By just about any measure, Sam Darnold is one of the top candidates for the 2024 NFL MVP award entering the New York Jets’ Week 5 trip to London.
Jets fans would have been ecstatic to hear that sentence in 2018. The only problem is that Darnold is playing against the Jets in London.
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As the quarterback of a 4-0 team, the league leader in touchdown passes (11), and the league leader in passer rating (118.9), Darnold is in the midst of a breakout season at 27 years old. While he has a solid supporting cast around him, Darnold’s early success in Minnesota is more than just a product of his surroundings. In most areas of the game, Darnold is not the same quarterback who got booted from New York in favor of Zach Wilson three years ago.
Whether it’s his mastery of the blitz (perfect 158.3 passer rating when blitzed), his poise under pressure (8th-ranked 95.7 passer rating when pressured), or his deep-ball accuracy (2nd-ranked 61.5% adjusted completion rate on deep passes), Darnold has turned many of his former weaknesses into strengths. He is firing on all cylinders and cannot be exploited as easily as he once could.
However, hidden beneath the hype of his surprise breakout, one familiar hole in Darnold’s game quietly remains: his lackadaisical ball security.
At first glance, it might seem like Darnold’s ball security has been a part of his improvement this year. Through four games, he has three interceptions and one lost fumble, giving him four turnovers. That number isn’t great in itself, ranking as the eighth-most among quarterbacks this season, but he has had far worse stretches in his career. As a Jet, Darnold had three games with at least four turnovers. So, three picks and one lost fumble in four games sure doesn’t seem too bad, especially when it’s coming with 11 touchdown passes.
Darnold has actually been more careless with the ball than his total of four turnovers would suggest.
Pro Football Focus tracks a stat called “turnover-worthy throws” (TWTs) that aims to isolate actual interceptions from passes that are truly worthy of being intercepted. Some interceptions are not necessarily the quarterback’s fault. Sometimes, the quarterback throws an awful pass that should have been intercepted, but the defender drops it. By isolating turnover-worthy throws, you get a more accurate measure of how well a quarterback protects the ball.
Darnold has been charged with five TWTs this season, tied for the 11th-most among quarterbacks and greater than his actual total of three interceptions (also tied for 11th-most). On top of that, Darnold has been charged with four fumbles, tying him for the second-most among quarterbacks. However, he’s had good luck on these fumbles, losing only one of them.
If you combine Darnold’s five TWTs with his four fumbles, that gives him a total of nine turnover-worthy plays (TWPs), tying him for the fifth-most among quarterbacks:
- 1. Jalen Hurts (16 TWPs) – 11 TWT, 5 FUM
- 2. Kirk Cousins (14) – 10 TWT, 4 FUM
- T3. Dak Prescott (10) – 7 TWT, 3 FUM
- T3. Anthony Richardson (10) – 7 TWT, 3 FUM
- T5. Sam Darnold (9) – 5 TWT, 4 FUM
- T5. Will Levis (9) – 6 TWT, 3 FUM
- T5. Caleb Williams (9) – 6 TWT, 3 FUM
- T5. Jacoby Brissett (9) – 6 TWT, 3 FUM
- T5. Josh Allen (9) – 6 TWT, 3 FUM
Despite his top-five ranking in TWPs, Darnold is only 24th in dropbacks (122), which means he is highly prone to putting the ball at risk relative to his number of opportunities. His 7.38% turnover-worthy play rate ranks sixth-worst among 32 qualified quarterbacks (min. 70 dropbacks):
- 1. Anthony Richardson (11.49%) – 10 TWP on 87 dropbacks
- 2. Jalen Hurts (10.26%) – 16 TWP on 156 dropbacks
- 3. Justin Herbert (8.00%) – 8 TWP on 100 dropbacks
- 4. Josh Allen (7.56%) – 9 TWP on 119 dropbacks
- 5. Kirk Cousins (7.41%) – 14 TWP on 189 dropbacks
- T6. Sam Darnold (7.38%) – 9 TWP on 122 dropbacks
- T6. Will Levis (7.38%) – 9 TWP on on 122 dropbacks
- 8. Jacoby Brissett (7.32%) – 9 TWP on 123 dropbacks
- 9. Dak Prescott (6.17%) – 10 TWP on 162 dropbacks
- 10. Matthew Stafford (5.59%) – 8 TWP on 143 dropbacks
It is not a good sign when you are tied with Will Levis in a metric related to ball security.
