Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - JJ McCarthy will NOT start for Vikings vs. Chargers -- is he close??? (Part 1)

Episode Date: October 22, 2025

Matthew Coller talks with Vikings fans about the news that Carson Wentz will be back under center against Los Angeles on Thursday night. But did it sound like JJ McCarthy is close? The Purple Insider podcast is brought to you by FanDuel. Also, check out our sponsor HIMS at https://hims.com/purpleinsider Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See https://pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hey, everybody, welcome to another episode of Purple Insider, Matthew Collar here. The show is always presented by Fanduil. And let me throw out the Fandul question of the day right away here. The over under for Vikings and Chargers, 44 and a half on Fanduel. How many points do the Vikings need to score to win this game against the Chargers and keep the season rolling? because if they lose this one to a beleaguered Chargers game, it's going to feel like a serious uphill climb the rest of the way as difficult opponents are on the way.

So Kevin O'Connell came out today and announced that J.J. McCarthy will not be starting. Sorry to break everyone's hearts, but that is the case. As we expected, it will be Carson Wentz. And I'll give you the O'Connell announcement because he went into a little bit more detail than just saying, hey, it's Carson Wentz. So here's what O'Connell said. We did put J.J. McCarthy through an on-field workout just to see if he had a chance to make it this week. You know, JJ, the medical staff, myself, were all kind of encouraged about where he's at and the progress he's making.

But he's just not there. And if this was a Sunday game, maybe it would be a little bit of a different story. And we could push it throughout the week and see where he's at towards the end of the week. But really, I look at today almost as the combination of a Wednesday, Thursday, but really, it is a Friday on the timeline of coming up on being 48 hours out from the game. So we wanted to have a plan at the quarterback position, and it'll be very similar to last week. Carson will start. Max will be the backup, and JJ will be available in the case of emergency as the third. And like I said, encouraged about where he's at and very much looking forward to continuing his progress. and hopefully having a chance to go next week,

and we'll keep you guys posted on that. So there you go. O'Connell, not just announcing that he wouldn't be playing this week, but also dropping multiple breadcrumbs about next week against the Detroit Lions, which has been a date that we've targeted since he was not able to practice in full last week leading into the game against the Philadelphia Eagles, then it seemed pretty clear that it would be very hard,

to just say, okay, yeah, I know we don't have actually real practices this week because it's the Thursday night football and it's essentially walkthroughs because everyone's still in recovery mode from last week. Your game plan has to be truncated or pared down a little bit. And oh, yeah, JJ, just go play, even if you're not 100%. And it even sounds like putting him through the workout, there was maybe some hope that he would come out of that. I'm paraphrasing here because O'Connell didn't say that.

that, but you only put him through the on-field workout if you're really trying to evaluate, like how far along is he? Is there any chance that you could get him out there for this week against the Chargers? So they elect to play it safe and not do that, which I think then means that Detroit would be the comeback for J.J. McCarthy. And the way I look at this is with that Detroit game, regardless of what happens with Carson Wentz and the Chargers on Thursday, night. If he goes 20 for 25 with three touchdowns at 300 yards, then you shake Carson Wentz's hand and you say, thank you so much for awesome backup quarterback play. This is as good of QB2 performance as we ever could have hoped. And J.J. McCarthy, come on down. At this point,

there is no scenario where you're not playing J.J. McCarthy. And with the way that O'Connell gave his announcement talking about he should be good to go next week, sort of insinuating that, that it seems like that decision has already been made. And of course, that's the decision that they should be making with the season where it's at right now. When you are in the basement of the NFC North and your schedule is a little bit on the nightmarish side for the second half of the season, you haven't played the Lions, you haven't played the Packers. The Bears are much improved. Lamar Jackson could be back by the time. you face the Ravens, like it looks pretty darn tough when you're sitting in a three and three

seat. I think if you were sitting in a four and two seat and Wentz had been fantastic against the Eagles. And it's crazy how close he was to that, right? Maybe a few throws away. But we've seen the ups and downs of Carson Wentz are exactly what you get when you are playing a QB2. And this is as good as you can expect from a QB2. But it ultimately is a backup quarterback. and it should be treated as such if there was ever going to be because we look we never know after the way that Daniel Jones is playing after the way Sam Darnold came in and played last year you don't know and if Wence had just taken off and been the 2017 Wence and whoa he's made them a Super Bowl contender then maybe the story would be a lot different maybe the story

would be, hey, the locker room is, you know, buying into Wentz and they got to keep going with the guy who keeps winning games until the wheels come off. That's just not the case. The games against the Steelers and against the Eagles, those are against two contending teams. They've beaten two terrible teams with Wentz. And once again, when you have a backup in, what do you expect? You expect to beat the bad teams if you're good as a roster. You expect to lose to the good teams. a Hall of Fame quarterback and a Super Bowl champion quarterback and you're unlikely to outperform them with your backup quarterback. All that is how you would expect this to play out just sometimes the way that it has or the way that O'Connell and Addison and Jefferson

have pumped up quarterbacks the past. You did wonder, could this be different than what you would usually think for a QB2? It has not been different. So for Carson Wentz, win this game against the Chargers, whose defense has been horrific over the last couple of weeks. And if you miss my conversation with Daniel Popper, make sure you check that out, covers the Chargers. Tomorrow we'll have a hardcore breakdown with Stephen Hagland, who also covers the Chargers and has a great podcast. But I'll give you the spoiler alert right now.

Their defense has been not good. They can't stop the run. They are not good at covering anything underneath. Daniel Jones absolutely lit them up. So did Jonathan Taylor. Like, this is a team that is so beaten down right now by injuries and a defense that's not performing. The Vikings can win this game. So you win this game, get to four and three, get your starting quarterback back and go to Detroit,

feeling like you've got some juice, you've got some energy, and you want to be able to do that with J.J. McCarthy at 100%. And this is something Kevin O'Connell went into detail today because he was asked, hey, when you say he's just not there yet, what do you mean? And here's what O'Connell said. What do you say JJ's just not there yet? What kinds of thresholds do you still need to see him clear before you say, yeah, he is there? Yeah, it's been, it's some of the movements that the reactionary movements within the pocket, being able to use his athleticism to protect himself in the pocket.

