Matthew Stafford is starting to feel like this year’s Christian McCaffrey. The Rams have been practicing for almost three weeks, and he still hasn’t made it on the field.
Sean McVay says Stafford threw about 60 balls on Saturday, putting him seemingly on track to return to practice this week. But the veteran didn’t feel well enough to go at today’s session.
Stafford has disc irritation in his back. He’s 37, and he’s taken a pounding over the years. It’s starting to seem pretty likely the Rams will be playing some regular season games without him.
McVay says surgery hasn’t yet been discussed as an option. “There’s been a lot of conversations about what’s the best method of how we want to approach it,” McVay said, via ESPN. “That hasn’t been something that comes up.”
If Stafford is healthy and doing his thing, he’ll probably finish with above-average passing numbers. He’s averaged 245 passing yards in his last 40 games, with 54 TDs. (That TD rate over a 17-game season would result in 23 TDs; we’ve got them up at 27 TDs on our board.)
If Stafford is sitting out or playing as a lesser, compromised version of himself, those estimates look high.
If there’s a silver lining here, it’s Jimmy Garoppolo. While Garoppolo is maligned, he should fit much better into this offense than he did in Josh McDaniels’ system in Las Vegas. Garoppolo looked credible in a Week 18 fill-in start against Seattle last year, completing 27 of 41 for 334 yards, with 2 TDs and 1 interception. The Rams were resting a bunch of starters in that game, but they were going against a Seattle defense that was playing well and using it’s regulars.
Garoppolo isn’t as good as a healthy Stafford, but the dropoff probably isn’t as severe as most are expecting.
Still, if the Rams don’t have Stafford, wide receivers Puka Nacua and Davante Adams don’t look as compelling.
—Ian Allan