Rams coach Sean McVay was pleased with how defensive tackle Aaron Donald played on Monday night, in his first game back after being retired for two years.
“I can’t even think of the words to say the love and respect I have for who he is,” McVay said. “He does everything the right way. I think the cool thing is his standards — he’ll be excited about where he can improve. But pretty impressive to be off almost 1,000 days, come back and play the defensive line position, 30-plus snaps, make your impact felt tremendously, still eliciting double and triple teams because of who he is. That’s Aaron Donald for you. Never ceases to amaze me.”
McVay said it was obvious that Donald kept himself in shape during his retirement, but that Donald still has things he can improve as the season goes on.
“He still is taking great care of himself, the hard work pays off,” McVay said. “And I think the best is yet to come from him.”
McVay said he personally was pumped up seeing Donald run out of the tunnel, and that he could tell Donald’s teammates and the crowd were getting pumped up, too.
“You get goosebumps,” McVay said. “It elevated everybody, and that’s what the greats do.”
Rams Clips
The Rams did not have an issue playing without star receiver Puka Nacua on Monday night, defeating the Giants, 28-6.
But the team would surely like to have Nacua healthy sooner rather than later, particularly as Los Angeles will face Denver on Sunday night in Week 3.
Head coach Sean McVay said on Tuesday that he was unsure of Nacua’s potential availability for the coming weekend as he deals with the psoas issue.
“I’m hopeful that he’ll play,” McVay said, via Gary Klein of the L.A. Times. “If he’s ready to go, great. If not, then we’ll continue to roll.”
Nacua missed practice on Friday and Saturday after the injury popped up during the week. He was listed as questionable for Monday night and was inactive for the contest.
“You have to redirect your whole kind of plans, and you almost have to operate where it’s like, ‘All right, if [Nacua] plays it’s a bonus, but we can’t count on him playing even though we were hopeful that there might be a chance,” McVay said. “It really just boiled down to ... when you have soft tissue injuries with guys like that, that are skill players, you’re going to err on the side of caution.”
Nacua caught five passes for 74 yards in the Rams’ season-opening loss to the 49ers.
Los Angeles’ first injury report of the week is due out on Wednesday.
The Rams didn’t have receiver Puka Nacua on Monday night. It made Davante Adams the focal point of the passing game.
And it added up to Adams catching nine passes for 175 yards and two touchdowns.
“He’s wide receiver one to me,” coach Sean McVay told reporters after the game. “He ain’t a two. He was special and it showed all night. That’s what he’s consistently done and I’m really happy for him. I thought he made some great plays, but you could see there’s a lot of trust that he and Matthew [Stafford] have. They were able to get a lot of work together this offseason, and it’s only going to continue to build. I was really happy for him. He did his thing tonight.”
And the Giants didn’t seem to do anything to adjust to Adams doing his thing.
Giants coach John Harbaugh was asked whether the Rams did anything that made it hard to cover Adams.
“They didn’t do anything special,” Harbaugh said. “He just made plays.”
Should the Giants have assigned cornerback Greg Newsome II to cover Adams wherever he goes?
“We had a lot of ideas,” Harbaugh said, “a lot of things we tried to do.”
They apparently didn’t try to double Adams, or to rotate the safeties in his direction.
It couldn’t have hurt. Yes, it would have made it easier for others to get open. And while that may have meant more opportunities for the tight ends, the Rams got very little from other receivers. Tutu Atwell caught one pass for 19 yards, and Konata Mumpfield caught one pass for 12 yards.
So, yes, maybe the things the Giants tried should have included taking Adams away. On Sunday night, the Broncos presumably will.
The first real sighting of Giants receiver Odell Beckham Jr. on Monday night happened when ESPN cameras captured him giving his former head coach, Sean McVay, a post-game hug. During the game, OBJ made even less of a cameo appearance.
Beckham was on the field for only three snaps. Out of 58 total offensive plays.
By way of comparison, Malachi Fields had 47 snaps. Malik Nabers played 43. Darnell Mooney was on the field for 42.
