SomersetHawk
New member
Slow day, thought I'd review with notes. None of that tldnr crap peaches!
Very first play from scrimmage: Line does a pretty good job, Graham takes on a linebacker and lets the DE (Chris Long) run free which forces Lynch to run left where Britt and Okung had made a hole. I think Lynch's hesitation cost him a few yards here as Chris Long makes up good ground to get to him first. We had Coleman out wide here and he was given a huge cushion (this becomes apparent with all of our receivers). Everyone knew we were running here.
1st Quarter, 12:55, 2nd and 5: Five wide, empty backfield, four rush five. Donald owns Sweezy but luckily Fred Jackson's given enough cushion out wide for Russ to find him quickly, easy first down, smart call, I think. Had the Rams played press here, we'd have seen some T-Jack on the next play.
1st Quarter, 11:15 remaining, 2nd and 10: Lynch in the backfield, three to the right (Lockett, Baldwin and Coleman), not hard to see the bubble screen coming here. I'm surprised this one wasn't stuffed. Baldwin goes out in front to block Johnson and kind of whiffs, but luckily Coleman goes for the same guy (leaving another completely free) and gets the job done. Not pretty, but a decent gain of seven yards from Lockett.
The very next play we go empty back again on 3rd and 3, five out wide but the Rams press this time and rush five. Russ makes the right read and throws to Doug Baldwin in the flat, but the throw is a little behind him and Doug has to adjust and pretty much come to a standstill; giving the defence enough time to stuff him short of a first. Thankfully we go for it on 4th and 1 and get it.
Then the very next play after that is a disaster. It's a read-option look with two TE's in-line. Luke Willson is left to block a DE (Hayes) and the result is pretty horrible. He's pushed all the way back into Russ, who tries to sidestep and stay in the pocket but is then swallowed by Aaron Donald; who had Sweezy on toast again. Had Russ bailed right then there was a ton of space, not that he had the chance to see it.
Their first drive was horrible and ended with the beautiful Lockett return TD but Bennett blew up two of the previous plays and deserves a huge amount of credit. He's a pretty polarising character around here but I think we're all glad to have him on our team. My growing respect for him has been in negative correlation with that of Kam. The way he's carried himself since threatening a holdout is worthy of praise, I'm not sure how he could have responded in a better way. The sack he got on the very next series was a thing of beauty. I'm a fan of Greg Robinson and think he'll make a very good player, but Bennett made him look like crap to give us a look at 3rd and 15...
Well this was horrible, the line gets pretty good pressure but Foles stands in the pocket and finds Cunningham out of the backfield. Cary Williams didn't cover himself in glory by over pursuing and then whiffing the tackle but KJ should have diagnosed this a lot quicker and stuffed him much sooner. Instead, he was caught flatfooted and his attempt at tackling Cunningham was really ugly. Gain of 18.
1st Quarter, 1:02 remaining, 1st and 10. Cassius Marsh sighting. A running play ends with Marsh stuffing Pead for a loss. Not going to get too carried away here, Lance Kendricks is a very serviceable blocker but you'd hope Marsh would be able to get across him. Cassius looks in fantastic shape though.
Jared Cook gets a free catch on the next play and I don't know who to blame. As Cook motions out wide KJ moves after him before stalling at the snap, it's a play action pass and now stopped in his tracks, KJ tags on to Austin out of the backfield, leaving Cary Williams playing catch up. I'd have thought Cook was KJ's man here (I'm not sure they'd ever want him up against Austin) but when KJ hesitates, Cary Williams surely has to cover that sooner. Smart play by the Rams I guess.
The very next play is their Touchdown. Jared Cook takes care of Bruce Irvin easily and KJ and Bobby are left trailing in Austin's wake. I feel that Bobby could have done better here, he takes one false step towards a full speed (and running parallel) Austin and after that he's unable to make up the ground to the outside. Cary Williams gets turned around very easily and looks slow in pursuit. I didn't actually think he looked that bad in coverage up to this point but the Bigger/Faster/Stronger traits we're used to seeing in our DBs are absent in Williams, he looks slow/small/weak. I know he did a nice job on the strip/sack TD but as a CB, I'm not sure he's got anything on Simon.
