Cornerback Nahshon Wright’s play with the Bears during the 2025 season landed him a contract with the Jets and it earned him the most performance-based pay in the league for last year as well.
The NFL announced that Wright earned more than $1.44 million in performance-based pay. The bonus more than doubles Wright’s base salary for the season.
Wright signed with the Bears after being released by the Vikings last April. He was named to the Pro Bowl after recording 80 tackles, five interceptions, two forced fumbles and three fumble recoveries during the regular season.
The performance-based pay fund is part of the league’s Collective Bargaining Agreement to compensate all players based on a formula encompassing their playing time and salary. It paid out more than $542 million for the 2025 season.
Browns safety Ronnie Hickman earned over $1.293 million for second place and tackle Elijah Wilkinson earned over $1.272 million for his work with the Falcons. Wilkinson has since signed with the Cardinals.
Panthers safety Nick Scott, former Commanders guard Chris Paul, Ravens guard Andrew Vorhees, Vikings defensive end Jalen Redmond, Steelers guard Mason McCormick, Chiefs defensive back Chamarri Conner, and Patriots safety Craig Woodson make up the rest of the top 10 recipients of performance-based pay for 2025.
With the Vikings signing quarterback Kyler Murray, there’s a vague sense that the starting job in Minnesota is his to lose. Which, if that happens, will mean that J.J. McCarthy has lost his starting job.
Lost in the arrival of Murray is the question of McCarthy’s potential reaction to it. The best response will be to welcome the challenge, embrace the competition, and keep working on getting better.
Still, McCarthy may believe he can’t win the competition. That Murray will be given the job. That McCarthy’s third season in the NFL will be spent on the bench, waiting for Murray to either face-plant or get injured or leave in free agency in 2027, thrusting McCarthy back into the role.
McCarthy eventually will speak to someone, somewhere. And there could be a disconnect between what he says publicly and thinks privately.
Last year, when the Vikings were trying to figure out what to do about their quarterback depth chart, there was a concern that McCarthy would possibly ask to be traded, if Sam Darnold or Daniel Jones returned, or if Aaron Rodgers had been signed. And while McCarthy’s body of work in his first season as QB1 (10 starts, 1,632 yards, 11 touchdown passes, 12 interceptions, passer rating of 72.6) hardly guarantees him anything, he could still be miffed about his situation.
There’s been no discussion of a possible McCarthy trade. There’s been no indication that he wants one, that the Vikings are interested in trading him, or that another team would do a deal. His only chance to be a starter, based on their current depth charts, would be in Arizona or Pittsburgh.
He could, in theory, serve as the bridge quarterback for Fernando Mendoza in Las Vegas, if the Raiders prefer not to throw the presumed No. 1 overall pick into the fray right away. McCarthy’s salary for 2026 is a very affordable $2.78 million.
Murray has been the recent focus in Minnesota. Presumably, it’ll be a fair and open competition between him and McCarthy. If, however, McCarthy believes it’s a formality that Murray will be the Week 1 starter, things could get awkward.
Nothing will happen unless someone wants to trade for McCarthy. Maybe, if/when it’s clear McCarthy won’t be the starter in Minnesota, someone will consider trying to trade for him to be the backup. And McCarthy may decide that he wants a fresh start after two lackluster seasons with the Vikings.
In four years on the job, Vikings coach Kevin O’Connell has worked with eight different starting quarterbacks. The ninth one could be the most intriguing.
Kyler Murray arrives, seven years after entering the NFL as the No. 1 overall pick in the draft — and four years after the Cardinals permanently poisoned their relationship with him by jamming a homework clause into his second contract. He has more raw talent than any of the others with whom O’Connell has worked.
Yes, there are flaws. His height, for starters. It’s far below prototypical, and it creates a real challenge when it comes to seeing through the wall of humanity in front of him. It’s the kind of obstacle O’Connell will embrace, scheming plays to get Murray in position to spot the open targets and/or to make him trust what he can’t visually acquire. At times, it could be like flying a plane with just the instruments.
Regardless, Murray can make the throws. He can buy time with his feet. And, if all else fails, he can spot an opening and put the pedal to the metal.
Of the quarterbacks who have started under O’Connell — Kirk Cousins, Josh Dobbs, Nick Mullens, Jaren Hall, Sam Darnold, J.J. McCarthy, Carson Wentz, and Max Brosmer — Hall is the closest comparison to Murray. At six feet, Hall is only two inches taller than Murray. Like Murray, Hall was regarded as a dual-threat quarterback.
