Friday Recap: Big Nickels, Dalvin's Contract and Reads of the Week

Every Friday I try to recap all of my work and link to other work I enjoyed

One advantage Substack has over other mediums is the ability to publish whatever I want. One of the ways I hope to use this advantage is keeping all of my work — whether it’s podcast appearances, radio hits, freelance writing or something else — in one place.

And I can shout out the work I’ve enjoyed over the week. The dollar sign marks paywalled content.

My Work:

• My initial Substack announcement

• How to approach conversations on starting/sitting rookie QBs ($)

• The Vikings using the Big Nickel ($)

• UDFA rookies who shined in preseason Week 1

• Norse Code Podcast 475: Closer to Correct. We discuss Vikings preseason standouts, the changes in the CBA that actually help mid-level veterans and a carjacking story.

• My conversation with Matthew Coller on the Purple Insider Podcast on Dalvin Cook’s contract with the Jets, the running back situation with the Vikings and how to evaluate Kwesi Adofo-Mensah after only having a year and a half of data

• The Minnesota Football Party recapped the Seattle game, talked about free agents who visited the team and our preseason fantasy teams.

Other Work I Enjoyed (Football)

• Jim Trotter did an excellent job discussing the Michael Oher legal case against the Tuohys, who were featured as his “adopted” parents in the book and movie The Blind Side. ($)

• I always love reading Charles McDonald, who went over preseason offensive line play and what to make of Russell Wilson and Trey Lance’s extended playing time.

• I really enjoyed this piece from Matthew Coller talking to Kevin O’Connell about Kirk Cousins’ most efficient routes to throw to ($)

• Coller’s observations from Titans practice are worth the read too (Day 1 is here) ($)

• Alec Lewis and Jon Krawczynski did an excellent job covering training camp as well ($)

• Kevin Cole is doing a series on whether the preseason matters. He started at quarterback ($)

• Watch the Jon Bois documentary on the Vikings. The first three episodes are out now and it looks to be a seven or eight-episode affair.

Other Work I Enjoyed (Other Sports)

• Lindsay Gibbs is doing an excellent job covering the Women’s World Cup but the piece that stuck out to me was this one going over the reactions to the Football Association’s ban on women playing on FA-sanctioned fields in 1921 ($)

• This video is on the player who broke competitive Yo-Yo

Other Work I Enjoyed (Non-Sports)

• Parker Molloy writes about local police raiding the offices of a small-town Kansas newspaper. I’ve followed this story for a bit now and the details get wild.

• If anyone has been following Techtube, the takedown of Linus Tech Tips by Gamer’s Nexus has been a tremendous shakeup of the space. The first video is here and there’s an update here. LTT’s (second) response is here (the first response is covered in GN’s second video).

  • Untouched by those videos are tweets from a former employee alleging sexual harassment, mistreatment, verbal and emotional abuse and more. Both the LTT community and the larger Techtube community have been regarding the allegations as credible for now. There is leaked audio from an HR meeting following that employee’s exit.

  • There are allegations within the community that LTT lied about key features of a core product that they sell

• This video on the rise and fall of The Young Turks, an online progressive news organization

• Learn about America’s toxic food system