After a shortened week of practice prior to Sunday’s game against the 49ers, the Rams will once again modify their preparation plans for this weekend’s matchup with the Cardinals. Rather than practicing at their headquarters in Thousand Oaks at Cal Lutheran, the Rams will hold Thursday’s session at SoFi Stadium due to a local wind advisory.
The forecast is calling for winds of 20-30 mph, with gusts up to 50 mph. Needless to say, it’s hard to throw and kick a football in those conditions, which has led Sean McVay to call an audible.
“Because of the wind advisory and tomorrow being a really important workday – I think last week with the short week, I probably did our guys a disservice not giving us an opportunity to practice with the fundamentals and the techniques,” McVay said. “I thought it was the right decision, but you always have to be honest with yourself, reflect, and look back. I think it’s important enough that we’ll do virtual meetings in the morning, and then we’ll go down and practice at SoFi tomorrow in a more controlled setting because we need to get that work in. You can see the amount of good work that gets in, even though it is minimal once you get this late in the season, is something that you can’t take for granted. That’s what we’ll do tomorrow as a result of the wind advisory.”
The Rams canceled practice last Friday due to a COVID-19 scare after two members of the organization needed further testing. It was a decision made out of an abundance of caution, but one McVay seemingly thinks cost his team.
The Rams have had to make adjustments to their practice schedule countless times under McVay and now having SoFi Stadium to use is an added benefit. It sparked a question from a reporter about whether McVay would like to have an indoor or outdoor facility whenever the Rams get a permanent home.
McVay knows that’s a long way out, so he’s not exactly focused on where the Rams will be practicing years from now.
“I think you’d like to have the availability for both,” he said. “I just know out here, once it gets later in the season, it’s nearly impossible. We’ve had different challenges each of the last few years since I’ve been here, whether it be the fires or whether it be the winds. Those are things that are really important. You don’t get enough time to practice. Fortunately for us, we do have SoFi.
“But we’ll see, talking about a new facility. That’s probably about 15 years away right now,” he joked. “What are we talking about? Let’s just get our eighth win, lets try to go get ready for this. We will go to SoFi and practice. You want to talk about a new facility, I’ll be aged about 50 years by then.”
SoFi Stadium has a mix of indoor and outdoor qualities, being somewhat of a hybrid stadium with open-air features but also a roof on top. It’s one of the best stadiums in the country, so getting the chance to practice there probably isn’t something players or coaches will complain about.
