ALLEN PARK, Mich. -- He hasn't thrown a pass or taken a snap during the offseason. Even without those obvious markers, Detroit Lions quarterback Matthew Stafford already feels more comfortable than last year entering offseason workouts.

He knows the playbook. He knows the majority of the offensive roster. He knows who and what he'll be working with and that's a massive improvement.

As he grows more comfortable in the Lions' offense, QB Matthew Stafford plans to work on throwing more downfield during offseason workouts. Kevin Jairaj/USA TODAY Sports

"We'll add things this year that we didn't have last year," Stafford said. "And tweak the offense to make sure we're playing as good as we can."

One of the adjustments from last season was understanding the offense and the personnel, including new throws that were different than what Stafford had to make under former offensive coordinator Scott Linehan.

Stafford said there weren't throws he felt he missed consistently in 2014, but knowing how each player runs their routes should help him more with another offseason and a full season with players such as Golden Tate and Eric Ebron, who were new to the Lions last season. Stafford plans on inviting Ebron, Tate, Calvin Johnson and the rest of his receivers to Georgia in July to work out prior to the season.

One of the things they might work on? Deep throws. Offensive coordinator Joe Lombardi hinted at the Lions' town hall meeting last month he would likely allow Stafford to take more downfield chances this season after he appeared to run a much more manageable, ball-control style of passing last season that limited turnovers and increased completions.

"I'm all for it," Stafford said. "Having another year in the offense is going to help that. Everybody understands it better. So that way we make the shorter plays more efficient. We make sure that we're hitting those. That gives the offensive coordinator and the quarterback and the team and the offense more confidence to go out there and take the big shot knowing that if it's second-and-10 we can get five of them back and have a manageable third down.

"It's on us to be more efficient on first and second down, that kind of thing, and then we take our shots when we're really rolling."

Helping Stafford become more efficient was part of the reason for the offense last season. The seventh-year quarterback is hoping to improve on his 2014 season where he made his second career playoff appearance, improved his completion percentage and cut down on his interceptions, but saw his yards and touchdowns drop from prior years.

"Obviously you win 11 games, that's a good season," Stafford said. "Not as good as we can be, for sure, but I think the first year in an offense, quite a few new faces in some spots all the way throughout the year as far as injuries go, but we battled, we hung together, we played really good, situational football late in games. Won a bunch of games late and that's what this league is about.

"You're not going to go out and blow everybody out every week. Finding a way to win games was big for us."

Detroit did that last season. With a schedule likely harder in 2015, they'll need him to do more than duplicate what he did a year ago.