Kelly, wife of LA Rams quarterback Matthew Stafford, will MISS Week 1 game in Detroit for ‘mental health reasons’

Kelly Stafford, the wife of Los Angeles Rams quarterback Matthew Stafford, says she will not attend her husband’s season-opening game against the Detroit Lions next Sunday.

Matthew was a former Lions player, so this “homecoming” was a difficult situation for the family – especially after the frosty reception they received in last season’s NFC playoffs.

In a recent episode of the podcast “The Morning After,” which Kelly co-hosts with Hank Winchester, she says she plans to watch the competition at home with her children – rather than subjecting them to a potentially similarly hostile environment at Ford Field as last time.

“Physically, I’m not (at the game),” Kelly said.

“After our incredible live show (in Detroit on September 7), I’m going to hop on a plane and fly home so I can watch it here with my daughters. So that’s the plan.”

Kelly Stafford says she will not attend the Rams’ Week 1 opening game at the Detroit Lions

Stafford, the wife of Rams QB Matthew Stafford, brought her girls to last season’s NFC Wild Card game against Detroit in January – where Matthew received a frosty reception.

Stafford was traded to the Los Angeles Rams in 2021 after spending 12 seasons in Detroit. In his first season in LA, he won Super Bowl LVI against the Cincinnati Bengals.

This wild-card matchup in January marked the first time Kelly and the Staffords returned to Ford Field since the trade.

In a social media post about the game, Kelly commented on the atmosphere: “This is sports. The city wants to win. Anything goes… Except the fans booing my kids. Other than that, I enjoyed the atmosphere and the boos only fueled my husband even more.”

Kelly cited another reason for not going to the game as being that her daughters did not want to go to Detroit.

“I actually asked them if they wanted to go back … and they said ‘no.’ So that’s another reason why we’re not going to go back to the game,” she said on the podcast, adding, “There’s a lot that goes into it … but I just think it’s the better decision for my mental health and my daughters’ mental health.”

“My husband doesn’t want to hear me say angrily, ‘Ugh.’ Not that I am, because I have grown from this experience too.

“You forget that this is football and that this is a big deal in Detroit. I forgot that and was so emotionally involved that I also forgot that this is a playoff football game.

“I think I could prepare my daughters better in some ways, but I just don’t think it’s worth it right now… So it’s better this way.”

Matthew played 12 seasons in Detroit with the Lions before joining the Rams in 2021

In a social media post from January, Kelly says her children were booed by Detroit fans

When asked if she thought her husband would receive a similar reception – or if she would simply prefer to watch the game at home – Kelly said, “I think it’s a little bit of both.”

‘I have such fond memories of that dome and my last memory wasn’t that great, but I still got to see Detroit in a playoff game, which was really cool because we never got to go to a home game, so that was really cool for me.

“And of course I know how passionate these fans are. I miss these fans. But I also want to continue to have these incredible memories of this place.

“I think people will still remember it because of all the drama that happened after the game.

“And I think you always hear the worst. You don’t hear people saying, ‘Thank you for everything you do.’ You hear people saying, ‘Fuck you, Kelly!'”

“Of course there are a lot of people in a stadium, but you hear it and you remember it. I don’t want to hold on to that. I prefer to watch the game at home and remember all the incredible moments I had there.”

After his transfer to Los Angeles, Stafford won a Super Bowl in his first season with the Rams

Kelly will launch a podcast tour starting this Saturday in Detroit

Kelly and Winchester will be in Detroit, the first stop on their “Cleat Chaser” tour, which begins in the Motor City and ends in New York on December 21.

The tour’s name is derived from a nickname Kelly received after she received strong backlash in June over her comments that she dated Stafford’s backup quarterback at the University of Georgia just to make him jealous.

“After the recent situation, I was called that and I said, ‘Let’s tackle this,'” she said. “It turns out that if you do it for the right reasons, it’s not all bad …

“If you’re doing it to lock up a man for money or fame, I’m not a fan of it.”

The Staffords are parents of 7-year-old twins Sawyer and Chandler, as well as 6-year-old Hunter and 4-year-old Tyler.