LA Rams defend SoFi Stadium, next home game will be Giants

Despite no fans and preseason of hearing all the ways they would lose, the LA Rams win their home opener in SoFi Stadium

To say that the LA Rams are disrespected by the entire NFL would be a little over the top. To say that the Rams are highly respected would be far too optimistic.  You see, the 2020 version of the LA Rams is a bit too complex to describe in ten words or less. Without a quick buzz catch-phrase, national media takes little interest. Perhaps the best impression of the Rams so far tracks one of two ways.

The first is the national impression of the team. That version is a poorly managed team filled with bloated contracts, sub-performing players who are just happy to collect a paycheck and mail it in each week. In their eyes, quarterback Jared Goff is at best a 3000 yard 20 TD 20 INT sort of quarterback who is overpaid and underwhelming. That perspective views the LA Rams as sub-par and the least competitive team in the NFC West.

A better perspective

The second is a more intimate impression. Not a walking-on-water view by any means. Simply one that recognized just how patched together the Rams were a season ago. That voice of reason that anticipated a healthier 2020 offensive line would outperform the patched up 2019 offensive line.  The logic that suggested that the team’s addition of run defender Leonard Floyd, return to the lineup of Micah Kiser and a Rams secondary built to complement one another.

There are things to work on. The Rams are not a “finished product” by any means. But the team managed to exercise a huge demon from 2019. It wasn’t losing to the Dallas Cowboys, but rather the way that the team lost last year, that deflated the Rams.  it also complicated the team’s 2020 debut. A Cowboys team that ran all over the Rams now faced the same team with questionable inside linebackers. Could the Rams stop the Cowboys runners?