It's all on the line Sunday at Lambeau. J.J. McCarthy gets his sixth opportunity to show the world what he's all about, and the Vikings need a win to stay relevant in the playoff picture.
Will the Vikings keep their playoff hopes, which are on life support, alive with a huge road win? We've made our score predictions.
I have legitimately considered the possibility that J.J. McCarthy’s “Nine” powers are only capable of being activated when he’s away from U.S. Bank Stadium, and that he’s going to lead the Vikings to a clean sweep of divisional road games in his sixth career start on Sunday. Sadly, I don’t think I can quite bring myself to actually predict that. With how McCarthy has played over the last two weeks, Packers defenders like Micah Parsons and Xavier McKinney have to be licking their chops. On the other side of the ball, a Vikings defense that doesn’t create takeaways anymore is going against Jordan Love and an offense that doesn’t turn the ball over. This will be an uphill battle for Minnesota.
My heart is telling me to trust in a talented offense when all five of the original starters on the offensive line are set to play together for the first time, so I'm going to do just that. I'm also picking the Vikings because Green Bay's offense is in shambles and they're just not as good as most people think. How in the world can anyone trust the Packers to perform consistently when Tucker Kraft and Jayden Reed are on I.R.? I think McCarthy does enough while the defense shuts the door on Jordan Love and company. In fact, I'll be bold and predict that the Vikings keep the Packers out of the end zone.
After another concerning performance from J.J. McCarthy, the vibes around the Vikings seem low. They have an opportunity to completely revamp the excitement on the road this week against Green Bay. McCarthy had a perfect record against his college rival, Ohio State, when he was at Michigan. He will have his first taste of one of the NFL's biggest rivalry games this week against the Packers. It's hard to find any stats or numbers that would support Minnesota's offense being improved on the road at Lambeau Field, but I think McCarthy comes up big and delivers one of his best performances of the season in a hard-fought win in Green Bay.
The ONLY reason I'm picking the Vikings here is that J.J. McCarthy is 2-0 on the road against division rivals. And also, selfishly, I need the win to draw closer to the rest of the staff, and I'm assuming they're all picking the Packers here. Minnesota's playoff hopes are on life support heading into this one on Sunday; a win gives them a small shock back to life, but a loss essentially buries them. A lot has been said, rightfully so, of McCarthy's struggles. Is this the week he starts to show some signs of putting things together? It's a tough task against a really good Packers defense. If the Vikings have Greenard back, this Vikings defense could cause the Packers offense some trouble. I think the Vikings narrowly pull off their third-straight win in Green Bay thanks to late heroics by McCarthy (because that's the only way he seemingly knows how to play at this point).
Here are last week's predictions, which all four pickers came up empty as the Vikings lost to the Bears.