And then as he's able to work through progressions, I feel really good about, you know, the work we've done on his, on the foundation. of his fundamentals. That's been pretty evident through the work that he's done and he's really the commitment to doing that. It's really just about, you know, hey, there's a, you know, maybe a guy gets edged and I don't really know the movement I'm going to have to make. That's where, you know, he still feels it. And if he doesn't have the ability to do that pain free, you know, we obviously risk setting him back, which would be very, very unfortunate with the time lost already, but also giving him the best chance to go out there and have success

is ultimately, you know, what we're looking for. I really, you know, having to overcome certain things, you know, that's kind of been the story of our season. If you look at it for JJ, I mean, whether it's, you know, early on in the Chicago game, we just didn't have a great all 11 field or our execution. Then we did late in the game and had a bunch of success and won that game.

And then clearly the circumstances involved in week two made it less than, you know, ideal from a standpoint of preparing a guy to play. in a football game. And now you have the injury as part of it. No, it's not going to need to be something where he's 130% or we're being, you know,

in a situation where we're waiting for this metric that, quite honestly, with this kind of injury, he's got to work through some of that here late in the rehab stages, but it's about his effectiveness and his ability to go out and do his job for 60 minutes without having any setbacks or making his job more difficult

than it has to be. Here's what's a little bit frustrating sometimes about this whole McCarthy situation is I do feel like Kevin O'Connell has gone out of his way to give as much detail on this thing as is humanly possible for a head coach. And trust me,

I have covered head coaches in the recent past who just said in terms of injury updates, sorry guys, I don't have a crystal ball. that's what Mike Zimmer told us when we asked about how Sam Bradford was doing in his recovery in 2017. So the fact that he's gone out of his way to give all these details, I think is very helpful in understanding and explaining what is going on in their thought process with J.J. McCarthy and yet all I see every single time there's an update on J.J. McCarthy is what's really going on with this team.

And I just, I don't know, people like to have fun on the internet and just say whatever because there are no consequences. But I think we have a pretty clear story here is that the injury maybe initially they didn't think was going to be quite this long. The setback or the travel or the schedule or those things have put them in a position where it has taken a little longer. I also saw a list on the internet the other day of all the guys who have taken more than two weeks to recover from a high ankle sprain.

In fact, the Chargers tackle Joe Alt, I think, is on four weeks that he's missed. And I know that's a different position. But still, not everybody can be Mahomes in the Super Bowl with this type of situation. And I also think when he talks about needing to have those sort of quick twitch type of things where someone is rushing the passer and you have to drive off of your ankle, if it was the Super Bowl, maybe you're going to say, ah, let's just figure it out. and you're not playing Carson Wentz, but in this case, against the Chargers on a short week, it wouldn't really make a lot of sense to play J.J. McCarthy with less than a full playbook

and less than full health. Giving him this extra run-up to face the Detroit Lions is the best possible situation. And I know that people are panicked to see J.J. McCarthy, that you want it more than anything else. That's what this entire season was about. for everybody is what is J.J. McCarthy going to be and I think we had this discussion at some point in the summer where we talked about like hey, if they went

eight and nine but McCarthy was really good and they just had bad luck versus if they won 11 but he wasn't that great and they had good luck. You'd take the losing season because it means so much more to the bigger picture. That's what from day one of training camp this season has been about for the Vikings

was if J.J. McCarthy can be good for them then they can seriously compete this year with their roster. That hasn't quite come to fruition with the whole roster, the injuries, the way certain guys have performed. So then you get to sort of phase two of that, which is, well, how good can he be? Can he get them into the playoff race? Can he go above 500 with a tough schedule the rest of the way and show that he can be this guy? And that's why even the Sam Darnold conversation remains premature.

And it's also hard to keep perspective because, We've been watching this team really closely for so long. It's hard to keep perspective on they have 11 games left and 10 could be with J.J. McCarthy. And I think if they have a 12 game sample of J.J. McCarthy, if he could stay healthy and that's a big if the rest of the way. But if they can do that and get 12 total games and 10 the rest of the way with J.J. McCarthy, then you should at least have a pretty darn good sense of where he stands going into next.

year and can he keep him alive in a playoff race? Can he have some high-end moments that show why he was the 10th overall pick? Can he justify the decision to move on from Sam Darnold? And that's why all that discussion, it has to be tabled with Darnold and Rogers and those things until J.J. McCarthy actually plays. And if you want to get a real sample on him playing, throwing him out there injured on a short week doesn't really tell you the real story. So this team has been patient with injuries. They were patient with the, I talked to Justin Jefferson today about this, about how he said it's incredibly hard. But this training staff, it is their philosophy to be patient with injuries and say you're much better off waiting one

more week and not getting re-injured than if you remember Adam Thiel in 2019 being pushed out there and then re-injuring his hamstring and then he's hurt for the rest of the year. They did that maybe too many times at times in the past where guys went back out there not 100% or not close enough to be able to play. And then you get setbacks, re-injuries, and you don't get the performance that you're expecting. So that's, that is how this franchise has done it since Tyler Williams got here. It makes sense to me. And it stands in line with how they've handled this J.J. McCarthy thing. And the rest is just, uh, internet nonsense. I think, uh, in a lot of ways. So that's where we're at. J.J. McCarthy won't

start. I know that that's wind out of the sales for a lot of folks, but the breadcrumbs that were left there by O'Connell pretty clearly point to, hey, give us another week and JJ will be back against the Detroit Lions. And then it's going to feel like, regardless of what happens against the Chargers, it's going to feel like a total reset and restart of the season. And that's how I'd like to treat it as, hey, seasons back on with J.J. McCarthy coming back. against the lions. If they lose, the unfortunate part is it's going to feel like, well, now he has to be Herculean to get them into this race because if you don't win, then you're falling even farther behind the Bears and the Packers and Lions are very clearly legitimate

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Uncommon Goods, we're all out of the ordinary. If they can win this game, and that's why it is an important game for Carson Wentz and this team, if they're four and three, then you feel like you're just right in the thick. You are right in the thick with a lot of other NFC teams that are good sometimes and bad sometimes. And now you kind of go back to the plan that you had all along, which was to have McCarthy in, have the supporting cast, have the defense, and then we'll see what happens. That doesn't mean I think that they're going to, if they go four and three, they're going to sweep the rest of the schedule. I would still say you're trying to get in on the final days is the most likely scenario. but it will feel much more like,

ah, yes, this was the season that they were supposed to have. And Carson Wentz will have done a great job to keep them in it and alive in that conversation and not let the season completely slip away. If they lose, then it feels like full evaluation mode and even, I would say even sell mode if they go to three and four. And this team traditionally has not been sell mode, but at some point, like, hey, they should have,

they should have been doing that in 2003 when Kirk got hurt but they said no we beat the Packers we shouldn't do that we shouldn't trade to Neil Hunter well in this case if they go to three and four then you have to seriously consider who you are moving off of the roster so

let me get to your your questions your thoughts your comments reminder about that Fandul question of the day which is the over under for this game is 44.5 on Fandul how many points do the Vikings need from Carson Wentz to win this game and you are allowed to subtract pick sixes if those happen as well. But I don't think the Chargers have quite the defense of what they saw talent-wise last week against the Philadelphia Eagles.

