LOS ANGELES — The first play of Sunday’s Super Bowl came 13 months earlier, when Matthew Stafford texted his wife, “Well, here we go,” and walked into a meeting with Lions president Rod Wood and, via speakerphone, owner Sheila Ford Hamp.
The Lions were searching for a head coach and general manager. At age 32, the quarterback had two years left on his contract and didn’t want to go through another rebuild.
There were great things he wanted to do. He asked to be traded.
The Lions didn’t say no. Instead, they agreed to wait until they hired GM Brad Holmes and head coach Dan Campbell to talk again. When they did, they held a phone call and agreed to trade the quarterback.
“Getting to know Matthew,” Rams coach Sean McVay said Monday morning, “you just realize that he’s one of the few people that could ever pull that off.”
He won’t be the last to try.
Stafford changed the landscape of the NFC North on Jan. 30, 2020, when the Lions — who drafted him first overall in 2009 and later made him the NFL’s highest-paid player — traded him for quarterback Jared Goff, two-first round picks and a 2021 third-rounder.
Stafford changed the landscape of the NFL on Sunday night when he led the Rams to a 23-20 Super Bowl victory against the Bengals at SoFi Stadium, completing 26-of-40 passes for 283 yards, three touchdowns and two interceptions.
Quarterbacks around the NFL who are dissatisfied with their own situation — and there are plenty — surely took notice. Teams did too. It’s not enough to draft and develop a franchise quarterback; franchises have to keep him content and their team competitive. The Bears would love to have that problem someday — if Justin Fields becomes the quarterback they hope he can be.
Veteran quarterbacks with wanderlust have a month to make their move. The NFL’s free agent tampering period begins March 14.
Aaron Rodgers has vowed to decide his future by then. The Packers quarterback has openly flirted with asking for a trade or retiring outright. Thursday, he made the latter sound more likely. Given his calculating nature, it’s always hard to decipher Rodgers’ intentions when he speaks publicly. Were he to leave the Packers, though, it would give the Bears their first sustained opening to try to dominate the division since Brett Favre started his first game in 1992.
Texans quarterback Deshaun Watson signed a four-year, $156 million contract extension last year — and within months demanded a trade after he felt the team didn’t listen to his suggestions for a new coach and GM. He’s since faced accusations from almost two dozen women who accuse him of coercive and lewd sexual behavior. He remains with the Texans, though he sat out last season.
Russell Wilson was so ready to leave the Seahawks last offseason that his agent leaked the four teams to which he’d happily be traded. The Bears, one of the four, made an offer to the Seahawks in March that they rebuffed because Pete Carroll, the NFL’s oldest coach, didn’t want to start over at the position. The Bears inquired about Stafford’s availability, too, but came away convinced the Lions didn’t want to trade him within the NFC North.
Wilson may look to move this offseason. Jimmy Garoppolo definitely will — the 49ers quarterback said earlier this month he expects to be dealt to make room for first-round pick Trey Lance.
If those quarterbacks all force their way to new teams, it would be the logical conclusion to what Stafford — and, with much less payoff, the Colts’ Carson Wentz — orchestrated last year.
Quarterbacks requesting trades — and getting them granted — have been relatively rare, Stafford was just the fifth passer not drafted by his team to play in the Super Bowl since 2010, joining the Broncos’ Peyton Manning [twice], the Eagles’ Nick Foles, the Buccaneers’ Tom Brady and Garoppolo.
“I love playing this game for the competition, for the relationships, for the hard times, for the good times — for all of it,” Stafford said moments after Sunday’s win. “This game can teach us so much as people. … For 12 years that goal wasn’t reached. It tore me up inside, but I knew I could keep playing and try to find a way. And the fact that we reached that goal today is so special.”
Sunday, Stafford did everything he dreamed when he asked to leave the Lions. McVay credited Stafford, but also Ford, Wood and the rest of the Lions brass for the move.
“They just did such a great job of facilitating a smooth change — or adjustment, however you wanna look at it,” McVay said “I think that’s just a reflection of two quality people on both ends.”
And if the Lions had told Stafford no?
“I don’t like to think about those things,” he said with a smile.
