Seahawks’ Geno Smith is not surprised. ‘I just didn’t get this good (in) one offseason’

Geno Smith wants to know: Why all the surprise over how he’s playing?

To him, this — leading the NFL in completion percentage, being the NFC offensive player of the month for October, playing the Seahawks into first place with the conference’s highest passer rating — is him.

“Knowing who I am, I am very set in who I am. I know exactly who I am and what I can do,” said the 32-year-old quarterback who has gone from seven years of barely playing as a backup for four teams to one of the NFL’s best this season. “So I never bought into the narrative that was out there.

“I just didn’t get this good over the course of one offseason.”

Smith has believed he’s been this good for all these years. From his second and final one as the starter for the New York Jets through getting a broken jaw from a teammate’s sucker-punch in the locker room to effectively end his Jets time. From backing up for both New York teams plus for the Chargers and Russell Wilson on the Seahawks for three seasons before this one.

For Smith, it wasn’t about his talent. It was about chances.

Asked this week before he leads Seattle (5-3) into Arizona to play the Cardinals (3-5) on Sunday (1:05 p.m., channel 13) what kept him focused from 2015 through ‘21 as a perennial backup quarterback, Smith said: “I mean, being in the NFL. It’s a day-to-day thing. You have to be on, every, single day.

“A lot of people wish they were in this position, and I’m grateful to have worked my way into this position.”

He doesn’t need your appreciation, or that of NFL “experts” who said with him replacing the traded Wilson at quarterback the Seahawks wouldn’t win five games all season.

They’ve won five of their first eight.

Smith’s validation doesn’t come from proving everybody wrong. It comes from proving those who know him best right.

That includes the people from his hometown of Miami. It includes his folks, college leaders and those with the Jets, who drafted him and made him their rookie starter in 2013.

In September, days after he beat Wilson and the Denver Broncos in his first game as Seattle’s full-time starter, Smith was inducted into West Virginia University’s Sports Hall of Fame. He set 33 Mountaineers game, season, class and career records as WVU’s quarterback from 2009-12. He set NCAA season record for the most passes without an interception (272).

“When it comes down to me, people from where I’m from know who I am,” Smith said. “West Virginia, I just got inducted into (its) Hall of Fame, so people in college football know who I am. And the New York Jets, Giants, Chargers, and Seattle. People have continued to let me know to keep working hard and things will happen for me.

“So that’s what I did.”

Seattle’s grand plan

When coach Pete Carroll finally decided in March he could trade Wilson, after general manager John Schneider got a wowing package from Denver of three players and four top picks in the next two drafts, this wasn’t the Smith they expected.

They expected Smith and Drew Lock to compete for Seattle’s job and finish the final years of their contracts in 2022. Lock, 25, is the former Broncos starter Seattle got as part of the Wilson trade.

In late August, when he named Smith the winner over Lock in a competition that really wasn’t much of one this summer, Carroll chose the older veteran because he trusted him more. He trusted Smith wouldn’t turn the ball over.

Carroll was less convinced Lock would be as safe. The league leader in interceptions in 2020 with Denver is, to use Carroll’s word in August, “a gunslinger.” Carroll didn’t want guns slung by his QB this season. He wanted his quarterback to take care of the ball.

The Seahawks’ grand plan in dealing Wilson and avoiding paying him $50 million per season beginning after 2023, when his contract was ending, was to have their quarterback for the near and longer term coming out of the 2023 draft. Next spring’s draft is loaded with what league scouts feel are elite, NFL-ready quarterbacks. Carroll and Schneider intended to use one of their four choices in the first two rounds in 2023 to get their QB.

Smith has changed that plan.

He’s been excellent reading defenses. He’s consistently changed the Seahawks out of bad plays into successful ones against blitzes and other defensive looks.

Prime examples: Rashaad Penny’s two, long touchdowns on third downs that won a shootout in Detroit, both off Smith’s audibles, and the changed play to Tyler Lockett’s double-move route for the go-ahead touchdown in the fourth quarter of Seattle’s win over the previously 6-1 New York Giants last weekend.

Smith has thrown the ball precisely, deep and short. He’s had three interceptions in eight games. He’s made wise, drive-changing decisions to run when receivers have been covered; Smith has averaged almost 9 yards per carry in his last five games, most on scrambles after dropping back to pass.

“Geno’s growth throughout the year, just as it has been throughout the time I have been around him, has been excellent,” said Shane Waldron, the Seahawks’ second-year offensive coordinator and play caller. “He really has a good, full understanding of everything.

“You know, it’s great to see his hard work pay off.”

Geno Smith’s pending payday

Smith is in every sense of the word earning his base salary of $1.26 million, with up to $3 million total from bonuses for this season. He is setting himself up for a multiyear contract worth at least $20 million annually next spring. That would be almost double the $11 million he’s earned in his 10 NFL seasons.

He is in no hurry to consider and sign any Seahawks offer to extend him before then, if the team decides to give him one in the coming months. The longer Smith waits while playing like this, the higher his value after 2022.

He knows that. He’s signed eight contracts in this league. The last seven of those have each been one-year, no-security deals.

These first eight games have changed his life for the future. At this rate, he stands to double his career earnings over 10 seasons in one year. Finally, at age 32 get, he’s set up for his first multiyear contract since his rookie one he signed with the Jets in the spring of 2013.

But he isn’t saying anything about that. Not yet.

“I don’t really live my life like that,” he said Thursday when asked about his contract ending. “I am always focused on what I have to do today and tomorrow.

“Those things will come. Time will tell, time will tell with all of that. But for me, I just have to stay focused on what I am doing in here. That’s working hard, leading this team, and going out there and competing to get wins.”