Sweezy had a forgettable first half, and if Donald wasn't owning him, Brockers was. With 7:25 remaining in the 2nd, Brockers sidesteps a Sweezy block and forces Lynch to jump around him and get stuffed for no gain. Had Sweezy been able to occupy his man, there was a lot of space for Lynch to run into.
Rawls had 2 rushes for 5 yards but looked good, really. On his second run he hit a hole that opened just as he got there, the kind of improvisation that I can't remember seeing from Turbo and Michael. He'll probably struggle for touches with Jackson looking reliable behind Lynch but it would be nice to see what else he's capable of.
One of our worst plays of the half came after the nearly interception that Kearse tipped up in the air, the kind of nonchalant half arsed attempt to get a finger on the ball that's got us into trouble before. Anyway, we go five-wide empty backfield again. The Rams rush five but somehow two of those run free on the outside (It's really ugly). It looks like Jackson and Kearse are the hot reads here as they're the only two who look back to the ball. Out left, Jackson looks too late and Russ progresses to Kearse (who's half-covered by a linebacker). Russ has about one second to make a throw, but nothing was on. You could argue that he should have changed the play-call (which looked doomed from the start) but there was no time on the play clock. The next time it happened, he called a time out.
Anyway, we got the ball back with 2 minutes left and Russ runs the hurry up. Surprise surprise, we start moving the chains. We're twice the offense when we're able to put the defence under pressure, it's so frustrating watching our slow tempo vanilla crap for 28 minutes a half. Oh what could be.
Russ did make a mistake at the end of that drive though (and the end of the half), if he'd thrown to Lynch quicker we'd have had a shot at a TD.
Second Half, surely we'll put things right...
The Rams very first play from scrimmage ends up in a big completion to Steadman Bailey. He had a ton of space but it's hard to find out who to blame from the broadcast, going to need to see the All-22 for this one. Dion Bailey bit on the play action though and ended up in no man's land; a place he occupied throughout this battle. Cary Williams was nowhere either. Only two Rams ran routes here, and DeShawn Shead was the only guy to cover either of them. Ugly.
Russ needed to be better with the read option in this game, and had a couple of opportunities to keep it for a good gain. With 12:27 left in the 3rd at 2nd and 5 he gave it to Lynch for a 4 yard gain when a keeper would have got us the first down and plenty more. The play after this is the one where Lynch sprung free and kind of tripped over himself on his way to a 12 yard gain. He normally gets 20+ out of these opportunities and I'm hoping this was a one-off but I couldn't help but think Lynch wasn't as sharp as normal. Hopefully it was just a little rust.
It seemed like the Rams had quite a bit of success on play action this game, and on their first play after our field goal drive in the 3rd, Cary Williams gets caught out giving Kenny Britt too much cushion on an intermediate comeback route and they gain 17.
A few plays later Jared Cook gets another big gain to take them to the 4 yard line. We get some good pressure as Mebane pushes his man into Foles', Wagner passes Cook off to nobody and Foles gets the pass off in time. Throughout this game I kept expecting to see Earl fly through the screen to deliver the hit but it seldom happened. Again, Bailey was nowhere near the ball covering absolutely nobody and nothing. That ball-hawking we've been so used was sorely missed. I know we all have very high opinions on Kam as a football player, but I'm only starting to realise the extent of that. Perhaps Kam wouldn't fix these problems, but so often in situations where he'd be around the play, Bailey isn't. The Foles TD run rather comically highlights this.
Aaron Donald's drive killing sack at the 5:15 mark probably has to go on Russ. We stack three out left with Lynch out on the right. Jimmy Graham does a very good job blocking Chris Long (honestly) and Russ makes his reads to the left, waiting for someone to get free while Lynch is hung out to dry on the right. Eventually the pressure comes and Aaron Donald has Russ for lunch.
Michael Bennett and Frank Clark are mean, let's play them together some more please. With 2:45 remaining in the 3rd they blow through the line and almost cut Tavon Austin in half.
