Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - What does the timeline look like for JJ McCarthy?

Episode Date: May 13, 2024

Matthew Coller talks about how Kevin O'Connell and JJ McCarthy laid out their goals for he offseason program and reflects on the takeaways from McCarthy's rookie camp. Also answering questions from Vikings fans Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of Purple Insider. Matthew Collar here. And yes, I did intentionally time out when I was going live this evening with the Minnesota Timberwolves playing basketball. So we've got a hard time that we're going to drop out here when that basketball game begins. And I didn't want to do it afterward because I figured we'd all be talking about what happened with the Wolves and beforehand you guys would all be anxious to talk about a little Minnesota sports before the Wolves game begins. So here we are. Welcome to another show. The other day got our first look at JJ McCarthy. And if you want to go back and get my reaction with Dane Mizutani, please do that. That video did extremely well.

So thank you to everybody who watched or listened to that show. Love the response about that. I mean, I think like Dane said in the show, you'll never get another chance to have a very, very, very first impression of J.J. McCarthy. So that was an interesting day on Friday. But we won't get another impression of J.J. McCarthy and how he looks at OTAs for another two weeks. So there isn't any media access this week to the Vikings. And then the next week there will be.

And after that, it'll be a weekly thing. And then there's minic camp at the beginning of June. And that will kind of set the stage for where we begin with training camps. So I figured what I would do here is kind of talk over our timeline for looking at J.J. McCarthy throughout the summer and where he might be by the end of, I guess we could call it the spring and then in training camp in the summer and what the he might be by the end of, I guess we could call it the spring and then in training camp in the summer and what the timeline might be based on the very small amount of information that we got from Rookie Minicamp. Although I will say that right before I went on, I was chuckling to myself about a few things.

And I feel like part of my job is to say when something is a thing and when it's not a thing. So part of it is playing almost panic traffic cop or overreaction traffic cop to, all right, I've been doing this a while. That's not a thing. I've been doing this a while. That's a thing. Let's all talk about that or let's not talk too much about that i mean it goes back to my approach to mccarthy my approach to justin jefferson's contract situation be patient let's let this thing play out and so forth and i was laughing about some of the reactions for the other rookie quarterbacks in comparing them to what we were saying about j McCarthy, Jaden Daniels and Bo Nix are already headed for Canton. Like that is just get the gold jackets ready right now.

I just saw a headline from my old friend, Chris Thomason's outlet in Denver talking about Google eyes over a Bo Nix that the Denver Broncos have Google eyes was was the exact word like that needs to come along with a little more like a like noise or something with the eyes popping out of their skulls. Bo Nix was so good at rookie mini camp. Apparently he did impress. So I'm not particularly surprised by that because Bo Nix is older than JJ McCarthy. He's got a lot more reps under his belt. And I very much doubt that Bo Nix at age 21, when he was playing for Auburn and throwing 16 touchdowns or whatever would have given everyone goo goo eyes had he been drafted

into the NFL. So not terribly shocked about that. And Jaden Daniels apparently looked good at his uh one rookie camp performance i saw that headline on espn and then there was drake may where gerard mayo said he's got a lot of work to do but the reality is all of them fall under that category actually that they all have a lot of work to do and that was really our main takeaway from JJ McCarthy. If you haven't listened to the recap yet, I will give it to you. The crib notes version is JJ McCarthy big and also throws really hard. And, you know, I was thinking about McCarthy and just how we've talked about him and how quickly some of our preconceived notions can be blown up once you actually see

someone in a Minnesota Vikings helmet with the purple on and football players around that are NFL players. And now look, rookie mini camp, this is the thing why it's so difficult to actually have any real takeaways. I understand that that's the job, but we're talking about not even going against players who are going to be on the team. Mostly when they hand you the list of players that are there at rookie mini camp, you really only recognize a handful of them, the draft picks, a couple of UDFAs that got talked up. And then a few guys, I think there may have been five players who were on the team last year. Thayer Thomas was there. Dwayne McBride. Someone asked the other day how Dwayne McBride looked. I wish I could tell you I was watching JJ McCarthy. And also really hard to tell you how someone looks as a running back when there's no contact. There's no hard practice reps. It's basically seven on seven. Everything is really passing. So you could see the receivers and you could see the quarterback.

And aside from that, you really can't tell what anybody is going to look like. But you also can't tell what they're going to look like aside from just how they throw the football and the handful of reps and how they performed against other rookies, UDFAs, and just a few guys who were on the team last year that were rookies last year and are still eligible to come to this practice. In OTAs, we get a little bit more. And then in minicamp, I think we will get a really good idea of how far JJ McCarthy has really come along since this first day that we're seeing him. So the impression

of him was much more that you could see that physical ability. You could see the raw arm strength that he has, which I was very, very impressed by, to tell you the truth. When we were walking back from practice, just chatting, like, I don't think we've seen a football thrown that hard at a Vikings practice since Sam Bradford maybe probably since Sam Bradford was here was the last time we saw a football thrown with that level of velocity now Bradford of course had been in the league a long time and had amazing touch on the football that's not something that we're seeing from J.J. McCarthy at this moment it's mostly all fastballs, but the fastballs are very fast. I mean, the ball, one of the things you can really tell is when they have to throw

to an outside sideline, like, does that ball get there up here or is it kind of dropping as it gets there and the receiver reaches down to catch it? No, that ball is going flat on a line to the outside receiver. And that was really impressive. And I guess it started making me think about when we were talking about those comparisons and the ceiling for JJ McCarthy and all those things. And this is why I said, do the men in black, whatever you saw at Michigan, just erase that from your mind. And now it's all about what we see now. Now, of course, there's only a handful of us that can go out to rookie mini camp and you can watch the highlights

that I, you know, the different news stations put out there that, that were out there. So you can go find those on YouTube now, which I think is really awesome that the Vikings put out highlights and everybody can get a look at these guys. Uh, but from seeing him up close is that I started thinking about that ceiling discussion and the comparisons discussion and how I might want to change it because we talked about his ceiling a lot during the period leading up to the NFL draft. And then after he was taken, we did an entire show on comparisons because I love them. I really enjoy talking about the different skill sets and how other quarterbacks from the past played and could he be this guy? Could he be that guy? And I was thinking about,

