When asked if he plans to bench Jared Goff, Sean McVay doesn’t dismiss him quickly

The 7-4 Rams went 2-2 in November. In both losses, quarterback Jared Goff didn’t play well.

A day after coach Sean McVay said Goff needed to take better care of the ball, McVay was asked if he was considering shooting Goff in either of those two losses, against the Dolphins and 49ers.

“If I thought it would be the best thing to just take a deep breath and walk away, then I would say, maybe,” McVay said. “But not in either of those situations, because both of them kind of reflected an opportunity where there were enough games to come back to it. The Dolphins’ game, maybe a little different, but I thought it was important to be able to play some of those things, to learn from them, especially based on some of the things they were activating defensively.

“Yesterday, each of these situations that happened that ended up hurting us, were a little different in themselves. All were in opposition to a man-blanket type situation, the three turnovers he had. Really for us we got back into this game where we had a good bit of momentum on this drive, which you get the big game to [receiver] Cooper [Kupp], then you end up hitting [receiver] Josh Reynolds and then we kind of missed a touchdown for [running back] Darrell Henderson who ended up getting 17-6. Then Aaron [Donald] does an amazing job of forcing the fumble [which resulted in a touchdown] And then the next thing you know the next drive you get is where you see [running back] Cam [Akers] smash a 61 yard yardstick and he’s got a tough, tough run in the red zone that two plays later you hit him and then you look up and you win the game.

“Yesterday that was never part of the consideration or really in Miami, to answer your question.”

What’s amazing about McVay’s response is that it was so long. When a team has a real franchise quarterback and a reporter asks the coach if he is considering benching the franchise quarterback, the coach does not engage in an extended monologue. to explain when asked why this had not happened. He just says, “Because he’s our quarterback,” or maybe something a lot less tactical.

That doesn’t mean Goff is in danger of being put on the bench (his replacement is Wolfords’ John Wolford “Who The Hell Is That?”), But McVay’s failure to dismiss the question in a knee-jerk style is telling. .