Kliff Kingsbury raved about Sean McVay on Wednesday.
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For the first time as NFL head coaches, Sean McVay and Kliff Kingsbury will square off on Sunday. The two are close off the field, but this will be the first time they face each other on opposing sidelines.
Kingsbury nearly joined McVay’s staff last offseason after he was fired by Texas Tech, but instead opted for the Cardinals’ head coaching vacancy after accepting a job as USC’s offensive coordinator.
On Wednesday, Kingsbury said he was “close” to joining the Rams, even after the USC opening came about.
"To learn under Sean would have been huge and just didn't work out," Kingsbury said.
Of course, Kingsbury found himself in a great spot with the Cardinals as their head coach, and he credits his current job to McVay. He told Arizona media members that if not for McVay, he wouldn’t be in this position.
#K2 On if he and Rams Head Coach Sean McVay have talked during the season:
“Even when I got this job in the division, he was really helpful with me. I wouldn’t have this job if it weren’t for him.” pic.twitter.com/nBqdvGS0zs
On a conference call with Rams media, he discussed further how helpful McVay has been during his transition to the NFL.
“Sean was great. Even though we’re in the same division, anything that I needed once I got the job – questions, thoughts, giving real advice – he was great,” Kingsbury said. “That’s just the type of person that he is – those of you that have been around him. We haven’t talked much during the season – both of us have jobs in the same division – but, he knows that I’m always cheering for him 14 out of 16 games and I’m sure he’s doing the same.”
Kingsbury and the Cardinals can play spoiler on Sunday afternoon against the Rams. A win would drop Los Angeles to 6-6 on the year, effectively ending any playoff hopes McVay’s squad had.
Three Rams have knee injuries, while another is recovering from an ankle issue.
After playing on Monday night, the Rams were given both Tuesday and Wednesday off from practice. They’ll be back on the field Thursday ahead of this weekend’s matchup with the Cardinals.
As a result, Wednesday’s injury report was just an estimation for the players listed. There were four players listed as non-participants, two on each side of the ball. Marqui Christian, Gerald Everett and Rob Havenstein have knee injuries, while Darious Williams is still recovering from an ankle injury.
Christian’s injury is the only one not previously disclosed. Sean McVay said Gerald Everett is day-to-day after hyperextending his knee Monday night, while Havenstein could return this week after missing two games.
There are no major concerns on the Cardinals’ side with several players getting veteran days off.
The Rams will practice on Thursday and Friday before their NFC matchup in Arizona. This is a must-win game for Los Angeles, as six losses will surely make it near-impossible for the Rams to make the playoffs.
Aaron Donald has once again been a stud for the Rams this season.
The Rams probably won’t be sending many players to the Pro Bowl this year with Jared Goff, Todd Gurley and Andrew Whitworth having down years, but Aaron Donald is one of the few standouts who hasn’t slowed down.
In an update released by the NFL on Wednesday, Donald leads all defensive tackles in Pro Bowl voting with 128,397 votes. The AFC leader at defensive tackle, Cameron Heyward of the Steelers, has 90,351 votes.
Donald is the only player who leads his position in voting, but another former Ram does, too. Marcus Peters has the most votes of any cornerback in the NFL at 110,949. Peters has been a stud for the Ravens since being traded by the Rams and is deserving of a spot in the Pro Bowl.
Players such as Cory Littleton and Jalen Ramsey still have time to earn votes from fans, but as of now, it’s looking like Donald is the only lock to make the Pro Bowl.
Sean McVay isn’t worried about the incident between Jalen Ramsey and Marcus Peters.
After the Ravens picked apart and dismantled the Rams on Monday night at the Coliseum, Marcus Peters and Jalen Ramsey got into it on the field and exchanged words. Ramsey had to be restrained by a member of the Rams and was held back all the way down to the team’s locker room.
Peters was seen taunting Ramsey during the game and even mocked his usual celebration, which appeared to anger the Rams cornerback. Ramsey refused to answer any questions about the altercation after the game, attempting to move on from the disappointing night.
Sean McVay wasn’t immediately aware of the confrontation between Ramsey and Peters and didn’t see them arguing until they were separated, but on Tuesday, he was asked if he talked to Ramsey about it.
“I have not, I haven’t spoken to him,” McVay said. “I addressed the team, we talked about a couple of things today. We’ve been getting ready for Arizona. (Rams communications director) Artis (Twyman) had mentioned (it) to me before we started here. And then, I saw those guys talking when I was walking off the field, but by the time I had circled back, they were separated and really that’s kind of all I had seen about that.”
