Jets CEO Christopher Johnson has high praise for Sam Darnold

NFL: New York Jets-Rookie Minicamp

The Jets may finally have found their franchise quarterback, which would make trading up to acquire Sam Darnold worth it.

CEO Christopher Johnson sure seems to be sold on Darnold, given what he recently had to say about the USC product. Johnson spoke to ESPN’s Rich Cimini at a charity event, and admitted the team was “pretty lucky” to have been able to draft Darnold.

“I think people are going to look back — I honestly think they’re going to look back 20 years from now and say this is the moment the Jets shifted into a new year, that they became a great team,” Johnson said.

He continued:

“I absolutely think he can be our quarterback of the future,” Johnson said. “I’m not the GM, I’m not the head coach, but I can recognize a great football player and he’s so good at playing football when everything goes wrong, when the pocket collapses.

“When it all goes to hell, he can throw across his body. He can throw when his feet are in the wrong place. He can do a lot of things that are hard to teach.”

The Jets history drafting USC products as signal-callers has not been pretty. Mark Sanchez, who the team took with the fifth overall pick in the 2009 draft, is currently a free agent. But Darnold could prove to be a different story, and it’s all about how the team develops him.

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