LOS ANGELES — As the Rams opened practice Friday, the winding piano and steady guitar of Eminem’s “Lose Yourself” began to play. Before the song’s first verse was up, someone had changed the song to Creed’s “Higher.”
“Lose Yourself” may be a preeminent pump-up song, but not this week for the Rams as they prepare to travel to the rapper’s native Detroit.
The Rams are returning to Ford Field to face the Detroit Lions in Sunday’s season opener, eight months after a thrilling playoff game between the two teams in the same building.
The game had everything you could ask for: Matthew Stafford returning to Detroit for the first time, Jared Goff facing off against the Rams three years after they traded him away, the first home playoff game in Detroit in three decades. And that was just the set up. Once the game started, the teams traded body blows in the first half in front of a raucous crowd, before defenses took over in the second.
Ultimately, the game came down to a trademark aggressive decision by Lions coach Dan Campbell to pass on second down right after the two-minute warning. The ball was completed to Amon-Ra St. Brown, and the Rams went home while the Lions marched on.
“I kept that play in my memory bank,” said safety Quentin Lake, the defender in coverage on St. Brown on that play.
Those moments still resonate, no matter how much has changed in both locker rooms, from coaching departures to retirements to free agent and draft acquisitions. Coaches can try to play down the motivational aspects of playing a team under new circumstance; Rams head coach Sean McVay did this week.
“Every year’s a new year,” he said. “There has been a lot of time that’s passed. There are a lot of new faces. There are a lot of hopeful development that’s occurred since then. I would imagine they would say the same thing.”
Fair enough. Aaron Donald is retired. The Rams have 16 rookies on their roster, most in the NFL, and those players have no emotional attachment to what happened in January. All their juice comes from playing in their first career game.
But the players who are going back to Detroit for the second time this calendar year? That feeling, of extinguished belief as Lions quarterback Jared Goff took a knee, isn’t one that’s easily forgotten.
“I was kind of in shock; I didn’t know that it was real,” defensive tackle Kobie Turner said. “I keep kind of hyping myself up about it, to be able to go back to the place where it all ended and just pick up right where we left off.”
We’ll have to see whom these Rams are Sunday to know if they carry on that magic that led to last year’s surprise playoff appearance.
Down at least starting left tackle Alaric Jackson (suspension) and potentially right tackle Rob Havenstein (ankle), can the Rams still create the push up front to free running back Kyren Williams and rookie Blake Corum? Are Joe Noteboom and Warren McClendon Jr. able to give quarterback Matthew Stafford the time he needs to find Puka Nacua and Cooper Kupp?
On defense, the losses of Donald, Ernest Jones IV, Jordan Fuller and coordinator Raheem Morris created a vast leadership turnover. What is new defensive coordinator Chris Shula able to dial up, especially against the Lions and their creative OC Ben Johnson? Are rookie pass rushers Jared Verse and Braden Fiske ready for the bright lights, or do they need time to adjust to the NFL?
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“I want [Verse and Fiske] to play within themselves, understand where their play ops arise within the different calls and what the offense presents,” McVay said. “Looking for consistency and those guys just playing their game snap in and snap out and enjoying the moment.”
It’s just Week 1, but we’ve got a lot to learn about these Rams.
RAMS (0-0) AT DETROIT LIONS (0-0)
When: 5:20 p.m. Sunday
Where: Ford Field (Detroit)
TV/radio: NBC Ch. 4 /710 AM; 93.1 FM; 1330 AM (Spanish); Sirius 226, 225