Really good read on Stafford and Goff - claims the Rams are a SB favorite

This article has some really good breakdowns on Goffs issues along with some solid analysis on both Stafford and Goff.

Take a moment to read it and let us know your thoughts.

Couple quotes from the article.

Goff has struggled to consistently execute when conditions around him aren’t ideal, like when the protection isn’t great or free rushers are bearing down on him off of blitzes.

Coverage recognition and the willingness to sit in the pocket to get the ball downfield are two areas where the Rams should see significant improvement at the quarterback position in 2021.

Make no mistake about it, the Rams are trading in a good quarterback in Goff for a great quarterback in Stafford

I can understand that the Rams must be more optimistic that Stafford may bring more of a willingness… and more ability to push the ball down the field that Goff did over past 2 years.

However… Stafford has had CJ, MJ, and KG his entire career.
Who are the Rams going to be using on deep routes in 2021?

Robert Woods and Cooper Kupp are not deep ball guys.
They both have averaged ~12 ypc in their careers.
Both of them average 14 ypc in 2018, then 12 ypc in 2019, and 10 ypc in 2020.

Woods is 6’0" tall and Kupp is 6’2" tall… and neither is a guy that routinely jumps over DBs to make contested catches.

I realize that Stafford can fit balls into tighter windows than Goff may be able to do… but the Rams do not have WRs that are superior to what Stafford had in Detroit when it comes to throwing downfield.

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Thanks for that. Yes, the Rams are one of the SB favorites. They’ll need to thread a lot of needles to get there. Will the O line protect Stafford? Free agency/cap squeeze? Massive coaching and scouting exodus? Defense return to earth?

It’s gonna be interesting.

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No offense but as of right now I’d say the Rams are the 3rd or 4th best team in the NFC. Stafford makes them better but that roster still isn’t good enough to make them a SB favorite to me. I’m not even sure the Rams are the best team in their division.

Truth!!

What most fans and even oddsmakers overlook is the overall picture of a teams talent, the continuity of their coaching and scheme, and their trajectory.

Let’s take a look a the Bears over the past 3 years. They drafted Trubisky high (clearly a mistake) and then in the following year got him a very solid WR1 in Allen Robinson, a 2nd WR pass catcher incAnthony Miller, and a 2nd round center. The team also went all in on trading for game wrecker K Mack, drafted field general Roquan Smith, had stud safety Eddie Jackson entering year 2, and monster A Hicks entering year 3 with the Bears…

The bears were the 31st ranked defense in 2014. Enter Vic Fangio as DC… take a look at the 2015 Bears (similar to 2021 Lions) roster and defensive depth chart. It was bad, and the only viable player that lasted for more than 2-3 years was rookie CB Kyle Fuller…in Vics first year they jumped to #20 from 31! Then came the additions of A Hicks and Eddie Jackson, and ultimately Roquan and the big trade for Mack which helped vault them to the #1 D in 2018…

The in 2019 Fangio left for a HC gig, and the D slipped to 4th and forced 19 less turnovers. Then slipped again to 14th in 2020!

The Rams made a similar all in trade for Ramsey and had the top ranked D (though not quite on the level of the 2018 Bears) in 2020 with a D built around Donald, Ramsey, Floyd and a decent pair of safeties…

Enter 2021- salary cap hell, no first round draft picks the next 3 years, and Aaron Donald is now 30! Their pro bowl LT is 40! Their top two wrs have battled injuries, and regressed effectiveness. Goff can be blamed for that if people want, but look at yards after catch, separation yards, missed tackles, etc. They have both become less explosive, less open, and that likely had a huge impact on Goff.

Their stud DC is gone, and it will be hard to resign L Floyd who was great last year, replace OL holes, and fill in roster with such few resources.

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I like this article a lot Air.

What frustrates me about looking at the differences between Goff and Stafford is accounting for experience. 2019 and 2020 Goff gets compared to 2019 and 2020 Stafford a whole lot. And it isn’t wrong as factually they were each starting QBs in the NFL during that period. But the context is all wrong.

2013 Stafford was broken before Caldwell got here. Matt’s talent level and ability to do the job was worthy to question as he was horrific down the stretch that season. Reggie Bush has a GREAT season that year, the defense wasn’t hot garbage and in many ways Matt DID let us down in 2013. The Lions were 13th in scoring and 15th in defensive points allowed. 2013 gave us a window into what 2014 would become on defense. We had Burleson for 8 games that season: weeks 1-3 and then also weeks 11-17. In that six game stretch with Nate Burleson back the Lions went 1-5. Terrible.

