The Development Of J.J. McCarthy Must Be Allowed
I’ll be the first to announce that my preseason prediction of the Vikings’ success was off. I thought they would be coming out of this bye week undefeated, as they faced the sharpest teeth of the schedule.
Vikings rookie quarterback J.J. McCarthy’s growth has sparked debate, but his development under Kevin O’Connell must be given time to unfold naturally.
While they still have a winning record, it has been a stressful run to get here. Injuries have been the main character in the 2025 season’s story on both sides of the ball. Along with that has been the overall mediocrity of the NFL as a whole.
The most significant injury and ongoing discussion topic is J.J. McCarthy’s development — something head coach Kevin O’Connell has grown tired of addressing in press conferences. The media has hashed it out, but not as much as the fans.
It Should Not Be a Controversial Take: Let J.J. McCarthy Develop
Some Vikings fans have it in their minds that McCarthy should be dumped to the side and Carson Wentz should start. Others are still pining for the love they feel we lost in Aaron Rodgers and the fact that the team didn’t sign him in free agency. There are still many fans who are willing to be patient and are doing their best to spread that idea.
Concerns Driving The Narrative
You have to be open to those who are concerned about how McCarthy’s career has traveled thus far. He comes from a Michigan program that had a strong running game and defense that got them a national championship trophy.
While McCarthy did have some great throws when the team needed them, the volume that a college quarterback throws nowadays was much less than that of others drafted in 2023. Some had labeled him as a “handoff merchant” before he took one snap in training camp.
Stories came out of camp about how well he was doing, and his calm demeanor, and the team was really gravitating towards him. In his first preseason game, he threw for a couple of impressive touchdowns, and the fanbase seemed to settle in a little with him starting. Suddenly, that all got thrown to the side as a meniscus tear took him out for the entire season.
This paved the way for Sam Darnold to revitalize his career and lead the team to a 14-3 season until he basically melted down in two big games.
The offseason was semi-tumultuous with the Vikings trying to re-sign Darnold to a team-friendly contract, knowing that McCarthy was waiting in the wings. When he signed with the Seahawks for a starting role, they also attempted to retain Daniel Jones, who subsequently signed with the Colts for a better chance to start.
Added to that was the fact that Aaron Rodgers was reported to be actively vying for the Vikings to sign him for one last run at the Super Bowl. When that didn’t happen, it told fans that McCarthy was the quarterback of the here and now. The first game against the Bears was a tough outing, but McCarthy led the team from behind for a fourth-quarter win, which gave fans hope that there will be growing pains, but the future will be bright.
Unfortunately, the next game against the Falcons at home was a disaster, and McCarthy got an ankle injury while scrambling for a first down. Wentz has been playing since then and has been OK in his performances while also dealing with the injuries around him.
Some fans quickly jumped on the theory that O’Connell had “soft benched” McCarthy, using the injury – a high ankle sprain that can take more than a month to come back from as an excuse to put him on the shelf. With two major injuries in two years, those same fans now believe he is injury-prone. These are the foundations on which those opinions are based.
The Quarterback Whisperer Effect
Two teams have had some relatively good seasons. They are the Seahawks and the Colts. Yes, the two teams whose starting quarterbacks were both with the Vikings last year are flourishing in part because of them.
Darnold was very gracious last year and into this year in attributing his resurgence to O’Connell’s coaching, as did Jones recently in an interview. That is why O’Connell was Coach of the Year in 2024 and became known as “The Quarterback Whisperer” in reference to the novel “The Horse Whisperer”.
He directly influenced their growth as players and got out of them what the teams that drafted them could not. While both had shining moments, they were both discarded by their former employers and considered busts in the NFL.
Darnold skipped around from the Jets to the Panthers, which are both franchises that lack stability and often eat up rookie QBs, only to spit them out like Fruit Stripe chewing gum as soon as their flavor loses its appeal. One year with O’Connell and all of that changed.
Fans think that the head coach can do the same with McCarthy. Some feel it should have already happened. If he can rebuild two busts, then he should have no trouble molding another high draft pick that wasn’t burdened by starting their career in poor circumstances.
Since it hasn’t happened in the two games McCarthy started, the magic must have worn off, and the team is benching him to protect his young ego. Others are remaining patient to see what comes from his time taking more “mental reps” as he gets back on the practice field, which happened this week.
McCarthy showed up on the injury report as a limited participant, meaning he is getting some live reps with the team. In the next few weeks, we should see him on the field as the starter again.
The fans with a more positive outlook haven’t given up on the young quarterback. The main discussions have centered around him missing that first season, and this is more of a rookie season than last year.
