How is anyone supposed to decide what to think about JJ McCarthy?

Mel Kiper Jr. mocked McCarthy to the Vikings at a big price... is he worth it?

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By Matthew Coller

Every day someone either says something or writes something about JJ McCarthy that I agree with. The problem is that these things are usually conflicting.

On Wednesday, I reached McCarthy overload when ESPN’s Mel Kiper Jr. mocked the Michigan quarterback to the Minnesota Vikings at the price of the No. 11 and 23 picks this year and the Vikings’ 2025 first-round pick to move up to the fifth slot, presently owned by the Los Angeles Chargers.

In his analysis, Kiper Jr. wrote, paraphrased, that the price is indeed steep for QB4 but if the Vikings want one of the best QB prospects in this draft then they’re going to have to pay up. Nobody is lending a hand to a QB-needy team for a reasonable price.

While Kiper Jr. offered a cold dose of reality that the Vikings are very unlikely to be able to move up without parting ways with the 2025 first-rounder — even if it’s for McCarthy rather than Maye or Daniels — I nodded along with his overall opinion that reaching on McCarthy (ranked 16th on Mel’s big board) still makes sense for a team that can put him in a tremendous position to succeed.

Sounds good. If Kevin O’Connell thinks McCarthy can be the guy, then go for it, price be darned. Think of it like the housing market. You are planning to live in your dream home for 30 years, right? So if you pay $25,000 over market price, that’s fine because you got what you wanted.

Then a guy named Cory, who I’ve never heard of before, made a point on Twitter that sent me backpedaling the other way.

On the same day that Kiper Jr. mocked McCarthy to the Vikings, Dane Brugler of The Athletic dropped “The Beast.” If you’re not familiar, “The Beast” is a massive PDF with hundreds of draft reports that go wildly in depth on each player, all the way down to factoids about their family, their high school performance and everything in between. If a QB prospect eats Wheaties for breakfast every day, Brugler has it in there.

Within “The Beast” writeup of McCarthy is an anecdote from an NFL scout that reads, "Before he signed, he was telling other Michigan recruits that if they wanted to party and chase girls, go somewhere else. His class was going to be the one that restored Michigan. To have that mentality and then actually go achieve it? He's different."

To that, Cory wrote on Twitter, “I just think it’s very funny that every JJ McCarthy quote from scouts hits everything except anything to do with throwing the football.”

It’s true. A lot of the analysis about McCarthy seems to be rooted in him being a great leader and a winner. Those things are real but lots of great quarterbacks in the NFL didn’t win national championships in college, including the greatest QB of the generation Patrick Mahomes and the second best QB in football Josh Allen.

A huge percentage of Brugler’s write up under “strengths” has to do with intangibles. “Mental preparation is important to him” and “coaches rave about his leadership.” And a good portion of his weaknesses have to do with throwing the ball. “Ball placement will suffer when he rushes throws” and “still developing his touch” and “decision making is still developing.”

McCarthy asks you to believe in things that you haven’t seen yet, which is exactly what Brugler writes in his report.

“McCarthy’s evaluation is incomplete, which creates even more projection than normal.”

Brugler finishes the write-up by ranking him as the 21st overall prospect.

So the Vikings are going to pay the price of two first-round picks to swap picks with the Chargers to get the top draft analyst’s 21st best prospect and bank on an incomplete evaluation and more projection than normal?

Feels a shady risky, does it not?

The problem with talking yourself into this being a good idea is that it’s hard to find comparable quarterbacks to McCarthy in recent drafts. Which recent QB had meh overall numbers, won a lot, had great intangibles and some decent but not ridiculous tools like raw arm strength and athleticism got picked high?

Daniel Jones comes to mind. Jake Locker? Tim Tebow? Mark Sanchez? That Vikings QB pick we do not speak of?

I’m not trying to pick busts, there just aren’t that many. Usually these guys have huge numbers or huge arms. Make no mistake, a lot of huge number or huge arm guys bust too.

The guy he reminds me of is Dak Prescott. NFL.com wrote of Prescott when he was coming out in the draft, “There are absolutely draftable traits and upside, but he will need extended work to smooth out his flaws.”

Prescott didn’t have wowing numbers and was appreciated for his toughness and intangibles.

If McCarthy is Prescott, the Vikings can absolutely win with him. If he’s Sanchez or Locker, they cannot.

But that’s not all that different from every quarterback prospect. All of them are about projection. How is Drake Maye going to look with a reasonable team around him? Can Caleb Williams play backyard football? Can Jayden Daniels play in rhythm in an NFL offense? Quarterbacks who succeed all end up being massively better versions of themselves than they were in college. Go back and watch Mahomes and Allen play in college. Heck, CJ Stroud was questioned for his lack of playmaking at Ohio State.

It’s hard to bet the future on the concept that McCarthy will be a different version of himself though.

The best thing going for McCarthy is that it’s easy to see him working with O’Connell. He comes across as a terrific communicator. If O’Connell can download the offense into McCarthy’s brain, he’s got a pretty good chance to succeed with Justin Jefferson.

If he executes 90% of what O’Connell wants and scrambles when the defense creates pressure, the Vikings can win a lot of games.

It’s not like winning NFL quarterbacks are perfect. Jared Goff misses throws wildly sometimes. There are line-drive throwers and guys who don’t exactly layer the ball over linebackers like Drew Brees and yet their offenses still execute at a high level.

Back and forth we go.

There is another part of Kiper Jr.’s mock that makes the Vikings trading up for McCarthy potentially justifiable: He doesn’t believe that Bo Nix or Michael Penix Jr. are first-round picks.

Would you rather reach a tad on a good prospect or hope a second-round caliber player is better than everyone else thinks?

We don’t know if the Vikings actually think Nix or Penix Jr. are second-rounders but if Kiper Jr. is right then it’s hard to argue with giving up the high price of admission into the QB Draft party.

We can look at it like every decision has its range of outcomes and spectrum of pitfalls. If you traded up for Maye, we can reasonably say that the range of outcomes includes a world where he’s one of the best QBs in the NFL. It’s harder to put that label on McCarthy but it isn’t hard to see him being a winner through his rookie deal. The spectrum of pitfalls with Maye includes the potential for him to throw endless ill-advised passes and end up like Sam Darnold whereas the worst version of McCarthy might be a game-managing mid starter.

The Vikings’ decision is made so much more fascinating by the fact it isn’t just an evaluation problem but an economic one as well. Is the difference between McCarthy and Penix Jr. or Nix as prospects worth giving up huge draft capital? Kiper Jr. seems to think so while some other draft analysts see the second-tier prospects as being deserving of first-round picks.

What we also have to recognize is that everyone mocking McCarthy to the Vikings has no idea how they actually feel about him. Everyone might be right or completely off (remember the Will Levis-Vikings mocks?).

If they do make the big deal for him, then it has a decent chance to succeed. That might be the most confident you can reasonably be about anything in the draft, regardless of how polarizing the prospect.

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