But I've got plenty of space this evening to chat, questions, thoughts, comments, and reactions to J.J. McCarthy not starting this week, but enough was said there to make me think, all right, the plan is for him to return against the Detroit Lions. so you can see light at the end of this tunnel. So let's start out with Digital Plains Media says Vikings fans have to get real. It's one more week of Wentz and then it's J.J. McCarthy. Too many meltdowns by the fan base. The Brosmer truthers also need to get real. While this is a, this is a Brosmer show.

So I will say that that Max Brosmer is a very impressive young quarterback. And he's got a lot of experience and it showed in the preseason. training camp and I think the next year, you're talking about Max Brosmer is probably QB2, that he should be the guy for next year as far as a backup quarterback goes. And maybe if you're having a competition, then, you know, you're going to have somebody else in there. That's way too far down the road for me to see. But let's just say that J.J. McCarthy plays well next year.

Then I think it probably is McCarthy is the starter and then a backup competition between Brozmer and whoever else journeyman veteran backup quarterback wants to come in, but he really has showed a lot. And every time somebody talks about Max Brosmer, coaching staff, teammate, they've been so impressed with him behind the scenes. But I think talking about starting him in a game like this when he's never played before would be excessive versus a guy in Carson Wentz who can clearly win you some football games and can clearly, you know, throw for 300 yards to give you a chance to win.

not a starter at this point in his career. And that's why he is a backup quarterback on the Minnesota Vikings. It's become very clear that he is still a backup. But he's also got a hundred games under his belt of playing in the NFL. And this is where that saying about, hey, the most popular guy is the backup quarterback. Well, in this situation, that's where it applies is that, yeah, I mean, everybody wants to see the younger guy because they realize the flaws. But it's kind of like, like Quinn Ewer is coming in for Tua in Miami and like, oh, well, just put in somebody else. I'm tired of watching this. And it doesn't always have the affected or the expected impact that you would think it would.

I think it's much better for Brosmer to continue to develop and be ready for next year. And if he's got to play, then, you know, he's got to play, which I think he could come in and do the job. But I don't know if you're talking about it being a good idea in a game that feels like you got to win. to keep the season rolling. So ML Vikes fans as 50-year-old Vikes fan in that spirit would like to see Purple Purdy Brosmer. Well, right, that's the thing is that like, look, Brock Purdy did it, Kurt Warner did it, Tom Brady did it.

I don't know that there's a lot of other examples. Like putting that on Max Brosmer, hey, hey, if Brock Purdy can do it, why not you? That to me is a little much. Even if he's looked good, Carson Wentz is still going to be your best chance to win. It's just that everyone hates the guy. who they already know his flaws because they've seen it. So if you haven't played yet, it's just play the other guy. I'll tell you a story.

When I was in Buffalo, the bills had so many injuries one year. They ended up playing a guy named Jeff Toole who had gone to Washington State. And Jeff Toll threw this great touchdown to Marquis Goodwin down the sideline. It was a great play. Goodwin blew away the corner, 40, 50 yard touchdown. It was amazing. And then he threw a pick. six, of course, at the goal line, 99-yard or 100-yard pick-six that lost the game.

But for the longest time, we would get phone calls at the radio station of people wanting to play Jeff Tool. He was QB4, undrafted free agent, no real physical tools, like, I mean, a hardworking guy, but just not NFL caliber. Yet, so when they eventually cut him, we said, like, pour one out for Jeff Tool guy because there was always that. So it is the case that fans always want to see the player that they don't know yet. But I think with Brozmer, you're going to have to probably give him a lot more time than you want to

because you just don't want to watch Carson Wentz anymore. And that's what it's really felt like after the Philly game is there's just an antsiness of, you know, hey, can you move on? Can you get back to the thread here of what this season was supposed to be? And I thought, if anything came out of KOC's press conference today, it was that. It was almost, it walked up to the line of being an acknowledgement of, yeah, guys, like, JJ's going to come back and he's going to be the starting quarterback. We didn't find, you know, a diamond in the rough here in Carson Wentz.

He's fine for a backup, but McCarthy's our guy and they're going to go forward with him. So digital planes media, check out Herbert's stat line last time he played B-Flow, 40 for 40. for 405 yards, three touchdowns, would remind you one of the touchdowns bounced off someone's face. But yeah, no, that was an interesting strategy for them, was just get the ball out of Herbert's hands as fast as possible. And I imagine that we're going to see the same thing because their offensive line is so banged up that it's going to be as fast as possible to Quentin Johnston, who can

run after catch, to Ladd McConkey, who's a really good short area route runner. to a Vikings murderer, Kellan, or Keenan Allen, I mean, Keenan Allen has just been so good against this team every single time he plays them. Even with the bears, he caught balls and was wide open. Caleb missed him a few times, but he was open all day. They've got guys that can do that. And this group in terms of a secondary has not been impressive this year as they were last year. The pass rush has gotten a lot of pressures, but hasn't gotten a lot of sacks.

so they're going to have to do that. Herbert's good at getting rid of it at the very last second. That's going to be a factor as well. But this should be a game where they get turnovers. And they have not gotten turnovers. I think it was maybe Will Raggitt's had the stat that they haven't gone. Was it three or four straight games without a turnover like ever in franchise history? And that's another thing that has been really surprising about this.

But if you're never in positions where the other team has to take risks, it's hard to get turnovers. When you have Jordan Love playing from way behind in two games last year, he'll probably throw you a pick. But if you have Jalen Hertz playing from way ahead the entire game or Aaron Rogers, what incentive do they have to take any risks? They might throw it, you know, 30 yards down the field taking shots, but that's not really a risk when you're talking about, you know, maybe turning the ball over 40 yards down the field or something. So they didn't have to throw a lot. And when you throw a lot from behind, that's where you get big mistakes.

