One of These QBs Will Start All 17 Games for Minnesota

All right, let's go to the last one here.

I think that we're gonna get really good, which is where we're gonna get to.

Yeah, I know.

So let's bundle this with the Minnesota Vikings, and I know our editor John Plume's probably got his ears up now.

We're finally talking about, uh, the purple and the gold.

John's very excited about it.

Um, Kyler Murray.

Carson Wentz and JJ McCarthy are all kind of lumped into this soup.

In my 100 bowl predictions column, I had, I had it finishing like this in order of starts.

Kyler Murray 1, Carson Wentz 2, JJ McCarthy 3.

What is your read on the quarterback situation as we approach the big, I'm like, like, dude, we're here.

It's training camp.

Like, I can already feel the sunburn and I can standing out on a field with dull leg pain as the sun beats down on my head.

It's great.

I can't wait.

Um, so I would say, Like everybody else, I would consider, um, I would definitely consider Kyler the leader in the clubhouse to win that job.

You asked me right now, he's gonna be the quarterback week one, I think it's Kyler.

Um, but I, I do think Kevin O'Connell and his staff are committed to, like, who is the best option for our team over the course of the year.

And so if somebody else proves to be that, like I don't think they're afraid to go in another direction either.

Um, and the reason why, like, I think Kevin owes it to his team to do that, to do that.

Like last year, so last year, the intention was to put Competition in the room with JJ.

It didn't work out that way because both Sam Darnold and Daniel Jones found better opportunities to become a long-term starting quarterback for a team elsewhere.

So, they pivoted and decided we're putting all of our eggs in the JJ McCarthy basket.

We know how that worked.

Now, um, he is effectively off scholarship.

Um, there will be no like tie goes to the former first-round pick anymore.

And so , like I think what they're hoping is that JJ McCarthy can somehow regain his confidence through competition.

And we'll see what happens, but Like I think that that's the biggest piece is like, can he go out there, can he play fast?

Can he play confident because they really felt like he lost his confidence last year.

And that can be a tough thing for a quarterback to get back.

So, if that's the case, I think this is academic, you know, and we're probably talking 2 months, 2 weeks in the camp about, you know, about Kyler Murray, um, going forward as the Vikings' starting quarterback officially.

If I, if JJ McCarthy can regain some confidence, then we'll see because I, I think Kyler's a good quarterback.

I don't know that Kyler is like this infallible answer at the position.

So like, I think that there's definitely opportunity there and they're excited to see what JJ does with it, you know, because obviously you go one of two ways with it.

I'm curious how, uh, Kevin O'Connell approaches this as a quarterback who, and I guess you could say that O'Connell, no offense to him, has never been in a very serious quarterback competition at the NFL level.

I mean, he was always kind of the, the third stringer, uh, during his time, at least when I covered Kevin O'Connell when he was with the Jets, uh, behind Mark Brunell, God love him, the, the 40, 41 or 42 year old Mark Brunell behind Mark Sanchez.

But, Uh, there is a, there's an emotional component to this.

We talked about it a little bit with James Palmer, um, and O'Connell being open and honest about how he, you know, how he's going to inform people that these quarterbacks are doing.

I still have the cynics point of view that there's no shot that Carson Wentz doesn't get at least 5 starts this year.

And it's so crazy to me because the two best, Preseason debuts for rookie quarterbacks that I can remember that made me think, holy crap, they got something here or JJ McCarthy and Trey Lance.

So it's what, you know, obviously, what do we know in the preseason's garbage, but I, I just, do you remember like the Niners color guy or it was a play by play guy calling it the Trey area instead of Bay Area?

Oh God, that's what I remember about it.

Yeah, I remember that it was something like they, he threw that long touchdown pass.

It was one of his first throws too, wasn't it?

It was that bootleg rolled right through left or something .

It was a throwback, yeah, yeah, yeah.

And so, and yeah, uh, but it was something like welcome to the tray area and, uh.

You know, he was sitting on that one all summer too.

He's like, God Almighty.

Um, it was crazy to me though.

It makes me feel old.

Do you know how old Carson Wentz actually is?

Hm.

I'm, I, I'm interested if this surprise to see if this surprises you.

OK, so Carson Wentz was a first round pick.

In 2016, right?

OK, um, so we might be.

What is he 34, 33, 34, somewhere in there 33, yeah, wow, yeah, that's turning 34 in the season.

I mean, you look at him and I think the history of, I don't know why that catches me.

He feels much older than Jared Goff just because of what he's gone through.

I was right, but they're, it went back to back.

I mean they're the same class, so golf came out.

I think golf is only 31 because Goff came out after 3 years in college, and I think that if I remember right, um, Wentz was in college for 5, but It's one of those situations, right, where you're like, oh, Goff could play for another 5 years, and then you're like, oh God, Carson Wentz shouldn't play for another 5 years, even though they're like basically the same age.

I mean, Carson's definitely, uh, been through the wringer, but I just think the way that O'Connell calls that offense, I mean, you know, he needs a quarterback like JJ McCarthy was so good on scripted downs last year, and then the game just kind of fell away from him as it went on.

And Carson Wentz would at least take that away.

Kyler Murray is the big question mark.

It's like, every single person in that room except for Wentz has to reinvent themselves to some degree before, like the 3rd preseason game.

And that's what I think is going to be fun about it.

If you're Connell, though, do you want this thing called early, or do you want to draw out the idea of a quarterback competition throughout the entirety of all these practices?

I, again, so here's the thing that's interesting to me about the Vikings, right?

