Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Film analyst Mark Bullock talks about JJ McCarthy's fit with Kevin O'Connell

Episode Date: May 7, 2024

Mark Bullock, who has written for Washington Post and The Athletic, wrote a great article studying JJ McCarthy's film. He joins Matthew Coller to talk about everything he saw that will translate quickly to the NFL and things he needs to improve in order to start. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of Purple Insider. Matthew Collar here and returning to the show is Mark Bullock, who has just written a terrific film breakdown of J.J. McCarthy for the Purple Insider website. So go over there, purpleinsider.com, find it. It is absolutely fantastic. Now, normally, Mark, you cover the Washington Commanders and do film analysis on your substack, which is just markbullock.substack.com,

but you pre-wrote a J.J. McCarthy piece just in case the Commanders decided to go totally rogue and pick J.J. McCarthy. So I benefited from that on Purple Insider. A tremendous, tremendous look inside of both the things that make him pro ready ish and the things that he's going to have to improve on. So why don't we start out with just the way that the first round went, it went as expected with Jaden Daniels going number two, but, uh, why, why'd you do a JJ McCarthy breakdown? Did you think that that was actually a possibility that they could go off the map and do it?

Yeah, I think nationally or maybe certainly with individual teams, it was probably people thought there's no way they'd go with J.J. McCarthy. But I think around Washington, the kind of talk was that McCarthy was definitely in the mix. And Adam Peterson, the new GM, really, really values traits like leadership and work ethic and culture building stuff. And obviously there was, we had the saga with Ben Johnson, the Lions offensive coordinator, potentially being the head coach that they wanted and they were waiting to interview him. And then, you know, mid-flight to go interview him,

he decided he pulled out of that race and they went with Dan Quinn because Dan Quinn was the guy that they interviewed best and he was the culture builder, great leadership, character guy. So it kind of felt like even though everyone was kind of pointing to jayden daniels was the guy that they liked um jj mccarthy kind of the the leadership and and and the off-field qualities felt like he fit what adam peters really liked um and he as kind of i guess you probably would have seen from the from the breakdown is um he really fits what Adam Peters was just scouting for um with Kyle Shanahan as the head coach in

San Francisco and um I've kind of felt like McCarthy would be a perfect fit for that system so I can see Adam Peters having just scouted the last seven years for for Kyle Shanahan I could have seen him going actually I really like this guy because he fits exactly what I've just been scouting for. So I think he was definitely in play. And I think certain reporters, I can't remember, it might have been Ian Rappaport said that, or maybe it was Adam Schefter. I can't remember.

One of those two said, actually, it was between Jaden Daniels and J.J. McCarthy, not may uh for the second overall pick um but it certainly appears that it was it was pretty much jayden daniels the whole way well that would have been something though what i mean we were already shocked enough by michael pennix but if they had taken mccarthy number two left the heisman winner on the board that would have changed maybe everything and potentially the vikings could have been trading up for drake may at four or five and that would have changed maybe everything. And potentially the Vikings could have been trading up for Drake May at four or five. And that would have been really wild. I guess that was always within the amount of possibilities.

If you squint, you can do a little JJ McCarthy, Brock Purdy thing, except for everything about their background is different. And the fact that, you know, one is a top draft pick and the other one is mysteriously irrelevant. But the way in which Brock Purdy plays, there's more arm strength, more raw arm strength. But when you see the third down scrambling from Brock Purdy, the processing, a little bit of a baller mentality, and also not the biggest guy, McCarthy's quite a bit bigger than Brock Purdy. But you could see a playing style where the precision isn't always flawless when it comes to Brock Purdy, but you could see a playing style where the precision isn't always flawless when it comes to Brock Purdy, but kind of finds a way to get the ball to the right places.

So why don't we start there with what you saw on tape? One thing that I noticed is when I was looking at the clips that you pulled is like, I recognize some of these concepts that the Vikings have run and they're much more intricate in the NFL, but the basics of high-low type of things where you have somebody running an out route underneath, somebody going over the top with a corner route or something like that. But the question I always have is how NFL-ish is this when you watch someone at Michigan

and then have to try to, in your mind, transfer over to what it will look like with the Minnesota Vikings. Yeah, I thought that was the thing that probably put McCarthy up into that conversation with Jaden Daniels and Drake May, was that the offense that he ran at Michigan is the Harbaugh offense. And obviously Harbaugh's going to the NFL so it is technically an NFL offense and it was an NFL offense um now obviously Harbaugh had the big emphasis on running the ball and that limited the amount on his plate but um in terms of actually the concepts that they ran that they all translate um you saw a lot of the typical west coast offense stuff stuff that I'm sure Kevin O'Connell will be running plenty of and has run plenty of. He obviously, he has his own background,

but he did coach under McVay, and McVay and that Shanahan system kind of blend together. And he has some experience under Jay Gruden here in Washington, Kevin O'Connell, and that was another West Coast offense. So you see a lot of those West Coast staples, the sort of, as you talk about, the high lows, the middle triangle reads, all those kind of things were in that Michigan offense.

