When it comes to mega extensions for Seahawks stars, the current focus is on Devon Witherspoon. But next year, it will be on Sam Darnold.

Darnold still is not getting respect from some corners of the NFL universe, but others know what he is worth.

Daniel Jeremiah recently told Seattle Sports 710 AM that he thinks Darnold will get around $50 million per year on his next deal.

“(If) he comes out and has a year that approaches what he did last year,” DJ said, “I would say he’s going to land in that ballpark.”

We think he will get around $55 million a year — and that will not be a problem for Seattle.

Darnold is every bit as good as or better than Jordan Love, Trevor Lawrence, Jared Goff and Brock Purdy – all of whom are at $53 million or higher. Love and Lawrence are tied with Joe Burrow and Josh Allen at $55 million. That’s all you need to know to figure out Darnold’s value.

Dak Prescott is an outlier at $60 million a year, a desperate overpay by Jerry Jones in Dallas. But Darnold’s agent surely will point out that Darnold compares favorably to the league’s highest-paid QB.

C.J. Stroud and Bryce Young are up for extensions in 2027 as well; if either is for some reason overpaid as a top-five QB, Darnold’s price will raise commensurately. He is far better than either of them.

For now, we are going with $55 million as the market for Darnold. The Seahawks surely are prepared to pay it.

As DJ pointed out, the salary cap keeps going up and up. It has jumped 40% over the past five years.

“It just feels like every year when you get these quarterback numbers and everybody freaks out, you just have to remind everybody this league is not making any less money,” Jeremiah said. “Like, this cap is going to continue to go up, and these quarterback numbers are going to continue to go up. We’re going to have $100 million quarterback in AAV before it’s all said and done.”

For team affordability, it really comes down to cap percentage.

Prescott is the only QB projected over 20% of his team’s cap in the next three years – 23% in 2027 and 24% in 2028. Burrow is no higher than 16%, Allen no higher than 17%.

Darnold’s cap share is 12.1% this year. Even with a $44.9 million cap hit currently for 2027, he still would be taking up under 14% of the projected $325 million cap. His cap percentages in 2027-29 likely will be less than that on an extension.

So what might Darnold’s total extension look like?

Guaranteed money is always a point of negotiation. The top 10 QBs average $125 million fully guaranteed. The Seahawks tend to win that part of their contracts though, because they do not guarantee past two years.

Jaxon Smith-Njigba has $75 million in bonuses in his new six-year deal — about 38% of the total. If Darnold’s deal, wrapped with 2027, is about $266 million over five years, 38% would be $102 million. So figure the quarterback’s full guarantees fall somewhere between that and the $125 million QB average.

Whatever the final numbers end up being, Darnold figures to get paid as a top-10 quarterback — and he should.