Is the, one of the reasons they bring in, um, they bring in Nolan Teasley from Seattle to be their new general manager.

They're bringing in a guy who comes from a place that's historically drafted really, really well, right?

And that's sort of what the Vikings need is that they need a layer of young talent.

The thing is they hired him in May, so there's nothing you can do about that now, right?

So, for right now, for the here and the now, we're talking about having a layer of veteran players and guys who are like in the heart of the prime of their careers.

And that's Justin Jefferson, it's Jordan Addison, it's, um, Christian Darisov, a tackle.

Van Ginkle is older than that.

He's sort of in the back end of his prime.

Same goes for Aaron Jones, Byron Murphy.

Um, you're down the list, and it's all of these guys, TJ Hawkinson, where, like, They're not there for the three-year plan.

They're there to win right now.

And so, look, I, it sounds like weird to say, but like I think the important, the most important thing is you don't rig the competition is you let it play out and you know you sort of.

You know, cause the players are gonna know, right?

And the players are gonna know when it's time to name a starter, right?

Like if it's a week and a half in and Kyler looks like that much better, that locker room is gonna know, especially after what they've been through over the last year and a half, they're gonna know, OK, you know, it's time for Kyler Murray or JJ McCarthy to be named the starter.

And so I think Just because of the makeup of the team , you have to kind of let that, let nature take its course there, you know.

And, you know, I would even like be open if I was Kevin O'Connell to like, Hearing players out on it, you know what I mean, like, not saying that they helped decide, but like asking them what do you see out there, you know, and what do you see out there in the spring and what do you see here after three days of camp, um, you know, because I think like the, the, the thing you want is you wanna give the guys who are there now.

The best chance of competing at the highest level cause those guys won 14 games two years ago.

And those guys had a crash landing in the playoffs, and, and, and we all remember what happened there.

They played the Lions on that, um, on that Sunday night, they wind up losing that game, that game would have given them the number 1 seed.

Then they play a Rams team that arrested everybody, and they wind up , the Rams wind up punching them in the face and that's it.

And I still think like we forget how good that team was and a lot of those guys are still there and they still have an excellent defensive coordinator and Brian Flores pressing buttons and you know an offensive system that's proven that Kevin O'Connell and Wes Phillips and Josh McCown have built.

Um, it just feels like to me like my priority would be like making sure that locker room knows like we are pulling every string we possibly can.

To give you the best possible answer at quarterback.

If you had to estimate, like, let's say the, let's do it two ways.

What's the depth chart coming, coming out of camp?

123.

Murray McCarthy went.

OK, I'm going, I'm going Murray Went McCarthy.

Um, see, at that, at that point is the question, do you let go of McCarthy or do you trade him?

It's an interesting question, um, you know, but here's the second one, and then maybe you can change, we can change the, the, the avenue of discourse here.

By the end of the season, what out of 17 games, what's your start breakdown?

And this is a lot.

This is injuries.

This is like there's a lot to be factored in here because I think what I want us to, I'll, I'll tell you why I asked you that in a second.

Give me your answer.

I think Kyler's gonna start every game.

I think Kyler, I think it's gonna sound weird that I said this, right, because I said a minute ago, I said to you a minute ago that like Kyler is good but not infallible and can be beat out.

I believe that.

I also believe that.

Kevin O'Connell and his staff, they're so good at building an offensive scheme that works for the quarterback that I think they're gonna be able to play well enough for Kyler to hold on to the job, OK.

All right, if you, if you follow my logic there, again, he's, it's, he's not infallible, he could get beat out, but like I, I just think Like I saw how Kirk Cousins finished in Minnesota under O'Connell.

I saw how Sam Darnold looked in Minnesota under O'Connell.

I think you could argue O'Connell got more out of Arnold than the Seahawks did last year and the Seahawks won the Super Bowl.

So, like I still Despite the dumpster fire that last year was, and by the way, They were still 9 and 8.

I mean, I know, I was just gonna say that.

I mean, they had a winning record at the bye.

They won their last 5 games, yeah, uh, they, and, and so I ask you that to say this as we close it out.

I think that we're going to move away from this season.

Thinking that it didn't matter, right, because I think that Kevin O'Connell can kind of win with any quarterback, and I think like one quarterback's gonna have 9 starts, one's gonna have 5, let me, and then one's gonna have 3, and they were saying the same thing then, right?

Well, you're saying that like I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm saying O'Connell.

So you're saying O'Connell is gonna make it not matter, right, who the quarterback is, not make it not matter because I think we saw that that's, that's too much make it, make it matter less.

And I'm saying that O'Connell is gonna have Kyler playing well enough to keep the job.

We're basically saying the same thing, OK, yeah, I mean, yeah, I just think we're not gonna go different paths of getting to that.

But yeah, we're gonna go into next season.

Saying the Vikings need a quarterback still, do you think that's right?

Like, I mean, the Vikings are still gonna need to figure this out.

Like, I, I don't think it's like, oh, halfway through the season we're extending Kyler Murray.

I would say, I would say like we're talking in December and January, and if there is like a quarterback upset with his current situation somewhere.

Minnesota will be one of the teams that we'll look at, it's like, oh yeah, they should go get them, you know, so, I got, that, that's, that's the category I put them in.

I wouldn't say like you're necessarily going to be blowing up your quarterback room again at this point next year, or in 7 months, 8 months , whatever it is, but I would say that like, I would say that, you know, I think they'll still be like in January and February, with the radar up for what quarterbacks are in the draft and what veteran quarterbacks might be available, absolutely.