5 Things The Jets Must Do To Ensure Sam Darnold Reaches His Potential
Sam Darnold somehow fell to the New York Jets with the third pick in the 2018 NFL Draft, and the team’s management and fans had a right to be ecstatic. The USC signal-caller was the consensus top quarterback in the draft and now the Jets have a legitimate franchise caliber guy on their roster.
While Darnold is a fantastic talent, he still has a lot of developing to do. As I’ve broken down before, the kid makes reads and throws few players can, but he also has plenty of things to work on. Fostering that development should be the Jets’ No. 1 priority as a franchise.
What follows are five steps the New York must take to ensure their new franchise quarterback develops properly.
Sit him for most of 2018
The Jets re-signed Josh McCown this offseason, and grabbed Teddy Bridgewater as an upside insurance option. Now that they landed Darnold, neither of those guys has a long-term future with the franchise.
McCown is a great veteran for the rookie quarterback to sit behind and is coming off a career year. He’ll be 39 when the season rolls around, and will almost certainly start for the majority of the campaign. It would likely be best for Darnold to get some snaps this year, but he needs to sit.
Darnold is still just 20. He has a lot of growing and improving to do. His footwork and delivery looked vastly improved at his pro day, but he’ll need to show that kind of progress consistently. With the Jets unlikely to come anywhere close to competing this season, they should get Darnold a few drives per game starting in the middle of the year. Getting the rookie’s feet wet will pay off in the long run.
McCown should get the nod this season, while Bridgewater was long-term insurance if the Jets didn’t find their franchise quarterback in the draft. With those guys in place, Darnold has the luxury of sitting and learning. That will be a huge benefit to a guy with a lot of developing to do.
Spend heavily on offensive linemen
The Jets offensive line was an absolute disaster in 2017. James Carpenter and Brian Winters were overpriced and terrible, now-departed center Wesley Johnson was horrendous, and tackles Brandon Shell and Kelvin Beachum were average at best. That’s just not going to cut it moving forward.
New York signed Spencer Long away from Washington and he will take over at center, while Travis Swanson was brought in as depth along the interior. Neither guy is going to blow anyone away. The rest of the group will likely remain the same, unless someone becomes a cap casualty. It’s notable that the franchise didn’t add a single offensive lineman in this year’s draft.
Fixing this mess will be a multi-year process, but one that must be the team’s main focus moving forward. As we’ve seen with the Indianapolis Colts and Andrew Luck, it doesn’t matter how good your franchise quarterback can be if you don’t invest in protecting him. The Colts ignored the offensive line for years and Luck wound up seriously injured.
When you pin your hopes on a quarterback winning you games, you have to protect him. The Jets have to be better at addressing the offensive line. Given what the team has on the roster, an entirely new line is not out of the question. New York has to invest there and soon.
Find someone to play a skill position competently
The Jets have been bad at landing skill position talent since Rex Ryan was in charge. Right now they’re an absolute disaster at the skill spots. Last year’s leading receiver Robby Anderson is a walking arrest warrant, Quincy Enunwa is coming off a neck injury and Jermaine Kearse is a solid, complementary piece at best. Off-season signings Terrelle Pryor and Andre Roberts aren’t going to get it done either.
At running back, the Jets had the wholly inadequate Bilal Powell and matt forte’s corpse toting the ball last year. Forte is gone, so they signed Isaiah Crowell this offseason and will give Elijah McGuire and Thomas Rawls chances. But none of those guys has proven himself to be a true No. 1 back.
Over the next two offseasons, the Jets must shift their focus to offense. They need to find a legit, go-to No. 1 receiver for Darnold to build a relationship with. Every great quarterback needs a primary target and that guy does not exist on the Jets’ roster right now. On top of that, they must find a reliable running back who can take pressure off the young quarterback.
Darnold is far more talented than Mark Sanchez, but it’s instructive to look at what happened after the Jets last selected a USC quarterback in 2009. They took him, then didn’t get him any help. During Sanchez’s four years as a starter in New York, his leading receivers in each season were Jerricho Cotchery (2009), Dustin Keller (2010 and 2011) and Jeremy Kerley (2012). And he mostly had to deal with Shonn Greene as his running back. That’s just embarrassing. How can you expect a guy to win games or even develop when his supporting cast is that awful?
It’s imperative that the Jets change the way they’ve done things on the skill position front over the last decade. They’ve constantly gone after bargain deals or banked on high-ceiling, low-floor prospects. That can’t go on any longer.
Include lots of run-pass options in the offense
Darnold has strengths and weaknesses as a quarterback, but one way to get the best out of him is to install quick reads into the offense. At USC he thrived when he could diagnose a defense pre-snap and get the ball out quickly. New Jets offensive coordinator Jeremy Bates should take advantage of that.
While Bates doesn’t typically utilize run-pass option plays, he’d be wise to start installing some. Line Darnold up in the shotgun with a running back next to him, and allow him to figure out what the defense is giving him and make a play. While at USC, he was so good on those plays, the Trojans ran them constantly. Yes, he’d make a mistake or a bad read occasionally, but for the most part, that’s where he dominated in college.
Setting up some designed rollouts would also be a good idea since Darnold is fantastic throwing on the run.
Bates runs a West Coast offense and is almost certain to employ a zone blocking running scheme. The young quarterback should fit that system well, but Bates would be smart to adjust it to fit what Darnold did well in college.
Heavily emphasize pocket ball security
We all know Darnold struggled with turnovers at USC, as he threw 13 interceptions and fumbled the ball away a whopping nine times. The concern here is the fumbles, because interceptions typically have a lot of factors involved. When you put the ball on the ground, it’s solely on you.
Most of Darnold’s fumbles came when he was trying to extend plays within the pocket. He’s fantastic at feeling pressure and keeping plays alive. He reminds me of Aaron Rodgers in that way. The problem is that he doesn’t always protect the ball.
Much was made of Darnold possibly having small hands, but at the combine we found out that his hand size was actually about average (9 3/8 inches). The issue is that he often holds the ball loose in one hand as he scrambles.
Jeremy Bates knows quarterbacks and knows all the drills in the books. As the team’s quarterbacks coach and offensive coordinator it will be his job to work overtime with Darnold to change his habits in the pocket. He’ll need to get the young quarterback to put a second hand on the ball and to hold it higher in the pocket not down by his waist. It’s certainly something that can be fixed but it will take a lot of work.