you know, this Brad Johnson type with better wheels, who isn't the most accurate, but delivers the ball to the, to the right places and so forth. And then as I was watching him at rookie camp and seeing what kind of arm he has and how big he actually is in person, I thought, I don't know if we need to have that as a ceiling, if the ceiling has to be some sort of game manager type. And this is not me watching one practice and telling you, guys, the ceiling is Josh Allen. Here we go. But I think more of when you have that type of arm talent,

just to begin with, and that's where your starting point is. I don't know that we need to put a cap on it that says, Hey, you know, some of these game managers, that's what the guy is going to be when he actually gets to the NFL. And I was also thinking about how different things will be with the Minnesota Vikings than when he was in college where, yes, there were NFL concepts. There's no doubt about that. And he's going to understand some of the things that the Vikings are giving him because they were similar at Michigan, but also at Michigan, I think that Jim Harbaugh understood a few things. I mean, number one, that their offensive line was better at run blocking than it was at pass blocking, that their running backs were freaking amazing,

and that you could set up an offense to not make mistakes where the defense would dominate, run play actions, and then rely on your quarterback every so often but that doesn't mean that that has to be what he becomes in the nfl you see it doesn't it doesn't mean because he played this way that that is the only way that he will ever be able to play football it's that he was playing this way there and And what he can become in the NFL is, I don't know. I don't know how to watch one practice and tell you that, no, no, no guys, the ceiling is all of a sudden, because I saw one practice, because that would be goo-goo eyes. That would be doing what I was

talking about Denver doing with Bo Nix, getting the goo-goo eyes out there. But I guess I was thinking that that's why I try to get rid of those thoughts about what I saw from him in college and only focus on what I'm seeing in the NFL. And I try to do that with all the rookies with, you know, whether it's some third rounder that I watched a couple of games from, or if it's Dallas Turner, who I thought was an absolute monster in college, or if it is a quarterback in JJ McCarthy. And I was thinking about the timeline for him and when we're going to start to get an idea of, oh, this is a great point. Let me interrupt my own sentence to pull this point

up on the screen. I think it's great. 28 Dead Poet says, one thing I can't shake, Jefferson, people thought he was a slot-only guy because of the sample size outside wasn't high, especially in his last year. He dropped because of that. Same for McCarthy. I don't know if it's going to be the same for McCarthy, but I love this point because this is exactly why I try to wash out everything before exactly because so many times guys played a certain way in college and this goes for good and bad. But Jefferson is the ultimate example is we were told Jefferson was a slot guy only, which I thought, wait a minute, don't receivers in the NFL play in the slot all the time. Like they move to lots of different positions.

I don't think that's fair. He's also six one and has like a 38 inch vertical or something. But I understood what they meant that, you know, maybe getting off the line of scrimmage wasn't really his thing. Yet you look at other great receivers in the league, Cooper cup, when does Cooper cup ever have to line up outside and go to battle deep down the sideline like Michael Irvin or something? I think it was an antiquated way of looking at that. And with McCarthy, we just have more of an incomplete picture from college. I think I want to look at it that way is that what we saw in college offered an incomplete picture in the same way that maybe Jefferson did as well when they had Terrace

Marshall and they had Jamar Chase and they had Thaddeus Moss it was just the right place for Justin Jefferson to be in the slot right and so like after he got to the NFL they quickly found out oh he can go out there and he could play outside. And honestly, I mean, it set him back a little bit, even coming into the NFL, because I think the Vikings had that as their idea to begin the season was to have him in the slot. And then they realized, oh, actually he can be outside in his first game. He's roasting people down the sideline as an outside wide receiver, his first game as a starter. We also have to remember that just to go back on that, that it was in part because of COVID

that he was not starting early in the season. I'll see that every year when someone's not starting or getting reps or, well, remember Justin Jefferson. Okay. Well, that was a little bit of a different story. Anyhow. So with JJ McCarthy, I think the ceiling, I'm going to start to try to put that together through this off-season program of,

well, what do I think about what this guy could potentially be? Because I think if I knew nothing and I just showed up and let's say I just got the job, I had looked at nothing through the draft. I didn't do any research. I just walked out there and they pointed to the quarterback and they said, there's the guy, there's the guy like he's going to start. I'd be like, okay, let's see here. And I would immediately go, whoa, that guy could throw a football and he's fast too. Cause we didn't really see him run at all. And he's pretty big.

You know, if he goes to the podium and he's pretty mature, all right, well, you know, this could be their guy. And so I don't want to say any way of declaring that he's going to be this or that as far as his ceiling. But I think that we could throw out some of those at absolute best. He's going to be Alex Smith or whatever else, or Hey, he's not going to be a guy who can ever put the offense on his back. There is a long way to go with that. And the biggest area is in accuracy. Very, very clearly that accuracy is the major

thing that he's going to have to discover as he goes forward, which I'm okay with him discovering on the fly and improving on the fly in terms of his accuracy. And not every quarterback who's great in the NFL is absolutely flawless when it comes to throwing perfect dimes everywhere. There were a lot of throws of JJ McCarthy's where it's sailed on him. He just dropped back and he let it rip and the receiver's going, up there and grabbing it over their head as opposed to right on the money. There were a few balls that ended up in foul territory outside. There were a couple that have flown over people's heads at the safeties on deep balls and stuff like that. Yeah. Very clear that he's going to have to

work on the accuracy quite a bit in order to be a top-notch quarterback. But I do think that we can rework that based on seeing him up close and the raw talent that we see from JJ McCarthy. We don't have to look at it as, well, look, the guy's going to be a game manager. That's going to play itself out. And as far as the timeline, and then I'll get to your questions here and be happy to answer whatever's on your mind. It doesn't have to be about J.J. McCarthy, but figure the right place to begin the show.

