On his very first pass of the afternoon, Seattle Seahawks quarterback Sam Darnold stepped to his right to avoid the oncoming rusher, scrambled to his left and hit an open Jaxon Smith-Njigba for a 29-yard gain.

The completion set the tone for the rest of the New Orleans Saints’ ugly 44-19 loss: Darnold had no problem reading the black and gold’s defense.

And that’s been an early theme to start the season.

After Darnold completed 77.8% of his passes Sunday and posted a 154.2 passer rating, opposing quarterbacks have now posted a 70.8% completion percentage to go with a 118.9 passer rating against the Saints. That’s good for the sixth-worst and third-worst rates across the league.

At their best, the Saints want to be a zone-heavy defense that disguises well, takes away the big shot an

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