Matthew Stafford Camp Update — August 16: The Encore Is Actually Practicing This Time
2026 NFL Season · Monday, Aug 17
Stafford sits atop the Rams' first depth chart and, unlike last August, is fully participating in camp. The June bet on the reigning MVP's floor looks intact, with the rookie succession story humming quietly behind him.
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Matthew Stafford is listed as the Rams' first-team quarterback on the club's first unofficial depth chart, and by Davante Adams's account he is fully participating in this training camp, which is a sentence nobody could write about him a year ago. Adams put it directly back on August 3: he and Stafford "are getting a whole different start than we had last year," per John Newman of SB Nation via Yahoo.
Back in June, our preview made a simple argument about the reigning Most Valuable Player. The 46 touchdown passes were a career outlier that would come back to earth, and a 38-year-old pocket passer with no running game carries real cliff risk, but the efficiency underneath that season was genuinely elite, second in the league in adjusted net yards per attempt. Our claim was that even a regressed Stafford, throwing to these receivers in this scheme, remains a quality starting quarterback. The doubt was all about age and durability.
This week's evidence supports the healthy version of the story. Stafford did not play in Saturday's preseason opener at Kansas City, a 20 to 12 Rams win, but that was by design, since every starter sat. Stetson Bennett started, and rookie first-rounder Ty Simpson played roughly three quarters and went 21 of 25 for 190 yards and two touchdowns, per Stu Jackson of therams.com and Julia Stumbaugh of Bleacher Report. Simpson is the succession plan we mentioned in June, and he sounds like it, saying he is trying to soak up as much knowledge as he can, "and what better guy to do it from than Matthew Stafford?" That is next year's story arriving on schedule. The depth chart, per Bret Stuter of Ramblin Fan, reads Stafford, then Bennett, then Simpson.
Does the June read hold? CONFIRMED — the whole worry was the body, and the body is on the field taking a full camp, with the first-team job never in question.
Next week, watch whether Stafford takes any live preseason snaps before the Melbourne opener against San Francisco, and watch Puka Nacua's core-muscle situation, which is the one cloud over this passing game. We'll check next Sunday.
_Data via nflverse._
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