Sam Darnold’s horrific stretch over the final two weeks of the Vikings’ season won’t have a detrimental impact on his future bottom line.
That’s according to Bleacher Report’s James Palmer, who on Wednesday relayed the takes of NFL executives he spoke to about Darnold, suggesting the notion the quarterback’s career resurgence has shifted “more than his market.”
“I talked to an executive in the AFC, an executive in the NFC yesterday and they told me the same thing, there are too many quarterback-needy teams out there to have his market dramatically change even after these two games,” Palmer said, via Sports Illustrated, of Darnold, who threw one touchdown spanning Minnesota’s final two games, including Monday’s season-ending wild-card loss to the Rams.
“They both told me probably the perception of his turnaround has been altered more than his market. And it’s because there’s more teams and there’s fewer quarterbacks.”
Signed by the Vikings in March on a one-year, $10 million deal, Darnold — starting over injured rookie J.J. McCarthy, who underwent surgery for his meniscus during preseason — helped lead Minnesota to a 14-3 regular season record that boasted a nine-game win streak.
Entering the final stretch of Minnesota’s 2024 campaign, speculation began to mount as to whether Darnold — long regarded as a bust after failing to live up to expectations as the Jets’ No. 3 pick in 2018 — would be part of the Vikings’ future and further, what kind of monster contract did he play himself into.
The bubble burst just days into the new year when the Vikings faced the Lions in the regular-season finale with the NFC’s top seed and a first-round bye on the line.
Darnold went 18 of 41 for 166 yards and zero touchdowns in the 31-9 loss to the Lions on Jan. 5, when he was also sacked twice.
Despite the Vikings officially turning the page to the playoffs, the ghost of Week 18 came back to haunt Darnold on Monday night, when the quarterback tossed one touchdown, one interception and was sacked nine times in the season-ending 27-9 defeat.
“They were just better than us today,” Darnold said postgame. “I left a couple throws out there that I could be better on, especially early in the game. … Just too many mistakes.”
Although these final two games certainly cast a shadow on Darnold’s otherwise bright tenure in Minnesota, coach Kevin O’Connell stressed the 27-year-old’s full “body of work.”
“It’s very important we all think about Sam’s body of work, what he was able to do this year, when not very many people thought he would be able to lead a team to 14 wins,” O’Connell said. “It did not work out in the end, and I think Sam would be the first one to tell you. Could he have played better tonight? I’m sure he would tell you he could have. … Sam, and the journey him and I went on this year, will always be something that’s a special place in my heart, for sure.”
Darnold, whose career also included stops in Carolina and San Francisco, is one of several veteran free-agent signal-callers hitting the market this spring.
It remains to be seen if the quarterback-needy teams holding the highest numbers in this year’s draft — the тιтans, Browns and Giants — will choose from a lukewarm class at the position or pay for the experience a quarterback such as Darnold has to offer.