Postgame incidents are never something the NFL or its teams want to see, but this one was pretty harmless – especially compared to the fight between the Browns and Steelers a couple weeks ago.
McVay would not compare the Ramsey-Peters spat to the Myles Garrett-Mason Rudolph fight, saying it was just a matter of competitors going back and forth.
“What, just them talking back and forth? I’m not sure,” McVay said when asked if this was in the same category as the Browns-Steelers fight. “Guys have fun, that’s a part of it. What we always talk about is, as long as what goes on doesn’t take away from what we are trying to get done as a team, those are things that competitors (do), they go back and forth, but I think that’s a little bit of a different scenario than kind of what occurred in that game.”
McVay had a strong relationship with Peters while he was with the Rams, and he still does. He said he talked to the cornerback before and after the game, saying he’s playing at a high level for his new team.
“I talked to him before the game – Marcus and I have a great relationship – then I talked with him afterwards. He did a good job. That’s a really good football team and he’s playing at a high level for them,” he said.
McVay clearly wasn’t bothered by the incident after the game, as long as it doesn’t deter from the task at hand: winning games.
The Rams don’t look very smart for signing Jared Goff and Todd Gurley when they did.
Les Snead is widely viewed as one of the better general managers in the NFL. Since joining the Rams, he’s helped turn the franchise around after years of ineptitude and sub-.500 play. He’s done so with an aggressive approach to roster building, opting to acquire proven players via trade rather than adding assets with first- and second-round picks.
It’s paid off with the Rams reaching the Super Bowl last season, but after hitting a rough patch in 2019, one aspect of the Rams’ aggressive philosophy warrants criticism.
Snead and the front office have been more than generous when it comes to paying players before necessary. It’s an approach teams across the NFL have taken, attempting to get ahead of the market by extending their top players before they can field offers from other teams in free agency.
On paper, it’s a smart way to build a roster and secure a team’s future. But for the Rams, they’ve made this mistake too many times.
Two of the most glaring examples happened just a few years ago. Before the 2016 season kicked off, the Rams signed Tavon Austin to a four-year, $42 million extension. He still had two years left on his contract, but the Rams wanted to reward him and his 1,133 career receiving yards with a lucrative new deal.
Austin was traded during the 2018 draft, barely contributing in his one season with Sean McVay at the helm.
They did the same thing one year later with Alec Ogletree, giving him a four-year extension worth $42.75 million. Ogletree was set to hit free agency the following year and was just an average linebacker for the Rams, but the front office saw him as a key piece on defense…
…for about five months.
Ogletree was traded the following March, leaving the Rams to take on $6.4 million in dead money in 2018.
The Rams didn’t learn from those mistakes and continued to hand out contract extensions before necessary in the last couple of years.
In 2018, they signed Todd Gurley to a $60 million extension despite him having two years left on his rookie deal. His new contract hasn’t even kicked in yet, and will run for four more years until 2023.
With the way he’s been used on offense, there’s no doubt signing him to such a massive contract was a mistake, based on the timing of it all. If the Rams had waited a year and evaluated him for another season, they almost certainly would not have given Gurley the deal they did.
Of course, hindsight is 20-20, but giving a running back with a significant knee injury in the past all that money two years early was almost destined to fail.
(Photo by Kevork Djansezian/Getty Images)
Then came Jared Goff’s deal, the granddaddy of them all. After a year of declaring that they were going to be patient with the young quarterback and would eventually give him a huge extension, the Rams faked everyone out and signed him to a contract with the most guaranteed money in NFL history. Goff’s deal is for four years and is worth $134 million with $110 million guaranteed. He will have the largest cap hit in the league in 2020.
Goff has done nothing this season to make the Rams look smart for once again doling out a monster contract two years before they had to; Goff was under contract through 2020 and never threatened to hold out publicly.
Los Angeles’ front office has come under heavy criticism for signing Goff when it did, especially after seeing him regress to near-2016 form with 11 touchdown passes, 12 interceptions and 10 fumbles (five lost) in 11 games this season. And like Gurley, Goff’s contract extension hasn’t even gone on the books yet. It will in 2020 with a cap hit of $36 million.
In addition to those contracts, the Rams also made Rob Havenstein one of the highest-paid tackles in the league last year with a $32.5 million extension. Los Angeles looked smart for that contract after Havenstein improved in 2018, but he experienced a sharp decline in 2019.
