Sam Darnold’s Status With Vikings: Kelvin O’Connell’s Offers Full…

It’s not going to be popular with the entire Minnesota Vikings fanbase, but Sam Darnold is the starting quarterback.

After a performance against the Jacksonville Jaguars where he threw three interceptions and nearly had two others, there were some fans who wanted the Vikings to go with Nick Mullens and some analysts opined about that idea as well. We have seen Mullens start three games where he threw for over 1,300 yards and seven touchdowns, but eight interceptions.

Kevin O’Connell gives Sam Darnold a vote of confidence

With the game in the rear view mirror, the topic of Darnold still being the starting quarterback, specifically head coach Kevin O’Connell making a major point of it in the locker room about how much faith they have in him.

“Sam (Darnold), everyone in this locker room knows you are the guy that’s gonna take us there.”

He was asked about that moment on Monday and gave some really good perspective on it.

“In those moments, I don’t think about those things ahead of time and I certainly wouldn’t have thought about that ahead of time of not scoring a touchdown yesterday. So, it’s one of those things. We’re just in the moment, speaking from the heart and what I really think and believe, both the good things that allowed us to win the football game and the foundation of our belief in one another. It would not be as authentic if an opportunity like that made us change the way we think about everything. But at the same time, I think it’s important we look at it with a really close eye together and make sure that anything that can be coached is coached and we hold that standard. And at the same time, areas where I can help Sam [Darnold], because there’s plenty of those too. So, I think it’s just a matter of making sure full transparency to our team, even though it ends up being much more transparent to just the folks in that room every a week, but it is important for everybody in that room to hear me say that, not for any other reason than it’s the truth.”

The real answer here is that Darnold would likely be benched at this point for rookie quarterback J.J. McCarthy. Up until Sunday afternoon, there didn’t seem to be a point where the Vikings would make the switch to McCarthy. With Darnold’s performance, it made sense to make the switch at halftime, especially since everything else was working offensively.

With McCarthy unable to return with his meniscus injury, this is Darnold’s team and for better or worse, they will live or die by his performance.