And the Vikings haven't been able to cause teams to do that. Let's see. Fanny, just going to go with that. Is Nashan Wright a sneaky underrated loss? No, I don't think so. I don't think. Now, Nashan Wright made an amazing play to intercept J.J. McCarthy, but I don't think he's a sneaky underrated loss.

I think it was more of, and you're saying he could have been CB3 instead of Jeff Okuda. I think that it was underrated that they just did not address that position with a more proven player. So then when you were looking at the cornerback group, it initially looked like they had depth, but Mackay Blackman ends up being traded, which was a huge surprise. And when we look at Blackman's performance, he's been an average player for the Indianapolis Colts, maybe a little bit below average. and he's been below average in coverage, does have two interceptions, but he's been a little below average overall in coverage by the numbers. But then, you know, is that more reliable a little below average than Jeff Okuda? Maybe that was a health thing.

Kind of looked like it in training camp, but they didn't have any other answer. And the only corner that they went and got was Fabian Moreau, who's been around in the league. And it's, you know, not like there's a million great corners available, but only going and getting Fabian Moreau was surprised. and leaving it to Jeff Okuda, and then when they do have to play three corners, and that's what the Chargers are going to do.

They're going to try to get extra weapons on the field and make the Vikings either play three safeties with a mismatch or play Jeff Okuda as many snaps as they can. The teams know what the weakness is. So that's one where we often talk about first guessing and second guessing. That's a first guess of a lot of us, you guys, wondered about, hey, are you sure with the cornerback group? Are you sure that this is all you want to do going into the season?

And maybe just throw it out there that, you know, Dwight Mcglother might be a guy as the CB3 to try because the way that it's been going is, you know, these teams are taking advantage when Okuda's on the field. And they found him twice in two very big situations last week. But the overall cornerback group has not, I think, lived up to expectation. and Byron Murphy isn't even getting targeted a whole heck of a lot, gave up a touchdown to A.J. Brown, but why would you when you have the less

experience as a starter, Isaiah Rogers? And then when Okuda's on the field, somebody who has really struggled in man-to-man coverage over his career. And you got that matchup, like they're going to go after it. So we could see that this week. So under, underrated position. I don't know about underrated because we did talk about it a lot through the off season. I don't think Nashon Wright was that guy, but somebody, somebody was probably needed there. Let's see.

And this is, Grandel says clearly a soft benching at this point. People will just never let it go. And that's what's, I think, frustrating sometimes about like the, you know, group think or whatever, like taking the time to work your way through this and the facts that we know

is just so much more challenging for some people than just being like, soft benching. I mean, like, you heard Kevin O'Connell strongly insinuate that J.J. McCarthy would be back against the Detroit Lions in playing. Do you think that Kevin O'Connell didn't want to play J.J. McCarthy? That's, that's the thing that is just so epically dumb about the soft benching thing that I have really been maybe annoyed the most about is, do you think they didn't want to play J.J. McCarthy? Like, do you think that they saw the one bad game and said, I'm out. Like they put all their chips to the middle of the table on this guy.

They put all their coaching efforts, all lasers set and getting him ready for this season and all the work they put in from OTAs, mini camp, training camp, joint practices, every single day meeting with the head coach, all that sort of stuff, building up the roster, everything else. They see one bad game and say like, no, give us Carson Wentz. Just doesn't make any sense. Give us a backup quarterback who was on his couch until the middle of August. That was what they wanted. I mean, that just doesn't add up. They would have far preferred J.J. McCarthy just continue to play, especially, oh, soft benching against Cincinnati, the worst defense that you would really want him to have

played against? No, it doesn't. None of it really makes a heck of a lot of sense. So it's fun to say things like that, I guess, for people because they want to think, oh, it's got to be something else, but it, I don't think it is. I don't think it is. Let's see. George says, at this point, need JJ to get 100% healthy and similar in terms of KOC's belief he can execute the full playbook, 2025, not a Super Bowl year. So we need JJ at his physical best to see 2026 could be.

Yeah, and that's the one thing about, like, looking far into the future is always so hard to say, well, hey, next year's our year. Like, you know, I don't know about that. because who knows what's going to happen between now and then and how it's going to look. But what you do need is a reasonable sample of a guy playing as close to 100% as he can be. And you can't control, hey, maybe on the second snap of the game, he'll get hurt again against the Detroit lines. You can't control what happens next.

But you can control what happens right now. You can control when you put him back out there and what type of physical status you're letting him take back over the team. and also from the technical status as well. Like they've taken this time to rework some of the mechanics. But that's also another thing of O'Connell being open about that. Also then open the door for people to be like, see, see, they can't stand his mechanics. Like, well, obviously he had to work on some things after that Atlanta game. Clearly he had to work on things.

It's just that, you know, saying it in public, explaining what you're doing has, I think, caused some people to make reaches that were unnecessary in a situation that's really been laid out right in front of us. It matters that they went to Dublin. It matters that they're playing on Thursday night. You heard him say it. If it was Sunday, he'd be starting. Basically is what Kevin O'Connell said. So they want him back as soon as they can possibly get him. But they also don't want to be stupid, which would be to put him out there with half a game plan and not at a point where they feel like he can be the best version because they have to evaluate the best version. And these things can hang around.

That's the other thing, too, is that with a high ankle sprain, you play on it, and you heard it more. It can really linger and be bad for the quarterback. So do you want to be getting to week 16, 17? And you're looking at McCarthy in his performance and going, gosh, it's not very good, but he played with an injured ankle the whole time. No, you want to get there and say, we know who this is. We know what you have here.

that's so much, so much, so much more important, I think, is to know what you have here. Yemka's corpse, don't know what that is. I think the rumors that were dismissed over the summer about certain staff being concerned might have been right. Well, when it comes to quarterbacks, uncertainty is absolutely intrinsic to the position because nobody actually knows anything when it comes to quarterbacks.

Otherwise, the greatest quarterback of all time wouldn't have been a sixth round pick. Otherwise, you know, the Miami Dolphins would have picked Drew Breeze instead of Dante Culpepper to play for them. And Drew Breeze, you know, I don't think anybody saw coming that a guy with a shoulder injury would become one of the top 10 quarterbacks in the history of the game, right? Like there's so many Daniel Jones right now, Sam Darnold, Baker Mayfield. If everybody knew, then they would have. made different moves, right? Even if the Vikings had known how good Daniel Jones was going to be, they might have thrown more cash at him to stay and made him QB1.