Possibly the most surprising of all was the $29 million contract Tyler Higbee got from the Rams this year, despite Gerald Everett being on the roster. Higbee has never been a huge part of the passing game, and this season, he has just 26 catches for 212 yards and one touchdown. The Rams could have easily waited to sign Higbee, or simply let him walk in free agency next offseason and moved forward with Everett.
Brandin Cooks’ contract doesn’t look great right now, either, owning the fourth-highest cap hit on the team in 2020 at $16.8 million. Just with the four highest-paid players on the roster – Goff, Aaron Donald, Cooks and Gurley – the Rams have $95.1 million on the books next season.
They’re not in great shape cap-wise, and that’s before even mentioning the need to re-sign Jalen Ramsey next year, and likely Cooper Kupp, John Johnson and Everett the following year. Signing Gurley, Goff and Higbee when they did was questionable, and it doesn’t shine a very bright light on the front office.
After getting torched by Lamar Jackson, the Rams will face yet another dynamic quarterback in Kyler Murray.
“I kid you not, and I wouldn’t lie to you guys. Half the time, I didn’t know where the ball was.”
That was said by Eric Weddle after the Rams got their “faces peeled off” by the Ravens, as the veteran safety put it. He and his fellow defenders had no idea how to stop MVP frontrunner Lamar Jackson, who torched them for five touchdown passes and 95 yards rushing in only three quarters of play.
The good news is, the Rams won’t have to face Jackson again this season unless they miraculously make it to the Super Bowl. The bad news is, they have to play a quarterback with similar speed and quickness twice in the next five weeks – beginning on Sunday when the Rams visit Kyler Murray and the Cardinals.
It’s the team’s first taste of Murray, who’s in contention for Offensive Rookie of the Year after being drafted No. 1 overall by Arizona. He doesn’t run as much as Jackson, and the Cardinals don’t utilize zone reads the way Baltimore does, but Murray is certainly the second-fastest quarterback in the league.
With as much trouble as Jackson gave the Rams, it’s easy to wonder how Los Angeles will fare against another player like Murray. Sean McVay shared his thoughts on the Cardinals rookie Tuesday, calling him a “dynamic runner” who’s throwing the football well.
“Really impressive. Takes great care of the football. His ability to speed it up and be able to deliver the ball when he sees guys open is really impressive – just how twitchy he is,” McVay said. “He can obviously make throws from a bunch of different platforms. He can make plays in the pocket, out of the pocket. Then, you see just what dynamic runner he is as well. You look at a couple of the plays that he’s made as of late, where they’ve started to utilize him a little bit more as a runner. He’s playing with a lot of confidence and you can see why he was a No. 1 pick.”
Kliff Kingsbury and the Cardinals probably watched Baltimore’s dismantling of the Rams and loved what they saw. Los Angeles had no answer for Jackson, whether it was against the run or pass. When Weddle, one of the smartest players in the NFL, says he didn’t know where the ball was half the time, that’s alarming.
Expect to see plenty of read-options by the Cardinals on Sunday afternoon in an attempt to fool the Rams defense. At the very least, it can slow down the pass rush the way it did in Monday night’s drubbing.
Arizona is only 3-7-1, but this is yet another tough test for the Rams. They failed miserably against Jackson and the Ravens, so perhaps they learned from their mistakes and will be better prepared for yet another former Heisman winner.
Rob Havenstein could return this week against the Cardinals.
The Rams have played their last two games without right tackle Rob Havenstein after he suffered a knee injury in Week 10 against the Steelers. Rookie Bobby Evans has stepped in and done well, allowing zero sacks and very little pressure in his first two career starts.
Los Angeles could be getting Havenstein back against the Cardinals on Sunday as he continues to progress from his knee injury. Sean McVay shared a positive update on Havenstein Tuesday, but wouldn’t say for sure if he will return this week.
Making good progress with Rob Havenstein,” McVay said. “There’s a chance that he could be ready to go. We’ll have a little bit more of an update as the week progresses.”
Evans has done a good job at right tackle and has led some to believe maybe the Rams would stick with him even when Havenstein returns. That won’t be the case, though.
“If he’s ready to go, we’ll get him back in there,” McVay said of whether Havenstein would start.
The Rams gave Havenstein a four-year, $31.5 million contract in 2018, and he made them look smart for it last season. However, he’s struggled mightily this season, going from playing like one of the best right tackles in football to below-average.
