Sam Darnold’s renaissance offers hope for the quarterback scrapheap

Not long ago, it looked like Sam Darnold’s days in the NFL were numbered. The No 3 overall pick in 2018 by the New York Jets had bounced around teams over the past few years and was set to be a backup this fall to the Minnesota Vikings’ first-round draft pick, JJ McCarthy. A preseason knee injury for McCarthy pressed Darnold into action, though, and the veteran has made the most of the chance. In a 34-7 romp over the Houston Texans on Sunday, Darnold completed 17 of his 28 passes, only getting 181 yards through the air but avoiding interceptions and firing four touchdowns to four different receivers. Darnold has been one of the league’s most efficient quarterbacks in all three weeks this season, and the Vikings are 3-0.

Darnold was a college star at Southern California, but his NFL career had mostly been cascading disappointment. If Darnold had never gotten on the field this year, it’s possible that the defining image of his career would have been an ESPN graphic from the time he got mononucleosis in 2019, or perhaps another moment that season when a hot mic caught Darnold becoming so befuddled by the New England Patriots defense that he said he was “seeing ghosts”. For an early draft pick, Darnold had become a sideshow. Until now.

Darnold is still far from a top-tier quarterback, but after three starts this season we have enough of a sample size to believe his turnaround is probably real. He’s been one of the league’s best passers by completion percentage over expectation, according to the NFL’s Next Gen Stats. Vikings head coach and playcaller Kevin O’Connell has turned him loose, letting Darnold hang on to the ball while receivers run their routes and then fire the ball downfield. (At 3.03 seconds of average time to throw, Darnold is one of the most patient passers in football this year, although his offensive line is good enough to allow him that time.) With all-world receiver Justin Jefferson at his disposal, the Vikings could well continue to get strong QB play out of Darnold.

His improvement gives the Vikings a fighting chance in the NFC, but it also may provide a flicker of inspiration at a moment when plenty of teams have quarterback situations ranging from dreadful to hopelessly mediocre. The Carolina Panthers just benched last year’s No 1 pick, Bryce Young, whose career has already become a mess because of his lack of physical tools (height, in particular) and the Panthers’ lousy supporting cast (although his backup, Andy Dalton, proved on Sunday that Carolina may not be as bad as we thought). The New York Giants are stuck with an expensive Daniel Jones who’s good for a couple of nice performances a season but is often a liability. The Las Vegas Raiders are trotting out a career backup, Gardner Minshew. And a handful of teams are relying on recent high draft picks to become something much more than they’ve been so far. (In this category you might find Anthony Richardson, Bo Nix, and even the newly resurgent Justin Fields.)

Quarterback performance leaguewide is a sensitive subject right now. The season’s first few weeks have seen the position put up historically poor stats, and everyone’s got a theory as to why. Is it rushed development of green college passers to maximize their rookie contracts? Is it a lack of refined offensive schemes in college? Is it the strategic savvy of defenses, which have loaded up with more safeties in the defensive backfield to make quarterbacks’ throwing lanes tighter? It all probably plays a role, and indeed, many of the quarterbacks who look like busts will turn out to simply be busts.

But here is Darnold, finally playing like something approaching a first-round quarterback in his seventh year in the NFL. It wouldn’t be right to say that he was a total zero until now – the Vikings did give him $10m this year – but he was at risk of straying even further out of the limelight. Now Darnold is playing well, the Vikings look like a playoff team even without McCarthy, and fanbases of the league’s quarterback-deprived teams can use Darnold’s bounce back to comfort themselves. Maybe their bad QB can one day flip a switch too. Although it’s not quite that simple: they’ll also need an elite play-caller like O’Connell, an elite receiver like Jefferson, and a bit of elbow grease.

MVP of the week

Malik Willis, quarterback, Green Bay Packers. The third-year quarterback started his career with the Tennessee Titans, who flipped him to the Packers in the offseason. Willis was a toolsy prospect in 2022, when the Titans took him in the third round. He showed very little on the field in 11 appearances over two years there, so the Titans cashed him out in a trade to Green Bay for a seventh-round pick. Willis was to be Jordan Love’s backup. A Week 1 MCL sprain for Love has pressed Willis into duty the past two weeks, and he pushed his record to 2-0 by beating his old team on Sunday in Nashville, 30-14. Williams completed 13 of his 19 passes for 202 yards and a score, and he added 73 yards and a touchdown on six carries. Willis offered good perspective on his time in Tennessee this week, expressing gratitude for his time there and not sounding overly hung up on getting revenge on a team that gave up on him. But Willis got some anyway in what may be his last start before Love returns to the fold.

Video of the week

NFL offenses are an intricate tapestry, full of complexities that even savvy football fans and media can barely comprehend. So it’s refreshing when a team succeeds with an old schoolyard trick, one of the few plays that little kids can pull off with a bit of luck. Enter the Detroit Lions, who conned the Arizona Cardinals for this touchdown with a hook and ladder ruse. The Lions won, 20-13, with the touchdown going in the books as the decisive score.

