Some people are fans of the Los Angeles Rams. But many, many more people are NOT fans of the Los Angeles Rams. This 2025 Defector NFL team preview is for those in the latter group. Read all the previews so far here.
Your team: Los Angeles Rams, the only sports franchise in history dumb enough to leave Southern California for Saint Louis. Zero points for having the sense to move back.
Your 2024 record: 10-7, tied for first in the NFC with Seattle, though the Rams stole the division title on the fifth tiebreaker (strength of victory). The coward’s tiebreaker!
The popular narrative of the Rams’ season is that, following an injury-plagued early-season stumble, the team emerged as an NFC contender and provided the Eagles their toughest playoff test on Philly’s otherwise smooth road to the championship, which has them poised to contend once again this year. This is to be expected from the city that industrialized fiction and a fan base that habitually memory-holes the truth (try asking a Lakers fan about Kobe’s sexual assault case).
So let’s put some disinfecting sunlight on the bullshit. The Rams stumbled out of the gate as their entire offense (Puka Nacua) dealt with an injury. That included a Week 1 OT loss to the Lions, which was a rematch of the 2023 Wild Card game (the Rams lost that one, too). That’s one loss to Jared Goff per first-round pick they gave up to get rid of him.
That was followed by a Week 2 ass-stomping by the Cardinals in which the Rams gave up 15 percent of Marvin Harrison Jr’s rookie season yardage and 25 percent of his touchdowns. After squeaking by the Niners in their home opener, the Rams lost at Chicago (lol) after QB Matthew Stafford fumbled to set up a Bears TD and threw a game-sealing pick with a minute to play. The next week they lost to the Packers by an almost identical score. Entering the bye, the Rams were 1-4, Donald Trump wasn’t president, and I couldn’t go outside without bluebirds landing on my outstretched fingers.
Alas, the Rams won nine of their next 11 games, including barnburners like:
- A 20-15 win over the Raiders in which both Stafford and Gardner Minshew threw for exactly 154 yards and zero touchdowns (Minshew’s three interceptions to Stafford’s one was the difference in the game).
- An alleged “game” against the Niners that ended 12-6. The teams combined for zero touchdowns and fewer than 500 yards of offense.
- A 13-9 gift from the Cardinals to seal the NFC West; Kyler Murray, given two opportunities to steal the lead late, threw two interceptions, the second one at the Rams’ 1-yard line.
The Rams had a -19 point differential for the season, third-best in the NFC West. They were 17th in total DVOA. Congrats to them for beating Sam Darnold in a Wild Card game the week after he turned back into a pumpkin, I guess, but this team was remarkable only in the extent of its mediocrity.
MEW MEW MEW, but we were in the snow and almost beat the Eagles! Please. Try not fumbling the ball away twice in the fourth quarter. A warm-weather team going on the road in the playoffs and losing in the snow to a team with a better defense and better run game is such an obvious and moldy cliche that it’s barely worth acknowledging – kind of like the Rams secondary during Saquon Barkley’s 62- and 78-yard touchdown runs!
Your coach:
Sean McVay. By now you know the accolades: The youngest coach in NFL history. The youngest coach to win a Super Bowl and Coach of the Year. An innovator who hasn’t changed his haircut since 2003. An offensive genius who mind-birthed three whole points against an underwhelming Patriots team in the dullest Super Bowl in history. The only active coach who, if he misplaces his Norelco Bodygroom for a week, will be revealed to be the Wolf Man. Look at that shadow creeping up his face! He’s in a constant battle from becoming the body hair version of the Vacant Lot’s nose hair trimmer sketch.
McVay deserves all of the accolades he’s earned in reshaping the Rams from Jeff Fisher’s fraudulent husk to the fifth-most popular team in Los Angeles. But he also deserves WAY more scrutiny for dissolving like Matt Stafford’s cartilage at the first hint of adversity. The Rams famously traded away a franchise starter pack of draft picks to acquire Jalen Ramsey, Von Miller, and Stafford to power their 2021 Super Bowl run, and when injuries predictably hit aging stars the next season (most notably Stafford and Human Galactus Aaron Donald), the team went 5-12 without young depth to stay competitive. It was as predictable of a Super Bowl hangover as the one at any frat house, and McVay was surprised despite being the one who booked the tickets on Regression Air. He had ONE losing year and moaned all season to Diana Russini that he wanted to quit! As Jourdan Rodrigue wrote after that season:
[McVay] became emotionally distant from players and staff, consumed by his frustration. Sky-high expectations had been replaced by problems that the meticulous coach couldn’t control, and it was infuriating to him.
