Los Angeles Rams' Sean McVay On Trick Play Gone Wrong: 'Stupid Idea!'

Trick plays in the NFL are always a fun gamble. Sometimes they can work out very well, while other times they can go horribly wrong, as the Los Angeles Rams found out on Sunday.

Early in the fourth quarter of Sunday's game against the Seattle Seahawks, the Rams broke out a trick play that was essentially a cross between a jet sweep and a flea flicker, with receiver Tutu Atwell giving the ball back to quarterback Matthew Stafford for a shot downfield. While an inventive concept, the play turned into a disaster for L.A. as Stafford not only threw a pick to Seattle cornerback Tariq Woolen, but took a huge hit as well.

As with most trick plays, though, the Rams didn't just pull it out of thin air. Coach Sean McVay actually took inspiration from another L.A. team in the USC Trojans, who ran the play to perfection against the Washington Huskies two weeks earlier.

After the same play produced drastically different results, McVay admitted that taking it for himself wasn't the best idea.

“It looked a little different than when they ran that against Washington,” McVay said on The Coach McVay Show. “Bobby Wagner did a good job of forcing him to not be able to sell that quite as much. Tariq Woolen made a heck of a play. But yes, we had stolen that from those guys and put our own little spin on it. It definitely didn’t work as good as theirs did, so that was a stupid idea by me.

“Oh man, it looked a lot better in practice, guys."

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It's much easier to execute trick plays like that in practice when the defense isn't at full speed, but making it work in an actual game is much harder. Either way, it seems like McVay won't be trying that one again.