Recent Forum Topics › Forums › The Rams Huddle › game reactions from around the net (3)
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August 9, 2014 at 12:49 pm #3705znModerator
alyoshamucci
As usual, the initial reviews I read before watching the game were totally different from the game I saw . . . but they got closer to what I saw after a day or so.
Of course there was no gameplanning, 1 starter on the D line playing, and 0 of our top 3 CBs. Also, the biggest thing, JL, the General of our defense was not on field to make the calls . .. I am pretty sure thats why we were a step late in our run fits.
The Good
1) Aaron Donald was putting on a show . . . his ability to get through around and under starting O linemen was pretty stunning. The opposing coaches are going to have to design run plays with him in mind, because he’s coming through one way or another on most plays it looks like. I put his TFL over under at 20 (including sacks) . . .Donald has the hard part down. The hand play, strength and speed. He will need scheme help in our defense to not take himself out of plays, but thats on GW to ensure
2) G Rob is a freak. He has excellent balance, and seems to be setting up just fine for passing plays . . inside and outside (though outside he was against 2nd teamers). His drive blocking and ability to shoot out to the next level was pretty insane . . he didn’t look like it was more of a physical challenge then college, though the game was moving faster for him, that was obvious.
3) EJ Gaines was what I expected. Professional and ready to play at this level. He was a tackler in the SEC, and he forced 2 fumbles during the game. He was patient. there was a play where Michael Sam was giving chase and the QB was rolling out . . Gaines didn’t play to the ball until the QB let it go, ensuring he got the breakup, no first down, and no PI. That was pretty savvy. If you can make the team in one PS game, I figure he did it. The play aginst the fullback on the goal line sealed it for me.
4) Tavon looks really comfortable. He seems to be running his routes at a different speed.
5) Stedman Bailey is really a quality receiver. The back shoulder TD showcased his body intelligence. As he started making his turn to get the ball, he gave the defender a light tap on the shoulder, BUT DID NOT EXTEND HIS ARM. He got the push off with no Offensive PI by doing that. That was pretty awesome.
6) Our TE group is pretty impressive and specialized. Harkey is impressive and rumbling boulder of a person, Kendricks has gotten so smooth in his routes I no longer hold my breathe when he rolls out for the ball. Bayer is ready to play. He was more showcased at Bowling Green than any other receiver (except maybe Gallon), so he’s used to having the ball come his way…. he makes the final 53. If Kendricks leaves he’ll likely be the replacement. He has a good tool set.
7) Emory Blake and Austin Franklin made cases for themselves. If not here, then somewhere. Franklin’s route running is special.
8) Michael Sam looked better than Westbrooks . . which I was not expecting. Guess the stage kinda scared him. Between the D line and the DBs, Im not sure we keep everyone, maybe we can trade rather than just cutting, but I want to keep 10 DBs and 10 Dline.
9) Pettis is going to be tough to cut.
10) Zac Stacy was a vision. He makes his cuts so effortlessly with those ballerina feet. I think many do not give him credit for how hard he hits the hole. Tre Mason may have better lateral agility . . but he is not the runner that Benny or Zac is yet. I think besides KC, we have the best running attack in football (I am counting Tavon). I picked Cunningham as my surprise player this year. He does not have the feet or vision to get 7 yards where there is only 3 like Zac does, but he has the ability to breakaway if the D makes a mistake, and I believe we will see it couple times this year.
11) The young LBs fared fine, and I really like them blitzing Steward.
12) Joyner isn’t going to have any trouble tackling at his size.
13) The backup QBs are an upgrade for sure. [Gilbert]…I thought showed poise and calm I was not expecting. He has a solid throwing motion that will give him an edge when he gets flustered. Overall I scored him pretty high. Want to see more though.
The not so good.
14) Givens may wash out this year. He is not dynamic or trustworthy.
15) Barnes upset me a couple times. He may practice well, but I am going to be stunned if Barrett Jones cannot take his spot.
16) Cody Davis is going to have a hard time. He is playing kinda francic, and if he misses tackles like that he wont make the team.
17) Jo-Lonn Dunbar is too old to miss tackling high.
