Getty Jares Goff celebrates in the NFC Championship.
The Detroit Lions have made the move to do a trade for Jared Goff from the Los Angeles Rams, and there is going to be radio silence on that front in an official capacity for the next month considering the trade cannot be made official until the start of the new league year.
Even such, some hints are leaking out from behind the scenes as to what the Lions think of their new quarterback courtesy of the man himself. In a piece with L.A. Times writer Sam Farmer, Goff takes a deep dive on his feelings and thoughts after the trade was revealed last weekend.
As Goff said, he was disappointed at first to learn of the trade considering it felt as if the Rams were giving up on him and simply letting him go after blaming him for the failures of the team. As a result, he was upset in the aftermath of the deal. That feeling lasted until he talked to his new Lions coaches as well as the team’s general manager. After that, Goff began to feel much better about the future.
Farmer wrote:
“Goff said he was “extremely disappointed and upset” upon learning of the trade, but his mood brightened within 30 minutes after speaking to the Lions, whose new general manager, Brad Holmes, was director of college scouting for the Rams, and whose new offensive coordinator is former Chargers coach Anthony Lynn.
Talking to the Lions, Goff said, “is what made me go, ‘oh my God, this is how it’s supposed to feel. This makes me feel great,’ how excited they were, how fired up they were.”
He added: “As time has gone on over the last few days, and even the end of that night, it becomes a positive and you start to feel really good about yourself again. You start to feel, I don’t want to say relief is the word, but you start to feel happy, grateful, ready for a new opportunity. That’s the biggest feeling that I was overcome with that night, and even in the days following.”
Goff has said in the days since the deal was revealed that he is excited to get to Detroit to turn over a new leaf on his career. Obviously, the Lions are just as ready to turn over that leaf as well, and hope Goff can help them get that job done in the future with the team.
Obviously, there are two sides to every trade. Goff clearly is ready to prove that he was not a mere throw-in for this deal or a washed up player. It’s clear the Lions don’t think any of those things are true either given their reported excitement to land him and get him in the mix.
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Inside Jared Goff’s Split With Rams
The Rams have had plenty of playoff success in the last few seasons, and Goff has been a big part of that success, even as he has not received tons of credit for what he’s done. He’s been overlooked on the Rams at times given the coaching staff and other big name players on the team. Other things went wrong for the Rams other than just Goff, so he gets a chance at a clean slate and a brand new start which could help bolster his career.
Goff might look like the scapegoat for Los Angeles right now, but it’s true that the team had other problems which helped in their struggle the last few seasons. With a good start in Detroit, Goff can make others begin to realize that fact if he’s able to play well in his new surroundings. It sounds like both he and the team are motivated to make this happen.
Lions Getting Solid Quarterback With Jared Goff
Detroit isn’t just getting a pair of first-round draft picks and a third-round pick, they are getting a quarterback who was in the Super Bowl just two years ago. Goff, a former top pick himself in 2016 out of Cal, has been a dependable player who has won plenty of big games in his career in the rough and tumble NFC West. So far, he’s thrown 107 touchdowns, 55 interceptions, 18,171 yards and has been a two-time Pro Bowler in 2017 and 2018.
Obviously, Goff has had a better defense to work with than Stafford, which has obviously helped him big time. Still, it’s hard to ignore some of the impressive wins he has been able to put together. Just this postseason, the Rams won a huge road game against the Seattle Seahawks in which Goff was pressed into duty with a thumb injury and delivered a solid performance when the team needed him the most.
The Lions appear to know just what they’re getting with Goff, and feel good about the potential addition for the future.
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