On his biggest throw of the game, probably his biggest throw of the season so far, Jared Goff knew he was going to get drilled. 300-pound defensive tackle Karl Brooks was charging into Goff's face after beating Blake Miller to the inside, but Goff needed to give Sam LaPorta an extra half second to come out of his break.
It was 2nd and 8 in a tie game with under three minutes to play. The Lions were trying to put together a game-winning drive against the Packers. They still had a long way to go.
Goff stepped into the pass and got clobbered. He couldn't even complete his follow-through. The throw was perfect, knifed between a dropping defensive lineman and a converging safety. It didn't go to where LaPorta was, but where he would be. LaPorta caught it in stride, then got crunched himself by the safety and a linebacker.
Goff wound up on his back. Brooks got flagged for roughing the passer for hitting Goff up high. The Lions gained 18 yards, plus 15 more on the penalty. Several runs -- and one big neutral zone infraction -- later, Jake Bates kicked the decisive field goal as time expired to send the Lions to their biggest win of the season.
Taking a hit to make a play is part and parcel to the quarterback position. Some are just more willing to do it than others.
"It probably goes back to college for me," Goff said on 97.1 The Ticket. "I don’t know if I’m unique in this, but I think that’s part of my job. These guys up front and all over the place are getting hit all over the field, and if all it takes is for me hold on for an extra second and maybe take a little bit more of a shot to make sure the ball moves down the field the way it’s supposed to, then that’s an easy task for me to do.
"And I take pride in it. I try to sit in there as long as I can. I know I’m not gonna be extending the play much outside the pocket, so if I can extend it in the pocket even for a half a second, it’s certainly worth it. And it always feels better when you get hit, if it gets caught."
The pass to LaPorta was Goff's latest big throw in a season where he's earning chatter for MVP. Indeed, that was the chant in Ford Field at one point during Sunday's game. Through six games, Goff has thrown 14 touchdowns, no interceptions and leads the NFL in both passer rating and passing yards per game. This shouldn't surprise anyone who's been paying attention. Goff leads the NFL in passing yards and ranks second in passer rating, to Lamar Jackson, over the last four seasons.
Jackson is your typical MVP candidate, a human highlight reel who's won the award twice. Same for Josh Allen, who won it in 2024 and is the odds-on favorite to win it this year. Goff knows his own physical limitations, and overcomes them mentally. For one, he processes the field as quickly as arguably any quarterback in the NFL. For another, he's not afraid to get hit.
"I feel like that's one thing that's very underrated about Jared," Amon-Ra St. Brown said Thursday. "He's one of the toughest guys on our team. He's never complaining about getting hit. He has bumps and bruises, too, and you never really hear about it as his teammate. He just plays through stuff, so we respect the hell out of him. We know he gets hit, and half the time I don't even know he's getting hit when he's throwing it because I'm just looking at the ball and I just realize after the fact, the next day watching tape, that he got blasted. He's as tough as they come."
Dan Campbell knew this about Goff long before they united in Detroit. When Brad Holmes broached the idea of acquiring Goff in the Matthew Stafford trade back in 2021, Campbell fully endorsed it. His first impression of Goff came from the opposite sideline when Campbell was a rising coach with the Saints and Goff was early in his career with the Rams.
For Campbell, the 2018 NFC championship game will always stick out, "watching one of the top defenses I've ever been a part of as a coach or a player give that guy fits, and watching him get hit and get up and make another accurate throw, get hit, get up, make another accurate throw," Campbell once said on the Rich Eisen Show.
"I just saw the environment, the type of pressure that he was under, and thinking, 'This guy won't break.' And I would've sworn he would've broke," Campbell said. "I'm just like, 'This guy can't handle this.' I don't know many quarterbacks that could. It was impressive, man. That's the type of thing that sticks in your memory. You don't forget those moments.
"You're like, 'I don't know this guy, but I know enough sitting here watching him on the sideline that this guy has found a way to win and he just won't give up.' And he just keeps coming back for more. There's a quiet competitiveness about him that, man, you want that guy on your team."
Goff will be under siege, at times, Sunday. The Vikings lead the NFL in blitz rate, quarterback pressure rate and sack rate. They've always blitzed a lot under defensive coordinator Brian Flores, but this year they've taken it to new levels. It's one of the ways in which they've evolved in Flores' fourth season calling plays. They're allowing 12.3 points per game, which would be the fewest over a full season since the Super Bowl-winning Buccaneers in 2002.
"It’s a new evolution of this defense this year," Goff said this week, "and it may be the best one yet."
With the help of Ben Johnson and center Frank Ragnow, Goff and the Lions got the better of Flores and the Vikings in 2023 and 2024. With John Morton and Graham Glasgow/Kingsley Eguakun last year, the Vikings got the better of Goff. They sacked him 10 times and won both games. Flores poses constant questions with his ever-changing blitz looks, and the Lions couldn't come up with the answers.
Next up are Drew Petzing and Cade Mays. If those two can help Goff sift through the chaos of the Vikings' various fronts, Goff will take care of the rest. Against the blitz this season, Goff has thrown eight touchdowns, no picks and touts the second best passer rating in the NFL. He sees the extra rushers as an opportunity. The defense becomes more dangerous and more vulnerable at the same time.
The Vikings are coming. Goff will take some punishment, and then come back for more.
