Friday Mailbag: The injury bug arrives

How will the Vikings approach Sunday with their roster banged up

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By Matthew Coller

Happy Friday, everyone! What a week, huh? Let’s dive right into your questions about last week’s win and the matchup with Atlanta…

Bradley P… After watching the QB school video on the game I tend to believe that - while JJ wasn’t blameless - that Jefferson slipping constantly, dropped passes, turnstile left tackle, questionable play calling, etc. had more to do with the awful three quarters. Your thoughts?

Yeah, the QB School video is must watch because it shows that McCarthy’s decision making wasn’t bad when things were going wrong. The fact that he didn’t freak out when his teammates were making mistakes was really important.

Kevin Cole of the Unexpected Points newsletter has a QB efficiency metric that adjusts for drops and some other factors. That had McCarthy as the 12th best QB in the league and the QB who lost the third most Expected Points to drops.

I agree with your statement: He’s not blameless. The ball needed to come out faster at times and he missed some details. My take is: All the things that went wrong can be corrected. What you can’t teach is how he handled the bad times and how he responded. That was top notch.

I did my best this summer to prepare Purple Insider faithful for the moments where things were not going to go smoothly with McCarthy. I’ll keep saying it: You can’t lose your mind every time he has a quarter where he goes 1-for-6 with 12 yards or whatever.

Derrick K… 1. Did you see anything specifically to explain why the run game was more successful later in the game rather than earlier? Scheme, personnel, game flow? 2. Do you expect to see this group pound the ball for short yardage for easy first downs or on the goal line? We didn’t see much of that last year.

One thing was that they seemed to use some more power stuff, focusing on getting behind the interior guys. Wes Phillips made it sound like they were able to adjust to the alignments that the Bears were using with their defense. Sometimes that’s just how it goes with the run game too. Keep pounding and eventually something will shake loose.

It’s funny, we didn’t see them in any goal line spots against the Bears. They scored each time from more than 15 yards away, so it’s not clear if they’re going to be able to take advantage of that or not but I would suspect that the more times they see Mason blast through people, the better they will feel about it.

Steve D… When I was watching the Bears game, it looked like a lot of McCarthy's throws were to the outside (I couldn't find a way to verify this so I could be wrong). Were the Bears doing something to take away the middle of the field, and is that something other teams will try to copy?

Your eyes are correct, Steve. He only had four passes to the middle of the field. On tape I saw opportunities early in the game for a few passes to the middle that didn’t quite work out. I didn’t feel like the Bears were doing something unique but it’s hard to really tell when there are only 20 passes in the game. Going forward though, he has to be able to work the middle of the field. That’s where Hockenson is going to be underneath and Jefferson running in the intermediate areas like on the touchdown. There can’t be only 20% of his passes going to the place where he’s best at throwing the ball.

Eldon… How concerned should we be about the first 3 quarters of the game against Chicago with McCarthy? Do you think it was a combo of first game and Soldier field or something that could continue through the season?

It’s really hard to say how anybody should feel about anything after Week 1. I do think it was the lack of execution by everyone and not just the quarterback and that the atmosphere played a big role in that but I can’t promise you that it won’t happen again or that he will just be smooth sailing from here. They are in the process of finding out what this team is really going to be just as much as we are. I will say that I’d be pretty surprised if some of that stuff happened again like Justin Jefferson making big mistakes or if the LT position struggles like that once Darrisaw comes back. Addison returning will also be pretty significant, I’m guessing.

The big key for me was that he didn’t panic when people made mistakes. He didn’t throw the ball away or fumble or look scared. That bodes well for him going forward and I also think KOC found some things that worked for the offense and him late in the game that they can carry over.

Brent…Hey Matthew, Thanks for all of the coverage you provide! I have questions: 1) How do you reconcile the first 3 quarters with the 4th quarter? What changed? What do you expect going forward? 2) Both Offense and Defense performed below my expectations overall. Do you think it was just due to the Bears' new coaching? Or was it just rust?

Thanks Brent. One way that I reconcile it is… do all quarterbacks just dominate four quarters? It’s funny how we go into the game saying that there could be rough patches and that it could be a knock-down-drag-out game and then when those things happen it’s total freak out mode. Look around the league this year.

There haven’t been a lot of special QB showings outside of Lamar vs. Josh on Sunday night. Defenses have figured out a lot of stuff to make life difficult on quarterbacks. The last two years have sorta gone back to the early 2000s with defenses being extremely tough, running games mattering a lot and QBs having to fight for four quarters. There were no 300-yard games in the NFC in Week 1 and Penix Jr. needed 42 attempts to get to 298. Yards per attempt in the NFL are at 6.7. Five years ago it got as high as 7.2. It’s a grindy league right now.

Nothing happened that was so horrendous that I felt like those things are going to be a disaster moving forward and there’s no way to overcome them. That’s the NFL sometimes. The Chicago Bears defense played really dang well at times. They pressured the QB, they stopped runs, they mixed up looks. You’re allowed to give the other team credit.

