After the game, McCarthy, shirtless, walked through the locker room, bumping fists and hugging a couple of teammates. He spoke with Thielen, then the Vikings’ PR team, then sat at his locker, stretching his neck.
Wentz sat beside him and they spoke at length before McCarthy put on a purple shirt and headed to the postgame interview room.
He was asked about his brief conversation with O’Connell on the sideline toward the end of the game.
“The extent was just, you know, there’s a lot of things we’ve got to clean up,” McCarthy said. “And there’s a bright future ahead in that locker room.”
The Vikings have little choice but to adopt that as a working theory.