What a great New Year's Eve for Rams fans as the Rams win their most nerve-wracking game since the Super Bowl, Seattle gets beaten by Pitt (as many of us suspected they would), thus the Rams lock in a playoff spot. AZ beating the Eagles, making the final Ram/SF game meaningless was the cherry on top of a great Sunday.
I expect McVay will play as few starters as possible on Sunday and the 49ers to do the same. This will look like a pre-season game with back-ups vs back-ups. If anyone paid big bucks for a ticket to this game, well, I bet they regret it now. After what happened to the Dolphin's Chubb I would be shocked if either coach was willing to risk an impact starter to injury in this game. Also a great opportunity to rest up all our key players for another "bye" week following our mini bye.
So we will likely play Detroit or Dallas in the first round. Who would you rather play? Here are a few thoughts...
Stafford going back to Detroit is almost too good of a story to believe. You can imagine he would be motivated to play the game of his life, but he's such a dawg you know he already plays every game that way. Of course, the vibe around the whole Ram team would be - "We have to win this for #9." and that could only help. On the other hand, you know Goff would be motivated to show the Rams made a bad choice throwing him out with the garbage like they did, and that would motivate the Lions to play extra hard for him. You can imagine Dan Campbell's pre-game speech to his locker room with that idea as the central focus. I think Detroit would also be a louder, crazier environment for the Rams to have to deal with than Dallas, which is not a particularly huge advantage to the Cowboys since their fans are not as loud. But for Stafford to go into Detroit and come out with a win, you can imagine how meaningful that would be to him, McVay and the whole Rams team.
Dallas might be a harder team to beat than Detroit because they would seem to have a better defense with more consistent pass rushers. But the Rams played in Dallas earlier this season so you would think they could take a lot of lessons from that defeat and the film from it. Since the Cowboys won that game easily they might have a little bit of a sense of "no problem, we beat these guys handily, we can do it again" while the Rams will come loaded for bear with revenge in mind for that humiliating loss. For many of us who hate Dallas, the Rams winning that game would bring almost as much joy as a Super Bowl win (almost). The Cowboys also have a tendency to choke in playoff games and make ridiculous mistakes that cost them the game. Bottom line, most of us hate the Boys way more than the Lions so a win would be so sweet.
Which team I would rather see the Rams play will ultimately be decided by what happens with the Lions and the Boys this Sunday in terms of their injury situations. Who knows who might get hurt this weekend for either team (not wishing ill towards anyone, of course). I just know this - if the Rams play an impact player up in SF and he gets hurt, I'll be sick about it and McVay would be even more sick. That's why I can't see it happening. The Rams going into the playoffs as healthy as they are is almost as incredible as the Rams going to the playoffs at all this year. The Rams having a "bye" before the playoff game will be an advantage vs either Dallas or Detroit who will simply not be as rested.
What a great season, Herd, our team did it, we made the playoffs when no one (except Rampage2K) thought they could. The 2023 season is already a massive success. Now let's shock the world again with at least one playoff win! (one game at a time, as they always say)
So who would you rather play, Dallas or Detroit? Who do you think would present a tougher challenge?
