Vinny B: On Todd Gurley

[theathletic.com]

‘I don’t call the play calls, bro’ — The Rams’ words about Todd Gurley aren’t matching reality



By Vincent Bonsignore Sep 29, 2019 23
LOS ANGELES — On the oddest of Rams afternoons, it wasn’t the absurdly copious 68 times Jared Goff dropped back to throw that stood out most, or his four turnovers. It wasn’t that somehow the Rams managed to make a game out of the madness that unfolded Sunday at the Coliseum.

It wasn’t even that the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, of all teams, dropped 55 points on the defending NFC champions to hand them their first loss of the season, though it was pretty weird that Jameis Winston strolled in and hung a 55-40 loss on the Rams.

No, the strangest thing of all was the Rams’ usage of star running back Todd Gurley, and then coach Sean McVay’s reaction to it.

McVay called only five run plays for Gurley (who totaled 16 yards and two touchdowns), and none in the first quarter when the Rams were in desperate need of establishing a level of physicality and dominance. McVay then went to the postgame podium and insisted, through gritted teeth and a clenched jaw, that there is no mandate, no plan, no concerted effort to monitor Gurley’s usage to try and preserve him (and specifically his left knee) for the length of the season.

“There’s none of that,” McVay said. “We’re doing what we can to win games. It’s not about conserving. We’ve gotta win right now and that’s the most important thing. There’s nothing like that.”

Hogwash.

Be it by decree or out of protection for his star running back — who the Rams are tied to through the 2023 season at $57.5 million — or simply out of strategy, McVay has reduced the NFL’s best running back in 2017 and 2018 to little more than a bit player through the first four games of the season. McVay also is standing in front of everyone after every game and every practice and insisting there is nothing to see as it relates to Gurley’s left knee.

When it comes to Gurley’s usage right now — or lack thereof — McVay continues to assert it’s simply a matter of the flow of the game and the manner in which he believes victories can be achieved.

Sorry, not buying it. And for the first time all year, there was a sense of frustration from McVay while watching him speak.

McVay deserves credit for being a good soldier in toeing the company line. He’s taking some massive public-relations hits right now by having to explain a complicated situation and by the way he’s being forced to utilize one of the most prized commodities in all of football.

McVay is taking one for the team, obviously.

But it doesn’t seem fair.

The only alternative is that McVay, who built the NFL’s most explosive offense around the phenomenal running power and pass-catching ability of Gurley, suddenly decided the Rams are better off with Gurley as a decoy rather than a dynamic weapon.

Come on.

And here is the biggest problem of all: The obvious plan in place for Gurley has resulted in McVay and the Rams going into games with one arm figuratively tied behind their back. Imagine having one of the great assets in all of football — the very weapon the offense revolves around — and not being able to use him freely.

Even worse, he’s on the field for long stretches without even touching the ball.

Then everyone else, including coaches, is asked to do just a little bit better to compensate. And everyone knows full well that everything — from Goff to the offensive line to the playbook — is affected, if not compromised, because the team can’t lean as much on Gurley.

This includes Goff being asked to drop back 68 times, as happened Sunday. Three of those passes ended up in the hands of the Buccaneers, and they cashed in with three touchdowns. Goff also got strip-sacked late in the game, resulting in a back-breaking fumble recovery and touchdown run by former Rams defensive tackle Ndamukong Suh.

Goff needs to be better, flat out, and now more than ever with Gurley no longer being a focal point of the offense. But a team is asking for trouble when it dials up nearly 70 pass plays.

Bad things almost always end up happening.




Todd Gurley had 70 yards from scrimmage Sunday, and 54 came on his seven receptions. (Jayne Kamin-Oncea / USA Today)
“It’s hard to win in this league, usually, when you’re doing that,” Rams left tackle Andrew Whitworth said. “Unless, very rare circumstances. Yeah, at some point you keep having to throw the ball like that you’re not going to win many games probably. And when you are, it’s miracles at the end.”

And while the Rams’ offensive line has simply not been up to par while breaking in two new starters, one of the easiest ways to settle an inexperienced group down and build confidence and cohesion is handing the ball to Gurley and telling the line to go punish people. Not once or twice or here or there, but consistently and with conviction and purpose.

Nothing gets an offensive line going like one that gets unleashed on people. It’s a tone-setter.

“Gotta get physicality to our offense,” Whitworth said.

There were days, not long ago, when the balance and physicality created by Gurley’s brute force and breathtaking ability was the Rams’ key that opened all the offensive locks. The punishment he doled out and the production he delivered ripped the hearts out of opponents and weaponized Goff with the most lethal play-action pass package in the NFL.

Those days are long gone.

If the plan is to preserve Gurley, that’s fine. If it’s to work around a damaged Gurley, that is understandable too.

What doesn’t make sense, though, is running him onto the field series after series and barely using him, which the Rams did far too often on Sunday while relying way too heavily on the pass game.

If Gurley is on a pitch count, maybe the more prudent approach would be to use backup Malcolm Brown more often during the phases when the Rams are limiting Gurley’s usage.

At least then McVay can dig as deep as needed into his playbook. The five runs he called in the first half on Sunday — with 11 overall — is a recipe for disaster for an offense that is predicated on balance and the play-action pass.

“I mean, way above my jurisdiction to pick which one we’re doing,” Whitworth said when asked about the unbalanced playcalling. “Whatever Jared calls in the huddle, that’s what I run.”

Not that Gurley was much help either.

“I control what I control,” he said afterward. “At the end of the day, we didn’t get the win, whether I had 20 carries or two carries. Definitely want to get the win, that’s the main thing, but Seattle next on Thursday.”

When asked if he saw anything from the Tampa Bay defense that might dissuade the Rams from calling his number more often, Gurley had very little to say.

“I don’t call the play calls, bro.”

When pressed a bit more, Gurley said, “Like I say, I don’t call the plays. I go out there and play. I block for ‘JG’ , run the ball, run the routes, whatever. Whatever the play call is, I’m going to go out there and do it just like everyone else is going to go out there and do their job. It’s 11 people on the field and there’s only one ball.”

The Rams were a good enough team to win their first three games with Gurley Lite, albeit each too close for comfort. But a day like Sunday was bound to happen. It wasn’t so much the loss itself. This is the NFL, mind you, and if you don’t bring it at optimal level every week you’re liable to get waylaid.

That is understandable.

The inevitability was a situation in which the Rams turned so obviously and conspicuously away from one of the game’s great assets that it became egregious.

It felt similar to the NFC Championship Game, when Gurley essentially was a spectator in the Rams’ crowning moment of reaching the Super Bowl. And it certainly felt the same as two weeks later, when Gurley was barely a part of the game plan in the close loss to the New England Patriots, only for everyone to insist everything was perfectly fine.

“Ultimately, it’s our job to figure out what we think is the best way to move the football and score points,” McVay said. “And that was what we decided on…it’s what I decided on today.

The young coach was being a good soldier. But we all know better.

The Rams are tiptoeing around a delicate situation while pretending it doesn’t even exist. They are either desperately trying to preserve a healthy Gurley or managing a damaged one.

That might work some of the time. But the inevitable is always lurking. It reared its ugly head on Sunday. And chances are that won’t be the last time.