The fact also remains that the Vikings have trotted out twelve different iterations of their offensive line due to injuries, with only new right guard Will Fries playing in every game. Right tackle Christian Darrisaw was still out as he recovers from a knee injury from last year for the two games McCarthy was in.
Add to that, Jordan Addison, with whom McCarthy gained a strong rapport during training camp, was suspended for the first three games of the season. Starting running back Aaron Jones went out with an injury, and McCarthy welcomed his first child on September 11th, which caused him to miss some practice time. The two games were also in primetime, which added pressure, as a young player may need some time to adjust.
O’Connell has stated that he was not benched while using the injury as an excuse. Anyone who knows anything about high ankle sprains knows that it is a long recovery injury, and caution is the best plan when trying to heal from them.
Throwing an athlete on the field too early can set them up to reinjure it and set them back for even longer. Wentz has come in and has played well enough, but isn’t exactly lighting up the stats page. He has had to endure some of the same challenges that McCarthy did, and the team has struggled as a whole.
He had a chance to lead a come-from-behind victory in Dublin against the Steelers that fell flat, and played well enough against the Browns for a win in London. He hasn’t been the second coming of Sam Darnold so far.
The Hypocrisy Is Rampant
Here’s the deal: you can never have it both ways, and you can’t keep moving the goal posts. Fans who thought the team never should have drafted McCarthy in the first place are rolling around in the muck of misfortunes, giggling because they feel they were right in their assessment.
They think that because his limited sample size has been plenty to name McCarthy a bust and to move on, and have gone so far as to say that the coaching staff already knows this, hence the “soft benching”. They are fully ready to start over with another quarterback, as has happened numerous times in the Vikings’ history, by bringing in a retread player.
Some are lamenting that Justin Jefferson’s prime is going to be wasted waiting on McCarthy to develop, and the current open window to the Super Bowl with a very talented team all around will slam shut.
I’ve seen people post on social media that the staff was “Coddling” him, and even had a guy comment on one of our Vikings Territory posts with, “3 years played in like 4 games.” I corrected him that he’s only at the beginning of his second year, but even that fact wasn’t enough.
I find it funny that people use Darnold and Jones as the ones that got away in some arguments. These men, who were spurned by their former teams and fanbases, were the saviors we were always hoping for.
They seem to forget that we fans had been clamoring for years for the team to draft a quarterback to develop, as the constant carousel of other teams’ castoffs would never have given us a championship. They also conveniently forget Darnold melted down in the two biggest games last year, missing open receivers in the endzone, most notably against the Lions.
They forget that Jones has had similar situations, and there’s no proof that he wouldn’t have done the same thing again. They also forget that the team tried to sign them both to team-friendly contracts, and he main reason they both left was for better opportunities where they weren’t looking over their shoulders. That’s what they both had just left.
It’s also conveniently overlooked that the money saved by not overpaying allowed the team to upgrade the offensive and defensive lines and cornerback positions, and not hamstring the team with a bloated quarterback salary, as everyone complained Kirk Cousins did. Getting a newly drafted quarterback to shine from day one or even season two is difficult.
Not everyone is Patrick Mahomes. It’s also easily forgotten that many quarterbacks don’t win the big game right away, and the average age to win one is 28. McCarthy is only 22.
You, me, every fan wanted to get a franchise quarterback to mold on our terms, and now that’s what you’ve got.
Yes, the talent around him is great for a young quarterback who merely needs to “steer the ship”. Yes, the coaching staff is a great, offense-minded group.
Yes, the defense should be good enough to support the offense when everyone is healthy and in sync. No, it doesn’t happen overnight, and there will be growing pains along the way that we may have to watch unfold right in front of our eyes while the team loses. The fact remains that there is not enough evidence on tape for anyone outside of the organization to know what McCarthy is capable of.
Once he is fully healthy, he should be the starting quarterback, and Wentz should go back to the bench. So far, Wentz hasn’t blown anyone’s mind with his play, and at 31 years old, he has likely reached his ceiling.
If he didn’t have to deal with the health of the team around him, maybe he could have performed better, but he’s not going to be the long-term solution that you want. Additionally, McCarthy will never develop if you don’t put him in live games and give him things to build upon and learn from. That’s part of the deal we all signed up for.
Kevin O’Connell has stated time and again that the league gives up on quarterbacks way too early, and that’s not going to happen on his watch. But if you think you know more than the guy who’s revitalized two “busts”, is the reigning NFL Coach of the Year, played the position in the NFL regardless of his own success, and has an entire team that believes in him by all means, go and die on that hill.
If I’m wrong in a few years, at least I will know that my hill was based on facts and tendencies, not just two games and a need to have everything work out faster than it can. Patience will be required, no matter how painful it may be right now.
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