Who is the Rams’ most likely opponent in the 2022 season opener?

In exactly one week, the Super Bowl Champion Los Angeles Rams will know who they’ll be facing in the season opener. Next Thursday, the NFL will release the schedule for the highly-anticipated 2022 season.

While every year brings excitement, this upcoming campaign promises to bring its A game following the most insane offseason in league history. LA fans already know the opponents for 2022 but there’s still a debate over who they’ll face first on the road to defending their crown.

Fans have speculated on social media who that team will be. Two months ago after the Russell Wilson trade that initially sparked all the offseason movement, I predicted a matchup against the Denver Broncos would be the clear front-runner. Now I’m not so sure since an interconference opener has been rare in recent years.

Having Russell face off against a familiar foe would make for great TV. Los Angeles would love nothing better than to spoil his first game with the team. Pitting the Buffalo Bills against LA in the opener is complete nonsense. This matchup is seen as a potential Super Bowl preview so knowing the league, they’ll try to push it as late in the regular season as possible.

The Raiders make a little more sense given they’re an up-and-coming team once again after adding Davante Adams and Chandler Jones. Despite that, I believe LA’s likely opponent will be from the NFC, most likely the 49ers or Cowboys.

Dallas opened the 2021 season against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers so they would be a huge ratings boost. There would be nothing sweeter than watching the America’s (Most Obnoxious) Team lose yet another opener to the defending champs. But doesn’t America already have enough to deal with than watch Dallas stink it up in primetime again? Actually wait, wouldn’t that take our minds off our troubles? It’s a win-win!

Anyways, my belief is that the Rams will face the 49ers week one in an NFC Championship rematch. A bitter rivalry to begin the season is reminiscent of the Packers-Bears opener in 2019. San Francisco has won six of the last seven games in the series including the playoffs. LA will be out for blood to prove their postseason matchup wasn’t a one-time thing.

I could be completely wrong about my predictions. That is the nature of the NFL beast. All I want is for it to be next Thursday already so I can quit playing this guessing game.