I actually don't think our O-line is terrible, or at least was terrible, in this game. All it takes is for one guy to crap the bed and we blame the unit, but mistakes came from all over in this game. I haven't seen the stats but bar the low snaps Nowak looked to have a solid game. Gilliam gave up some pressures but I didn't notice him do anything glaringly bad. Our two longest serving O-linemen actually seemed to make the biggest mistakes in this one. At the end of the 3rd quarter at 1st and 17 Quinn runs around Okung and nail Russ for a sack. I think here's where Russ gets pissed off and we start to turn a corner on offense, the very next play he fires a bullet to Graham for a 20 yard gain. His catch just a few plays later is ridiculous, covered (and being fouled) by two guys, he snags another bullet that probably shouldn't have been thrown.
The proceeding goal line series is ugly, Russ throws to Willson when he probably could have run the TD himself, then he sails one to a triple-covered Jimmy. He redeems himself on the TD throw though. Man, that pressure was instant and he delivers a perfect throw whilst about to be trucked.
On the kick off after the Cary Williams TD Cassius Marsh makes a great tackle on Special Teams, I'd mentioned he was in good shape and he had to be to beat some of those guys to the tackle.
The Rams start the drive from the 11 and pick up 9 yards on a run by Cunningham. Bailey looked like a bundle of nervous energy all game, from his yawning at the beginning to his bouncing around before the snap. He bounced around some here and just kind of waited for the play to come towards him. He'll be credited with the tackle on this run but I feel he could have attacked this more than he did, diving low and allowing Cunningham to jump over him for a few more yards. The kind of play where we see Kam wade through the traffic and stuff the runner at scrimmage.
KJ finally showed up in this drive (the Rams game-tying drive) with some nice coverage to force a 3rd and 15. At this point I was feeling pretty good about our chances. We rush four, Foles breaks right and fines Kenny Britt for the 1st down. DeShawn Shead was in coverage but lost his man. Shead redeams himself two plays later when he brings the boom on a defenceless camera man. Poor chap.
This brings up the 3rd and 5 that Dion will be having nightmares about. Lance Kendricks always scores against us, so much so that I debated playing him at TE in my fantasy team this week. I didn't. It's pretty icky coverage from Bailey who was hung out to dry whilst we rushed six (with Earl Thomas assisting the other 3 db's). It's a terrible look, and we still had one time out left.
We get the ball back and try and move upfield but regular time ends with a big fat sack. A free rusher (Sims) comes all the way around the outside and before Russ can get rid of it. It's a shame Marshawn (lined out left) doesn't turn around quicker because there's more cushion given by the Rams DB's and he'd have been there for the first down.
The Rams DB's gave our receivers tons of cushion throughout, both trusting their D-line whilst being wary of our deep threat. I'm surprised we didn't really take advantage of this but I don't pin it on Russ. The Rams D made sure Russ never had time to keep the ball and they did a good job of containing him, this meant he had to get it out fast, but often our receivers were either running intermediate routes or not getting their heads around quick enough. Had we adapted and been able to take what they were giving us (plenty), they might have been forced to give us tighter coverage (something all of our guys are capable of beating, particularly Graham and Lockett).
It's often said the definition of insanity is trying the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. Well, I think it's fair to suggest that our pass play bordered on insane throughout much of this game, and it only got better when we went with the hurry-up.
I hated the on-side kick call but on review it was smart, but now it turns out we weren't trying for the onside kick? Well we definitely should have gone for it. Rams weren't expecting it and were sat deep, had Hauschka kicked it three yards shorter we'd have recovered it. They were far enough back that we had a reasonable margin for error.
Then Foles pulls off a great throw over Sherman that has to be applauded really, the coverage wasn't bad, most QB's don't even try that, let alone make it.
Baldwin's status as the best 'tiptoe' catcher on the team might be under pressure, Lockett pulls off a great one on our final drive. Two plays later we finally take what the defense offers on a throw to Baldwin, he can only gain 4 yards on the play though as again it's a little behind Doug. It only took until OT for us to finally try and exploit the space our receivers have been given and the very next play Doug Baldwin gets it again on a bubble. He hesitates though and probably loses out on a couple of yards, gaining only two. It's now 3rd and 4, and the Rams db's have to play tight, if only Russ can buy some time. The O-line do a solid job and Russ has a pocket but all our receivers are covered up as a hole opens in front of him, he makes for it but is swallowed by Brockers just short of the 1st down. We all know what happened next and have our opinions on it. Personally I think the Super Bowl cost us on this one. We had to run it. Though, perhaps we could have called a different running play.
