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How does Sam Darnold’s signing impact the QB market? (0:57)
Dan Orlovksy and Adam Schefter explain how Sam Darnold’s deal with the Seahawks helps to shape the rest of the quarterback landscape in free agency. (0:57)
SEATTLE — As Seattle Seahawks general manager John Schneider fielded questions at the scouting combine about upcoming contract negotiations with Geno Smith’s agent, his answer to one of them included an important qualifier.
“We expect him to be our guy,” Schneider told reporters in Indianapolis, “but we want to do what’s right, too.”
As it turns out, the team’s top decision-maker was leaving the door cracked for what would be a blockbuster quarterback swap. It began with the Seahawks trading Smith to the Las Vegas Raiders on Friday for a third-round pick amid a breakdown in extension talks, and it was completed Monday when they agreed to sign free agent Sam Darnold to a three-year, $100.5 million deal.
The Seahawks are giving Darnold $55 million in guarantees, according to ESPN’s Adam Schefter, making it a significant bet on their part that he’ll be better than Smith.
It’s an understandable risk.
Smith has one of the NFL’s most talented and accurate arms, having just broken his own single-season franchise record with a 70.4% completion rate. He has led nine winning drives over the past two seasons and has a 27-22 record over the last three, including 10-7 last year despite a bad offensive line and not much help from his run game.
But Smith is 34 years old and has been up and down the past two seasons, ranking 21st in QBR in that span. He threw 15 interceptions last season, including a league-high four in the red zone. And while coach Mike Macdonald consistently touted Smith’s toughness and work ethic, he also noted the quarterback’s room for improvement as a leader.
At 27, Darnold is seven years younger than Smith. He’s also coming off a better year, having led the Minnesota Vikings to a 14-3 record in his lone season as their starter. Darnold ranked 14th in QBR (60.4) — seven spots ahead of Smith (53.8) — en route to the Pro Bowl.
But while Darnold might have more long-term upside than Smith, his struggles in the Vikings’ final two games — including an 11-sack debacle in their wild-card playoff loss to the Los Angeles Rams — might have provided a look at his ceiling. And without a track record of sustained success, there’s a risk he could end up being a one-year wonder now that he has left the only NFL setting in which he has excelled.
Darnold is replacing Smith as Seattle’s quarterback after agreeing to a $100.5 million deal. Jeff Hanisch-Imagn Images
Darnold was widely viewed as a disappointment as the No. 3 pick in 2018, having bounced around from the New York Jets to the Carolina Panthers and then the San Francisco 49ers — where he played under new Seahawks offensive coordinator Klint Kubiak — before landing in Minnesota.
Darnold ranked 39th in QBR (42.1) over his first six seasons before thriving under the guidance of Vikings coach Kevin O’Connell, who won’t be following him to Seattle. Nor will he have the same elite tandem of receivers that he was throwing to in Minnesota — Justin Jefferson and Jordan Addison — now that the Seahawks have traded DK Metcalf and released Tyler Lockett, leaving them with no proven options outside of Jaxon Smith-Njigba.
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Those moves, as well as the Smith trade, came after the Seahawks released four other veterans as part of a significant purge.
Their roster will look dramatically different — especially on offense — but the Seahawks aren’t intentionally taking a step back in 2025 so that they can take two steps forward in 2026. They return most of their key players from what was a top-10 defense, and they now have ample cap space as well as five draft picks among the top 100 to address their glaring needs in the interior of their offensive line and receiver corps.
The Seahawks have done this before under Schneider. What was viewed on the outside as a rebuild in 2018 — when they moved on from some of their Legion of Boom stars — instead resulted in a playoff appearance. The same thing happened in 2022, after they traded quarterback Russell Wilson and cut linebacker Bobby Wagner.
Whether that history repeats itself this season will depend, more than anything, on whether Schneider and Macdonald got their quarterback swap right.
