Rams at the break: What’s working, what’s not

[Prime Time]

http://www.dailynews.com/sports/20161029/los-angeles-rams-at-the-break-whats-working-whats-not

Los Angeles Rams at the break: What’s working, what’s not
By Rich Hammond

Photo by David Crane/SCNG, file

WHY THEY’RE WINNING

1. Stout defense late: The Rams’ three victories this season have required the defense to be on the field in the final two minutes to hold a narrow lead. The defense went 3 for 3, and the Rams beat Seattle, Tampa Bay and Arizona by a total of 15 points. In the final two minutes of those games, the Rams forced a fumble, a final-play tackle and an interception, respectively. Take away those big late-game defensive plays, and this season could be a total disaster.

2. Kenny Britt: The veteran receiver has been the Rams’ only consistent offensive player, and that’s not faint praise. A receiver isn’t likely to have a career year at age 28, but Britt already has 535 yards and he has never totaled more than 775 in any of his previous seven NFL seasons. Britt has accounted for 31.3 percent of the Rams’ receiving yards and he has a chance to become their first 1,000-yard receiver since Torry Holt in 2007.

3: Special teams: One could make the argument that punter Johnny Hekker is the team MVP, particularly given the narrow nature of all three Rams victories. Hekker has dropped 22 of his 38 punts inside the opponent’s 20-yard line and has yet to have a touchback. Then there’s kicker Greg Zuerlein, who is one of only three full-time kickers to be perfect on field-goal attempts (10-10) and extra points (12-12) this season. Zuerlein has accounted for 42 of the Rams’ 120 points.

WHY THEY’RE LOSING

1. Todd Gurley invisible: Los Angeles fans were told that the Rams had a dynamic running back. They’re still waiting for the payoff. Gurley, who finished third in the NFL in rushing yards last season, ranks 20th this season. There’s no secret formula here. Opponents are stacking the line of scrimmage, daring the Rams to throw the ball and back them off. It hasn’t happened on any consistent level. Plus, the Rams’ offensive line has done a mediocre job, at best, of opening holes for Gurley.

2. Late-game errors: Given a chance at a fourth-quarter, game-winning drive against Buffalo, Rams quarterback Case Keenum threw an interception. It happened again the next week at Detroit, and the next week against the New York Giants. Twice, in fact. Keenum has thrown nine interceptions in the Rams’ four losses, compared to only one in their three victories. Keenum has looked quite good at times, but has yet to show he has the ability to lead the Rams on a pressure-filled, field-length late scoring drive.

3. Short-handed defense: Let’s be clear, and note that every team experiences injuries. But the Rams have been hit hard on defense, and almost all at once, with the loss of top cornerback Trumaine Johnson and with defensive linemen Michael Brockers, William Hayes and Robert Quinn in and out of the lineup. The Rams’ last three losses have come by a total of 21 points, so it stands to reason that a (somewhat) healthy defense could have turned at least one of those losses into a victory.

FIRST-HALF MVP

Aaron Donald, DT: Don’t be fooled by the statistics. Yes, Donald has only three sacks in seven games, after he totaled 20 in his initial 32 NFL games. Donald remains arguably the league’s most dominant defensive player. He is regularly double-teamed, and he’s the only Rams defensive lineman to stay healthy all season.

Even when he’s not recording sacks and tackles, Donald is drawing significant attention and he’s impacting the decisions of opposing linemen, quarterbacks and running backs. If the Rams’ defense could ever get completely healthy, Donald’s stats would catch up to his impact.

LOOKING AHEAD

For the Rams (3-4) to retain hopes of finishing above .500 for the first time since 2003, they must thrive over the next month. The Rams’ next four opponents – Carolina, the New York Jets, Miami and New Orleans – have a combined record of 8-18. The final five opponents – New England, Atlanta, Seattle, San Francisco and Arizona – are a combined 18-14-2, and the 49ers (1-6) are bringing that curve way down.

Sunday's game will be a great barometer. The Panthers (2-5) have been massively disappointing this season, and if the Rams, after a bye week to get healthy and stew over three consecutive losses – don’t record a victory at the Coliseum, then look out below.

PREDICTED FINISH

Let’s assume the Rams get by the Panthers, then take two of three against the Jets, Dolphins and Saints. A Dec. 4 loss to New England seems likely, as does a loss to the Falcons the following week. That would put the Rams at 6-7, with games against the Seahawks, 49ers and Cardinals to close the season.