In Summary
Our O-line didn't look THAT bad. No, there's probably no All-Pro's on that line but I thought they did a serviceable job against an all-world D-line. There's always a tendency to throw the whole line under the bus when we allow a pressure or a sack, and whilst they're capable of collectively crapping the bed, it's often only one guy making the mistake. In this game, Sweezy stood out as being particularly poor, but then he was going up against Aaron Donald and Michael Brockers most of the time.
Gary Gilliam gave up some pressures (got pushed around quite a bit) but I rarely saw any big mistakes and apart from the low snaps, Drew Nowak held his own in his debut at Center (dude doesn't get moved back too often)
Russ was on and off, but mostly on when he was running the show. I saw the fieldgulls article on our passing game and it goes someway to proving why screenshots aren't sufficient material for evaluating a play. What looks open and looks like Russ has plenty of time from a still image, doesn't represent what's happening in real time, at all.
Jimmy Graham's really good, I hope we start taking advantage of that. Had we put him in more situations where he's the first or second read we'd have had some more success. No use in him being the 3rd, 4th or 5th read against a team like the Rams.
We have to get better at beating the Blitz, I'm excited to see the chemistry between Russ and Fred Jackson grow, he looks like a very solid pickup.
Tyler Lockett continues to look the part. He's already our best WR, it will be interesting see where Richardson fits into all of this.
Our linebackers had the worst game I can remember in a while, as did our db's, that we can say that and still be disappointed that we didn't win this game says plenty about this team.
We appeared to create pretty good pressure throughout the game and were very close to making big plays on multiple occasions. Mebane looked stout, Bennett continued from the Super Bowl and Avril was solid if unspectacular. I didn't notice Hill or Rubin too much and it was disappointing to see how few snaps pre-season hero Clark played, has Pete given any reasoning for that yet?
Bruce has not looked like we thought he would, contract year and all. Was easy to block and didn't flash like he can, it appears that weight gain has cost him some speed. He did have that tfl on their first drive but was pretty absent after that, and as noted was easily blocked by Bailey and then Cook on Austin's TD run.
We can definitely win next week, but it will probably have to be a shootout, I don't have much faith in the likes of Williams and Bailey vs Rodgers. I hope God tells Kam to suit up soon.
Very first play from scrimmage: Line does a pretty good job, Graham takes on a linebacker and lets the DE (Chris Long) run free which forces Lynch to run left where Britt and Okung had made a hole. I think Lynch's hesitation cost him a few yards here as Chris Long makes up good ground to get to him first. We had Coleman out wide here and he was given a huge cushion (this becomes apparent with all of our receivers). Everyone knew we were running here.
1st Quarter, 12:55, 2nd and 5: Five wide, empty backfield, four rush five. Donald owns Sweezy but luckily Fred Jackson's given enough cushion out wide for Russ to find him quickly, easy first down, smart call, I think. Had the Rams played press here, we'd have seen some T-Jack on the next play.
1st Quarter, 11:15 remaining, 2nd and 10: Lynch in the backfield, three to the right (Lockett, Baldwin and Coleman), not hard to see the bubble screen coming here. I'm surprised this one wasn't stuffed. Baldwin goes out in front to block Johnson and kind of whiffs, but luckily Coleman goes for the same guy (leaving another completely free) and gets the job done. Not pretty, but a decent gain of seven yards from Lockett.
The very next play we go empty back again on 3rd and 3, five out wide but the Rams press this time and rush five. Russ makes the right read and throws to Doug Baldwin in the flat, but the throw is a little behind him and Doug has to adjust and pretty much come to a standstill; giving the defence enough time to stuff him short of a first. Thankfully we go for it on 4th and 1 and get it.
Then the very next play after that is a disaster. It's a read-option look with two TE's in-line. Luke Willson is left to block a DE (Hayes) and the result is pretty horrible. He's pushed all the way back into Russ, who tries to sidestep and stay in the pocket but is then swallowed by Aaron Donald; who had Sweezy on toast again. Had Russ bailed right then there was a ton of space, not that he had the chance to see it.