Rob P… Not a question Matthew but more of an observation. By the end of the game JJ's uniform was grass stained and dirty something we have not seen from our QBs in a long time. It seems to me like the sign of a gritty leader that the rest of the team can take its cues from. He gives me Teddy vibes with a lot better tools.

I wouldn’t overlook Sam Darnold’s toughness last year and there were a lot of moments in 2022 and 2023 where Kirk showed resilience but I know what you mean. There’s definitely a comparison between JJ and Teddy when it comes to the way their teammates buy into them as people and how that translates to the field, even if they aren’t fully formed yet.

Passing the huddle test with teammates is a big step for JJ.

Zoyx… I'm seeing some Jim Harbaugh in McCarthy. Both Harbaugh the coach and Harbaugh the QB. Seeing something similar?

McCarthy is a more talented quarterback than Harbaugh. He didn’t have much for arm strength or accuracy but the similarities are in the way that he commands the team and the athleticism. Harbaugh averaged around 300 yards rushing per year in his prime, which translates to around 20-25 yards per game. That’s not Lamar Jackson level but it’s enough to steal a couple of first downs or run the ball into the end zone.

In terms of the personality, Harbaugh was always a lunatic but he has endless energy/passion. That’s where they are similar. You couldn’t knock Harbaugh out of a game no matter what happened because of his energy and fight and I can see that with JJ.

Myles S… What is it that makes Darrisaw's missing so impactful in a game? Felt like the line, despite grading okay, looked awful all night.

The O-line graded excellently overall because the four other guys outside of left tackle where really good. I think fans always think the offensive line is awful unless the QB has five seconds to throw and the run game is going for 200 yards at 7.0 yards per carry. Maybe it’s also the NFL Red Zone or highlight nature of how a lot of folks watch football these days. Watch other full games, you’re going to see pressure on the QB and D-linemen winning blocks all the time. The D-lines and defenses have gotten so ridiculously good.

Overall JJ had plenty of time to throw the ball and was only charted by PFF as under pressure on six drop-backs. But four of those pressures went to one guy at left tackle.

Darrisaw is just one of the best players in the NFL, man. He can take on any rusher one-on-one because his size/athleticism/preparation is all elite. Usually opponents’ best rusher is on that side because it’s the QB’s blind side, so having Darrisaw means that the defense’s best rusher is going to be slowed down all day. They also don’t have to give help to his side in the form of tight ends or chips, which is beneficial. He’s also a major impact player in the run game.

There’s no replicating this guy. There are only about 10-12 tackles in the NFL who can do the stuff he can do, which means that they don’t have to give him any help on his side and they can run whatever they want. The drop-off to any backup LT is absolutely enormous. It’s similar to starting QB and backup QB. Anyone who’s remotely capable of being good at that job is already starting somewhere.

Bradley P…Matthew, do we all owe Myles Price an apology because that man can play!

Who was anti-Myles Price? It was reasonable to wonder how a UDFA was going to perform on that stage but I had him making the 53 in my roster projection after the second preseason game. He did have some trouble with bobbling the ball during practice and preseason but his returns against New England were lightning. He’s already the best returner they have had since Marcus Sherels. It’s a cool story for a guy that was way, way down the depth chart to start camp.

Matt D… What’s the biggest DNP on the injury report going into this week? I’d probably have to with Kelly. Also, what’s the one type of play you want to see more of to help McCarthy get off to a good start? I’m going with play action roll out passes. McCarthy is good on the run and it will get him away from Skule if he starts again.

It’s definitely Kelly. It helps a lot that the game is at home because being on the road without Kelly would be a nightmare but it’s still a massive drop off in terms of experience and talent. I do think Michael Jurgens is a good run blocker and bright dude with a couple years in the system, so he has a chance to hang in there. It’s just a tough ask for him to replicate what Kelly is able to do with his size, physical play, intelligence and leadership.

The silver lining is that Atlanta’s interior D-line is unimpressive. They didn’t have a single player grade by PFF over 65 last week against Tampa Bay. This is a week to survive it.

As far as the play I want to see more: I’d like to see a couple of screens hit. They only threw three of them in the game. Everything is better if you can hit on screens.

Tim… Michael Penix vs JJ McCarthy a rematch of the National Championship game and I’m going to miss it. Is quarterback pressure going to be the game plan? Any updates on Cashman’s MRI?

You’re going to miss it? Tim, we have the technology for you to watch from anywhere. Unless you’re missing it because you can’t stay up all night, in which case you gotta grind for the cause.

Anyway, Flores talked about the pressure aspect on Thursday. Do you blitz Penix when he’s so good at getting rid of the ball? He throttled the Bucs when they blitzed. At the same time, it’s Flores’ identity to send extra pressure and US Bank Stadium is extremely difficult on QBs, which makes me think that they will test Penix early to see if he can sort through their deception. If he’s beating their blitzes, then start focusing on coverage.