Los Angeles needs him to play well the rest of this season and beyond after making him a top-paid tackle, which would also allow Evans to head back to the bench to develop further.
Sean McVay shared an update on Gerald Everett’s knee injury.
Rams tight end Gerald Everett only played 17 snaps on Monday night against the Ravens, his second-fewest of the season. It seemed like he simply wasn’t a big part of the game plan, but he actually suffered an injury in the first half.
While blocking Matt Judon on a sack of Jared Goff, Everett hyperextended his knee. It looked like a significant injury, but it’s not believed to be one that sidelines him for a while. Sean McVay shared an update on Everett during his press conference on Tuesday, calling him day-to-day.
“Seems like we came out of the game pretty clean,” McVay began. “There was a situation earlier on in the game where Gerald might’ve tweaked his knee a little bit. He’ll be day-to-day. It was when he was in a protection and kind of just buckled his knee.”
Everett was never ruled out or questionable to return, which was a good sign for the tight end’s health. However, Tyler Higbee dominated the playing time at tight end from there on, playing 70% of the snaps.
Everett will have one fewer day to recover this week with the Rams having played on Monday night, but hopefully he’ll be available against the Cardinals in Week 13.
The Rams opened as 3.5-point favorites on the road against the Cardinals.
The Rams hope Week 13 brings a very different result than their 39-point loss to the Baltimore Ravens on Monday night. Unfortunately, they’ll have to face a quarterback with a similar skill set as Lamar Jackson, and instead of being at home, the Rams will be the road team.
Still, despite their embarrassing loss to the Ravens, Los Angeles opened as the favorite over the Cardinals in Week 13. According to BetMGM, the 6-5 Rams are favored by 3.5 points against Arizona, which sits at 3-7-1 through 11 games.
The over/under is 47.5 points, so the oddsmakers expect it to be a fairly high-scoring game. It’s the fifth-highest total of any game this week.
The Cardinals are 5-1-1 against the spread in their last seven games, so they’ve done a good job of keeping games close despite being underdogs in each game. The Rams, on the other hand, 3-3 ATS in their last six games.
The Cardinals have lost four games in a row, but they were close to beating the 49ers twice and lost to the Buccaneers by just three points. This team is much better than its 3-7-1 record, so the Rams should not take them lightly.
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Jared Goff can’t pick one thing that the Rams must fix offensively.
Last season, the Rams averaged 33 points per game, which was good for second-best in the NFL. They only had one game in which they failed to score at least 23 points, rolling to a 13-3 record and eventual Super Bowl appearance.
In comparison, Los Angeles has scored just 35 total points in its last three games and now only average 22.6 points per game on the year – 14th in the NFL. The numbers don’t tell the whole story because the offense has been abysmal in recent weeks, and is one of the biggest reasons for Los Angeles’ unimpressive record.
Jared Goff is obviously at the forefront of it all, being the leader of the offense. He hasn’t thrown a touchdown since Halloween and has five interceptions and four fumbles in his last three games.
After Monday’s demoralizing 45-6 loss to the Ravens, Goff was asked what needs to happen for the Rams to fix their offense.
“A million things. I think there’s no one thing. It’s just be better consistently. I know that’s easy to say, but it’s the truth. We need to be better down-in and down-out and not kill ourselves with little mistakes, penalties. I can distribute the ball better, we can do different things in the run game. There’s a million things. There’s not one thing and I think you just have to focus every single day on getting better, trusting the people around you and just do your best.”
A million is a slight exaggeration by the fourth-year quarterback, but he’s not wrong about the number of issues plaguing the Rams. They’re committing bad penalties at inopportune times, even taking a touchdown off the board against the Bears last week.
The ground game has gotten nothing going as Los Angeles ranks 24th in rushing and 26th in yards per carry.
Goff isn’t one to point fingers and he’s not doing that here, but at the same time he probably realizes he’s not the only player to blame for the Rams’ struggles. When asked about the offense as a whole and whether the Rams are far off from being an elite team, he had this to say.
“I don’t know. It’s so hit or miss every week. You want to stay consistent, but I think this game just got away from us. That’s the best way to describe it. Got away from us and I think everyone on offense, defense, special teams would look at themselves and say, ‘We can be better.’ I’ve said this before, it starts with me. I can be better and I think like I mentioned, we let the game get away from us.”
The Rams are running out of time to get the ship righted, having just five weeks left in the season. With their playoff hopes all but evaporated, this team might have to start looking forward to 2020 instead of the postseason.
