Is Jared Goff Holding the Lions Back? | November 30th, 2023 Mailbox

The first day of viewer questions is here! Thanks to Threads and our little community we are building on Threads, it allows us to truly connect with our audience, especially considering YouTube putting some sort of shadow ban on our account for posting a video that we took from YouTube in a meme and putting a community guidelines violation on our account for "bullying". FUCK YOUTUBE. Anyways, here we go!

From @3thehardwaysports

"Is (Jared) Goff holding Detroit back or lifting them up?"

The narrative surrounding Jared Goff has seemed to constantly move, when the Lions are great, Jared Goff is the media darling, but when he's bad, his head has some sort of target on it. When he's good, the media talk about how the Goff for Stafford trade is actually better for Detroit even if the trade was straight up. First, I am going to set that straight, no matter if Goff is playing well or not, if Jared Goff retired tonight and never played another down for the Lions, the Lions would still have won the trade.

We forget that Goff's career was on it's last legs when the Rams traded Goff, every Lions fan saw him as the bridge to their possible franchise quarterback, especially after their abysmal but somewhat fun first season with Dan Campbell and Goff, the Lions were 2-6-1 in games decided by one possession that season, really giving Lions fans something to be positive about going into the next season. Suddenly Goff wasn't as big of a problem as they thought. After starting 1-6, everything turned again, Goff and the defense were the problem, especially after that shutout against the Patriots. Since their 6th loss of 2022, the Lions are 16-5 and most of the sports world has turned back to the Goff train, although some remain against him because of his lack of flash.

Stats wise, Goff sits in the top 10 in yards, pass touchdowns, completion percentage, yards per completion and rating. A stat we don't really see too much of is the success percentage of a pass which by definition is a completed pass that gains 40% of yards on 1st down, 60% on 2nd down and 100% on 3rd down, a number that is crucial in measuring a QB's efficiency in the offense, there are 2 QB's in the NFL that are ahead of Goff right now, Tua Tagovailoa and Brock Purdy, 2 QB's who sit at 5th and 6th in the current NFL MVP odds. Stats are important but what about importance to the team? From the outside looking in, Goff seems almost inseparable from the team, Dan Campbell was the first player to embrace Goff in their walk off win in 2021 to break their massive losing streak, the team seems to love Goff as a leader, in the 3 int win over Chicago, even as Goff seemed to struggle, he put the team on his back and still found a way to win, something we don't see from many QB's who aren't a centerpiece in their team's locker room.

Good QB's can sling it, they can throw the ball everywhere, but great ones find ways to be as efficient as possible, especially for teams like the Lions, who seemingly find ways to ruin almost every good thing they have

So, 3 The Hard Way Sports, although I do believe a QB like Jalen Hurts or Patrick Mahomes would drastically improve the Lions past what they are today, if you put an average QB in the Lions system, like a Derek Carr, the Lions would be worse than what they are right now with Jared Goff.

Alex Boyajian is the CEO of Chaotically Intolerant Multi Media Productions, Host of the Chaotically Intolerant Podcast, Commissioner of Chaotically Intolerant Table Tennis and the biggest Colts fan at Chaotically Intolerant