Kyler Murray is QB1…Was it All a Waste of Time?

To no one’s surprise, Kyler Murray has been named the Vikings’ starting QB after a two-week battle with JJ McCarthy. Did Kevin O’Connell err in letting it go on this long?

In hindsight, it’s easy to say that the competition was unnecessary: Kyler Murray is a Pro Bowl caliber QB, and JJ McCarthy had a disastrous first season as the Vikings’ starter in 2025. From the moment he signed with the team, Murray has been the clear favorite to start, and by putting us through this one-sided QB competition, the team has cost Murray valuable reps with the first-team offense. These reps are important for any QB, but they are especially valuable for someone like Murray, who is new to the team and the O’Connell system.

On the other hand, it’s somewhat unfair to second-guess O’Connell after the fact: no coach or executive is going to be as good as a casual fan who has the benefit of hindsight.

The case for giving McCarthy a fair chance was the same as it’s ever been: the youngster brings upside potential. The sad reality is that most NFL QBs—even QBs taken in the first round—never become franchise QBs. But there is always a chance that you’ll draft the next Mahomes. And as bad as he was last season, McCarthy still arguably has a higher ceiling than Murray, who is entering his 8th season as a starting QB and has likely already peaked.

Kyler Murray is the New Vikings Starter

Teams rarely give up on QBs taken 10th overall after one bad half-season, so it would have been unusual for the team to bring in a replacement without giving McCarthy a serious look.

Plus, even if McCarthy doesn’t play a down for the Vikings this season, the reps he’s gotten in training camp may pay dividends for him and the rest of the Vikings down the road.

Much of the discourse around the Vikings’ QB competition has treated the decision as a binary one: either let them compete for the job or else name Murray the starter. But the Vikings had other, intermediate options. Last season, for instance, the Vikings never officially declared that JJ McCarthy would be their starting QB: they simply gave him the lions share of first-team reps and marked him down as QB1 on the depth chart.

In plenty of other situations, the Vikings have initially placed a player with the second or third team, only to promote them to the first or second team after strong play. The Vikings could have followed a similar approach with Murray and McCarthy, letting the veteran start off with the 1s, giving McCarthy a few reps here and there, and perhaps even moving him up to QB1 if he showed significant improvement.

In other words, the Vikings could have given JJ McCarthy a legitimate chance to prove himself without sacrificing practice reps for the odds-on favorite Murray. (Of course, this strategy could backfire if McCarthy did ultimately snatch the starting job from Murray, since he would then be facing an even greater shortage of practice reps than Murray is currently).

The fact that the Vikings chose to give Murray and McCarthy approximately equal reps suggests that they viewed the QB competition as more of a toss-up than most fans did. Ultimately, there are pros and cons of every approach, and it’s virtually impossible to quantify them.

If Kyler Murray struggles out of the gate, it may suggest that he didn’t have enough practice reps in camp, but it could be that Murray simply isn’t very good anymore, doesn’t fit the Vikings’ offensive system, or isn’t getting enough help from the players around him.

The Vikings’ approach to the QB competition isn’t the one I would have taken, but it may prove insignificant or even beneficial in the long run.