Is starting J.J. McCarthy the right choice? BBV staff weighs in

J.J. McCarthy | Getty Images

Did New York Giants coach John Harbaugh make the right decision, announcing that J.J. McCarthy will replace Jameis Winston as the starting quarterback beginning Sunday against the Houston Texans?

Tony Del Genio

For the players? No. John Harbaugh is quickly creating an impression of having an outward persona as a good guy but an actual personality as a coach who considers his players little more than fungible quantities. (See: Running back rotation and Harris release - not that Harris was playing well, but you should be able to express frustration to reporters without losing your job.) Did Jameis Winston play poorly against the Saints? Yes. Did he play well in the two wins and a tie before that? Yes. If I'm a Giants player now I'm thinking one bad game and I'm benched. Tom Coughlin at least waited until Game 10 in 2004 before he sat Kurt Warner for Eli Manning. I would have started Jameis on Sunday, gone to J.J. McCarthy after halftime if the first half was a disaster, and waited until after the bye week to name J.J. the starter, with two bad Jameis starts as my evidence.

If my only consideration is the short-term let's win today" goal, then starting J.J. is understandable. I've had this game circled as a loss for the Giants since the summer. The Giants' IOLs are playing poorly and the team may have to call a couple of Giants fans who travel to Houston out of the stands to play LT and RT. Whoever plays QB is likely to be running for his life, especially from the outside where Will Anderson Jr., the best edge defender in the NFL, and Danielle Hunter will be hunting the QB. The more mobile J.J. has a much better chance of avoiding that pressure, and with a skill set that is somewhat more like Jaxson Dart's, that may allow Matt Nagy to use more of the playbook he had developed for Dart in the off-season. If J.J. pulls out a win, Harbaugh will look prescient.

Finally, if the long-term goal is not to develop J.J. to compete with Dart as starter next season, but rather to showcase him and then flip him to a contender at the trade deadline for a much bigger draft haul than the 5th rounder they gave up to get him, then I can see that making him starter sooner rather than later is the best way to do that.

So there are reasons to start J.J. now. The issue is whether Harbaugh risks losing the locker room by doing so after one bad half of football from his previous starter.

Chris Pflum

It felt like this move was coming at some point after the Giants traded for McCarthy, and the only question was how long Jameis Winston would hold out and hold onto the starting job.

It was a bit of a surprise that the move came before the bye week, but the Giants decided to rip off the band-aid. And the fact remains that the Giants' offensive brain trust have long enjoyed having mobile quarterbacks and built the offense with a certain skill set in mind at the quarterback position - a skill set that Winston just doesn't have. McCarthy was far from perfect against the New Orleans Saints, but we saw how the threat of the quarterback run slowed down the Saints' defense and sparked the Giants' offense.

The Giants will still have to use a pared down version of their offense with McCarthy and add concepts as he gets more comfortable. However, the fact that McCarthy's athleticism enables designed quarterback runs, zone-read or read-option plays, and package plays, he'll have a wider variety of plays available. McCarthy's mobility and arm strength also add a level of explosiveness that could help unlock the Giants' run game - or make teams pay for playing downhill too hard.

I'm not going to expect that the Giants will have the same kind of suffocating offense that we saw in Week 1. But I am interested to see what happens with the Giants once again planning their offense around the type of quarterback for which it was built.

Nick Falato

This was coming sooner rather than later. The Giants traded a round-five selection to acquire the 10th overall pick from two years ago. McCarthy shined in his opportunity, throwing for 243 yards in less than a quarter and sparking an improbable comeback that ultimately failed. Under Jameis Winston, the Giants' offense was one-dimensional, with a stale run game. The Jameis Winston experience is full of peaks and valleys, and McCarthy seized the opportunity when Winston was in a valley.

McCarthy's success on Sunday wasn't just against prevent defenses-his accomplishments were impressive-but it's also fair to acknowledge the fortune of two dropped near-interceptions and the one he threw on what looked like a miscommunication with Malachi Fields. Communication is my reason for hesitation on the move; can McCarthy effectively relay the calls and get the offense on the same page to allow post-alignment adjustments within the Matt Nagy scheme? Communicating in Houston with a young quarterback

Jeremy Brener

I think this has to be the right move for the Giants at this time. They traded for McCarthy a few weeks ago, not just to stash him on the bench. Eventually, this move was coming, and it comes at a time when the Giants are still in first place, which puts them in the proper position to compete.

Moving to McCarthy gives them the best chance to win in Week 7 against the Texans, and that's what the decision should be based on first and foremost.

Over the course of the season, McCarthy has a higher ceiling than Winston. Given that the Giants are competing for the division crown among a gaggle of teams that don't look very promising, this move is happening at the right time.

David Hartman

The Giants will turn to J.J. McCarthy as their starting QB in Houston on Sunday. It's not an ideal spot for the switch. Although their defense has been way worse than expected this season, the Texans are on a two-game winning streak and they've got a ton of talent on the defensive line and in the secondary. Still, they've been carved up by multiple QBs in the early going.

McCarthy acquitted himself well in mop-up duty last Sunday. But that was at home, and mostly against the Saints' second string, in what started out as garbage time. This will be a much sterner test. And with New York's top three tackles all ailing, and Will Anderson on the other side, some mobility at the position will help. But I do worry about a disaster performance, and then what?

That said, I don't disagree with giving this a shot. New York needs to see if McCarthy is a potential reclamation project like Sam Darnold or Baker Mayfield. They know what they have with Jameis. They don't know what they have with McCarthy, although the 2025 tape and results are dreadful. Let's see what happens. My gut says it won't be pretty.

Valentine's View

It feels like the move to McCarthy was inevitable since the Giants surrendered a fifth-round draft pick to acquire him. In an ideal world, Harbaugh might have waited until after the BYE week to make this move. Then again, the Giants have not been living in an ideal world since the moment Jaxson Dart was lost for the season.

Fact is, the Giants have been in survival mode. They are going to be in survival mode all season, doing the best they can with backup quarterbacks they did not plan on playing.

McCarthy is not Dart. He does, though, give the Giants the opportunity to be the offense they want to be rather than the offense they have to be with Winston. There is more upside there, though nobody knows if McCarthy will be better or worse than Winston has been.

It is still going to be a wild ride. I get it, though.