Should Vikings Fans Get Their Hopes Up for Sam Darnold?
With J.J. McCarthy’s rookie season officially ended by a meniscus injury, the Vikings’ 2024 hopes have come down to Sam Darnold.
What are the odds that he’s actually good?
Based on his track record in New York, Carolina, and San Francisco, the answer seems to be “not likely.” Darnold’s career passer rating is 78.3, and his highest PFF grade for any season is an uninspiring 66.0.
But on the other hand, Darnold is coming to a new environment, with plenty of talent on the offensive side of the ball and a head coach known for his skill in working with quarterbacks. Is there precedence for a QB taking a big step forward under the right conditions?
To assess this in a more systematic way, I assembled a list of QBs who satisfied the following criteria:
- Drafted in the first round of the NFL draft since the year 2000
- Played less than five years with their original team due to poor play/injury
- Subsequently began anew with a different team as the Week 1 starter
The “first-round” requirement ensures that we are dealing only with QBs who came into the league with high expectations and/or high potential. The (admittedly nebulous) “poor play” stipulation excludes players like Jay Cutler, who was traded because they were unhappy with their current team/contract situation. The condition that they were the Week 1 starter ensures that their new team considered them a starting-caliber QB, as the 2024 Vikings apparently do with Darnold.
When the dust settled, I found just six players who fit all three criteria:
- Robert Griffin III
- Teddy Bridgewater
- Carson Wentz
- Baker Mayfield
- Sam Darnold
- Sam Bradford
Ironically, Darnold is already on the list, thanks to his fresh start with the Panthers after being drafted by the Jets. On the whole, this isn’t exactly an inspiring list of NFL QBs, and none of them has lived up to the hype they received coming into the league.
However, improvement is possible. Of the six QBs listed, two achieved a higher passer rating in their first season with a new team than in any of their previous seasons: Teddy Bridgewater and Sam Bradford, both of whom are familiar to Vikings fans.
Bridgewater was originally drafted by the Vikings, but his time in purple came to an end when his rookie contract expired, due in large part to a horrific leg injury he suffered before his third season. He served as a backup to Drew Brees for two seasons before getting a chance to start for the 2020 Carolina Panthers, where he posted a passer rating of 92.1 — 3.4 points higher than his previous best of 88.7.
Meanwhile, Sam Bradford began his career with the St. Louis Rams, but after an ACL injury sidelined him for the 2014 season, Bradford was traded to the Philadelphia Eagles. After a mediocre 2015 season in Philadelphia, Bradford was traded to the Vikings in 2016, where he posted the highest passer rating of his career — an impressive 99.3, more than eight points higher than his previous best.
In summary, it would be virtually unprecedented for Darnold to become a franchise QB at this point; nothing in his track record suggests that he is capable of consistently performing at a high level. Nonetheless, it is not unreasonable to think that this will be the best year of his career.
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