I don't know, right? Like, who can ever predict this stuff? It's one of the best parts about football and the most frustrating and fascinating is that we're always chasing answers when it comes to this. How was Jamarcus Russell a bust when he was the most physically gifted quarterback ever? How is Ryan Leif a bust? But Peyton Manning the greatest thing, right? Like, we just don't ever know how it's going to go.

So uncertainty in the building about how good J.J. McCarthy was going to be sounds about right to me. I mean, sure, there was. But there was also enough belief that they could not franchise tag Darnold and not bring in Aaron Rogers. So there's also proof in the decision that while you're saying, well, you know, some people were worried. Yeah, why wouldn't they be? You just won 14 games. And you're going to a different quarterback. You're not nervous doing that.

but in terms of how they actually felt about McCarthy, well, he's here, right? And they made that decision, right? So you can't say, well, it was obvious that they never believed in him. They believed in him enough to make the decision. So it's one of those, it's very hindsighty, I think, to be like, oh, well, you know, he's only played two games. It wasn't that great. So clearly everyone was right who had concerns. We don't have anywhere close to enough sample size to start evaluating.

what J.J. McCarthy really is. And I'll go back to right after the Falcons game. As bad as it was, I remember saying, like, I still think they're going to win a lot of games because of how quarterbacks that are this young have these games and they need them to turn a corner and I still think the team has a lot of talent. Now, there's a lot of other things that have gone sideways for them that I didn't expect. The injuries, a number of players have just not performed to their level that they had before or that was expected, and that's how you get a result of being a 500 team.

It's been a lot more inconsistent than we thought it was going to be around the quarterback position. But also, if you told me that McCarthy didn't play in four of the first six games, I would have said, yeah, their record's probably three and three at best if they were playing the backup quarterback. So, let's see. Let me slide down here a little bit. uh k brewer says a little bit late to the party i'd rather watch mccarthy go through

bumps as soon as he can but rather him not make his first three starts uh in prime time yeah the prime time thing doesn't really concern me so much i mean that's football like you have to you have to play in big games if you're going to be a quarterback he you know go back to college he's playing in big games in michigan in front of a lot of people and stuff i i don't think that was an issue for the first two games i really think it's i i don't want to have him play when he's this inexperienced at less than the best amount of strength that they can get him to. If he was Justin Herbert, yeah, he's probably playing right now and trying to fight through it. But even then, if you listen to my interview with Daniel Popper, who covers the Chargers earlier,

he talked about, they did have him play through a high ankle sprain. It was a bad idea. And he couldn't move and they had to pull him out of a game. Like, these things are, they're not fake. I mean, the high ankle sprain is a difficult injury to play through. So, you know, I don't think you would want him out there with that. But, you know, I mean, look, every stage is pretty big in the NFL most times. Oh, you're not playing a national TV while you're going to play in the Lions den there at Ford Field next week.

That's going to be pretty big too. ML Vikes fans, as I'm thinking, we're going to see a 2723 game. Not sure which team gets to 27, though. Blinky, that was the answer to a fan dual question of the day, by the way. over under on Fanduil, 44 and a half, how many points do they need to win? So the answer for you, I think sounds like it's 27. Blinky, I can't understand playing or even signing Carson, who is a liability, both in the locker room and on the field.

Well, he hasn't been any problem whatsoever in the locker room. I mean, I think that things of the past are not to be applied from things to the present. It's just a different scenario. It's not a Philadelphia Eagles team tanking around you and giving up on you and things like that and then trading you away, that's a situation that would be a lot more tense between the quarterback and the franchise. When Carson Wentz got here, he understood the deal, that he's the backup quarterback. He's here to work with J.J. McCarthy, and that's what we've

seen from him so far. So I don't, I don't think you can hold every report of the past about J.J. or about Carson Wentz against him. Also, I was not the same person at 24 than I was at 33, nor am I the same person now at 39 that I was at 33. So, you know, things change. I wouldn't hold that against them. But as far as, you know, liability on the field, I mean, look, you go back to any backup quarterback throughout history, find me many of them that have 500 records. And it's probably the best backups that you've ever heard of.

That's just the reality of what you're talking about. Like a liability, he's not a liability. I mean, a liability was like Jared. Hall. Sometimes, this is where it's like, I don't know what you guys thought Carson Wentz was going to bring you. I mean, maybe we thought he could kind of get the ball out quick and grind through, but he did a good job against Cincinnati, did a good job against Cleveland. But if you, if you think that this level of quarterback play is a travesty, like I don't, you just maybe have a very short memory because, and I saw Will Raggett's talking about this, there have been 15 Vikings quarterbacks

in the last 25 years who have been wildly worse than this. Way, way, way, way worse. And maybe you've gotten a little bit spoiled from seeing at least average to a good quarterback play. But I mean, even think about Dobbs after the first two games where that went, Jaron Hall trying to start against the Packers and having to be pulled. You go back to the guy that we try not to mention on the show,

Christian Ponder. I mean, there's been Josh Freeman. I mean, there's been so much. worse quarterback play than this. I think Wentz overall has done a good job. He missed badly on some throws against the Eagles and he got lit up against the Eagles a few times and the pick six is bad. But this is what you expect. If you tell me at the beginning of any season, a team will play the Eagles with a backup quarterback. I'm not expecting they win. And I'm not expecting that they get great quarterback play. I didn't pick them to win last week in part for that reason. But if he can get

you one win against a Chargers team that is beaten down and go three and two in your season's still alive. He'll have done a great job. I'll defend backup quarterback Carson Wentz all day. If they didn't have J.J. McCarthy and they pick Carson Wentz over Sam Darl. I'd be losing my mind. But that's not what happened. That is not what happened. So let's see. Joe says funny how KOC has made such a big deal about missing that practice the Atlanta week, yet he went ahead and started him now we have to wait seems like crap to me okay well i don't really understand the connection um j j mccarthy was healthy going into that game and he clearly in hindsight felt that missing that practice was a difference maker but if you actually go back to that

friday practice after the press conference that we had with him before the alana game he was talking about how impressed he was with j jay coming out and practicing on friday and running that practice and how prepared he seemed after that. So it's very much a hindsight analysis that I think KOC himself maybe underrated, but they weren't going to not start him for missing that practice. So I don't know really what the connection is to right now other than to say maybe you learn from the past a little bit that if he wasn't 100% locked into the game plan because he missed some practice that week, that putting him out there on a Thursday would be

kind of bad as process, right? Because you've already seen, hey, if he didn't have a full week to prepare that this is what happened, that he wasn't able to execute the offense, well, why would you throw him out in a short week where he hasn't been able to practice in full? That wouldn't make much of a sense. I also do think that O'Connell has overly hammered home that point about him missing the practice every single time that he's talked about it. every single time he's talked about it, he's brought that up.

