The Los Angeles Rams are preparing to place Puka Nacua on IR after their best receiver — and I would say best player period — sprained both his MCL and PCL on L.A.’s final offensive snap of Week 9. It was a pointless end-around called by Sean McVay for Nacua to simply pick up a few yards, but there’s nothing “simple” about putting your only good and healthy pass catcher in harm’s way on a rushing play to setup for better punting field position at the end of the game.

Nacua will join Davante Adams, who is already on IR with a ruptured hamstring that is expected to keep him out for at least another month. I still can’t fathom how the words “ruptured” and “hamstring” are side-by-side and the 34-year-old receiver is supposed to play again in 2026, but that’s what the Rams are claiming.

Even though I expect the L.A. Rams to win their fourth game in a row when they face the Arizona Cardinals (who will not have Gardner Minshew or Michael Wilson) on Sunday, McVay’s road to the playoffs appears to be much tougher than Mike Macdonald and the Seattle Seahawks.

If the Rams lose two of these games after the bye week, will L.A. start to shut down players like Matthew Stafford and Myles Garrett for the remainder of the season, similar to how they did in 2022 after the worst Super Bowl hangover of all-time?

The Rams have the toughest remaining strength of schedule in the NFL, according to ESPN. That includes facing the Seahawks twice in the last three weeks, but will L.A. be the team we expected when the schedule was announced? Or at that point will McVay be more invested in finding out what the Rams have in 13th overall pick Ty Simpson because they lost too many players — and too many games?

Though Myles Garrett had three sacks on Sunday in his first game back since his own two-month stint on IR, can we definitively say that L.A. is better than the Cleveland Browns team he left to “go win a Super Bowl” with the Rams?

Stafford’s starting WRs and TEs for the next month, at least:

WR Konata Mumpfield (48% catch rate)
WR Jordan Whittington (12 yards this season)
WR Tutu Atwell (40% of his 99 yards came on one play)
WR C.J. Daniels (rookie no targets)
TE Tyler Higbee (how is he still their starter?)
TE Colby Parkinson (worse than you remember)
TE Davis Allen (10 yards per game)
TE Max Klare (rookie no targets)

McVay suggested on Monday that the team has no intention to trade for a receiver and it’s not surprise really: L.A. is 32nd in cap space.

And all of their 2027 cap space is spoken for because the Rams have the LONGEST list of starters who are pending free agents after the season: Nacua, OLB Byron Young, DT Kobie Turner, LG Steve Avila, C Coleman Shelton, RG Kevin Dotson, RT Warren McClendon, Parkinson, Atwell, Allen, CB Emmanuel Forbes, P Ethan Evans, and several more key restricted free agents.

Yes, 80% of their starting offensive line is set to hit free agency.

The Rams also don’t have a kicker signed for next year. They probably need to replace Adams. Their plan with Stafford and Simpson is unclear, but L.A. might need to sign a reliable free agent quarterback.

McVay almost quit coaching after the 2022 disaster. What will he do if the Rams miss the playoffs in 2026?

The Rams are getting a “layup” in Week 10 with the Cardinals set to play rookie third-round pick Carson Beck for the first time on Sunday, with a receiver room led by Simi Fehoko and Reggie Virgil. But this is, in fact, a team that L.A. lost to a few weeks ago, 18-16.

Cardinals head coach Mike LaFleur may have as good of a reason on McVay and Stafford as anybody, having spent 2023-2025 as the Rams’ offensive coordinator.

Just last week I wrote that the Seahawks were facing a must-win game against the Arizona Cardinals at midseason. Now it’s the Rams turn; a loss to the Cardinals this week will make general manager Les Snead heavily regret the decision to not be sellers at tomorrows deadline.

However, even a win over the Cardinals — which is what I expect to happen — will only improve the Rams to 6-4 going into the bye week, which Stafford’s wife Kelly has already complained is much shorter than normal because the NFL scheduled their return game on a WEDNESDAY against the Packers.

11/25, vs Packers
12/3, vs Chiefs
12/14, at 49ers

McVay has always struggled against Kyle Shanahan, going 8-12 in the matchups, including nine straight regular season losses at one point. Even having won four of the last six, half of those games came against backup quarterbacks (once against Mac Jones, and once against Sam Darnold when San Francisco rested all starters).

So if the Rams lose to the 49ers, which is at least what most people assume will happen, it makes it even more imperative for L.A. to go 3-0 before then.

If the Rams go 2-2 over their next four games, they’ll be 7-5 (potentially also being 1-3 or 0-4 in the NFC West, which is detrimental to their playoff hopes) headed into the home stretch of Cowboys, Seahawks, Buccaneers, Seahawks.

