Sam Darnold: One year ago

Despite a great season under his belt, Sam Darnold has to prove himself all over again with the Seahawks

When will it finally settle in that the quarterback of the Seattle Seahawks is Sam Darnold? Because for me, that still doesn’t feel real. Will it happen this week as the Seahawks open 2025 training camp? Or will we have to wait another six weeks until the regular season starts?

It doesn’t help that I just scrolled through 61 photos of players arriving to camp this week and not a single one of them was of Darnold. We’ll just have to trust that it really happened.

Fans can’t be blamed for feeling skeptical that Darnold is actually Seattle’s quarterback, not only because the change is so recent — it’s still only been four months since the signing — but a year ago at this time most people expected his stint as Minnesota’s new QB (and therefore his career as a starter) to last for less than half of a season.

In the words of one Vikings fan Reddit user last August after Kevin O’Connell officially listed Darnold as QB1:

“Darnold is likely the guy to start the year. Will he be starting week 7 after the bye? I doubt it.”

Notably the name that believers brought up most often as a reason to give Darnold the benefit of the doubt was none other than:

“Well two years ago Geno Smith resurrected his career from the dead, and last year Baker Mayfield resurrected his career from the dead. So for not a real logical reason I predict Sam Darnold will continue that trend for the Vikings this year.”

One year later, Darnold’s career is in some ways different (he was statistically ranked among the best quarterbacks in the NFL for the first time ever) and in other ways he’s walking down the same path of doubters that he had to survive in Minnesota. Doubts so powerful that despite 35 touchdowns, 10th in MVP voting, and 14 wins, Darnold left the Vikings with nary an offer to stay and little hype around his unrestricted free agency.

As such, the formality of Darnold’s return to the west coast on a $100 million contract practically drained “the big news!” of any pomp and most circumstance.

And because Darnold’s place as the Seahawks starting quarterback doesn’t feel real yet, I don’t feel any need to defend his NFL resume any more than I would if he was on the Jets, Panthers, 49ers, or Vikings. As of today, Sam Darnold of the Seahawks may as well be Sam Darnold of the Falcons, Texans, or USC Trojans…

He’s in the same position that Geno Smith and Drew Lock were in before the 2022 season with the only difference being that he’s not in competition with anybody and he was actually very good last year. Very good in spite of most Vikings fans expecting him to be at best very mediocre.

What can we learn from Sam Darnold’s pre-2024 season expectations, 2024 season, and pre-2025 season expectations?

The Setup

It’s worth going back to how Darnold ended up in Minnesota to begin with. Between 2024 and 2025, we’ve seen a pattern emerge for the Vikings in which general manager Kwesi Adofo-Mensah and O’Connell don’t seem to believe that just because the last quarterback was successful, that doesn’t mean the team can’t get as much or more from a cheaper replacement.

Based on comments in Netflix’s Quarterback, Kirk Cousins was flabbergasted that the Vikings didn’t want him back last year. But again, Adofo-Mensah wasn’t involved in his previous extensions and so it tracks that Minnesota is trying something new after a 48-year absence since their last Super Bowl appearance.

The Vikings wanted a bridge quarterback last year and it didn’t matter to them if it was Cousins or a much cheaper free agent like Darnold. So Cousins took the bigger guarantee from the Falcons and Minnesota signed Darnold to a one-year, $10 million contract with almost no intention of having him around longer than that, which was verified by the selection of J.J. McCarthy in the draft.

We’d later find out that those transition plans were nearly “spoiled” by Darnold ranking top-6 in some major passing stats, but at this time a year ago most (including perhaps within the Vikings) expected McCarthy to start by the second half of the season, if not much sooner.

The following excerpts are from July and August of 2024, as examples of expectations of Darnold as he was going through his first and only training camp with the Minnesota Vikings.

Matthew Coller: Darnold learned to play 'point guard' in SF — can he protect the ball in MN?

On Thursday, Darnold said that during his time in San Francisco he learned to adopt a different mentality than he had in previous stops with the Jets and Panthers — a mindset that focused on not trying to press too hard to make something happen.

“The biggest thing for me as a quarterback is playing the game like a point guard,” Darnold said. “Being able to dish the ball to the guys and let them go run after the catch and not trying to do too much out there. Take what the defense gives you — I know that’s a cliche but it’s really true especially on first and second down. Taking completions, coming back to the sideline and if we had a look where I could have taken a shot then maybe come back to it but taking what they give you play after play and eventually something will pop.”

