NFL1000: Is Matthew Stafford Leaping into NFL’s Elite QB Class?

Over the last 16 games, a “Tiger Slam” version of a regular season, Lions quarterback Matthew Stafford has hit a new statistical plane. In that time, he’s completed 391 of 570 passes for a 69% completion rate, 4310 yards, 35 touchdowns, and eight interceptions. Stafford has always been a prolific stat-collector, primarily because the Lions have competed with the Saints for the passing attempts crown. Stafford won the Attempts King title in 2011 (with 663) and 2012 with 727), but after his 41-touchdown season in ’11, he’s ramped down fairly considerably in the scoring department. In ’12, he threw for just 20 touchdowns in those 727 attempts, for a touchdown percentage of 2.8. Between 2013 and 2015, Stafford threw the ball 634, 602, and 592 yards, but had just 29 touchdown passes in 2013, and 22 in 2014.

Things started looking better last year, when he threw for 32 touchdowns on those 592 attempts, but 2016 has proven to be a revelation. Through seven games this season, Stafford has 15 passing touchdowns in 241 attempts, and the corresponding 6.2 touchdown rate matches his 2011 career high. Stafford has seen significant improvement in just about every relevant category in the last two seasons, and he’s now doing it without Calvin Johnson, the future Hall-of-Famer who retired in March. Stafford also has 12 fourth-quarter comebacks since the start of the 2014 season, which leads the league.  

What’s changed for the better? Well, the Lions signed former Bengals receiver Marvin Jones to replace Megatron, and that’s helped, but the big difference has been offensive coordinator Jim Bob Cooter (yes, that’s his real name), who was promoted to that position in the 2015 mid-season. He had been the team’s quarterbacks coach since 2014, and had held various offensive assistant positions with the Broncos, Chiefs, and Colts in the last few years. Until recently, the only reason Cooter was remarkable was for his name, but people are starting to notice what he’s done to diversify Detroit’s offense – and how it’s helping Stafford.

I didn’t make a conscious decision,” Cooter said last October when asked about his name. “I think maybe my parents were really into marketing, so we were trying to sell some T-shirts from an early age.”

Laugh all you want, but Cooter’s charges are all in to the way he’s designing the offense and calling plays.

“I’m not sure how much you guys know, but Jim Bob’s a very, very, very intelligent guy,” receiver Golden Tate recently said. “His playcalling has been phenomenal, I think, the last season, really. Every single game, we’ve been in it when it came down to it. He’s finding ways to put us in position to win. He understands what we all do well, and he’s putting us in positions to do that. And when you make great play calls, it almost makes the game a little bit easier.”

That’s true. When you watch the Lions’ offense at work, you’ll see Tate as the moveable chess piece, everywhere from the backfield to the slot to outside. You’ll see one of the better screen teams in the league, and you’ll see favorable receiver distribution and location matchups that help Stafford simply find the open man. It’s helping everyone play more consistently.

Based on what I’ve seen, Cooter’s primary assistance to Stafford has been to keep him within himself. It’s often thought that great quarterback coaches are the ones who can take marginally talented signal-callers and prompt them to reach the upper tiers of their potential, and that’s one true story. But it’s just as important, when you’re blessed with a quarterback who has nearly limitless physical ability, to refine his attributes into a package that presents the most consistent player possible.

There’s no question that Stafford pins the needle when it comes to pure talent. He’s had one of the three best arms in the NFL since he entered the league in 2009 as the first-overall pick out of Georgia. He’s always been a tough and mobile player as well, …

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