Their first drive was horrible and ended with the beautiful Lockett return TD but Bennett blew up two of the previous plays and deserves a huge amount of credit. He's a pretty polarising character around here but I think we're all glad to have him on our team. My growing respect for him has been in negative correlation with that of Kam. The way he's carried himself since threatening a holdout is worthy of praise, I'm not sure how he could have responded in a better way. The sack he got on the very next series was a thing of beauty. I'm a fan of Greg Robinson and think he'll make a very good player, but Bennett made him look like crap to give us a look at 3rd and 15...
Well this was horrible, the line gets pretty good pressure but Foles stands in the pocket and finds Cunningham out of the backfield. Cary Williams didn't cover himself in glory by over pursuing and then whiffing the tackle but KJ should have diagnosed this a lot quicker and stuffed him much sooner. Instead, he was caught flatfooted and his attempt at tackling Cunningham was really ugly. Gain of 18.
1st Quarter, 1:02 remaining, 1st and 10. Cassius Marsh sighting. A running play ends with Marsh stuffing Pead for a loss. Not going to get too carried away here, Lance Kendricks is a very serviceable blocker but you'd hope Marsh would be able to get across him. Cassius looks in fantastic shape though.
Jared Cook gets a free catch on the next play and I don't know who to blame. As Cook motions out wide KJ moves after him before stalling at the snap, it's a play action pass and now stopped in his tracks, KJ tags on to Austin out of the backfield, leaving Cary Williams playing catch up. I'd have thought Cook was KJ's man here (I'm not sure they'd ever want him up against Austin) but when KJ hesitates, Cary Williams surely has to cover that sooner. Smart play by the Rams I guess.
The very next play is their Touchdown. Jared Cook takes care of Bruce Irvin easily and KJ and Bobby are left trailing in Austin's wake. I feel that Bobby could have done better here, he takes one false step towards a full speed (and running parallel) Austin and after that he's unable to make up the ground to the outside. Cary Williams gets turned around very easily and looks slow in pursuit. I didn't actually think he looked that bad in coverage up to this point but the Bigger/Faster/Stronger traits we're used to seeing in our DBs are absent in Williams, he looks slow/small/weak. I know he did a nice job on the strip/sack TD but as a CB, I'm not sure he's got anything on Simon.
Sweezy had a forgettable first half, and if Donald wasn't owning him, Brockers was. With 7:25 remaining in the 2nd, Brockers sidesteps a Sweezy block and forces Lynch to jump around him and get stuffed for no gain. Had Sweezy been able to occupy his man, there was a lot of space for Lynch to run into.
Rawls had 2 rushes for 5 yards but looked good, really. On his second run he hit a hole that opened just as he got there, the kind of improvisation that I can't remember seeing from Turbo and Michael. He'll probably struggle for touches with Jackson looking reliable behind Lynch but it would be nice to see what else he's capable of.
One of our worst plays of the half came after the nearly interception that Kearse tipped up in the air, the kind of nonchalant half arsed attempt to get a finger on the ball that's got us into trouble before. Anyway, we go five-wide empty backfield again. The Rams rush five but somehow two of those run free on the outside (It's really ugly). It looks like Jackson and Kearse are the hot reads here as they're the only two who look back to the ball. Out left, Jackson looks too late and Russ progresses to Kearse (who's half-covered by a linebacker). Russ has about one second to make a throw, but nothing was on. You could argue that he should have changed the play-call (which looked doomed from the start) but there was no time on the play clock. The next time it happened, he called a time out.
Anyway, we got the ball back with 2 minutes left and Russ runs the hurry up. Surprise surprise, we start moving the chains. We're twice the offense when we're able to put the defence under pressure, it's so frustrating watching our slow tempo vanilla crap for 28 minutes a half. Oh what could be.
Russ did make a mistake at the end of that drive though (and the end of the half), if he'd thrown to Lynch quicker we'd have had a shot at a TD.
Second Half, surely we'll put things right...
The Rams very first play from scrimmage ends up in a big completion to Steadman Bailey. He had a ton of space but it's hard to find out who to blame from the broadcast, going to need to see the All-22 for this one. Dion Bailey bit on the play action though and ended up in no man's land; a place he occupied throughout this battle. Cary Williams was nowhere either. Only two Rams ran routes here, and DeShawn Shead was the only guy to cover either of them. Ugly.
