Did Geno Smith sell his soul to the devil? Smith is 32 years old and by far is having the best year of his nine-season career this season. You probably have to go back to Smith’s rookie year where his career started as a New York Jet, where he played meaningful games as a starter. After Smith’s rookie year, the wheels quickly fell off the bus in year two. Some quarterbacks would have walked away from the game. His starting job in the NFL was over as he was relegated to being a backup quarterback the rest of the way. Smith would bounce around after the leaving the Jets after 4 seasons. Smith would stay in New York and help the other team in the Big Apple, the Giants. After 5 seasons in New York, Smith went West and played a season with the Chargers. In 2020, Smith would then sign with the Seahawks and has been Russell Wilson’s back up until they traded him in the off-season. The starting job was supposed to go to Drew Lock. Lock was one of the pieces in the trade they got back for Wilson with the Broncos. Many thought Seahawks would land Baker Mayfield in a trade with Cleveland. Experts thought the team was going to draft a quarterback before all this speculation about Mayfield coming to Seattle even began. Then Satan himself, Pete Carol, gave the starting job to Smith and Seahawks are off to a 6-3 start when they were picked to be last in the NFC West. Suddenly after 9 seasons, Smith flipped the switch and is one of the best quarterbacks in the entire league after 9 games. Kind of the same path as when Rich Gannon became the starting quarterback for the Raiders late in his career.

Rich Gannon arrived in the NFL in 1987 with the Minnesota Vikings. It was not until Gannon’s 4th season in Minnesota that he made his first career start. Gannon made 12 starts in 1990 for the Vikings completing 52% of his passes & throwing 16 touchdown passes with the same number of picks. Gannon was 5-7 as a starter in his first season. In 1991 and 1992, Gannon started to improve as he had winning records as a starter in both seasons with a 14-9 record as a starter. Gannon in those two seasons threw 24 touchdowns but still got picked off 19 more times. In 1993, Gannon was in Washington as he went 1-3 as a starter in a Redskins uniform before ending the season with an injury that cost him the 1994 season as well. In 1995, Gannon now was with another team as he would resurface in Kansas City. In 1995, Gannon did not get any starts behind center & appeared in two games in the general mop-up role. In 4 seasons in Kansas City, Gannon made 19 starts & went 11-8 behind center for the Chiefs throwing 23 touchdowns as the picks were getting lower with only 11. It took Oakland for Gannon to finally put everything together. In 1999, Gannon was no longer a backup quarterback in the NFL. Gannon started all 16 games for the Raiders as he went 8-8 in his first season wearing silver and black. Gannon was completing 59% of his passes as he threw 24 touchdown passes with 14 interceptions. The next three seasons, Gannon was completing passes over 60%. In 2000, Gannon tossed 28 touchdown passes, in 2001: 27, & in 2002: 26 while setting his all-time high in passing yards with 4,689. Gannon helped the Raiders make multiple trips to the post-season and eventually leading them to the Superbowl where they lost to their former coach Jon Gruden and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Gannon in 74 starts in Oakland had a QB Record of 45-29 completing 62 % of his passes with 114 touchdown strikes compared to 50 interceptions. Gannon most of his career before Oakland, was not the guy and became the Man as a Raider.

Geno Smith went 8-8 as the starting Quarterback in his first season in a Jets uniform. Smith threw 12 touchdown passes and was picked off 21 times. Smith finished 12-18 as a starter for the Jets throwing 28 touchdown passes while being picked off 36 times. The Big Apple was rotten to Smith when as a Giant he started one game had one touchdown pass and lost that start while wearing the blue and white for the G-Men. Smith would only throw 4 passes in the lone year in a charger uniform. In Seattle Smith was 1-2 behind center before getting the starting nod this season. This year Smith is 6-3 as the starter with 15 touchdown passes to only 4 interceptions and he is completing 73% of his passes which is of the charts. That is tops in the NFL. Smith is ranked 4th in TD passes thrown. Smith perhaps soaked in all the knowledge backing up Russell Wilson while watching him in practice and in games. Smith may be a one-year wonder after this season. The front office in Seattle has to be careful on any extension for Smith. Smith career-wise has played in 52 games and still has a losing record of 19-24. Take this season out of Smith record he came in with a 13-21 record as a starter. Seattle has a great running attack with rookie back Kenneth Walker III lighting the league on fire carrying the rock. Smith has great receivers in D.K. Metcalf and Tyler Lockett which any quarterback would want both these guys on their team. Everything is working in Seattle this season, and even the defense has played better. Sometimes it takes guys longer time to figure it out. Sometimes it comes down to what system a guy is in. Is the offense tailored to the quarterback’s strengths? The coach could be the big difference. I know I don’t like giving Pete Carol a bigger ego than he already has. It would be interesting if Smith could lead Seattle to the playoffs. I would want to see what he could do in post-season with this team. Smith is leading one of the scariest offenses in the entire league as Seattle has been putting up a ton of points in the last few weeks as they average 29 points per game. Smith… for years I figured he should be playing in the USFL or XFL if he wanted to get playing time as a quarterback. I thought of Smith as back up, and that if he came in season over. Sometimes waiting patiently, you will get another chance to perform in any sport if you just hang around and improve your game while practicing. Eventually that switch will pop on. Smith has tossed that switch to overdrive.