Cal quarterback Jared Goff leaving early for NFL draft

Cal has announced it will hold a news conference at 10 a.m. PT on Thursday, during which time star quarterback Jared Goff will “discuss his future plans”.

Goff and Memphis quarterback Paxton Lynch are widely regarded as the top two quarterback prospects in this year’s draft class, with a sizable gap between them and their nearest competitors, such as Connor Cook.

Even with those inconsistencies, Goff, a starter since the Bears’ season opener as a freshman, finished this season with 4,719 yards, 43 TDs and 13 INTs while hitting on 64.5 percent of his passes. The 43 touchdowns broke the Pac-12’s single-season touchdown pass record, which was set by Oregon’s Marcus Mariota in 2014.

“You have to get a calculator with Goff’s numbers”, Stanford head coach David Shaw said, according to the Bay Area News Group’s Jeff Faraudo. He completed 25 of 37 passes for 467 yards with six touchdowns and no interceptions against Air Force on Tuesday at the Lockheed Martin Armed Forces Bowl, setting Cal bowl and Armed Forces Bowl records.

The young quarterback leaves Cal as the school’s record-holder in just about every passing category imaginable.

Goff is basically a unanimous first-round pick and predicted to be the first or second quarterback selected.

Goff will likely be put in the same situation in the National Football League, being named the quarterback to help turn around a bad team, either by starting right away or by learning under the incumbent starting quarterback for a season or two. Goff said he has “a million things” to learn to become successful in the NFL.