The Rams have been a trendy Super Bowl pick since trading for quarterback Matthew Stafford, but 49ers safety Jimmie Ward will believe it when he sees it.
Ward questioned whether Stafford is really an upgrade over Jared Goff, given the two quarterbacks’ playoff records.
“I like Stafford, but they still will have the same players that he’ll be throwing the ball to,” Ward told Grant Cohn of SI.com. “He’s the same quarterback who was on the Detroit Lions and they still didn’t go to the playoffs, and they had Megatron [Calvin Johnson]. What was the problem over there in Detroit? Are you going to blame the city? What was the problem? Was it the money? If they city didn’t have enough money to bring players over there, why even have an NFL team? That’s a big question mark.
“They went and traded Jared Goff, who went to the playoffs several times and went to the Super Bowl. Yeah, he lost. He went to the Super Bowl, though. I’ve yet to see that with Matt Stafford. And I’m saying, he’s still great. I believe he’s a top 10 quarterback, maybe top 5. I don’t know. We’ll see. I’m just going off of what I see. And I see Jared Goff got those boys to the Super Bowl.”
It’s true that Stafford only reached the playoffs three times in 12 seasons in Detroit, and lost in the wild card round all three times. And it’s true that Goff got to the playoffs three times in five seasons with the Rams, including reaching the Super Bowl once.
That does not, however, mean Stafford isn’t an upgrade over Goff. And now perhaps Stafford will have a little extra motivation to prove that to Ward.
49ers’ Jimmie Ward: Matt Stafford is the same QB who was in Detroit and didn’t make the playoffs originally appeared on Pro Football Talk