Minnesota Vikings head coach Kevin O’Connell made a rather telling remark about quarterback JJ McCarthy’s job security on Monday.
O’Connell was asked about trying to balance McCarthy’s development as a quarterback with the team’s need to win games. The coach admitted that what is best for the quarterback might not always be best for the team, and that he needed to do a better job balancing those concerns.
“There’s what’s best for the young quarterback, what’s best for our offense, what’s best for our team,” O’Connell said, via Josh Alper of Pro Football Talk. “That’s my job to manage all those things and I’ve got to do a better job of that.”
More tellingly, O’Connell said he was not going to get into the topic of benching McCarthy, but did not outright say there was no chance of it happening.
This feels like a tacit admission that McCarthy simply has not been good enough this season. The quarterback struggled to 150 yards on Sunday in a 19-17 loss to the Chicago Bears, and his offensive players seemed very frustrated with his play. Perhaps the biggest problem is that this has been an ongoing trend for the second-year quarterback.
O’Connell did not seem eager to insert McCarthy back into the lineup after the quarterback was injured earlier this season. However, Carson Wentz’s season-ending injury largely forced his hand. The lack of a quality alternative may keep McCarthy on the field at this point more than anything else.