This apparent need to go 3-1 or 4-0 in the next month means doing so without these players, for most or all of it:

WR Puka Nacua (IR)
WR Davante Adams (IR)
CB Jaylen Watson (season-ending IR)
NT Poona Ford (season-ending IR)
DT Kobie Turner (IR)
TE Terrance Ferguson (IR)
LG Steve Avila (not IR, but out at least 2 weeks)
CB Trent McDuffie (missed last game, status TBD)

If that weren’t convincing enough of the issues facing L.A., they currently roster TWO kickers (something Seattle hasn’t done since the year of Olindo Mare and Brandon Coutu) because they cut the first guy and they put the second guy on IR, now they have veteran Brandon McManus, and Josh Karty, a player who they cut a couple of years ago.

Going into the season the Rams had the worst special teams on paper and on the field. That has held true.

But what has changed is that the current roster is in contention for the worst WR/TE room in the NFL (the Cardinals still have Trey McBride) despite the Rams overloading the 53-man edition with five tight ends and a starting duo of Nacua and Adams. L.A. has Stafford, Kyren Williams, Blake Corum, McVay, and a pretty good offensive line, which is certainly something.

However, Stafford is not a quarterback known for creating magic out of thin air and he’s never been successful in his career without a Calvin Johnson or Cooper Kupp or Puka Nacua or Davante Adams. This would be a first. Plus, he has an elbow injury.

How relevant is this to the Seahawks’ playoff chances?

Extremely.

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From Super Bowl to Sleepers?

The Seahawks are 5-4, same as the Rams, and they do not expect Sam Darnold to return this week against the Las Vegas Raiders; which is certainly relevant to some fans, but not to all.

They do expect Drew Lock to be available, which IS good news to everybody.

But unlike L.A., the Seahawks still possess a superpower: Their defense is allowing 4.14 yards per play, which would be the best mark by ANY team in almost 20 years! No defense since the 2008 Steelers (a team I mentioned here on this newsletter not long ago) has allowed that few yards per play.

Just over the last five years, 4.14 would by BY FAR the best mark. The second-closest team is the 2025 Broncos. The next-closest? The 2025 Seahawks.

No matter what you think of Darnold or Lock — or even Jalen Milroe — a team that ranks first in yards per play allowed, net yards per pass allowed, second in yards per carry allowed, and just generally first overall on defense, can never be dismissed from the playoff conversation. Especially in a conference that — as I just wrote — is basically down to five teams for three wild cards.

One of those five teams was supposed to be the Rams.

Going by winning percentage of remaining opponents, the four hardest remaining strength of schedules? Bears, Packers, Lions, Vikings. The entire NFC North.

You can’t punch your ticket to the playoffs based on strength of schedule, but … will you take it? Are you, as a Seahawks fan, mad about this?

Image of I'll take everything you've got.

The Seahawks must first take care of business against a Raiders team that is 4-5, but those four wins have come against teams with a combined winning percentage of .182 (average score 31-22) vs. five losses against teams with a winning percentage of .707 (average score 22-36).

Last week, Arizona had the 32nd ranked scoring defense. This week, the Raiders took over as the team with the last place scoring defense.

I don’t care if JOHN LOCKE is starting at quarterback: If the Seahawks can’t beat the Raiders, what’s it all for anyway?

Following a 14-day break, the Seahawks face a 49ers team that will have just played the Vikings on Sunday Night Football the week before. Then they have three straight games against the NFC East:

Cowboys (4-5*, 0-1 against teams with a winning record)
Giants (5-2-1, 0-1 against teams with a winning record)
Eagles (2-7, tanking!)

If — and I know I’m only saying IF because of course Seattle can lose to teams they should win and they’ve already done that in 2026 — the Seahawks beat bad teams over this stretch, they will be 9-5 or 10-4 as of their Christmas Day game against the L.A. Rams.

In the same stretch, if the Rams lose to good teams (Chiefs, Packers, 49ers) they would be 7-7, at best. If they win one of those games, maybe 8-6. And that would be great motivation for Week 16, right? “Beat the Seahawks this one time and you’ll be right back in it.” But should there be any semblance of a meltdown — like losing to the Cardinals this week — who can say which version of the Rams will even show up in six weeks?

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There’s a lot that can happen between now and Week 16, but I felt it was important to send out an update now with the trade deadline tomorrow and L.A.’s bad news hitting them tonight. Not that we revel in their injuries (personally, I rank Puka high on my list of most entertaining players to watch play) — only that this is EXTREMELY relevant to Seattle’s playoff picture.

The Seahawks won’t always look like fine art. But beauty is in the eye of the beholder and what I see now is a glimmer of hope for a string of season-ending wins that Seattle will certainly need.

(Clark Update: The Seaside Dog is healthy and in good spirits. We have more vet appointments — and a surgery — left to go. But we believe that aside from that and once that’s done, Clark has many years left ahead. Thank you to everyone who supported us last week BUT I can’t leave out the fact that literally all of you helped: Without Seaside Joe’s Regular Joes supporters, paying for the surgery wouldn’t be so feasible. So thank YOU ALL.)

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Will the Rams quit before they even play the…