In Week 9, the Indianapolis Colts had an offensive meltdown and lost to the Pittsburgh Steelers. Indy was trying to win a game when the team had six turnovers total, five of them from the offense. Meanwhile, the Minnesota Vikings were pulling off a stunning upset of the Detroit Lions.
How this relates is that Minnesota made a decision this past offseason to go with unproven quarterback J.J. McCarthy, who the Vikings took in the first round of the 2024 NFL draft, over two other quarterbacks they had on the roster at the end of last season. One of those was Sam Darnold, now with the Seattle Seahawks, and the other was Daniel Jones.
Darnold started for Minnesota in 2024 and was mostly excellent. He has remained so for Seattle this year.
Vikings expert throws shade at Indianapolis Colts quarterback Daniel Jones
Jones was only with the Vikings for the last couple of months of last season, and he didn't play. It made sense for Minnesota to move on from Danny Dimes, as he had not shown he could do anything for Skol Nation's favorite team.
That didn't stop one Vikings analyst, Adam Patrick of FanSided's The Viking Age, from delivering a blunt take on the decision to take a risk with McCarthy, who missed his rookie season with a knee injury, rather than keep Darnold or Jones. Both of those QBs have been great in 2025, while McCarthy has missed more games because of getting hurt.
Patrick wrote, "(Jones's) performance against Pittsburgh was easily his worst of the 2025 season so far, but his play was a reminder of how people shouldn't be so quick to make conclusions about the Vikings making a mistake for not re-signing him in the offseason."
To be fair to Jones, he has far outplayed McCarthy in a myriad of ways so far this season. The Colts' quarterback has been available for every game, while McCarthy has played in only three. Jones also has tossed 14 touchdown passes (and scored five more rushing) while throwing six interceptions, three of which came in Week 9.
One game of being bad doesn't mean Daniel Jones is suddenly the same quarterback he was for most of his tenure with his first team, the New York Giants. After all, Indianapolis is still 7-2 and wouldn't be if the team had not signed Jones in free agency this past offseason.
McCarthy has thrown four touchdowns in three games, but he also has been intercepted four times. He is completing just 57.6 percent of his passes (Jones has completed 69.6 percent), and the Vikings quarterback's passer rating is an extremely low 73.0, while Jones' is 101.7.
J.J. McCarthy certainly outplayed Daniel Jones against different competition in Week 9, but there should be little doubt that the Minnesota Vikings would have been better off keeping the new quarterback of the Indianapolis Colts. Jones has been much better than McCarthy this year.