Lions must draft competition for Jared Goff ASAP
As we move towards training camp for the Detroit Lions, many fans have already decided how 2021 is going to turn out. Quarterback Jared Goff is already either the GOAT or a bust, without him taking any live snaps in the Honolulu Blue. We’re going to convince you that almost no matter what Goff does, that the Detroit Lions need to draft another signal-caller going into 2022, hopefully.
You love Goff or hate him, either way it doesn’t matter at this point; he’s general manager Brad Holmes “guy” for 2021 and 2022 based on his contract money, which you can find on Spotrac, a pro sports transaction website.
Jared Goff has demonstrated that he is at worst a decent starter in the NFL when given some support. Goff is making Top-5 money at his position but not performing that way and with the cast around him in Detroit, that will probably continue in 2021.
Additionally, the best teams in the NFL have great QB play. If you think back to the 2020 playoffs, the last four teams were the Bills, Buccaneers, Packers, and Chiefs. A common denominator is great quarterback play, which is not easy to find and cannot be faked or gotten around.
Either your guy can beat teams from the pocket or he can’t and good teams will make him. Goff has never done very well when tested that way but did obviously manage to do enough to get his former team to a Super Bowl once.
What is clear is that Detroit boasts few of the advantages that Goff enjoyed in Los Angeles, though.
We understand the bad taste in fans’ mouths from drafting poorly and especially the disappointment of choosing a quarterback that doesn’t live up to his draft status. Like in any sport, those failures should inform us on how to move forward in a more productive way, not cripple us to live in the shadow of the past.
To add weight to our argument we will introduce a couple of concepts put forth by Pro Football Focus (PFF), positional value and wins above replacement (WAR). Those concepts back our position that the pertinent move for the Detroit Lions is to draft another option at QB as soon as possible. The geeky math and analytics reinforce some basic football common sense which says that if you don’t have a great quarterback, you should keep swinging until you hit on one.
The Lions have a decent starter, which provides a great opportunity to go and find a better player without having to shove him into the lineup before he’s ready, a‘ la Patrick Mahomes or Aaron Rodgers. It also means not over-drafting a candidate due to desperation, plus the Lions have poor depth which needs to be addressed if we want to win.
Good quarterbacks are the least replaceable players, a lesson we’ve seen play out when Matthew Stafford has missed time, like in 2019. Hopefully, this article will address some fan’s denial about the wisdom of drafting another quarterback just because we have Jared Goff.