Rams’ last-minute travel plans aided by Cardinals owner’s plane as wildfires force relocation
By Jourdan Rodrigue and Mark Puleo
LOS ANGELES — With Monday night’s wild-card game between the Los Angeles Rams and Minnesota Vikings now moved to State Farm Stadium in Arizona, the Rams have enacted their travel plan beginning Friday night.
After practice, which will take place at their usual site in Woodland Hills, Calif., a group of 350 people including players, coaches, football support staff, family members, six dogs and two cats will fly to Phoenix. Arizona Cardinals owner Michael Bidwill has donated his plane to help with the effort, team president and president of Kroenke Sports and Entertainment Kevin Demoff said.
As The Athletic reported Thursday night, factors in the NFL’s decision to move the game included the air quality throughout Los Angeles County as multiple fires have decimated the area and displaced tens of thousands of people — but also the fear that staffing an NFL game would remove first responders, fire personnel or medical staff from fighting the fires which are not yet contained.
The Rams usually have about 100 such personnel for home games, including two full paramedics/EMTs with two life support ambulances in accordance with the league’s Emergency Action Plan.
“Heaven forbid a single home, car or human life was lost because some asset was diverted to SoFi Stadium,” Demoff said, “or that a firefighter who has been working non-stop for 10 days had to stay on the front line to cover for a firefighter who had to go to SoFi Stadium. Or heaven forbid a fire break out during the game and people get an evacuation notice on their phone and have to leave.”
For home games, the hosting team typically holds 500 hotel rooms for their own staff and players and the traveling team. Demoff said freeing up those rooms for possible evacuees fleeing the fires was also a factor in moving the game.
“This was the right decision,” he said. “It’s heartbreaking for our fans, for our players. Our players earned a home playoff game which is a great testament to that. But this situation merits that we play that somewhere else.”
Kelly Stafford, the wife of quarterback Matthew Stafford, is working with the team to provide additional buses for fans to travel to the game.
Sunday, 100 more Rams game day staff including cheerleaders, the field crew (to paint the logos on the Arizona field) and in-house announcing and booth crews will join the team.
The Rams will practice at the Cardinals’ facilities in Tempe, Ariz., on Saturday. They didn’t have to leave as early as Friday for a Monday game, and in normal circumstances would fly Sunday.
But these are not normal circumstances, and that was reiterated over the course of just a few minutes on Thursday afternoon as the Kenneth Fire blazed in the West Hills and the area was ordered to evacuate. Just an hour prior, coach Sean McVay and others in the organization had expressed their optimism that the game would be played at SoFi Stadium.
McVay’s wife, Veronika, and their young son had to evacuate their home because of the Kenneth Fire, as did 30 other players and coaches. The team held a virtual meeting with all members of the organization and family members late Thursday night to discuss next steps.
“I think (VP of football) Tony Pastoors put it best, ‘hope is not a strategy,’” said Demoff. “Watching yesterday, the middle of practice when all hell broke loose — those players can’t focus. They can’t focus with their families (staying) behind.
“There is nothing that I hope more than that we are completely wrong about all of this. I would love for people on Monday to say that we could have played at SoFi. Because that would mean so many things have gone right for our community.”
As of Friday afternoon, the six wildfires burning in the Los Angeles area have consumed nearly 36,000 acres and destroyed over 10,000 structures, according to data from Cal Fire. Firefighting crews have managed to contain eight percent of the Palisades Fire and three percent of the Eaton Fire.
The fires have been responsible for at least 10 deaths, according to officials, The Associated Press reported. Over 153,000 residents have been under evacuation orders, Los Angeles County Sheriff Robert G. Luna said Friday, while 57,830 structures are at risk. Air quality levels in Los Angeles have improved slightly after reaching and staying at unhealthy levels throughout Wednesday and Thursday.
Along with the decision to move Monday’s wild-card game, the fires have impacted professional sports schedules in both the NHL and NBA, where the Los Angeles Kings and Los Angeles Lakers — both of whom play in Crypto.com Arena — postponed Wednesday and Thursday home games, respectively.
Like the Rams, the Los Angeles Chargers practiced outside in the smoke-filled air ahead of their Saturday wild-card round matchup in Houston. Players practiced in masks Thursday and had an adjusted practice schedule to limit their time spent on the field.
The Chargers arrived in Houston on Thursday night.
The NFL announced in a statement Friday the league is providing $5 million to support communities affected by the fires and said individual contributions notably poured in from the Rams, Chargers and their wild-card round opponents, the Vikings and Houston Texans.
The Rams’ ticket sales team had to evacuate their Agoura Hills, Calif., offices on Thursday because of the Kenneth Fire in the West Hills. But an hour after the team opened sales on Friday, team officials said season ticket holders had purchased 25,000 tickets. The NFL said 52,000 seats had been purchased by the end of the second hour.
The Rams will wear Los Angeles Fire Department hats and shirts during Monday night’s game to honor the crews battling these fires.
“You’re watching those water drops yesterday like we watched the Falcons-Commanders playoff game (that helped the Rams clinch the NFC West),” Demoff said. “Like, you’re cheering at every second. That was going to be the difference between this organization being able to play a game, and not play a game. Had that fire spread I don’t think we could have played this week, it would have been really hard emotionally.”
