After the Los Angeles Rams traded Jared Goff and a bundle of picks for Matthew Stafford in 2021, his first year with the Detroit Lions yielded a 3-10-1 regular-season record. That left many believing that the third-round draft pick was entering ‘bust’ territory. Enter Dan Campbell, who revitalized both Goff’s career and the Lions.
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Goff and the rest of the Lions’ offense have been dominating the league since 2023. He’s thrown for 30 and 37 touchdowns in the last two seasons and is now surging up the all-time career passing touchdowns leaderboard.
With 222 passing touchdowns, Goff currently has the 40th most among signal callers in NFL history. He is right behind Ryan Fitzpatrick, who has 223, and well within striking range of Steve Young’s career total of 232. Needing just one to surpass Fitzpatrick, Goff looks set to surpass him by halftime of Week 1.
Currently averaging 28 passing touchdowns per season, the 30-year-old is projected to finish just outside of the top 25 all-time Passing TD rankings. As long as he can keep his current form, Goff will be able to eclipse the likes of Joe Montana and Vinny Testaverde to enter the top-20 rankings.
While he’s far removed from the all-time leaders, Tom Brady and Drew Brees, Goff is steadily proving that he is the long-term franchise quarterback that the Rams initially thought he could be. That said, it’ll still be a while, if ever, before he can outdo Stafford, the man that he was traded for.
Stafford has 282 passing touchdowns as a Lion, easily the most in the history of what has been a relatively impoverished franchise. Nevertheless, Goff, with 115, has already produced the third most in Lions’ history.
Should he maintain his average of 28 touchdowns per season, Goff would need six more seasons in Detroit before he would be able to take Stafford’s crown. When it comes to passing yards, it would take Goff a total of seven seasons to pass him and become the topper in franchise history.
It is quite an achievable feat, but it won’t be without its challenges. The team’s offensive coordinator, Ben Johnson, who was largely credited for the Lions becoming the highest-scoring team in football last year, is leaving town and taking his explosive play-calling with him.
Throw in the fact that Detroit also lost its defensive coordinator Aaron Glenn. So, the Lions are going to look like a different team in 2025. Whether or not they can be as productive as last year will be largely up to Goff.
The front office has provided him with the services of Amon-Ra St. Brown and Jahmyr Gibbs, two of the more proficient players at their respective positions. So there won’t be many excuses for Goff should he fail to make the most of this offense.
He has proved the doubters wrong so far. So there are very few reasons to believe that he won’t be capable of becoming the next king of Detroit.
