Lions quarterback Jared Goff can vividly remember the moment he learned he was being traded to Detroit and feeling “betrayed” by the Rams in the immediate aftermath.
Reflecting on the franchise-altering transaction in the Season 2 premiere of the Netflix docuseries “Quarterback,” Goff expanded on the notion of feeling unwanted by the team that drafted him first overall in 2016, and the apparent lack of transparency leading up to the January 2021 blockbuster that sent Detroit QB Matthew Stafford to Los Angeles.
“So 2020 season happens, three weeks after the last game of the season, I get a call from [Rams coach] Sean [McVay], and really did not expect anything. He lets me know they’re trading me to Detroit and I’m like, ‘Oh, whoa, OK, alright,’ what the hell, what’s happening?’ And I would say about 30 seconds after that phone call, it was on Twitter,” Goff said in the episode, which dropped Tuesday.
“You feel like you’ve been betrayed, or like you’re not wanted, and I think, for me, ultimately, it was the fact that there wasn’t a conversation had and that there wasn’t a, ‘Hey, we’re thinking about moving on,’ type of thing, there was nothing. You wish that it wasn’t such a blindside and you wish that there was some sort of, maturity, I guess, to have that conversation, to be able to let me know what was going on and how things went down, and why this is happening.”
Goff, 30, spent the first five years of his career with the Rams and guided them to a Super Bowl appearance in February 2019, a 13-3 defeat to the Patriots.
Although Goff considered the trade his “first real taste of true adversity,” his perspective on the situation flipped after hearing the excitement about his arrival from Detroit general manager Brad Holmes and head coach Dan Campbell.
“It kind of brought me from this moment of picking up the pieces to reinvigorated with this energy of, oh, this is what it feels like to truly be wanted and to have these guys behind you, and I hadn’t felt that in quite some time,” Goff said.
“… A lot of people saw it as I was being cast away, or I was being sent to, my career had died, and I think a lot of people in my former organization may have thought that as well, for me, I saw it as what an incredible opportunity.”
While the Rams and McVay — who has expressed remorse over the handling of the trade — experienced immediate success with Stafford, winning Super Bowl 2022 in his first season out west, the Lions gradually transformed from NFC North bottom feeders to perennial Super Bowl contenders.
Goff helped the Lions clinch their first division тιтle in 30 years during the 2023-24 season. They fell one game shy of the Super Bowl with an NFC Championship loss to the Niners.
The Lions awarded Goff with a four-year contract extension worth up to $212 million entering the 2024-25 season, in which Detroit finished 15-2 and secured the top seed in the NFC.
Despite that Super Bowl hype, Detroit was shockingly upset by the Commanders at home in the Divisional Round of the playoffs in January.
Goff, coming off a career-high 37 touchdowns in 2024, feels immense graтιтude for the Lions as they’ve built the foundation of an NFL powerhouse together.
“It’s been so incredible to build with them,” Goff said on “Quarterback,” “but that moment of hearing them on the phone, knowing that the opportunity that I had here was special.”
The Lions visit the Rams on Dec.14 this upcoming season.