But anything that's on your mind with the Vikings, happy to answer up until the time that the Wolves tip off. But I think when it comes to his timeline, what you want to see from OTAs, it's totally fine if he's taking all the second team reps to Sam Darnold. My guess would be that Sam Darnold will be taking all the first team reps to begin OTAs because he's been in the league before. He knows portions, I'm sure, of this offense coming from Kyle Shanahan. He's learned numerous offenses in the past. And also he got a head start

on this thing, even going back to their first, whatever, what is it called? Their workout, off-season workouts, voluntary workouts. So he would have started to get a head start on this thing already way before jj mccarthy and one of the things that happened the other day was mccarthy threw an interception where they weren't exactly lined up totally correct and whether that was his fault or the receiver's fault like it's always on the quarterback to make sure hey we're supposed to be at this marker to line up to make this play. And O'Connell talked about when he threw the interception, how he'll have to understand that sometimes in this league, you have to just check down and you can't take the shot

every time. Though I would much rather hear that he tries to take the shot every time and has to be dialed back, then checks down every time and has to be dialed back then checks down every time and has to be told hey buddy you can throw it into traffic or whatever but those are just the minuscule details he's going to still be working out when we get to otas whereas sam darnold i would guess will step right in and start whipping around throwing it to receivers with the right timing with the right you know just he's going to have it down because he's a professional quarterback. Who's been doing this for quite some time, whether it's always perfect or accurate or whatever, I guess we're going to find out, but I guess I would just say that he's going to be far ahead

of JJ McCarthy because of his experience, because already of his time in the NFL, his time with this offense, he's had more since he got here to look at the playbook and work with Kevin O'Connell enough to get a feel for what the Vikings want to do. And they've talked highly of Sam Darnold and his ability to pick this thing up. What I'd like to see timeline-wise with McCarthy is, one, when he does get the reps, because my, I would guess that it's going to be first team, Sam Darnold, second team, JJ McCarthy, and then

everything else goes to Nick Mullins and Jaron Hall, uh, with the third team, but first and second team going back and forth with those reps for JJ McCarthy, that by the time we get to mini camp, if things are going really well, then maybe a mix of those reps with McCarthy and Sam Darnold. And I would like to have an understanding. And by the way, mini camp is at the beginning of June. So that'll be three practices. I'll be at all three of those practices. As always, we'll have two more or maybe even three more OTA practices before that maybe two i think it's two ota practices open to the media and then three in a row and we'll do recaps sometimes they cancel the last one but i don't think they will this year so we'll do recaps

podcasts out from tco performance center after those practices you can look forward to all that as usual when we get there by day three of minicamp, are we seeing McCarthy and Sam Darnold split some reps with the first team? And I think if we are, that's going to be a very good sign for the progress that McCarthy has made. And sometimes I've discovered in talking about J.J. McCarthy, it's hard to find different words than kind of the obvious cliches to say about him. Like he's a hardworking kid, you know, he's, he's real focused and driven and

all those things, but it really does come across that way. It does that he's sort of immersed himself in this right away. And even, you know, a small detail that of course we don't need to make too much out of, but that when Kevin O'Connell gets there to the facility, JJ McCarthy's already there going through practice in his head outside on the, you know, the field turf. And that's one of those that if he becomes a great player, we'll say that was, you know, the first day of mini camp, he was out there running reps by himself at whatever o'clock in the morning and that kind of thing. But I, I do think that everything points to with JJ McCarthy, that he is instantly in the building as the guy that's working closely with the coaches and trying to pick it up as fast as possible. And you can see signs of that at practice.

And so my expectation would be that he does make significant progress through OTAs. And as we set the stage for training camp, which is how I've always looked at minicamp, is that's our starting point. That's like qualifying, and then now we take off. That if we get to there and he's getting some first team reps, that means that what the coaches have said about him is coming to fruition and we're ready for an actual quarterback competition. If he is not getting any first team reps at that point, it does not mean we declare him

a bust. Although I, you know, if you want to overreact, you can, but some people will. I'm certain of that, but you shouldn't. And we should just say, all right, it's Sam Darnold's job unless something kind of crazy happens as training camp goes along. So there's these kind of markers where it's, all right, let's see where they're at in OTAs and see if he's getting any reps with the receivers. And a lot of times they will mix them in in OTAs. So you'd be like,

oh wait, you know, and we'll see if Jefferson is there. If he doesn't have a contract, I wouldn't expect it, but no, we got a rep with Jordan Addison or something. Usually you watch the offensive line because those guys don't really mix and match. So if to know if it's a first team rep or not. So if the first team offensive line, if it's Garrett Bradbury and Sam Darnold the whole time, all right, then that's a first team rep and we'll see if McCarthy mixes in or not. I don't suspect there'll be a ton of first team reps through OTAs, but minicamp will tell us is he starting far behind or is he starting neck and neck? I would be very shocked if it was McCarthy taking the most first team reps and then Darnold but if

that happened then go nuts because that would really be something to see if if he took you know the reins of this position already that would be truly shocking we're talking about a guy that has to learn to get everything lined up has to learn to throw the football a little bit different or it's going to be inaccurate so you know there's a there's a, there's a ways to go, but that's how I'm looking at the timeline for analyzing JJ McCarthy as we go forward. Folks, we all have smartphones and we know that they are pretty amazing, but they can also be amazingly distracting, especially when we're around other people. So us cellular wants us to reset our relationship with our phones by putting down our phones for five. That's right. A company that sells phones wants us to put down our phones and

see what we can find. Learn more at uscellular.com slash built for us. That's uscellular.com slash built for us. I'm happy to answer any of your questions and make fun of any overly exuberant headlines that you guys saw from Rookie Minicamp. I saw one, because I'll just Google Minnesota Vikings, make sure I didn't miss anything, you know, just because sometimes there are random stories that pop up

that get picked up by somebody that has to do with the Vikings. So I just searched it. And one of them was winners and losers of rookie minicamp. And I was like, there were losers of rookie minicamp? I mean, I guess everyone who doesn't make the team is the loser. What are we talking about here? There's no winners or losers of rookie minicamp. We're all winners because the Vikings got their new quarterback out on the field.

