The Rams are set to move back to Los Angeles for the 2021 season, which will mark their return to the NFL after a 21-year hiatus. The team is expected to be one of the most popular in the league with fans who have waited decades for this momentous occasion, but it’s unclear how their performance on the field will match up.
The rams defense is a fantasy football outlook for the 2021 NFL season. This article provides an overview of each team’s offense and defense, as well as how they may perform in the upcoming year.
Los Angeles now has a new sheriff. In lieu of Jared Goff, quarterback Matthew Stafford will try to push the Rams over the hump this season after being traded from the Detroit Lions. It’s a huge change of pace for Stafford. While he’s spent most of his career on poor teams with good offensive skill, which allowed him to put up huge fantasy numbers, he now joins last year’s No. 1 defense, where gunslinging to catch up will be uncommon.
In terms of fantasy football, it’ll be fascinating to watch how Stafford’s statistics compare to last season, given the great defense and the improvements at receiver with Cooper Kupp and Robert Woods. The fact that running back Cam Akers, who was expected to be the Rams’ workhorse this season, would miss the whole season due to a ruptured Achilles tendon, is also significant.
Sean McVay also like the quick-hitting passing game, so all indications are that Stafford will have a year that is at least as good as 2020 in fantasy football. But just how excellent will he be? Let’s take a closer look.
Fantasy Football Stats for 2020
Matthew Stafford threw for 4,084 yards, 26 touchdowns, and 10 interceptions in 16 games last season (albeit he departed one after just three pass attempts). His performances earned him 270.56 fantasy points on the season, putting him in the QB15 and high-end QB2 categories. Stafford had one of the more consistent floors for quarterbacks around his ADP, scoring fewer than 14 fantasy points just three times last season.
Stafford’s issue was his depressingly uninspired weekly ceiling. His best point total of the season was 27.1 against the Chicago Bears in Week 13, and it was the only game last year in which he scored more than 24 fantasy points.
Stafford’s concern stems from the fact that he finished top-10 in the league in passing yards among all quarterbacks, played on a team with the 30th-ranked rushing attack by yardage, threw for more touchdowns than his career average (25.7 for full seasons), and still didn’t come close to being a QB1 at the end of the season.
I’d like to think that the bulk of the responsibility for this issue lies with the team’s conditions. To some degree, a poor running game may help quarterback statistics, but diminishing returns eventually lead to the offense becoming one-dimensional, resulting in stopped drives and punts. Playing against a well-rounded defense meant that any drops in the passing game meant extra repetitions for the special teams unit for the Lions and Matthew Stafford.
The Rams, who were 10th in running yards last season, should offer Stafford with much-needed balance, which may harm his yardage totals but will almost certainly increase his chances of scoring in the end zone.
Fantasy Forecasts for 2021
Matthew Stafford has a good chance of playing up to his ESPN ADP of 93 (QB11), as he has a lot of weapons around him and a system that is intended to get him into a groove with simple passes.
The Rams’ quick-hitting passing attack took away a majority of the opportunities that would usually be allocated to running the ball, and Jared Goff topped the league in passing attempts alone in 2019. The injury to Akers, as well as the key wideout combination of Woods and Kupp, may result in a very similar scenario in 2021. This is good news for Stafford, who has averaged over 5,000 yards and 30 touchdowns each season in the two seasons he has led the league in passing attempts.
I wouldn’t anticipate those kinds of statistics, but 4,500 yards and 30 touchdowns aren’t out of the question. Despite the fact that Goff is a far less skilled quarterback than Stafford, he was able to achieve both of those two milestone numbers under McVay’s system in 2018. Last year’s Rams were already fantastic, but Stafford has the potential to take them to new heights in 2021.
Position in the Rankings
Matthew Stafford seems to be a pretty safe selection at quarterback number eleven. As long since he remains healthy, he’ll almost certainly outperform his ADP this season, as the Rams’ system seems to be extremely efficient for a player with his arm skill. With a plethora of weapons at his disposal, Stafford has proved to be much too talented a quarterback to fail.
Stafford’s potential is limited, though, due to his lack of mobility. Stafford had to wait until his lone 5,000-yard season in 2011 to finish (barely) in the top five quarterbacks in fantasy football. He will almost definitely not be a top-five quarterback, with a potential of QB7 or thereabouts.
Matthew Stafford isn’t the man for you if you’re looking for a high return on investment in the draft. But if you need someone who is dependable, remains healthy, and has a team that will support him no matter what, he is the man for you.
The cooper kupp injury is a story that has been making headlines. Cooper Kupp was injured during the Rams game against the Chiefs, and he will likely miss the rest of the season.
Related Tags
- fantasy qb rankings 2021
- cooper kupp fantasy names
- trey sermon fantasy
- 2021 nfl season start date
- fantasy football 2021 rankings