Russ needed to be better with the read option in this game, and had a couple of opportunities to keep it for a good gain. With 12:27 left in the 3rd at 2nd and 5 he gave it to Lynch for a 4 yard gain when a keeper would have got us the first down and plenty more. The play after this is the one where Lynch sprung free and kind of tripped over himself on his way to a 12 yard gain. He normally gets 20+ out of these opportunities and I'm hoping this was a one-off but I couldn't help but think Lynch wasn't as sharp as normal. Hopefully it was just a little rust.
It seemed like the Rams had quite a bit of success on play action this game, and on their first play after our field goal drive in the 3rd, Cary Williams gets caught out giving Kenny Britt too much cushion on an intermediate comeback route and they gain 17.
A few plays later Jared Cook gets another big gain to take them to the 4 yard line. We get some good pressure as Mebane pushes his man into Foles', Wagner passes Cook off to nobody and Foles gets the pass off in time. Throughout this game I kept expecting to see Earl fly through the screen to deliver the hit but it seldom happened. Again, Bailey was nowhere near the ball covering absolutely nobody and nothing. That ball-hawking we've been so used was sorely missed. I know we all have very high opinions on Kam as a football player, but I'm only starting to realise the extent of that. Perhaps Kam wouldn't fix these problems, but so often in situations where he'd be around the play, Bailey isn't. The Foles TD run rather comically highlights this.
Aaron Donald's drive killing sack at the 5:15 mark probably has to go on Russ. We stack three out left with Lynch out on the right. Jimmy Graham does a very good job blocking Chris Long (honestly) and Russ makes his reads to the left, waiting for someone to get free while Lynch is hung out to dry on the right. Eventually the pressure comes and Aaron Donald has Russ for lunch.
Michael Bennett and Frank Clark are mean, let's play them together some more please. With 2:45 remaining in the 3rd they blow through the line and almost cut Tavon Austin in half.
I actually don't think our O-line is terrible, or at least was terrible, in this game. All it takes is for one guy to crap the bed and we blame the unit, but mistakes came from all over in this game. I haven't seen the stats but bar the low snaps Nowak looked to have a solid game. Gilliam gave up some pressures but I didn't notice him do anything glaringly bad. Our two longest serving O-linemen actually seemed to make the biggest mistakes in this one. At the end of the 3rd quarter at 1st and 17 Quinn runs around Okung and nail Russ for a sack. I think here's where Russ gets pissed off and we start to turn a corner on offense, the very next play he fires a bullet to Graham for a 20 yard gain. His catch just a few plays later is ridiculous, covered (and being fouled) by two guys, he snags another bullet that probably shouldn't have been thrown.
The proceeding goal line series is ugly, Russ throws to Willson when he probably could have run the TD himself, then he sails one to a triple-covered Jimmy. He redeems himself on the TD throw though. Man, that pressure was instant and he delivers a perfect throw whilst about to be trucked.
On the kick off after the Cary Williams TD Cassius Marsh makes a great tackle on Special Teams, I'd mentioned he was in good shape and he had to be to beat some of those guys to the tackle.
The Rams start the drive from the 11 and pick up 9 yards on a run by Cunningham. Bailey looked like a bundle of nervous energy all game, from his yawning at the beginning to his bouncing around before the snap. He bounced around some here and just kind of waited for the play to come towards him. He'll be credited with the tackle on this run but I feel he could have attacked this more than he did, diving low and allowing Cunningham to jump over him for a few more yards. The kind of play where we see Kam wade through the traffic and stuff the runner at scrimmage.
KJ finally showed up in this drive (the Rams game-tying drive) with some nice coverage to force a 3rd and 15. At this point I was feeling pretty good about our chances. We rush four, Foles breaks right and fines Kenny Britt for the 1st down. DeShawn Shead was in coverage but lost his man. Shead redeams himself two plays later when he brings the boom on a defenceless camera man. Poor chap.
This brings up the 3rd and 5 that Dion will be having nightmares about. Lance Kendricks always scores against us, so much so that I debated playing him at TE in my fantasy team this week. I didn't. It's pretty icky coverage from Bailey who was hung out to dry whilst we rushed six (with Earl Thomas assisting the other 3 db's). It's a terrible look, and we still had one time out left.
We get the ball back and try and move upfield but regular time ends with a big fat sack. A free rusher (Sims) comes all the way around the outside and before Russ can get rid of it. It's a shame Marshawn (lined out left) doesn't turn around quicker because there's more cushion given by the Rams DB's and he'd have been there for the first down.