That's the winners. It's all us because we get to have fun talking about it. But that made me laugh. I was like, what? Who could? The losers are probably the offensive linemen who are going there for a tryout, but they don't get to hit anybody because Kevin O'Connell strongly believes in not getting anyone hurt. So this is not an intense practice. So not intense that Kevin O'Connell said the goal

is to not have anybody hit the ground. That's how not intense a rookie mini camp practice is. Anyway, Joel says, who are the wide receivers JJ is throwing to at camp? Are these guys even on the roster week one? Also update on the kicker battle. The kicker was there. That's all I got for you. He was there. He was in attendance. We're going to start getting kicker battle stuff in OTAs where they'll have both kickers in because this was only Reichard was there. We'll have both kickers in and I'm guessing they're going to actually take some reps because normally they in OTAs they'll line them up they'll have everybody kind of gather around and hoot and holler and whatever try to distract the kicker and then both guys will kick from the 35 the 45 the 50 whatever

they kind of go back and forth like a kicker rap battle going on out on the OTA fields at TCO Performance Center and as windy as it's, could be pretty interesting battling that wind, which they won't have to battle at US Bank Stadium. So that may be a little bit tricky. That's when that really begins, OTAs, as they do this kind of everyone gather around and the guys are going to kick thing. I am looking forward to that very much as I'm sure everybody is to get updates of Will Reichard versus John Parker Romo.

We'll see if John Parker Romo even lasts past OTAs. The last couple of years that hasn't happened, but that wasn't your main question. The receivers that he's throwing to are all other UDFAs or rookie tryout players that they've brought in. So there was the guys for, and the one other guy was Malik Knowles, who was on the team last year as a UDFA signing, but then he was banged up. So he didn't get out there and they must've liked him enough to decide to bring him back for this year, but nobody that is on the roster right now was out there catching passes except for Thayer Thomas, who was a UDFA signing for them last year, practice squad guy. I don't think he got into an actual game and was most remembered for getting crushed on a punt return in the preseason, but he actually had a good camp last year, enough to stick on the

team. So he can run routes and he can make some plays in practice, but he's not out there throwing to Jordan Addison, Justin Jefferson, Brandon Powell. Those guys will get there in OTAs. And that's why when we're talking about how he performed in some of the throws, were they on point? Were they inaccurate? Some of them were blatantly inaccurate, like an out route to the sideline. It just goes flying out of bounds. Like, okay. Or it's a bomb and it goes way over the guy's head by 20 yards. Clearly that was not the intent.

But there were other ones where you go, was that supposed to be where the guy was? Did he run the route exactly right? And that's what makes it a little difficult to talk about uh with the accuracy of a quarterback in rookie minicamp that's why otas will start to give us a little bit more uh you know a little bit more insight into where jj mccarthy stands because he will be throwing to at very least Jordan Addison, Brandon Powell, Trent Shurfield, et cetera. I trying to think of who the other receivers are. Jalen Naylor is going to be back. Um, so, you know, there's, there's going to be real NFL receivers when he gets out

there and OTAs, and it will give us a little better sense for where he actually stands. Horsefeather says college is a whole different animal, different rules, size of players, just the enormity of being part of the NFL. Some great college players fold under NFL pressure. Yeah, no, no, no question about it. I mean, the difference is so, so humongous between the two, but also I had somebody say this to me before the draft and it might've been regarding JJ McCarthy, but that college coaches, usually even Jim Harbaugh, they set up their systems to win games for them because Jim Harbaugh is trying to get back to the NFL and he had the best chance of doing it by winning a national championship, right? He was not setting up the offense to give JJ McCarthy as many yards as he can. Now that doesn't mean that throughout the

draft process, you shouldn't ask any questions at all about JJ McCarthy and his stats. And I talked to Kweisi Adafo-Mensa on the podcast about that very subject and everything else, but it is just a fact of the matter that if you're a running program that you can win that way with an amazing defense, that you're not going to say, let me give JJ McCarthy the most stats he can rack up in order to get him drafted higher. You're going to teach him how to play your brand of football so you can win those games. And you go back to someone like Tim Tebow, where the Florida offense is unbelievable with talent. And it's either throw to your first read, let it go deep or just run the ball. Tim Tebow himself. And he was able to do that in

college, but then not be a complete quarterback when it came to the NFL. And I think there's reason to say that for a quarterback of JJ McCarthy's age, that there was a reason why they dialed it back. I mean, if they thought that they could throw for 500 yards a game and win by a lot more and put together an even more impressive resume for Jim Harbaugh than he would have done it. So there's still that part of it. And it's still obvious how few passes that JJ McCarthy has truly thrown, even by just watching him throw the ball in a rookie mini camp practice. But just to your point that they put Justin Jefferson in college in the slot because that worked best for that offense to win those games right there. That wasn't necessarily evidence that he wasn't going to be able to do it

when he got to the NFL. Timothy says if McCarthy would have stayed at Michigan, he would have been the number one overall pick. That's a decent assumption that he would be up there, especially since there's nobody super special, I guess, in next year's draft. This draft had a lot of really great quarterbacks, or at least that's the projection. Who knows by the time we get there? Nobody thought McCarthy was a top 10 talent to start the season. He ends up in the top 10. So there's always guys who can emerge, but to your point, that's what always makes this evaluation so difficult during the COVID era, especially where guys could stay longer

and they can treat it like, and Kwesi Nafomensa said this, the minor leagues. And you can almost like have a bunch of AAA reps of hitting a bunch of home runs off AAA pitching before you go to the NFL. And that's why I mentioned that, you know, when they're talking about, you know, Bo Nix looking so good that, you know, part of that has to be, okay, sure. I mean, of course Bo Nix should look good. The guy had two minor league seasons at Oregon and three more seasons than, uh, of, of starting than JJ McCarthy. So yeah, he should look good. That doesn't mean McCarthy will ever get there to the point where he would have if he was 24

or be putting up those types of numbers. It just changes the way we have to analyze it. And to me, that information's just not good. Like there's good information, but even when we're trying to look at all the statistics about, well, he does this and he does that, you know, in certain circumstances. And it's like, is this information good? Because how much of that was even against NFL caliber talent?

All we can really look at is just, you know, looking at how he looked in front of me right now in this moment. And that's why I'm not paying much attention to what happened in the past and what we thought of what his ceiling was supposed to be. That's kind of the, the tie-in, uh, Alex says, uh, it was windy as hell out there for rookie minicamp. It was, yeah, not, not as windy as it is today, but it was a little, it was a little on the breezy side. So I factor that into his accuracy not really no uh he throws the ball hard enough where i didn't think it was the football blowing away on him it was it was just ripping it i mean that's that's the thing with someone

like mccarthy is that because he is big and he is strong and he knows how to put a lot of torque onto his body you know really i mean I don't know how to describe this, but you know what I'm saying, right? He just gets a lot of body behind the football. And when it explodes out of his hand, it's going. And sometimes it's going to the right spot like a dart. And sometimes it's flying over there. But I didn't think that it was,

it was because the wind took it this way. The wind took it that way. I think I played at Michigan. It wasn't that bad. It was a little breezy, but it wasn't so bad that that was the problem. Um, Tristan says, I have a hard time believing accuracy is a big problem for JJ completed 72% in college. No. Uh, so yes, that's true. He did have a high completion percentage at college. NFL accuracy is just a different thing. A lot of those are play actions. They're bootlegs. They're with lots of room and a lot of space to throw. It's not, I mean, if he was wildly inaccurate and he threw the ball into the stands all the time, then he wouldn't be a first round pick. So there's that.