And I think it's just something that maybe if he were to do it differently, they would have tried to work out something else with him, with the scheduling. And, you know, you guys know this, that life doesn't always allow you to have a perfect schedule. There was one night where my friend came up from Florida to play golf during the biweek and my dog got sick in the middle of the night. We're in the vets from midnight to 5 a.m. And like, sometimes life just comes and gets you and doesn't make it the easiest in the world.

So that happened going into the Atlanta game. I think, though, I would probably tell KOC to just move on from that point. Like, you don't have to bring it up every time we get it. But I think what he's trying to say by saying that, like, hey, the last time he didn't have full preparation, he didn't play well. So we want to make sure he has full preparation. That's all I take out of that. And playing him on a Thursday, he's not going to have full preparation.

Blinky says, don't understand the Sam Darnold and Daniel Jones pining. Jones had the best O line and best running back, nearly lost to the Cardinals. Well, okay, I mean, come on. They are six and one. Like, let's give them credit. I think it's more about, it's probably less about Daniel Jones, though. Look, if the Vikings had Daniel Jones right now and he was playing well, that it would be maybe a four and two team. And we would be talking about how is it really good enough to go anywhere?

The difference with Sam Darnold, and look, all credit to Daniel Jones, like he's been a great pro and he was classy in the way he handled his exit from New York and he didn't throw people under the bus and didn't do Sean Peyton stuff where he's taking shots at everybody and all that. So I credit Daniel Jones and his professionalism. He also came to Minnesota with a clear eye on trying to improve as a quarterback, which I think really shows in his performance now and says a lot about him, where he came here and. said, I want to learn from Josh McCown, I want to learn from Kevin O'Connell, their preparation. I want to see it up close. That's why he came here. And the Vikings said, great, and maybe we'll get a compick. But, you know, with Daniel Jones, it's a little bit different than Sam Darnold. Those are two different things, because I agree with your overall point that Jones, they've leaned heavily on the run game. They've leaned heavily on the defense. They haven't had the greatest

schedule so far. And there might be some regression coming. With Darnold, we saw it up close we saw him beat the Packers twice we saw him make the throws against Atlanta we saw him with the game winning drive against Arizona we saw him beat a good Seattle team in Seattle in the rain with a crazy throw I that guy that's who he is I think I mean Sam Darnold has won 23 of his last 31 games with 102 quarterback rating like he might just be really good uh and I think you're probably getting to the point where Sam Darnold has put his name in the same category as guys like Jordan Love and Justin Herber, who are really good quarterbacks.

Can they actually get all the way through the playoffs and win the Super Bowl? I don't know, but their teams feel really good about their chances to be in that dance all the time when they have them. And, you know, with Darnold, the upside was always extremely, extremely high. So that's where you can, I think, go back at second guess now that we have the results or some of the results. We don't have all the results. And that's the point about the second guess. We could have probably guessed J.J. McCarthy would need more development and maybe not be

fully ready to lead a team that had high expectations. And I think based on the sample of Darnold playing good football going all the way back to 2022, and then when he got in with San Francisco and then 14 games with the Vikings, that you could say, if you had franchise tagged him, he probably was going to continue to play well in this offense. So that's the one I think you could second guess. But the problem is you don't, it's, it's Darnold versus nothing. You just don't have any sample of J.J. McCarthy to compare it to. So if McCarthy plays really well, then you're going to say, well, then they made the right

decision. So these things, it's the reactionary nature of the NFL that we have to live in that if Darnold is playing well and McCarthy's not playing, then you're like, clearly they made the wrong decision. But if McCarthy plays 10 games and wins six of them, the rest of the way, and the Vikings get to 10 wins because they win against the Chargers, then no one's going to be saying, wow, they really screwed up by letting go Sam Darnold. In fact, wow, good job.

Right, this is how quickly these narratives change. And so we've got to see the other side of that before we really have something to compare it to. But I, I'm a Sam Darnold enjoyer. You guys know that that I thought, and this is maybe just me being the, appreciator of history in the NFL is that, you know, I go back to 20 different quarterbacks that had bad first playoff games that turned out to be really great or Super Bowl champions, but the first playoff game they had didn't go very well just like

Sam Darnold. So I thought that those two games back to back swayed people's analysis way too far. And I still see it. He makes a bad mistake last night and half the internet fires out, oh yeah he's seeing ghosts again dweeb it's like dude he's been good for a really really long time uh we don't have to do this every single time he makes a mistake just like lots of other quarterbacks including josh allen had a horrible game against atlanta nobody said see that's the josh allen from 2018 like nobody says that uh anymore so uh i think with darnold you could have foreseen him being really good in seattle you could have foreseen it not being an aberration you could have foreseen it not being just the whispering that they also, you know, have a good

wide receiver one as well. But you can also say, hey, like, if you're going to play that game, can we wait? Like, can we wait to play that game until the end of this season when we've seen J.J. McCarthy play. Then we can actually have that conversation. Until then, it's really, it's a really hard one to have because we just don't know what McCarthy is going to be. And honestly, through six games, we probably wouldn't really know overall. already fully who he's going to be.

So that's where that discussion, I think, is, is maybe been, like, I think it's premature. I think it needs to be had at some point, but it's premature to second guess it just yet when we haven't seen him. Brandon says, any trades you think that the Vikings need to make? No, I don't think so as far as buying. If you're sort of suggesting buying, I think they need to stay with where, where they're at, as far as, you know, selling, you know, someone brought up, and it jumped away from me,

but someone brought up selling Jonathan Allen. No one's, no one's buying Jonathan Allen at that price. Maybe Hargrave, I don't know about that either. You know, I think that this team just needs to play it out and see where they're at. And at some point, you might see a shift from guys like Jonathan Allen and Javon Hargrave playing as much to even way more of Jalen Redman and Levi-Drake. Rodriguez. I think we're kind of already seeing that, though, because those guys are just playing a better football at this moment. So we're seeing a little bit of that. But I think with this team, you just play it out. Like, there isn't big moves that need to be made. Maybe if you lose this

game, you do become a seller. But you've got to figure out, like, who exactly could you sell to another team where they were going to give you significant enough draft capital and someone who's surely not on the team in the future? Like, how many guys can we actually save? that about, that this team was really built for a two-year to three-year window with this group. So there aren't many guys that I could go over on the roster. Maybe Ivan Pace if he's benched, but then, you know, I don't know how they feel about other guys behind him stepping up into that backup role. There's just really not that many players where you could say for sure, hey, move this guy, get a fifth round pick for him. That will be worth it. I think the

team is kind of is what it is, but I would not say that they should go into buying mode. Cody says, we're doing worse than the Chicago Bears. That says a lot with all this talent. Well, I mean, one thing is the Chicago Bears have had a pretty easy schedule. We do need to acknowledge that part of it with Chicago. And they have a good win against Washington, but Washington really doesn't appear to be that great of a team. Daniels hasn't been healthy, really the entire season.

