When Kirk Cousins went down with a season-ending non-contact injury at Lambeau Field on October 29, 2023, the Vikings’ future suddenly tilted into chaos. At the time, nobody would have looked at Minnesota and said the answer was Sam Darnold, or that J.J. McCarthy would end up as little more than a possibility in Kevin O’Connell’s head.
Darnold had spent 2023 quietly with the San Francisco 49ers, starting just one game - a 21-20 Week 18 loss to the Los Angeles Rams - while Kyle Shanahan worked to rebuild the former third-overall pick from the ground up. Shanahan was trying to wipe away the damage from five uneven years with the New York Jets and the Carolina Panthers and get back to the quarterback experts once compared to Andrew Luck on draft day.
That makes the timing feel especially strange now. Darnold was on the sideline on a fall day that may have altered the Vikings’ franchise path forever. If Minnesota had lost to the Niners on October 23, a week before Cousins tore his Achilles in Green Bay, the season could have gone in a completely different direction.
The Vikings, though, kept themselves afloat. They beat San Francisco on October 23 and then won again in Lambeau on October 30, with Jaren Hall finishing the game.
At 4-4, they weren’t in a place where tanking had become official, but a team that started 2-4 and then lost its quarterback has to at least think about Drake Maye. It would have been irresponsible not to, especially with the gap between Maye and the other options in the draft or free agency.
Instead, Minnesota traded for Joshua Dobbs on October 31 and watched him become the Passtronaut. He delivered wins over the Atlanta Falcons and the New Orleans Saints, then came back to earth in a loss to the Denver Broncos at Mile High Stadium. O’Connell then shut that door after Dobbs threw a hospital ball to Justin Jefferson in a 3-0 win over the Las Vegas Raiders.
That ended up being Minnesota’s last win after it had started 6-4. A week later, Zac Taylor solved Brian Flores’ initial defensive scheme, the season unraveled, and the Vikings finished 7-10 before selecting McCarthy 10th overall in the 2024 draft. They believed they had found the long-term answer for a franchise that had been searching since Daunte Culpepper tore his ACL in 2005.
Two O’Connell lines now hang over the whole story. After Darnold’s breakout in 2024, he told Rich Eisen, “Organizations fail young quarterbacks,” before adding, “before young quarterbacks fail organizations.”
And after McCarthy tore his meniscus in Minnesota’s first preseason game in 2024, O’Connell said that “our fanbase and everyone should be excited about the fact that we’ve got our young quarterback in the building”.
The Vikings had intended to move from Cousins - who they paid $185 million and who gave them only one playoff win - to McCarthy. Former general manager Kwesi Adofo-Mensah had wanted to go year to year with Cousins, who was in his mid-30s and coming off an Achilles tear, but Cousins instead signed an $180 million deal with the Atlanta Falcons.
From there, Minnesota shifted and tried to build around McCarthy and his rookie contract. At the time, the idea made sense.
McCarthy had just won a national championship at Michigan. O’Connell had already gotten strong play out of Cousins, Dobbs, and Darnold.
Adofo-Mensah could strengthen Brian Flores’ defense while protecting the rookie with a better offensive line and top-tier skill talent.
Cousins, for his part, has made more than $333 million because teams have always viewed him as the safer answer. He isn’t the flashiest option, but he prepares, starts, and keeps a roster from falling apart.
Minnesota had plenty of reasons to believe McCarthy could become that kind of franchise quarterback. O’Connell had a reputation as a quarterback whisperer.
McCarthy had led Michigan to its first national championship since 1997. Justin Jefferson, Jordan Addison and T.J.
Hockenson were all there waiting for him.
It still fell apart. The Vikings either overestimated McCarthy or put him out there before he was ready. They also never wanted to commit to Darnold long-term, and he went on to win the Super Bowl with the Seattle Seahawks last year.
Now the Vikings have moved on from McCarthy and are starting Kyler Murray, who becomes a free agent after this season. And there’s another twist buried inside all of it: if Murray hadn’t been ready for the Arizona Cardinals’ Week 9 game in 2023, the Cardinals probably never would have traded Josh Dobbs to Minnesota. That means the Vikings may have stumbled into a tank without meaning to and ended up with Drake Maye anyway.
That’s the cruel part of the whole chain. Cousins got paid for being the constant in a league built on instability.
Minnesota never could have known that Dobbs’ short-lived run after Cousins’ injury might have cost them a franchise quarterback. They didn’t think McCarthy would become a bust because they believed they were handling things the right way.
And nobody was expecting Darnold to win a Super Bowl the year after they let him walk.
In the end, Cousins has enough money to trade his dented van for a helicopter because the Vikings’ best answer after his injury was something nobody would have believed at the time: Sam Darnold.
In Other News...
Vikings Just Lost Another Depth Piece To A Desperate Giants Team
The Vikings practice squad took another hit this week when the Giants came calling for defensive lineman Jihad Ward, a familiar face in New York who had already spent time with the franchise in 2022 and 2023. With Brian Burns going down, the Giants moved quickly to add Ward to their active roster, leaving Minnesota to watch another depth option disappear before he ever had a real chance to factor into the rotation.
For a team that spends much of the season trying to preserve depth at the edges of the roster, these little losses can matter more than they look. Wards departure is the latest reminder that practice-squad help is always vulnerable when injuries strike elsewhere, and the Giants made room for him by parting with Josh Tupou. [Read more 🡒]
Vikings Finally Explained The J.J. McCarthy Trade Fans Feared
The Vikings spent the early part of the week cleaning up the kind of move that tends to linger with fans, and general manager Nolan Teasley finally laid out why the team sent J.J. McCarthy to the Giants. It was the sort of explanation Minnesota supporters had been waiting for, especially after the deal immediately raised questions about whether the quarterback had pushed for a fresh start or whether the team had simply decided to move on.
Teasley said the trade was not requested by McCarthy, which helped narrow the focus to the organizations own thinking rather than any private demand behind the scenes. Kevin OConnell also described the emotional exchange he had with McCarthy after the announcement, adding a personal layer to a transaction that had already hit plenty of nerves around the fan base. [Read more 🡒]
Undefeated Vikings Suddenly Have Two Big Week 4 Questions
The Vikings head into Week 4 at 3-0 with a home date against Miami, and the matchup brings a pair of questions that could shape the afternoon before the ball is even kicked. Minnesota is waiting on receiver Justin Jefferson as he works back from an ankle injury, while the Dolphins arrive still searching for their first win and carrying their own uncertainty around quarterback Kyler Murray.
Brian Flores adds another layer to a game that already has plenty of edge, since the Vikings defensive coordinator will be facing the team he once coached. Both clubs are expected to get a better read on their injury situations after their first practices of the week, which should go a long way toward clarifying what kind of game this becomes in Minneapolis. [Read more 🡒]