EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. -- It was always a matter of when -- not if -- J.J. McCarthy would take over as the New York Giants' starting quarterback. The clock was ticking on veteran Jameis Winston the moment the Giants sent a 2027 fifth-round pick to the Minnesota Vikings for McCarthy on Sept. 28.
The inevitable became reality Wednesday, when coach John Harbaugh announced that McCarthy would take over as the starting quarterback for Sunday's road game against the Houston Texans.
"All things considered, what gives us the best chance to be our best?" Harbaugh said. "(McCarthy) gives us the best chance to play the best offense we can."
The harsh reality is there are no good options when a team loses its burgeoning franchise quarterback to a season-ending knee injury seven snaps into Week 2, as the Giants did with Jaxson Dart. So, the Giants are onto their third starting quarterback of the season in Week 7, benching Winston a week after he threw for 326 yards, three touchdowns and no interceptions in a 27-27 tie with the Washington Commanders.
The shift to the immobile Winston presented a challenge for a coaching staff that spent the offseason building an offense around Dart's dual-threat ability. After Winston flourished by firing the ball all over the field while leading a 14-point second-half comeback in Washington, the coaches tried to adjust to the gunslinger's style.
But that crashed and burned in Sunday's 34-27 loss to the Saints, with the Giants falling into a 34-10 hole as Winston's two interceptions and general inaccuracy derailed the offense. It was the type of performance Winston couldn't afford because it provided an opening for McCarthy.
The enormous deficit gave Harbaugh the opportunity to "get a look" at McCarthy, inserting the third-year quarterback with 11:25 remaining and the Giants trailing by 24 points. Even the optimistic Harbaugh conceded the circumstances made a comeback unlikely, but he hoped McCarthy could provide a spark. McCarthy proceeded to light up the Saints' defense for 243 yards while putting the Giants 14 yards away from a potential game-winning touchdown.
Although the Saints mostly played vanilla defensively, McCarthy impressed with the arm talent that made him the 10th pick in the 2024 draft on some pinpoint throws into tight windows. It will be far more challenging when McCarthy is starting and playing full games, beginning with Sunday's matchup against Houston's Will Anderson and Danielle Hunter, who form arguably the best edge rusher duo in the league.
The Giants, of course, won't be relying on McCarthy to throw for 243 yards per quarter as the starter. In fact, his biggest impact figures to come on the run game.
It has pained Harbaugh to oversee such an ineffective rushing attack. The Giants rushed for 165 yards, including 54 from Dart, in their season-opening 28-20 win over the Dallas Cowboys. They are averaging 92.8 yards rushing in the five games without Dart, which ranks 22nd in the NFL over that stretch.
It was immediately evident that the coaching staff viewed McCarthy's legs as an asset. Even as he was cramming to learn the playbook, the coaches installed quarterback-run packages for McCarthy.
The coaches wedged McCarthy into the past two games so he could run zone reads and throw a couple short passes before he fully replaced Winston late in the Saints game. Winston's poor fit in the style of offense that Harbaugh wants to run makes it puzzling that this regime gave the 32-year-old a two-year, $13 million extension a week before the season started.
McCarthy's 28-yard scramble to kick-start the final drive against the Saints was an illustration of the difference between him at quarterback and Winston, whose lumbering pocket movement led to sacks. Winston's 15 sacks since taking over in Week 2 are the fifth-most in the NFL over that span.
McCarthy's scrambles will be a bonus. The true value of having him under center is that he will allow the Giants to reincorporate the quarterback-run elements that were a pillar of their offensive identity with Dart. Even though McCarthy isn't as effective as Dart as a rusher, defenses will at least need to respect the quarterback as a running threat again. That should open lanes on zone reads, which are desperately needed as the offensive line and running backs have struggled.
"We haven't been able to go down the roads we wanted to go down in terms of the types of elements that we wanted to use to run the football," Harbaugh said Monday. "Some of the read plays and some of the different things you can do moving the quarterback around, those are definitely things that are part of that equation."
There's no such thing as a soft landing spot in the NFL. The Texans' defense hasn't been as dominant as last season, when it finished second in points allowed, but the unit returned the same coaching staff and most of the same players. This undoubtedly is a tough first start for McCarthy, but this wasn't a change made with the short-term in mind.
The Giants wouldn't have dealt a fifth-round pick if they were only seeking a backup for Winston after Dart went down. They had to know the erratic Winston wouldn't be capable of steering the ship for 15 games as the starter. So they took a swing on McCarthy, whom Harbaugh deemed "the very best quarterback you could get" at the time of the trade.
That McCarthy is starting less than four weeks after arriving in New York isn't a surprise. And this isn't a decision made lightly. Harbaugh said the "plan going forward" is to roll with McCarthy at quarterback.
Despite all the adversity the Giants have faced this season, they're still in first place in the NFC East with a 3-2-1 record, and no indication that any of their pursuers can win games consistently.
"We're right there trying to find our identity and our rhythm and get consistent in what we're doing," Harbaugh said. "And the teams that can find that over the next three, four, five, six weeks are going to be the teams that are going to be fighting for a championship at the end. And we can be one of those teams. … We can win the division. We can win more than the division. Are we going to be able to do it? That's what we're fighting for."
Harbaugh is now betting on McCarthy to lead the Giants to those lofty goals.
This article originally appeared in The Athletic.