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Rams43
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Tavon. Ummmmm... I'm gonna take the high road here. But I still think that he's a man without a position.
Just caught Rob Ryan on Colin Cowherd's show. He brought up an interesting tidbit about the on-field relationship involving Austin and Rams' rushing attack that I hadn't really put much thought into.
He said that, in Buffalo, one of the main reasons that Shady McCoy has enjoyed success there is because defenses have to respect Tyrod Taylor's running ability on the read-option. Taylor's ability to give weak-side rushers "pause" really helps their rushing attack even if he keeps the ball once or twice a game for no gain.
Ryan said that the same situation exists for the Rams and Tavon Austin. But instead of running the read-option, Tavon is doing the jet sweep. And Tavon's speed and open-field ability forces defenders to pause in the same manner.
Kinda an expensive decoy, but Austin definitely has a role out there.
Ryan also took a parting shot at the Bills organization for letting both Woods and Watkins go. He said that they've decided to part ways with several good players - and coaches too.
The same up-the-gut plays that see Gurley stymied more often than not when there is no TA threat see him get at least three w/TA comes hard across the backfield. Conversely, the decoys and Gurley touches all game long meant that when TA finally got the ball the LB on that side HADN'T already dropped down across the LOS and TA got 8 and almost scored.
I'm definitely not saying TA is earning his money right now. And we know that even beyond the costly muffed punt he was VERY shaky w/the ball last night. But he's contributing offensively out there in ways that don't show up in his own stats. And if ever teams start trying harder to slow the other guys down and pay less attention to TA, he absolutely will make them pay.
