At one point this season, Jared Goff completed 30 straight passes to Amon-Ra St. Brown. That streak went on a bit and ended the following week against the Houston Texans, but it was still a remarkable streak by many measures. Next Gen Stats, gauging the difficulty of each throw during that 30-for-30 streak, gave it about a 1-in-780,000 (.0001 percent) chance of happening.
Spanning back to late in the 2021 season, when St. Brown emerged late as a rookie and Goff started playing a lot better than he did to start his Lions' tenure (perhaps not coincidentally in concert with each other), there have not been many more productive quarterback-wide receiver duos in the NFL.
After the aforementioned Week 9 game against the Packers, Lions head coach Dan Campbell talked about the connection between Goff and St. Brown.
"The connection between those two? It’s special. Those two have been clicking now for four years — really three and a half, it started about halfway through that ’21 season and it’s just built from there. If you’re a quarterback, we’ve got a dang good one, but it’s easy to throw to a guy like St. Brown because he gets open, he’s got body control, balance, he can separate, he’s got quickness, he’s got play speed, strong hands,” Campbell said. “They’ve done it well enough that they can think without speaking. They know each other, what they’re getting ready to do, and all that. So it’s special and they make each other better.”
Jared Goff and Amon-Ra St. Brown get high praise in ranking of QB-WR duos
Former Lions quarterback and current ESPN analyst Dan Orlovsky recently ranked his top-20 quarterback-wide receiver duos in the NFL for this season. Just for this season is an important note.
Goff and St. Brown are No. 4 on the list, behind Joe Burrow and Ja'Marr Chase, Jalen Hurts and A.J. Brown and Sam Darnold and Justin Jefferson. Recent developments between Hurts and Brown could arguably knock them down a spot or two.
Orlovsky had some notable praise for Goff and St. Brown.
"2024 stats: 81 completions, 892 yards, 10 touchdowns"
"This is the best chain-moving crew in the NFL, having accumulated 53 first downs (No. 1 overall) and zero drops. Goff has an 81.8% completion rate when he throws St. Brown's way, 13.2% above expectation per NFL Next Gen Stats. When Detroit needs to make a play, these two deliver."
That last line from Orlovsky summarizes the connection Goff and St. Brown have perfectly. In a critical situation, Goff will look St. Brown's way first every time. The opposing defense knows it, but usually can't do much to stop it.
