But Goff did more than just put on a brave face, says Dan Skipper, Decker’s offensive linemate. He jumped headfirst into his new world. “When he walked in here, he embraced it,” Skipper says. “And said, ‘Hey, we’re in this together.’ I think that tells you a lot about a person real quick.”
Skipper popped in at guard in a game against Las Vegas last season. He’s a backup. It’s in his job description to pop in, but Goff knows what it can do to a person to be told you’re not good enough, you’re not up for this, you aren’t trustworthy. He also knows what it can do for a person to be told you are. He looked at Skipper in the huddle and told him: “No one else I’d rather have here right now than you.”
Really good article on Goff, the Lions, and some mix of the life of Lions fans.
Nice read. Super Bowl win forth comming.
My oldest brother was losing his battle with cancer last season. I asked him if he was going to stick around to see the Lions win the Super Bowl. He got a big grin and emphatically said,“Yes!”. He didn’t see them fall short of the Bowl by half a game.
The city, state, and fans need this win. The great thing is, our players know it, and they want for us as bad as they want it for themselves. That’s the team we’ve got. Vegas knows it. The world is going to know it soon enough.
Wow, one of the best Goff articles I’ve read. So many tidbits in there, i’m still reading it but this portion, below, makes me believe that Tanner Engstrund will be the next OC. Due to the process that Ben and Jared have in place and that Tanner is part of and the success from it.
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Before all these good feelings, though, the aforementioned dreadful early days were dire enough to compel Campbell to make some changes, even if quarterback was not among them. Midway through the 2021 season and with the Lions in free fall, Campbell took over playcalling duties and promoted his tight ends coach, Ben Johnson, to passing game coordinator – and by that offseason, offensive coordinator. Which is how Goff found his game in his second perfect marriage in Detroit.
Dedeaux’s theory is that since this was Johnson’s first foray as coordinator, he didn’t come armed with the ego and rigidity of experience. He did prosaic things like ask Goff what kind of plays he felt most comfortable running. He made shocking decisions like including Goff as a collaborator in the offense they installed.
“Sounds simple, doesn’t it?” Dedeaux says. “I truly believe that in Detroit this is the Ben Johnson-Jared Goff offense. I just think Jared has absolute ownership over it. And I think that exists in maybe one or two other places.”
Johnson says the collaboration is practically science now. They make time early each week to watch practice together, to watch cutups together, to spitball together. “The things that he’s most comfortable with usually work on game days,” Johnson says. “So we want to give him a lot of liberty early in the week.”
The net result of this partnership is that when Goff is asked to do uncomfortable things like move the chains on fourth down more than just about any player in the league, he’s pretty comfortable with that responsibility because it is shared.
So the quarterback who was deemed a failure a few short years ago now feels free to play unafraid to fail.
There is a level of authenticity to this team that naturally starts at the top but it is so very cool to hear a dude from Marin County embrace Detroit the way he has. Don’t know how many of you have ever been to marin county. It’s right outside San Francisco. For those of you who are dirty harry fan’s the factory at the end of the first movie is near the city of marin…lived in marin till I was a mid teen, dad moved us to Detroit where he is from. There are 2 different worlds. When he first came to detroit I didn’t think it was possible he would embrace Detroit. I was wrong.
This season he has: the sixth-best QBR in the league (68.5); six games with an 80% completion rate, the most in NFL history; an NFL-best 18 touchdown passes on third and fourth downs, with no interceptions on such downs.