Point is 2013 is the same point where Goff is right now. Jared worked with two different offenses and Matt worked with only Scott Linehan through that point of his career as his OC. And people on this board were ALL over Matt and his inability to feel pressure, move in the pocket and extend plays past throwing deep to Calvin. And those criticisms were spot on then AND now.

I understand why Goff is seen as struggling the last two seasons under McVay. My best guess is that McVay is and was terrible at teaching and explaining what the expectations were in his offense after a play breaks down. Sean has a great system and he seems VERY details in what to do in this system and how to play here but McVay seems to stink at explaining and coaching what happens when a play breaks down. And my guess is 100% that Goff is simply confused, hit a wall in terms what to do when a play breaks down and what his coach expects of him. As much as people gloss over it Matt had the greatest WR in the modern era at his side while he learned how to survive in situations like that. Goff hasn’t had a WE as good as Calvin OR Kenny which is why I want to keepo Kenny at all costs for Goff.

Caldwell made Stafford a great QB. Jim taught Matt how to be a professional QB past his God-given talent. McVay isn’t Jim Caldwell on any level. Sean doesn’t have Jim’s communication skills or experience as a QB coach.

Simply put Sean seems to feel like he needs a QB who already knows how to play when a play break down as he cannot teach those skills. That is a total failure on Sean as to GET that QB (Stafford) he gave up a serviceable young QB with upside for a veteran who is great right now as well as two future 1st rd. draft picks AND a 2021 3rd rd. pick. Make no mistake…this is 100% on McVay as his failure on Goff brought Stafford here and those future draft assets are gone because Sean could not teach that to Goff.

This is like a great batter who cannot hit a curve ball. That guy IS a great batter who needs to work on hitting the curve. What does Seab do? He brings in a guy that already know how to hit the curve and is more well-rounded instead of teaching the guy he already has to hit the curve. I think what the Rams did here is a total mistake.

As of right now I’ll take Goff over 2013 Stafford. Whole I don’t think Goff has been amazing in many of the Rams big games he has stepped up in some of them AND Goff didn’t shit the bed either. He didn’t go full Scott Mitchell V. the Bucs either. WE get to benefit from Goff’s experience to date but our coaching staff has a lot of work to do to re-build Goff’s confidence and skillset. All things considered I’ll take a kid who has played in the Super Bowl, won playoff games including on the road but needs to have his game broken down and re-built over a better veteran who is on his last shot. I LOVE Stafford, I wish he was still here but he is 33 years old. Goff is 27 in October. To continue the analogy Goff needs to round out his game. Look at it this way…in 2027 Goff will be the same age Matt is right now. Six seasons from now. And that will make Goff Matt’s age and experience level right now. I’ll take that trade despite missing and loving Matt as the face of the Lions all these seasons.

I see this as a total failure of McVay and his inability to get Goff where he needed to be for the Rams and McVay. I do. I see that as Sean’s failure. When Matt is done in the NFL and Goff is hopefully still playing…then and only then can this trade really be understood for what Sean gave up to get in Stafford right now. Past his rookie season Goff has only missed 2 or 3 games total.

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I’m not sure who Ed Steele is but am I the only one who finds him a bit ADHD as a writer?
He talks about how, “Stafford offers an element to the passing game that was largely missing with Goff. That is, the ability to consistently complete passes when the design of the play doesn’t go exactly as planned.”
But then shows a GIF of Stafford looking-off a Safety against a 4 man front?!?!? LOL

The second GIF shows Stafford throwing late and high to Golladay, good luck throwing that pass to the Rams WR’s. That pass should have hit Golladay as soon as he cleared the LB and was designed to be completed in front of the secondary, it was only completed because of Golladay’s leaping ability and the DB misplayed…again, against a 4-man front, no twisting or stunting, just a straight-up normal pass-rush.

The next point the writer was trying to make was that Stafford somehow handles pressure in the pocket better than Goff, I guess. The GIF provided shows Stafford sliding-up in the pocket, something that any QB at any level can do and something that a lot of people have questioned with Stafford. It’s one play that doesn’t prove either way imo.

The last GIF is an impressive throw that Stafford made against a blitz, it was pretty awesome.
But again, I’m sure if I search the interwebs that I can find an impressive pass from Goff as well.

