EAGAN, Minn. — J.J. McCarthy will be sidelined for Minnesota’s Week 17 Christmas Day game against the Detroit Lions, Vikings Head Coach Kevin O’Connell announced Tuesday.
O’Connell said further imaging than an X-ray Sunday revealed a “very, very small hairline fracture that was discovered in McCarthy’s hand.”
He said McCarthy’s availability for the season finale against the Packers in Week 18 will continue to be evaluated.
McCarthy left Sunday’s win at the New York Giants late in the first half. His final snap of that game was a tunnel screen designed to get the ball to the perimeter.
O’Connell said after the game that the first-year starter was struggling to grip the football. The result was a fumble, shown on slow-motion replay, before a massive hit by Brian Burns, who was unblocked on the right side of Minnesota’s formation by design of the play.
O’Connell said there were “some potential candidates” of plays on which the injury occurred but McCarthy was “not entirely sure exactly when it was.”