Seahawks' Cooper Kupp on Rams possibly honoring him at L.A. game: "I didn't die. I'm here." Kupp spoke before practice at the Virginia Mason Athletic Center in Renton Wednesday, Nov. 12, 2025. By Gregg Bell/The News Tribune
There’s apparently talk out of southern California that Cooper Kupp’s former team may honor him in some way when he plays against it for the first time this weekend.
The now-Seahawks wide receiver isn’t quite sure why the Los Angeles Rams would do that when he plays them Sunday in Inglewood, California, in a showdown for the NFC West lead.
“I didn’t die,” the 32-year-old Kupp said Wednesday, with a smile.
“I’m here.”
He’s here, at Seahawks headquarters, back from missing one game from heel and hamstring injuries two weeks ago. He’s readying to play the Rams for the first time in his NFL career.
He’s saying it’s just another game. But he knows better.
Seattle Seahawks wide receiver Cooper Kupp (10) walk off after training camp at Virginia Mason Athletic Center on Friday, July 25, 2025, in Renton, Wash. Brian Hayes bhayes@thenewstribune.com
Cooper Kupp gets Rams closure
He’s headed back to Los Angeles to play in the stadium where the Yakima native and former Eastern Washington University star spent eight seasons. He’s going back to L.A., where he and his wife Anna had and began raising their three sons: Cooper (age 7), Cypress (4) and Solas (2). Cooper Kupp and the former Anna Croskrey met their senior year of high school in 2012, at a track meet when he was starring at Yakima’s Davis High School and she was at Richland High.
Kupp is going back Sunday to where he grew from Rams rookie to Rams royalty. He was the NFL offensive player of the year and Super Bowl MVP for the Rams in the 2021 season. Months after it ended, he signed an $80 million contract with Los Angeles.
He ended up playing only one of the three years of that massive deal for L.A. Injuries caused him to miss 18 games over the three season following his Super Bowl breakout. The Rams, believing they had gotten Kupp’s best and he was declining, decided this spring to cut him.
A couple days after they did, Kupp signed in March with his home-state Seahawks. It’s the team he grew up watching with his dad, former NFL quarterback father Craig and grandfather, former University of Washington lineman grandfather Jake Kupp. He signed a three-year contract with Seattle worth up to $45 million.
All-Pro wide receiver Cooper Kupp from Yakima displays his new Seahawks jersey number 10 after signing a three-year free-agent contract with Seattle March 18, 2025, at the Virginia Mason Athletic Center in Renton. Gregg Bell/The News Tribune
When he did, he felt an emptiness leaving the Rams.
“I’ve always imagined that I’d finish my career there,” he said the day he signed with Seattle.
He said then his departure then from L.A. lacked closure, that the Rams didn’t explain to him why they released him.
“Not a ton of clarity in that regard,” he said eight months ago.
There is now.
A few months into being a Seahawk, Kupp went back to the Rams’ leaders this summer to ask why.
“That is important,” he said Wednesday. “I was able to have some conversations, in private, with people in that organization and try to get that point, you know?”
Kupp didn’t specify whom with the Rams he talked to this summer. It’s not a stretch to assume it was Sean McVay, the head coach who made him what he became in L.A., Les Snead, Los Angeles’ general manager who drafted him, and/or Rams quarterback Matthew Stafford.
Snead’s selection of Kupp late in the third round of the 2017 draft, months after Kupp became the Football Championship Subdivision’s national player of the year at Eastern Washington, remains one of Snead’s shrewdest moves in his 13 years as Rams GM.
“I’m glad to be at that place (of closure),” Kupp said Wednesday. “I’m looking forward to being able to see some of the people there pregame, you give them a hug.
“And then when it’s time to go, it’s time to go.
“It was a meaningful place to me. I enjoyed stepping on that field for eight years and representing the city of Los Angeles. I tried to do it to the best of my ability. It was important to me. It was important for the guys in the organization, to the guys I was preparing with. It was important for me for the fans, and what we wanted to build there.
“The relationships there were too important to just feel like that was broken.
“So I wanted to get that right, and feel better about being able to come here and represent the state of Washington here.”
Los Angeles Rams wide receiver Cooper Kupp (10) waves to fans as he leaves the field after his team beat the Arizona Cardinals at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California, Dec. 28, 2024. The Seahawks signed the Yakima native and Eastern Washington University record-holder to a three-year free-agent contract on March 14, 2025. Jayne Kamin-Oncea USA TODAY NETWORK
Cooper Kupp the Seahawk
Kupp returned from missing his first game as a Seahawk last weekend. In the second quarter he sneaked out to the right sideline and just stood there for a few seconds before quarterback Sam Darnold found him, alone. Darnold’s short pass became Kupp’s 67-yard catch and run zig-zagging through Cardinals defenders down the field.
It set up Zach Charbonnet’s 6-yard touchdown run to put the Seahawks ahead 35-0 in their blowout of Arizona.
