J.J. McCarthy is worth a top 10 NFL Draft pick and has all the right ingredients to turn his ‘cupcake’ into a ‘wedding cake,’ insider says

If Drake Maye is the most debated quarterback in the NFL draft, JJ McCarthy is a close second.

Picking McCarthy in the first round on April 25 in Detroit should be easy.

He just won a national championship with Michigan.

Jim Harbaugh, McCarthy’s coach with the Wolverines and now head coach of the Los Angeles Chargers, praised McCarthy’s talent and leadership.

But with Caleb Williams sitting No. 1 behind Chicago and Jayden Daniels fresh off winning the Heisman Trophy, football fans and some draft analysts have questioned McCarthy’s value in the NFL.

ESPN’s latest mock draft has McCarthy going to Minnesota with the No. 5 overall pick.

In this simulation, the Vikings would trade with Harbaugh’s Chargers, which would represent a complete irony.

NFL Network analyst Daniel Jeremiah exclusively told talkSPORT that McCarthy is his “fourth quarterback” in the draft.

Jeremiah recognized the questions raised so high regarding McCarthy’s drafting.

But after throwing for 6,226 yards, 49 touchdowns and just 11 interceptions in three years at Michigan, teams are likely to pass up a proven college QB who won big games and excelled under pressure in 2023.

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“I anticipate he will be the fourth quarterback to go,” Jeremiah said. “But I think people look at him and say, ‘OK, he’s your 20th player, why the hell would a team put him up there in the top 5, if you don’t think he’s in the top 5 or top 10?

“To me, there really isn’t much difference. If you’re comfortable with your quarterback at 15, you’ll be comfortable taking him to the top, because you attach to him.

“And if you feel like he has some starting traits, some starting tools, then you’ll be comfortable with that.”

Williams possesses professional dual-threat talent and has been compared to everyone from Patrick Mahomes to Aaron Rodgers.

Daniels is more athletic than Maye, while Maye has a huge arm and big-play potential downfield.

Then there’s McCarthy, who went 28-1 over the past two seasons but led a Michigan offense that used him more as a game manager than a dangerous offensive weapon.

McCarthy has all the tools to excel at the next level.

If he does, it will prove that he has been locked down at Michigan and has much more to display in his NFL repertoire.

Potentially just like a former Wolverines QB who was forced to wait for the No. 199 pick in the draft, then won seven Super Bowls with New England and Tampa Bay.

“The way I explained it with him (McCarthy) is that all the ingredients are there,” Jeremiah said. “You can look at all the other top quarterbacks, they just have a bigger sample size.

“So the analogy I used is the ingredients are the same, but these guys used more ingredients to make a wedding cake, whereas JJ McCarthy had a cupcake.

“He didn’t make as much but we can identify the same ingredients.”