Friday Mailbag: QB questions

Things are rocky right now and Vikings fans have questions

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By Matthew Coller

Happy (?) Friday everyone. Well, every trip to Lambeau has resulted in something pretty insane so we’ll see what happens next.

Until then, let’s see what’s on everyone’s minds…

Stephanie…I’m listening to the pod right now about JJ’s mechanics. You commented how you are learning so much about QB play from KOC that you could coach it. That makes me wonder about how much you are learning from KOC vs Zimmer. You’ve said many times how much you appreciated Zimmer’s insights. Is KOC on the same track as a fountain of teaching wisdom as Zimmer was?

It’s a little bit different because when I arrived to cover Mike Zimmer in 2016, I knew very little about how the NFL really worked. Of course, I had been a football junkie since I was eight years old and worked in sports media for five years already but I didn’t have any understanding of the technical aspects of each position, player evaluation and development, game planning, drafting or the absolute hell that coaches go through every season. I learned so much from Mike about all that stuff. Sometimes those lessons came from being shot down on a question and sometimes they came from him getting really detailed.

Listening to KOC, you’d be surprised how many lessons are similar to Zimmer, just with a different presentation. But this quarterback technique stuff, it’s been a college-level course in how/why things need to be done a certain way. Seeing it not work consistently is probably more instructive than if it was working.

And we’re also seeing a different layer to coaching that is instructive as well. The way KOC has handled this overall is something to study. Zim let his frustrations boil over into rage-out moments in front of everyone and it didn’t do the players any good. KOC coping with the ups and downs this season by mostly just explaining what’s happening without pointing fingers and playing the blame game is the right way to push through it.

Pickle Enjoyer…One thing I think people aren’t talking about enough is whether Jefferson will want a trade soon. He’s a competitive maniac and he isn’t getting any younger. I think we’re taking it for granted that he’ll want to stick around.

I don’t think we have reason to think right now that a trade demand is imminent. He seems to be doing everything he can to help JJ McCarthy push through this and then I’m sure he will assess things at the end of the season.

There is another key point here: Jefferson is under contract through 2028. It would have to get very ugly in order for the franchise to get to the point where they would even entertain something like that and even then Jefferson is the type of player that you never, ever let leave your building.

Connor J…Matt, we have talked all year about our frustrations with McCarthy and how his play has come up short. From your perspective, what are some improvements JJ can show over these next few weeks that may reignite confidence in him as a long term answer here? More specifically, have you gleaned any consistent messages from KOC or Phillips about certain things that JJ can realistically achieve these next few weeks?

Pulling an upset, even if it’s ugly, on the road at Green Bay or Seattle in itself would be a big boost of confidence for everybody. Two things would go a long way toward doing that: 1) not turning the ball over 2) hitting the easy stuff.

It felt like after the Detroit win (and at times during the win) that he has been trying way too hard to be “Nine” at times and that could be causing some balls to sail on him. That assessment could also be me trying hard to find an explanation for something that’s been an issue since he was in college, which is the problems with consistent footwork and throwing technique.

Is it realistic that he can fix it between last week and this week? No. Is it possible that he could settle down a bit and start playing game manager football rather than trying to make superstar plays all the time and turning the ball over? Absolutely.

Kip N…Listening to Get Up, I was hearing Dan O talk about JJs mechanics and he said something with hips and it brought me back to the “oily hips” inside joke that you and CC used to joke about, but it sounds like there is more positive than panic for the future, would you agree or should we be on QB watch yet again this offseason?

I really don’t know what to think. It’s pretty much my brand to focus on the numbers, right? In this case, very small sample, the numbers are extremely worrisome.

I’ll give you one that’s hard to unsee. Since 2019, there have been 307 individual QB seasons with at least 100 pass attempts. McCarthy’s on-target percentage right now is 305th.

Other QBs in the ballpark are 2023 PJ Walker, 2024 Anthony Richardson, 2019 David Blough, 2019 Josh Rosen, 2023 Will Levis, 2022 Zach Wilson, 2020 Drew Lock, 2020 Taylor Heinicke etc…

The one outlier there is 2020 Jalen Hurts but the Eagles were tanking and their top wide receiver was someone named Greg Ward.

That could change quickly. The season isn’t over yet and if things start to click for him with the timing of some of these throws, he could quickly move out of that category and have a 2024 Bryce Young-like improvement down the stretch.

Nobody knows whether that corner is going to get turned or not. Technical things usually take an entire offseason to correct and it’s hard to know if that ever changes because it isn’t just the footwork, it’s also the consistent velocity and touch and the timing of the offense that’s off as well.

But you can’t write it all off after five games. That would be foolish. We’ve seen way too many quarterbacks take big strides to say that it’s already over.

Brett K…Has KOC ever addressed why JJ didn’t play the whole preseason when he needed so much work?

Yeah, he has. If he got hurt in the preseason again, it would have been a complete disaster and ruined everything. KOC doesn’t feel like the current preseason format, where teams play their 3rd and 4th stringers the entire game, doesn’t do much for developing the QB.

If this were preseason 2003 where the starters played 2/3 quarters, then he would have gotten a lot out of it.

