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Will the 49ers Trade for Vikings Quarterback J.J. McCarthy?

Something to think about.
Grant Cohn|
Aug 10, 2024; Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA; Minnesota Vikings quarterback J.J. McCarthy (9) and center Michael Jurgens (65) warm up before the game against the Las Vegas Raiders at U.S. Bank Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Jeffrey Becker-Imagn Images
Aug 10, 2024; Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA; Minnesota Vikings quarterback J.J. McCarthy (9) and center Michael Jurgens (65) warm up before the game against the Las Vegas Raiders at U.S. Bank Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Jeffrey Becker-Imagn Images | Jeffrey Becker-Imagn Images

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San Francisco 49ers

The Vikings and Aaron Rodgers have mutual interest according to reports. Does that mean Vikings quarterback J.J. McCarthy is available, and would the 49ers be interested in trading for him?

The Vikings drafted McCarthy last year before they realized just how good their roster was. Then they won 14 games with Sam Darnold as their quarterback. Now, they probably think they can win a Super Bowl with Aaron Rodgers, and they might be right.

Which brings us back to McCarthy. He's an extremely talented young quarterback, but he doesn't quite fit the Vikings all-in win-now timeline, because he's essentially a rookie. You can't expect him to win a Super Bowl in his first season starting.

Meanwhile, the 49ers aren't all-in anymore. In fact, they're rebuilding and slashing their spending budget. So McCarthy actually would be a great fit for them.

What's the point of making Brock Purdy the highest-paid player in franchise history when the front office is in the process of tearing down the team around him? Why spend so much money on a non-elite quarterback when the 49ers are so far away from Super Bowl contention?

If the 49ers want to save money, what better way than to trade Brock Purdy to a team that needs a quarterback (the Steelers?) and then trade for McCarthy, who won't be eligible for an extension until 2027?

McCarthy might intrigue the 49ers because he has experience under center and has been coached by Jim Harbaugh and Kevin O' Connell -- two of the best quarterback coaches in the world.

Something to think about.

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Grant Cohn
GRANT COHN

Grant Cohn has covered the San Francisco 49ers daily since 2011. He spent the first nine years of his career with the Santa Rosa Press Democrat where he wrote the Inside the 49ers blog and covered famous coaches and athletes such as Jim Harbaugh, Colin Kaepernick and Patrick Willis. In 2012, Inside the 49ers won Sports Blog of the Year from the Peninsula Press Club. In 2020, Cohn joined FanNation and began writing All49ers. In addition, he created a YouTube channel which has become the go-to place on YouTube to consume 49ers content. Cohn's channel typically generates roughly 3.5 million viewers per month, while the 49ers' official YouTube channel generates roughly 1.5 million viewers per month. Cohn live streams almost every day and posts videos hourly during the football season. Cohn is committed to asking the questions that 49ers fans want answered, and providing the most honest and interactive coverage in the country. His loyalty is to the reader and the viewer, not the team or any player or coach. Cohn is a new-age multimedia journalist with an old-school mentality, because his father is Lowell Cohn, the legendary sports columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle from 1979 to 1993. The two have a live podcast every Tuesday. Grant Cohn grew up in Oakland and studied English Literature at UCLA from 2006 to 2010. He currently lives in Oakland with his wife.

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