Stafford: Rams Were Prepared for Noise From Road Bills Fans
The L.A. offense operated off of a silent count on Thursday, despite being at home in SoFi Stadium.
The Bills mafia descended upon SoFi Stadium for Thursday’s opener against the Rams and helped Josh Allen and company rout the defending Super Bowl champions. Buffalo dominated in all facets of the game to capture a 31–10 victory to kick off the 2022 campaign.
The traveling Bills crowd was raucous enough to force the Rams to use a silent snap count, despite playing at their home stadium, coach Sean McVay admitted after the game. He explained that Buffalo “did a good job being able to jump the count” during the “some instances” that L.A. was forced to use the silent count on Thursday, per ESPN.
Quarterback Matthew Stafford also addressed the Rams use of the silent count, but said that the team prepared to use it ahead of time.
“I mean, we prepared for it,” Stafford said, per ESPN’s Sarah Barshop. “We prepared to be on the silent count at home again. But it wasn’t something that we haven’t done before.”
The Rams previously used a silent snap count in Week 18 of last year’s regular season, when the 49ers came to town and the franchise’s visiting fanbase rained down noise on the home team. San Francisco stormed back from a 17-point deficit to win that game in overtime, 27–24.
While Stafford and the Rams may have been prepared for the Bills fans to take over, wide receiver Cooper Kupp admitted that the use of the silent count did affect his ability to get off the line of scrimmage.
“Once you go to silent count, you lose the advantage offensively to be able to get off the ball,” Kupp said, per Barshop. “So ideally, you don’t want to be doing silent.”
Kupp, the reigning Offensive Player of the Year, was one of the few bright spots for the Rams on Thursday. He caught 13 passes for 128 yards and a touchdown in the loss.
The Rams will hope to flip the script and defend their home field significantly better in just over a week when they welcome the Falcons to Los Angeles on Sept. 18.
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For more Los Angeles Rams coverage, go to Ram Digest.