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Swanson: For Sean McVay and the Rams, perspective is everything

September 5, 2024

Two years ago, our predictions about the Rams were too tall. Last year, too small.

In 2024, those predictions – not too tall, not too small, not too hot or too cold – might be just right.

No, I wouldn’t recommend betting all your gold on the Rams to win another Super Bowl, though they could.

Nor are they a lock to struggle, though they could.

And that space, this realistic balance of expectations, could be a recipe for success, as head coach Sean McVay sees it these days. Because of how McVay sees it these days.

He’s realized, he’s said, after the roller coaster ride his Rams have been on the past few seasons, how important it is to him to be more transformational than transactional in his working relationships.

A notion borne of experiencing the severe drop from top of the football world into an all-out stall in 2022. From the Super Bowl to 5-12, before creeping upward again, steadily, satisfyingly. Last year, the Rams recovered from a 3-6 start by closing the regular season 7-1. It was, McVay said two seasons after winning a championship, his “most rewarding” season.

“If you have the purpose of going on a journey that’s meaningful, where relationships are developed – and, hell yeah, you want to go try to win a championship – but if that’s the only thing that dictates and determines what you deem as successful, for me personally, I’ll be empty,” said McVay on a July podcast with The Athletic’s Robert Mays.

McVay – who at 38 is the fourth-longest tenured NFL coach, entering his eighth season leading the Rams – is an intense, fast-talker who could be a convincing con man if he didn’t have a track record as an actual football savant.

If he weren’t genuinely a philosophical dude, a new dad who says he values sleep more than before and also sounds a little like a golfer because of how much he’s selling us on the mental part of the game, the feel-good, play-good part, and how paramount that is.

For Rams fans, it’s been and still is In McVay They Trust. And why wouldn’t they? He’s six victories away of becoming the franchise’s winningest coach, entering this season ranked third among Rams coaches in games coached (115), playoff games coached (11) and playoff victories (seven).

He’s a head coach you can trust to traverse all of the pesky potholes along the way, issues that would derail many a team.

Because who could be expected to withstand losing the great – greatest – Aaron Donald and not be worse for it?

Who shuffles their offensive line at the starting line, on account of a suspension and injuries, and is better for it? Who trades away Ernest Jones IV, whose 145 tackles just set the team’s single-season record, without blinking? Who goes into a season with the NFL’s second-youngest roster without anticipating growing pains?

Who designates their primary running back as their primary punt returner without raising eyebrows?

Which team enters the fray with the younger of its star receivers just getting healthy and the other just getting older without expecting some turbulence along the route?

No one. No one at all. Including the Rams.

There are so many questions facing them, you’d think they’re opening their season with a midterm exam. And yet, even put together, it doesn’t seem like an insurmountable test heading into Detroit, where the Rams will open their season where they finished it last year, with a 24-23 wild-card loss.

That’s largely because McVay is doing the math on these football decisions and he’s telling us that, no, no one is adding up to a Donald on defense, but that the kids will be all right.

Because the Rams just need “Kobie Turner to be Kobie Turner, Bobby Brown to be Bobby Brown, Braden Fiske to be Braden Fiske …” And McVay has a hunch those guys absorbed enough of Donald’s desire and work ethic via their proximity to the 10-time Pro Bowler who has retired from the NFL and begun his career as a youth coach.

Because it’s by McVay’s calculations that the risk will be worth the reward of having Kyren Williams handle punts. If he thinks it will pay off to further feature the third-year running back who finished third in the NFL with 1,144 rushing yards, maybe it will.

Because, before Puka Nacua was injured in a joint practice with the Chargers, last season’s breakout star rookie spent the offseason learning from Cooper Kupp, one of the best in the business. “He’s a kid,” quarterback Matthew Stafford said of Nacua, “who’s always looking for, ‘How can I get better?’ ‘How can I work an edge here?’ ‘How can I make it easier on myself?’”

And because of what McVay has learned about his necessarily hard job, an edge you might call it.

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“I think a renewed perspective,” McVay said this week when I asked what’s resonating still from last season. “Certainly being a dad has helped gain an appreciation and the appropriate perspective. And really just the experiences, I’m so young, continuing to grow and mature and try to be better in every part of my life.

“When you look back on some of the shortcomings that you’ve had, you realize that these are all great learning opportunities and what a fortunate blessing it is to be in this role, to be around people that I love. You want to work hard to do right by then.

“And also balance, being the best competitor that you can be while understanding there are some things you can control and some things you can’t. But these players, these coaches, they’ve certainly got me feeling really excited about trying to work as hard as I can to do my part to not let them down.”

You know, that sounds about right.

“Grateful for the group of men, the efforts, the way that they worked, and the consistency.” pic.twitter.com/fxfytlLyLT

— Los Angeles Rams (@RamsNFL) August 24, 2024

Orange County Register

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Swanson: For Sean McVay and the Rams, perspective is everything

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