EAGAN, Minn. — You'd never guess J.J. McCarthy spent most of his rookie season off his feet, and everything after the first preseason game off the field.

Eight months ago, he rammed a motorized cart into the doorframe of Head Coach Kevin O'Connell's office. Now, nearly 10 months removed from a torn meniscus in his right knee that robbed him of competing to play as a rookie, the 2024 10^th overall draft pick is on track to lead Minnesota in 2025.

"I honestly feel, physically, bigger, faster [and] stronger," McCarthy humbly told Twin Cities media members Wednesday afternoon following the club's second Organized Team Activity (OTA) practice.

He had no convincing to do after a 90-minute session, the first OTA open to reporters this spring. McCarthy, in fact, looked more ready for the pro game, like he picked up without skipping a beat from his lone preseason action, an explosion that reasonably grew fans' expectations.

"It feels amazing," McCarthy said of rejoining his teammates. "When you get it taken away from you, you take every chance you get to be back out here and really appreciate it, really [make] the most out of it."

There's no better feeling than slinging the rock, competing "with the boys," he said with a beam.

"You kind of forget the fact that this is really his first runway since the injury happened, and I think it's just a credit to the work he put in," O'Connell stated. "You guys have heard me say it throughout the offseason, but there's been a lot of lonely hours where it's him and the training staff and the strength staff, and just the work he's put in to get his body where he's at, his arm feeling the way it is, and then of course, coming off the injury, his lower body feeling as good as it does to move the way he's doing."

On Wednesday, McCarthy dropped throws into receiver's breadbaskets down the field, needled them into tight windows, varied his RPMs to sneak them through coverages at short and intermediate levels, and demonstrated a good risk tolerance that is bound to build his confidence on anticipatory passes.

What is enabling him to do that? To discern lessons in mistakes, and improve through failure?

Really, it boils down to the way he's conducted himself since his junior year at Michigan, and what the late Greg Harden, one of McCarthy's mentors, instilled in him – an unshakeable belief in his own abilities.

"It's just not being afraid to fail out here and try new things, and afterwards, chalk it up and go from there," said McCarthy, elaborating that he doesn't get hung up on poor throws, but rather keeps pressing forward. "You learn from it, you emotionally detach from that outcome and you just keep moving."

Evidently, McCarthy also is better equipped, mentally, to assume the role of NFL starter.

"I was just very happy with the way I prepared and went about that recovery process above the neck," McCarthy shared. "Everyone wants to be perfect, especially at the quarterback position, but the more you try to be perfect, it's going to kill you more than your imperfections will. And I feel like just being able to accept, in these learning and teaching phases, that it's OK to fail and try things and go out there and take risks … as long as you do that, whatever's down the road is going to come when it comes."

O'Connell and quarterbacks coach Josh McCown have taken a "no-stone-unturned" approach with passing along lessons and communication to McCarthy.

"We've got to come out and feel it, and organically feel exactly where he's at," said O'Connell, explaining for a long time he's told quarterbacks it doesn't matter if they're studying on their own, or in the huddle resetting after a play where perhaps a protection call was forgotten – there's another snap coming fast.

While it's impossible to replicate a game-feel in helmets-only practices that focus heavily on learning and by design keep McCarthy and fellow quarterbacks completely clean from contact, there's an innate advantage the Vikings offense, and especially McCarthy, can absorb from going against a defense that ranked first in interceptions and fifth in points against in 2024 and is continuing to evolve.

"It's a tremendous blessing, just being able to go against that scheme [and] go against those players," McCarthy commented, before providing a true only-in-Minnesota experience. "The way Harrison Smith plays, you can't get that anywhere else. Just being able to see that every single day, it's extremely invaluable. It's a copy-cat league. I wouldn't be surprised if we saw more of that from opponents this year. But it's just fantastic to be able to go against [Defensive Coordinator Brian Flores] and those guys every single day."

The uncommon practice reps – yes, even in teaching-centric phases like OTAs – are something McCarthy's predecessor, Sam Darnold, cited as being incredibly valuable after the first couple games.

"I remember him making a comment about how easy it was to see the field: 'Hey, they're just kind of standing out there,' versus what we see every single day," O'Connell recalled, noting that the premise of Minnesota's schemes on both sides of the ball is to make the opposing units uncomfortable via available resources and tactics, such as checking calls, getting into attack mode and extending players' ownership.

That latter piece is wholly important to the Vikings being at their best, O'Connell remarked.

"That just comes from time and reps," he detailed. "Then offensively, even with new quarterbacks, we've got some guys around that have been in this system, whether it's Brian O'Neill, Justin Jefferson, Aaron Jones in Year 2, Jordan Addison going on a few years in the system, Speedy (Jalen Nailor) showing up in his new number that I'm still getting used to; in general, there's a lot more ownership across the board."

Ownership that McCarthy is accepting in stride, as well.

Although a season without physical reps may put McCarthy behind the 8-ball relative to other young quarterbacks with actual game snaps, he's a year into his learning at the O'Connell School of Quarterbacks, and is finding himself more easily able to regurgitate information from last season and dip into the archives of knowledge that was important to the 2024 offense and will be equally so in 2025.

"I've been really surprised by some of the things that he does know," O'Connell expressed. "You're like, 'Man, we covered that in a 10-minute burst in Week 11 last year; how do you remember that?'

"And then there's some other things where you're like, 'Oh, I assumed he knew that,' " O'Connell added. "So it's our job, baseline teaching and stacking days and layered learning, so that we're constantly making him feel like he's growing – but never comfortable, never satisfied [with] any particular outcome, because we're building toward something much greater than just a single play here or there."

Naturally, McCarthy will have no issue adjusting, self-correcting and finding what works for him. That's part of the risk-taking scenarios going on now, too, that are encouraged by O'Connell and his assistants.

"It's just how many situations can he put me in where I'm able to almost be on my own a little bit, and then we come back together and we regroup and we talk through it," McCarthy remarked. "And that's why this learning and teaching phase is so huge, because there's so many opportunities to do that in a controlled setting where we could be uncomfortable and there's no consequences and all that.

"It's just the more opportunities the merrier," he added.

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