The last time we did these notes, we talked about the tough road facing the Minnesota Vikings:
The Vikings are in the most sympathetic situation (in the NFC North) as far as meeting expectations goes. None of the hype around them can be described as “breathless,” and breathless is certainly a word that can be used on each of the other three. But it’s still a recipe for a hard year. Right now, ESPN’s FPI doesn’t have them favored in a single game in September or October.
This weekend, rookie quarterback J.J. McCarthy tore the meniscus in his right knee. Today, the Vikings announced he’ll have surgery.
McCarthy was already the backup, at least temporarily. Sam Darnold has been taking the No. 1 reps. The question was constant, though, of when McCarthy would take over. Now, it’s not a question at all. The question is when McCarthy might be game-ready again.
The debate on how quickly to debut first-round quarterbacks is far from settled. The wisest consensus seems to hold that if a franchise can bring a quarterback along slowly, they should, but that it’s a luxury most can’t afford. Even the Packers, who are very happy with their Jordan Love situation, lost three effective playoff games by a combined twelve points between drafting Love and making him their first-string man. We can all guess Aaron Rodgers’s opinion on whether a first-round talent at another position might have helped. Whether McCarthy would be better served sitting or starting was a reasonable question. The answer was unknowable, having as much to do with Darnold and the Vikings’ quarterback coaching as it did with McCarthy as a prospect.
On Friday, a wide range of possibilities existed for how McCarthy’s season might go. One of the likelier paths went like this:
- McCarthy takes the starting job from Darnold immediately, or early in the season.
- McCarthy is overmatched, partly through his own inexperience and partly thanks to the Vikings’ mediocrity.
- McCarthy takes a lot of heat from people pointing out that Justin Jefferson is among the best receivers in football (and neglecting the rest of offense.)
That’s still just one possibility, and while it was one of the likelier ones, that doesn’t mean it was particularly likely. The elimination of it, though, has some value. Kevin O’Connell came up as a quarterback coach. That doesn’t mean he knows how to develop a quarterback. Most of his career was spent with Kirk Cousins, whether in Washington or Minnesota. His Super Bowl victory as an offensive coordinator came with Matthew Stafford. He’s proven he can work with veterans. His track record with rookies is sparse.
It would be better for McCarthy to be healthy. Meniscuses are tricky, the kind of injury that can add up as the years go on. He’ll get more time before starting this way, but that doesn’t necessarily mean he’ll get more practice time before starting. Still, he’s likely to be more prepared, and importantly, the pressure dynamics when he does start will be different. If Darnold is playing well, he’ll be likelier to keep the job, and it’s hard to imagine the Vikings being in any sort of playoff contention if Darnold isn’t playing well. If Darnold isn’t playing well, McCarthy might start late in the year, but it’ll be for a short slate of games in front of a fanbase that’s already given up. Health is better. But there are upsides to this kind of injury.
Miscellany – Baseball
- Mookie Betts and Julio Rodríguez are both back from the IL, and while Betts had the better first game back (homering as opposed to striking out five times), the Mariners are quietly hot, winning ten of fifteen behind potent pitching and finally respectable hitting. Helping the bats? Victor Robles, of all people. The Nationals’ castoff, long better with the glove, has hit as well as José Ramírez and Manny Machado since debuting in Seattle. The Mariners rewarded Robles yesterday with a two-year extension. It’s probably below market rate, but for a guy who was bad enough to be DFA’d by the Nats, it has to be nice to lock in nearly eight figures of guaranteed money.
- In another young talent twist, the Giants finally saw enough of Camilo Doval to demote their closer to Triple-A. Among the 332 pitchers with 40 or more innings thrown this year, Doval has the second highest rate of walks per inning, and with his strikeouts still high but merely level to last year and before, the Giants couldn’t keep him in the closer role. Rather than demote him to mop-up duty, they decided to try to get him right in Sacramento. I’d imagine that signals he’ll be in the mix for his old job again when he’s ready to come back up? It’s an unusual approach, but it seems more constructive than most closer demotions.
- With River Ryan done for the season (and probably for next season too), the Dodgers now have Ryan, Yordan Yamamoto, Dustin May, Tony Gonsolin, and Emmet Sheehan on the IL. Where would those five rank as a rotation unto themselves? Going by projected FIP’s, it wouldn’t actually be that great. (Ryan remains unproven. Gonsolin is probably kind of bad.) But! It would be far from the worst in the league.
- The Padres are on fire, and Luis Arraez recently revealed he’s been playing through a torn ligament in his thumb. The results are showing—his Padres performance is only barely league-average—but he’s still an above-average hitter. In other words: While he isn’t himself, it’s still good for the Padres that he’s doing this.
- Last night was brutal for the Yankees, who left nine runners on base across the first four innings before the White Sox pulled away. In the fifth, Jazz Chisholm Jr. tried to make something happen, attempting to score from second on a ground ball to the shortstop. (The play was an effective hit-and-run.) Chisholm did make something happen, successfully sliding in under Korey Lee’s tag, but he hurt his non-throwing elbow on the play, and he’s now headed to the IL. Perceptions are generally wrong about how the Yankees have been playing—they have one of the best records in baseball and have been great since the All-Star Break—but this one hurts a team that definitely wanted more momentum than they had.
Miscellany – Miscellany
- Whether the Warriors get back to contending soon or not, how lucky we were to see Steph Curry in these Olympics. LeBron James was the face of basketball during Curry’s generation, and that is fair and right. But while LeBron did the things basketball players had always done with a previously unseen athleticism, Curry did new things. He did things basketball players had never done before. This is why Curry was the one who changed the sport. I wonder if we’ll look back in 20 years and view LeBron as the end of one era and Curry as the beginning of the next.
- We mentioned Louis Rees-Zammit on this site this spring or summer, when it was first announced the Welsh rugby player would jump to the NFL. At the time, we didn’t make the connection to the new kickoff rule. (Others did, we were the ones who missed it.) If the new kickoff really is revolutionary, will it be a breakthrough for rugby players? Or will more linebacker-style players simply learn to kick off?
- NCAA legal development number one: The Fontenot v. NCAA plaintiffs asked the House v. NCAA judge to deny the proposed settlement, pointing out that it’s a bad deal for athletes. We knew the Fontenot plaintiffs were opposed to the settlement (that’s why they’re involved in a separate suit), but the legal challenge is new. We’re learning a lot about the class-action process these days.
- NCAA legal development number two: An OHL player sued the NCAA and a few Division I hockey schools for barring Canadian Hockey League players (the CHL includes the OHL, and some CHL teams are in the USA) from making the move to the college game. The suit argues that other athletes play professionally and retain collegiate eligibility, and that by suppressing competition for labor, the NCAA and CHL are suppressing player wages. I have no idea how viable this suit is, but if it has legs, there’s an obvious corresponding question: Can the NCAA legally bar former NHL players from playing college hockey? I am not a legal expert.
- With a decent chunk of the WNBA returning this week from the Olympics, how will jet lag shake out? Which teams had the most Olympians, and how late did those players’ tournaments go? I want to see the WNBA betting diehards calculating this.
