Week 1 couldn’t have gone much better for the Los Angeles Rams. They crushed the Seattle Seahawks, a divisional opponent, and came out of the game mostly unscathed on the injury front.
What awaits in Week 2, however, is a much bigger test against another divisional foe: the San Francisco 49ers.
Buy Rams TicketsKyle Shanahan’s team came into the season as the favorite in the NFC West and one of the top teams in all of football – and the 49ers backed up the hype in the opener by beating the Steelers, 30-7. As good as the Rams looked in Week 1, this will be a tough matchup on both sides of the ball.
Speaking specifically of the 49ers offense, Sean McVay knows the challenges it presents with Brock Purdy leading a group of skill players that rivals any in the NFL. On the “Coach McVay Show” this week, McVay broke down what makes Purdy such a good fit in Shanahan’s offense, calling it a “scary combination” between him and the 49ers’ playmakers.
“He’s a stud. Really great ownership and understanding,” McVay said of Purdy. “You can just see the rapport that Kyle and him have, the way that Kyle’s able to call a game. You can see how quickly he gets through progressions. I think it’s super impressive how quickly he’s able to create off-schedule, keep his eyes down the field and have a rapport with guys working off-schedule. There’s a lot of different moving parts and a lot of different things, whether it’s personnel groupings or different things they can present in the run and the different ways they can throw the football with the different phases of their offense that he has complete autonomy over.
“I think he plays fast, he’s able to process things, he can make quick decisions and he delivers the ball with accuracy and anticipation. It’s a scary combination with the guys that they have.”
Purdy helped lead the 49ers to the NFC title game last year but an injury after just four pass attempts sidelined him for the rest of the contest – and ended any hopes of San Francisco reaching the Super Bowl. What Purdy didn’t do last year was face the Rams. He was inactive for both games, so Los Angeles hasn’t gotten a firsthand look at the second-year quarterback.
They will on Sunday at 4:05 p.m. ET in what’s arguably the biggest game of the season for the Rams. They’ll either be sent back to reality with a loss to the 49ers or they’ll prove even more people wrong by pulling off a stunning upset.
