After every Minnesota Vikings game, win or lose, Kevin O’Connell enters the media room holding a piece of paper. It’s a stat sheet. Sometimes, the head coach looks at it and references numbers as part of his postgame summation. Sunday night was another one of those times.
“Yeah, I mean … ” O’Connell began while glancing down at the sheet of paper.
A reporter had just asked him about quarterback Sam Darnold’s performance in the Vikings’ 21-13 victory over the Indianapolis Colts. O’Connell’s review began with the box score.
“He was 28-of-34,” O’Connell said. “Threw a bunch of completions. Was very accurate. Critical pitch-and-catches that were igniting plays for us.”
And yet … the turnovers. Darnold threw two interceptions — one in the red zone on the Vikings’ opening possession, the other after the Minnesota defense secured a takeaway of its own. Each thwarted momentum and made a mostly lopsided “Sunday Night Football” matchup closer than it should have been.
“I’m sure Sam will be hard on himself about those,” O’Connell said.
There is an obvious yin and yang here. In how the performance felt and in the story the statistics tell (he totaled 290 passing yards and three touchdowns). In some of the throws Darnold did make and in the throws he should not have made. He provides hope then despair at a moment’s notice, which is about what you’d expect from a well-traveled quarterback paid $10 million on the free-agent market.
To expect anything different at this point, to think he is all of a sudden going to eliminate that recklessness that has been present at every stop dating back to his college days at USC, would be foolish. And yet to doubt him entirely, to think he cannot overcome said recklessness with his tremendous arm talent, would be similarly silly.
This Vikings team is caught between those highs and lows. And for that reason, the rest of this 2024 season remains a massive mystery box.
“I felt like we played a really clean game as an offense besides my turnovers,” Darnold said.
He was right. Darnold posted his highest completion percentage of the season (82.4 percent), regularly hitting superstar wideout Justin Jefferson (seven receptions for 137 yards) for chunk plays and finding receiver Jordan Addison and tight ends T.J. Hockenson and Josh Oliver for vital first downs.
The Vikings defense also played a key role in the result. Reeling from two matchups with elite offenses (yes, the Matthew Stafford-Puka Nacua-Cooper Kupp-Kyren Williams Los Angeles Rams qualify as such), Brian Flores’ unit feasted against the Colts. The Vikings limited Indianapolis running back Jonathan Taylor to 48 yards on 13 carries. Taylor’s longest run of the night came on the first drive, a 13-yarder over the left side of the line of scrimmage, meaning the Minnesota run defense held him to fewer than 3.0 yards per carry after that.
Unable to move the ball on the ground, the Colts looked to the passing game — namely 39-year-old quarterback Joe Flacco, who was neither processing nor moving quickly. He finished 16-of-27 passing with 176 yards and an interception. The Colts’ lack of rhythm offensively kept the Vikings on the field (Minnesota ran 71 offensive plays compared to Indianapolis’ 49 and dominated the time-of-possession battle), but although each of the Vikings’ first seven drives ended in Colts territory, they only had 14 points to show for it.
One of the reasons for that was the first two misses of rookie kicker Will Reichard’s career. In the second quarter, he pushed a 53-yarder wide right. Later, he doinked a 31-yard attempt off the upright. After the game, Reichard said he’d injured his leg during the week. He’ll undergo further testing Monday. Beyond his misses, the Vikings frequently converted first downs (they had 29 to the Colts’ 13) but failed to produce points.
This brings us back to Darnold, who, in a third-and-3 situation on the Vikings’ opening drive, was flushed out of the pocket. Drifting to his left, Darnold tried to lift a pass over two defenders in the direction of tight end T.J. Hockenson. The throw was easily intercepted, and Darnold ripped the straps off his helmet as he walked off the field.
“I had a throw to T.J. in the back of the end zone,” Darnold said. “Just gotta get it over that (line)backer. Didn’t make a good throw. Just gotta be careful when I’m down there knowing we have points.”
His next turnover came in the second quarter. On first down from Colts territory, the Vikings were setting up a deep play-action pass. Just as Darnold completed his dropback, Colts defensive tackle Grover Stewart — who had bulldozed center Garrett Bradbury — whacked Darnold in the helmet with his hand. He fumbled, and Colts cornerback Kenny Moore II recovered the ball and scooted into the end zone. Initially, referee Shawn Smith threw a flag, but the referees later conferred and picked it up.
Asked about the decision afterward, Smith told a pool reporter, “We determined that the initial force was at the shoulder, and it was incidental contact to the head and neck area.”
Darnold’s third turnover mirrored the first in that it was another questionable decision at an important point in the game. Vikings cornerback Byron Murphy Jr. had just intercepted Flacco, and the Vikings led 14-7 in the fourth quarter with a chance to extinguish any Indianapolis comeback attempt. On the first play of the Vikings’ ensuing drive, Darnold again faked a handoff and dropped back to pass. Rather than hurling a deep ball to a streaking Addison, he threaded a pass toward Jefferson over the middle of the field.
Colts linebacker Zaire Franklin undercut the ball and made the Colts’ second interception.
“As great as he feels ripping those dagger cuts,” O’Connell said of Darnold aiming for Jefferson on that in-breaking route, “sometimes the defense can make you say no, check the ball down and move on.”
It would be one thing if the Vikings could eliminate Darnold’s aggression and carelessness — he often walks that fine line between playmaker and gunslinger — but why would they? They have constructed the NFL’s most explosive passing game with Darnold as a key contributor. Sunday night, he connected with Jefferson on six passes of 20 yards or more, including a high-arcing, 41-yard go-ball resulting in the go-ahead touchdown.
The same goes for Darnold’s athleticism. Take it away, and you don’t benefit from his 11-yard scramble in the third quarter. Or the full-sprinting bootleg touch pass to Addison for a 4-yard touchdown in the third quarter. Or the game-sealing 14-yard touchdown toss to tight end Josh Oliver over two defenders. At the same time, when you let him create, he might spin out of the pocket only to find himself crumbling to the turf for another sack.
O’Connell and the offensive staff have implemented metaphorical bumper rails to keep Darnold away from the catastrophic. That dagger cut O’Connell referenced? The Vikings run those because they know they make Darnold comfortable, an intentional process developed with the idea of confining Darnold to his most consistent self. This past week, Minnesota streamlined its offensive plan to eliminate pre-snap delays. And even after the three turnovers Sunday, O’Connell started with the statistics as a way of showing his confidence in his quarterback.
“My trust in Sam,” O’Connell said Sunday night, “is going to be something that’s a winning edge for our football team.”
The real question is: What are the bounds of that winning edge? How far can a team go with a quarterback capable of such dramatic highs and lows? The answers to those questions will emerge in time. Until then, fans will have to weather both throws that’ll make them fist-pump and decisions that’ll result in surrender cobras. Come to think of it, that feels like a perfect match for what it’s like to be a fan of this team.