It's just that that's a statistic right there that you go, I don't really know what I'm supposed to do with that. It's a good completion percentage, but there's a lot of quarterbacks in college that have high completion percentages. have seven out of 10 passes complete by running play actions, throwing short over the middle, you know, making plays like that. His numbers were not bad in college by any means. He graded highly by PFF. It just that it wasn't on the same level as some of the other quarterbacks, which left you wondering, is this telling me the full story or do I have to kind of paint the rest of the picture? There's not that many quarterbacks historically with this few passes that they've thrown before going to the NFL, but there's no question that accuracy is something he's going to have to work on a lot over the next few weeks and into the next couple of years. But I don't think accuracy is

something that I would look at and go, oh, well, you'll just never fix it. That was a little bit of an old thing where, well, you know, you can't really fix accuracy. We've seen a ton of quarterbacks over the years be much better as they improved and worked on it. Josh Allen is the biggest example of somebody who threw the ball super hard, big giant guy

and greatly improved his accuracy as he went along. So I kind of look, I kind of look like that at that as something that they're just going to have to improve. It wasn't horrendous. I just mean, it's obviously going to have to get better. And this is after watching, you know, Sam Bradford, this is after watching Kirk cousins. These are some of the most accurate quarterbacks in the NFL that the Vikings have had during my time covering the team. It didn't look like Case Keenum, but because he was putting so much velo on the ball, it just means there's areas that he's going to have to get better.

And that's, again, judging off of one practice. So don't make too much of that. But the completion percentage in college, just not really a telling stat for what someone's going to be in the NFL. I mean, even you go the opposite way where people made a big deal out of Lamar Jackson's completion percentage. He had pretty bad receivers at Louisville and what ended up happening. He became a pretty solid NFL completion percentage guy. And I think we've looked at this before, analytics people, and haven't found much correlation to the NFL. It's just the college accuracy, NFL accuracy, two very, very different things.

So I'm always judging everything on an NFL, not on a college curve. Alex says, regarding Dallas Turner, does he look like a guy who moves different from other players on the field? That's what I'm going to have to let you know. I know that his numbers regarding his combine and so forth are different, but there just was not a lot of movement actually happening. So what the rookies are there for, for somebody like Dallas Turner, get familiar with Brian Flores, learn the base stuff, start to build toward the versatile packages he's going to have to play in. But we're talking about running a handful of drills, and I wasn't looking that closely at anybody running those drills because I was watching

the quarterback. What I do know is that Dallas Turner, the way that he played in college gives me a lot of confidence that he is a guy that moves different because I saw it in college. Just, I mean, the way he was taking on NFL caliber players with Georgia and so forth, but I'm going to have to wait and see. I mean, with even any defensive player, OTAs and minicamp, not a whole lot to really take away. That's probably more of a training camp thing where I'll be able to look at Dallas Turner. What I'm more interested in him is just alignment. When we get to OTAs and we get to mini camp, is he out there with Andrew Van Ginkle at the same time and Josh Metellus and Blake Cashman and Ivan Pace? Like how are

they fitting all these pieces in together? Are we seeing lots of different packages or is he right on the edge to start? Like, what's that going to look like? Is he rotating in and out that that's more of what I could tell from a defensive perspective. So, uh, let me see here. Um, you guys are, uh, debating, uh debating what he did at the end of practice about running gassers. I mean, that was just, you know, this is the thing about McCarthy that I noticed right away is he just relates to people really well. I mean, he just does. You know, like that's something that is a really big part of his value, I think, to the team and that made him a likable

person to draft in the top 10 is you just, the only times I've been around him, you pick up on it very quickly that he likes people. He likes to be out there. He likes talking to his teammates. He went up to one of the TV reporters and said, Hey, is this your name? Like we met the other day. And just little stuff like that, that you pick up on that. I think that him talking trash and then running gassers at the end of practice, it's kind of a funny little rookie mini camp story, but also that's him just making connections with his teammates and stuff. And I think he has a natural talent for that where nothing feels contrived to me. And I kind of have like a radar about that.

Like, you know, is this guy doing that to just kind of seem like, oh, see me being a leader out there? I don't think that that's him. You know, I think that it's very genuine and natural for McCarthy. And again, everything's small sample size, but that's just my impression. And based on everything I've heard before, uh, Matthew says,

uh, have you seen McCarthy and Mahomes official NFL draft profiles next to each other? Just saying eerily similar in measurements, grade and exact draft draft slot. So, uh, so should we sit for, for a year? I thought that your question was going to be, should we set the homes as the ceiling? Um, the difference of course, is that, you know, my homes in college through for like 5,000 yards a season. Uh, but there is that, you know, that playmaking element that he has, the, the raw arm strength is certainly there. And should he sit for a season? There are people in Kansas city. I can tell you this because I know some people from Kansas city who think that had Mahomes

not sat for a year, that they would have won another super bowl there. So that's what they think. I, I feel like this with McCarthy, that it's entirely a Kevin O'Connell feel thing. And I don't want it to be anything different. I don't want it to be a predetermined. All right. He's definitely sitting for a year. And then he sits over on the sideline and doesn't get a chance to play when he was showing in practice that he was ready just because they predetermined that they thought that was too scary for him. I also don't want them to look at Sam Darnold's

record and how Sam Darnold is performing and say, well, you know, if Sam loses this next game, then JJ, you're it. I want it to be what they see in OTAs, mini camp training camp practice and decide from there, is it time to put him in? And I think we'll have a pretty good feel for it several weeks into camp when they have their joint practices, where he stands, how many first team reps he's getting in those joint practices, because they view those as an actual preseason game. But I also think that when we talk about guys who have raw physical talent that needs to be reined in. Jordan Love, Patrick Mahomes, Josh Allen. These are the guys that come to mind that are top quarterback draft picks.