And so McCarthy has a lot of experience in that, and that should give him a heads up. Now, the defenses that he'll have been facing wouldn't necessarily be as complex as what he will be facing in the nfl and you see a lot more in the nfl you see a lot more match coverages and um and so that can that can make the reads a little bit different um and make the processing slow the processing down a little bit but um like if you're still running a high low concept you're still trying to isolate

a single defender and and put him in a bind, does he sink back and take the deeper route and then allow to pick up yards after the catch underneath? Or does he bite up to the thing underneath and you can rip one behind him? And McCarthy was certainly very good at ripping those balls behind guys biting up low. So, yeah, I think those concepts definitely translate and that should give him a pretty good head start compared to a lot of other quarterbacks that won't have run anywhere near the level of concepts that what McCarthy did at Michigan.

I don't know if you're suggesting the East Carolina Pirates are not going to be as good as the Green Bay Packers. I'm not sure what you mean. But yeah, that's always a major challenge though, is trying to figure out, all right, well, what would this actually look like if he were doing this at NFL speed? And there's no great way to translate it because the talent is just so massively different. The defenses are so much more complex where a defense for East Carolina is running a couple of different looks potentially every week, probably running something similar where in the NFL, you have them very specific game plans, all sorts of different coverages, hard to ID before the snap, all those things. But what I liked about JJ McCarthy is that, and you pointed out his running ability, his

playmaking ability, and also just the pocket presence that exists with him at times where it's a shuffle here, it's a slide here, it's a couple of extra feet to give himself throwing lanes that might not have been there otherwise. And I think when you combine that with having raw arm strength and being able to really put a lot of RPMs on the football when he's getting that torque going, he kind of uses his whole body to do it, but when he does, he can really let it rip. And that's where I think those are NFL things. Like NFL windows are small, so you have to put VLO on the ball.

And also NFL pockets are messy. You can't just stand back there and go one, two, three, four, five. Let's see. And this is a Jaden Daniels thing, by the way. Oh, let's see who's as far down oh malik neighbors is 67 yards downfield let me take three crow hops and launched it like that just doesn't happen and i didn't think that michigan's pass blocking was amazing that he actually did have some messy pockets and it looked to me like he operated mostly well out of those. Yeah, I agree. That was one of the strong suits for me was that he could manage those pockets pretty well.

He wasn't amazing. It wasn't like he was dodging rushes left, right, and center. He wasn't in a situation with like Caleb Williams where the protection was so bad that he was having to dodge three rushes just to get a throwaway. But he could make those subtle adjustments adjustments in the pocket as you mentioned the kind of the little slide here or the little step up to avoid the edge rusher and let the tackle run the guy by him and um those kind of things that they're subtle nuances that a quarterback needs to have in the nfl um to be able to operate from the pocket. And you mentioned J.D. McCarthy has that mobility, and that's a nice part of his game.

But he first and foremost does look to win from the pocket, which I think it's great to have mobility, and it's a necessary part of the modern quarterback is to be mobile. But you need to still be able to play the position and win from the pocket first and foremost. And then when things break down, you can make use of that mobility. Or if a concept is covered and they have the right coverage for whatever you've got called, then you can go off script

and use that mobility. And that's what McCarthy can do. But first and foremost, he likes to win from the pocket, and he's pretty efficient at working through progression and making the little moves in the pocket to speed things up if he needs to. If there's a sudden corner blitz that he didn't have accounted for, he can shorten up his drop and get the ball out quickly and do those little small nuances that you kind of overlook

if you're just casually watching a game and you think, oh, he just threw a nice quick out route, but actually there was a slot blitz and they didn't have it. They had the protection sliding the other way. So rather than taking a three-step drop, you know, one step got the ball out quick, threw over the blitz, and they got a completion and moved the chains or stayed ahead of the chains rather than, you know, turn it into a second and four rather than a second and 14 from a sack.

