Rams, Chargers face rosters cuts

The countdown to the NFL roster cut down date is near. Both the Rams and Chargers, the two local teams in Southern California, both play on the road for their final preseason game. 

The Rams will be entertained by the Houston Texans while the Chargers hit the road and travel to face off against the Dallas Cowboys. 

Both teams struggled to put points on the scoreboard in a preseason game played at SoFi Stadium on Aug. 17. The Rams, getting a 47-yard pass play from Stetson Bennett to JJ Laap in the fourth quarter, eventually prevailed with a 13-9 win. 

When asked about whether he is focusing on certain positions for roster makes, Rams head coach Sean McVay said he and his staff are looking at everything. Every position is being evaluated.    

“It’s all of them,” McVay said recently. “ I’m not going to get into the specifics of where [we are] right now. We’re going to use all the evaluation time, but there are certain spots that you’re really seeing… alright there’s a decision still to be made in a couple of those positions.” 

“I don’t want to make like any decision because fortunately or unfortunately, unscheduled things occur, and you hope that everybody stays healthy but injuries are a part of this game. We’ve seen that fortunately, really with the exception of [Derion Kendrick] ‘DK’, we haven’t lost anybody that we expect it to affect the season. Every position is something that we’re monitoring,” McVay added.  

The official day for roster cuts is Aug. 27. Teams will have to shave their roster down to 53 players. The Chargers have struggled thus far offensively. Against the Seattle Seahawks, the Bolts put up three points before their nine-point outing against the Rams. 

The good news for the Chargers is that starting quarterback Justin Herbert is now out of that protective boot he’s worn for the last couple of weeks and is back at practicing. Chargers head coach Jim Harbaugh was happy to see his signal-caller out on the field. 

“Great, great,” Harbaugh said. “It felt like the music should be playing. I even thought I felt…I thought I heard music. Voices of angels, maybe. It felt great.”