The Minnesota Vikings haven't signed either of their first-round picks in quarterback J.J. McCarthy and edge rusher Dallas Turner. During the summer, it's not a big deal that draft picks are unsigned. However, it's becoming more prudent that it gets done.
The Vikings are now the only team to have not signed their drafted quarterback after the Chicago Bears signed Caleb Williams to his rookie deal on Tuesday afternoon. The Bears also signed wide receiver Rome Odunze to his rookie deal as well, leaving the Vikings two draft picks as well as Cincinnati Bengals offensive tackle Amarius Mims unsigned.
Time to panic about J.J. McCarthy being unsigned?
The Vikings haven't put pen to paper yet with McCarthy and it could end up stunting his development curve. I wrote about if it's time to panic about McCarthy on Friday and it's certainly getting closer.
If McCarthy isn't able to practice during any portion of training camp, it isn't good. You want him to get as many reps as possible as training camp is a peak time of development for any rookie. If he does miss time, that doesn't mean he's in trouble. It's more likely that he doesn't play during his rookie season or has to wait to get in the game. That will be an issue for a good portion of the fanbase.
Pro Football Talk's Mike Florio reported earlier on Tuesday that the Vikings haven't engaged much with McCarthy about a contract. The potential reasoning? The Vikings were waiting to see the contract the Bears gave Williams.
As to quarterback J.J. McCarthy, a source with knowledge of the situation says that the Vikings haven’t engaged much when it comes to negotiating the contract.
One possible explanation is that the Vikings want to see what happens with the Caleb Williams contract before finalizing things with McCarthy, the tenth overall pick. If the unverified social-media chatter that McCarthy wants his full signing bonus right away is accurate, that would make sense. If Williams doesn’t get his full signing bonus right away as the first overall selection, it’s easier to tell McCarthy that, at most, he’ll get the same payment schedule that Williams received.
Now that Williams has his contract, the Vikings "in theory" could be more apt to engage in contract discussions with McCarthy, especially if the signing bonus is an issue. They haven't done it before, but that philosophy hasn't mattered much in the past.
About a month ago, I wrote about a possible McCarthy holdout because it was being discussed across social media. There are reasons for a player to hold out with the rookie wage scale with the main ones being offset language and payout structure of the signing bonus.
The Vikings haven't paid out the entire signing bonus at once before. That doesn't necessarily mean much, as they had never fully guaranteed a three-year contract (Kirk Cousins), they hadn't guaranteed salary into year two of the extension (T.J. Hockenson) and they instituted a paradigm shift with the Justin Jefferson extension.
Will McCarthy and Turner be signed before rookies are set to report for training camp? The Vikings haven't had a rookie holdout since the rookie wage scale was implemented and it's not likely to happen now.
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