Stat of the week

21 years and 56 days. That was the age of Giants rookie wideout on Sunday of Malik Nabers, who became the youngest player in NFL history to catch two touchdowns in a game. Nabers connected with Jones for scores from three and five yards, slipping behind the Cleveland Browns defense a couple of times. Nabers, the No 6 pick in April’s draft out of LSU, has quickly become a legitimate No 1 receiving option for an otherwise embattled New York offense (and for many thousands of fantasy football managers). With running back Saquon Barkley now in Philadelphia, Nabers is suddenly the Giants’ big offensive star.

Elsewhere around the league

— The Dallas Cowboys faceplanted at home against the Baltimore Ravens, losing a 28-25 decision that perhaps wasn’t as close as the scoreline suggests. The Cowboys trailed 28-6 in the early fourth quarter and clawed back to nearly get a chance to win the game, but they ultimately couldn’t prevent Lamar Jackson and the Ravens from getting a pair of late first downs to kill the clock. There is no shame in a three-point loss to a likely playoff team, but the close final score belies that the Cowboys were horrendous for most of the afternoon. Baltimore’s Derrick Henry rumbled for 151 yards and two touchdowns on 25 carries, and Jackson had a typically strong day with both his arm (12-of-15 for 182 yards and a touchdown) and legs (14 carries for 87 yards and another score). Cameras caught several testy moments on the Cowboys sideline, including one between Dak Prescott and CeeDee Lamb, who had just four catches for 67 yards. Prescott and Lamb are now under fresh contract extensions, with Prescott the league’s highest-paid QB and Lamb the No 2 receiver. They’ll have to figure it out. Baltimore’s win moved both teams to 1-2 on the season.

— The San Francisco 49ers are also off to a 1-2 start, and are without star running back Christian McCaffrey, tight end George Kittle, and receiver Deebo Samuel who are all out with injuries. The remaining Niners blew a 21-7 lead at the Los Angeles Rams on Sunday afternoon to lose 27-24, leaving themselves in a surprising last place in the NFC West. The crucial play was a 38-yard punt return in a tied game by the Rams’ Xavier Smith with 42 seconds left. It was the first touch of Smith’s NFL career, and it set up the Rams at midfield. A pass interference penalty put rookie kicker Josh Karty in range for a 37-yard game-winner. The 49ers’ Brock Purdy and receiver Jauan Jennings connected for three touchdowns in their team’s defeat.

— More bad news for the Miami Dolphins. They had already lost their starter, Tua Tagovailoa, to concussion earlier this season, and his backup, Skylar Thompson, left Sunday’s 24-3 loss to the Seattle Seahawks with a chest injury. Tagovailoa will miss at least three more games.

— The Pittsburgh Steelers beat the Los Angeles Chargers, 20-10, in a battle of teams that entered Sunday with 2-0 records. The Steelers will be bullish about a dominant defensive performance and the steady play of quarterback Justin Fields. But the biggest story for Los Angeles may prove to be a series of injuries to the team’s most important players. Quarterback Justin Herbert, who had been dealing with a high ankle sprain, seemed to aggravate it while a swarm of Steelers sacked him in the third quarter. His Pro Bowl left tackle Rashawn Slater also exited with an injury in the second half. And in the first quarter, before any of that, four-time Pro Bowl defensive end Joey Bosa suffered a hip injury. None of those stars returned. Jim Harbaugh has a talented roster in his first year in southern California, but for the moment, he does not have a healthy one.

— Bo Nix! The rookie quarterback was a widely panned first-round selection, 12th overall, by the Denver Broncos in April. Nix played five college seasons and was productive by the end of his career, but he rarely demonstrated classic NFL quarterbacking traits. In Week 2, the Pittsburgh Steelers embarrassed him, picking him off twice and holding Denver to six points. But in his third start, Nix got his first win, thrashing the Tampa Bay Buccaneers on the road, 26-7. Nix carried nine times for 47 yards, and his runs included a three-yard touchdown and a 22-yard breakaway. As a passer, Nix was unspectacular, totaling 216 yards (with no touchdowns or interceptions) on 36 attempts (25 completions). But he didn’t concede a sack, and his completion percentage was 4.3% better than expectation, per Next Gen Stats. Nix, often criticized for not pushing the ball downfield, was 2-for-2 on passes 20-plus yards from the line.

— And, of course, the Kansas City Chiefs are 3-0 despite not playing particularly well again. Their victims this time were the Atlanta Falcons, who went down to a 22-17 defeat on Sunday Night Football. Patrick Mahomes has looked as subpar as much of his team this season, but the best teams win even when they’re not at the top of their form. And, as we know, the Chiefs tend to get better as the season winds on.