Sam Darnold
Samuel Richard Darnold (born June 5, 1997)[1] is an American football quarterback for the Carolina Panthers of the National Football League (NFL). He played college football at USC and was selected third overall by the New York Jets in the 2018 NFL Draft.
Darnold was a two-sport athlete at San Clemente High School, playing football and basketball. Considered a four-star recruit by Rivals.com, he was recruited to USC and joined the football team.
After redshirting his freshman year in 2015, he served as the second-string quarterback in 2016 before being named the starter after three games. As a redshirt freshman starter, he set multiple USC freshman records and led the Trojans to nine consecutive wins that culminated with a victory at the 2017 Rose Bowl.
Upon being drafted by the Jets, he became the NFL’s youngest opening-day starter since the AFL–NFL merger in 1970. He was traded to the Panthers in 2021.
Darnold was born in Dana Point, California on June 5, 1997. He started playing basketball when he was five years old.
Darnold attended San Clemente High School in San Clemente, California. After playing baseball in his freshman year, he played football and basketball. During his high school basketball career, Darnold excelled, and was named South Coast League Most Valuable Player[3] twice, along with being named to the all-CIF team. Basketball coach Marc Popovich stated Darnold’s basketball skills helped translate into football, being the “only guy [I’ve] ever had who could get a defensive rebound and launch a 70-foot pass on target, pretty much in the same motion, to a guy breaking out in the fastbreak. It was almost Wes Unseld-like.” Popovich added that Darnold could have played college basketball in the Pac-12 Conference or the Mountain West Conference “at worst.”
On the football team, Darnold played wide receiver and linebacker, though he played quarterback as a sophomore after the starting quarterback was injured in a game against Tesoro High School. He threw a touchdown pass and scored the game-winning two-point conversion, but returned to playing receiver and linebacker a week later. When he legitimately became the school’s quarterback, Darnold broke the school record for the most touchdown passes in a game when he threw five on two occasions. He missed much of his junior year with a foot injury. In his senior year, San Clemente reached the CIF-Southern Section Southwest Division championship game, where they lost 37–44 to Trabuco Hills High School in a comeback upset after Sam was knocked out of the game with a concussion.[6] He ended his senior season with 3,000 passing yards and 39 touchdowns, along with 800 rushing yards and 13 rushing touchdowns.
Darnold was rated by Rivals.com as a four-star recruit and was ranked as the eighth best dual-threat quarterback in his class and 179th best player overall. However, he did not have much footage of him performing at recruiting camps, preferring to show his play in games. As a result, San Clemente head football coach Jaime Ortiz elected to provide video of his basketball career to football coaches.[3] He received scholarship offers to play college football from schools like Oregon, Utah, Northwestern and Duke. During a football camp, USC coaches Clay Helton and Steve Sarkisian were impressed by Darnold’s performance,[8] and extended to him a scholarship to play for the Trojans.
