Former NFL quarterback and current analyst Chris Simms has always been a Matthew Stafford fan. So it's no surprise he ranked Stafford No. 8 on his annual list of the top 40 quarterbacks in the game, two spots ahead of Tom Brady and one spot ahead of Dak Prescott.
And now that Stafford's out of Detroit, Simms says his talents will shine.
"You say what you want, I don't give a damn. Go ahead, start the hate right now. You know who's going to get the last laugh? Me. Because he’s on a team now and everyone’s going to see what he’s really worthy of this year," Simms said this week on his podcast Chris Simms Unbuttoned.
Stafford, who was traded to the Rams in January, was 16 games under .500 without a single playoff win in his 12 seasons with the Lions. Some would say the quarterback's to blame. Simms would point to everyone else.
"You thought it was just him. 'He's the only reason Detroit hasn't gone to the playoffs and won playoff games.' Yeah right. He still has one of the greatest, game-changing arms in the history of the NFL and still one of the best game-changing, most explosive arms in the NFL right now," Simms said. "That's where it starts. You can say what you want, but he does things with his right arm that very few people in this league can do. It’s in the echelon of Mahomes, Rodgers and Josh Allen. It’s those four if you just want to talk about crazy, gifted, unbelievable throws that nobody else on the planet can make."
Simms, who ranked Stafford No. 9 on last year's list, said every time he sits down and studies him in the offseason he comes away thinking, "Holy cow, we gotta give him more (credit)."
"If anybody sat down and watched some film with me, you're going to come away with a lot more plays than you realize to go, 'Holy sh*t, what a throw. Holy sh*t, what great movement in the pocket and then what a throw.' It's just going to be one thing after another and what you'll slowly start to realize is their team would be absolute garbage if not for him. That's all there is to be said.
"Is he perfect? No, but I think a lot of the problems Matthew Stafford had were team-related, people around him-related, offensive scheme-related, and of course we’re in this era of just blaming one guy.”
Even in Stafford's three playoff losses, Simms believes he was good enough to win.
"They lost to the Saints early in his career, Cowboys (in 2014) was the game where they called pass interference and then picked up the flag. They're going to win the game. He can't referee, too. His other loss up in Seattle in the wild card round (in 2016), hey, he can't catch the ball either. Go back and watch it, he made throws and plays in that game to win the game. It was there to be had that night against Seattle. They could have won that game," Simms said. "His team let him down.
"So now you go, 'He's 0-3 in the playoffs,' and I go, 'Yeah, two out of the three he played really good and they should have won but he was f*cked over in one shape or form or another.' And that's where we're at. So I'm really ready for him to crap on some people this year."
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