J.J. McCarthy is getting another shot under center, and this one comes with a different jersey and a different kind of pressure.
Just over three weeks after the Minnesota Vikings sent McCarthy to the Giants on Sept. 28 for a 2027 fifth-round pick, New York is now preparing to hand him the start Sunday against the Houston Texans, according to Jeremy Fowler of ESPN and others.
The move closes the book on Jameis Winston’s run as the starter. Winston stepped in after Jaxson Dart went down with a knee injury on the opening drive of a Week 2 loss to the Rams, an injury head coach John Harbaugh said will keep Dart out for the rest of the regular season.
Winston’s stint produced mixed results. The Giants went 2-1-1 in his four starts, but Sunday’s 34-27 loss to the New Orleans Saints ended with him on the bench after two interceptions. McCarthy came on with 11:25 remaining and New York trailing 34-10.
That was the opening he made count.
McCarthy finished that game 11-of-21 for 243 yards, a touchdown and an interception, while the Giants rattled off 17 straight points before a fourth-and-1 pass from the Saints 14 fell incomplete with 12 seconds left. That performance was enough to push him past Winston for this week’s job.
The numbers from that fourth quarter also carried some history. McCarthy’s 243 passing yards in the period matched Eli Manning’s 2012 mark for the most by a Giants quarterback in a single quarter since at least 1991.
It’s been a winding path to this point. The Vikings drafted McCarthy 10th overall out of Michigan in 2024, then watched him miss his entire rookie season after injuring his knee in the first preseason game.
In 2025, he started 10 games and went 6-4, throwing for 1,632 yards, 11 touchdowns and 12 interceptions on 140 completions in 243 attempts. A high-ankle sprain in Week 2 cost him five games, and he also dealt with a concussion and a hand injury.
Minnesota signed Kyler Murray in March, and Kevin O’Connell named Murray the starter on Aug. 11 after a training camp competition. When the Vikings dealt McCarthy to the Giants, GM Nolan Teasley said McCarthy never requested a trade and that the return “ made sense for us now.”
Now McCarthy gets the first Giants start of his career against a Texans team that enters at 2-4 and trying to keep its season from slipping away. The Giants are 3-2-1 and sit atop the NFC East, with kickoff set for noon CT Sunday. Both teams will head into their bye the following week.
Minnesota, meanwhile, comes out of its bye this week and returns Sunday at noon CT against the Indianapolis Colts.
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