In the first go-around, the Rams went 2-1 against those teams, so it’s probably not tough to see where this is going. Rams coach Jeff Fisher, mocked and maligned for being a .500 coach throughout his career, probably will have to pull off a couple upsets to simply reach 8-8. More like, it will be more 7-9 “stuff” for the Rams.

OFFENSE STAT RANK

Points per game: 17.1 (29th)

Yards per game: 307.6 (30th)

Rushing yds. per game: 79.9 (29th)

Passing yds. per game: 227.7 (25th)

DEFENSE

Points per game: 22 (T-14th)

Yards per game: 343.3 (11th)

Rushing yds. per game: 104.3 (15th)

Passing yds. per game: 239 (14th)

MISCELLANEOUS

Turnover margin: Minus-3 (T-23rd)

Penalty yards: 478 (6th)

 

[fearsomefour]

Looking at this O stats and rankings....really makes you wonder if the staff has the ability to identify talent on O. They can find D lineman and Dbacks for sure. A first round RB, a first round WR, a first round LT a second round RT....and just not much production. Sadly, these ranking are with an improvement in the passing game. Either they can't identify the talent or can't match talent to a scheme or can't coach them in the scheme or to improve. Crazy.

 

[LACHAMP46]

Looking at this O stats and rankings....really makes you wonder if the staff has the ability to identify talent on O. They can find D lineman and Dbacks for sure. A first round RB, a first round WR, a first round LT a second round RT....and just not much production. Sadly, these ranking are with an improvement in the passing game. Either they can't identify the talent or can't match talent to a scheme or can't coach them in the scheme or to improve.

What round QB do we have leading this group again???? Oh yeah, this one....
http://thesportsquotient.com/nfl/2016/10/29/whos-at-fault-for-the-rams-offensive-struggles

There probably weren’t that many people tuned in to watch the New York Giants take on the Los Angeles Rams across the pond last weekend. Any game with the Rams is already not going to draw in the casual fan, but then throw in a 9:30 EST start time and you’ve certainly whittled your audience down.

For those of you who didn’t see the game, you didn’t miss much. The teams played sloppily and combined for five turnovers and only 27 points. Case Keenum had himself a nightmarish day finding members of the Giants four times in a contest he probably wishes to forget.

After the game, reporters understandably asked head coach Jeff Fisher whether he would look at making a change at quarterback and start the rookie first overall pick, Jared Goff. Fisher said, “Quarterback is not the reason we lost. We’re staying with Case. We’ll make changes at receiver before I make changes at quarterback.”

It’s easy to dismiss Fisher’s comments as being dumb or old-fashioned, but let’s try to give him the benefit of the doubt and approach this with an open mind. Keenum did after all still manage to throw for nearly 300 yards and a touchdown in that game. Let’s start by looking at the tape.

Interception #1

Now on this play, Keenum tries to get the ball to Tavon Austin coming across the middle on a drag route. You can see that the ball hits Austin in the hands and then bounces into the arms of Giants safety Landon Collins. Now the throw may have been a tad bit high for the 5‘9” wide receiver, but he should have made the catch. He’s the Rams number one wide receiver on their depth chart and the ball was thrown basically at his chest/neck. The blame can be spread here, but it falls mostly on Austin.



Interception #2

This was Keenum’s worst interception on the day. He tried to force the ball down the middle of the field to a well covered receiver. Bad decision aside, he threw the ball behind his target. Although this pick was again the result of a tip and there is certainly some bad luck there, this was a ball that he never should have thrown.



Interception #3

This is a pick that looks really bad, and in some ways it is, but the fault is not squarely on Keenum. He took a shot to get a big play and put the ball in a vulnerable spot where it could be and was intercepted. That said, the ball location on the throw is pretty good. He put it in between the defenders and gave his guy a chance. If you look closely you’ll see that Austin got bodied and knocked off his spot. He had inside positioning on the route, but wasn’t strong or physical enough to hold his position. So although Keenum maybe shouldn’t have made such a risky throw, it is important to note that one, he put the ball in a good spot giving his receiver a chance, and two, the Rams were down a touchdown and only had four minutes to go.



Interception #4

What the hell was he doing?!?! That’s the initial reaction, but there’s something that happened before the ball was snapped that takes the blame off of Keenum.

