Jalen Ramsey: Matthew Stafford’s debut with Rams ‘should go down in history’

It can’t definitively be said that Matthew Stafford had the best debut with a new team in NFL history, but it’s certainly up there with the greatest we’ve seen. In the season opener against the Bears on Sunday night, Stafford completed 20 of 26 passes for 321 yards and three touchdowns, setting career-highs in passer rating (156.1) and yards per attempt (12.3).

His 156.1 passer rating is the highest ever by a player in his debut with a new team, so perhaps Jalen Ramsey is onto something when he says Stafford’s performance should go down in history.

“He did amazing,” Ramsey said after the game. “I’m sure he’s self-critical and he’s going to have some things that he’ll probably want to get better at and hopefully we can challenge him in practice to do that, but his command, his swag – like, everything was great. That’s like a debut that probably should go down in history, just the way he played, like his swag. I’m not all into the stats all the time, but his stats were probably crazy too. It’s just a debut that was nice.”

Ramsey was visibly excited about the way Stafford played, showing it both during the game and afterwards. On Stafford’s first touchdown pass to Van Jefferson, Ramsey ran out onto the field to celebrate with his new quarterback.

That didn’t go unnoticed by Stafford, who called Ramsey a “great teammate” and someone that makes the Rams’ passing game better because of the way he practices every day.

“Yeah, I noticed it. It was awesome,” Stafford said. “You know, he’s a great teammate. He’s a guy that pushes me and pushes our entire receiving core. Everybody’s he’s guarding, that’s as good as a match up you’re going to get in this league and we get to see every single day. I tell those guys all the time, this is as good a practice I’ve ever been a part of. We’ve got extremely talented guys on both sides of the ball.
“It’s a lot of fun to go out there and compete. At the end of the day, if we get the best of them one day, they’re going ‘Man, they’re on our team.’ And if they get the best of us one day, we’re going, ‘Shoot, I love having that defense on our team.’ So it was cool for him to be out there celebrating with me. I was having fun. He seemed like he was having a good time too.”

It’s only been one game but the Rams appear to have a tight-knit group in the locker room. Stafford has already established himself as a leader and captain of the team, using his wealth of experience to help guide the Rams in the right direction this season.

It’s Super Bowl or bust in L.A. and Week 1 gave us no reason to believe the Rams can’t contend for a championship.