This past offseason, Sam Darnold bet on himself. It was a long shot. However, long shots go in, and Darnold is going to be an even richer man after the season. After agreeing to a one-year, $10 million contract with the Minnesota Vikings, his fortunes may soon turn — after the year he has had so far in 2024, he is going to lead an owner to open his wallet very widely.
Sam Darnold’s Excellent Season With the Vikings
Sam Darnold is having a season that fairy tales are made of. If he opens his eyes he will wake up and realize it is not a dream. He signed a one-year contract with the Minnesota Vikings and has led them to a 12-2 season so far through 15 weeks. He is in a position to sign a long-term contract somewhere which will give him life-altering money.
However, Darnold admitted before the Monday Night Football game with the Chicago Bears in Week 15 that “he’s not focused on that at all.” He just wants the season to continue as long as possible and have it end with a Super Bowl berth in New Orleans.
“I’m really stuck in the moment,” Darnold said. “I think that’s the best way to approach that, to just be where my feet are.”
After the Monday night victory over the Bears, Darnold’s stats are very impressive. He has thrown 3,530 yards in 14 games. He has a completion percentage of 67.6% with 29 touchdowns versus 11 interceptions.
Not bad for a guy who was signed to just be around as a model for J.J. McCarthy, the No. 10 pick in the 2024 NFL Draft, to learn from.
Heading into 2023, Darnold was picked up off the scrap heap by the San Francisco 49ers after a less-than-stellar career with the New York Jets and the Carolina Panthers. A year later, and his marvelous season with the Vikings has turned his career around.
“It’s special,” Darnold said. “To be honest, I really haven’t had a ton of time to think about it, think about my journey and where I’m at now because we really are just taking it one game at a time. I’m really trying to be stuck in the moment. But it’s special.
“This team that I’m on, the teammates that I have in that locker room, the coaches that I have that are able to put together such great game plans for us every single week and put us in great positions, it’s a special group to be a part of.”
Darnold concentrates on taking the game one snap at a time and one day at a time.
“The biggest thing was just doing exactly what I do now and just taking it one game at a time. One moment at a time, really,” Darnold said. “Whether it’s Wednesday practice, Thursday, you’re moving onto third down, Friday, red zone. Just continuing to stack really good days.
“Obviously, my time in New York, my time in Carolina, those days, on Sundays, sometimes didn’t go our way but that is what it is. Sometimes that’s going to happen in the NFL. Even as a young player, being able to understand that, it really helped me move forward and I learned a ton about myself, about just how resilient I really am.”
Darnold’s 1-Year Contract Considered a Bargain
With the new quarterback contracts that have circulated around the league, $10 million for a starting quarterback is chump change. Add in that the quarterback is leading his team to a potential division title and the top seed in the conference, and it really is a bargain.
Darnold’s contract has quickly become one of the biggest bargains in the NFL. He has the 32nd-highest cap hit among NFL quarterbacks this season, according to Spotrac. Darnold has a lower cap hit ($5 million) than backups like Washington Commanders QB Marcus Mariota ($6 million) and Dallas Cowboys QB Trey Lance ($5.3 million).
The highest-paid quarterback in the NFL is the Dallas Cowboys’ injured signal caller Dak Prescott, who makes more than $60 million per season. Jordan Love of the Green Bay Packers is just below him with the new contract he received this summer.
Factor in Tua Tagovailoa, Trevor Lawrence, and Jared Goff who all got new deals this summer that eclipse the $50 million-per-year plateau, one must figure Darnold will be living in the high-rent district after the season.
Sam Darnold’s QB Ranking for 2024
Here at Pro Football Network, we have created our own Quarterback+ (QB+) metric, which weighs statistics we value highly and then uses them to evaluate a quarterback across the current season.
Our metric uses numbers that are fully available through 2019, so that’s where the historical context comes from. All data referenced is relative to either the current season or in comparison to stats dating back to 2000 for most or 2019 for pressure-related data.
For the season, Darnold has a B- grade (82).
Darnold’s performance in Week 15 was fairly underwhelming, but only because we were comparing it to his incredible one the week before. However, the Minnesota Vikings did not need much from him as they won comfortably. Perhaps most important was his 50% third-down conversion rate, which kept the team moving, even if the rest of his performance was nothing more than average.
We have seen some up-and-down performances in recent weeks, but Darnold ranks eighth in the last four weeks. For the season as a whole, his best trait has been his 7.6 nYPA, which ranks sixth, despite getting just 4.8 YAC/Cp, which ranks 32nd. He is also converting third downs at a 41.1% rate (11th), while his EPA/DB numbers are all above average for the league this season.
