The NFL’s leader in efficient, deep passing most of this season also leads the league in turnovers. And Seattle must fix slow starts to win West.
Sam Darnold walked out to a crowd of questioners looking sheepish. And like he’d forgotten something.
“How’s my hair?” the wavy-coifed southern Californian quarterback said off to the side. Then he walked in front of television cameras and reporters to begin his weekly press conference at Seahawks headquarters.
“Didn’t bring my hat.”
Told of his hair “it’s working,” Darnold responded playfully: “I know.”
“It’s very authentic,” someone else told him of his flowing, reddish-brown mane wandering off in multiple directions.
“Thanks,” the quarterback deadpanned.
Yes, Darnold was noticeably loose and joking more than he usually does with reporters following practice New Year’s Day, two days before his biggest game yet for Seattle.
The Pro Bowl QB and his Seahawks (13-3), recently dormant on offense in the first half of games, play the recent juggernaut San Francisco 49ers (12-4) Saturday night in Santa Clara, California (5 p.m., ABC and ESPN, KOMO channel 4 locally).
He’s gotten the same word as The News Tribune has: Members of his San Clemente High School football program south of Los Angeles for which he starred are flying up to the Bay Area to attend Darnold’s game Saturday night. It’s for the NFC West championship and top seed with a first-round by and home field throughout the conference’s playoffs
“Need to text my coach (from San Clemente High)!” Darnold told the TNT, cheerily.
Flights are booked and Triton Nation is heading to Levi Stadium this weekend! @Seahawks@12s@gbellseattle@BradyHendersonpic.twitter.com/aHSdYrtp4Q
— Triton Football (@Tritonfootball) December 29, 2025
Will the Tritons from SoCal see a Darnold different than he was in a game for a division title and NFC’s top seed this time last year, for Minnesota? Darnold’s 2024 Vikings were 14-2 going into Detroit for a week 18 game against the Lions for the NFC North title. Detroit destroyed Darnold and the Vikings 31-9. Darnold, with 4,300 yards passing with 35 touchdowns coming in to that game, was 18 for 41 passing for just 166 yards with two sacks and no touchdowns that night in Detroit. The Lions’ pass rush roared all over him.
The next week, the Rams similarly dismantled Darnold and Minnesota to end the Vikings’ season in the first round of the last postseason. Two months later, the Seahawks traded Geno Smith and signed Darnold in free agency for $100.5 million over three years this spring to replace him.
What did he learn from that week-18 game for the Vikings with the same stakes as this one for the Seahawks?
“I would say the biggest thing is just mentally, just understanding the gravity of the game and all that stuff,” Darnold said Thursday. “But at the end of the day, it’s just football. I think that’s the best part about it is people want to make it a little bit bigger than it is...
“We’re playing against the Niners, a really good football team, a team that we’re going to be prepared for. It’s going to be great, though, the fans are going to be into it. It’s going to be a great atmosphere.
“Great point about going through it last year for myself. Just having that experience of going through a game like that, but I think the biggest thing is just treating it like another game.”
Darnold, Seahawks’ slow starts
More to the crux of this game Saturday for the Seahawks: Will this be a different than he and Seattle’s offense have been for the last month?
Darnold spent the first three months of the season at the top of the NFL in passing efficiency, deep pass completions and completion percentage. He’s led Seattle to only its third 13-3 record in the 50-year history of the franchise. His 27 wins the last two seasons are the most in league history over consecutive years with two different teams. If he wins Saturday at San Francisco, Darnold will tie Tom Brady for the most wins in consecutive seasons by a QB (28).
But Darnold and the Seahawks and Seattle have scored exactly one touchdown, total, in their last four games. The fifth game ago, Nov. 30 against Minnesota, the Seahawks were scoreless past halfway through the second quarter.
The current number-one seed in the NFC has been 3-3 with Carolina into the third quarter last weekend, down 13-7 to the Rams in the second period, down 13-3 to the Colts into the final seconds before halftime, 0-0 with Minnesota into the second quarter.
“We can come out faster,” Darnold said. “At the end of the day, we have a plan of how we want to come out and attack a team and attack the game. And I think we’ve just got to do a better job of executing, and that’s really it.”
His play caller wants Darnold and the offense to get in and out of the huddle more quickly against a 49ers defense that is without injured All-Pros Fred Warner and Nick Bosa. The NFC North-champion Chicago Bears ripped San Francisco for 440 yards in a 42-38 loss on the Niners’ home field last weekend.
AN INCREDIBLE ENDING TO A INCREDIBLE NIGHT!
— Sunday Night Football on NBC (@SNFonNBC) December 29, 2025
NFL
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“In Carolina I didn’t like how we came out of the gate,” Kubiak said. “We were not crisp enough, slow out of the huddle.
“Got to make improvements there going into this game.”
Sam Darnold’s turnovers
Kubiak, coach Mike Macdonald and all the Pacific Northwest don’t like that Darnold leads the NFL in turnovers. He has committed 20 in 17 games. That’s been 14 interceptions and six lost fumbles.
He had one of each last weekend, including again losing the ball as a defender hit him as he was trying to throw, before he had a strong second half to pull his team away from Carolina. Seattle has committed the second-most turnovers as a team in the league, 28.
The question of this week around the Seahawks has been: Can they keep winning with Darnold and the offense turning the ball over this much?
Kubiak has an answer for that: No.
“It’s not a number that we’re proud of, at all,” the play caller and OC said. “(It’s) something that we’re always preaching, things that we’ve got to improve on. Obviously, we want to maximize our possessions, and we’re giving away points when we give the ball away.”
Macdonald this week says the offense has to be better early in plays to keep Darnold from having “the ball in jeopardy.”
Kubiak better defines what that needs to happen, beginning against the 49ers and however long the Seahawks go in the upcoming playoffs.
“Whether it’s decision-making, throwing the ball, holding onto it, then protecting our quarterback so that we’re not getting sack fumbles, there’s a lot of things that go on there,” Kubiak said.
“But something’s got to get better if we want to be a championship team.”
The subject of his turnovers turned Darnold off his jovial mood New Year’s Day.
“I would love on offense to play a really clean game, all four quarters,” Darnold said, “and we’re working towards that.
“I think turnovers, they’re unacceptable — no matter how they come. Obviously tipped balls, some things like that, you would like to say, ‘Oh man, that’s out of my control.’ But did I need to be in that position for that guy to tip that ball?
“So, I think that all turnovers are all plays where we can look at ourselves and be like, ‘Oh, man, I could have done better on that play.’ Which is almost every play if you think about it, you can always be a little bit better every single play.
“This team can continue to get better. And I look at that as me, personally.”
Category: General Sports
