{"id":209425,"date":"2025-09-08T05:29:17","date_gmt":"2025-09-08T05:29:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/209425\/"},"modified":"2025-09-08T05:29:17","modified_gmt":"2025-09-08T05:29:17","slug":"los-angeles-rams-have-something-special-with-puka-nacua-davante-adams","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/209425\/","title":{"rendered":"Los Angeles Rams have something special with Puka Nacua, Davante Adams"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" style=\"position:absolute;top:0;left:0;right:0;bottom:0;width:100%;height:100%;z-index:2\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/86031280007-usatsi-27028015.jpg\"\/><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"vidplayicon\" src=\"https:\/\/www.gannett-cdn.com\/appservices\/universal-web\/universal\/icons\/icon-play-alt-white.svg\" alt=\"play\" style=\"height:40px;margin:auto 18px auto 27px;width:40px\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Aaron Rodgers turns back the clock in revenge game against Jets<\/p>\n<p>USA TODAY Sports&#8217; Chris Bumbaca breaks down the 34-32 win by the Steelers over the Jets in a game that saw Aaron Rodgers defeat his former team.<\/p>\n<p>Sports Pulse<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Matthew Stafford showed no issues from a previous back injury in the Rams&#8217; 14-9 win over the Texans.<\/li>\n<li>Stafford surpassed 60,000 career passing yards, becoming the 10th player in NFL history to do so.<\/li>\n<li>New wide receiver duo Puka Nacua and Davante Adams combined for 14 catches and 181 yards.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>INGLEWOOD, Calif. \u2212 <a href=\"https:\/\/sportsdata.usatoday.com\/football\/nfl\/players\/matthew-stafford\/323205\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Matthew Stafford<\/a> didn\u2019t show any ill effects from a back injury that hampered him most of the summer.<\/p>\n<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/sportsdata.usatoday.com\/football\/nfl\/players\/matthew-stafford\/323205\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Los Angeles Rams<\/a> quarterback completed 21 of 29 passes for 245 yards and tossed one touchdown in the team\u2019s gritty 14-9 win over the Houston Texans. Stafford was even sacked three times and hit six more.<\/p>\n<p>The 37-year-old QB got back up every single time.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt was great. I don&#8217;t take it for granted. I love being out there with those guys. I love getting to work with them,\u201d Stafford said. \u201cJust happy that I was able to kind of get through what was going on. A lot of support from a lot of people, teammates, coaches, trainers, everybody (and) family. A lot of appreciation goes to those people for helping me. Put a bunch of work in and was able to get back to this point. Just happy to do it. I love being out there. I love playing.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Maybe the best cure for Stafford\u2019s back is Puka Nacua and Davante Adams &#8212; one of the NFL&#8217;s top new wide receiver tandems. The two were the recipients of 14 of Stafford\u2019s 21 completions and combined for 19 targets.<\/p>\n<p>One of Nacua\u2019s receptions elevated <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/NFL\/status\/1964824859885924444\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Stafford over 60,000 career passing yards<\/a>, becoming one of 10 players in NFL history to reach such milestone.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI thought Matthew Stafford was in great command all day,\u201d <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/sportsdata.usatoday.com\/football\/nfl\/teams\/los-angeles-rams\/343\" data-autotag=\"f489e821-d3f9-4cff-bec5-7eaa0f4b51cb\" rel=\"noopener\">Rams<\/a> coach Sean McVay said. \u201cHe came up with clutch play after clutch play. I thought he was seeing the field really well. Really awesome for him to go over 60,000 yards. That&#8217;s unbelievable. Real testament to the consistency of what he&#8217;s done.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Nacua produced a game-high 10 catches for 130 yards despite <a href=\"https:\/\/www.usatoday.com\/story\/sports\/nfl\/2025\/09\/07\/puka-nacua-bloodied-los-angeles-rams\/86032172007\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">leaving the game momentarily to be evaluated for a concussion<\/a>. Adams hauled in four catches for 51 yards in his Rams debut.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cA lot of the game plan is geared to get us involved. Puka had a great game,\u201d Adams said postgame. \u201cI think there&#8217;s a lot more we can build on, for sure.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Houston had a problem covering Nacua most of the contest. Yet, Nacua owes Adams an assist. Adams\u2019 presence on the field gave Nacua a matchup advantage because Adams was covered by Texans All-Pro cornerback Derek Stingley Jr. That allowed the Rams to exploit Nacua\u2019s matchup against Kamari Lassiter and Houston\u2019s other corners.<\/p>\n<p class=\"related-link\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.usatoday.com\/story\/sports\/nfl\/2025\/09\/07\/puka-nacua-bloodied-los-angeles-rams\/86032172007\/\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Bloodied Los Angeles Rams receiver Puka Nacua evaluated for concussion<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt&#8217;s huge. He has a ton of respect, and rightfully so. He\u2019s an unbelievable player. He&#8217;s made a bunch of big plays,\u201d Stafford said of Adams. \u201cIt&#8217;s fun to go out there and work with him, get to throw the ball to a guy that&#8217;s a future Hall of Famer. Unbelievable player. I feel lucky.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The Rams essentially replaced Cooper Kupp with the three-time All-Pro Adams during the offseason. Adams at age 32 might be at the end of his prime, but Week 1 showed teams still have to gameplan for his mere presence on the field. He had a modest outing by his standards, but the Rams have something good brewing with their newly formed duo on the outside.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s fun. These guys are just gritty and grimy dudes that&#8217;s gonna go out there and find a way to make it work,\u201d Adams said of his Rams teammates. \u201cA young team with a lot of energy and really everything that it takes to be a great team.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Follow USA TODAY Sports&#8217; Tyler Dragon on X\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/TheTylerDragon\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">@TheTylerDragon<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Aaron Rodgers turns back the clock in revenge game against Jets USA TODAY Sports&#8217; Chris Bumbaca breaks down&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":209426,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5123],"tags":[5714,691,8015,8019,4231,1582,276,30900,29299,104941,12943,115018,58172,2488,1318,2487,11652,8591,104939,2961,4230,224,9006,5337,72707,56082,72006,114843,1571,5382,50,1232,12623,450,1457,1451,115020,89635,7138,8038,32896,62,1458,72004,115019,645,2490],"class_list":{"0":"post-209425","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles","8":"tag-adams","9":"tag-ai","10":"tag-american","11":"tag-american-football","12":"tag-angeles","13":"tag-ca","14":"tag-california","15":"tag-cooper","16":"tag-cooper-kupp","17":"tag-davante","18":"tag-davante-adams","19":"tag-derek","20":"tag-derek-stingley-jr","21":"tag-enabled","22":"tag-football","23":"tag-highlights","24":"tag-hub","25":"tag-jr","26":"tag-kupp","27":"tag-la","28":"tag-los","29":"tag-los-angeles","30":"tag-los-angeles-rams","31":"tag-losangeles","32":"tag-matthew","33":"tag-matthew-stafford","34":"tag-mcvay","35":"tag-nacua","36":"tag-national","37":"tag-national-sports","38":"tag-news","39":"tag-nfl","40":"tag-nfl-hub","41":"tag-overall","42":"tag-overall-positive","43":"tag-positive","44":"tag-puka","45":"tag-puka-nacua","46":"tag-rams","47":"tag-sean","48":"tag-sean-mcvay","49":"tag-sports","50":"tag-sports-news","51":"tag-stafford","52":"tag-stingley","53":"tag-story","54":"tag-story-highlights-ai-enabled"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":"Validation failed: Text character limit of 500 exceeded"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/209425","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=209425"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/209425\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/209426"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=209425"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=209425"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=209425"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}