Even an opening kickoff return for a touchdown by the Dallas Cowboys’ Lucky Whitehead in Saturday’s preseason opener for both teams couldn’t kill the mood, and many late-arriving LA fans missed that anyway.
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Already, the Rams training camp is the focus of an HBO episode of “Hard Knocks”.
The Rams have lots of questions in their roster to answer and just a few games in the preseason to figure things out before everything counts. No Jack Nicholson sightings yet, but can that be far behind?
Play Football Month salutes the talent, character, values and achievements of football players as they embark on a new season.
Remember two years ago, when the Dallas Cowboys appeared to be the league’s worst team in August before rolling to a 12-4 record? It marked the first National Football League game in Los Angeles since the Rams were still an LA franchise on Christmas Eve of 1994. Twenty years later, the Rams once again needed a new stadium, and St. Louis was unable to provide the funds to renovate the Edward Jones Dome, which faced a $144 million debt.
Usually, Saturdays at the LA Coliseum are reserved for the USC Trojans, but the Rams practiced at their new home a week earlier in front of almost 30,000 fans and will play their final preseason home game on Saturday, Aug. 20 against the Kansas City Chiefs at the home of the 1984 Olympics.
‘Due to high ticket demand for those games in particular, the Rams will make seats available in areas of the Coliseum they originally planned not to sell – mostly the upper level corners’. Todd Gurley did not play for the Rams. The Rams are back, but with Case Keenum as their quarterback, and that hardly seems worth the wait. Nevertheless, as most of the players and coaches said, “2015 was a learning experience”.
For their preseason match, the Rams are favorites to beat the Cowboys Saturday. He probably isn’t going to yield the Cowboys an 8-10 year starter who will rack up double digit sacks this season. We had a time and place there with the Rams, with the ability to relocate to Los Angeles, the resources, the economic timing, to do it right.
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“The NFL security policies are more strict than USC home game policies, but USC Athletics and the Coliseum commission are moving more towards the level of security that the NFL has”, Carlisle said. “Our interior have had just about enough of (All-Pro defensive tackle) Aaron Donald, so they are looking forward to lining up against someone else”, Fisher said.
