Vikings’ J.J. McCarthy ‘just not the guy’ in NFL – Mike Florio | Pro Football Talk | NFL on NBC

Vikings’ J.J. McCarthy ‘just not the guy’ in NFL – Mike Florio | Pro Football Talk | NFL on NBC

So, the Lions get the Packers on Thursday. Another beauty, the early Thanksgiving game. Is that game? Did I see that at 1:00? I think they’ve moved it back. It used to be 12:30. They moved it to 1:00. I was going to say I was shocked by that. Yeah. This is the game now that you know what? Maybe we maybe we find a way to eat between the two games because that used to be the oh, you just put it on, it adds to the to the holiday vibe. It’s the Lions on Thanksgiving. Well, the Lions are good now. and they get their Packers rivals coming to town in a game that will have massive implications on the NFC North standings and the Packers got their win yesterday against the Minnesota Vikings 23-6. It was close at halftime. The moment really came and I don’t know how this would have turned out. No, but the game Miles Price like get the hell away from the ball. That was the whole game. Once that becomes 176, here’s what happens. Here’s my take on JJ McCarthy. And you know, I’ve watched 50 years of football. I’d like to think I know a little something about how the game works. Okay. Um, he’s trying too hard and he’s thinking too much. Yeah, I’m sure. And the more pressure he feels, the harder he tries and the more he thinks. And when they get down 17-6, what happens? He’s thinking too much and he’s trying too hard. He doesn’t just let the game come to him. Now, every once in a while, we see him slip into that nine mode late in the game where it’s still in doubt. Yeah. But you knock them out. You get them on the ropes. And I look balancing various emotions here, but I think we’ve seen enough. He’s just not the guy. I think I think we’ve objectively seen enough. And I know Vikings fans are going to say, “Oh, he’s still developing. Oh, you need to give him more time.” But you either have it or you don’t. I mean, you either have it or you don’t. You don’t just wake up one day, oh, you know what? Now that I’ve been banged around and I’ve made all these mistakes and we’ve lost all these games, I’ve finally figured out to play how to play football in the NFL. You either have it or you don’t. And he doesn’t have it. He just doesn’t have it. And and maybe he can acquire it. And and maybe the way to acquire it is the Bryce Young way. Maybe he needs to take a seat. Maybe he needs to learn a little bit more. Maybe he needs less pressure. I really do think and we’ve we’ve all been in this situation at one time or another where we’re trying to will our bodies to do something they can’t do. We’re trying to do something that goes beyond our god-given abilities. And he’s achieved, hey, national champion, top 10 pick. That’s fine. But the worst thing the Vikings can do is just stubbornly push forward for something that’s not going to work. And I feel like I feel like all we have to do is look, it’s not going to work. Hey, you tried. It’s not going to work. And if you’re going to be a dysfunctional team, Minnesota Vikings, what you’re going to do is double down and keep trying to prove it because you let Sam Darnold go. You let Daniel Jones go. You said no thank you to Aaron Rogers. We have to make this. We have to ride this horse as far as we can and we’re not going to admit it. We’re going to double down. We’re going to triple down. We’re going to quadruple down. We’re going to quintuple down. We’re not going to let this go. I think it’s a mistake. And at some point, see what Max Brosmer can do. Let’s just see what he can do. If the rest of this season is preseason for next year, we know what McCarthy can do. Let’s see what the other guy can do because we got a decision to make in 2026. It’s gonna be a big decision. I can tell you, don’t waste your time. Max Bromer is not the answer. That’s not it. Let’s see what he can do. The best thing is to see what JJ McCarthy can do and stay patient here. You’re not going to the Super Bowl. You don’t want to rip the B like bench him now. That’s not that’s not what you want. I’m curious to what the other guy can do. I hear I I watched enough of Max Broman to know he doesn’t have JJ McCarthy’s talent. He’s not that way. Okay, now JJ McCarthy. Listen, I’m not disagreeing with some of the stuff you’re saying. Also, also, you can’t block Michael Parsons with one guy. Okay, what are you doing? There we go. You brought up Bryce Young. What does Bryce Young have? A run game that can run it when everybody knows they’re going to run it. And everybody goes, “What? Bryce Young’s looking a little better.” And I’m going to go, they ran the ball 74 times today for 900 yards. And then you wonder why he’s looking a little better. That skull clip in there is fired. Right. Right. So, look, see, you still like the Vikings. But either way, uh, but but I hear your concerns with JJ and it is concerning. I’m with you all the way. There there’s definitely a look and throws that we’ve discussed at length. It still is early in his career. And what I think makes it worse, too, is yeah, he didn’t get the play last year. He got hurt this year. So, that hurts the development right now. And then there’s the pressure of like, hey, like you kind of said, Minnesota’s ready right now. This is what we talked about with Aaron Rodgers all off season and all that. That’s why the talk was there. That’s why Minnesota thought about Aaron Rogers because they looked at their team and went, “We’re ready right now. Do we really want to be team ready with, hey, quarterback, catch up to the team.” And of course, his injury early in the year even makes that more apparent and crazy looking right now. And then I think you throw on top of that, damn, he comes back, he gets healthy, he wins against the Lions, but then he’s got to play the Ravens. Then he’s got to play the Bears who do lead the league in