Jared Goff Scores $212 Million Contract Extension From Lions, But Is He Worth It?

If you were the GM of an NFL football team, would you pay Jared Goff $53 million a year?

According to ESPN’s Adam Schefter, the Detroit Lions are finalizing a four-year, $212 million extension with Goff. The deal includes $170 million in guaranteed money and is the most money the Lions have ever paid to a player. Including the last year of his current contract, Goff will, on average, earn $53 million a year. So, if you are Dak Prescott sitting at home sipping a nice glass of red, you might want to send Goff a thank you text. 

So, is the 2106 former overall number one draft pick worth the bank he is receiving?

Goff, who led the Lions to just three wins in his first year with the team, has done more to rebuild his reputation in the last couple of seasons than any other quarterback in the NFL. Plus, when the Lions' new uniforms were leaked last month, Goff was one of the players featured in their new Motor City Muscle uniforms - of course, the Lions were going to resign him; it's not like they would roll him out in new uniforms and then say to him we no longer need your services, Jared.  

As for his performance on the field, Goff had an impressive season, completing 67.3% of his passes for 4,575 yards and 30 touchdowns, with 12 interceptions. Under his leadership, Detroit achieved a 12–5 record and secured the franchise's first playoff win in 32 years, defeating the Los Angeles Rams 24–23 in the wild-card playoff round and then winning a divisional-round playoff game at home over the Tampa Buccaneers.

The Lions lost to the San Francisco 49ers 31-34 in the NFL championship game. I know it's still hard to believe that the Lions of Detroit made it to an NFC title game.

To determine if Goff is worth the money, you should simply take a look around the National Football League. Today, the NFL has one truly great quarterback, Patrick Mahomes. If you read the NFL.com’s QB index from early January, they actually had him ranked 9th in the NFL, and they called Mahomes's season to that point disappointing. I get that many QB indexes are largely based on stats, but seriously, NFL.com, how bad is that - you may want to rethink your index altogether. 

So clearly, Mahomes is the best, followed by Lamar Jackson, and then the waters get a little murky. Goff definitely lives in the murky water between the almost-great QBs and the very good QBs.

From a ranking perspective, Goff falls somewhere between the 5th and 12th-best QB in the NFL. In my opinion, Goff is a very good quarterback and is certainly capable of winning the Super Bowl. To be clear, I’m not saying the Lions are winning the Super Bowl this upcoming year, but what I am saying is based on what QBs make in the NFL and based on the fact that he took the Detriot Lions to an NFC Championship, I’d say he is absolutely worth the $53 million and year.