Oh so the boy genius that got elected mayor turned out to be immature? Knock me over with a feather. He wouldn’t last a month in Cleveland.
Six of McVay’s former assistants have been hired as NFL head coaches, and as many as two of them may be worth a shit. If you tuned in to the Rams’ playoff games, you heard the booth praising the work of defensive coordinator Chris Shula, who rose to the position after Raheem Morris left to author the next chapter of the Falcons pratfalling so hard their pants fly off and land atop a flagpole. Perhaps Shula is the real deal. Or – hear me out now – perhaps he’s a nepo baby who authored the 26th-ranked defense in the league by DVOA, and was only credited as a defensive genius after the Rams sacked Sam Darnold nine times in the Wild Card round one week after the Lions crafted the (obvious) playbook for beating him. Who can say. He’ll be a head coach in two years.
Speaking of nepo hires!
Golly, I wonder how Mike got the job. Surely his résumé is impeccable. From the Rams site:
He joined the team ahead of the 2023 season after serving as the New York Jets offensive coordinator for the two [previous] seasons.
LaFleur wasn’t retained after the Jets closed his second season there with six straight losses, the last three of which the team failed to score a touchdown. Good to see him land on his feet!
Your quarterback: 37-year-old Matt Stafford, darling of the internet’s tape grinders. (Do not call him Matthew! Matthews look like they’ve read a book without pictures.) For roughly three quarters of every season, Stafford will grit through a nagging injury and finish games with a Brian Hoyer stat line, but also make one throw into a tight window that will make the Derek Klassens of the world say, “No one else makes this throw!”
But two or three times a season—typically on primetime and against your favorite team—Stafford goes unconscious and throws for 400 yards against the 2000 Ravens, which refuels the hype train all over again. This tiki-headed dullard is perfect for the Rams: great enough in spots to cast a halo over the swaths of mediocrity.
NFL media has already started to gaslight us into thinking that Stafford—two Pro Bowls in 16 seasons, exactly one season with 10-plus starts and fewer than 10 interceptions—is an all-time great because he’s a Super Bowl champion, so let’s go ahead and tell the truth about beating a 10-7 Bengals team: He got outplayed by Joe Burrow in the younger QB’s first-ever playoff run, Aaron Donald and Von Miller are the reason the Rams won the game, and the game-winning touchdown happened after Cincinnati committed three defensive penalties inside the 10-yard line. The Super Bowl MVP, which is designed to go to the winning team’s quarterback, was awarded to Cooper Kupp. That’ll happen when you throw two picks in the most important game of your career.
If it sounds like I’m talking about Stafford in the past tense, that’s because Stafford’s back is actively campaigning for him to retire. No, I’m kidding: his back is fine, just as long as he doesn’t walk or throw or bend over to pick up a sock. He’ll be ready to absorb a hit that exerts the same force as a car crash by Week 1. Maybe Week 2. A short IL stint. The PUP list. Let’s not put a number on it, OK? As every human over the age of 35 can testify, it is very easy to recover from a back injury, and you certainly get back to 100 percent once you do.
Backing up Stafford—read: starting too many games this season—is Jimmy Garoppolo. I can’t believe this guy is still around. I can’t believe he’s started 64 games in his career. I can’t believe the 49ers paid him $137 million to get replaced by Mr. Irrelevant. I can, however, believe that when you type “Jimmy Garoppolo” into Google, it will offer up an autocomplete of “Jimmy Garoppolo girlfriend” with no secondary option like “Jimmy Garoppolo stats” or “Jimmy Garoppolo career” or “Jimmy Garoppolo two interceptions in Super Bowl loss.” We all have our legacies, I guess.
Filling out the QB room is Stetson Bennett IV, who’s the funhouse version of Stafford: A Georgia quarterback who was never praised for his talent, but DID win national titles. Photos from this preseason will one day grace his Kia dealership in Athens.
