Of the 52 players currently on the Rams’ roster, 14 of them are rookies. They have five more on the practice squad and another on injured reserve. By every measure, this is one of the youngest and least experienced teams in the league.
Matthew Stafford is the eldest of the bunch, entering his 15th year in the NFL at the age of 35 – three years older than anyone else on the team. So when his wife said on her podcast that Stafford has trouble connecting to his younger teammates, it wasn’t overly surprising; 35-year-olds don’t often hang out with 22- and 23-year-olds on a regular basis the way NFL players do.
Buy Rams TicketsAnd as viral as those comments went, Stafford cleared the air on Wednesday when he met with reporters and assured everyone that he doesn’t have trouble gelling with his teammates. He didn’t even feel the need to address it in the locker room.
“No, I think those guys understand where I’m coming from,” Stafford said. “They see me come in this building every single day and know how I go to work, know how I interact with everybody and we didn’t really think too much about it to be honest with you.
“I’m not too worried about it. Nobody in that locker room is too worried about it, I can promise you that. We’ve completely moved on not that we ever really stopped to think about it, to be honest with you. But yeah, I’m not too worried about it.”
Stafford said he “definitely” feels connected to the rest of the team, as young as it is. And he was even going to poke fun at his age at his press conference Wednesday by showing up with glasses and a newspaper, but he couldn’t find a newspaper anywhere.
“I was going to come out here with a newspaper under my arm with some spectacles,” he joked. “Set the mood, but it turns out you can’t even find a newspaper around here so I couldn’t do that. I was going to try to have some fun with it, but no it’s been great. I love coming to work. I love working with these guys and they all know that.”
The Rams underwent a lot of changes this offseason, from the departures of leaders such as Jalen Ramsey, Bobby Wagner, Leonard Floyd and Allen Robinson to the addition of 30-plus rookies during and after the draft.
Every team sees roster turnover each year, but this was an extreme for the rebuilding Rams.
“I think in general in the NFL you get like, what is the average like 30% turnover on a team? And every team is different. Every team is new,” Stafford said. “We happen to have a lot of young guys on our team, a lot of rookies that have come in and done a heck of a job and earned roles on our football team. They are going to be big parts of our season and that’s exciting. But every season, every team is different. That’s the great part about this game is you get exposure to all different kinds of people from all different places and different places in their life and I love being a part of that. It’s probably my favorite thing is coming into the locker room and being a part of that. So every single year is different. That difference is the same for us as it is around the league and I’m enjoying it.”
Stafford is confident in his connection with the Rams’ younger players and there doesn’t seem to be any lack of chemistry in the locker room, so hopefully all parties have moved past this like Stafford said.
