Matthew Stafford, Kingmaker
Where Stafford lands will have a significant impact in 2025
It’s been a minute since I’ve written, as I’ve been a bit focused on other things, including the Omnifantasy thing I’ve written about before, but also time away to work out and be more present with family. But I’ve been feeling itchy to get some writing done, and I had a thought today I wanted to dig into that felt like one of those strong opinions for hyper-specific reasons that are probably the best ways I can add value to the broader discourse for anyone paying attention to this stuff right now.
The Matthew Stafford recruitment has been high, as it sounds like he is very available this offseason and the interest from around the league is there. Yesterday’s big report was that he and Tom Brady were at a Montana ski resort together, with NFL reporters apparently disputing how that came to be and then getting into it at Starbucks as a result.
Brady’s part ownership in the Raiders obviously has speculation situated there as a potential destination, but earlier in the day, there was news the Giants are also really in on Stafford, and I sent out this tweet:
As far as other dot-connecting to the Giants, Hayden Winks had a great point a few days ago that the Giants hired Kelly Stafford’s brother as their WR Coach this offseason.
Last month, in talking on Ship Chasing about the Giants, I shared some thoughts that I felt organizationally they were in a place where they really need to acquire a QB at basically all costs. That’s obviously true of any team, but the decision from ownership to retain Joe Schoen and Brian Daboll was essentially an admission they were unfairly tied to Daniel Jones, who they found surprising success with in 2022 right before his contract was up which more or less locked them into worked with him again in 2023 and 2024. But Schoen and Daboll are obviously on the hot seat; you can’t stay in those positions forever, in New York. They have the No. 3 pick in a draft that doesn’t have much QB depth, and they more or less have a mandate to figure out the QB position for 2025, or else. Obviously there are limitations — most significantly what the Staffords want, as he’s a veteran who will have say, and it’s possible his family would rather not move across the country when Vegas is more or less up the road — but if one team overpays here, I’d expect that to be the Giants even more than the Raiders.
Anyway, I got a reply that said “McVay isn’t going to be standing on that sideline,” which is one of those things I didn’t need to give a ton of attention to, except it made me really consider why Stafford has had a trend of elite No. 1 WR production dating back long before his time with McVay and the Rams. Because, in case you’re not aware, it wasn’t just Cooper Kupp having the best WR season ever, and Puka Nacua the best for a rookie, but Calvin Johnson having possibly the second-best WR season ever with a young Stafford, plus many more great seasons, but then also guys like Golden Tate, and Marvin Jones, and Kenny Golladay who all had overwhelmingly the best stretches of their careers playing with Stafford. Go look at their player pages.
And I just wanted to write about why that is, because Stafford’s a fascinating dude. The last we saw this guy, he was playing phenomenal football over the final two drives in the final five minutes, under the gun, to very nearly lead a come-from-behind upset victory in the snow over the eventual Super Bowl champs who it seemed like no one else could play with. Stafford was maybe one blitz pickup away from beating the Eagles. They got down to the 12-yard line with a minute left, down 6.
This dude can ball. But to be clear, I don’t think Stafford has probably ever been a top-three QB in the league at really any point in his career, either. But he does have top-three traits, and I’d argue those explain why he’s been so fantasy friendly throughout his entire career. So I want to get into a sort of film take of who he is specifically.
What makes Stafford unique is a set of traits we could probably jumble together by saying “throwing guys open,” or even just that broad “fantasy friendly” term. He’s always had an incredibly strong arm, and he’s also accurate with it. So we might say “arm talent” is very high. But over his career, there have been subtle drumbeats of players saying, in moments of candor, stuff like, “You guys in the media don’t understand how good Matthew Stafford is.” C.J. Stroud had words to that effect last summer, and NFL coaches and execs ranked Stafford the fifth-best QB in the NFL about a month after that, which was at least mildly surprising. Other great examples don’t immediately come to mind, but this has been a common refrain through Stafford’s career, to the extent as a close observer of the NFL, I’ve definitely taken notice that the people in the league pretty overwhelmingly have always thought Stafford was at least a half tier better than I did (and I never thought he sucked or anything).
When I’ve tried to understand that, by watching breakdowns from smart film people and that sort of thing, the points that are always referenced essentially boil down to his ability to move defenders. We know about the no-look passes, but I think skeptics will immediately think of that as something of a gimmick, and not a frequent enough occurrence to really be relevant here. I’d probably debate that, as I think he does a version of the no look thing far more frequently than broadcasts catch it, but I’ve heard this same point brought up as it relates not just to where his eyes are at the time of the throw, but his whole frame. Other quarterbacks might “look off” defenders, but Stafford has a unique ability to set his whole frame one direction and throw another way, in part again because of his arm strength, which was always said to be the stuff of legend since his college days. (In other words, when we see a Patrick Mahomes no-look pass — as probably the other most frequently cited no-look passer — he’s often off platform or something, but the Stafford ones are always unique to me because his shoulders are completely square to a different target than where the ball goes in a way that is unique to really any other no-look pass you might see.)
