LOS ANGELES — Matthew Stafford may have changed teams, but his problems at Ford Field remain the same. In his recent return to the stadium where he was the face of the Detroit Lions for 12 seasons, Stafford and the Los Angeles Rams suffered a bitter defeat, losing in overtime to his former team in Sunday night’s season opener.

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Before the game, Stafford and Rams coach Sean McVay expressed their anticipation of the Lions fan base, a rowdy crowd they themselves experienced during their loss to Detroit in the wild-card round of last postseason.

“(The atmosphere) was good,” Stafford told reporters. “I thought it was a great place to play. The crowd was excited. Of course, a great football game helps to get the crowd excited – back and forth all day long.”

The 20-26 loss was Stafford’s sixth consecutive defeat at Ford Field.

His last win in Detroit came on November 15, 2020, when he was a member of the Lions. In that game, Detroit defeated the Washington Football Team with a 59-yard field goal by Matt Prater under former coach Matt Patricia.

Given Stafford’s first 12 seasons with the Lions, it was expected that his return to Detroit in last year’s postseason would be emotional, especially given the pregame noise of Lions fans booing him and chanting Jared Goff’s name at a deafening volume – which could be seen as a jab at Stafford, who left Detroit in 2021 when the teams swapped quarterbacks.

When asked if he had gotten over the booing from the Lions fans and the Goff chants, Stafford simply replied, “Yes, I did. I’m fine.”

Compared to his postgame press conference last season, where his comments about the Lions fan base went viral, Stafford seemed calmer and in a better mood — which is understandable considering this was a playoff contest and Sunday’s game was just the first of 17 weeks.

However, if Stafford shows emotion upon his return, this would be understandable, according to his teammate Cooper Kupp, even though he considers Stafford’s game on Sunday to be “good.”

“Of course there’s an emotional aspect to it,” Kupp said. “I think it’s always emotional when you come back here as a person. He was here so long and raised his family here, so I understand that. I thought he did such a good job this week and was able to approach it like a normal week. He put us in the right plays.”

“He communicated clearly in a hostile environment and was able to get us in and out of the right situations. Obviously, like he said, there are plays we all want to get back, but I thought he did a really good job.”

With a weakened offensive line, Stafford completed 69% of his passes, threw for 317 yards, one touchdown and one interception. Stafford is now 1-2 against the Lions since the 2021 trade that brought him to Los Angeles.