Via
FTNFantasy.com (which replaced Football Outsiders):
The Rams' Abominable Kicking GameAs long as we're talking about great teams and units, we should talk about a really bad unit. The Los Angeles Rams clinched a playoff spot yesterday but DVOA is less impressed with the team as a whole. The Rams are currently only 18th in DVOA. They rank seventh on offense, 22nd on defense, and this is what we really want to talk about... dead last in special teams. They are way, way, way behind the rest of the league in special teams DVOA.
This year's special teams units are very closely grouped together. Some of that is because of the changes in the kickoff rules in recent years, which basically take away the chance to get any real field-position value out of kickoffs. So the No. 1 special teams unit this year is Philadelphia at 4.3%. That is the second-lowest DVOA ever for a team to rank No. 1. Only the 1992 Lions were lower at 4.0%. The tightly packed teams include the bottom of the league, too. The New England Patriots rank No. 31 in special teams but they're only -3.4% and they just had a kick return for a touchdown yesterday. That's really not much of a gap between the Eagles and the Patriots.
And then there are the Rams. The Rams are last at -9.8% DVOA. The Rams are nearly three times as negative as the No. 31 Patriots. In this year where special teams are super packed together, the Rams currently come out as the sixth-worst special teams unit ever measured by DVOA. They have been killed all year by terrible placekicking and atrocious punt coverage. They've allowed two touchdowns and then 10 other returns of 15 or more yards. (Tampa Bay has allowed 13 such returns, the most in the league, but no touchdowns.) We'll see if this comes back to haunt them in the playoffs, but it nearly cost them a win against the Giants yesterday.