turnovers and creating chaos on that side of the ball. Then you play the Packers, right? So it’s not necessarily the easiest teams to break back into playing again and then he’s got his own issues and then they don’t help him out a whole lot and I think all that yeah they got to play a game right now that they want to play defense right and keep a low scoring that’s what stunk about them muff punt because you’re going wait it’s 10 six this is this is the this is how they win right let’s just stay within a score and then maybe JJ can be what’ you say nine nine yeah ninetime at the end of the football game that’s what you’re hoping for and that disrup rupted the whole thing and of course put them down 17 to6 and they couldn’t climb back in the football. I just feel like I’ve seen enough and prove me wrong. You got more chances. Got the Seahawks at Seattle. Great. Hey, let’s go see how Sam Darnold’s doing. It is amazing. It was it was a Vikings game at Seattle in 2002 and they got splattered. Sean Alexander scored 13 touchdowns that day. I think I quit the website the next day. I said I’m done. Screw this. Like this thing’s never going to do anything. It’s never going to amount to anything. Why am I wasting my time? The Vikings. The Vikings are and and then like a day or two later, I was back at it. What the hell else am I going to do? This is fun, right? But uh yeah, I don’t expect much this weekend against the Seattle Seahawks. And that’s why I thought they would win yesterday because they’ve been riding this roller coaster where we can’t really get a feel for them. And when we like when they went to Detroit, we we expect them to lose and they win. And then they come home and you know, they got a chance against the Bears. They were favored against the Bears and they lose. And I just I’ve seen enough and I’ve said enough and I think we need to take a careful look at frankly frankly frankly and I have now I’ve yet to say this right got to take a look at the front office because I don’t have a whole lot of faith in the decisions they’ve been making in the draft. I don’t have a lot of faith in the decisions they’ve been making in free agency. And I said, “Let’s find out what JJ McCarthy has because you’ve already invested the 10 the 10th overall pick with the team in the draft and all that.” The offensive line sucks. The offensive line sucks. They’ve had a few injuries. The offensive line sucks. That’s part of the problem. And that actually that actually favors JJ McCarthy, but I we could go year by year and look at what’s happened with the Quacommensa picks. It’s not a pretty picture. It’s not a pretty picture. But they had all those wins last year, so let’s give everyone extensions. Let’s just go get drunk on whatever Vikings drink and let’s give everybody extensions. What do they drink? What does a Viking drink? I don’t know. You don’t know. Damn. I thought you would know that it’s purple, right? Would that make sense? I mean, I guess so. I guess. But but but it’s just it feels like it feels like something is off badly. I I badly there’s concern and they’re never going to come out and tell us what it is. Of course not. And I go back to the off seasonason when what are they gonna do with Sam Darnold? Nobody knew. What are they gonna do with Daniel Jones? Nobody knew. And I was I was digging around and I got the impression that the people who were dealing with the Vikings from the outside, you know, as representatives of Darnold and McCarthy, like we don’t know who’s making the decision. And this gets back to and somebody made this point to me. It’s entirely possible that the Vikings are a dysfunctional organization that have a coach who is good enough to mask some of it. And hey, Kevin accepted the extension. There was all that talk last year he may become a coaching free agent. That was put out there week 18 by Jay Glazer. And it’s funny, Nick Seriani was in the same boat. Nobody suggested he was going to become a free agent, but that all got put out there and he could have coached out the contract and he could go wherever he wants. He decided to stay. Part of this is on him. He’s there there’s there’s something wrong in that organization. This is one of those teams where the owners don’t live there, you know, and they’re not around as often as some other owners are. They there there’s just something is badly off with the Vikings right now. I can feel it. I can feel it. We We’ll see. There there is the cautionary tale of like hey when you got a good quarterback you don’t just get rid of him and they kind of had Kirk Cousins who I know but it was you know and then last year with Sam Darnold like it so I’m just say well listen there just I know there was a lot of people in football and I certainly think it’s a fair question and they’re going wait they’re they’re getting rid of him with this team right now. I don’t you know I think there was some people that certainly questioned that but yeah they’re in a tough spot right now and JJ McCarthy is going to be under more pressure than any quarterback in football down the street. You know what I told you last week and I wrote this at PFT. We haven’t talked about it here. Mac Jones next year. Yeah, I I mean I feel you. That could be Sam Donald part two, right? They’re going to get somebody in there that’s going to be like, “Hey, if JJ doesn’t work out, we got to have somebody else, right?” Hi, it’s Mike Florio. 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Mike Florio and Chris Simms analyze J.J. McCarthy having another bad game, claiming that the 2024 first-round pick “just doesn’t have it” and Minnesota’s plan to make him the franchise quarterback is “not going to work.” #NBCSports #NFLonNBC #ProFootballTalk #NFL
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Vikings’ J.J. McCarthy ‘just not the guy’ in NFL – Mike Florio | Pro Football Talk | NFL on NBC
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