When the cameras caught J.J. McCarthy in a focused stare before his NFL regular-season debut on Monday night -- and again when he roared intensely following his third fourth-quarter touchdown -- they were great examples of the 22-year-old Vikings quarterback in action during a football war.
Off the field, McCarthy is calm and steady. So what changes when he steps between the white lines?
"It's kind of how I roll," McCarthy said Wednesday. "It is real when I'm ready to go to war on Sundays, Mondays and Thursdays, and sometimes Saturdays and Wednesdays. It's really just a flip that's switched and the rest can take care of itself from there."
McCarthy led the Vikings to a 27-24 win over Chicago in his debut. He was good enough in the fourth quarter, after three rough quarters, to win the NFC Offensive Player of the Week award. He simply never got rattled, which is a trait that he credits to meditation.
"I feel like a lot of it comes with just meditation. Just being able to stay present and understand that there's a lot of things out of your control, whether it's a football game or in life. Really staying hellbent on what's in my hands, what can I do to affect this moment right now," McCarthy explained.
"Meditation is just a tool that helps strengthen that muscle, so I feel like the more disciplined I stay with that, the easier it is to stay composed."
Meditation helps McCarthy stay focused on what he can control.
"For me, it's about controlling the controllables. Just being able to focus on that next play. Stay present, stay calm and really just worry about operating the next play," he said. "It's really simple but really hard to do. But I feel like just being in that thought process of, 'OK, what can I control right here,' helps me out tremendously."
Since his electrifying debut, McCarthy says he's watched the game film a few times. He says he buzzes through the tape on the plane ride back to Minnesota before going through a four-hour deep dive in which he micro analyzes every detail of his performance. After a third time watching the film, he's ready to move on.
So what did he learn from watching back his game against the Bears?
"Big takeaway is just all the little fundamental things that we kind of lean on is something that isn't 100% there. Just being able to go back onto the practice field and keep making those concrete habits," McCarthy said.
"I feel like the way we adapted as an offense throughout the game when it wasn't going our way in those first three quarters, and being able to experience that and know what we have is something that was huge to take away from. But there's a lot of work that needs to be done and we're definitely not even close to where we want to be as an offense. It was a lot of things that we learned."