Sean McVay knew questions about the Rams' travel schedule were coming following his team's ugly 27-7 season-opening loss to the 49ers in the first-ever game played in Australia. McVay started his postgame press conference by stating that there were going to be "narratives" stemming from the loss and that others would "appropriately, put the blame on me." He accepts responsibility for the loss, but he doesn't (at least publicly) regret his decision to arrive in Australia less than 30 hours prior to kickoff. "I don't believe that's why we didn't play well enough," he said.
I'm more than comfortable with that. I'll always make decisions that I think are best for the football team. It's easy in hindsight to be able to say it was it was a miss.
But those are responsibilities that I'll take and then you try to be able to look at it. I'll always look at myself inside out and figure out where I can improve." A popular offseason pick to win the Super Bowl, the Rams looked anything like a championship team on Thursday night, while the 49ers did. Los Angeles was outgained by nearly 100 yards, were just 2 of 9 on third down, allowed the 49ers to convert on more than half of their third downs, and had no answers for the 49ers' star players.
Brock Purdy threw three touchdown passes that included scores to Mike Evans and Deebo Samuel. Christian McCaffrey had 88 total yards, and Fred Warner recorded 11 tackles and a forced fumble. The Rams' star players, however, largely failed to show up.
Matthew Stafford had his worst game in recent memory. He finished the game with just 155 yards with no touchdowns and an interception. Davante Adams didn't have a catch until midway through the third quarter and finished with just three receptions on six targets.
Myles Garrett didn't register a sack or a tackle. McVay shared several other reasons for the loss outside of the team's travel schedule. He pointed out his team's inability to capitalize on some of its momentum early in the game.
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