New York Jets: Sam Darnold after the first quarter of his career

After one quarter of the season, we take a look at the performance of New York Jets rookie quarterback Sam Darnold, by the numbers.

The New York Jets season is one quarter in the books and the record is 1-3. After an impressive win against Detroit they are mired in a three game losing streak.

While the team has been up and down, so has their popular quarterback, Sam Darnold. The third overall pick in the draft has had his brilliant moments and has had moments he would like to have back.

That’s the story with every rookie quarterback, even the great ones. We all know we have to live with it.

With four games in the books, let’s look at how Sam has performed, courtesy of Pro Football Focus (subscription required).

More from Empire Writes Back

Overall you can see a big difference between the first two weeks and the last two.

In weeks one and two, Darnold threw for completion percentages of 76.2% and 61%. Over the last two he posted marks of 48.4% and 50%.

His yards per attempt have gone steadily down each week, from 9.4 to 4.9. That number is a bit misleading as he seemed to take more shots against Jacksonville, per the eye test.

These types of dropoffs are going to happen to a rookie. As the defenses see more and more tape, they are going to take away his strengths.

Darnold has been stricken with five drops that haven’t helped, including some key ones throughout the first four games.

The offensive line has been no help either, as we all have seen. The numbers weren’t necessary to tell us this, but they do anyway.

In four games, Darnold has been under pressure on 53 drop backs. On those 53 drop backs, he has only completed 48.8% of his passes. He has only thrown away six out of 41 attempts so that isn’t a significant factor in the numbers.

Performance when under pressure will come with experience. It means fast decisions, and as good as Darnold is, he isn’t used to making them coming out of college. The pressure is unexpected and it quite literally, puts pressure on the decision-making.

He will get better as he does it. The good sign is that Darnold is nearly completing 60% of his passes when being blitzed. When he knows it’s coming he makes the right play. It’s just when he doesn’t that he runs into trouble.

Darnold is a rookie, we have to ride the wave with him and live through this.

Next. Few positives in Jacksonville loss. dark

His ability to throw the deep ball has not manifested quite yet. So far, on passes of 20 yards or more, Darnold is 3-17. That simply won’t cut it if the Jets have any interest in stretching the defense.

On passes from 10-20 yards, Darnold is 22-35 which is up over 62%. The percentage gets incrementally better from 0-10 yards, 67% (31-46). He has only missed one pass out of 18 on short passes less than zero yards, like screen passes and swing passes.

Much of this will get better with experience. It will also get better when the offensive line improves. It cannot be overstated that Darnold has been pressured on 53 drop backs. That obviously is not conducive to good quarterback play.

Stop the overreactions, like we have talked about. Sam Darnold will be just fine. We just need to allow him to grow.

Home/New York Jets