Breaking Down the Preseason: Murray, McCarthy and What We Can Learn

The offseason is over. The NFL world finally got to watch real, live football (sort of) this past weekend, and the Minnesota Vikings beat the New York Giants, 13-10.

The QB room drove the narrative for the Vikings’ offseason, and the preseason game as well. We got to see Kyler Murray, fresh off of winning a QB competition, see first action in a Vikings’ uniform. JJ McCarthy, the competition’s loser, got the opportunity to show us his game with another offseason under his belt.

Let’s dive in to how they did.

The starters played only one drive, with 9 total offensive plays, so we didn’t get to see much of Kyler. With only three dropbacks, there’s not a lot to evaluate from a throwing perspective.

It’s notable that the Vikings ran six of their nine snaps from under center, including one of their passing attempts, and that there were no hiccups with the operation. Kyler’s ability to translate to the Vikings’ offense is still an open question, so it was nice to see that go off cleanly.

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Kyler’s first pass was from under center. On a play-action dropback, he found rookie fullback Max Bredeson in the flat for a short gain. The design of the play is a Smash-like concept, with Bredeson attacking the flat and WR Jordan Addison running a corner route. The offensive line blocks down to execute their pass protection assignment, which means running back Aaron Jones is responsible for the unblocked edge rusher, Abdul Carter.

To an extent, this read functions like a rollout because, with the RB-EDGE blocking matchup, the ball needs to come out quickly. With Bredeson open, Kyler needs to throw the ball there immediately.

Addison might be open on a deep corner, but that doesn’t matter because of the design of the play. Kyler makes the correct decision here; Jones’ cut block on Carter is the most impressive part of the play.

Two plays later, the Vikings faced down third-and-medium. Jordan Addison motions into a stack formation and then runs an out, forcing the cornerback to collapse in, read the release, and get too much depth as Addison breaks. Kyler makes a really nice anticipation throw; you can see his hands come apart as Addison plants his foot hard in the ground at the 43-yard line. The anticipation is good, but the placement isn’t perfect.

I like throwing a low ball in this circumstance, as it means only Addison can get it, but the ball is further inside than I’d like. If the throw were towards the hashes on the sideline or right on Addison, the placement would be better, but that’s nitpicking. It’s still a good enough throw and a nice catch for a conversion; in all, a positive play.

Kyler’s third and final throw came on another third down. Kyler did well, progressing quickly from 1 to 2 to 3 to checkdown. You can see him look at tight end TJ Hockenson in the flat, Addison on the curl, and wide receiver Tai Felton on the slant, all covered. WR Jauan Jennings is also covered on his slant, which means that the checkdown to Jones is the correct option.

The issue on this play comes when Kyler needs to slide in the pocket. This may be due to his height. Left guard Donovan Jackson’s block is in the path of Kyler’s throw, so he shifts left in the pocket to find a throwing lane. This changes the timing of the throw a little and gives the linebacker and slot corner in underneath zones the chance to drive on the ball. Kyler still has a window to fit it in, and I think he smartly leads Jones away from contact, but the throw is too far outside of Jones’ frame for him to catch. This is a miss by Kyler, and I think it’s partly due to his height.

One other noteworthy play run by Kyler was executed immediately before that third-down failure. The Vikings are in shotgun and run a Power concept.

However, I don’t believe that’s all there was to the play. This looks like an RPO, with Addison running a bubble screen. You can see Kyler has his eyes on the slot corner to the left when handing off, and he fishes out a fake after the handoff. This is the correct read, as the corner widens at the snap, telling Kyler to hand off. Just noteworthy that the Vikings are running an RPO in this situation.

Overall, the signs from Kyler’s performance are positive. I like the anticipation on the throw to Addison, and I also really liked his quick and decisive progression on the incompletion. The accuracy was a little off, but I’m not concerned about it given the bulk of his work.

McCarthy got three drives with the Vikings’ second team and did not have as much success as Kyler, going three-and-out twice and gaining only two first downs. Let’s dive into the plays.

Operationally, McCarthy started off on the wrong foot. His first snap was supposed to be a Jet Sweep, but WR Jeshaun Jones was already past McCarthy when he went to hand off. Post-game press conferences confirmed that this play should have been a sweep, and something went wrong with the execution.