Less than two weeks ago, the Minnesota Vikings and Carson Wentz agreed to a new contract that will have the veteran signal-caller suiting up for the purple and gold for the second year in a row.
Minnesota's decision to re-sign Wentz came just a few days after the team was able to land former Arizona Cardinals quarterback Kyler Murray in free agency.
So the return of Wentz immediately had people putting on their purple tin foil hats and doing their best Brian Windhorst "Now, why is that?" meme impressions about what it meant for J.J. McCarthy moving forward.
Some were even convinced that Wentz should currently be viewed as Minnesota's QB1 since he's more familiar with the team's offense than Murray is right now.
Thankfully, at the NFL's Annual League Meeting on Monday, Vikings head coach Kevin O'Connell revealed (possibly unintentionally) if Wentz is going to get a chance to compete for the team's QB1 job this offseason.
"Yeah, I think that's one of the things, knowing that we feel comfortable and confident about the depth of our quarterback room, we want to prepare all those guys to be able to take snaps and contribute to winning when called upon, and what that looks like, we'll see.
But I will say, and I've shared this with Carson, what he was able to do without any reps throughout the offseason program and training camp last year, and really come in and prove to us and his teammates in that huddle that he could not only run our offense, but he could run it at a pretty high clip, I think that a lot of that contributed to the really, really strong feelings to want to get Carson back.
Because in an offseason where reps are going to be very important, and when you have a competitive situation like we want to have, having a guy that's proven to maybe not need a totally equal share of reps and understands how we feel about him and the expectations we have of him and he has of himself, that makes it a really, really quality spot in that room for us and for him to know those feelings we have for him."
Carson Wentz's role with Minnesota Vikings in 2026 seems obvious after Kevin O'Connell's comments
That last bit of what O'Connell said in his answer basically revealed what Minnesota's intentions are for the veteran quarterback this year.
Based on what O'Connell said, it seems like Wentz will likely begin training camp as the Vikings' QB3 behind J.J. McCarthy and Kyler Murray.
Reps will probably be more evenly split during OTAs and mandatory mini-camp between the three, but once training camp begins, don't expect Wentz to be given any reps with Minnesota's first-team offense.
Some might wonder why he would even return to the Vikings if he was only being brought back to be the team's QB3. Well, O'Connell answered that on Monday as well.
"I think some people may be discounting the fact that [Wentz has] really enjoyed his time, not only being around Josh [McCown] and his teammates, but just being a Minnesota Viking.
It's an important thing for me to always know that it's a place that guys want to come play, whether they have previous experience with us, or, in Kyler's circumstances, not so much
But there's a desire and still an enthusiasm about playing quarterback for the Minnesota Vikings."
Wentz grew up rooting for the Vikings, and he admitted multiple times last season that suiting up and playing in a Minnesota uniform was a dream come true for him.
Last year, the Vikings became the sixth team that Wentz has been a member of since 2020. That's six different teams in six seasons.
Part of re-signing with Minnesota likely had to do with him probably just wanting to stay in the same place for the first time since his final year with the Philadelphia Eagles in 2020.
Plus, Wentz grew up in North Dakota, so he's much closer to his family than he was during any of his other stops in the NFL.
He's close to home, and he gets to continue to play for the franchise that he grew up rooting for.
It's not really that complicated. Sometimes, things are just that simple.