So they've gotten away. And also they gave away that game by just dropping. the ball. The Raiders gave Chicago a game by getting a kick blocked at the end of it. Circumstances have played into Chicago's record a lot, not saying they don't deserve it. But, you know, this Vikings team also having to play the backup quarterback, it is a lot of disappointment in certain areas of, hey, you know, this guy got hurt Ryan Kelly or Aaron Jones, and they spent money there and was Allen really worth it and it was Hargrave really worth it and all that. But then if we kind of pull back and go, well, they've been playing a backup quarterback for

four out of the six games, well, then you'd expect to probably be about 500. So it does feel like a lot of the pieces have disappointed. But when you receive the 24th best quarterback play in the league or whatever I said it was the other day, 22nd in quarterback rating around the NFL, it makes everybody's job so much harder. You give up a pick six. You're down two scores. And guess what? what? Philadelphia can say, how about we run play action and throw it 50 yards down the field and see if we get a big play, right? I mean, when you're playing against Cleveland with half an offensive line, a backup quarterback, I don't know, you just don't expect to blow anybody out or put up huge numbers or something like that. But you're right that they expect it to be better than

Chicago. And the other part of it, too, which I think is very fair, is that when you say that you built a roster so good to sort of be quarterback proof than it needs to be, even if that quarterback is Carson Wentz. That that was the idea of this team was you're going to be able to run the ball enough, which they have not. You're going to have the weapons, which they have played very well, but not everybody. And you're going to have the defense to be able to win a game like that against Philadelphia. And that was my kind of main criticism coming out of that game is this is the one that you're supposed to be able to grind out because you have an elite defense and you don't you just don't have an elite defense so you can't grind out that type of game

but that was the one that they were supposed to be able to do uh norse forces should be able to get a good corner with the top 10 draft pick uh we're not there yet not there yet uh and i refuse to start talking about the draft for a really long time because we'll have plenty of time to talk about that later on. LDR, believe, versus Fandul answer either 17 points or 38 points. Feels like Thursday night games in general only have those two options. Yeah, I totally agree with you there. This to me is one where you likely will need to score. And you probably can against this Chargers team. You can't go one for six in the red zone. But the way they move the ball against Philadelphia with this offensive line where four out of the five players on the offensive line had good games in terms of past protection.

It was really just six pressures allowed from Blake Brandel that you're not going to have a lot of luck with when one of the best players on Earth is going up against the backup center. And that's what happened. And KOC was a little bit KG when it came to who's playing center for this week. that's not what you want either, is bouncing back and forth between, is it this guy, is it that guy? Like, that's not ideal. When you're talking about a young quarterback or a backup quarterback, they need to kind of just say, hey, it's Brandel, you know, it is what it is.

Or it's Juergens and just stick with that and not kind of go week to week. Also, you know, he got banged for a holding call that wasn't even remotely a holding call, which is not fair to Blake Brandel either. So the way that this team is right now with the backup quarterback and a backup center, the fact that they could move the ball as well as they did against Philadelphia, I think still says that there's versions of this thing that they expect it to be that they can be. But you probably are going to need a much better defensive performance than they've gotten so far this year in the two games they've played good quarterback. So that would actually be my biggest concern is not that.

it while the offense has been very inconsistent with a backup QB, yeah, well, that's life. But that the two times they've played reasonably decent quarterbacks, they have just been throttled. Aaron Rogers, I mean, they couldn't buy an incompletion from Rogers. They couldn't buy an incompletion from Hertz. That's not what we expected from this defense. Let's see. Is that Scougarra?

KOC has been right about Kirk, Darnold, and Jones. giving him a chance to be right about McCarthy, still, even if it is an instant. I think that's very fair. That's very fair. Maybe you might say not right, like right and then wrong about Darnold, like, right that they got him and he was the right guy to get, but then maybe wrong to let him go. But we'll see on that. Certainly, Sam Darnold is a really, really good quarterback.

I think we know that from a big enough sample size. I mean, I don't know. I guess he needs to play for some people to believe it. like 50 more games and maybe they still won't because I don't know there are still people who say Herbert sucks and golf sucks and everybody you know all these other quarterbacks Dak Prescott and all that like there's lots of people who have lots of opinions on these quarterbacks but I think the sample's big enough with 30 games and thank you to Blanco Niño for the super chat and asking about Mackay Blackman yeah let me get to that in just a second

and what happened there. But really appreciate the super chat. So with Darnold, it's, I think that the physical talent was very clear from last year. And thinking about where his ceiling could be, did he even reach it last year? I don't know because of the way he's playing against Seattle. He's even playing in a lot of ways better football than he did last year with the Vikings with a team that has, you know, really one weapon. and he's been a little bad turnover last night,

but he's been a little bit safer with the football and getting it out a little bit faster. So I think you could have foreseen that coming that Darnold would continue to be good. It's a lot of games, and there's not a lot of quarterbacks who have a 14-win season with 35 touchdowns who turn out to be trash.

That doesn't happen much. But really, the idea was not that Sam Darnold could get you to a certain level and be a good quarterback, and you'd have to, to make some sacrifices on the roster for that. It was to build around your top 10 draft picks. So, but that doesn't mean that like, look, no one's, no one's perfect with this.

