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The Los Angeles Rams have had a terrible start to the 2024 NFL season. Los Angeles has dealt with a ton of injuries on the offensive side of the ball, which has kept them from winning games. The Rams are 1-4 and at the bottom of the NFC West heading into their Week 6 bye. Now trade rumors are beginning to bubble surrounding the Rams.
Rams QB Matthew Stafford is someone the rumor mill is talking about, per ESPN's Jeremy Fowler and Dan Graziano. In their most recent article, Graziano pitches the idea that Matthew Stafford could be traded at the deadline if the Rams can't start winning games. Fowler had an emphatic response to the question.
“Definitely,” Fowler began. “The Rams have looked at Stafford's future as a year-to-year proposition. His reworked contract last offseason reflects that, pushing his 2024 pay into the $40 million range but lessening his guarantees in 2025, essentially allowing both sides to decide whether they want to remain married at that point.”
Those same contract moves could make Stafford an easy QB to trade. Any team trading for him could easily view him as a one-year rental who could become more depending on how things pans out.
“This is a situation to watch closely, because neither player nor team seems to know how or when it will end,” Fowler continued. “Stafford is 36 and has dealt with injuries recently. Does he want to play after this season?”
The injuries that the Rams have suffered on offense have nearly wrecked the season already. Cooper Kupp and Puka Nacua are the main offensive weapons who are hurt, as well as multiple offensive linemen.
Fowler notes that it is unclear who would be interested in Stafford. However, the Las Vegas Raiders jump to mind as a team with a glaring need at QB.
Rams coach Sean McVay hints at more changes after Week 5 loss against Packers
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Sean McVay hinted that more changes could be coming after the Rams' Week 6 bye.
“We’ll evaluate everything,” McVay said when asked if he'd consider making adjustments during the bye. “That was the result of Josh Wallace playing some star today. That enabled Quentin Lake to be able to play safety almost exclusively with the exception of a couple things. We’ll observe everything. When you’re in these situations, we have to make sure we’re doing a good job of looking at the totality of everything, regardless of position, and make sure we’re doing a great job of trying to make sure we’re playing as good of football as we can with the remainder of the season.”
McVay likely would have evaluated the roster either way. He is a noted fan of self scouting.
“You always want to be able to reflect [and] make sure that you're doing an after-action review, really on a daily basis but a weekly basis. You're saying, ‘Okay, with this five-week inventory, what's important for us to go where we want to go, to continuously improve, to focus on the process and progress, and then who are the guys that we're getting back that hopefully will elevate our team overall?' There'll be a lot of things that go into it. Here is the thing I feel good about is the guys have done a great job with the preparation this week and go into it with a quieted mind. Let's compete to the best of our ability against an excellent opponent, and let's see what the heck happens.”
The Rams need to get their act together before they face the Raiders in Week 7.
