Mike Florio ,
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In Week 2 against the Falcons, Vikings quarterback J.J. McCarthy suffered a high-ankle sprain. With the Vikings entering a bye and due to return in Week 7 against the Eagles, will McCarthy be ready to go?
As explained on Football Night in America , McCarthy’s status remains “up in the air.” That’s because the original timeline for McCarthy’s recovery and rehab was four-to-six weeks. The next game will happen five weeks from the date of the injury.
In a Monday press conference, Vikings coach Kevin O’Connell addressed McCarthy’s status.
“We’ll be able to get him some extensive work, you know, kind of as a lead in to next week,” O’Connell said. “And then I anticipate his workload building up. We’re going to really take advantage of that bonus Monday, not only with him but with our whole team. We’re going to spend some time as a coaching staff, making sure we’re self-scouting and taking a look at exactly, you know, what we’ve been, how much of what we are is tied to the adversity, we’ve kind of dealt with with injuries, and then what do we want our identity to be as a team here, as we attack the post-bye part of the season and we’ve [got] a lot of work to be done for sure. But yeah, I’m excited to, you know, get back here. You know, J.J. got some work today and he’ll get some work throughout the rest of the week. We got some other guys he’ll be getting some work with on the field, and then we’ll pick it up officially next week. But I’m encouraged about where he’s at right now.”
McCarthy has not practiced in the three weeks since suffering the injury, despite some optimism that he’d practice last week, in the period between games at Ireland and London.
O’Connell has previously made it clear that McCarthy’s return won’t simply be tied to him getting healthy on the Saturday before a game. He’ll need to be able to devote an entire week to practice and preparation before he’ll return to action.
After the two-week break before the Philadelphia game, the Vikings make a short-week trip to L.A. for a Thursday night game against the Chargers.
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