Seahawks can keep winning with Drew Lock, but history offers one big warning

Sam Darnold was five snaps into the 2026 NFL season — and the Seahawks were five snaps into their Super Bowl title defense — before everything took an unexpected turn. A sack ended Seattle's opening possession. Darnold walked gingerly to the sidelines before later limping to the locker room with a hip injury, and suddenly Drew Lock found himself as QB1.

Seattle won anyway (with some help); Lock finished 16 of 22 for 187 yards and a touchdown, the defense picked off Drake Maye three times in the fourth quarter and the defending champs rallied from a 10-point deficit. The early news on Darnold has been encouraging – tests ruled out a fracture and the injury is believed to be muscular — but he is expected to miss at least the Week 2 matchup against Arizona.

Which brings us to a question that comes up almost every NFL season: What actually happens when a championship-caliber team loses its starting quarterback?

The easy answer: The team gets worse. The more interesting question is whether the rest of the roster can absorb that drop-off without letting one injury change the entire season. History says good teams can survive losing QB1 — especially…

Original source: https://www.cbssports.com/