Vikings “exploring every option” at quarterback

The Vikings’ plan to turn the quarterback job over to J.J. McCarthy did not go exactly as planned in 2025.

McCarthy got off to a rocky start before missing time with an ankle injury and his play remained uneven upon his return to action. He also missed games with a concussion and a hairline fracture to his hand in the second half of the season, which led to head coach Kevin O’Connell saying that the team plans to add competition to the position at his end of season press conference.

The Vikings fired General Manager Kwesi Adofo-Mensah after O’Connell made those comments, but the plan to address the position hasn’t changed. Executive vice president of football operations Rob Brzezinski is currently handling the GM responsibilities and he said on Tuesday that the team is not “ruling anything out” at the moment.

“We have not a ton of time, but we have a couple of weeks and so we’re exploring every option that could be out there,” Brzezinski said, via Kevin Seifert of ESPN.com. “It’s casting a wide net, I guess I would say.”

O’Connell also spoke to reporters from the Scouting Combine and said “a lot of those feelings are still the same” when asked if the team continues to view McCarthy as their franchise quarterback but “the timeline is in a different place” than it was when McCarthy was taken in the first round in 2024. The search for another option indicates that things are in a significantly different place and the moves the Vikings make in the coming weeks will send a clearer signal about how they view the position in 2026.