In the still above Keenum notices that the Giants are going to send pressure and alerts his offensive line and receivers.

Then Keenum signals to his outside receiver to change his route, no doubt because of the blitz that he’s read. The receiver doesn’t pick up the audible resulting in Keenum throwing the ball to where his guy should have been. It’s a pick that will get you trolled on Twitter, but it is a pick that falls firmly on the wideout who failed to adjust his route.

So of his four interceptions, three were primarily on his wide receivers. Jeff Fisher may have a point …

The Numbers

… But then the numbers attempt to snatch that hope away. By most metrics Keenum has been bad this season. He ranks 26th in DYAR and DVOA and ranks 32nd in QBR. The issue here being that those metrics don’t and can’t distinguish between his second interception and interceptions one, three, and four. As always football is a tough game to judge individual performance strictly from a box score because of how interdependent its players are. Pro football focus attempts to grade players with this thought in mind, and interestingly enough, Keenum came out of that four interception game with a higher rating than Eli Manning did.

So Keenum is average to bad, but what about his wideouts? They actually have pretty good numbers. Rams receiver Kenny Britt is seventh in the league in DYAR, ahead of guys like Odell Beckham and Mike Evans. In addition to him, Brian Quick is ranked 22nd in DYAR, making the Rams one of only eight teams to have two top 30 wide receivers in that category. So Jeff Fisher may be wrong about replacing those guys. Tavon Austin is notably absent from the top 30; he is after all number one on the depth chart. In the same metric of DYAR which measures how a player plays compared to a replacement level player, he comes up 78th, last among qualified receivers. Good thing for him that he already got paid.

At the end of the day, the verdict seems to be this. Fisher is right to not put all of the Rams misfortunes on Keenum, but Keenum is still an average quarterback at best. Fisher is wrong to blame the Rams wide receivers given that they have played well this season, although Tavon Austin needs to step up and the wide receivers were responsible for the majority of the turnovers last game. The Rams have talent, but in no way are they ready to meaningfully compete until these issues get addressed.

 

[Rmfnlt]

Pretty good analysis, IMO.

 

[JerseyRam1]

The first 7 games were tough with only two home games and the London trip. The break couldnt come at a better time and hopefully this young bunch can come out and reel off 4 in a row and finish 6-3 to end the season at 9-7. If not, more 7-9 BS--change will be imminent.

 

[fearsomefour]

What round QB do we have leading this group again???? Oh yeah, this one....
http://thesportsquotient.com/nfl/2016/10/29/whos-at-fault-for-the-rams-offensive-struggles

There probably weren’t that many people tuned in to watch the New York Giants take on the Los Angeles Rams across the pond last weekend. Any game with the Rams is already not going to draw in the casual fan, but then throw in a 9:30 EST start time and you’ve certainly whittled your audience down.

For those of you who didn’t see the game, you didn’t miss much. The teams played sloppily and combined for five turnovers and only 27 points. Case Keenum had himself a nightmarish day finding members of the Giants four times in a contest he probably wishes to forget.

After the game, reporters understandably asked head coach Jeff Fisher whether he would look at making a change at quarterback and start the rookie first overall pick, Jared Goff. Fisher said, “Quarterback is not the reason we lost. We’re staying with Case. We’ll make changes at receiver before I make changes at quarterback.”

It’s easy to dismiss Fisher’s comments as being dumb or old-fashioned, but let’s try to give him the benefit of the doubt and approach this with an open mind. Keenum did after all still manage to throw for nearly 300 yards and a touchdown in that game. Let’s start by looking at the tape.

Interception #1

Now on this play, Keenum tries to get the ball to Tavon Austin coming across the middle on a drag route. You can see that the ball hits Austin in the hands and then bounces into the arms of Giants safety Landon Collins. Now the throw may have been a tad bit high for the 5‘9” wide receiver, but he should have made the catch. He’s the Rams number one wide receiver on their depth chart and the ball was thrown basically at his chest/neck. The blame can be spread here, but it falls mostly on Austin.



Interception #2

This was Keenum’s worst interception on the day. He tried to force the ball down the middle of the field to a well covered receiver. Bad decision aside, he threw the ball behind his target. Although this pick was again the result of a tip and there is certainly some bad luck there, this was a ball that he never should have thrown.



