It's time to go to Max Brosmer, for the sake of everyone else on the roster

Kevin O'Connell has made it clear that he's not going to let the Vikings fail J.J. McCarthy, but to what extent will he allow McCarthy to continue stunting the growth and effectiveness of the other 52 players on the roster?

"I believe organizations fail young quarterbacks before young quarterbacks fail organizations," O'Connell famously said last year. But again, when do the crushing impacts on everyone else, which are a direct result of McCarthy's poor play, factor into O'Connell's philosophy?

How is Jordan Addison supposed to maximize his value entering a contract year when McCarthy is so bad that he throws for only 87 yards while targeting Addison just once at Lambeau Field? How are the Vikings supposed to make an educated decision about tight end T.J. Hockenson? How can anyone on defense be judged fairly when they're playing tired because McCarthy can't sustain a drive?

If I'm Addison or Hockenson or a defensive player, I'm fuming that I can't do my job to the best of my abilities because the guy playing the most important position is, at least at this stage of his career, awful.

At the same time, I'd be furious knowing that a middle-of-the-road quarterback could probably have kept the Vikings in the playoff conversation rather than slumping to 4-7 and falling four games out of the division race and three games behind the last wild-card spot.

If McCarthy wasn't playing so badly, the Vikings might've won at Lambeau Field on Sunday. The defense allowed only two touchdowns, including one in which the Packers got the ball inside the 10-yard line after Myles Price's catastrophic mistake on a punt return. If McCarthy hadn't been bad for the first 58 minutes in Week 11, the Vikings would've beaten the Bears on a day in which the defense allowed only 19 points.

Sure, it wasn't McCarthy's fault (we don't think) that there were eight false start penalties in a home loss to the Ravens, and it wasn't McCarthy's fault when the offensive line looked like a D-III group blocking professionals in losses to the Falcons and Steelers, but the Vikings were 4-4 and fresh off a win at Detroit when McCarthy began performing at a catastrophic level.

Instead of being 4-7 and presumed dead in the playoff race, the Vikings could've been 6-5 had they gotten anything better than what McCarthy gave them the last two weeks. At 6-5, with six games to go, 10 wins and a playoff spot would still be realistic.

The guys in the locker room know the situation is grim, but if they're true professionals, they won't accept that they're dead until they're mathematically eliminated. Until then, O'Connell has to set his team up to deliver its best punch. He has to know that McCarthy makes the Vikings more like Peter McNeeley than Mike Tyson, and to go forward knowing as much is insulting to the rest of the team.

With the Vikings placing McCarthy in the concussion protocol, O'Connell may be forced to stray from him and give undrafted rookie Max Brosmer a chance to revive a lifeless football team. But if McCarthy clears the protocol and starts again on Sunday — and stinks it up in Seattle — it'll be O'Connell's fault for once again prioritizing McCarthy over everyone else on the roster.

Remember, O'Connell flat-out admitted last week that McCarthy is tying a hand behind his own back. McCarthy has been pummeled by the media, critiqued publicly by his coaching staff, and admitted himself that it's hard to play up to his abilities when he's trying to rewire his brain to meet the fundamental and technical expectations O'Connell has for his quarterbacks.

With the last shred of playoff hope hanging in the balance, and everyone else's needs not being met, Brosmer is clearly the only right answer. It doesn't mean he'll be Mike Tyson, but so long as he doesn't miss wide-open receivers and throw egregious interceptions, the Vikings will have a puncher's chance to win and keep their hopes mathematically alive.

More from Vikings On SI