What’s new that sucks: The Rams parted with franchise legend/secret Paul brother Cooper Kupp this offseason, and replaced him with an even older wideout: Davante Adams, who cobbled together his fifth consecutive 1,000-yard season after Aaron Rodgers forced the Jets to trade for him. That streak will end this season when he gets half the targets that Nacua does.
The only other notable addition in free agency was DT Poona Ford, who should help shore up a run defense that struggled at the point of attack. Did I mention Saquon Barkley’s 62- and 78-yard touchdown runs in the Rams’ playoff exit? I did?
AHAHAHA. This is my favorite writing job in 15 years.
In the draft, the Rams used their first pick on second-round TE Terrance Ferguson, who should bolster a tight end room that was largely anonymous after 32-year-old Tyler Higbee lost most of last season to an ACL and MCL tear suffered in the aforementioned Wild Card loss to the Lions. They also added some defensive depth and Auburn RB Jarquez Hunter, who will take Blake Corum’s place as the intriguing rookie running back who never gets in the game, with the added benefit of making me say “Jarnathan!” if he ever does.
You know who they didn’t draft? Anyone to play on the offensive line a season after OT Rob Havenstein (age 33), OT Joe Noteboom (signed with the Ravens), C Jonah Jackson (traded to the Bears), and Steve Avila all missed significant time to injury. Franchise-ish LT Alaric Jackson was healthy last year, but his two-game suspension for violating the league’s personal conduct policy is often rolled up in complaints of the Rams’ injury woes. He’s dealing with blood clots now. McVay says he’s “hopeful” Jackson will be able to start Week 1. We all have hopes, Coach. I hope Jennifer Connelly tries to break up my marriage. Doesn’t mean I have a plan to make it happen.
Not to worry! The Rams signed LT D.J. Humphries, most notable for being the Cardinals’ first-round pick from—[flips calendar pages backward] [keeps flipping]—2015. He tore his ACL at the end of the 2023 season, signed with the Chiefs last season, and didn’t play a snap in the Super Bowl despite 100 million people saying things like, “The Chiefs O-line has been decimated by injuries” and “Wow the Chiefs O-line needs help” and “Joe Thuney is getting mauled at tackle, is there no one else who can play the position?” That’s who’s going to step up and protect Stafford’s wobbly Jenga tower of a spinal column.
On the defensive side, the Rams had one of the worst secondaries in the league last year. Yes, while DROY Jared Verse and the front seven were applying pressure, any quarterback with a quick release could blindly heave the ball downfield and find a receiver as open and unbothered as a Nazi on Gavin Newsom’s podcast. Hear it from the FTN Almanac:
34.1% of pass attempts while the Rams were getting pressure went to open receivers (2 to 5 yards of separation), fourth most in the league. 11.9% more went to wide open receivers, with more than 5 yards of separation, also fourth most in the league. That’s nearly half of these attempts going to receivers with no one remotely close to them, the worst figure in the NFL. When the Rams corners were in coverage, things weren’t much better, with no Rams cornerback finishing in the top 40 in coverage DVOA.
Here is where I should note the additions the Rams made to the secondary. I should note it, but I cannot because they did NOTHING. Well, OK, they DID re-sign CB Ahkello Witherspoon, who got benched midseason. That’s like treating a bullet wound with a gunshot (AKA “LAPD First Aid”).
Kyren Williams got paid, which seems fair for carrying Stafford’s ass up and down the field last year.
What has always sucked: It’s easy to point at Las Vegas and Phoenix as cities that shouldn’t exist, but there’s something to be said for LA’s destruction of what was one of America’s most beautiful and biodiverse natural areas. These idiots literally paved paradise. They paved a river! I love to live in a city with famously racist cops and a faint whiff of public transit because rich people a century ago loved redlining. Christ. I’m going to die in a wildfire parked in standstill traffic on the 101 during the ‘28 Olympics.
If you think it’s dumb when fanbases label themselves Raiders Nation or the 12s, try saying “Welcome to the Ramily!” out loud. DORKS.
It would be in poor taste to use this space to speak ill of a player’s wife, and so I will NOT say that Kelly Stafford’s head is filled with day-old chowder. She seems nice, and her podcast is … newsworthy.