Even Braxton Berrios — primarily a special-teamer — had five offensive snaps.
Making the lack of involvement from Beckham more surprising is the fact that starting quarterback Jaxson Dart made an early exit with a knee injury. Beckham and backup quarterback Jameis Winston have a strong rapport, and Winston struggled in relief of Dart, completing 11 of 27 throws. Why not give Beckham and Winston a chance to connect?
The other question is whether Beckham has frustrations regarding his lack of involvement. Yes, he’s apparently happy to simply be back in the NFL after a year out of football. But, with only three snaps in a prime-time game, is he really back?
In Week 1, Beckham was on the field for 11 of 69 snaps. He has been targeted zero times, through two games.
From the Giants’ perspective, it’s fair to wonder whether a game-day roster spot is being wasted on someone who isn’t contributing to the cause. As MDS points out, the Giants have receiver Dalen Cambre on the practice squad. He was second in the NCAA in special-teams tackles as a senior, and he blocked two punts at the college level.
Yes, the Giants bringing Beckham back to Big Blue is a good story. The fans love him. But the early-season trends aren’t encouraging. At some point, they’re going to need his roster spot.
Especially if they don’t put Dart on IR and add another quarterback (other than Berrios) to serve as the backup to Winston.
The Rams didn’t have Puka Nacua for Monday night’s game against the Giants, but the wide receiver’s absence didn’t wind up holding them back.
Matthew Stafford found the groove that eluded the Rams in Week 1’s loss to the 49ers and threw for 327 yards and four touchdowns in a 28-6 win. The first of those scores came late in the first quarter when he found a wide open Davante Adams for a 31-yard score and it would not be the last time Adams found holes in the Giants defense.
Adams used a double move to shake off Giants defenders for a 64-yard catch on the next Rams possession and he added his second touchdown catch of the night in the third quarter. The night ended with eight catches for 195 yards that Stafford said the Rams really needed given who wasn’t available for the game.
“He’s an elite player,” Stafford said, via the team’s website. “He made all sorts of plays today. [He] made contested catches. He ran great routes and got open. He did it all for us, and he’s a guy that can do that. We understand that. We know it. And like I said, leaned on him big time tonight, and he came through for us.”
The Rams will be hoping to have more hands on deck in Denver next weekend, but Monday was a reminder of how much they bring to the table even when they aren’t playing with a full deck.
SoFi Stadium got a jolt of energy before Monday night’s game when Rams defensive tackle Aaron Donald was the final defensive starter announced to the home crowd.
Donald said the response from that crowd “kind of amped me up a little bit” as he ran onto the field for the first time since deciding to end the retirement that started after the 2023 season. Donald did not travel to Australia for the opener and took more time to ramp himself up for his return to game action.
The result was three tackles and a tackle for loss while playing 33 of the team’s 58 defensive snaps in Monday night’s 28-6 win over the Giants. Donald said he would like to win “a little faster” when he’s blocked one-on-one and that he feels like everything will feel more natural with a little more playing time under his belt.
“The game really wasn’t as fast as I thought,” Donald said, via the team’s website. “It was more of me calming myself down, overrunning stuff or just my feet not being in the ground how they supposed to be, not trusting my eyes, little stuff like that. But playing the game, when I held out in ’17, ’18 it was the same way when I came back, it took a couple games to get going. It’s a little different. I ain’t played in two years, so I gotta watch the film, see what I did good, see what I did wrong, and just clean it up.”
The plan was for the Rams to team Donald with Myles Garrett, but Garrett’s knee injury leaves that on hold for the time being so all involved will hope that the weeks to come find Donald recovering even more of the game that made him a three-time defensive player of the year.
Giants pass rusher Brian Burns limped off the field in obvious pain on Monday night, but in the locker room after the game, Burns said the medical diagnosis showed that the damage to his ankle wasn’t as bad as it felt.
Burns said as he sat at his locker that he could feel his ankle getting stiff but the Giants’ medical staff had told him it’s a low ankle sprain that shouldn’t cause him to miss much time.
