Five words foreshadowed J.J. McCarthy's future.
"The process is the progress," the quarterback said more than a year ago.
McCarthy was passing along the team mantra of Head Coach Kevin O'Connell's choosing. The youngster shared the sentiment during his first training camp chat with media not long before tearing his meniscus.
Well, close enough anyway.
McCarthy, then 21 years old and the anointed future face of the franchise based on his 10th overall draft slot (the highest in Minnesota history for a quarterback), was embracing the summer competition with free-agent signing Sam Darnold for ownership of O'Connell's offense. In actuality, the rookie had a Freudian slip of sorts, confusing the order of O'Connell's declaration. He meant: progress is the process.
The mixup did not matter then, though, and has not mattered since. No one has embodied O'Connell's guiding slogan to a greater extent than McCarthy, who endured 609 days between a college national title and NFL debut that garnered him NFC Offensive Player of the Week honors – and convinced outsiders he's for real.
On Wednesday of this week, with McCarthy's inspiring comeback in his hometown Chicago on Monday Night Football still fresh in the sporting world, Sports Illustrated's Albert Breer included a question and answer pertaining to O'Connell's success with a litany of quarterbacks in his Week 1 NFL mailbag article.
In an attempt to shed light on O'Connell's formula (folks, it's simpler than you'd imagine), Breer dug through the archives of his conversations with the reigning NFL Coach of the Year and stuck on a quote he liked from August 2024, prior to Minnesota's QB battle being determined out of McCarthy's control.
"I've used this term — progress is the process," O'Connell remarked to Breer last year. "I've always said process over results, but what is process? It's just progress. Good, bad, how do I get better? Compartmentalize the results as you're learning, but never miss the chance to stack some confidence from the s—t you're doing well. That's where it's really cool, the intangibles, the work ethic, the physical traits of playing the position, the athleticism. I've seen all the things I hoped to see from J.J. and more.
"Now it's just a matter of how comfortable and how second nature we can get him playing the position at an NFL level from a consistency standpoint," the former quarterback continued. "Everybody thinks that when [J.J.] eventually plays, it's going to be perfect. No plan involves no adversity when you start playing quarterback in the NFL. Talk to Patrick Mahomes. He experiences it every single week. That's the nature of quarterback development that I don't think everybody always understands every layer to it."
Adversity definitely hammered McCarthy when the brightest lights flickered on. The first touchdown he threw went to a former Vikings teammate, Bears cornerback Nahshon Wright, not generational receiver Justin Jefferson. The McCarthy era began with six three-and-outs in the first nine drives. It featured a 16.7 third-quarter passer rating and instances of sloppy execution, from play-clock management to motion-timings and overall cohesion of an offense that left its defense out to dry for the first 45 minutes.
But McCarthy progressed, and the process bore a feverish finish that showcased special individual ability.
In doing so, McCarthy aligned himself with what O'Connell strives to unearth in his quarterbacks.
"It's not just, OK, 'How are you going to respond to an interception?' It's stacking plays of doing your job, regardless of the result, and then when the results don't happen, identifying why and moving forward to make sure you try not to make the same mistake twice. You try to make sure you're able to do some things to help that player get back into a rhythm, get back into a place where they can consistently operate," O'Connell explained his scope of practice to Breer early last season. "I don't know if that always happens without some litmus test of millions of people deciding that this guy can or can't in that moment. That's always what I have viewed as one of the main issues with how these situations play out."
Right or wrong, the litmus test happened quick, and Breer took notice of the outcome:
[It] says everything about how O'Connell works with his quarterbacks. He balances leaning into what they do well while continuing to develop them and prioritizing their confidence in playing the position as well as anyone. What's resulted from it, of course, tells you all you need to know about O'Connell as a coach.
Reaching the NFL
Vershon Lee is not yet a household name, but his story is compelling.
One of 16 players on Minnesota's practice squad, Lee joined the Vikings after going undrafted out of South Carolina and bouncing around a couple different rookie minicamp tryouts. He's got the size, at 6-foot-4 and 318 pounds, and the versatility, evidenced by starting at three separate positions over 40 games in the SEC (18 at center, 16 at left guard and six at right tackle). But that's not his greatest trait.
Lee's real superpower is resiliency.
David Fawcett of InsideNova shared a story this week about the 23-year-old Woodbridge, Virginia, native. Specifically, it's the account of Lee pushing through NFL Draft preparations after the most difficult moment in his life – the unfathomable sudden passing of his father, best friend and mentor, Vernon Lee.
Vershon's father died in a car accident in early February, two days before his 58th birthday.
"I think about him all the time," Vershon said. "He always believed in me."
Here's an excerpt from Fawcett's feature on Lee:
(Vershon's mother) Chantelle sees positives coming out of Vernon's death. Coming from a Christian family, Vershon reads his Bible every day and soaks in its promises to help carry him through tough times.
Vernon's death, she believes, prompted Vershon to rely on God even more and know there's more to our lives than just the here and now.
One scripture, Chantelle says, comes to mind. It's from 2 Corinthians 5:7-9: "For we live by faith, not by sight. We are confident, I say, and would prefer to be away from the body and at home with the Lord. So we make it our goal to please him, whether we are at home in the body or away from it."
Although his father is no longer here in person, Vershon still knows Vernon is a part of him and that he and his mother and sister "were loved by one of the best people God ever created," Chantelle said.
Read the entire piece on Lee, a standout on the college field as well as in the classroom, here.
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