Which LA Rams opponents will be better than advertised?

The LA Rams face a formidable gauntlet of highly competitive opponents in 2022, but of those teams, you can pretty much gauge which team will be very good, and which teams will struggle. But as a rule for each and every opponent faced in 2022, the LA Rams can expect to face their best. That translates into games that will be surprisingly challenging.

The best of the NFL’s best teams in a 17-game season is quite the gauntlet folks.  And that strength of schedule does not take into account the crazy arms race that the AFC West teams found themselves engaged in this offseason. All four AFC West teams, already quite formidable, are even more weaponized for the 2022 NFL season.

That is quite the task ahead of the LA Rams this year.  Even as we gauge the best competitors from a safe distance, this looks like a difficult year. But of the 17 games facing the Rams right now, which team has made the type of moves that, if everything aligns, could be far more effective than most pundits and NFL analysts currently expect?

That’s the rub, isn’t it? Out-analyzing professional analysts? Well, we’ll give it a try.

After a quick review of the 2022 NFL schedule, we tried to analyze the schedule as a whole, notated when the team faced opponents on the road, and at home, and then noted when the Rams and their opponents had BYE weeks. Then, we sat down to analyze the off-season moves of the opponents, with a view toward all of the dominoes falling the right way.

Looking at the schedule twice, three times, and finally four times, we believe that there are three teams that could be far more challenging than first thought. Well, if everything goes their way, that is. In short, the Rams face three opponents who could play far tougher than advertised in 2022. Who are they? Well, to nobody’s surprise, the first team on our list is the San Francisco 49ers.