Sort of ties back into what I said at the beginning of why I don't want to say the ceiling on this player is X, Y, or Z based on the way he played against UNLV or Bowling Green or whoever else that I'd rather just see it play out in front of me and then decide as we go along what we think he can really be. But those players have benefited from sitting. There's no question about it,

that those players have absolutely benefited from sitting and he probably should. Let's see. Alexander says, love your stance on comp picks. Let's see. Alexander says, love your stance on comp picks. Let's see the picks figure themselves out. There were a lot of people who got caught up with that, including your boy, Will.

Ah, Will Raggetts. Yeah. Will loves comp picks. He's just like you. Will is a man of the people and I love Will. But yeah, I mean, look, with the comp picks, Ben Gessling reported that they didn't expect to get another one.

None of us know the formula shrug my shoulders. I don't really know what else to say about it. It's, it seems unlikely to me that with Rob Brzezinski in the front office, someone who's been around forever, that they would give away a draft pick to sign somebody a couple of weeks before they could have signed him. It feels like they would be on top of something like that, but people make mistakes. And those who are the internet sleuths trying to figure it out, it's interesting to read their process. And I've read

a couple of people who look into this. That doesn't necessarily mean they're right all the time. It's just like a draft analyst. If you don't know the answer down the road, you're just kind of taking your best guess. So yeah, I've moved on from that conversation and hopefully don't have to have it for quite some time. Huge Boy says McCarthy's arm strength, not even in the top five of his own class. Caleb May Penix Ritter Milton.

Will he crack the top 15 in the NFL? I don't think so. Okay. So, I mean, Joe Milton is a circus act that is not an NFL quarterback at all. And wouldn't be surprised if he becomes a tight end in the NFL eventually. So congratulations to him on throwing the ball super hard, but very, very unlikely to ever make the league. Uh, the idea that Spencer Rattler has a stronger arm than JJ McCarthy, I think is comical. I don't think that's true at all. I think he throws a nicer football right now because he's 24. Uh, that's probably why there's no doubt that Pennix and may and Caleb Williams williams have special arm talent they went number one number three uh pennix you know has he has a monster arm there's no doubt about it but with jj mccarthy i think if you saw it in person you'd say that's pretty good

and i mean i don't after seeing it i don't have to go back to the combine number but the combine number looked like what it looked like in person the miles per hour of him throwing the football. And of course, everybody's jacking up and throwing as hard as they can. He kind of does that all the time, kind of does that all the time. But I think that he has, see, there's a difference between having the raw arm strength and throwing it the same way that Caleb and May and Pennix are capable of throwing it. Right. So, for example, Caleb Williams can be scrambling around, running to his left with three guys chasing him, flip his hips and spin it perfectly 40 yards down the field. So we'll see on McCarthy doing that, but I don't know if there's too many people just period who could do that, which is why he's the number one pick. Uh, may is much bigger than JJ McCarthy. I think it looks easier when the

football comes out of Drake Mays hands. I think it's got touch on it. It's got more layering, but I think if they both stood there and threw the football as hard at your face as they possibly could, I don't think the velocity would be a lot different. It's that McCarthy has to understand on a deep ball where he's supposed to lead the ball to and what type of arc he has to put on it. And that's what he's going to have to learn as he goes forward here. I think that's different than raw arm strength. And I mean, Penix has a cannon. Penix has one of the best pure arms to come into the NFL in a while. So yeah, I don't doubt that one. But as far as my observation after seeing how many quarterbacks have I seen now at practice up close at the field,

the TCO Performance Center, I mean, quite a few Sam Bradford, Teddy Bridgewater, case Keenum, Kirk cousins, Sean Mannion, the list goes on of different quarterbacks that I've seen Nick Mullins. And I can tell you that I think JJ McCarthy throws the ball as hard as Bradford, but maybe even velocity wise, slightly harder. And of course, Bradford had the great touch on the ball that made him a number one overall pick. But I don't think you're right saying that his arm isn't good. And I think it's borderline disingenuous to bring up Spencer Rattler in that. Let's see. Keep it real. JJ isn't going to be a star. Well, I guess you're a fortune teller. I don't know, man. At least we don't ever have to see Kirk anymore. Well, the thing is that in keeping it, see,

that's funny. You say, keep it real because throughout the draft process, I questioned JJ McCarthy, probably more than a lot of the other draft picks because of his small sample, because of the way that they played and because of him not being a refined player. So I questioned that a lot leading up to JJ McCarthy being picked by the Vikings. And then I threw it out completely to only focus on my observations as him on an NFL field and not think about what I saw in college, because as it was brought up, a lot of players are a lot different on the NFL field than they were in college. So, I mean, as far as keeping it real, I don't know if he's going to be a star is keeping it real. I'm saying that when we think about his, um, his actual ceiling that I don't want to put

it at, well, game manager or whatever after seeing him, because I think that he has pure talent enough to maybe be more than that, but that's ceiling. That's best case scenario. And we're going to see how that ends up playing out. 28 dead poet says big picture question. Should fans expect to be tolerant of a sub 500, 2024 season? I can see the picture but all the pieces aren't ready or even there yet until 2025 free agency i go back and forth on this one because you know i've seen and i gotta look at my friends at circa and what they say about it i think they just released their win totals i've seen some win totals that put them at six and a half. And I guess I would

go the over on that, but you might have to, when you look at their schedule, which will be released, we'll have a live show. Very excited about that. So everybody make sure you join the minute the NFL schedule comes out. I'm going live, breaking down every game, first impression, pick and win losses, because why not? So I'll be doing that. Is that Wednesday night? Wednesday night, as soon as the schedule comes out, like minutes after it drops, bang, we're here having a conversation about it. So that'd be a lot of fun, but it's not easy.

