Jared Goff: When Five Interceptions Aren’t That Bad

Since moving to Detroit, Jared Goff has been quite good at avoiding interceptions. Entering last week, Goff had dropped from a 2.3% interception rate as a Ram to a 1.6% interception rate as a Lion, finishing significantly above league average each season. It looked like 2024 was shaping up the same way, with just four interceptions in his first eight games – part of his argument for sticking in the MVP race and all.

Well, sometimes we all just need to get things out of our system.

Goff’s five-interception performance against Houston is something Lions fans can laugh about now because they escaped with a win, but it was both fascinating and hilarious to watch in real time as the third-best offense in football suddenly seemed incapable of avoiding Texans defenders. Is it possible that Jared Goff is red-green color blind, and the candy-apple clown costumes Houston was wearing befuddled him? In this essay…

Seriously, though, it was fun to watch the researchers scrambling to find accolades and achievements to post in real time as the interceptions kept racking up. Literally as I was posting about it being the first game with six (combined) interceptions since 2022, Goff threw another one, making it the first game with seven (combined) interceptions since 2018. That game, in one of life’s fun little coincidences, also involved Goff, in an immortal duel for the ages with Mitchell Trubisky’s Bears. Goff didn’t manage to find the end zone in that one, so the Rams lost – chalk up just the slightest hint of redemption for Goff on Sunday, then.