The bottom line is simple: While he has improved in many areas this season, Sam Darnold is still prone to yielding takeaway opportunities. The New York Jets must capitalize on these chances in London.
If Minnesota’s opponents capitalized on more of Darnold’s mistakes, the Vikings might not be 4-0 right now.
On the Vikings’ opening drive in Green Bay last week, Darnold made a decision that looks reminiscent of the ones that doomed his Jets career. He brilliantly dodges pressure and extends the play toward the sideline, but he foolishly tries to squeeze the ball to Justin Jefferson, totally unaware of the Packers linebacker waiting in Jefferson’s path. Darnold hits Isaiah McDuffie in the chest and lucks out that he drops it.
Minnesota proceeded to score a touchdown on this drive, the first of four on their way to opening up a 28-0 lead. The Packers eventually made a comeback bid and fell short by only two points. Who knows how much differently the game would have played out if this ball was caught?
In London, it will likely be Jamien Sherwood or Quincy Williams in that situation. Both linebackers have excellent athleticism and are performing tremendously in coverage this season. They each have yet to record an interception, though. It is imperative that they both take the field ready to snag anything that comes their way, because Darnold is bound to give them at least one chance.
On a second-and-9 play, Darnold takes an ill-advised deep shot to tight end Josh Oliver, who is double-covered. This should be picked off, but the two Houston defenders collide and fail to come down with it.
Minnesota was up 14-0 at this point, but there were still over 14 minutes remaining in the second quarter, and the interception would have set Houston up around midfield. Instead, the Vikings ended up punting to maintain control of the field position battle. Houston never got the big play it needed to turn the tide, as Minnesota went on to win 34-7.
This is a botched operation by Minnesota, drawing an illegal shift penalty as two players are motioning simultaneously at the snap. It looks like tight end Johnny Mundt (No. 86) is in the wrong for mistiming the snap count and motioning too early here, as Mundt runs right into Darnold while he is turning around to pitch the ball to Aaron Jones.
This is a terrible job by Mundt that puts Darnold in a precarious position. However, Darnold makes a bad situation worse by recklessly trying to jump-pass the ball backwards to Jones while taking a hit. The ball hits the deck, and Minnesota luckily maintains possession.
While Darnold was placed in a difficult position here, this play is a great example of how Darnold’s mind works when stuff hits the fan. In these moments, Darnold’s Brett Favre instincts kick in.
When the pressure is on and it’s time to make a critical decision, Darnold’s mindset is to try and make something happen rather than to take the loss and live to fight another down. Placed in the same spot, a safer quarterback’s instincts would have told him to squeeze the ball and go down at the moment he realized this play was busted, but Darnold’s instincts tell him to find a way. This mentality has led to plenty of magic so far this year, but it has also put him on the brink of some killer mistakes, most of which he’s been lucky enough to dodge.
This play occurred on Minnesota’s first possession while the score was still 0-0, so a turnover would have changed the entire trajectory of the game. While the Vikings ended up punting on this drive, they never trailed in the game, eventually taking a 20-7 lead entering the fourth quarter. If this ball were recovered by San Francisco, they would have already been in range for a go-ahead field goal, giving them a lead they’d never end up getting.
One turnover can change the course of a football game. Darnold has been lucky not to commit the big game-altering turnover this season. While he does have four turnovers, three of those occurred in the second half while the Vikings were up 14+ points, and one occurred in the second quarter while they were up 10 points. Minnesota already held big leads when Darnold’s turnovers occurred. His lucky breaks have happened when control of the game was still hanging in the balance.
The Jets cannot let Darnold get away with his reckless plays in London. If they do, the good of his playmaker mentality will far outweigh the bad, and the Vikings will likely run away with another high-scoring victory. But if they can capitalize on the chances he gives them – particularly the ones in the first half – they will have a good chance of ending Darnold-mania.
