Three weeks from tonight on NBC and Peacock, the Rams start their season with a return to Detroit. Quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo will be suspended. When will coach Sean McVay know whether Stetson Bennett IV is ready to serve as Matthew Stafford’s understudy?
“We’ll use all the time that we have,” McVay told reporters on Sunday. “What I try to do is take it a little bit at a time. . . . [Y]ou’re always just evaluating each day, but to his credit, where he’s come from and the way he has acted, interacted, and responded to all the different things thrown at him. I’ve been proud of Stetson. I really have.”
And that’s giving McVay confidence in Bennett.
“I think he’s done a really good job of taking steps in the right direction,” McVay said. “All we talk about is making progress and what does that progress look like? . . . He is progressing. I’ve been really pleased. He hasn’t gotten a ton of reps. He’s gotten a ton of reps in these preseason games, but Jimmy’s taking the majority of the other reps. What I was really pleased that he did is when Matthew ended up coming out after a couple of periods against Dallas, I thought Stetson came in and did a magnificent job when he wasn’t planning on practicing. I thought that was really beneficial for him as well. Doing it against the opponent where we had a couple turnovers, and it was after the game. He was able to bounce back. I thought he saw their coverages well. I thought he made good decisions for the most part. I thought yesterday was a lot of the same. . . . I thought given the parameters, Stetson did a nice job and I was pleased with the progress. That’s what we want to continue to be able to see for us to feel good about that. But it’s trending in the right direction.”
Bennett has one more preseason game to show enough progress to be the No. 2 quarterback for Week 1 at Detroit and Week 2 at Arizona. The assignment becomes even more important now that Stafford is dealing with a hamstring injury that easily could be aggravated when it’s time to play.