So those are the little details that he does really well. And they all add up to keeping the offense kind of ahead of the chains and then progressing um and taking those those little chunks um that keep you moving down the field speaking of progressing it's probably the most over talked about thing with prospects well i didn't see him go through his progressions in college and you go well how many progressions are there needed in college uh because the receivers who are your first read often win their route and they get open and it's you know that's how it goes uh when you're playing at that level but i did see times where mccarthy seemed to understand where his outlet was going

to be if something went wrong. So examples of, hey, you got this concept over on the left side, he drops back. He clearly looks over to the left side where he's beginning. And then somebody runs into somebody or it's covered up pretty well that he would get back to somebody else where it wasn't spectacular, but it was just, all right, that's not there. So I know where somebody's supposed to be. And I also see him doing things when we talk about this pro to pro, you know, to the real professionals, adjusting protections. He doesn't look over at his coach and his coach goes, Hey, looks like a blitzer over there. Right? I mean, we don't see that from him. Uh, we, we see him running play action in a way that you would actually run play action in the

NFL. How these things all translate on the bigger level is hard to say. But what we can say is that as we discuss whether he should be playing or not, when he should be playing, he's done more of these things than most quarterbacks that go into the NFL that play right away, I think. Yeah, no, I agree. I kind of felt like for us in Washington, when we were looking at Daniels and McCarthy and Drake May, when we were debating them, everyone kind of felt like Daniels was probably the most pro-ready just because he's had the most experience.

And he's been, you know, he's the older guy. He's 23, as opposed to these's the older guy, he's 23, as opposed to these guys, which are Drake May and McCarthy are both 21. So he has the most experience and then he was ready to play right away. Drake May, I felt like he had some footwork stuff that he really needs to clean up and he missed a lot of underneath throws. But we don't need to get into too much of Drake May. I know the Vikings fan base wanted him a lot more i think uh is my understanding but um so i won't

get too far into him but with jj i thought he was a guy that i actually felt you you could play right away because he has experience in a pro style offense you could run the same kind of offense where you're probably going to be more run-based anyway. You build off of it with the play action and you build into the dropback stuff. And you hope that, you know, if you're staying ahead of the chains and he's consistently making the right decision, maybe you let him pass the ball a little bit more than what Michigan did. But, you know, none of those, what, the Penn State game where he only threw eight times

or something like that, maybe a little bit more than that but um I think you could kind of limit him a little bit and and get him on the field because the number one thing for him was just the lack of experience actually throwing the ball consistently and you want to see him do that more and he's not going to do that more on the sidelines. So for me, I always kind of felt he's a guy you want to be playing right away. He's capable of doing it. He's shown that he can run an NFL offense or at least an NFL scheme at Michigan. And he can, as you talked about, change some of the looks at the line of scrimmage. And if he sees a bad look that they're going to run into,

he can flip the call or change the call or what have you. So he can handle that stuff. And for me, that means I'd be putting him in right away and probably not putting it all on his plate, not throwing the ball 40 times a game, but certainly leaning into the run stuff and then the play action stuff, which he does so well. And that kind of McVay-Shanahan West Coast system does so well of opening the play action stuff, which he does so well. And that kind of McVay Shanahan West coast system does so well of,

of opening up play action and attacking the middle of the field, which is, which is where he's at his best is middle of the field stuff off play action. I think there's two ways to do it. When it comes to a young quarterback, you can either pare it down and work with what they are comfortable with and then work off the run game, which the Vikings should improve with Aaron Jones in the backfield from where they were last year.

Or you can wait until you feel like they can run the whole thing. I think Kevin O'Connell might prefer to wait until he feels like he can run the whole thing where every single drop is tied with every single route concept. And O'Connell can open the whole playbook on the sideline and get in his headset and dial up absolutely anything. I think that's the way Kevin O'Connell wants to do it. And I'm judging in part because they tried to do that with Josh Dobbs last year, maybe not to the most success, the more they opened up the playbook, but they felt like this is what they said to us was if we don't give Dobbs the entire playbook, then we're not going to be as effective to execute the things that we have planned for a particular game or

particular opponent. And if that is the case, that's totally fine. I mean, you're talking about a quarterback who should be able to handle these things. He's been preparing for a long time to understand a lot of these concepts. But if he's not ready until halfway through the season, like I don't think they're under a lot of pressure to say, man, we got to get him out there right away. But I definitely see what you're saying. These NFL things that he's done already because of Jim Harbaugh make him more prepared for this level than some other quarterbacks, even if his actual age number doesn't reflect that. Let's talk about some of the downside, though, some of the improvement that has to be made. For me, I think that just the consistency of throwing the football

accurately, just dropping back and getting the timing on a comeback correct and hitting it on the marks, simple things like that were a little bit wild at times. And I'm sure that's something technical that they're going to work through with Kevin O'Connell. And then just the lack of overall experience. We just don't have a ton of reps. Like as you're doing the film piece, I'm sure you have to kind of fight for some of these things. Like, all right, what is the next time on this film