And just to note, the writer talks about how the offense was humming with Goff in 2018 when they had Gurley and then how it struggled more after. The Rams don’t have Gurley anymore, they only have Cam Akers, a RB taken two RB’s after we took Swift. The Rams O-line is not that good and the Rams don’t have jump-ball WR’s to bail Stafford out when he chucks-n-ducks like he’s had here.

This probably the only thing that I thought was useful from the piece, these stats show Stafford’s QB Rate vs. the blitz, non-play action, and 3rd down.

Overall, I thought it was a pretty poorly written piece. Maybe I’ll read his other article, “How the Chiefs can protect Mahommes”.

Thanks for sharing @Air2theThrown

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Good point!
They’re trying to compare a 32 year old “fixed” Stafford under Bevell against a younger Goff who somehow all-of-a-sudden-like couldn’t have success in McVay’s offense.
Again, I like Stafford but his injuries and age combined with bad O-line, a very non-Todd Gurley RB, and no jumpball WR’s. I can see Stafford having success in LA and I can just as easily see him being the same QB with the same results he had here, time will tell.

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I added the word “west” to this post… and it still might be true!

Lol that’s what I meant! Thanks !!

The nfc west is really talented. But the rams roster is really good. They are for sure in the top 6 in the nfc. They have the best defensive player in the game. They have the best corner in football. They have a ton of solid veterans and good young players. Fuller and rapp at safety. Darius williams at corner. Cam akers has looked just as promising as swift has for us. Cooper kupp, tyler higbee, etc. Even guys like van jefferson and terrell lewis who basically got to redshirt and learn for a year. Now they got an upgrade at QB who can sit back in the shotgun and sling it when the other things aren’t working. A guy who can convert 3rd and longs or convert two minute drills. The rams went 10-6 and won a playoff game with a QB who was struggling and almost got benched for John wolford. Stafford has only been on a roster near that good once. In 2014.

The 2014 Lions roster was way better than the 2020 Rams roster.

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Way better? I disagree. The rams defense let up 300 fewer yards than the 2014 lions defense. It also forced more turnovers. Their run game gained 600 more yards as well. Their defense has all world players who are better than anything we had. We had a better big play wr in calvin, but they have 3 deep at wr, 2 deep at TE and a way better run game. Lions fans are so used to depravity that they think guys like reggie bush were all stars…

And you think Cam Akers with his 625 rushing yards is an All Star!?!? Good to know!

We had the best WR in the game and Tate, so probably the best 1,2 WR punch in the NFL. We had Pettigrew who was supposed to be some All-world talented TE (but never seemed to live-up to that billing). We had a way-better O-line than the Rams do.

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Are the Rams the favorites to win their division? They need to cross that bridge first.

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Rams actually don’t have Darius Williams on their current roster.

He is a RFA, so they have a chance to keep him.
He will likely need a 1st round ($4.9 mill estimate) or 2nd round ($3.4 mill tender) to keep other teams from signing him away. At the 2nd round tender, there still might offers made by other teams.

Rams are well over the cap right now.
They have some big contracts they can restructure, but OLTwill be tough to clear a lot of cap space to re-sign Darius Williams… or John Johnson, Leonard Floyd,
DE Fox, Ekubam, or the other UFA CB starter Troy Hill.
There defense may take a step back.

On offense… starting C Austin Blythe is UFA.
OLT Whitworth is almost 40yo.

Father Time is undefeated… so there will eventually be a drop off in Whitworth’s play.

The Rams also still lack a deep threat at WR, so adding may not truly solve the offenses lack of explosive plays.

My main point is that many of the predictions for the Rams seem to be looking only at the benefiit of adding Stafford’s big arm… but not looking at how the rest of the Rams roster around may be changing for the worse in 2021.

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Between akers, henderson and brown they rushed for 600 more yards than a washed up reggie bush and a try hard guy in joique bell. Also, fyi… everyone on the board thinks swift is a stud… and he had 520 yards. I’m not down on swift… but akers was impressive for a rookie too.

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Williams isn’t going anywhere. A 1st round tender of 4.9m is a steal for them. They will find the money. They are going to lose a few guys… but they have a bunch of young players who are ready to step up because they are good at drafting and development of role players. Losing john johnson will sting… but they have 2 good young safeties on the roster. Same with floyd. They drafted lewis to potentially be a replacement.

Reggie rushed for over 1000 yards the year before and one of those years both Reggie and Joique were the first tandem to both rush and receive for 500 yards.

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Reggie bush rushed for 290 yards that year. He was injured and ineffective. He wasn’t nearly as good as any of the rams backs this year. They outran us by 600 yards. That is a ton.