Dermo Man…Outside of JJ (biggest negative / development area) and O-Line over past few weeks (biggest positive for me), what has been the biggest concern and biggest positive for you over the season so far .

The biggest concern is the secondary. They are 30th in PFF coverage grade and they are allowing the 9th highest QB rating in the NFL. I would have never expected that Byron Murphy Jr. would have a 126.8 rating on throws in his direction and Isaiah Rodgers would be 56th out of 70 starters in yards per reception allowed. The safety play in past years was a driver of turnovers and that hasn’t been the case this year.

If some of this stuff comes back to life, particularly with the takeaways, they can be a dangerous defense down the stretch. But even looking down the road, they have to be asking what they have long term in the DB room.

In terms of positive, by far the O-line. Donovan Jackson is showing a lot of really good signs. Will Fries looks like he belongs. Christian Darrisaw is back to full health. This offensive line could stay together for years.

Ben…Do you think McCarthy having an awareness of where he is in his development is extremely important?? I feel like just acknowledging a problem is the first step to fixing it. We have seen many players who are talented not work out because they never acknowledge things they need to improve on.

Yes, I do think that his self awareness is really important. And it’s also important that it is happening in practice. I believe KOC when he says that because I’ve seen it both in 2024 and 2025 training camps. It wasn’t always consistent and the practices weren’t on the level of a veteran like Sam Darnold but he showed a lot of signs of getting it by the end of camp this year.

It’s clear that he understands what needs to happen and how bad it wants it to happen. Does that mean it will work? I’m not sure. But it won’t be for lack of trying on his part or the coaches or his teammates.

Brad L…What are we missing, performance wise, because of our hyper focus on McCarthy? What are the sub headlines?

Who is the most insightful read that you follow?

What is your assessment of the Packers? What should we be watching for?

We’re probably not talking about how good the front seven has been since Andrew Van Ginkel came back, including how much better Dallas Turner has been with him out there. How Flores was able to flip to an old school 3-4 defense using Eric Wilson to completely turn around their run defense. How good Donovan Jackson has been. How good Jalen Nailor has been (even if his fantasy numbers aren’t great). How about the freaking kicker and punter? They’ve been great.

The long term things that are developing are… who’s going to take over for Nailor next year? He looks pretty valuable now but I don’t see how they can keep him. What’s the secondary going to look like?

In terms of reading their work, there’s a lot of folks… two that come to mind for X’s and O’s stuff that I’ve always been a fan of are Ted Nyguen of The Athletic and Doug Farrar (now with Athlon). Nate Tice does a great job. My fellow newsletter writers Tyler Dunne, Cody Alexander, Brandon Thorn… yeah, I could go on. Keep reading folks, don’t let the Tik Toks melt your brain.

I think the fully healthy Packers would be a Super Bowl contender. The half healthy Packers are just another team in the league with a good quarterback. Any given week they can be disappointing or play great, depending on matchups.

Last week, Jordan Love was great. The week before that, he struggled. The difference was who they played. If they had more consistent weapons, a healthy/good offensive line and some better run stuffers up front, they’d be scary. But they’re not scary. They’re just OK. Put them in the bin of about 6 other contenders in the NFC that are like that.

Eric…Looks like the FA haul wasn’t as great as we expected. Is I Rodgers your top acquisition? How many do you foresee staying with the club for next season?

Well, yes and no. Will Fries looks like a long-term, above average starting RG (a dream come true for you folks). Eric Wilson has been great bang-for-buck. They have gotten 48 QB pressures from Allen/Hargrave, which is probably 3x last year already, even if those guys haven’t been the total game changers we expected.

I need to see the rest of the season from Rodgers. He’s had some great moments and rough moments.

I’d try to keep Wilson. I’m interested to see if they keep Hargrave next year. He has a $21 million cap hit that… is not gonna happen.

If we talk about in-house free agents, the Murphy Jr. and Jones deals look suspect but I think Murphy Jr. is a good player and will be fine.

Jon D…Would another injury for McCarthy be seen as just rank bad luck or a label of injury prone being applied?

Man, let’s not do this. I loathe nothing more than when players get called “injury prone.”

Dan…How much of McCarthy’s struggles are mental vs mechanical? How much of it seems theoretically fixable?

If it’s just about footwork and the rhythm of the offense, then it is fixable. But I have questions. Can you teach having a touch on the football? If he’s always been this inconsistent in terms of mechanics, can it suddenly become consistent? When I think about other sports, it’s really hard to teach somebody to become a good free-throw shooter. It’s really hard to teach someone to become a better skater. It’s hard to teach someone to have a soft touch around the greens. But people do get better at those things, right?

As far as the mental part, I do think he’s trying too hard to make a play on every down. That’s pretty natural for a young player.

I also think there’s a concern about the rest of the season when it comes to the mental element. He has to get out of this year with his confidence still alive. If he continues to struggle and it feels like the weight of the world is falling on him because he’s the reason the Vikings’ season went down the drain, that can be a really, really hard feeling. This guy has never failed before, so we’re going to learn a lot about him mentally over the next few weeks.