Puka Nacua stole the show. Davante Adams was a supporting player.
That was the story for the star receivers in the Rams’ season-opening victory over the Houston Texans.
No one was complaining.
Except, perhaps, fantasy football players who drafted Adams.
“That’s not in the forefront of my mind,” Adams, chuckling, said this week. “I know they think it is. I’m just out here trying to win games and contribute and make plays when I can.”
Nacua brushed off a cut above his eye that required stitches and caught 10 passes for 130 yards. Adams, making his Rams debut, caught four passes for 51 yards.
As the season progresses — starting with Sunday’s game against the Tennessee Titans in Nashville — coach Sean McVay and quarterback Matthew Stafford are apt to even out the targets.
“I’m excited about being able to learn — and it’s a good thing to be able to figure out how to get those guys involved,” McVay said as the Rams prepared for a Titans (0-1) team that will be playing its home opener.
Nissan Stadium in Nashville was the setting for one of the first big moments of McVay’s tenure.
In 2017, McVay’s first season, the Rams clinched the NFC West with a victory over the Titans made possible by then-rookie receiver Cooper Kupp’s diving touchdown catch.
Last March, a few days after they agreed to terms with the three-time All-Pro Adams, the Rams released Kupp, the 2021 NFL offensive player of the year and most valuable player of Super Bowl LVI.
Since last visiting Tennessee, the Rams have played in two Super Bowls and won a title. They have been to the playoffs six times in McVay’s eight seasons.
With a deep and talented roster, they are regarded as Super Bowl contenders.
But much of that rides on how McVay can blend Nacua and Adams.
“I thought it was a good start,” McVay said of the opener.
Rams wide receiver Puka Nacua evades a Houston Texans defender after making a catch during the Rams’ win on Sept. 7.
(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)
Late in the first quarter against the Texans, Nacua caught a pass for a first down, and then left the field and went to the locker room, where he was evaluated for a concussion and received stitches.
“I felt like half my face had fallen off into my facemask that was all the way over here,” Nacua said, gesturing beyond his left shoulder.
But the third-year pro demonstrated his trademark toughness and returned.
Adams noted that Nacua “bounced up” after taking hits against the Texans, came back after receiving stitches and continued to excel.
“It’s hard to stop a pit bull once you get going,” Adams said. “That’s clearly what you get from somebody like Puka.”
Or somebody like Adams.
On the Rams’ third play, Adams absorbed a major hit after converting a third down, but he popped to his feet and pointed downfield, signaling first down.
That set the tone, Nacua said.
“To give that exclamation point of being like, ‘All right, we’re here, we’re going to take your best shot, and we’re going to stand up and we’re going to get ready to march the ball forward,’” Nacua said, adding, “There’s a toughness that you earn the right to play with in the NFL, and he definitely has that.”
As does Nacua, who has said that his physical style was borne from competing against older brothers. Those siblings pumped him up as a youth by slapping him hard on his shoulders during car rides to games. Nacua had college teammates slap him on his shoulder pads before each series, and he recruited several Rams teammates to do the same.
“It’s always nice to get a little wake up on the sideline before you officially get hit by somebody else out there,” Nacua said.
Rams receivers have a saying, Adams said: “You can’t live forever.”
“Sometimes you have to go across the middle and make that play,” he said. “You can’t just let a ball soar past your eyes just because you’re in harm’s way. It sounds kind of crazy, but that’s what you signed up for when you want to be a receiver in this league.”
In the opener, Adams and Nacua made pivotal plays for long gains.
Adams’ textbook back-shoulder catch along the left sideline netted 24 yards. It was the kind of play the Rams envisioned when they paired Stafford, a 17th-year pro who played 12 seasons for the Detroit Lions, with Adams, a 12th-year pro who played his first eight seasons with the Green Bay Packers.
“I know he is really good at that kind of stuff from playing against him and watching him do it and tormenting my team back in the day,” Stafford said, laughing.
Said Adams: “It’s a good building block.”
Nacua caught a no-look pass for 25 yards in the fourth quarter. In the final series, he caught a short pass and clinched the victory by turning it into a 24–yard gain.
Which receiver gets the leading role each week will be determined by how opponents attempt to stop them.
“I’m sure there’ll be times when he’s lighting it up and they say, ‘All right, let’s try to tilt over there, maybe we’ll stop that, see if that works,’” Adams said. “Then I’ll be one-on-one and have a lot more opportunities as well.
“It’s a long season and I think everybody here knows that.”
This story originally appeared on LA Times