There's a lot of tough games on that schedule for this year. There's a trip to London, which I think might be a home game. Someone will have to correct me if it's not, but I think they might be taking a home game. That's always more difficult. So I think that a 500 season around there, eight, nine, nine, and eight is where I would put them right now. But there is something I keep coming back to, which is if the defense can remain relatively healthy, they've added to this defense. It's got more overall total talent than it did last year because Blake Cashman is 27. Jordan Hicks, massive respect for him, but we're talking about some limitations with Jordan Hicks in coverage, especially

that Blake Cashman won't have. And that now you have three rushers as opposed to one rusher that you really are thinking could be a difference maker. They've improved the interior of the D line, even though it's not to my personal standard, the cornerback group is a little bit better. The safeties are going to be exactly the same. Like this could be a very good defense and that could keep them in a lot of games and give them a chance. But yeah, I think that fans going into the season should absolutely expect for like, Hey, uh, you know, like 500 sort of ballpark. And by the end of it, that's when you're looking toward, all right, like this is, this is a team that's ready to explode if they can add free agents in 2025.

That's what you're aiming for. And the other day I did a totally ridiculous 2025 free agency mock because I was waiting for rookie camp. But you know what I came up with is the team gets a lot better in the free agency mock. There's some very interesting free agents to be. Edwin says, grateful for my mom and wife being cool that I'm watching you

on Mother's Day. Well, shout out to them. They either love you or they love ball and, or maybe both. So, and of course, shout out to all the mothers. I called my own mom before I went live here. So don't worry. I did that, but all, all the moms, it, if you're raising football players, that's not easy. I can tell you that every single one of these players needed a lot of support from their moms. So happy mother's day to all. In fact,

every one of them who raised all of you people to love ball or tolerated your love for ball. There you go. Alex says, didn't Tristan Jackson impress a little last year. Can he be a legit wide receiver for he did? Uh, he did. He had a really good training camp. Uh, definitely think he had a great training camp to make the team. And he got in a little bit, a handful of plays. I think he had maybe what two catches or something like that. I see him as part of the competition for wide receiver four. He really does

track the ball quite well, but I think it's probably Naylor would be ahead of him right now on the depth chart. And he would have to prove that it's a make or break. He goes under whatever article I'm going to write, make or break camps. There'll be certain guys from the 2022 draft class. They're a little higher on that, tristan jackson for sure because i think he does have a chance to be a player uh but the fact that they brought in surefield they brought who's played in the league before and then nailer who they've liked for several years it just hasn't come to fruition uh that's going to be a little hard for him to crack i guess we'll have to find out there uh let's see reconnected says i'm worried about jj accuracy issues hopefully mechanical issue and footwork that can be corrected yeah that's where

i really don't know whether to tell you are you concerned or not and again it's you know one practice that we saw it in but yeah footwork is something that he's gonna have to work on big time and and there's so many details to throwing a ball accurately that we just took for granted people like, you know, drew breeze and, and how perfect he can be. Or even with Kirk cousins, when he first came into the league, he wasn't accurate. Like he was at 35 years old. So there's a lot of, there's a lot to it. There's it's crazy. I mean, there's like shoulder angles, there's footwork, there's how you, I don't know, like how you torque the hips, whatever, all sorts of stuff that has to go into it and that he's going to learn in the coming months. And that's why, you know, it's great to see rookie mini camp up close because then when

we get to mini camp, how much has that improved? When we get to training camp, how much has that improved? And something that they talked about really liking was that from what they saw on tape to what they saw up close at the combine, that there was a difference there. And I mean, he just seems like a constant improver kind of person. I've always looked at accuracy as you cannot make a guy have a stronger arm. That's really hard to do. I don't think that you can just be like, dude, lift some weights in the off season. You'll throw that thing way harder, but you can work on all the mechanics that you're talking about. And so at this moment, I'm not going into this saying, Oh my gosh, Oh gosh oh my gosh uh he was a little inaccurate out

there like in the 16 passes he threw no i'm just pointing out that you know when it comes to certain throws you shouldn't really be spraying them off into the sideline but then other times he threw it it was a laser so how can you make that a little more consistent and that's really the game right uh daniel says do we have a Mr. Mankato front runner yet? Not after one rookie practice. They just don't have enough rookies. That's a little bit of the problem. They don't have enough rookies.

I mean, who could do, well, Levi Drake Rodriguez. I mean, clearly the front runner to start the guy from the college that no one's ever heard of seventh rounder. They hyped it up. They talked about it a it a ton you know all those sorts of things uh you know i i think that um levi drake rodriguez with the great story and his personality he's got this big personality super energetic guy yeah he would make a lot of sense there uh rank vikings quarterbacks and arm strength only. You mean of all time or just right now? I mean, right now is not a too hard of a ranking, but as far as all time, I mean, number one has to be Jeff George. I don't think anyone's ever thrown it harder than Jeff

George, maybe in the entire NFL all time. Like it's gotta be up there. John Elway, Jeff George, Josh Allen, gotta be way up there in terms of pure velo. Warren moon would also have to be close. I didn't look at, and I've only seen old broadcasts of old games. Didn't look at Tommy Kramer as necessarily rockets more of the guy would take any risk at any time and try to make any play. Wade Wilson had an absolute gun too. They threw the ball deep down the field a lot with Wade Wilson, Dante, Dante throwing those balloons 700 yards in the air and dropping them down in Randy Moss's hands. And then Sam Bradford would be up there as well. Those would probably be my tops. I don't think from at least the old games I've watched that

fran tarkington had a laser i think it was more again like the playmaking from fran tarkington so probably george moon culpepper bradford wilson is maybe the list right off the top of my head and uh you know uh let's see tristan says to be as accurate as, as cousins would be amazing. He might be the most accurate quarterback in the NFL. I don't think he's quite the most accurate quarterback in the NFL, but I would put him probably in the top seven, uh, somewhere in that range. So yeah, for sure. I mean, look, the thing about Kirk Cousins is the way that he became a good NFL quarterback is because he was very, very accurate. Right. And he had the right footwork and he threw the right places.

