A change could do Sam good

[Sir Purr]

"I think the mentality the city of Charlotte has, the state of North Carolina has, he'll feed off that," said Southern Cal coach Clay Helton, who was coaching at Duke in 1995 when the Panthers were born but Darnold hadn't been. "I think the fan base there will end up loving him, because he's one of them."


Well, maybe not exactly, but the point Helton's trying to make could still hold up.


Darnold grew up in San Clemente, Calif., at home on the warm beaches of Orange County. His dad was a plumber and his mom was a middle school phys ed teacher, which is why Helton refers to Darnold as "the ultimate blue-collar kid." But Darnold's also accustomed to being known. His grandfather Dick Hammer was the cowboy hat-wearing Marlboro Man from the cigarette ads of the 1970s, an Olympic volleyball player and a firefighter and an actor, the kind of larger-than-life character from which the step to star quarterback in Los Angeles and New York is a short one.


Darnold's own relationship with publicity is accepting, if not eager.


Katie Ryan, the assistant sports information director at Southern Cal, acknowledged that Darnold does media out of obligation rather than preference. But she can't say enough good things about the quarterback she met his first day on campus.


"You're going to looooove his family," she said to begin, stretching it out for emphasis.


"He's just super-normal," Ryan said. "There are a lot of guys like Sam who are, 'I'm an NFL player, look at me,' but he's not the kind of guy who views himself as any kind of celebrity. There are people who want to be Instagram-famous, but that's not him."


Beyond working as a conduit between the football team and the press, Ryan also helped Darnold step to the other side of the microphone. In 2017, as part of a Heisman campaign the school planned, she helped facilitate the "Season of Sam" podcast.