Seattle Seahawks wide receiver Cooper Kupp (10) picks up a 67-yard reception during the second quarter of the game against the Arizona Cardinals at Lumen Field, on Sunday, Nov. 9, 2025, in Seattle. Brian Hayes bhayes@thenewstribune.com
It was the biggest play yet for Kupp in what’s been a tempered season. Jaxon Smith-Njigba has gotten the preponderance of targets from Darnold. He leads the NFL in yards receiving (1,041) by a lot.
Smith-Njigba has 63 catches with five touchdowns this season. That’s 37 more receptions and four more scores than Kupp has.
He credits Kupp’s advice for a lot of that.
“Just his preparation. I love when he says ‘Process over results,’” Smith-Njigba said. “That’s something that sticks with me. It’s about being dedicated to the process and not attached to the result. That can go up and down.
“So, being dedicated and trusting the process is something that I felt like was in me, but he put it in words.
“And...it just clicked.”
Seattle Seahawks wide receiver Jaxon Smith-Njigba (11) runs after a 11-yard reception during the fourth quarter of the game against the Arizona Cardinals at Lumen Field, on Sunday, Nov. 9, 2025, in Seattle. Brian Hayes bhayes@thenewstribune.com
Kupp’s process is better than his initial Seahawks results. So far.
He has 26 receptions, for 367 yards and one score. It’s the fewest catches for Kupp through week 10 in any of the nine seasons he’s been in the NFL.
Yet his Seahawks teammates and coaches see more than Kupp’s numbers. They see that process at work.
They see Kupp’s car among the first at the facility when it’s dark each morning. They see it’s still there in the players’ parking lot when it’s darker outside to leave each night.
Offensive coordinator Klint Kubiak, position coach Andrew Janocko, Darnold and Seattle’s quarterbacks see Kupp. A lot. The wide receiver is a fixture in the QB meetings. He’s the only non-quarterback person there. He’s the only wide receiver pretty much anybody in the Seahawks building has seen attend quarterback meetings.
Kupp says does it to learn how the guys calling his plays and throwing his passes see that week’s game plan and opposing defense.
The NFL’s most efficient passer with the most yards per pass attempt so far this season sees that another one of Kupp gaining a mental edge for games.
“Just as much as we talk about ‘Jax’ every single week, I feel like we talk about ‘Coop’ being a really smart player that just understands the game at a different level,” Darnold said. “And it’s part of his experience. But it’s also a huge part of the work that he puts in behind the scenes.
“I know he doesn’t necessarily like to talk about it. That’s what we’re for. We’re here to talk for him and tell you guys how much work he puts in. He’s a great teammate, first and foremost.
“He’s willing to share with the group in terms of how much football knowledge that he has.”
Kupp also sticks his head into the office of head coach Mike Macdonald. He’s given the 38-year-old, second-year head coach advice Macdonald has acted on. It’s been offensive plays to run against zone and man coverages, defensive plays to beat certain offensive looks, even how to practice and when and how to travel to road games.
Macdonald said it was Kupp’s idea to have this Seahawks week mimic last week’s lighter, walk-through-like tempos in practices.
Seattle Seahawks wide receiver Cooper Kupp (10) slips Arizona Cardinals safety Budda Baker (3) on his way to a 67-yard pick up during the second quarter of the game at Lumen Field, on Sunday, Nov. 9, 2025, in Seattle. Brian Hayes bhayes@thenewstribune.com
Last week, the team got back early Monday from a late-night East Coast game at Washington and all-night flight home back across the country. Macdonald lightened the practices Wednesday, Thursday and Friday to shorts and helmets last week. The Seahawks responded Sunday by going up 38-0 in the first half on Arizona. They won for the seventh time in eight games.
This week, Kupp told Macdonald the workload the team’s primary players and pounding the offensive line did while blocking for season highs of 46 running plays for 198 yards against the Cardinals warranted more light practices. The coach is obliging heading into this showdown Sunday between the Seahawks (7-2) and Rams (7-2) for the division lead.
Wednesday was one of Macdonald’s “ACT” practices, in shirts and helmets focusing on accountability, communication and technique. You can bet Kupp’s mind was in full pads. That, more than the numbers so far, has been his truest value to these Seahawks.
“He’s another example that you can show to players: ‘Look, this is how you do it,’” Macdonald said.
“He — as a player, as a person — I can’t say enough great things about ‘Coop.’ I’m so happy he’s here. I’m so happy to have him as a Seahawk. He’s a force multiplier. He thinks he’s made a tremendous impact on the receiving room, the offense and the team, in general. Just in terms of our attitude and how you just approach our business every day.
“He’s got a lot of great ideas. He’s seen a lot of great things, and he a sharp guy. He understands how that affects the players on a daily basis.
“I feel like you should be tapping into that knowledge. Anybody with that type of wisdom you’re going to want to tap into and it should make us better.”
Seattle Seahawks wide receiver Steven Sims (84) and wide receiver Cooper Kupp (10) talk during training camp at Virginia Mason Athletic Center on Friday, July 25, 2025, in Renton, Wash. Brian Hayes bhayes@thenewstribune.com