J.J. McCarthy’s Alter Ego Might Be Gone for Good
Remember when Minnesota Vikings signal-caller J.J. McCarthy cooked in Detroit this season, and afterward, revealed that he was often overtaken by an alter ego he calls “Nine?” His head coach basically told him to cut it out.
J.J. McCarthy’s alter ego might be gone for good after head coach Kevin O’Connell dialed things back, a shift the Vikings desperately needed.
Kevin O’Connell spoke to the media this week, appearing to hint at the fact that the Nine persona isn’t needed.
“Nine” Persona for J.J. McCarthy May Be Dead
O’Connell reeled his young passer back in.
O’Connell Says QBs Can’t “Be Somebody Else”
O’Connell chatted with Paul Allen, the Voice of the Vikings, this week, fresh off his team’s dub over the Washington Commanders.
He told Allen about McCarthy and quarterbacking, in general, “You better have confidence, and you better have a comfort in who you are to be in certain roles. I think being the starting quarterback of an NFL team is one of those things. All I’ve asked J.J. to do is just be authentically himself.”
Most agreed that his remarks sounded like pushback against McCarthy’s Nine alter ego.
“I think at times, guys try to — and maybe it is the moment, and if it’s authentic in the moment, fire away, have at it — but we don’t need to exhaust any energy. Our jobs are hard enough already. Trying to be somebody else, or trying to play to some sort of persona, whatever it may be, let’s just go back to work, man. Let’s just go back to work and try to get better every single day,” O’Connell continued.
“When we do have moments like Sunday and we can take a step back like J.J. and I were able to do —and I told him, I was proud of him. I was proud of the way from the moment he showed up on Wednesday all the way through to flipping him that game ball afterwards — it just felt like the guy that he can be for us, and it felt like it’s repeatable.”
The message from the skipper? Play ball, and leave Nine for comic book fantasies.
A Veiled Shot at Nine?
Of course, O’Connell’s comments could be a bizarre coincidence. But it’s just not likely.
His quarterback struggled with ordinary functionality through six starts, and after some advice telling McCarthy to get back to basics and fling the ball without the hassle of overthinking, the plan worked. That recommendation clicked for the 22-year-old, as McCarthy unleashed his best game as a pro, cutting loose 3 touchdowns against the Commanders en route to a 70% completion rate, by far the best of his career.
O’Connell used the spot on Allen’s show to let the world know, along with McCarthy, that the team needs J.J. — not the playfully fun facade of Nine.
Nine Can Come Back when McCarthy Cooks
The fun part? Shedding the Nine character doesn’t have to be eternal. It’s obviously very much part of McCarthy’s schtick; he would not have talked about it if it were fake.
Assume McCarthy morphs into a franchise quarterback, getting rid of his Games 1-6 woes and transforming into the real deal. If so, he can do whatever he wants after games and in interviews. Acting like a goofball is only scrutinized when the player a) stinks b) his team is losing.
Nine can be something McCarthy puts on the shelf and returns to if his performance turns stellar.
A Career-Saving Performance Last Weekend
McCarthy had been written off by plenty of fans, turned into a meme factory, and treated like a punchline across the league for weeks.
Then Sunday happened.
He delivered three touchdowns, zero turnovers, and 163 passing yards — modest yardage but mistake-free football mattered most. For the first time in a while, McCarthy carried poise snap to snap, and when paired with a functioning ground game, Minnesota offered a glimpse of how this era could actually work once he stabilizes.
By Monday morning, McCarthy checked in at sixth among Week 14 quarterbacks in EPA+CPOE. There’s no clever spin needed — he flat-out won the day.
More from O’Connell
O’Connell also mentioned to Allen: “What I’ve learned, and maybe it came from one week there for Max Brosmer to play against the Seahawks when he was in the protocol, but taking a step back after having a pretty good amount of work over the last few weeks prior, ‘Man, if I just throw that completion right there.'”
“If on that second down, instead of trying to take three hitches and work the ball down the field, I check the ball down, I put the ball in play and we end up with a 2nd-and-3 or a new set of downs or a 3rd-and-manageable where it doesn’t feel like we’ve gotta move heaven and earth at the quarterback position to try to stay on the field and sustain drives. The whole game plan was about stacking positive plays. There’s a lot been made of fundamentals and technique. Our job as coaches are to try to help players improve.”
In addition to McCarthy developing in real-time, it seems his head coach is, too.
O’Connell continued, “We’ve navigated through the season of watching him show improvement in areas of fundamentals and technique. But there’s another layer to it with J.J. It’s amazing just what the calmness you’re speaking of simply comes from stacking plays of doing your job and putting the ball in play to Minnesota Vikings players in space.”
“Whether it’s a two-yard gain or a 50-yard gain, they’re all positive, and they all have a negative effect on the defense. It allows me to continue calling the game within the sequencing of how we practice on Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, on into the game.”
Nine and the Vikings are 5.5-point underdogs this weekend at Dallas.
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