk Cousins was
07:11basically like, Hey, you know what? Let bygones be bygones. We get it. Or was there some venture
07:16all about Kirk Cousins moving out from Minnesota? No, I think that everybody understood that it was
07:21just time. I mean, he had been here for six years and they had won nothing. And their best season
07:27was a fluky 13 win year where they won. I think more of one score games than anybody in history
07:34or something like that, where they ended the season with a negative point differential,
07:38even though they won 13 games. And then they were eliminated by Daniel Jones in the playoffs,
07:43which really showed the actual strength of that team. And that was the best year other than 2019
07:49or where they want to play off game. And as you guys well know, then they got whooped
07:53in the playoffs and that was it. I mean, one playoff win in six years for one of the highest
07:59paid quarterbacks, the NFL every year of his tenure here. I just don't, I think that we had
08:05really fallen into this purgatory type of field. Like you can't really win with him,
08:10but you're never going to be terrible with him. So now what does everybody do? And I think what
08:16place you'd Apple meant. So he used to work out there at San Francisco. I think his mentality
08:20from being there is you, you gotta, you gotta take a swing. I mean, you're not going to
08:25chase a championship with a quarterback in his mid thirties coming off of the killings injury.
08:30And the way I've prepared it just for bike fans. And my feeling is that it's sort of like
08:36the first day of spring and you open up the windows, you get all that fresh air that comes
08:40in. That's what it felt like to draft JJ McCarthy. And that's even what it felt like to beat the New
08:44York giant. But this is, this is new. This is different. They added so much talent on the
08:49defensive side that I thought didn't get talked about maybe enough because everyone was focusing
08:54so much on the quarterback situation. I don't think this team is suddenly, well, you get rid
08:58of Kirk cousins and now you compete for a championship. I don't think that, but you could
09:03see down the road of being able to add talent with the cap space that, that he, you know, allowed them
09:09to have now in the future. I mean, you look at what Dak Prescott made, think about this JJ
09:13McCarthy's salary next year is going to be like $50 million less than, you know, top starting
09:19quarterback. Everybody knows what you could do with that cap space. San Francisco's doing it
09:23right now around Brock Purdy. That's the model they're trying to chase. So I think everybody in
09:28the fan base understood that. And I think you're actually going to get a new energy from the fans
09:32in us bank stadium, where I thought it was an incredible atmosphere, but I thought there was
09:36some lethargy there. I thought that, that they just had not had the same energy for that team
09:41that I think will be restored a little bit here on a opening day. Interesting. What do you think
09:46of Brock Purdy? You've referenced him a couple of times right now. I think he's fantastic. Honestly,
09:52I think that we obsess over ranking quarterbacks and we look at who's the tallest and who throws
09:58the hardest. And I don't know, my entire life was dominated by, well, a short guy from a BYU
10:05in San Francisco, complete all passes and winning all the time. And then Tom Brady,
10:10a late round draft pick who couldn't move really at all. I mean, look, I just, I look at it as
10:17offenses and offensive success. And this is why I probably give Jared Goff more credit than most
10:21people to what does your offense do with this quarterback? Does your offense put up the third
10:27most points in the league like San Francisco did last year? And I also really like that he has a
10:34playmaking element to him. And I think we saw that last year when the Vikings played against
10:38Brock Purdy that it's not just, Oh, well he throws to Kyle Shanahan's wide open receivers.
10:43Well, you know, we got a quarterback here who played for Kyle Shanahan,
10:47Nick Mullins, and all respect to him for having an NFL career, but he didn't win very many games
10:5249ers. So I don't think you could just draft any guy in the last pick and throw him out there.
10:58I think that he's special that he sees the field unbelievably well for a guy his size.
11:03And then when things break down, you have to pay attention to him. You saw that in the NFC
11:07championship. So I don't worry too much about how somebody for whatever website ranks quarterbacks.
11:14I just look at when the team I cover is going to play another team. How worried are you about
11:19the quarterback putting up a ton of points? And I would say very, very worried about Brock Purdy
11:23putting up a lot of points. Wow. Matthew Collar here on the River Islands guest. So I covered the
11:27Vikings for purple insider.com. Love some, some Brock Purdy here. And I think a lot of fans are
11:31starting to warm up to Brock Purdy and are excited to see him play without Chris McCaffrey, who it
11:36doesn't sound like we'll go a quick update on Jordan Addison, Matthew, and then who was a guy
11:41at a Vikings two-part question for you, Jordan Addison, will he be available because he destroyed
11:46the Niners last Monday night football without Justin Jefferson, of course, to cover zero
11:49blitz right before halftime and score that touchdown. And two, who's the guy in the Vikings
11:53that Niner fans should be paying attention to that nobody knows about? Yeah. So Jordan Addison,
12:00it doesn't seem great. Just the way that Kevin O'Connell has talked about it. O'Connell is
12:04usually leaning toward optimistic when it comes to injuries. But even he didn't try to spin it
12:10too much yesterday. He missed practice. We'll see what happens today as far as practice goes. But
12:16if it's a high ankle sprain, that usually takes a couple of weeks to get back. And Addison has
12:20kind of had issues with his ankles recently. I don't expect him to play at this moment, but
12:26things can change as we go forward. And I know that would be a sigh of relief for 49ers fans,
12:31because he is that good. Jordan Addison is a tremendous wide receiver. So that would be a
12:36big blow. And next man up is definitely somebody you'd have to be in a 30-team fantasy league to
12:42know about Jalen Naylor, I think, because he's a guy that had maybe nine catches going into
12:49this year previously, but he's struggled with health. When he's healthy, he can play. He scored
12:54a touchdown last week. He's more of a deep threat wide receiver, but plays in a similar type of
13:00fashion as a, as a shifty type of route runner who can make contested catches. The team has been
13:05really high on him for a couple of years now, but he's just running for these health issues.
13:10So now that he's finally healthy, that's somebody that they should pay attention to.
13:14And the other guy I think is Ty Chandler, who wasn't a huge part of the game plan
13:17last week because Aaron Jones was so good, but Chandler is a guy that runs
13:22four, three. He's pretty big guy and has some real jolt to them. They like to throw
13:27little screen passes, swing passes, and he can kind of make something out of nothing.
13:30So I think they're going to need contributions from pretty much everywhere. If Addison is out,
13:35because they also don't have TJ Hockinson either. So they're a little bit shorthanded here,
13:39even though of course, just the Jefferson is always going to be just the Jefferson.
13:43Wow. I can't wait for this game. 10 a.m. U.S. Bank stadium is going to be rocking and rolling.
13:47Who's going to blow the horn? Who's more, who's more of that big Viking core?
13:50Who's doing that this week? Do you know in the inside of that?
13:53I don't, they don't tell anybody until the last minute until the guy walks up to the horn. So I
13:58have not heard. Maybe it's John Randall with eye blackout. Who knows? Who knows? Matthew,
14:02really good stuff, man. We appreciate the knowledge and the expertise on the Minnesota
14:06Vikings. Continue to great work, brother. Yeah. Thanks for bringing me on. Anytime. Matthew
14:10Collar here at the River Islands. That's like covering the Vikings for purple insider.com.
14:15As we go behind enemy lines, Jordan Addison may not play. So if he doesn't