And the path he took to get there should be informative about the path he and his new team are trying to chart after a messy start to their careers.
First, the reality of the situation: The Vikings still need a long-term solution at the most important position on the field, and they were certain McCarthy wasn’t going to become that answer when his rookie contract expired in a year and a half. Even with a veteran roster and even with a veteran coaching staff, with a solid infrastructure for any quarterback.
Time will tell if they are right. But it also indicates where McCarthy currently is as a player and how far he needs to go. Even though the Vikings won five straight to end 2025 — McCarthy started four of those games, Max Brosmer started the other — the book on the then-22-year-old was written. Defensive coaches saw a quarterback who didn’t see the field well, didn’t look comfortable and took too many hits.
Hit him enough, they said, and it would be over.
This is also the case for many young quarterbacks. They go out and play early, and if efforts to minimize their youthful flaws don’t work, they start to get hit too hard, doubt sets in, and the problem metastasizes. The game moves at lightning speed as is, and if a quarterback starts to internally question what he’s seeing, things can go downhill quickly.
And this is where you can look specifically at McCarthy’s situation and start to better understand how this happened. At Michigan, he was on the top team most Saturdays, most play calls went as planned, and he didn’t throw the ball as much, meaning that while he had plenty of starts, he didn’t have the number of applicable reps as some of his peers.
Then he came to the Vikings and was injured during the summer that followed. So at 21, he had just gotten married, had a child and suddenly had football taken away from him, which can be a terribly isolating experience for a player. He had a hard time with that. He came back to the facility in February 2025 at good weight, throwing the ball very well, and a month later, after Minnesota flipped and failed to keep Sam Darnold or Daniel Jones, he was given the starting job.
The Vikings thought they could make him a top-20 quarterback this fall, and that would be enough for the team to win and buy him time in his development. Instead, two problems continued to short-circuit the plan: sustainability and consistency. When he was right and confident, Minnesota saw the guy they believed in enough to take the 10th pick. He simply wasn’t good enough, physically or performance-wise, for a contending team.
His last game action as a Viking, during the preseason last month, was a continuation of how the 2025 season had gone. After starting 5 of 6 for 81 yards in Minnesota’s second preseason game, he missed his final four attempts, took a sack and injured his ankle enough to miss the preseason finale. Kevin O’Connell had already named Kyler Murray the Week 1 starter. But on this night, the Vikings moved a little closer to where they ended up, pushing him to third on the depth chart and further dimming his light at the end of the developmental tunnel.
Could the Giants shine that light now and find that path?
It’ll be tough, and that’s kind of the situation Trey Lance — another gifted kid from a dominant college team with a run-based offense — found himself in three years ago.
For starters, both guys were drafted into situations that seemed Perfect for a young NFL quarterback, with teams ready to win who had a proven track record of maximizing players at the position. The problem with these kinds of situations, however, is that these teams can’t overcome the struggles of a young passer like a bad team can, nor can they throw seasons overboard in the name of developing a single position. McCarthy and Lance took the longest leash once, ended up struggling and hurting themselves, then never got it again.
And what both guys really needed was exactly that: take their lumps and grow. You can ask them to do this by sitting and learning. But ultimately, they need play reps, to build their own library of plays and defenses seen, and the sooner those arrive, the more risk there is that the aforementioned bumps will be felt by the team as well. Plus, when you’re no longer the recent first-round pick, it’s harder to find a team willing to go through that with you.
Now the hope would be that McCarthy lands in a place that will, and I think there’s reason to believe the Giants can be that place for him. John Harbaugh put together a team with guys like Matt Nagy, Greg Roman, Brian Callahan and Willie Taggart, who worked with accomplished veterans. And young guys developing at this position. The offense is built for Jaxson Dart, who stylistically had many similarities to McCarthy coming out of college.
So if the Giants were to start McCarthy, could they put together an offense that moves the pocket, incorporates RPOs, and makes him play fast? Yes, although there is an injury risk that comes with playing a quarterback like McCarthy that way.
What they can’t do is treat him like the savior, and I hope Harbaugh doesn’t do that. Which brings us to one final reason for optimism: Harbaugh himself.
He talked to his brother, Jim, McCarthy’s college coach, before making the trade, and even got to know McCarthy himself while McCarthy was at Michigan. That means he doesn’t just know what type of player he’ll get; he also knows what kind of person is coming. In that sense, McCarthy ticks a lot of boxes. He’s smart and understands coverages and protections, as well as football in general. He’s tough. He showed he could lead and was well-liked in the Vikings locker room. He is also, I believe, conscientious enough to learn from his missteps.
From there, you can only hope that everyone takes notice of how this all happened.
If they can, I’d still say McCarthy has a chance.
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