Minnesota Vikings quarterback Sam Darnold has been a journeyman throughout his NFL career. Darnold started his NFL career with the New York Jets. He was the third overall pick in the 2018 NFL Draft. The Jets have not been his only team in his NFL career.
He also had stops with the Carolina Panthers and the San Francisco 49ers. This time, Sam Darnold is with the Minnesota Vikings. For now, he is projected to be the Week 1 starter against the New York Giants. Darnold’s backup quarterback is rookie J.J. McCarthy from Michigan.
It will be interesting to see if Sam Darnold could be the starting quarterback for the entire season. J.J. McCarthy is only 21 years old. Minnesota would like to have him sit and develop this season behind Darnold. He is already 27 years old. In minimal action last season with the San Francisco 49ers, he completed 60.9% of his passes for 297 yards, two touchdowns, and one interception.
Alec Lewis of The Athletic wrote about things that he saw from Vikings camp during the first week. One of those things he saw was Darnold throwing it deep early on. Lewis said:
“Sam Darnold began training camp with a couple of massive deep balls. Justin Jefferson torched cornerback Andrew Booth Jr. on one, and a day later it was Jordan Addison doing damage. Placing the ball accurately has not been an issue when Darnold has aired it out. If anything, O’Connell mentioned Tuesday, there are times the quarterbacks could probably take the shot rather than checking the ball down.
Darnold’s layering ability is apparent, too. He frequently arcs the ball effectively into holes on the sideline.
One challenging aspect to gauge in training camp is in-traffic attempts over the middle. If a ball is nearly picked off by the defense, is it because the receiver did not peel his route off correctly? Is it because Darnold forced a ball into a tight window? Or was he humming that ball into that window to see what he could get away with as part of a trial-and-error process? These questions don’t have easy answers; only the coaches have the film to review each throw, and only they know all of the intricacies of each play. But these types of throws will continue to be worth watching as training camp progresses.”
It will be interesting to see how often head coach Kevin O’Connell will call the deep ball this season with Darnold. They have two legit wide receivers on the roster, Justin Jefferson and Jordan Addison. Jefferson is one of the best wide receivers in the NFL and Addison proved himself as a rookie last season.
Sam Darnold also has a history of making bad decisions down the field. There will be a point this season where the Minnesota Vikings fanbase will want to see J.J. McCarthy instead of Sam Darnold. That will probably happen only if Darnold gets hurt or if the Vikings are out of the playoff race by the end of the year.