The Vikings made Hall a fifth-round pick in 2023. And while it didn’t work for Hall in Minnesota (he got the first start after Cousins tore an Achilles tendon in 2023, and Hall suffered a concussion at the end of a nine-play, 74-yard drive that resulted in a field goal), Murray has a much better arm — and much fleeter feet. (Hall, after spending 2024 with the Seahawks, is preparing for his first season in the UFL, with the Birmingham Stallions.)
Then there’s the difference between the Cardinals and the Vikings, as overall organizations. Beyond the ridiculous decision to reduce to writing an expectation that Murray show a greater commitment to his craft, the Cardinals have been among the group of dysfunctional organizations that more often than not find themselves jockeying for position in the top ten of the draft. Now, Murray lands with a team that typically lands in the middle of the pack, with an every-other-year trend (generally) of getting to the playoffs.
And, yes, the Vikings are less than 15 months removed from a winner-take-all Week 18 game for the top seed in the NFC.
In recent years, we’ve seen several quarterbacks find success with a team other than the one that drafted them. From Geno Smith to Baker Mayfield to Darnold to Daniel Jones, a change of scenery, of coaching, of teammates, of organization can unlock a higher level of performance.
Murray, of course, has already played at a high level. He was the offensive rookie of the year. He qualified for the Pro Bowl in 2020 and 2021. His second contract resulted in a new-money annual average that put him at $46.1 million, a click above the Deshaun Watson deal, which had matched Patrick Mahomes for the top APY of $45 million. No one suggested that the Cardinals had overpaid.
Of course, the dip started that same year. But Murray didn’t implode; he simply didn’t play as well as he had during his first three seasons. Along the way, coach Kliff Kingsbury was fired and replaced by Jonathan Gannon, who was recently fired after three seasons and a 15-36 record.
So was it Murray or was it the Cardinals? The Vikings have made a low-money bet ($1.3 million) on it being the latter. And if O’Connell can get Murray back to doing what he did in 2019 through 2021, the Vikings could end up with the best overall player at the quarterback position that they’ve had since O’Connell arrived in 2022.
They finished 2025 with five straight wins and somehow escaped the basement of the ultra-competitive NFC North, thanks largely to a defense orchestrated by Brian Flores. And while the entire roster is dealing with a cap-driven overhaul, plenty of players who know the system well will be back.
Ultimately, how things go in 2026 will depend on how the quarterback position goes. Which will depend on whether O’Connell can coax enough out of Murray — first to position him to win the starting job and second to help propel the team to victories.
The Vikings, as expected, have added a veteran quarterback to the depth chart, in the form of 2019 No. 1 overall pick Kyler Murray.
With Murray signing a one-year, $1.3 million deal (thanks to the Cardinals owing him another $35.5 million) that includes a no-tag clause for 2027, it’s fair to wonder whether Murray arrives as the new starter.
Coach Kevin O’Connell didn’t answer that question on Thursday night.
“Unless I’m confused in any way, shape or form, I don’t believe we have to name one of those currently,” O’Connell said, via Kevin Seifert of ESPN.
The fact that O’Connell didn’t say J.J. McCarthy is the starter becomes a strong clue that it’ll be a competition, and that the better player will earn the job.
And McCarthy can’t be surprised by the development, given the full-season body of evidence from 2025.
“He knew we were going to be adding somebody to the room,” O’Connell said regarding McCarthy, via Seifert. “He knew that that didn’t change anything about his mindset and focus on improving and attacking this offseason the right way.”
That’s the goal of competition. Both players should be motivated to win the job. That should push each guy to become as good as he can be.
Given their respective injury histories, there’s a good chance both will play, at some point. It will be for the coaching staff to decide which of the two will be the Week 1 starter, and beyond.
Most NFL players never play for the NFL team they grew up rooting for. In 2027, new Viking quarterback Kyler Murray will.
In his introductory press conference after signing with the Vikings, Murray said he was a Vikings fan as a child.
“Ever since I started playing tackle football — I was 7 years old,” Murray said. “Genuine fandom. . . . Vikings gear through and through. A lot of purple in my household.”
He initially hesitated to share a specific example to prove it, before telling the story.
“I cried real tears whenever Brett [Favre] threw that interception,” Murray said, referring to the team’s overtime loss in the 2009 NFC Championship.
He revisited during the video conference the winding road that brought him to the Vikings, 17 years later.
“Never in a million years did I think that this was gonna come around full circle,” Murray said. “Not even a thought in my head. But the opportunity presented itself. Again, just watching from afar what [coach Kevin O’Connell] has been able to do [with] quarterbacks, offense. The guys in place here. [Defensive coordinator Brian Flores] and the defense. I think that it’s a great fit. And like I said, I’m thankful. I’m thankful for the opportunity.”
As to his role, Murray said only that he looks forward to coming in and competing. And he’ll be competing primarily with J.J. McCarthy.
