Sports

Through six NFL starts, it seems as if Vikings quarterback J.J. McCarthy doesn't have it. Whatever "it" is — that thing that allows a quarterback to thrive in the NFL — it's not there.

The numbers make that clear. Six touchdown passes, 10 interceptions, passer rating of 57.9. If he had played enough games to make the list of qualifying passing leaders through 12 weeks of the 2025 season, McCarthy would be dead last. By nearly 20 points.

He fails the eyeball test, too. McCarthy's performances just don't have the right overall look.

Throw in the fact that he can't consistently avoid injury, and it adds up to McCarthy being (so far) a top-10 bust.

That said, it's not all his fault. Part of the problem seems to be that he's thinking too much and trying too hard. If so, it's for good reason. The broader circumstances have put him under incredible pressure to perform.

The fault ultimately flows to the Vikings. With or without Kirk Cousins returning for 2024, the Vikings planned to roll the dice on a rookie quarterback. With four off the board in the top eight, they moved up a spot to take McCarthy over Bo Nix at No. 10.

They surely saw something in McCarthy. Or maybe his personality influenced them to overlook the lack of overall throws at Michigan, where he had 22.13 attempts per game in 2023. (Nix averaged 33.57 that same season.) Maybe the belief that McCarthy could become the leader they needed caused them not to fret about his habit of having one pitch in his arsenal: Fastball.

Maybe they swallowed the hook on the predictable coaching-clichés from former Michigan coach Jim Harbaugh, who seemed to hype McCarthy into the top 10. Even though it should have been obvious that he was doing a solid for a guy who had helped Harbaugh win a championship. And if Harbaugh could have gotten a team picking before the Chargers in 2024 to take McCarthy, it would have pushed toward Harbaugh's Chargers at No. 5 a player they needed more than a quarterback.

Drafting McCarthy was the Vikings' first apparent mistake. The second mistake came from not having an effective plan for the dramatically-changed circumstances after the 2024 season.

Sam Darnold led the Vikings to an unexpected 14-3 record. Letting him leave in free agency placed a little more pressure on McCarthy to justify the team's faith in him.

Daniel Jones, who fell into Minnesota's lap during the season (and who was inching toward supplanting Darnold in the postseason), saw a better opportunity to play in Indy, where the Colts were ready to admit their mistake with the fourth overall pick in 2023. More pressure on McCarthy.

And Aaron Rodgers's interest in the Vikings went unrequited. Even more pressure on McCarthy.

In the abstract, did it make sense to find out what they have in McCarthy? Yes. But the Vikings whiffed on the broader strategic question as to the potential impact that passing on Darnold, Jones, and Rodgers would have on the pressure cooker occupied by McCarthy.

Regardless of whether McCarthy can ever develop as a high-end NFL quarterback, the rare (and potentially unprecedented) pressure he was surely feeling may have short-circuited the process, irreparably.

That's not an excuse for McCarthy. It's an indictment of the Vikings, flowing directly from the perception that emerged in March among those who were dealing with the Vikings that it wasn't clear who was making the decision as to whether the quarterback for 2025 would be Darnold, Jones, Rodgers, or McCarthy.

Put simply, there seems to be a current void of effective short- and long-term strategic thinking within the Vikings organization. Kevin O'Connell is a great head coach, able to sculpt every lump of quarterback clay into an effective performer. (Well, except one.) An NFL team needs much more than that to truly thrive.

When it comes to creating a clear path for a young quarterback to check the various boxes, the Vikings instead threw an array of obstacles in McCarthy's path, in the form of one-at-a-time decisions that added to the expectations and the pressure. Especially after missing all of his rookie season due to a knee injury suffered in his lone preseason game last August.

Who decided it would be a good idea to turn up the heat on McCarthy, one lost veteran opportunity at a time? Did anyone within the organization consider the various factors and complications with an eye toward assessing whether it would result in, to no surprise, McCarthy thinking too much and/or trying too hard?

That brings us back to the question of who, if anyone, is even making those big decisions as it relates to the structure of the roster and the various factors and dynamics that can, and apparently did, torpedo a team that was tantalizingly close to plucking the No. 1 seed a season ago. It's almost enough to make Vikings fans long for the days of the ill-fated Triangle of Authority.

Currently, maybe it's a dodecahedron. Whatever the number of cooks, the absence of an Executive Chef is making the Vikings seem like a bunch of dodos as it relates to the handling of J.J. McCarthy.

Packers quarterback Jordan Love is on the injury report this week because of his left shoulder and he discussed the issue during a session with reporters on Tuesday.

Love handed the ball off exclusively with his right hand during last Sunday's win over the Vikings and said that he's not going to "sugarcoat" the injury he picked up in the previous week's win over the Giants. A short week before facing the Lions on Thursday gives him less time for rest or treatment, but Love said that he doesn't feel limited in what he can do because of it.

“It’s one of those where I’m able to play through it,” Love said. “Obviously, anytime you take a hit, fall on it, you feel it. But nothing that it is holding me back or nothing that I can’t play through.”

Love, who is fully participating in practice, got some experience with using one hand to hand the ball off when he hurt his left thumb this summer. It's not an ideal situation, but it is one Love and the Packers will have to manage to stay afloat in a three-way race for the top of the NFC North.