My point there is that it’s not just the no-look element, but his understanding of how he’s constantly being read by defenders, and how he shows them what he wants to show them, then throws to a spot where he knows his guy will be. That’s been massive with guys like Kupp and Nacua, and the final QB buzzword I want to throw in here is placement. It’s not just arm strength and accuracy — arm talent — and it’s not just looking off defenders, but it’s also his understanding of placement, which he leverages with his accuracy and the misdirection things he’s doing in the pocket. That’s the whole package, as I see it, and that specific package is something where he’s probably 1 of 1.
It’s also why you see his top WRs always putting up huge numbers. The fascinating thing about Stafford’s career is less about the Tate, Jones, and Golladay types that he’s elevated, but how guys like Johnson and Kupp could keep producing, week after week, even when the whole gameplan was around stopping them. I called Kupp’s 2021 the best WR season ever, because he was better over the four-game playoff stretch — as measured by fantasy points per game — than in his legendary 17-game regular season. He went for 21 games, absolutely dominating the league, and won Super Bowl MVP to cap it. You can debate me on “best regular season,” but I honestly don’t think there’s a discussion when you include the playoff run.
My point there is everything was on the line for the Rams’ opponents for four straight games there, and they were the No. 4 seed in the NFC and weren’t exactly an insanely dominant team all year, but they were consistently able to get what they wanted to get in the passing game, specifically to Kupp.
When I said Stafford is 1 of 1 as it relates to those specific traits that are fantastic for his WRs in fantasy, the one guy of this era I think you could probably debate was better during their respective (overlapping) primes is probably Aaron Rodgers. Those skills I referenced were the same thing that allowed Rodgers to win MVPs; his accuracy and placement and ability to throw guys open was also his elite trait, though maybe there wasn’t as much in the no-look category as I was discussing with Stafford. It’s the same idea, though. “You want to stop that guy, and I’m still going to get the ball to him.” Rodgers of course had strong WR1 trends, and elevated when the guy on the other end was playing at a peak level as well, like with Davante Adams and guys like Jordy Nelson and Greg Jennings before him.
Anyway, whoever lands Stafford is getting a QB that is still playing at a high level. As I mentioned, the last we saw him, he was nearly upsetting what by the end of the Super Bowl felt like an unbeatable team.
They’re also getting a QB who gets the ball where he wants it to go. Even as Rodgers aged this past year in New York, we saw those flashes from Adams after the trade. (For the record, Stafford just turned 37 this month; Rodgers is 41, and was coming off an Achilles last year, so I don’t think the Rodgers decline is really instructive here other than we do know there will be some age-related risk with Stafford. But when Rodgers was 37, he won MVP while leading the NFL with 48 pass TDs, then he won it again at age 38.)
All that said, it’s important to not just leave the Malik Nabers side of this hanging. Nabers was elite last year, perhaps overshadowed a touch by other rookie pass-catchers like Brock Bowers and Brian Thomas, Jr. dominating, but in a way that doesn’t change that when you isolate his profile, you’re looking at an absolute superstar. This is a guy that dominated production over BTJ when they shared a field, so we have a strong reason to believe BTJ’s success at the next level only speaks favorably for Nabers. That doesn’t always mean Nabers will be better his whole career — Ja’Marr Chase was more productive than Justin Jefferson at LSU, and was a year younger, but certainly Jefferson has made it a question who is better in the NFL — but I do just want to reiterate that what Nabers did as a rookie was elite on its own merits.
This is an already-great WR, who has only ever been great dating back to college, who just had 170 targets in 15 games — not only at age 21 but where he doesn’t even turn 22 until July — and who is primed to take another step forward in Year 2. There might be a learning curve with whatever QB he lands, but I meant it literally when I sent that tweet about Nabers’ ADP. He would be in the 1.01 discussion for me if Matthew Stafford was his QB, because Daboll and company already showed us last year they are happy from a scheme perspective to build the whole plane out of Nabers when possible. The fit would be perfect for Nabers’ ceiling outcomes, and that’s what we shoot for.
But if Stafford lands in Vegas, I’ll be pretty pumped for Bowers, too. I’m not 100% sure it’ll translate the same way for a tight end, but Bowers is so incredibly dynamic that you already want to be in on him so any boost is obviously a great one. He’d frankly also be in the 1.01 discussion, in all formats.
And then also, as it relates to Nacua potentially losing Stafford, I’ll be pretty concerned. I was wrong about Nacua’s ability to maintain his level of rookie-year play into Year 2, and he seemed to take it up another notch. I’ll still be very interested in him, because I think I artificially capped what he is as a player last year.
But I think losing Stafford is a real risk to his ceiling. It has to be. Every WR I named above who played with Stafford and had huge numbers had worse numbers when they weren’t playing with Stafford, and it’s almost exactly the case that all of their best seasons came with Stafford and then their entire rest of their career was just on a lower plane. Again, I don’t think Nacua is going to be confined to that, because I think he’s great, and I do think he’ll have help from McVay and wherever the Rams go next. But I also don’t think we’ll get a discount on his ADP, so he’ll be tricky.
Alright, that’s it for today. Back soon with more thoughts as they come to me, plus some news on some things I’ve been working on. Until next time!