When something works in the NFL, coaches tend to embrace it like their first born, especially if it helps get them to the Super Bowl.
So we shouldn’t be too surprised that the Los Angeles Rams aren’t likely to put many of their marquee players on the field at Aloha Stadium for their Aug. 17 preseason game with the Dallas Cowboys.
No Todd Gurley at running back, no Jared Goff lofting passes, no Aaron Donald coming up with sacks …
“None of them will be playing in the game,” a spokesman confirmed Thursday.
Not the Rams’ first preseason game of the summer Saturday against the Raiders in Oakland and not the one here against the Cowboys the following week.
Probably not what Rams fans, especially those who shelled out $100 — or more — for tickets to the first NFL preseason game here in 43 years, want to hear.
When the Rams hired Sean McVay as the youngest head coach in modern NFL history at age 30 in 2017, he brought with him some fresh ideas and a willingness to confront convention.
In the final regular-season game of his rookie head coaching season, McVay sat several players, including Gurley and Donald, the NFL sacks leader, against San Francisco knowing the Rams would be the third or fourth seed regardless of the outcome, an eventual 34-13 loss.
Then, last year he went whole hog keeping most of his starters out of preseason games. Not just the first game or the last one, but all four of them as the fringe players took the field.
All the offensive starters but one, guard Jamon Brown, who was suspended for the first two regular-season games and therefore was deemed to need some preseason work, sat out the entire 2018 exhibition season.
It apparently worked. Or sure didn’t hurt. The Rams, with a veteran offensive cast, showed little early rust winning their first eight games, suffered few injuries and made their way to the Super Bowl before losing to New England.
Four months ago McVay signaled an intention to follow the same path toward the team’s Sept. 8 opener with Carolina, telling the media there was a “very likely chance that we’ll approach the preseason very similar to what we did last year.”
You pretty much knew he’d take the approach with Gurley, a three-time Pro Bowl selection whose left knee was troublesome late in the 2018 season. He did not take part in offseason team workouts and, to this point, Gurley has had an alternating schedule of practicing and receiving days off.
But, in second preseason games, as the one at Aloha Stadium will be, teams generally employ their starters for a quarter or at least a few series. They usually play a little more in the third game and then not at all in the fourth one.
Then there are the Rams. In lieu of starters getting repetitions in preseason games, McVay has increasingly looked to shared workouts and scrimmages like last week’s sessions with the Chargers or this week’s work with the Raiders in Napa, Calif., to help his players get down their timing.
That leaves the field to the players at positions where there is a battle for a starting job — or a place on the roster at all. Which is what we’re likely to see come Aug. 17.
Reach Ferd Lewis at flewis@staradvertiser.com or 529-4820.
