Lions QB Jared Goff says trade from Rams will 'never leave me'

Sunday's Super Wild Card Weekend showdown between the Los Angeles Rams and NFC North champion Detroit Lions is chock full of storylines.

One doesn't have to look too far back in the past, or scan down the roster beyond quarterback to find the connections. Jared Goff and Matthew Stafford are forever tied together because of the 2021 trade that sent the former to Detroit, and the latter to Los Angeles, where he won a Super Bowl at the end of the 2021 season.

Goff certainly hasn't forgotten the life-changing deal, and the disrespect that came with it.

"Of course," Goff told ESPN on Wednesday. "I think it'll never leave me, and I think that's a good thing."

The Rams shipped Goff and picks to Detroit in exchange for Stafford in a deal that produced an instant (and necessary) upgrade under center, supplying Rams head coach Sean McVay with the veteran quarterback he so desperately desired after he concluded he could never win a title with Goff. Ahead of their wild-card matchup, McVay admitted the manner in which Los Angeles sent Goff eastward wasn't the cleanest.

If anything, it was an emotionless dumping of Goff in pursuit of a title.

"The thing that I'll never run away from are mistakes that I've made in previous instances," McVay said, via ESPN. "But when you look back on it, the gratitude for those four years, all the good memories that we had. And then when you end up making a change, that ended up being difficult. And could it have been handled better on my end? Absolutely. And I'll never run away from that.

"But the further you get away from it, the more that you try to grow as a man, as a person, as the leader that you want to become. He deserved better than the way that it all went down. I'll acknowledge that. And I think he