Mike Florio Is Absolutely Right About What Vikings Are Doing With JJ McCarthy
Credit: Brad Rempel-USA TODAY Sports
An awful lot of eyes are on the Vikings’ quarterback situation right now, but it’s not because of anyone who is currently on the roster. Aaron Rodgers swirled over the organization for a number of weeks now. Now every breaking news update is a non-update that is a different wording of “We don’t know who the veteran back up will be but maybe it’s this guy” that makes me want to treat my phone like this.
With that, JJ McCarthy is the Vikings’ 2025 starting quarterback as of now. After McCarthy missed his entire rookie season due to an ACL tear, he is set to start next year in light of Sam Darnold’s departure to Seattle. When Kwesi Adofo-Mensah talked about the presumed “competition”, Mike Florio perfectly described the fact that the “competition” is nothing more than coach-speak to give McCarthy an opportunity to feel a need to develop as a prospect. McCarthy has the job, but the team has an obligation to not make the Michigan product feel like he will be automatically given the starting job.
“He kind of snuck the word ‘competition’ in there. He said all the right things, but he said competition. Right now, there’s no competition with JJ McCarthy and Brett Rypien. I think they have been tip-toeing on eggshells on the question of who the competition will be, and will it be true competition, or will it be phony competition? Matt Hasselbeck explained when he was the backup to Andrew Luck (in Indianapolis). ‘I know I’m number two, but I am approaching every day like I am competing with Andrew Luck so I can get the best out of him.’
Is it that kind of competition, or is it… who knows? May the best man win, the best quarterback will play… I think what they’re trying to do, and it’s pretty simple: let’s create some internal roadblocks, some internal hurdles that he’s got to jump over, because if he can’t clear these, how’s he going to make the big throw in the big spot when the one seed is riding on the line on the final Sunday night of the regular season, and all of a sudden the quarterback freaks out, and he’s throwing helium filled footballs into the stands? That’s the key. If you can’t deal with this, you’re never going to deal with the highest level of pressure the sport has to offer.”
Chris Simms, a long-time NFL quarterback in his own right, discussed his own experience as a quarterback. While bringing in a veteran can give a quarterback a competitive edge, he believes the Vikings would be better off fully developing McCarthy and putting pressure on him by insinuating we believe in you, but it’s your job to lose.
“That’s necessary. You want that. You need somebody to push you. But where it’s different, is yes, let’s see which we got. Let’s trust what we did in our eval with this quarterback. And if we brought in Aaron Rodgers right now, you’re not going to get to see the true picture of what JJ McCarthy could really be. It’s going to disturb his development. So you’re not going to get a real picture.
Where I give them credit here and pumping the brakes on the whole thing is going, ‘Wait, we like this guy.’ So let’s trust in that, and then let’s give him a chance here in the off season to make him the number one, and hopefully, yes, bring in a veteran that is like a Matt Hasselbeck. ‘Hey, he’s good. He can help us if our quarterback goes down,’ but he’s not going to be a threat to our starter to where he’s going to feel like, ‘Oh man, this is a competition,’… But a guy that nudges him every day right, a guy like Brett Rypien is going to be too many days of ‘Oh, way to go. JJ, you were great today. You were great today. You were better than Brett, right?’…You bring in a guy like Ryan Tannehill or Joe Flacco, okay, it’s that type of guy, let’s just say. There’s gonna be days where they look real good in practice, but it’s not going to be like Mahomes or Josh Allen, and then JJ McCarthy is gonna be like, ‘Oh, okay, I gotta bring it today. I gotta get on my game here… Damn, Joe’s throwing it great. He’s made another good decision. I better make sure I get my check right here and all that.’
That’s what they need to do, to your point, so they can see how he thrives in those situations. It’s not pressure that’s gonna crush them, but it’s the kind of pressure that, hey, let’s keep it on him. Let’s see how much he can succeed and grow here in the OTAs. I think that’s what they’re going for, at least from what I’m looking at right now.”
Essentially, Simms is not only saying that a veteran may be harmful to JJ McCarthy’s development, but not making him feel like he has to earn the starting job may be equally as harmful. McCarthy had an opportunity to spend a year learning under Sam Darnold due to his ACL injury; now, McCarthy is essentially the leading candidate to be the Vikings’ QB1 in 2025. The Vikings made it clear they believed in him when they moved up one spot to guarantee they wouldn’t lose him in the 2024 NFL Draft. Now, it’s time for the Vikings and JJ to take the next step that will allow them to be in a secure position going forward.
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