No time for a fluffy intro because we've got some issues involving Minnesota Vikings quarterback J.J. McCarthy that need to be discussed before they continue to drive the entire fanbase apart.
On Thursday, The Athletic's Alec Lewis released an article centered around what Vikings head coach Kevin O'Connell said in response to a question about what his reaction was to the viral moment that McCarthy and Kyler Murray created last week with comments about their relationship with each other.
A lot of people wrote about the same thing, us here at The Viking Age included. But that's not the point
In addition to sharing O'Connell's comments, Lewis tossed in a small paragraph that ended up acting as the piece of Mentos to the liter of Coke that is the Vikings fanbase. Once the two mixed together, an unstoppable explosion was created.
Here's what Lewis wrote:
"O’Connell’s perch provides him with the details behind these snaps — behind everything. He knows the degree of difficulty of throws in his scheme, and he knows whether or not it matters that McCarthy stretches away from the other three quarterbacks before practices like Thursday’s, or that he jogged off the field Thursday before the other three, who stayed behind together."
This snippet was then shared throughout the super understanding and friendly group of Vikings fans that doomscroll all day on X, and, now, this might come as a surprise to some, but not everyone was super thrilled with the observations about McCarthy that Lewis decided to share in his article.
Some interpretted it as McCarthy acting like a spoiled child because he knows he's highly unlikely to win Minnesota's QB1 job over Murray, while others begged for everyone to stop overanalyzing every (literal) blade of grass McCarthy touches.
Oh yeah, and late into the evening on Friday, Lewis basically said "oopsies" online when he posted the following on his X account.
"Does sound like J.J. McCarthy had golf plans this weekend with a bunch of teammates and practice went long, hence the quick exit post practice. Context critical, always."
Insert grimacing face emoji.
Two things can be true about Minnesota Vikings QB J.J. McCarthy
Let's make this very clear.
It is absolutely and completely fair to be critical of how McCarthy plays on the field and assume he's not going to win the Vikings' No. 1 quarterback job for next season.
But we also don't need to pretend that things like who he stretches with on the practice field or if he jogs into the locker room with the other quarterbacks are a factor in absolutely anything.
Or at the very, very least, do a little more digging to find out the why before publishing articles or posts on X that hundreds of thousands of Vikings fans are going to read.
In this day and age, and in this industry specifically, we're all guilty of wanting to be the first to share a piece of info to the public. But in many instances, it's usually better to be right than first.
McCarthy is currently in the middle of a incorrectly labeled "competition" for his livlihood, and he's also part of a generation of people that is very online. One can guarantee he's seen more NINE memes that he would like to admit.
One could also put good money on betting that he saw all of the bickering among Vikings fans on X on Friday, and he probably wondered why he can't even stretch before practice without getting criticized by fans and reporters.
At this point, McCarthy could take a breath, and someone would post online that he didn't inhale the right amount of oxygen.
It's reached a point of over-analysis. Honestly, it was probably already there, but Friday was just a legit tipping point for how this 23-year-old quarterback is covered online.
Unfortunately, this isn't going to stop. It's just the time we live in where everyone has to sprint in front of a camera or keyboard to share a "hot" take about something before even getting the full context of what happened.
I've definitely been guilty of this. I'm not afraid to admit that at all. But within the last few years, as more white hairs have forced their way into my beard, I've attempted to let things settle a bit before sharing my thoughts.
Had this happened on Friday before Lewis added some very necessary context with his evening post on X, then there might (heavy emphasis on the might) not have been such a big reaction from Minnesota's fanbase.
Instead, McCarthy will have to just continue to walk on eggshells when he takes the practice field. And we already know they're probably the wrong kind of eggshells.
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