And that's how he survived in the NFL with J.J. McCarthy. There's going to be like a difference there. It's unlikely to be super pristine, accurate to start like cousins was into his thirties. If he eventually got there though. And how do you think cousins got there? Like he was pretty accurate at Michigan state. I think that was probably on the scouting report when he came out, but how do you think he got to this level? The anticipation was a big thing, right? You had to get to a point where with, with cousins, where he could anticipate guys coming out of their breaks. And we saw some of that from McCarthy in college, but it wasn't over and over and over. So, you know, I like,

this is all going to take a lot of work. Like how was Kirk cousins even out of college? He had a 21. I don't think he was so I mean that just tells you how far you have to come the progress you have to make in order to get there one thing I would give Kirk though that McCarthy if he ever got this he could really be a star is that with Kirk could put touch on the ball down the sideline this is something I've not seen from McCarthy that if he can get this and I'm sure it's something that's learned but when Kirk would drop back and throw like a sideline fade or something where you have to lead the wide receiver Penix could do this as well and and you're you're

releasing the football where the guy is 20 yards away from where he's going to catch it and it would drop in the bucket as Justin Jefferson or Stefan Diggs is running. I mean, that was really a special talent for Kirk Cousins. So they're going to have to get there. That's why it's weird to say Josh Allen, because he's so unique. He's so huge, right? That it's different, but it reminds me of that in that I remember when we saw Josh Allen in 2018, all he was doing is throwing rockets too. And, you know, he's gotten much better and much more accurate as we've gone along. Uh, I'm not sure. Uh, Ken kinetic, I'm sorry. I don't know how to pronounce the name there. You have a JJ will end up being the best quarterback in

this class. Caleb has all the talent, uh, in the world, but is mentally soft. I think that's probably unfair. Daniel's talented, but gets hurt every other hit. That's not true. May is in a situation no quarterback could thrive in. Also probably not right, but I appreciate the effort there. The enthusiasm for J.J. McCarthy. Look, I mean, as far, just to go backwards on that, I think that some of the Caleb Williams narrative is a little too much. I wondered about his ability to handle adversity. We're going to find out about that, but just a little bit too on the, like, let's not make him sound like he's just a complete cry baby or whatever, and just can't do anything and just totally melts. I mean, the guy had an unbelievable college football career at usc

so i i think that's a little bit too harsh even though maybe there's like truth to all rumors there uh daniels didn't get hurt much in college he took some stupid big hits but he wasn't injured often and as far as drake may things change fast man Things change really fast. And you can, you know, start off with a really bad team and then suddenly get a lot better really quickly when you get cap space and you get a couple of high draft picks. So I don't think that he has no chance to succeed there. When it comes to all of them, they all have a chance to make it. They all do, uh, all of these quarterbacks and with McCarthy, we declared going into it, that his ceiling was Alex

Smith. And I just want to back off from that and say, you know what, let's find out, let's find out where the ceiling is. And maybe we'll have that conversation again, when we get through training camp and even mini camp where we can actually see him a little bit more, but as far as, and this is where we're talking about the arm strength. This is what I'm saying. I'm not going off Michigan tape. I'm going off right in front of me. How did it look? How did it look right in front of me? And it looked like the man is throwing the heck out of the ball. He clearly has clearly has a good arm. Every person who watched that practice walked away going, oh, okay. Like that football is moving, but arm talent is not just throw it hard. It's not just the contest.

And when you have a deep pass, you need to put air under that football. You can't throw it like a dart. It can't just go straight through the air because then it's not going to lead your receiver well enough. So, you know, he's going to have to learn these things, but as far as pure talent, it's there enough to be a very good quarterback. All right. Well, it's a couple more minutes here. I'm going to go watch basketball, but luckily the NBA never tips off when it says it's going to. So you've got a couple more minutes. Bench says, will our 2025 cap advantage make up for the lack of draft capital?

I could see it. Yeah. I mean, I can see it because I think the way they're looking at it is 2025 and 2026 are the years to win. And so if you're going to draft people in the third and fourth round of 2024, 2025, when will they develop? When will they be ready? Well, you know, even those guys who became great, we're not superstars right away from the 2015 class, the third round pick the fifth round pick. It took a little while before they were, whereas, you know, if you could sign free agents, they are players in their prime and you're filling out your roster with players in their prime, but signings are risky too. Sometimes we treat it as

if signings are a guaranteed thing and forget about Marcus Davenport and Dean Lowry. But the idea with the cap advantage is that you can do better than that, that you could do better than just, you know, uh, throwing out a player who had been washed up with another team for a couple of million dollars. You can chase the Jonathan Grenards, the Blake Cashmans, the better players there. Some of it though is going to depend. Your question is going to depend on the players they have right now, the draft picks from recent years, the draft picks from this year, the UDF phase from the last couple of years. Do they develop and find a couple of guys? Because if they don't, then it will be hard. No matter how much cap space they have, you always need the Anthony Harris to show up the Adam

Thielen to show up the, the late round Stefan digs. You always need that in order to build a truly complete team. But if the, the, the key pieces stay together here over the next year, going to 2025, a lot of it is filled already a lot with players that are going to be here for a long time. That makes it easier to get those last couple of pieces. Uh, Edwin says, uh, kick returns are going to be the Viking secret weapon, man. I can't wait. I cannot wait to see it. I am so excited to see what the kick returns look like. Really. I just, I mean, Kenne Wongwu could be a big weapon for them. We'll see if there's other guys.

Oh, I didn't mention Favre with the arm strength. Yeah, of course. Of course. Favre would have to go up there for sure. Would I put him? I'd probably have to put Favre of wade wilson even old farb because he made that throw against uh san francisco wade did have a cannon though but my apologies for forgetting farb in that list uh but as far as what we were talking oh the kick return uh yeah

so we're gonna get maybe a little bit of a sense for that hopefully in otas and minicamp just what the lineup looked like what the alignment looks like who's back there returning what they could potentially run i don't know uh we're going to talk to matt daniels at some point i mean i've got lots of questions about how this kick return is going to look uh timothy says one of the best things about this offseason the Vikings kept their 2025 first round pick I agree with that yeah I agree with that absolutely 100% yep keeping that pick and getting your quarterback not having to give it away to get McCarthy big for the future all right I'm gonna let you all go watch some basketball uh good discussion here for J.J. McCarthy oh this is funny 20 years 20 years from now there'll be a roast of JJ McCarthy. Hopefully that's not after he got divorced or whatever and, and cheated by deflating

footballs. Maybe there'll be a little less drama around him than there was Tom Brady. So, all right. Uh, go enjoy the Minnesota Timberwolves basketball game. Hopefully it works out for you all. And thanks so much for everybody popping in for a little football talk beforehand. We will catch you all later. Happy Mother's Day. Tell your mom, football.