I can’t see Adam Lefkoe at the Inside the NBA desk without thinking, “This is Sean McVay’s fault.”
Les Snead is the name of a silent movie villain who ties a woman to railroad tracks.
Kobe Bryant is the most overrated player in NBA history. Dear Basketball deserved an Oscar about as much as Crash.
What might not suck: The light at golden hour really IS special. Also the Rams face the AFC South and NFC South this season, a gauntlet of clownshoes and bikehorns that Sean McVay could hand off to Marty Lafleurshula Jr and still make the playoffs.
HEAR IT FROM THE FANS!
Josh:
After spending the off-season hanging their “Almost Beat the Eagles in the Playoffs” banner, let’s remind everyone that Sean McVay’s erratic off-season decision-making and overindulgence by the Rams front office led to that exact fucking outcome.
In 2023, they draft Steve Avila who plays well at guard. So what the fuck do they do in 2024? They sign walking injury report Jonah Jackson to an albatross of a contract with the expectation that Avila will kick inside to center. Only for McVay to change his mind in August and have Jackson go to center, a position he hadn’t played since fucking college. Anyway both of them got hurt and they ended up starting 6th round rookie Beaux Limmer, the center who bit on back to back inside steps from Jalen Carter to get Stafford annihilated and end our season.
Oh but it wouldn’t have been that fucking close if maybe, just motherfucking maybe they had kept their best run stuffing middle linebacker and team captain to maybe sniff out one or two of those MASSIVE fucking Saquon Barkley runs. But the wunderkind hair gel mannequin traded him two weeks before the season started to the Titans who then proceeded to trade him to the division rival Seahawks for MORE than what the Rams got for him.
And let’s not forget Andy Benoit has a Super Bowl championship because of Sean McVay.
Fuck this fucking team.
Kevin:
They wound up being the only serious playoff obstacle standing in the way of the Eagles Super Bowl victory that the nation was forced to endure, yet they couldn’t pull it off. For this alone, they should be mocked, despised and perhaps relegated to the UFL. Even bro wonder Sean McVay couldn’t scheme up a game-winning TD from 13 measly yards away in the snow…because the Rams O-line forgot to block a game-wrecking Jalen Carter—TWICE!
Lance:
As a native Angeleno of a certain age, I remember the Rams’ first go-round in LA — or rather Anaheim, which they’d already decamped to for some time. They were roundly mediocre in my earliest memories and absolutely terrible in the years leading up to their departure. I did not care when they left after the ’94 season. Why would I? I considered myself a dyed-in-the-wool 49er fan. They had Steve Young and Jerry Rice after all! All my friends cheered for non-local teams, except for a few who’d thrown in with the Raiders. It wasn’t until the ’99 Greatest Show on Turf team that I realized what I had lost. I wasn’t from fucking San Francisco! As the Niners took a turn for the worse and the Rams were on the upswing, I switched allegiances (like the bad fan I am). I had to. Those Rams were an absolute miracle. Watching from afar as that previously dogshit team put up video game numbers, I felt a profound sadness that it wasn’t happening here. That should have been LA’s miracle. I’m basically the absentee husband that only realizes he loves his wife after she starts fucking a guy a few towns over. Such a cuck.
Being an LA Rams fan means being indebted to Jerry Jones for orchestrating their return instead of the (honestly more logical option) Raiders. I would rather owe a favor to Mephistopheles than Jerry Jones.
Neill:
I started an email just after the loss to a clearly better Eagles team but figured I’d wait to see what happened in the offseason. Come July, I realized that Snead and McVay actually had made a credible attempt to patch the holes we had. And yet.
Is everyone around me convinced the Rams are loaded for the playoffs? You know they are. Stafford remains hobbled and one decent hit from retirement, behind an O-line pulled from the streets and cobbled together with baling wire, but it’ll be fine; look at all the experience the O-line rotation (my God) got, and Stafford’s “been working out and looks healthy.” We’ve released or let walk triple digits in receptions and TDs, but that’ll be fine: Adams is “totally committed” and will “put the team on his back.” We had so many injuries last year, but *that* will be fine: we “have a healthy year coming to us.” McVay found his mojo again, and he is completely stable and not at all prone to existential crises.
I almost look forward to our inevitable Divisional loss at the hands of a healthier team.
