The Minnesota Vikings’ quarterback battle may be over, but the war is just beginning. Half the fan base has aligned with Kyler Murray as a quarterback who can get the Vikings back to the playoffs. The other half is a simmering underbelly, ready to strike at the slightest remark against J.J. McCarthy.
McCarthy’s time with the Vikings has been up and down, and training camp may be rock bottom as he prepares to be Murray’s backup entering the 2026 season. But for some fans, accepting McCarthy’s new role is hard to digest and has led them down the path of tin foil hats and conspiracy theories.
The evidence is everywhere.
A recent clip from the "Vikings Collective" podcast, hosted by Purple Insider’s Matthew Coller, The Athletic’s Alec Lewis and Football Analysis' Garret Greenlee, has generated 31,500 views as of Wednesday, but while they made the overall point that McCarthy’s future was in his hands, several users took it as a slight to the young quarterback, questioning the analysts' backgrounds and the overall point being made.
This is what being a Vikings fan has turned into, and much like fans have taken their disdain for McCarthy to another level, it’s also worth asking why some fans are defensive of a player who was a catastrophic flop in his first year as a starter.
Minnesota Vikings fans still see J.J. McCarthy as an escape from their QB nightmare
The most obvious reason fans back McCarthy is his upside. While last year was a failure, he’s still only 23 years old and made 10 starts last season.
Other quarterbacks such as Josh Allen and Matthew Stafford got off to similar starts in their careers in terms of accuracy but got better with experience.
After McCarthy played well over the final five games, some Vikings fans saw the same path, and he could become a “Phoenix” quarterback in the same way Sam Darnold went from “seeing ghosts” to becoming a Super Bowl champion after leaving Minnesota for the Seattle Seahawks last offseason.
Compared to Murray, Vikings fans don’t see the same upside. Murray is a former No. 1 overall pick and could put up solid numbers with what every analyst has deemed the best infrastructure he’s ever had.
But at age 29, his current play is who he is as a quarterback, and one that has produced just one winning season in seven seasons as a starter with the Arizona Cardinals.
There are also the myths surrounding Murray. Because fans don’t go out of their way to watch the Cardinals unless they are gambling or have fantasy football interests, Murray’s reputation is the guy who plays video games over studying film and had a spoon-fed, college-style offense led by former head coach Kliff Kingsbury.
There’s also the perception that he’s shorter than the 5-foot-10 height the Vikings have listed him as during training camp, opening the floodgates of memes while dubbing the quarterback battle “Nine vs. 5-9.”
Looking at his past, Murray isn’t really inspiring, and that is an organizational problem. The Vikings have been one of the most successful teams in NFL history, ranking tied with the Kansas City Chiefs and Miami Dolphins for sixth in all-time winning percentage (.550) entering this season. The issue is that they’re the only franchise in the top 16 without a Super Bowl win.
Another issue is that they never seem to have the urgency to solve the problem.
While other teams have found a franchise quarterback for a decade, the Vikings have been stuck on the carousel, hoping to catch the same lightning in a bottle that Randall Cunningham brought in 1998, Brett Favre delivered in 2009, or Case Keenum supplied in 2017.
Even Darnold, who optimistic fans see as a potential outcome for Murray, brought it for O’Connell in 2024, but none of these quarterbacks ended the Vikings’ most dubious streaks, as they haven’t won multiple playoff games in the same year since 1987 and haven’t appeared in a Super Bowl since the 1976 season.
It’s also easy to see the Vikings going down the same path if Murray doesn’t pan out. Mac Jones was a speculated trade target when Minnesota looked to add a quarterback last spring and will be a free agent after this season.
Baker Mayfield is another quarterback with an expiring contract and could be linked with O’Connell in the same way Stafford linked up with Sean McVay five years ago.
Because of that, people see Murray as more of the same and McCarthy as a way out. But that argument also has plenty of flaws as he heads into this season.
J.J. McCarthy’s supporters are ignoring a brutal reality of the NFL
McCarthy has only made 10 starts in his career, but that’s an eternity in the NFL.
Trey Lance was the third overall pick in the 2021 NFL Draft, but the San Francisco 49ers had enough of his erratic play after four starts before trading him to the Dallas Cowboys.
Michael Penix, who was taken two picks ahead of McCarthy in the 2024 draft, is already playing for his job after 12 starts with the Atlanta Falcons. And Josh Rosen didn’t last a year on the Cardinals roster after being selected with the 10th overall pick in the 2018 draft.
Still, there are many McCarthy supporters who don’t feel like he got a fair chance.
Kevin O’Connell spent all of last season talking about McCarthy’s fundamentals and lamenting over the Week 2 birth of his son.
While Adam Thielen famously said he was “swimming” trying to learn O’Connell’s offense, McCarthy fans acted like he was being waterboarded until O’Connell made significant changes after the season was over with a 4-8 record.
There’s also the non-stop criticism that has come from YouTube film gurus and Vikings analysts that seem to make things like the “Nine” alter ego or a towel on the sideline feel like a big deal.
McCarthy fans respond to these instances with comments like “He’s still a kid,” but as Coller mentioned in the clip, NFL years may be the only thing that ages worse than dog years.
In addition, several quarterbacks have performed well in their first year as a starter at age 22 or younger and with a minimum of 10 starts.
This list of names with the highest passer rating in those seasons includes Lamar Jackson (113.3 in 2019), C.J. Stroud (100.8 in 2023), Justin Herbert (98.3 in 2020) and Ben Roethlisberger (98.1 in 2004).
While those names may seem like a high bar, they’re exactly who McCarthy should be graded against as a player who was the highest-drafted quarterback in Vikings history two years ago.
Some Minnesota Vikings fan’s loyalty to J.J. McCarthy has crossed a line
McCarthy fans may still look for a scapegoat, and if O’Connell can’t get the best out of Murray, there will be more questions to be asked. But the biggest thing that may be on the mind of those fans is that McCarthy was supposed to pan out.
The Vikings hatched an elaborate plan to replace Kirk Cousins when Kwesi Adofo-Mensah and O’Connell arrived in 2022. Fans watched as O’Connell got the most out of recycled quarterbacks, and it was exciting to think what he could do with his hand-chosen signal-caller.
McCarthy’s development has been nothing like those dreams, and it’s only natural to find the root of the problem.
But that’s where things go overboard. O’Connell wants McCarthy to work out because it would solve the NFL’s most important decision for the next decade.
Fans are holding onto that same lottery ticket with the same hopes, but in reality it has the same chance of cashing as getting struck by lightning. Even the conspiracy theories toward reporters are asinine, as nobody is fist-pumping on the sideline as McCarthy chucks a “Nine Ball” into triple coverage.
In all honesty, the three-man trio of Coller, Lewis and Greenlee are right in that McCarthy’s future in Minnesota depends on him.
If he puts his head down and works hard, there’s still a chance he could play his way into their plans. If he becomes a brooding malcontent, he could quickly find himself as a backup for the New York Jets or another dysfunctional franchise.
This is something that McCarthy’s defenders can’t grasp as they defend the prince they were promised, and while they will see things out until the bloody end, it’s clear that it’s something the Vikings have little interest in doing.
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