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Since the Minnesota Vikings announced that it would be Kyler Murray, not JJ McCarthy, starting the season off as QB1 two weeks ago, things have only gotten worse for the former first-round pick.
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The Vikings spent the 10th overall pick in the 2024 draft on the former Michigan Wolverine, so the best-cast scenario would have been for McCarthy to win the quarterback competition against Murray. But it hasn’t worked out that way, and after an uneven showing in the Vikings’ second preseason game, there are even questions about whether he will be relegated to QB3 on the depth chart.
Head coach and quarterback whisperer Kevin O’Connell clearly didn’t decide on McCarthy lightly, but he made the decision he felt was right for the team.
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O’Connell benched McCarthy during the 2025 season. After the season, he was asked whether he still views McCarthy as the franchise QB they drafted with a top-10 pick; O’Connell said, “A lot of those feelings are still the same. It’s just the timeline is in a different place for all of us than it was in [2024].”
Recently, comments O’Connell made on the Fitz Whit podcast with former NFL players Ryan Fitzpatrick and Andrew Whitworth from last year resurfaced because they seem relevant today. He spoke about evaluating quarterbacks in general, but his comments also offer a window into his decision-making with McCarthy.
Training camp interceptions don’t matter
NFL football is one of the few American sports left where the conversation about the game is mostly centered on the field. The WNBA is having a conversation about trans participation, the NBA is having a conversation about owners circumventing the cap, MLB is having conversations about owners being investigated by the feds and a potential lockout.
Meanwhile, Cleveland Browns fans are counting every incompletion Deshaun Watson throws in training camp. That type of hyper-scrutiny is antithetical to Kevin O’Connell’s approach to evaluating a quarterback.
“Every year in training camp I give my yearly State of the Union on the first practice: ‘Just a heads up, I’m not going to be commenting on you guys taking your stats every single day,” O’Connell said. “So-and-so went 6 of 11 with two interceptions, and then we chart it for the whole training camp and decide who won or lost this position or quarterback battle.’”
One reason he doesn’t operate that way is that he knows his offense has a tough job every day going against Brian Flores’ defense. Flores is known league-wide as a mad man when it comes to disguising his defenses and blitzes, and O’Connell’s offense has to go against that type of pressure on a daily basis.
“I challenge the quarterbacks all the time. We’re against Brian Flores every day,” O’Connell said. “This is going to be a 10-out-of-10 stress for all of us. There are going to be bad days, but I want you to be aggressive with your decision-making.”
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That aggressiveness can lead to mistakes and even interceptions. But while those mistakes don’t bother O’Connell, fans and media hungry for content are still counting every snap.
Kevin O’Connell says process is more important than results
So if the day-to-day stats aren’t very important, what does Kevin O’Connell look for when evaluating quarterback talent?
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He wants players to be aggressive in practice because “how will we know on third-and-eight in Week 12 that you can try to fit a ball in there to Justin Jefferson on a backside in-cut? How will we know if you don’t try it now?”
But if the throw doesn’t work, or even results in a turnover, O’Connell is more fixed on the process than anything else.
“So when you do it now, and you take the proper footwork and try to throw it into a tight window, and the ball gets tipped and intercepted, let’s go back and look at it first. I’ve got no problem with the decision. What was the footwork like? Were you in your base, balance, body position? Were you playing on the timing of the play? Did you make the protection call you needed?” O’Connell said.
“If you did all those things and it was just a blade of grass different from being the best completion you had all day, now you know.”
So for the fans making grand declarations either way about his QBs based on training camp and preseason performances, O’Connell had a simple message.
“There’s not enough time in the day for me to explain all the reasons why you’re wrong. We’re going to go into the quarterback room, we’re going to watch it, and we’re going to get better tomorrow,” he said.
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This story was originally published August 26, 2026 at 1:42 PM.