Jared Goff and some of his teammates pulled themselves together against the Seahawks and nearly eked out a victory, but this team remains in deep trouble. If they lose the next game, it is conceivable that they could go into free fall. That often happens unexpectedly to good teams. For whatever reason, they reach a critical point, and everything falls apart all at once. Many teams, such as the 2002 Rams, have gone into free fall, seemingly out of nowhere. It was admirable how the Rams reached deep within themselves and nearly managed to win a tough road game last night, but there are lots of underlying problems. There is no excuse for having a delay of game penalty late in the game just after moving into FG range and with the game on the line. A top notch NFL coach would not allow that to happen. There have been repeated costly blunders in the return game. Earlier in the season, Natson got the Rams in trouble by catching a punt inside the five yard line. Last night, he failed to run up to catch a punt outside the ten yard line, and the Rams ended up getting pinned near the goal line. There have also been blunders on the kickoffs. A few of them have gone out of bounds to give the opponent field position at the 40 yard line. I believe that, in both cases, this led to touchdowns. In some cases, they seem to be trying to get the kickoff to land just outside the end zone. This can work great if the opponent gets pinned inside their 20, but it can backfire. In one case, the Seahawks returned the ball to the 35 yard line. It is best to just kick it deep into the end zone every time and settle for a touchback. I didn't notice any discussion of these special teams blunders, which were very costly. The Rams "best" CBs have hit the wall. They are totally outmatched and incapable of coverage. There has been one embarrassing play after another in the secondary. On a positive note, there is no Rams receiver of the past 50+ years since I have been following them that I would trade for Cooper Kupp. The dude is an on-field genius, and he is the most important player on the Rams right now. Yes, even more so than Aaron Donald. I sure hope that Kupp can remain healthy and realize his full potential in the NFL. It's great to see the resurgence of Clay Matthews, who had a really bad (and costly) call go against him late in the game.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/04/2019 03:03PM by L.A.Rams.
