NFL

He really wasn’t better in the last 4 games. Just had more favorable matchups.

While he does throw 3 touchdowns against the Commanders, this is a team who went 5-12 and scored nothing all game. 2 of 4 passes to Justin Jefferson for 11 yards and 4 of 7 to Jordan Addison for 62 yards. With the longest pass being for 21 yards. 16 total completions out of 23 attempted passes. There was 34 running play, the runs brought more yardage than the passing game did.

Cowboys game is probably the more convincing game if you want to argue that McCarthy is good. 250 passing yards (career high), 2 passing touchdowns, 1 rushing touchdown (tied for career high), 15/24 on passes. And just 28 rushing plays for low yardage he still throws a pick and it’s his toughest competition of the last 4 games he plays. The cowboys go 7-9-1 and still were trying to make the playoffs when this game happened.

The Giants game should not even have been remotely close but it was. Jaxson Dart threw for 33 yards and that’s all the Giants got all game. McCarthy throws for 108 yards and a pick, going 9/14 and getting injured again. Max Brosmer fills in and goes 7/9 for 52 yards. Oh 31 running plays in this game. The Giants finished the season tied with the worst record at 3-14. They were a tanking team like the Commanders.

Last game of the season was the Packers, who had benched a lot of their starters and were on a skid post the Broncos game. Jordan Love and Malik Willis weren’t playing, so it was McCarthy and Brosmer against 3rd string Clayton Tune. McCarthy goes 14/23 for 182 yards and gets injured again after missing the week prior due to the injury he got against the tanking Commanders. Max Brosmer goes for 7/8 and 57 yards after Nine goes down with the injury. Oh and 31 running plays here too.

While the Vikings won all these games it’s hard to really say that McCarthy was the reason why. The Vikings had a nasty defense last year and did the year prior too. With Sam Darnold in charge the Vikings went to a 14-4 record and were in real contender talks. But with McCarthy, Wentz and Brosmer the team was never really considered anything other than bad. Justin Jefferson had a steep falloff in production from the Darnold year to this past year and it’s pretty obvious it’s not on him being worse but on the quarterback play around him being for a lack of a better word, utter dogshit.

McCarthy was never really a first round talent and just got labeled as a winning quarterback because his team won a national championship. He never threw for even 3,000 yards in college and handed the ball off a lot to 2 quality running backs a lot. Add on that McCarthy has missed his entire rookie season, 7 games the following season and struggled to stay healthy in the 10 games he did play in. It’s fairly obvious that he just is not the type of player the Vikings need or really want.

Sam Darnold won it all with the Seahawks this year. It’s clear that he is far and away better than McCarthy. This isn’t just young quarterback troubles or quarterback struggling on a bad team. This is just McCarthy not being good enough. Maybe if he sits for a while longer he can be the guy for a team. I just wouldn’t bet on it happening.