The Seahawks have turned the ball over 12 times in their last four games, and while they won three of them, last week's close loss the Rams, which featured four Sam Darnold interceptions, showed how costly turnovers can be against top opponents.
Darnold knows that, everyone on the team does, and now they know they need to go about cutting back on those turnovers this week in Tennessee and for the rest of the season.
"It's unacceptable," Darnold said Thursday. "We understand as an offense, we have to be better. I have to be better at protecting the football and we're doing everything that we can in practice for when the game comes to try to take care of the football a little bit better."
Darnold has been one of the NFL's best quarterbacks this season, and one rough outing doesn't change that, but he also knows he needs to clean up the issues that led to his four interceptions against the Rams.
"For me, I've got to go through my progressions, listen to my feet, and be able to not necessarily get stuck on one or two guys and be able to move on in the progression," he said when asked about those turnovers. "Especially with the guys that they have on defense, they did a really good job disguising and it's just about keeping my eyes down the middle of the field and just moving from there. Keeping my eyes down the middle of the field, seeing the shell a little bit better and just getting to the
right spots with the ball."
While Darnold is understandably going to be hard on himself, his teammates had his back after Sunday's game, with several players strongly showing their support, most notably linebacker Ernest Jones IV, who said, "Man, Sam's been balling. If we want to try to define Sam by this game—man, Sam's had us in every (expletive) game. So for him to sit there and say, 'Oh, that's my fault,' no it's not. There were plays that defensively we could have made, there were opportunities where we could have got better stops. It's football, man. He's our quarterback, we've got his back, and if you've got anything to say, quite frankly, (expletive) you."