With guys who want the ball out of their hands as fast as possible, the key is to get them to misidentify something and throw into traffic. I’m sure we will see a lot of situations where they drop guys into spaces that the QB wouldn’t expect behind the blitzes.

Anglo Vike… I thought that Addison not being available showed in our passing game, so do we see more use of the TEs and/or shorter passing game to help JJ settle in on Sunday. It's going to be a hyped up crowd after last weekend and also being JJ's home debut. So I'd hope that the coaching staff help him out a little more than they did for last week's first half.

Absolutely they missed Addison. Nobody had better chemistry in camp with McCarthy than Addison.

I actually think trying to throw shorter passes to help him settle in was the problem against the Bears. The best thing for McCarthy is to just grip it and rip it. Ideally they will build the pass game off the run game and get some play-actions/bootlegs going early but we saw in the second half that running aggressive pass plays is not a problem for him.

The best thing that KOC can do for JJ is just run the offense the way he’s run it with Kirk and Darnold: Aggressively. This thing works. If there are mistakes, that’s OK.

Florian K… OK Matthew I'll try this again. Is comparing Anthony Barr with Turner fair or unfair? Both 1st round OLBers. Zimmer loved him some Barr even though he didn't really show up on stats much. There are people giving Turner the bust label for pretty much, IMO, similar play. Are fans too fixated on stats or is Turner criticism warranted?

I think the Turner analysis is a symptom of the culture of sports. Every player gets so hyped up coming out of college that everyone expects them to be Lawrence Taylor right away. It can be really hard to acknowledge that we don’t have the answers on everyone right away and development is a real thing.

After watching the tape, I thought Turner was flying around against the run especially and made some excellent plays, particularly one down by the goal line where he just took out D’Andre Swift with some serious violence. He looks more confident and decisive. We just have to let it play out in order to see what he’s really going to be in the NFL. He might end up being like Anthony Barr, yeah, or he might end up being like my comparison which is Melvin Ingram — undersized guy with crazy burst who played a lot of coverage and had to develop over 2-3 years into a top pass rusher. Nolan Smith is another recent example.

I just can’t say enough: Stop making every game a referendum on every player. And stop obsessing about where guys were drafted if the entire defense is working.

Roger N… Special teams exceeded expectations. Now we ride the wave of injuries and enjoy the journey. Year 4 of KAM/KOC remind me of year 4 of Pat Richter /Barry Alvarez at Wisconsin. They had a plan, installed a system, got the players then finally plugged in the QB (Darell Bevell/ JJ). Badgers won the Rose Bowl for the first time. Vikings…?

I’m not quite as well versed in Badger football as you are but I can say that starting a young quarterback four years into KOC’s tenure when he has already built up his processes over time and he knows how to do the job and he’s established a ton of credibility in the locker room is the best possible scenario. Oftentimes we see first-time HCs with inexperienced quarterbacks and I’m not sure that’s the best combination. This was a fully formed, top-notch operation by the time JJ arrived. I can’t think of any better situation for a young QB.

That said, we have 20 passes from JJ McCarthy and a long, long way to go.

Bradley P… Pie chart for who’s responsible for the Vikings win.

If the Vikings win it will be 40% because McCarthy comes out slinging, 20% because they run the ball well, 30% because they confuse and pressure Penix and 10% because the secondary plays better than last week.

Walleyepike… I noticed that a lot of fans doubled down on their optimistic win totals for the Vikes this season. That game made me trend in the opposite direction. It just looked like we have a lot of systemic problems. Maybe Addison and Darrisaw can fix it? But I have my doubts. That defensive backfield looked very leaky. Are you sticking with your 11 wins, or getting jumpy too?

Why would I get jumpy about my prediction after a win? The thing about the early part of the game was that all of it was so uncharacteristic. They usually get a great opening script from KOC and the receivers (especially Jefferson) usually catch the ball and they usually have a top five LT in the NFL and they usually can get the stuff at the line of scrimmage executed. I expect that the shakiness will be improved when it’s not McCarthy’s debut.

As far as the secondary, I agree, it was vulnerable. I was not impressed with the way they covered in that game and it seemed several times there were either missed assignments or confusion. Maybe that’s a symptom of not having Harry out there.

At the end of the day, though, they allowed less than 200 yards passing and only 53 yards to Chicago’s running back.

Mike T… From what I'm seeing... from everything you and the other beat writers have reported... we FINALLY have "that guy" to lead this team. And correct me if I'm wrong, but we all can see the affinity you have for Josh Allen (partly due to this I'm guessing). Am I right in saying (with the asterisk that it's early and that I know you're not a "fan") that you also have a certain childlike excitement that we might have something similar here for the foreseeable future... who might actually take this organization somewhere?