If you traveled back in time to 2020 and told Jets fans that Sam Darnold would eventually find himself mentioned in the same breath as Tom Brady and Peyton Manning, they would have laughed you out of the stadium. They probably would have asked if you were seeing ghosts, too.
But here we are in 2025, and the script has flipped so hard it gave us whiplash. On Sunday, amidst the roar of the crowd in Charlotte, Darnold didn’t just beat the Panthers. He cemented his place in NFL history. By leading the Seattle Seahawks to a grit-and-grind 27-10 victory, Darnold notched his 13th win of the season.
That number is significant. It makes him the first quarterback in league history to post back-to-back 13-win seasons with two different teams.
A VIP Room For Quarterbacks
Let’s really look at the company Darnold is keeping right now. Before Sunday, only four quarterbacks had ever won 13 games in consecutive seasons. You might have heard of them:
- Tom Brady
- Peyton Manning
- Aaron Rodgers
- Brett Favre
That’s it. That’s the list. And now, Darnold has pulled up a chair at that table. It wasn’t a masterpiece in Seattle on Sunday. Darnold went 18-of-27 for 147 yards, tossing a touchdown and an interception. It was messy, it was scrappy, and honestly? It didn’t matter. Great teams find ways to win ugly, and Darnold has evolved into the kind of game manager who knows exactly when to step on the gas and when to let his defense do the heavy lifting.
The Minnesota Mistake
You have to appreciate the irony of how we got here. Last year, Darnold led the Minnesota Vikings to a sparkling 14-3 record. He played the best football of his life. And how did Minnesota reward him? They showed him the door, convinced that J.J. McCarthy was the future.
Fast forward to today: The Vikings are sitting at .500, McCarthy has struggled to stay healthy, and Darnold is preparing for a playoff run in the Pacific Northwest. It is the kind of poetic justice that sports writers dream about.
Winner Takes All in the NFC West
Darnold isn’t popping champagne yet, and he shouldn’t be. The job isn’t finished. “It was a slow start but a good win—a good team win,” Darnold told reporters after the game. He knows the stakes are about to skyrocket.
Next week, the Seahawks face the San Francisco 49ers in a primetime showdown that feels like a movie script. It’s a winner-take-all brawl for the NFC West title and the coveted No. 1 overall seed in the NFC. For Darnold, it’s also a game against another one of his former teams.
The redemption tour has one more regular-season stop. If he can topple the Niners, he won’t just be a historical footnote alongside Brady and Manning; he’ll be the favorite to lead Seattle to the Super Bowl. Not bad for a guy who was supposed to be finished three years ago.
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