he's going to throw a pass? And, you know, that was probably hard to figure out. But what did you see as things that need improvement at the next level? Yeah. So I had two main things for him, which was, well, I had three main things for him. The first was throwing left. He has a little bit of an issue throwing left where he overstrides. So that means when he, when he drops back to throw left, he swings his front leg open and he kind of overstrides. And as he tries to then drive over his front leg, because it's too far out in front, he can't get his weight over his front leg, which means his weight starts to kind of fall away

from him. And that causes him to lose accuracy with the ball. And then you see him missing left a fair few times. That's a relatively easy fix. You can kind of teach them what's known as a dovetail drop, where instead of dropping back dead straight and then opening up your front foot as you turn left to throw, you take what's called a dovetail drop, where you do your first two or three steps back straight, and then the last few steps, you angle them towards, you angle the steps towards the right

so that you're lined up towards the left um and that means that you don't have to take this big swing with your front leg when to to get left because you're already aligned left um so that for me is a pretty easy fix um and i think it's one that um you know kevin o'connell and and the viking staff should be able to fix pretty quickly and get him aligned and that should be fine. The second issue I had with him was he's very much a line drive thrower. He kind of throws only fastballs. He doesn't show a great deal of touch.

So that can really help him because a lot of what Michigan was asking him to do was throw these play action shots over the middle and and working to tight windows and and so if you're consistently trying to do that you're always trying to throw the ball as fast you can into those tight windows and you're pretty good at doing that but it meant that on the occasion where they were like okay we're going to take a shot down the field now he he tried to throw those same line drives but he's trying to throw them 40 50 yards down the field and it would cause the ball to, you know, it'd be really tough for a receiver to track it. It would be real too low rather than a nice arc and touch

and drop it over his shoulder. It would give DBs a chance to recover and get the ball, get their hand on the ball and that kind of thing. So those line drive throws are something that he is going to need to improve um when i vaguely remember a conversation uh jay gruden when he was washington coach um had with i can't remember what quarterback he was referring to but there was a quarterback that had a similar issue and he said yeah that's not really a huge deal we kind of we work on that and once they once it clicks it clicks and they're generally fine.

It can take a while for it to click sometimes to take a little bit off and throw a little bit more touch. But generally speaking, once it clicks, they're fine. So again, I don't think it's a huge issue, but it might take some time for him to get that to click. And then the third thing was there was just some immature moments. I call them moments of madness, but moments of immaturity. And again, he's a guy, he's extremely young. He only turned 21 in January. I'm sure you guys all know this by now.

But he did only turn 21 in January after he finished the bowl game, the national championship game. So he's incredibly young and he is still prone to those moments where it's like, come on, man, you're, you're, you're a better talent than that. And then he's still kind of trying to find where his limits are, you know, can I fit the ball in that window? And can I make this throw? And you see some times where there was a few interceptions where he would, you know, scramble out and be like, okay, I can actually make this throw.

And no, you can't, you can't get away with that in even college football, let alone in the NFL. So he still has those little moments of madness where he is just going to need to. You're probably as a team, as an organization, you're just going to have to accept that he is going to have those as a young quarterback. And every young quarterback does have them. He's maybe a little bit more prone to them than most. And you're going to have to accept that he's young, he's fighting through those moments, he's got to learn where his boundaries are and I think he's probably pretty smart and smart enough to recognise once he pushes those limits

and fails a few times, he'll very quickly get himself in line and work things out. So I had three main issues, those three main issues with him. I feel like they were all stuff that were relatively easily, easily fixable. So I think he can become a pretty decent quarterback in pretty good time, but they, they are certainly some things that will need to be fixed and worked on. Yeah.

Let me get, I'll get a bottom line from you in just a second. And then we'll go over, you know, Washington where they're at in the bigger picture there in the NFC. The, the dovetail drop i don't know that kevin o'connell's gonna love i i don't know if that's going to be the solution i saw the same thing you did i you put the definition of why it was happening but some of just the inconsistency i guess in my brain it never registered that it was to the left side but the pockets are are messy. The, you know, the,

the amount of blitzes and things people are running. I don't know how much you want them leaving that small space unless they have to like to throw one particular way. You know, I just, I'm not sure that that's, it's not something I've seen them use at least with Kirk Cousins. So I think they might have a different solution there, but I definitely saw that like that being able to throw consistency with accuracy to the left side. The other part about throwing harpoons, as opposed to nice rainbows on those deep balls, you are a hundred percent right on that. I mean, because sometimes you'd have a guy breaking free and if you throw it 15 yards out in front of him on a nice little rainbow, he's just going to catch it and walk into the end zone and he would throw it to where he was rainbow, he's just going to catch it and walk into the end zone.

