What's at stake for Sam Darnold in 2026?

The Sam Darnold narrative could change immensely

If the start of every NFL season was like a dating show where you tried to match quarterbacks with teams, how hot would the Seahawks be right now? You could basically center the entire show around them this year. “The Mac-chelor”.

For Sam Darnold’s part, he’s lucky because it’s not a dating competition. Seattle’s only two other realistic options right now are Drew Lock and Jalen Milroe, making Darnold a sure thing to end up with another proposal and an offer for a ring…as long as he helps pay for it.

With that in mind, Darnold does win the opportunity that so many other quarterbacks wish they had: A defense, a number one receiver, special teams, a GM on a hot streak, a good offensive line, and cap space. It’s not purely “hitting the lottery” because in many ways Darnold created his own luck to even get the offer: We rarely stop to appreciate how many “Sam Darnolds” there are in college every year who eventually flame out well before earning a starting role in the NFL.

If we flip this show around, Darnold may not be as attractive as the Seahawks, but he wouldn’t go home alone.

Darnold enters 2026 with an opportunity to accomplish goals rarely, if ever, seen by a quarterback. Because of the success he and his teams had in 2024 and 2025, Darnold could join a minuscule group of quarterbacks with another strong effort in 2026. Given who he’s with, these goals are well within the realm of possibility:

13 or 14-win seasons

Darnold already joined Tom Brady as the only QBs with 14 or more wins in back to back seasons and the first to do it with different teams.

If the Seahawks win just 13 games with Darnold next season, he’ll join an elite of just 10 elite quarterbacks to ever do that three or more times:

• Brady, 8 times

• Peyton Manning, 6

• Joe Montana, 4

• Aaron Rodgers, 4

• Drew Brees, 4

• Steve Young, 3

• Josh Allen, 3

• Patrick Mahomes, 3

• Brett Favre, 3

• John Elway, 3 (only actually won 13 games as a starter once)

If Seattle wins 13 games with Darnold in 2026, he’ll join THAT group of quarterbacks and he’ll only be 29. All the more absurd that Darnold went 21-35 as a starter over his first six seasons.

We know—”wins are not a quarterback stat”—but don’t rob yourself of the opportunity to let that list wash over you and realize that no quarterback gets respect without team success. A quarterback like Montana would not be revered for 40 years on talent alone; he was on some of the greatest teams of the 80s.

And none of them, not even Brady, ever won 13+ games three seasons in a row.

For those wondering about the importance of the 17-game schedule, notice that I set the bar at 13 wins, not 14, which is how many Darnold has won in the past two seasons. So he’s already crossed over the 13-win threshold twice.

Now if the Seahawks do win 13 or more games with Darnold as the starter next season does it mean that “Sam Darnold won them 14 games”? Doubtful but if partakes in that much success as a quarterback over a three-year span he will join an echelon of players with one name in the group:

Sam Darnold.

Brady’s career-best three-year run for Patriots wins was 39 from 2010-2012. (Notably, New England didn’t win a Super Bowl then.) Darnold can hit 40 if he wins 12 games with the Seahawks next season.

If all people say about Darnold is “he’s not elite but he wins a lot of games” what Seahawks fan could be mad about that?

2-time Super Bowl winners

If the Seahawks repeat with Darnold, he will become the 14th quarterback* to have won multiple Super Bowl as a starter. The first was Bart Starr and the most recent was Patrick Mahomes.

*Phil Simms was the Giants primary starter in 1990 but missed the playoffs. Technically backup Jeff Hostetler also won two Super Bowls. I didn’t include either of them in this group.

The only one of these quarterbacks to be held out of the Hall of Fame (eligible ones) is Jim Plunkett, who remarkably has more Super Bowl wins than 10-win seasons. And that’s not surprising just because Plunkett played in a 14-game era. He had a 72-72 career record.

When a quarterback wins multiple Super Bowls, the conversation immediately turns to the Hall of Fame. It’s hard to believe that fans could be doing that with Darnold in a year…

• In 2023, he was a backup

• In 2024, he was blamed for the Vikings losing badly in the playoffs and called a choke artist who would never win a playoff game

Could the narrative change that quickly? Well, not necessarily. It’s not necessarily true that Darnold would be a Hall of Famer, it’s just that people will ask the question for the first time if the Seahawks win back-to-back Super Bowls.

The only QBs to win back-to-back Super Bowls are: Starr, Bob Griese, Terry Bradshaw, Joe Montana, Troy Aikman, John Elway, Brady, and Mahomes.

Of course, Russell Wilson came face-to-face with back-to-back Super Bowls and fairly or not if that play had worked out for Seattle the career narratives for Wilson really would be that much different.

MVP consideration

Voters clearly care way too much about what people think of their votes for MVP and don’t want to be ridiculed for “having the wrong opinion” so them knowing that a quarterback is endorsed by the masses is important before they’ll actually consider making it publicly aware that they like somebody.

It’s the “She’s All That” problem:

In the movie She’s All That, the premise is centered around dating someone who is uncool and making them so cool that she becomes prom queen.

Before winning the Super Bowl, Darnold was totally uncool.

—Despite helping the Vikings win 14 games and posting great stats, Darnold finished 10th in MVP voting, which is basically the same as not getting any votes at all. (He had 3 points, ranking behind the likes of Jayden Daniels and Ja’Marr Chase.)

—Darnold helped the Seahawks win 14 games and got 0 MVP votes.

Voters didn’t want to look uncool by voting for Darnold. But now that he’s won the Super Bowl, I think they’ll be far more willing to ask him out.

When I think of a quarterback who’s reputation won after enjoying sustained success, I think of Tom Brady.

It’s not that I’m comparing Brady’s career arc to Darnold’s because by the end of his fifth season (fourth as starter) he won three Super Bowls. But the way that people like Cam Newton and Ryan Clark talk about Darnold now is how I remember the media talking about Brady in the early 2000s. That he was a “game manager” who was lucky to be in the best situation possible.

And that’s true. Brady was lucky. He knows it.

In his first six seasons, Brady averaged 13 interceptions (always had at least 12), had an interception rate of 2.5%, a passer rating of 88.4, and was treated like “a Pro Bowl guy but not an MVP guy”.

Then in Brady’s seventh season as a starter he threw 50 touchdowns.

That historic 2007 season was not the Tom Brady we had known during his 20s. He wouldn’t be called a game manager again after that. Even after tearing his ACL in 2008, Brady returned and was even better, winning two more MVPs.

The Darnold we’ve seen up until now is not what we would think of as an MVP. For at least half of Seattle’s wins last season, he was a support player, doing his part by not turning over the ball too many times. But he’s not even 29 yet, meaning the door is open for another career transformation.

And what about Drew Brees?

He was a much better quarterback when he got to the Saints in 2006, but he got even better when he won the Super Bowl at age 30, and the belief that he could be the best quarterback in the NFL continued to develop after that win.

Awards are obviously a pretty weird concept that people have invented to increase the interest in competition beyond the field and as we’ve seen from a lot of recent examples either the voters or the voting rules are completely out of whack, but just speaking from a purely observational point of view:

Winning the Super Bowl has put Darnold in a new category of player and this is a job that is heavily influenced by self-confidence.

Seaside Joe 2556