“It eases my mind to know it’s not nothing serious,” Burns said.
Burns said he’s had similar injuries and knows how to rehab them so he can get back on the field quickly.
“I’ve dealt with this before,” Burns said. “It all depends on how fast you can get the swelling and inflammation down. I’m going to do everything possible to get as tamed as I can.”
Burns said he would begin his rehab while on the flight from Los Angeles back to New York.
“The recovery process starts now, so it will be ice and compression until we get back to the facility and do more work on it, try to stay off it, keep it elevated,” Burns said. “That’s all you can do with sprains. I’ve dealt with it before.”
Burns is one of the Giants’ best defensive players, and on a night when quarterback Jaxson Dart, wide receiver Malik Nabers and left tackle Andrew Thomas all got hurt, a serious injury to Burns was the last thing the Giants needed. Fortunately, he’s going to be OK.
The Rams looked like Super Bowl contenders on Monday night against the Giants, a significant improvement from their Week 1 loss to the 49ers in Australia. Rams coach Sean McVay blamed the Rams’ much-discussed travel plans, and himself, for that Week 1 loss.
McVay was asked after the win over the Giants why the Rams looked so different than they did in Australia, and McVay said it was primarily about his own decision to arrive in Australia only a day before the game.
“Sometimes you win, sometimes you learn and sometimes you have a dumbass coach that makes travel plans that puts you in bad spots,” McVay said.
The Rams’ decision to arrive in Australia only about 24 hours before kickoff was an attempt not to acclimate to the time change at all. The 49ers arrived in Australia a week early and were well acclimated. The 49ers won 27-7, and the Rams’ travel schedule has been heavily scrutinized.
McVay took the blame for not having his team ready to play in Australia, but they were very ready to play in Los Angeles on Monday night, winning 28-6.
The Giants have gotten some good news, for now, regarding quarterback Jaxson Dart’s knee injury.
Via NFL Network, it’s believed that Dart suffered a sprained MCL.
The assessment is based on a preliminary exam. X-rays were negative, and an MRI will be conducted on Tuesday.
After the game, coach John Harbaugh was asked about the report. “We’ll know more tomorrow,” Harbaugh said. “That’s in the neighborhood of it, I would say. We’ll get an MRI tomorrow and have a really good feel for it, and give you more information then.”
The MCL can heal with rest and rehab, unless the tendon is completely torn.
If Dart misses time, Jameis Winston will continue to play in his place. On Monday night, Winston completed 11 of 27 passes for 111 yards and an interception.
The Giants host the Titans on Sunday, with the Cardinals next and a visit to the Commanders. So they could find a way to win some games, even if Dart is absent.
The Rams are back . . . and so is Aaron Donald.
Eleven days after a lackluster performance against the 49ers in Australia, the Rams rebounded with a dominant 28-6 victory over the Giants in Donald’s season debut. Both teams are 1-1.
The Rams might have won big anyway, but the Giants had no chance after Jaxson Dart injured his left knee on the first drive. The Giants had only 182 yards, and Jameis Winston was 11-of-27 for 111 yards and an interception.
The Giants crossed midfield six times, but punted six times, kicked two field goals, threw an interception and once turned it over on downs in their 10 possessions. It was as depressing as their season-opening win over the Cowboys was encouraging.
Donald, playing his first game in 981 days after unretiring Aug. 30, made three tackles, including a tackle for loss.
The Rams gained 481 yards despite playing without wide receiver Puka Nacua. Davante Adams more than made up for Nacua’s absence, catching eight passes for 195 yards and two touchdowns.
Matthew Stafford threw touchdown passes of 31 and 11 yards to Adams, 10 yards to running back Kyren Williams and 5 yards to tight end Terrance Ferguson. Stafford was 22-of-31 for 327 yards with an interception to go with the four touchdowns.
Williams ran for 85 yards on 12 carries, but he did lose a fumble. Blake Corum had 12 carries for 79 yards.
Giants safety Jevon Holland totaled eight tackles, an interception, two forced fumbles and a fumble recovery in an elite performance.