And he would throw it to where he was like, I'm just going to gun it right to you 40, 50 yards down the field and try to hit it almost like I'm throwing a dart. And that is something that absolutely has to be improved for him to throw deep down the field. It kind of reminds me of if you're shooting a basketball, if you are shooting in the park, you can shoot the ball right at the rim. But if you got somebody guarding you, you have to learn that arc to be able to get that over your defender and all the greatest shooters can do that. That is something that he's going to have to develop

and the age probably plays into it. The crazy stuff in some ways you go, I want them to keep trying that though, because the Vikingsings and you know all about this from writing about washington had a quarterback who just wouldn't do it just hey man just throw it up for justin jefferson yeah well you know i don't know if it's the right read uh and you're like come on man that was that was the thing with kirk in washington was he when he came out of college he was known as this gunslinger that took too many risks. And then he got into the game a few times as a backup under the Shanahans. And I think he had a game where he threw

like five interceptions against the Giants and they just kept leaving him out there because they didn't really have anyone else to put out there. And he came away from that game all depressed and feeling like his NFL career was over. And so he very much went the other way and went into his shell and was like, okay, I am not taking risks. I'm going to be captain, I don't want to say captain check down,

but, you know, making sure I'm working through my progressions and getting the ball out to the right guy and not taking risks and very conservative with the ball. And that gets you a certain level of play. But it doesn't necessarily take you to the elite level where, where guys are, you know, competing for a Superbowl year in, year out. So yeah, that, that was, that was the thing with Kirk where he,

he came out kind of similar to JJ in that regard where he, he was very aggressive and liked to attack and didn't know where his limits were and then very quickly found out what his limits were in the NFL and went too far the other way. I get the impression from McCarthy he's not going to go too far the other way. He likes to be aggressive and you see that with, there was that incredible throw, I think it was in the Ohio State game where he was hitting that deep over to Roman Wilson. And it was, there was a safety that on film,

it looked like the safety was just looking straight at him. And I was like, why on earth would you try to fit that into that window? And then he said, talked about in a separate interview, how on film study, he'd seen that safety every single time that safety peaked somewhere else, that safety was no longer looking at the quarterback and you could be aggressive and attack him.

And so you like that kind of note from him that he does a lot of film work. So he's not just always recklessly aggressive, but he is planning to be aggressive. And that's good. You like that. So to me, that says he's not going to go at least not as far as Kirk Cousins did in being very reserved and conservative. I did not know that story of all the years, of course, that I covered Kirk here. But it always was in my mind that he was raised as a backup quarterback in the NFL. And the way you stay around as a backup quarterback in the NFL is just be he would even call himself a point guard. Just be a point guard. Just be a point guard. Just throw to the right people.

And with McCarthy, it's impossible not to compare your new quarterback and his skills with your previous quarterback. What they were looking for, they mentioned a number of times, was when things break down, when a bad play call is out there that doesn't work or there's a blitz that breaks through or, say, the right or left guard just allows someone to run right at your quarterback you need someone to make a play and the the thing about cousins was he would still turn the ball over quite a bit overall so you needed that extra balance that

wasn't uh often there with the playmaking and so with mccarthy i guess i would say i'd rather see him let's say he plays nine games this year throw 12 picks and like you said figure out what he's supposed to do there then i would want to see him just oh let me just check it down to johnny munt or something a bunch of times um so uh give me your give me your bottom line in your opinion after watching this film doing this film breakdown which again purple insider.com is really terrific about what the what the the, the high end of JJ McCarthy, what the median, what the low end can be. Yeah. Well, so the comparison with, I will start out with saying personally, I like JJ McCarthy quite a bit because as I kind of mentioned with Adam Peters, I grew up and learned the NFL from

the Shanahan system when Shanahans were in Washington. So when I was watching J.J. McCarthy, I was also seeing a guy that was like, that's a concept that Shanahan would run, that's a concept Kyle would run, that's something. And I saw a quarterback that I think he's going to fit Kyle Shanahan or that group's system so well. He's so good off play action,

so good at attacking the middle of the field. So that's where I saw him. And so I quite liked him a bit and then I I personally had him over Drake May because Drake May had these misses where I really liked the upside of Drake May and I just questioned like can you live with the amount of misses that he has where he'd short hop a throw and and unlike we talked about with McCarthy the the misses for me were very consistent. It was always throwing to the left where he'd overstride. Whereas Drake May's misses were one play he'd be sailing a throw over a guy to his right. And the next play he'd be short hopping a hitch to his left.