This article from SI highlights that Darnold had a promising start to his “second career” with the Panthers after being traded, but after three solid games in 2021 he then led the NFL with the most “turnover worthy plays” over the next nine starts.

“Only Jameis Winston and Ryan Fitzpatrick have higher interception rates among QBs who have thrown at least 1,000 passes since 2018.”

To Darnold’s credit, as well as his coaches and supporting cast, few quarterbacks have managed a more distinct mid-career turnaround as the one that happened to him three years ago:

• From 2018-2021, Darnold had a 3.2% interception rate on 1,625 attempts, completing 59.8% of his throws, 54 TD/52 INT, 76.9 rating

• From 2022-2024, Darnold has a 2.2% interception rate (mid-pack) on 731 attempts, completing 64.4% of his throws, 44 TD/16 INT, 99.5 rating

The vast majority of that success happened in 2024 with the Vikings when he had Justin Jefferson and Jordan Addison. With the exception of D.J. Moore on the Panthers, either of those receivers would be at least 10x better than any pass catcher that Darnold had before last year. His coaching in Minnesota, other than when he was a backup on the 49ers, was also a major upgrade from his previous stops.

But as always, everything comes back to the offensive line and a consistent pattern in Darnold’s career is that he’s decent in a clean pocket and among the worst quarterbacks in recent history under pressure:

In 2021 when Darnold threw the ball in under 2.5 seconds, he graded a 68.1 by PFF. That was still below average but was only a shade behind Jared Goff (70.2) and Matthew Stafford (71.8). When he held the ball for more than 2.5 seconds he had a 47.5 grade, second worst in the NFL.

Furthermore, he was not great with a clean pocket but when pressured his play was catastrophically bad. Darnold had the fourth worst pressure PFF grade and third worst QB rating.

This article mentions that Darnold’s o-line in Carolina was ranked 28th in pass protection in 2021, while their receivers were 32nd. Would the Vikings offensive line prove to be Darnold’s missing link? Sure and not really.

There is a timeline in which the Vikings 2024 offensive line could have been one of the best in the league, but left tackle Christian Darrisaw went on season-ending IR after Week 5. Minnesota’s offensive line had remarkable continuity in spite of that change from Darrisaw to (bad) Cam Robinson, but consider how desperate the Vikings were to overhaul that unit after the 2024 season:

• Signed G Will Fries to massive contract

• Signed C Ryan Kelly in free agency

• Drafted G Donovan Jackson in the first round

Darnold is potentially leaving a team that has a better offensive line than Seattle’s, but I think only if you’re looking at the 2025 version with Darrisaw and three new starters, not the 2024 edition he actually played behind. For example, Darnold has been raked over the coals for playing poorly in Minnesota’s final two games, but an article at the Vikings own website notes that he was pressured 22 times in Week 18’s loss to the Lions:

57.8 – The Vikings starting five — Robinson, Brandel, Bradbury, Risner and O'Neill — struggled at Detroit in Week 18, averaging an overall offense grade of 57.8 from PFF. Minnesota needed a regular-season finale victory to clinch the No. 1 seed in the postseason and earn a first-round bye, plus home-field advantage. Darnold was sacked just twice but was pressured 22 times, four more than the previous highest instance in Week 15.

Obviously Darnold was much happier with the offensive line he had in Minnesota compared to New York and Carolina, just as you might be stoked to be served plain bread and chicken broth if your previous diet was dirt, sticks, and brown leaves.

What about the 2025 Seahawks?

The Seahawks have been stuffed at the bottom of every 2025 offensive line ranking, but John Schneider has made his own attempts at an overhaul by drafting Grey Zabel and replacing almost the entire offensive coaching staff with a clear focus on people who have OL coaching experience. If nothing elsee, at least Darnold isn’t getting the Seattle OL with Laken Tomlinson and Scott Huff.

Increased Play Action and Pre-Snap Motion

One of the main highlights of why Darnold improved from 2021 to 2022 with the Panthers was Carolina’s increased rate of play-action passes that season. Darnold’s rate went from 24.4% to 37.7% and subsequently his viability as a starting quarterback (albeit still not great and only in six starts) became apparent. This is something that O’Connell’s gameplan was able to build around Darnold’s strengths, albeit not at 37%, as well as an increased rate in pre-snap motions.