No one is perfect with this when it comes to picking quarterbacks. Like, yes, he's been right before, but that doesn't mean you're going to nail it every single time. Kyle Shanahan has not nailed it every single time, not, you know, betray Lance. Shane Steichen, look at him. Shane Steichen was behind the original iteration of Jalen Hertz becoming a good quarterback. And then he's getting so much out of Daniel. Jones in this offense, but, you know, they drafted Anthony Richardson and he's been

horrible. So, you know, no one, no one is perfect when it comes to quarterbacks. There have been, you know, just some people loves Patrick Mahomes coming out. Some people said he was a second round draft pick. Like, you just never know when it comes to that position because so many things go into it. As far as Mackay Blackman, my observation on Mackay Blackman during training camp is that it just didn't. look the same to me. It just didn't look like he looked before. And it may have been a physical issue that just because someone has an ACL and there's a long history of ACL recoveries being okay, like Adrian Peterson, doesn't mean every single one of them is the same, just like, believe

it or not, high ankle sprains. They're not all the same. And every single injury isn't, it's not mad at it. It's not where someone gets an injury. And then, hey, two to four weeks, you're good. ACL, he'll be back. You're good. Turn injuries off. It's like every injury is different. He didn't have the same confidence, I thought, for the Vikings in his training camp. So I understood why they did that. What I didn't fully understand is why there wasn't somebody else here to replace him. That's what I didn't really fully understand.

Chris says I was never a JJ McCarthy fan, even thought that they wasted the draft pick. But I hope he does well because I love the Vikings. But come on. Can you at least stay on the field? well look uh you know that's i think a reasonable frustration for everybody is that we've spent how many hours talking about j j mccarthy and for you guys like i go to the stadium and when we walk down to the locker room i go down the stairs because the elevator just gets cramped so i go down the stairs and fans are kind of pouring in the number of j j mccarthy jerseys

I see is through the roof. Like, there's been so much buy-in to J.J. McCarthy from the fan base and belief in McCarthy from the fan base. And the payoff has been one great night in Chicago so far after how many months of talking about this, the expectation was that when he was originally drafted, maybe he'll start like week eight of his first year and go from there and to not see him basically at all and then see one quarter of good play. Yeah, I mean, you can really feel the anxiousness.

the tension building. And I think that that goes for within the building. It goes for everybody who plays on the team. It goes for us and you and ever like, what is this guy going to be and is he ever going to play? But it would also be really bad process to get frustrated with the fact that he hasn't played and be like, all right, kid, you're good to go. Go out there.

Yeah, can you throw properly with this ankle? No, but like just get out there, run around, see what happens. I mean, you know, look. everybody we don't the other thing that i that i won't that i won't do is like everybody's got their takes on the draft but i i will stick with this no matter what is whatever happens with the draft like j j mccarthy you could go back and you could say well you know i saw this coming or saw that coming and there and i've already seen a lot of that from fans and i had my questions and concerns about every quarterback that was in the 2024 draft class um saw by

thought what might be better fits or not as good a fits, but every single one of them is like, well, here's what they do well, here's what they don't do well, and here's how I think they fit. And with McCarthy, the clear thing that was necessary was development. And that would be my biggest concern right now. So I'm not going to go back and say, you see, I told you so that. I don't want to be on TV, folks. I don't want to be on Fox Sports. One, with my own daily show where I just do a bunch of told you shows about what I was right or wrong.

that's just not my style. I am a reporter. So I try to look at the entire picture and the entire, I don't keep some sort of scoreboard of like what take was right, what take was wrong and all that. But if there's one thing you can go back and look at, as far as what has mattered to whether he's going to be good eventually or not, and is the fact that it was clear he needed development.

And it's very hard to get development when you're not on the field. And I think that we have seen other quarterbacks who have struggled to become the best versions of themselves because they've had those types of injuries. I mean, that that's the issue for me is that when you have these injuries and you can't work on technical stuff, you can't work on those drops, you can't work on throwing the football with touch and all that stuff at full speed and practice, it's really hard to get better. so if we're talking about one thing going forward is that's what he needs like he needs to be on the field he needs to be able to practice in full he needs to be able to find a development space without being injured so yeah i mean it's frustrating you can't blame somebody for getting hurt like he got tackled funny what are you going to do right like oh man it's it's not his fault what are you going to do like some people get you're a quarterback you get banged up you get tackled funny you miss games lots of great quarterbacks have had ankle sprains that have caused them to miss games. But that's the one fear I would say for me is just that you're not developing if you're not able to play. A reminder about that Fandul question of the day over under for this game, 44 and a half.

How many points does a Viking offense need to win this game against the Chargers? Lour says since they've been winning and losing every other game that will continue the next couple of games, which means they'll beat the Chargers, lose to the Lions. Yeah, I don't know if it quite works that way, but if you were thinking in terms of, hey, you're kind of playing like a 500 team, if this season ends up playing out that way and they end up being kind of like a 500 team where it's a little bit of good and a little bit of bad and some weeks were in here saying, hey, that was a great win. And then the next week we're going, what happened?

That wouldn't surprise me at all. So I actually think your take, even though it's kind of like, yeah, I don't think they'll go every other exactly, but they certainly have played that way. And they, my guess is that we'll continue to play that way because it's just hard to see where they can flip the switch to being completely dominant. And 500 football, if they win the Chargers game, the rest of the way gives you a chance to be in the discussion. And at the way it's gone, we've just had to move the goalpost for this season.

I went into the season saying, you better win. And trust me, if they come out of this with a seven win record, That is a complete failure on so many different levels. But there are different ways to get to eight or nine wins. If you get to nine and you miss it because of tiebreakers, okay, you came out with a winning record, but if it means McCarthy played well, I'm much less apt to start saying, hey, you know, everybody is under the gun here or something like that. I'm much more likely to say, all right, yeah, these things went wrong and they made bad

bets here or there. But the bigger picture is that they can fix some of those things, but McCarthy's going to be okay. Like, that's where you need to come out of it for this season. But, you know, seven wins, not going to be enough. But I think you're right, though, about them being a 500 team. Sorry for the earlier Christian Ponder mention. I do apologize. Up north, the Spurgeon win was the worst quarterback I've ever seen. Hey, that's my point about Carson Wednesday. They're like, man, you should feel, uh, lucky to have Carson Wentz play this way. And I get where some of you are saying,

Hey, Wentz is banged up. Then you should play Brosmer. But Carson Wentz is playing. Yeah, banged up is the way to put it. But I wouldn't say that these injuries should keep him from being able to play. And that's with recognition that I'd like to,

I like Max Brosmer where he's at. It's just not the right time to do that for him. Aaron says, where would Sam Howell be one and four? Oh, yeah. Yeah. yeah they that wasn't going anywhere yep that wasn't going anywhere um adrian says a coc praised jj for practicing friday saying the missing thursday was not good