And the next he'd, you know, throw a swing screen behind the receiver. And the next play he'd throw a slant way out in front, and it was missing all over the place, and it was so inconsistent that it was harder to pin down exactly what was wrong. Whereas McCarthy, I felt like, okay, the ceiling for McCarthy is nowhere near as high as what it could be for Drake May, but the floor is a lot higher because you know the issue is throwing left, it's just overstriding.

We can fix that. Everyone's fixed that in the NFL. That's just over striding we can fix that everyone's fixed that in the nfl um that's not a problem we can deal with that uh and then we can get him to his ceiling a lot quicker um and getting to an nfl standard playing a lot quicker so yeah that was that was that's a long way of me saying i like jj mccarthy probably more than most people by the sounds of it probably more than a lot of Vikings fans. But the comparisons most people made in Washington to where his ceiling would be and where his floor would be, everyone seemed to compare him with the last two

kind of main starting quarterbacks that we had in Washington, which were Kirk Cousins and Alex Smith. And he was kind of, you compared him to an Alex Smith because Alex Smith, when he was kind of, you compared him to an Alex Smith because Alex Smith when he was younger was a lot more athletic, kind of like JJ. And Kirk Cousins because he was, you know, the Michigan offense was very, you know, run first, play action, attack middle of the field and check the ball down

and be efficient with the ball, kind of like Kirk is. So you're hoping that his ceiling is, you know, those kind of guys, but to a sort of slightly more mobile, slightly more playmaking version of those kind of guys. And, you know, the thing with Alex Smith as well was there's a leadership intangible to Alex Smith that you quite often heard Washington players I know everyone hates Alex Smith and they think he's kind of just an average NFL quarterback in Washington he was everyone talks about how before he got hurt with that horrific leg injury he was I think he was six and two or something like that before he got hurt and Washington were having a really good

season and he wasn't having this phenomenal season but he was consistently getting the ball out to the right player on time letting them pick up yards after the catch. And every player in that locker room talked about no matter what the point was in the game, no matter how far down they were, they all looked Alex Smith on the sideline. And Alex Smith had this kind of calming influence of, you know, we're good. We're fine. I'll get us out of it. It's all good. And, you know, six times that season out of the eight games that he played he did so people

from my understanding people at Michigan feel the same way about JJ McCarthy so you kind of feel like he has this leadership quality that can get more out of guys around him get everyone to buy in and he brings in that kind of athletic profile that he can do some stuff off script and hopefully be a little bit more high upside than what an Alex Smith was at the end of his career or what Kirk Cousins is. But the floor for him is kind of that profile of those two kind of guys where it's, you know, be efficient with the ball, you know, get the ball out quick on time, probably check it down too much

and not create enough big plays. So you kind of hope that he doesn't. I feel like he's not going to hit that floor. I think he's going to be more creative and more aggressive than those guys were. But I think the upside is probably a more athletic version of what Alex Smith was at the end of his career, which sounds like it's a negative,

but in the context that I've hopefully explained it there, it's a positive. Yeah, I don't really see the Kirk comparison with him because he's so much better of an athlete than Kirk was. And I also think Kirk is at least the version that was the grownup Kirk, and maybe this will be him in the years to come, but he was really, really accurate. I mean, really good at throwing with anticipation. You talk about arc and touch on the ball. Like these are things that Kirk was legitimately special at dropping the ball in the bucket slot fades that go 28 yards in the air where he just takes the ball and has to put it up and have Jefferson run underneath it. These were things that Kirk was prolific at where I see McCarthy

being like, Whoa, you know, just throw it as hard as you possibly can. So I look at that as a little bit different. Alex Smith is closer, but the difference is I felt like when Alex Smith dropped back, it was either I'm throwing to the exact place I plan to throw it, or I am putting my head down and running. And those are the only two things where McCarthy, you will see him by time by time. All right, now I'm going to let it go and, and throw to somebody. There's this, like, it's not, everyone just says Mahomes or whatever, but there's like a Joe Burrow ishness to what he does in the pocket where he's going to buy some time. He's going to keep his eyes downfield and try to make a play. So yeah, I mean, it's, it's always tough to make these comparisons. My favorite has been Matt. Matt Hasselbeck has been my favorite because it

