What a difference a year of good health makes.
The Rams’ offense returned to form in 2023 after injuries sunk the ship before it ever left the harbor in 2022. Better injury luck and a tweak to run-blocking concepts unlocked head coach Sean McVay’s attack and led to doubling-down on the approach this offseason.
What will that mean for 2024 success? Here’s a look at how the Rams’ offense looks entering Week 1 at the Detroit Lions:
Quarterbacks: Matthew Stafford, Jimmy Garoppolo, Stetson Bennett IV
Stafford is back after a half-week absence due to hamstring tightness and is ready to lead the offense while adding to his own historic résumé, sitting 977 passing yards and 10 touchdowns outside of the top-10 of each category in NFL history.
After his bounce-back performance last season, the Rams are confident in what they have in Stafford, still as accurate as he’s ever been with more knowledge than he’s ever had in Year 16. The backup situation is more in flux.
Garoppolo is suspended for two games for a performance-enhancing drug suspension dating to last season when he was a Raider. He’s the clear No. 2 for the Rams; he had some accuracy issues in joint practices, but McVay has long been a fan of Garoppolo’s and will rely on his starting experience should injury befall Stafford.
But for the next two weeks, Bennett will back up Stafford. He had a rocky preseason debut last month after his year away from football, but Bennett showed steady enough improvement (and didn’t get rattled by his mistakes) to earn McVay’s trust.
Running backs: Kyren Williams, Blake Corum, Ronnie Rivers, Cody Schrader
The work distribution in this room will be fascinating to watch in the early weeks of the season.
Williams was one of the breakthrough stars last season, and his return from injured reserve helped jumpstart the Rams’ late-season push to the playoffs. But his workload last season was unsustainable, sometimes approaching 95% of the Rams’ offensive snaps in a given week.
Enter Corum, third-round pick out of Michigan and third running back off the board in April’s draft. As training camp and the preseason progressed, the two have split first-team reps. Williams is still expected to be the starter in Week 1, but McVay has also announced him as the Rams’ punt returner this year in an effort to get the ball in Williams’ hand more. What that means for the overall running back rotation will be something to keep an eye on.
Wide receivers: Cooper Kupp, Puka Nacua, Demarcus Robinson, Jordan Whittington, Tutu Atwell, Tyler Johnson
A lot has changed in this room since a year ago. Nacua is no longer just some fifth-round pick, but a history-making star at the position. Robinson is no longer helping out on special teams, and instead is a trusted, always-open weapon in Stafford’s arsenal. Whittington is not at Texas, he’s riding a strong preseason into the expectations of contributing as a rookie.
And Kupp is now two years removed from his last fully healthy season.
Ankle and hamstring issues have hampered Kupp since his 2021 triple crown season. But this is the first time he had a full, healthy offseason since prior to that 2021 campaign that preceded the Rams’ Super Bowl LVI victory. No surgery to recover from, no late-season wound that needed to heal.
Kupp got a full winter, spring and summer to prepare for 2024, and the Rams had a full offseason to re-imagine their offense with both Kupp and Nacua. The latter’s ability to break downfield plays takes pressure off Kupp, 31, to do the same. Instead, he can focus on the move-the-chains stuff that has made him so valuable in the past.
Think, for a second, back to the start of 2022. The Rams’ offensive line issues were of an incomprehensible magnitude, and Stafford had to get the ball out quickly. Kupp averaged nine catches and 90.3 yards per game in eight weeks under those circumstances before his high-ankle sprain. If the Rams’ offensive line issues this fall persist, it’s not crazy to think of a similar usage of Kupp.
Tight ends: Colby Parkinson, Davis Allen, Tyler Higbee, Hunter Long
Higbee will miss at least the first four weeks of the season as he recovers from January knee surgery.
In the meantime, Parkinson is the clear alpha in the room. Used primarily as a run blocker in Seattle, Parkinson has flashed some underutilized skills as a pass catcher this summer and developed a good rapport with Stafford. But Allen and Long will still contribute, particularly the former in the passing game
Offensive line: Rob Havenstein, Steve Avila, Kevin Dotson, Jonah Jackson, Alaric Jackson, Joe Noteboom, Warren McClendon, Beaux Limmer, Logan Bruss
This room has been in a state of flux for a month now, but it looks as though the Rams will fly to Detroit this weekend with at least three of their presumed starters cleared to play.
Avila, Dotson and Jonah Jackson – the free-agent acquisition who missed time with a shoulder injury in camp – are ready to go this weekend, though Avila has moved back to left guard while Jackson works at center as the Rams look for the right combination up front. Alaric Jackson is suspended for two weeks, but Noteboom is a reliable veteran who can fill in at left tackle.
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Havenstein (ankle) is the wild card entering Week 1. He’s back participating in some fashion at practice, but whether he’s ready for live bullets against Aidan Hutchinson remains to be seen. McClendon has been a pleasant surprise for the Rams, but an in-game injury to him or Noteboom could send the Rams scrambling given the lack of tackle depth on the roster.
Specialists: K Joshua Karty, P Ethan Evans, LS Alex Ward
The Rams feel confident in Karty, a sixth-round pick, after a year of tough sledding from a variety of kickers in 2023. Evans remains a strong leg, but the Rams are still finding their footing as a coverage unit.
