When the Minnesota Vikings traded quarterback J.J. McCarthy to the New York Football Giants a month ago, a lot of Vikings fans seemed to be relieved because they thought they would likely never have to hear McCarthy’s name again. After all, after McCarthy missed his entire rookie season following a meniscus tear in the team’s 2024 preseason opener and then had an up-and-down first season as the full-time while dealing with multiple injuries, a significant portion of the fan base had decided that
there was no chance he could possibly be “the guy” in Minnesota.
The return the Vikings received for the highest-drafted quarterback in franchise history was a fifth-round selection in the 2027 NFL Draft, and a disturbingly large number of people seemed to be fine with that. The thought was that McCarthy would go to New York, continue to struggle, and likely be out of the league before he got to a second contract, after which everyone would just forget about him.
But a funny thing happened on the way to McCarthy’s impending irrelevance, and all of a sudden the people who were so sure that McCarthy was the worst quarterback they’d ever seen just don’t want to talk about him anymore. Why? Because now people have questions.
In Week 6, after Jameis Winston put the Giants into a 34-10 hole against the New Orleans Saints, McCarthy entered the game, led the Giants to 17 unanswered points, and had them within 12 yards of a potential tying score before he ran out of time. In Week 7, after being named the starter, he led the Giants into Houston as a double-digit underdog against the Texans and led New York to a 27-21 overtime win. He also seems to have unlocked Giants star wide receiver Malik Nabers, who has 11 catches for 206 yards since McCarthy took over.
In the five quarters plus overtime that McCarthy has been running the Giants’ offense, that offense has generated six touchdown drives.
The Minnesota Vikings’ offense has generated four touchdown drives. . .since Week 3.
There was Jordan Addison’s 41-yard touchdown catch against Tampa Bay, Justin Jefferson’s 15-yard touchdown catch and Aaron Jones’ 8-yard touchdown run against New Orleans, and T.J. Hockenson’s 5-yard touchdown catch against Indianapolis. That’s it. If you want to count the drive where Hockenson slid down at the 1-yard line against Miami, fine, but five touchdown drives in four games really isn’t terribly impressive, either.
And let me be clear on something. . .yes, the Vikings are 6-0, and I’m positively thrilled that they’re 6-0. The Vikings are 6-0 because Brian Flores is out here every week turning water into wine and Will Reichard is some sort of kicking robot cyborg machine from another planet. The defense and special teams have dragged this offense, kicking and screaming, to 6-0.
For the last few weeks, we’ve heard about how this is going to be the week that the Vikings’ offense was finally going to get itself right.
- Week 4: “Well, the Dolphins might be the worst team in the league. This is going to be a get-right game for the Vikings’ offense.”
- Week 5: “Well, the Saints have given up the most points in the league so far. This is going to be a get-right game for the Vikings’ offense.”
- Week 7: “Well, the Vikings are getting almost all their key players back on offense and the Colts just lost to the Titans at home. This is going to be a get-right game for the Vikings’ offense.”
And the Vikings’ offense just continues to. . .not get right.
Which brings us to Kyler Murray. The case for bringing in Murray to be the starting quarterback was that he was the sort of veteran who could get the ball to Justin Jefferson and help this offense push the ball down the field in ways that McCarthy, Carson Wentz, and Max Brosmer couldn’t in 2025. Now, because of injuries to both Murray and Jefferson, they’ve only played two full games together, so there’s still time for chemistry to develop, but the early results have not been great.
On Sunday, against a Colts defense that has been less than stellar this season, Murray completed 14-of-24 passes for 150 yards and a touchdown. That included four catches for 44 yards for Jefferson. Jefferson did not have a catch in the second half. He was targeted once in the second half. The Colts came into the game with star cornerback Sauce Gardner on the sideline and, by the end of the game, had none of their top three corners on the field due to injuries. I don’t know why this happened, but it’s precisely the sort of thing that people had complaints about last season with this offense.
Now, as many people have pointed out, the Vikings’ schedule gets significantly tougher. They head to Detroit this week, then it’s Josh Allen and the Buffalo Bills in prime time, then they travel to Green Bay before heading to Mexico City to take on the San Francisco 49ers. As good as the Vikings’ defense has been so far this season, it seems unlikely that point totals in the teens are going to be good enough going forward.
This shouldn’t be “training wheels” time for the Minnesota Vikings’ offense. This should be “put the ball into the end zone more than once a game and stop relying on Brian Flores and company to bail you out” time. And now Vikings fans are seeing a 23-year-old quarterback that their team sold for pennies on the dollar and had been dismissed as a complete flop performing at a significantly improved level for a team he’s been with for a month and, if the season ended today, a team that the Vikings could potentially see in the NFL’s postseason party.
So, yes, people are going to have questions. And the people who thought they had all the answers a month ago have, suddenly, found a lack of desire to approach the topic. Strange, that.
Put simply, the discourse about J.J. McCarthy and Kyler Murray isn’t going anywhere. It’s going to continue until at least one of those two parties puts forth enough compelling evidence to suggest that it shouldn’t continue.
To this point, neither of them has. And until one of them does, it’s only going to get louder.
