The Minnesota Vikings finally turned the page when they traded J.J. McCarthy to the New York Giants this week. But while the Vikings have closed the book on the franchise’s biggest draft bust since Christian Ponder, it’s an entirely new wave of hype for Giants fans to fall into.
Giants fans have taken the lead from Vikings fans and run with it, over-analyzing McCarthy’s practice reps in his new No. 18 jersey this week.
Some have even gone as far as wondering what New York will do with Jaxon Dart if McCarthy leads them to a Super Bowl victory this season, and NBC "Sunday Night Football" analyst Cris Collinsworth has even joined the chorus, believing that a simplified offense will help McCarthy succeed in ways he couldn’t in Minnesota.
“He was put into a very advanced offense [in Minnesota]. This is a much easier offense [in New York]. This is an offense that’s going to run the ball first. This is an offense that’s going to try to establish an old Bill Parcells-New York Giants approach.”
While Giants fans are understandably happy they may not have to watch World Cup correspondent Jameis Winston play quarterback all season, Vikings fans know they could be willingly diving headfirst into disappointment as he gets acclimated to his new surroundings in New York.
Giants’ new approach won’t cover up J.J. McCarthy’s weaknesses
There are a few things that McCarthy will have in his favor going to the Giants. The biggest is John Harbaugh, whose brother and current Los Angeles Chargers head coach, Jim Harbaugh, helped maximize McCarthy while running his way to a national championship at the University of Michigan.
With Cam Skattebo anchoring the running game, the Giants could mount a similar approach that could neutralize McCarthy’s weaknesses in a way that Kevin O’Connell’s preferred offense couldn’t.
Giants fans could also look at what happened in the Vikings’ final five games last season.
Shifting to an offense that relied more on the run and featured simpler passing concepts, McCarthy completed 64.3 percent of his passes for 703 yards, five touchdowns, and two interceptions, and could have had bigger numbers if it weren’t for a hand fracture that ironically flared up during a trip to MetLife Stadium last December.
But while things could be easier for McCarthy in New York, it may lead to the same problems. McCarthy’s biggest issue was his processing speed, as he had the NFL’s 11th-lowest time to throw at 3.04 seconds last season, according to PFF.
A deep dive by The Athletic’s Alec Lewis also revealed that the Vikings didn’t know what to expect from McCarthy on a day-to-day basis on or off the field, making him maddeningly volatile for a team that believes it can win with its defense and infrastructure.
It would be one thing if some of these issues improved.
But that wasn’t the case during the preseason. PFF charted McCarthy with a time to throw of 2.99 seconds on 19 preseason dropbacks, and the inconsistencies were still there, most notably on a drive against the Baltimore Ravens, where he missed touchdown passes to Tai Felton and Myles Price right after hitting Felton on a 50-yard pass.
Vikings fans are watching the Giants fall into the same J.J. McCarthy trap they did
While these concerns exist, the legend of McCarthy is still playing with the minds of his most ardent supporters.
The Vikings didn’t do him any favors by making him the quarterback who was supposed to replace Kirk Cousins and Sam Darnold and also be a better option than Aaron Rodgers, and whatever happened with the offense last year is bleeding into this year as Kyler Murray struggles to pick up the playbook.
But expecting McCarthy to magically get it after a week or two in New York would be something, especially because the Vikings spent three years trying to tell McCarthy that he didn’t need to become Ryu from Street Fighter to throw a three-yard screen pass.
It’s also telling that McCarthy couldn’t throw a catchable pass to Justin Jefferson during his time in Minnesota. But Giants fans believe that he’ll be able to have a renaissance throwing to Isaiah Likely, Malachi Fields, Darnell Mooney, and a broken Malik Nabers.
Stranger things have happened in Vikings history, and it would be a peak occurrence if McCarthy put it all together to become a franchise quarterback (perhaps with O’Connell in the broadcast booth) someday.
But Giants fans are already falling head over heels for their new quarterback in the same way that Vikings fans did before he crashed and burned.
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