As the NFL offseason heads to the final phase, the Minnesota Vikings have one big lingering question.
That’s how ESPN reporter and Vikings insider Kevin Seifert sees it following the NFL Draft. Seifert raised the question of whether or not second-year quarterback J.J. McCarthy is “ready” to start a 17-game season, which has remained an unknown for months.
“The Vikings have spent the offseason building a championship-caliber team around their young quarterback, who has recovered from a torn right meniscus that sidelined him for his rookie season,” Seifert wrote on Monday. “They spent $106 million to add new center Ryan Kelly and right guard Will Fries, while drafting new left guard Donovan Jackson in the first round.”
“They also re-signed running back Aaron Jones and traded for a strong No. 2 runner in Jordan Mason,” Seifert continued. “All that’s left now is to find out, via OTAs and minicamp, whether McCarthy can lock down the starting job heading into training camp.”
Behind McCarthy, the Vikings added Sam Howell via a trade with the Seattle Seahawks and kept Brett Rypien on the roster. Howell has one full season of experience as a starter amid his three seasons in the league, and Rypien has four career starts in four years.
Minnesota showed enough confidence in McCarthy to let Sam Darnold walk in free agency to the Seahawks and Daniel Jones leave for the Indianapolis Colts. Darnold led the Vikings to a 14-3 record last season, and Jones has six years of starting experience in the league.
Kevin O’Connell Explains J.J. McCarthy Status
Getty| JJ McCarthy only played in the preseason last year due to injury.
McCarthy participated in the first week of the Vikings’ offseason program going into the draft, and head coach Kevin O’Connell sounds confident about the former Michigan star’s progress.
“He’s doing great,” O’Connell told NFL Network’s Rich Eisen on April 26. “He’s really been in the building the whole offseason, completing his rehab. He’s healthy. He’s in a great spot.”
“I know he was very excited to get all of his teammates back this week, and they were all excited to see him,” O’Connell added. “We’re hitting the ground running this spring, and J.J.’s certainly done a great job putting himself in a great position to have a great spring.”
“We’ve got a lot of things to be excited about in the quarterback room around here,” O’Connell later added. “We’ve had a real strong plan in mind for J.J. throughout this whole offseason and, like I said, to hit the ground running for the offseason program. We’re getting him as many reps as we possibly can and get him geared up for training camp.”
Kevin O’Connell is Pleased With Sam Howell Trade
O’Connell sees Howell as a critical addition to the quarterback room as McCarthy gets back to the field for the first time since 2023 when he was a senior at Michigan.
The coach praised Vikings general manager Kwesi Adofo-Mensah for the trade and noted that Howell was on the team’s radar before. A former North Carolina star, Howell started off as a fifth-round pick by the Washington Commanders in 2022 where he played for two seasons before his one-year stay in Seattle.
