Within the most valuable sports league in the world, perhaps the most impactful decision a team can make is deciding who will play its most important position: quarterback. And through the first 17 weeks of the NFL season, Minnesota’s decision to sign Sam Darnold to a one-year, $10 million contract last spring looked like one of the league’s best bargains.
Originally intended to be the Vikings’ backup, only to become a starter on the eve of the regular season due to a preseason injury to rookie and first-round pick JJ McCarthy, Darnold instantly thrived within Minnesota coach Kevin’s offensive system. O’Connell, himself a former NFL quarterback, shows the type of production that led to him being selected third in the 2018 NFL draft and little of the struggles that made Minnesota already the fourth stop of the Darnold’s seven-year career.
However, as soon as the Minnesota Vikings’ season surprisingly ended on Monday, in a 27-9 loss to the Los Angeles Rams in the first round of the NFL playoffs, a dilemma began.
Will teams around the league continue to view Darnold as a potential face of the franchise capable of taking his team to new heights, or as a flawed free agent who will regress to average?
It wasn’t a question many were considering just two weeks before. Entering the final week of the regular season, the Vikings had reeled off nine straight wins, a streak that was due to Minnesota’s aggressive defense, but also to their quarterback, who had thrown 35 touchdowns and 12 interceptions. By significant margins, Darnold’s passer rating and completion percentages were the best of his career. His teammates were so fond of Darnold that after Minnesota won its 14th game, one shy of the franchise record, in Week 17 to set up a regular-season finale with Detroit that would decide first place in the NFC in the playoffs, Vikings players lifted Darnold. their shoulders to raucous cheers.
It was a resurrection of a career so stirring that it raised the question of whether Darnold’s success would lead the Vikings to reconsider their succession plan of starting McCarthy in 2025.
However, if the Vikings’ story was one of the NFL’s best stories, they quickly headed toward one of the league’s worst finishes. Trailing by 22 points against Detroit in the season finale on Jan. 5, where Darnold was ineffective under pressure, the Vikings fell again just eight days later in the first round of the postseason to the Rams, who sacked Darnold nine times .
Darnold’s last two games may have potentially cost him millions, but several teams are still expected to pursue him, said an NFL executive who evaluates talent and spoke on condition of anonymity because he is not authorized to speak publicly about other players.
“There will still be a pretty strong market for it,” the executive told NBC News. “He’s still young and has a lot of experience and there are a lot of teams out there, like the Raiders, Titans, Seahawks and Browns, that could be interested. Training in shape is essential.”
Of that group, the Raiders are projected to have the most cap space (about $92 million, second most in the NFL) to sign free agents, according to overthecap.com.
ESPN reporter Jeremy Fowler echoed the sentiment, writing Monday that Darnold was still the best quarterback on the free agent market.
If Darnold isn’t in Minnesota in 2025, his bid to earn a sizable contract and remain a starter elsewhere could be boosted by two factors: precedent and scarcity.
In each of the last two seasons, quarterbacks have capitalized on career resurgence seasons that teams believed were replicable. Signed by Seattle ostensibly to serve as a temporary bridge to their quarterback of the future, Geno Smith played well enough in 2022 to earn a three-year deal worth a reported $75 million. A year later, Baker Mayfield, another former first-round pick turned nomad (including a stint as Darnold’s teammate in Carolina), played so well in his first season with Tampa Bay that he earned a three-year contract worth reported $100 million.
Teams in need of a quarterback are also not guaranteed to find one in the 2025 draft. Teams are “lukewarm” about potentially available quarterbacks, the NFL executive said.
O’Connell, the Vikings coach, recommended that his team consider Darnold’s entire season when making decisions. Minnesota could franchise tag Darnold, which would pay him the average salary of the league’s top quarterbacks but prevent him from hitting free agency for the next year.
“What he was able to do this year, when not many people thought he would be able to lead a team to 14 wins, is unusual,” O’Connell told reporters. “The way he came in, he committed to a daily process to be the best version of himself.”
It wasn’t the best version in an early playoff exit. The multi-billion dollar question surrounding the NFL is how many teams believe Darnold can still fulfill that potential for them.