Interception #3

This is a pick that looks really bad, and in some ways it is, but the fault is not squarely on Keenum. He took a shot to get a big play and put the ball in a vulnerable spot where it could be and was intercepted. That said, the ball location on the throw is pretty good. He put it in between the defenders and gave his guy a chance. If you look closely you’ll see that Austin got bodied and knocked off his spot. He had inside positioning on the route, but wasn’t strong or physical enough to hold his position. So although Keenum maybe shouldn’t have made such a risky throw, it is important to note that one, he put the ball in a good spot giving his receiver a chance, and two, the Rams were down a touchdown and only had four minutes to go.



Interception #4

What the hell was he doing?!?! That’s the initial reaction, but there’s something that happened before the ball was snapped that takes the blame off of Keenum.

In the still above Keenum notices that the Giants are going to send pressure and alerts his offensive line and receivers.

Then Keenum signals to his outside receiver to change his route, no doubt because of the blitz that he’s read. The receiver doesn’t pick up the audible resulting in Keenum throwing the ball to where his guy should have been. It’s a pick that will get you trolled on Twitter, but it is a pick that falls firmly on the wideout who failed to adjust his route.

So of his four interceptions, three were primarily on his wide receivers. Jeff Fisher may have a point …

The Numbers

… But then the numbers attempt to snatch that hope away. By most metrics Keenum has been bad this season. He ranks 26th in DYAR and DVOA and ranks 32nd in QBR. The issue here being that those metrics don’t and can’t distinguish between his second interception and interceptions one, three, and four. As always football is a tough game to judge individual performance strictly from a box score because of how interdependent its players are. Pro football focus attempts to grade players with this thought in mind, and interestingly enough, Keenum came out of that four interception game with a higher rating than Eli Manning did.

So Keenum is average to bad, but what about his wideouts? They actually have pretty good numbers. Rams receiver Kenny Britt is seventh in the league in DYAR, ahead of guys like Odell Beckham and Mike Evans. In addition to him, Brian Quick is ranked 22nd in DYAR, making the Rams one of only eight teams to have two top 30 wide receivers in that category. So Jeff Fisher may be wrong about replacing those guys. Tavon Austin is notably absent from the top 30; he is after all number one on the depth chart. In the same metric of DYAR which measures how a player plays compared to a replacement level player, he comes up 78th, last among qualified receivers. Good thing for him that he already got paid.

At the end of the day, the verdict seems to be this. Fisher is right to not put all of the Rams misfortunes on Keenum, but Keenum is still an average quarterback at best. Fisher is wrong to blame the Rams wide receivers given that they have played well this season, although Tavon Austin needs to step up and the wide receivers were responsible for the majority of the turnovers last game. The Rams have talent, but in no way are they ready to meaningfully compete until these issues get addressed.

I watched the game of course.
The third pick is on Keenum. Austin is covered and cannot physically compete for a ball like that with a big S.
I for one believe a QB makes WRs better, not necessarily the other way around. Britt, Quick and Austin with Brady throwing them the ball? They would all be better.
I'm not gettin into the Goff thing because no one knows if he would play well or be in over his head.
The real issue to me is the lack of development along the line.
There has been investment akin the line, first FA investment then draft picks and the group still is not very good.

 

[Merlin]

1. OL underwhelming in the run game. Directly affects offensive identity and worse we have a QB in the backfield right now that needs that run game. Poor execution across the board, with breakdowns all over.

2. Forcing the ball to Tavon. Stop it. This offense has had its most success when the ball is spread around. Trying to give him enough touches to live up to Fisher's prediction is hurting this offense. Have a few new plays/looks per game where defenses don't have film/history and give him those chances. Outside of that let the QB get him the ball when he's open and/or in space.

3. Defensive consistency. This is affected by health, obviously. But these guys need to string together at least four games of top production to get this team on a win streak that can put them back in playoff contender ranks.

Goff is going to greatly impact Tavon's ability in this offense if and when Fisher lets him play. When that happens I'd run plenty of go routes and let the kid hit him deep, and show the league they can't roll up tight on him and play the percentage game any longer. QB improvement can basically help all of those issues above, even the defensive consistency, where they will hopefully find themselves going up a couple TDs on teams when they get stops and being able to pressure and force INTs.

 

[Rmfnlt]

The real issue to me is the lack of development along the line.

Me as well.

 

[-X-]

The real issue to me is the lack of development along the line.

Me as well.

Yes, there's been a real lack of development in you too.