Sam Darnold is headed to the Super Bowl, but it won’t be with the team that drafted him.
New York Jets social media was set ablaze with reactions to Darnold punching his ticket to the big dance with the Seattle Seahawks.
“If Sam Darnold prevents the Patriots from winning a Super Bowl, I’d argue he was worth the #3 pick in 2018 for the Jets,” Tony Vegas posted.
“We all owe Sam Darnold an apology. It wasn’t him. It was the Jets. I am sorry Sam,” Eric Nathan of Barstool Sports posted.
“The story of Sam Darnold is inspiring: Jets traded him. Panthers let him walk. 49ers had him as a backup. Vikings won 14 games & weren’t sold. Now he’s one win away from being a Super Bowl champion. Sometimes all you need is someone to believe in you. Seahawks did,” Joel Moran wrote.
The Frustrating Failure for the Jets in the Darnold Experiment
Former general manager Joe Douglas promised Darnold’s parents that he would get Sam protection and playmakers with the Jets.
“When I first met Sam’s parents in the first preseason game [last August], I promised them I was going to do everything in my power to take care of Sam with protection and playmakers,” Douglas recalled in April of 2020 via Randy Lange.
He failed to live up to that promise.
A big reason that Darnold failed with the Jets wasn’t because of him, but rather the situation the team put him in.
There wasn’t a good enough infrastructure built around Darnold to judge him properly. Now you see in Seattle how Darnold has flourished with the right people around him.
Ghost of Christmas Past Warns the Jets
The good news is the Jets have fixed a lot of those issues. The only problem is that it came a few years too late.
Gang Green has a young offensive line that has plenty of upside. The passing game is built around one of the best young receivers in football, Garrett Wilson. They have a talented running back in Breece Hall, who is scheduled to be a free agent this offseason.
Who knows what Darnold would have done with this pool of talent, but it’ll forever be a bar question of what if instead of what was.
Rooting Interest Should Be Easy for Jets Fans
Darnold is headed to the Super Bowl for the first time as a starting quarterback. The opponent he will face off against is one he is intimately familiar with in the New England Patriots.
So who do you root for?
Your ex-girlfriend, who was the prince that was promised to win it in a different uniform? Or a bitter rival that is threatening to have a second dynasty with two new heads of the snakes in Mike Vrabel and Drake Maye?
Obviously, it’s Darnold.
While it stinks he isn’t doing it for you, at least he is over in the NFC with a team that has nothing to do with the Jets.
“I’m admitting what I’m about to say is pathetic.. Sam Darnold beating the Patriots in the Super Bowl would be the happiest I’ve been as a Jets fan in 15 years. Go Sam,” a fan said.
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