Through the Quarterback's Eyes: Sam Darnold

What Darnold could have done differently on his last-minute interception vs. the Buccaneers

Normally when I do these “Through the Eyes” breakdowns, I dissect a play that’s positive for the player or coach describing it. This one will be a bit different.

I’ll walk you through Sam Darnold’s critical interception at the end of the Seahawks’ loss to the Buccaneers. But it’s just as informative (if not more) because Darnold describes both what he did wrong as well as what he could have done differently.

With the score tied at 35 and less than a minute remaining, the Seahawks were attempting to drive for the game-winning field goal. They faced a 2nd-and-1 at their own 32-yard line.

First, notice Seattle’s formation. They came out in a 2x2 with the running back offset to the left:

Look how the Buccaneers matched up. There were 8 defenders near the line of scrimmage and any combination of them could be rushing the quarterback:

I can’t get inside Darnold’s head, but I have to assume that the decision on how to protect against a potential blitz here was a simple numbers game.

Outside of the 4 down linemen, there were 3 potential coverage defenders over the 3 eligible receivers to his left, and 3 defenders over the 2 eligibles to his right. It’s possible that Darnold saw that and viewed the right side as the more dangerous threat for a blitz because of the extra defender:

Or perhaps there was some other tendency that helped Darnold make up his mind. Either way, he slid the protection to the right from the center over:

The left guard and left tackle would account for the two down linemen over them:

Unfortunately for Seattle, the Buccaneers brought a blitz that Todd Bowles said they hadn’t pulled out to that point in the game but were waiting for the right time:

“We were saving that blitz for a rainy day and we brought it out. We’ve been running it a lot. We didn’t run it the entire game. And everybody was waiting on it and it finally came.”

Here was the pressure design. Only 1 of the 4 potential pass rushers from the right would end up blitzing: