Jared Goff passer rating: Why Lions QB didn’t have perfect rating despite 18-for-18 game vs. Seahawks | Sporting News Canada

A perfect game in the NFL might not be as impressive as a perfect game in baseball, but in terms of all-time occurrences, it’s rarer. Jared Goff rewrote the book on perfect passing games Monday night.

The Lions quarterback didn’t throw an incompletion in a 42-29 win over the Seahawks, and he even did some of the dirty work with a touchdown reception on a pass from Amon-Ra St. Brown.

Before Monday, no quarterback in NFL history had attempted more than 10 passes in a game without an incompletion. Goff, with some help from the Seahawks’ defense, became the first, but it curiously wasn’t enough to earn him a perfect passer rating.

Here’s what you need to know about Goff’s historic night against Seattle and why his passer rating was less than perfect.

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Jared Goff stats vs. Seahawks

• Comp.: 18-18 (100%)
• Pass yards: 292
• Pass TD: 2
• INT: 0
• Sacks: 3
• Rec. TD: 1
• Passer rating: 155.8

Goff was a perfect 18-for-18 for 292 yards and two touchdowns in Monday’s win. He also added a touchdown reception on a trick-play toss from St. Brown.

Not only was it the best completion percentage of his career, but it was also the best completion rate by any quarterback with more than 10 pass attempts in a game. Kurt Warner went 10-for-10 before suffering a knee injury in a game in 2005, and Goff beat him by eight passes with the 18-for-18 display.

The chase for perfection got dicey at times for Goff. He overthrew his target in the end zone before his final touchdown pass, but the play was erased by offensive pass interference. Goff was also looking to throw on the Lions’ last possession, but he was taken down in the end zone for a safety. 

Here’s a look at how Goff’s performance compares to some of the most accurate games in NFL history.

NFL completion percentage record

The most accurate passing performances in NFL history (min. 15 attempts) are below:

Goff is the first player in NFL history with no incompletions through at least 15 pass attempts in a game. Philip Rivers, however, holds the record for consecutive completions with 25 in the game that placed him at the top of this list in 2018, only for Drew Brees to pull ahead of him in 2019.

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Why didn’t Jared Goff have a perfect passer rating vs. Seahawks?

Goff posted a terrific passer rating of 155.8, but a perfect passer rating is 158.3. How did he not get there despite not even throwing an incompletion?

The answer isn’t the safety that ended Detroit’s final drive. It’s more of a numbers game.

A perfect passer rating requires the following:

• Min. 10 pass attempts
• Min. 77.5% completion rate
• Min. 11.875% of passes result in touchdowns
• Min. 12.5 yards per attempt

Goff checks the first two boxes, of course, and he checks the yards per attempt box, as well. It’s the touchdown average that kept him from a perfect passer rating.

Only 11.1 percent of Goff’s pass attempts resulted in touchdowns, so he just barely missed the mark of 11.875 percent. Had Goff posted the same numbers on 16 pass attempts, he would’ve had a perfect passer rating.

Passer rating is entirely numbers-based, so no one is making the decision to keep Goff from a perfect mark. If someone was in charge, though, perhaps they could be petitioned to consider Goff’s receiving touchdown as a way to call it even and make up for the low touchdown rate.