The Los Angeles Rams made an addition to their quarterback room in signing veteran Jimmy Garoppolo to be the backup to Matthew Stafford. The move made sense as Garoppolo is a proven commodity who can step in and guide a successful offense.
However, the Rams won’t have Garoppolo available for the first two games of the season as he will be serving a two-game suspension for violating the NFL’s Performance Enhancing Drugs policy. Garoppolo chose not to appeal the suspension and overall the quarterback has simply accepted what has come down.
Garoppolo recently spoke about the suspension, saying that he will take it all in stride and choose to attack the Rams’ offseason workouts and be ready once to go once he’s eligible to be back on the field.
“Take it in stride, I guess. Never really been in this situation before so it’s a weird one, but it is what it is,” Garoppolo said. “I think attack OTAs, attack training camp, and let those first two games pass by. Hopefully we’ll get some dubs and start off 2-0 and keep things moving. But it’s just one of those situations. It is what it is. You got to deal with it and just keep moving on and stay positive.”
The Rams quarterback also made it clear that his violation was not a matter of him taking something illegal, but rather a failure on his end to properly handle the Therapeutic Use Exemption paperwork.
“I mean, just messed up the TUE (Therapeutic Use Exemptions), really,” Garoopolo added. “I hate to joke about it, but just messed up the TUE when I first got to Las Vegas and yeah, bad timing I guess.”
It was an honest mistake, but one that will unfortunately cost Garoppolo a pair of games to start the season. But as he said, he will simply dive into OTAs and training camp so that once those two games have passed, he will be able to provide the Rams with everything they ask of him.
Rams planning to move Steve Avila to center following Jonah Jackson signing
Regardless of the quarterback, it looks as if there will be a shift in the interior offensive line for the Rams as the team signed former Detroit Lions guard Jonah Jackson to a three-year deal. With the team also re-signing guard Kevin Dotson it is now expected that second-year lineman Steve Avila will move over to center.
Avila played two years of center in college at TCU so it is not an unfamiliar position for him and overall the move should help to improve the Rams’ offensive line.
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