Vikings, 2024: 28.7% play-action passes and 58.2% pre-snap motion

The Vikings rate of play action passes in 2024 was lower than Darnold’s final Carolina season, but still higher than his rate in 2021 when he got benched for P.J. Walker. Darnold’s rate of pre-snap motion and play-action passes in 2024 were almost the same as Derek Carr’s, the starter for Klint Kubiak:

We should not expect Kubiak to do anything to rock the boat when it comes to staying in a comfort zone with Darnold that has now been proven to work when the surrounding circumstances (i.e. offensive line, receivers, offensive coordinator) are above-average. Although the Seahawks do not have Justin Jefferson, most teams have to build a successful game plan around a quarterback without having a top-3 outside wide receiver weapon.

For Seattle, the idea with Darnold isn’t to replicate the success he had in Minnesota by “finding the next Jefferson”, but instead to develop a gameplan with Jaxon Smith-Njigba and Cooper Kupp, both of whom are still far better than the receivers that Darnold was accustomed to when he was one of the worst quarterbacks in the NFL.

I hesitate to tell Seahawks fans that the idea is to have a quarterback like Brock Purdy, only better…but that does seem like kind of the idea.

Darnold backed up Purdy and Kubiak help call plays for Shanahan in 2023, a season that saw the 49ers ranked first in points per drive and first in net yards per pass attempt. Seattle’s offensive personnel certainly doesn’t have the same reputation as an offense with Christian McCaffrey, Trent Williams, and George Kittle, but maybe the Seahawks can at least get closer to that than they’ve been in the last five years.

The Seahawks would be happy with any definition of a top-10 passing offense and Darnold’s trajectory over the past three seasons would seem to suggest that he’s capable of that in Seattle.

It wasn’t always clear that Darnold would start over McCarthy

A year ago at this time, Darnold’s competition with J.J. McCarthy was “open” according to Kevin O’Connell, but Darnold was listed as QB1 on the earliest versions of the depth chart and expected to win. Some fans wanted McCarthy to wait, but a strong preseason debut against the Raiders — as preseason games tend to do in spite of their lack of predictive value — had a lot more people pushing for the uncertain rookie over the uncertain free agent.

J.J. McCarthy debuts with 2 TD passes, Sam Darnold connects on opening drive (8/10/2024)

Darnold also garnered positive attention from fans during his one-drive outing that included completions of 19 and 26 yards, respectively, to Nailor. The second play received an especially excited reaction from the crowd as Darnold threaded the needle over the outstretched arm of linebacker Robert Spillane.

"Dime. Dime. An absolute dime," McCarthy said of Darnold's pass. "It's just such an artistry throw that … a lot of people in the quarterback world appreciate." Darnold was 4-of-8 passing for 59 yards with a 74.5 passer rating. He led a smooth opening drive despite unfortunate technical issues with his helmet's headset.

Were it not for the surprising news four days later that McCarthy was out for the season with a torn meniscus, it is easy to picture a world in which O’Connell either names the rookie the starter out of camp or makes a change during Darnold’s breakout season: Despite all his success, Darnold did throw 10 interceptions in Minnesota’s first nine games.

When your team drafts a quarterback who is perceived to have ANY amount of potential to become great, the rookie will always outshine the veteran even in the most unexpected circumstances and Darnold is seeing that narrative play out again in 2025 even though Jalen Milroe was drafted 82 picks later in his class than McCarthy was taken in 2024.

Seahawks fans are happy when the team finds a good quarterback and it doesn’t matter if he’s a free agent or a third round pick. We saw this happen when Russell Wilson beat out Matt Flynn, and we saw a different version of satisfaction when Seattle made the playoffs with Geno less than a year after Wilson was traded to the Broncos.

There are more benefits to Milroe being good than Darnold being good, namely cost savings if that happens in the next couple of years:

• Jalen Milroe’s salary won’t cross over $2 million until 2029 (not including potential bonuses if he becomes a starter)

• Darnold’s cap hit balloons from $13.4 million in 2025 to $33.9 million in 2026, then $44.9 million in 2027

• Milroe is 5 years younger and the dream outcome is that he’s a lite Lamar Jackson who gives Seattle a true dual threat

But if Darnold continues to be good, we don’t care if Milroe is bad. If Milroe turns out to be good, we won’t care if Darnold is bad. One quarterback steal is ENOUGH!

Although most “steals” do not get $100 million contracts right after leading their team to a 14-win season that somehow doesn’t get the division title, Darnold’s situation is different than Geno and Baker Mayfield’s previous “breakout” campaigns because while those quarterbacks got credit for proving themselves after escaping bad franchises, Darnold is practically getting punished for what he did with the Vikings last year.

I don’t know if Sam Darnold will be good with the Seahawks, but I will be surprised if he’s not “good enough” for now. Suddenly now it does seem like I’m defending his resume…maybe it’s starting to settle in.

Seaside Joe 2333