Matt:
In a city with so many great teams and a metric boat load of people, being a Rams fan can be the most underwhelming feeling.
We’ve got a good team, excellent coach, and solid front office, but there are more people concerned about Labubu dolls in LA county than whether the Rams have one more Super Bowl run left in them. It’s impressive how underwhelming being a fan of this team can feel.
I can’t wait for the inevitable leak that Davante Adams is squeezing in a round of golf at Lakeside or Sherwood on a rehab day. The second someone says Cooper Kupp would never disrespect the game/team like that, he’s going to have a melt down faster than a Palisades mid century modern (sorry).
We did nothing to improve our lackluster cornerback room, so I’m concerned we haven’t seen the last of Los Angeles getting torched this year (I’ll see myself out).
Jonathan:
So. Adams? I feel like we got the Temu version of the Rodgers trade.
Kupp is going to hang 42 points per game on us.
Our draft choices this year were as cooked as the Palisades.
We still don’t have a quarterback succession plan. We have two first round picks in 2026. Can’t wait to draft Nico lamaleava and one of Carson Beck’s elbows.
Using the Dodgers’ capitulation as a yardstick, I can’t wait to see the Rams’ AUDIENCE RAIDCAM SPONSORED BY ICE on the InfinityScreen(tm) this upcoming season.
When Gavin Newsome regains control of the National Guard, you know he’ll deport even *more* citizens because HE’S TOUGH ON IMMIGRATION. (Don’t think too hard. Voters won’t.)
Stan Kroenke and Steve Ballmer previously approved of a subway extension to their stadiums until they realized subway stations would use (their) land and THIS magical revelation turned them against and killed the project. Fuck them with all 16 lanes of the 405.
Luke:
I was only 5 when the Rams won the Super Bowl in the 1999 season, so the majority of my cognitive Fandom has been witnessing the mediocrity of the Mid 2000s through the Mid 2010s. This current regime has been nothing but a blessing for me and it’ll be something I’ll cherish my entire life as a fan. That being said:
– Our fanbase is full of people that didn’t know this team existed until 2019
– We just signed Alaric Jackson to an extension and now he might not even play the season due to blood clots
– JD Vance, being a casual Bengals fan, could not remember it was the Rams that beat them in Super Bowl 56
– Puka now has to deal with a gold digging babymomma
– I am SICK AND TIRED of Lions and Rams fans arguing who won/is winning the Goff/Stafford trade
– If i live to be 100 and I STILL have to hear about the Robey-Coleman hit, and the absolute egg that was Super Bowl 53
– Kroenke moved my team. Fuck him and Kevin Demoff, who is a massive snake in the grass and should be getting just as much hate, if not more.
– Fuck me for living in Kansas City yet being too stubborn to join the Chiefs Kingdom after the Rams relocated (but hey at least we didn’t get blown out by the Eagles)
Craig:
45 plus years as a Ram fan and it seems that for the last decade the Rams always draft a RB when they have a talented one already.
Zac Stacy? Did great his first year. Rams reward him by drafting his replacement as in that very next season.
Fast forward to this year’s draft. We have Corum as the backup, a smiliar version to our starter.
Corum gets barely any touches. So the Rams draft another RB who is supposed to be faster and a complete opposite of the ding dong they picked last year.
McVay is the best coach the Rams have had since the first Chuck Know HC years (he came back later and crapped the bed).
When McVay calls some exotic play when we only need a yard, I look around and see if Mike Martz is actually on the sidelines.
Snead is strong at drafting in the later rounds but his track record in the first few rounds are not as good compared to those 4th through six rounds. Williams and Pukka are late round picks.
Speaking of picks, the Rams constantly fail to draft a legit LB, even though it is so obvious to the homeless guy taking a shit on someone rich dude’s doorstep in Venice.
They see Troy Reeder, the doppelganger of Derek Carr right down to the weird eyeliner, as legit.
Even though he has one minor issue. He can’t tackle on the edges and whiffs on right into his face.
Being one of the idiots who bought a PSL for the privilege of having season tickets, in the club section, it still bothers me that Kevin Demoff ignores adding vegan food beyond a salad for club members.
The only bright spot?
Seeing Flea from the Red Hot Chili Peppers taking a piss in the urinal next to me.