Getty Cooper Kupp tries to evade two Buccaneer defenders during the Rams' Week 3 win in the 2021 season.
There’s a rival of the Los Angeles Rams who has the Super Bowl 56 champions on his mind.
And it’s not just for this upcoming season, it’s every season. Simply because that despite winning his own Super Bowl and having a legend behind center, he and his team have fallen short against the Rams.
This is not a division rival who has the Rams marked on his 2022 slate. It’s Tampa Bay Buccaneers Pro Bowl linebacker and Super Bowl 55 champion Devin White who has the horns and Ram colors embedded in his brain.
White Shares Memory of Playoff Loss
The 2021 Pro Bowl linebacker revealed to Tampa reporters on Wednesday, May 25 that the Rams’ game on November 6, 2022 is on his list of games he’s looking forward to.
One reason? How the game ended for the Bucs. Tom Brady helped spark the comeback, then White and the defense clamped down. But the game was decided by a climatic Cooper Kupp deep grab from Matthew Stafford followed by Matt Gay’s walk-off field goal as time wilted away at Raymond James Stadium.
“It took a long time,” White said of getting over that Rams loss.
White had this feeling beforehand that he shared with the Tampa media: Whoever wins the game that was played on January 23, 2022, was going to eventually claim the Vince Lombardi Trophy.
“I just knew — I kept telling everybody in the locker room — whoever is going to win this game is going to win the Super Bowl,” White said in reflecting on that last second win by the Rams. “Because we both had great balance of offense and defense. And if they had cameras in the locker room, they could tell you and I could tell you I told them ‘We coming back. The ball is eventually going to go our way.'”
But as White pointed out, there was “one missed opportunity.”
Just an unbelievably clutch play by Matthew Stafford & Cooper Kupp. Cooper Kupp is your MVP as far as I’m concerned, and he went up against the best Defensive Back from Tampa Bay during the most crucial offensive play. Effortless throw from our franchise QB! What a thriller!
White Not Just Thinking About That Rams Loss
White doesn’t just dwell on that defeat at the hands of the Rams, he says he always draws a circle on the Rams for multiple reasons.
“I always have that [game] circled,” White said. “We’ve never beat them [in the playoffs]. I definitely know we’ve never beat them [in the playoffs]. There was a perfect time to beat them [in the playoffs last year] when it really, really mattered.”
White also added he had a conversation with new Bucs head coach Todd Bowles, who was the defensive coordinator for that playoff loss and the Week 3 defeat against the Rams at SoFi Stadium.
“I talked to coach when he became the head coach: The teams we lost to, we need to find a way and we need to emphasize on what we don’t do when we play them,” White said. “And we just need to get over that hump, so he’s as fired up about it as myself, so I’m all in.”
White has been in the league since 2019. In the last victory the Bucs delivered over the Rams — the 55-40 shootout win in 2019 at the L.A. Memorial Coliseum — White was listed as “inactive” that afternoon. While he’s collected 24 total tackles and two tackles for a loss in his three meetings versus the Rams per Pro Football Reference, he’s still 0-3 overall in his career when he’s on the field against L.A.
It’s clear to the “Rams House:” White wants to topple the defending Super Bowl champs.
“It is fuel to the fire for this year,” White said, remembering how the Rams ended the Bucs’ season. “It’s Super Bowl or nothing. We know that. I will say it before all the cameras, that’s the only goal. That’s what we want. That’s what we are after. That’s what we are fighting for.”