The Rams DB's gave our receivers tons of cushion throughout, both trusting their D-line whilst being wary of our deep threat. I'm surprised we didn't really take advantage of this but I don't pin it on Russ. The Rams D made sure Russ never had time to keep the ball and they did a good job of containing him, this meant he had to get it out fast, but often our receivers were either running intermediate routes or not getting their heads around quick enough. Had we adapted and been able to take what they were giving us (plenty), they might have been forced to give us tighter coverage (something all of our guys are capable of beating, particularly Graham and Lockett).
It's often said the definition of insanity is trying the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. Well, I think it's fair to suggest that our pass play bordered on insane throughout much of this game, and it only got better when we went with the hurry-up.
I hated the on-side kick call but on review it was smart, but now it turns out we weren't trying for the onside kick? Well we definitely should have gone for it. Rams weren't expecting it and were sat deep, had Hauschka kicked it three yards shorter we'd have recovered it. They were far enough back that we had a reasonable margin for error.
Then Foles pulls off a great throw over Sherman that has to be applauded really, the coverage wasn't bad, most QB's don't even try that, let alone make it.
Baldwin's status as the best 'tiptoe' catcher on the team might be under pressure, Lockett pulls off a great one on our final drive. Two plays later we finally take what the defense offers on a throw to Baldwin, he can only gain 4 yards on the play though as again it's a little behind Doug. It only took until OT for us to finally try and exploit the space our receivers have been given and the very next play Doug Baldwin gets it again on a bubble. He hesitates though and probably loses out on a couple of yards, gaining only two. It's now 3rd and 4, and the Rams db's have to play tight, if only Russ can buy some time. The O-line do a solid job and Russ has a pocket but all our receivers are covered up as a hole opens in front of him, he makes for it but is swallowed by Brockers just short of the 1st down. We all know what happened next and have our opinions on it. Personally I think the Super Bowl cost us on this one. We had to run it. Though, perhaps we could have called a different running play.
In Summary
Our O-line didn't look THAT bad. No, there's probably no All-Pro's on that line but I thought they did a serviceable job against an all-world D-line. There's always a tendency to throw the whole line under the bus when we allow a pressure or a sack, and whilst they're capable of collectively crapping the bed, it's often only one guy making the mistake. In this game, Sweezy stood out as being particularly poor, but then he was going up against Aaron Donald and Michael Brockers most of the time.
Gary Gilliam gave up some pressures (got pushed around quite a bit) but I rarely saw any big mistakes and apart from the low snaps, Drew Nowak held his own in his debut at Center (dude doesn't get moved back too often)
Russ was on and off, but mostly on when he was running the show. I saw the fieldgulls article on our passing game and it goes someway to proving why screenshots aren't sufficient material for evaluating a play. What looks open and looks like Russ has plenty of time from a still image, doesn't represent what's happening in real time, at all.
Jimmy Graham's really good, I hope we start taking advantage of that. Had we put him in more situations where he's the first or second read we'd have had some more success. No use in him being the 3rd, 4th or 5th read against a team like the Rams.
We have to get better at beating the Blitz, I'm excited to see the chemistry between Russ and Fred Jackson grow, he looks like a very solid pickup.
Tyler Lockett continues to look the part. He's already our best WR, it will be interesting see where Richardson fits into all of this.
Our linebackers had the worst game I can remember in a while, as did our db's, that we can say that and still be disappointed that we didn't win this game says plenty about this team.
We appeared to create pretty good pressure throughout the game and were very close to making big plays on multiple occasions. Mebane looked stout, Bennett continued from the Super Bowl and Avril was solid if unspectacular. I didn't notice Hill or Rubin too much and it was disappointing to see how few snaps pre-season hero Clark played, has Pete given any reasoning for that yet?
Bruce has not looked like we thought he would, contract year and all. Was easy to block and didn't flash like he can, it appears that weight gain has cost him some speed. He did have that tfl on their first drive but was pretty absent after that, and as noted was easily blocked by Bailey and then Cook on Austin's TD run.
We can definitely win next week, but it will probably have to be a shootout, I don't have much faith in the likes of Williams and Bailey vs Rodgers. I hope God tells Kam to suit up soon.