was not the biggest statistical guy all the time, but had a lot of those things that you described that on the right team, you can win a lot of games. But the fact that, you know, Alex Smith is a first round pick at the top of the draft, similar, maybe San Francisco, Alex, but I mean, there's a, there's a playoff game against, I think the saints where he runs like a 30 yard touchdown or something like he, he was really good at, at, at scrambling and running at some point. So I want to hear about your opinion on Jaden Daniels because I watched a good amount of Jaden Daniels less than the other guys. Cause I just wasn't buying that he was ever going to be your opinion on jayden daniels uh because i watched a good amount of jayden daniels less

than the other guys because i just wasn't buying that he was ever going to be available to the vikings i was absolutely wowed in ways that i have very rarely been of him running the football uh the the deep accuracy is terrific but i also did see a guy who hangs on the ball hangs on the ball and you're like, come on, buddy. Like, you better get rid of it. Oh, and he sacked. So how do you think that transition is going to go for Jaden Daniels? Yeah, I think it's going to be an interesting one.

I like Jaden Daniels quite a bit. And I kind of throughout the process, I went back and forth on all three of these quarterbacks. I had Caleb Williams kind of as a clear one ahead of the rest of them. And then I think when I first finished watching all three, I said Daniels, May, McCarthy. And then I watched a little bit more of McCarthy and I moved him up to three. And then I think at one point I got to McCarthy up to two, but I think I always kind of kept Daniels ahead of May.

And then I, at the end, the weekend before the draft, I went back and watched eight games of each quarterback, and I finished with Daniels, McCarthy, and then May. So I kind of – it's very back and forth between McCarthy – sorry, yeah, McCarthy and Daniels for me. I like both guys a lot. And you're right, with Daniels, the play Daniels for me. I like both guys a lot. And you're right with Daniels. The playmaking ability is outstanding.

And I went into it expecting because a lot of people on social media and what have you would say that he's this one read and run quarterback. So I went into expecting that, and I found this guy that actually he was not bad at progressing through reads. And obviously he still needs to improve in that manner. But, you know, and as you kind of mentioned, when you have neighbors and Brian Thomas Jr. and then the kind of guys that they had at LSU, he often didn't need to get through more than one read because those guys were winning. But when there were situations that dictated that he couldn't throw to his first read or second read you could see him quite often working through his

progressions and and sometimes getting to the back side and going to third and fourth read so the ability is there um and there's this incredible thing i assume you probably heard about the vr stuff where um they he's been doing vr training where he's been doing VR training where he's been learning defenses and practicing defenses with mental reps in VR. So that led to a huge step of improvement, and I think that's what they've liked about him is he's improved year on year on year, and you can see that progression, and you hope that it obviously continues, and it did seem like it clicked for him this year. But when things do break down you know

that running ability is just amazing and sometimes he he does leave some things out there where it's like you know you have this 20-yard dig route you could throw that just throw it and it's like yeah well i could just tuck it and run for 40 myself you know and it's like well i mean if you make it work you make it work i guess but um and at times the first few times i saw i was like yeah you you could you did pick up a nice run there but you could you probably should have just thrown the ball to where your open guy was and then he'd run for another 40 yards on the next play and then uh next series he'd run for 30 yards and then the series after that he'd have another huge run it's like okay well you're just ridiculous um so the playmaking aspect is is really really fun um and for me personally it's

going to be fun to watch um i'm sure it will be frustrating at times because there'll be times where i'll miss a reader what have you but um i think you kind of have to just live with that and say this guy's fun um and just enjoy the the ride um the The big concern I had with him was the insane hits he takes. And the thing everyone says is that he kind of runs like, what was it, runs like Roadrunner and gets hit like Whitey Coyote. Like the hits are very cartoonish. And like trying to jump over a defensive lineman running between the tackles is not something I've ever seen from anyone ever in the NFL

or in college football. At any time watching football, I've never seen anyone try that. So for him to even think about trying it is insane, but for him to actually do it, I mean, he got punished for it as well. He took a big hit trying to do it. But those kind of things where he just has this – you obviously love the competitiveness the the desire to make the most of every single play but we saw that in washington

back in 2012 with with rg3 where we saw a guy that he didn't know how to slide he didn't know how to protect himself and eventually got himself hit while while scrambling and you know the mobility aspect the ability to build the run game around a quarterback with the read option elements and stuff like that, that adds a huge amount to an offense. And what you can do play action off of that, as we saw in 2012 in Washington with RG3 having that historic rookie year, like you can do so much from that. But the quarterback does need to be able to protect themselves. And the read option stuff, that does protect them. The play action stuff really helps protect them in the pocket. It's when they start scrambling and running around,

and then they feel like, I could probably make that guy miss. I'll try to cut up field rather than stepping out of bounds or sliding. That's when they then get the hits, and that's when they get hurt. And Jane Daniels is worse than what RG3 was, in my opinion. And so that's what scares me about him is that he's going to be a hell of a lot of fun until he gets hurt. And you just hope that he takes one big NFL hit and he goes, okay, I need to calm this down and I'm going to protect myself

and he doesn't get too hurt until he recognizes that. So yeah, that's kind of where I'm at with him. He's going to be a lot of fun until he recognizes that. So yeah, that's kind of where I'm at with him. He's going to be a lot of fun until he gets hurt. And the other part of it too, is that the percentage of downfield throws past 20 or 30 yards. Oh, it's incredible. I mean, it's just, but in the NFL, it's like, I think Jared Goff threw maybe 7% of his passes

that went over 20 yards. It's just the NFLfl the game is one because the blitzes are so good the pass rushes are so good it's all one in the intermediate areas between 10 and 20 yards if you are the best passers like that's where you are really making your life most of the time so can he consistently fit the ball into those windows it doesn't have the most juice behind the ball although i think he could put on weight I think he could put on velo even as he, as he goes forward. I remember everyone saying, Oh, this Joe burrow doesn't have a strong enough arm. And then by year two is like, but actually does, you know, so you can improve the arm strength as you go forward. I think he

will have to do that. That may be technical. That may be just putting on a little more girth that he will definitely need to take the cartoonish hits which is a great way to describe it because there were sometimes when i was watching going buddy do you want to live like the the guys at the next level are just twice as big as florida and you know but i don't think there are more than five guys who i've ever seen ever who are running at full speed and someone goes to tackle them and they can make a move and not slow down that they could dodge them, that they could stop and start. I mean, we're talking Vic Lamar, Randall Cunningham, period, like for the guys who can run at this

level. And it just raises your floor when you can, when you can run that well. And it also, another ancillary effect of this that it's probably not talked about enough is that you're going to run the football successfully because there's so much attention on that quarterback and what he's going to do. Someone has to be assigned to him and everyone who runs, if they put you in the backfield for the Ravens, you'd average four and a half. Like anybody can run for the Baltimore Ravens because there is so much attention on Lamar Jackson. So great stuff, man. Great breakdown. Let me ask you one final question here. Now that

we know where everyone is and we know what teams they're on and we know which guy's going to start the season as a backup is the number eight overall pick two years from now, who are we talking about as the best quarterback in this draft class? I don't love the situation that Kayla Williams went to because the bears, like the GM and the head coach kind of on the hot seat a little bit there, but I feel like he, I just want to kind of back the talent i i i really had kayla williams in like a really separate tier i really i never wavered on him being the clear top guy elite potential out of this class so i i would just back the talent to

to win out there um after that i kind of feel like j.J. McCarthy went to the best situation um with the Vikings and and I think Jaden Daniels also went to a pretty good situation you know they've got a decent set of receivers here but I don't know if Washington's necessarily going to be I think they've improved a lot this offseason but they had a lot of improving to do um and you saw that with when Adam Peters came in like he was asked in his press conference, what do you think of this roster? And he kind of just paused for two or three seconds before answering. And that kind of said a lot about, okay,

he doesn't think a lot of this roster. And you saw that they, I think they had about 20, 25 free agents from their own team last year. And I think they retained three or four. And so they brought in a hell of a lot of other guys. And so they are turning over this roster. So I think it's probably a few years rebuild for them. So that will probably have an impact on Daniels.

Maybe he can do some amazing stuff and take them beyond what they're ready to be. Hopefully he does from my perspective. That'll be that'll be a lot of fun to watch i but i feel like typically the quarterbacks that have success early in their careers are the guys that go to the best situations um and i feel like mccarthy with i i respect kevin o'connell so much i think he's a really really good coach um i think he runs a really good system um and the talent you guys have got, a receiver and a rep just built around him in general is pretty good. So I'd back McCarthy to have probably the next best success. I'd back the talent of Caleb and then the situation of McCarthy.

And maybe sometime in 2032, the Patriots will be able to fill out that entire roster. So dire at this moment that they're going to have to do a lot to rebuild that around a Drake may Mark Bullock NFL on Twitter, Mark Bullock on sub stack. You have a great sub stack. I subscribe to it and get your film breakdowns of lots of different Washington related things. But I learned stuff from you.

I learned what's going on with the commanders and people should go to purpleinsider.com. Check out your awesome contribution to my site, which I can't thank you enough for. And the people who have read it have really, really enjoyed your breakdown of JJ McCarthy. You're one of my favorite guys. Really appreciate having you on and we'll do it again soon, man. Anytime.