18) Carrington, Conrath, etc . . . no push. Carrington did get through one play and then didnt have the burst to get to the ball carrier.
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didn;t see too much from the safeties, they seemed to be playing deep like Williams likes. TJ covered Graham pretty well at the start of the game, and Mo showed up at the back end of plays . . and showed up bringing heat. he also impressed me by pulling up short of a roughing call on a receiver.
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RockRam
It was ridiculously easy for NO to run the ball.I recognize that our starters at DT didn’t play, and it was the rotation guys mainly. But it was like they’d never been blocked before and didn’t know what to do.I saw Donald get engulfed several times. Our LBs didn’t hold up. Again, I realize who played and who didn’t. But just terrible tackling and run support. Again, can’t seem to get off blocks.
TE Cunningham simply doesn’t belong. Hands of stone, too much time on the ground, misses blocks.
Is it me, or does some our 2nd string Oline look anorexic?
I think Blake or Harris can beat out Pettis this year. They have more speed, and while Pettis is good in the red zone, with our TEs and Brit and Quick we have plenty of size. I just don’t think he’s gonna make it. But he’ll play somewhere.
I didn’t think either starting Safety was particularly effective.
Positives:
GRob played LG and LT and did quite well on both. Made a few mistakes that were easily seen, but physically could move his man at Guard, and handled pass rushers well enough at LT.
Hill is a great pick up at backup QB. Very good command of the huddle, the plays, and is accurate and confident in where he’s throwing it. Takes calculated risks and throws 50/50 balls trusting our WRs to make the play. Looks to throw downfield. Garrett looked like a rookie, and Austin looked like he had 3 training camps. Nonetheless Garrett is more talented than Austin. But I have to believe that he’s a PS guy. Hard to imagine that they use one of the precious 53 spots on him.
That said, our WRs looked a lot more like NFL WRs. Ball awareness, position, making plays when contetested.
Bailey is going to be outstanding this year.
Austin in space can get us 5 yards anytime we want it, and is versatile.
Not enough of Quick or Brit to tell much of anything.
Mason got his sea legs and started to look like he was playing at Auburn.
If Cunningham isn’t Stacy’s backup I’ll eat my hat. Tough little sucker who knows what he’s doing.
TE Bayer is a keeper. Soft hands, runs good routes, just looks the part of a good all around TE. I have little doubt that barring injury our TE corps is Cook, Kendricks, the underrated Harkey, and Bayer.
I watched with interest an obscure DT named Harlan; really like what I saw. Not real big (yet), reminded me a lot of Hayes.
It was clear that only sometimes did GW ask for tight coverage; and when he did EJ Gaines looked quite good. Alexander has no idea what he’s doing but when he arrives, he makes plays. Joyner was up and down, but man can he close and when he gets there the size of the guy he’s tackling just doesn’t much matter.
Yeah, lots of errors, flags, etc. But no fumbles, no INTs by the Rams. Saw some guys who looked overmatched, but also have to accept that this is preseason, many were rookies or 2nd year guys, and everything was pretty vanilla.
I would NOT want to be some of the front 7 back-ups this week; GW is going to be brutal on them.
I also would not be surprised to see the Rams pick up a vet OT cast off. They look scary thin there. It’s not the best situation when your back up OT is your starting RG, and then your starting LG. You need to be able to insert a bench guy at OT if a guy goes down even for part of a game. You need to be able to dress a C/G and an OT or OT/G on game day. And as of yet I just don’t see a development guy that can be trusted. But, admittedly, it is early.
I never thought Fisher intended to roll back the clock. Rather I see him taking the NE approach. Pass and run with equal efficiency, adjusting your game for the opponent, and then understanding the pass scores points, the run controls the clock and prevents the D from just pinning their ears back and rushing the passer. But the run game HAS to be real. Because the D will then just take away the pass and let you run yourself silly knowing that the odds are you’ll cough the ball up in the 12 plays it takes to get to the goal line.
In watching the routes run by the Rams last night, they were intermediate and deep for the WOs. Used the slot and TEs underneath mostly.
This isn’t going to be 3 yards and a cloud of dust. If it was, Kendricks, Cook, Austin, Bailey, Givens, are all bad fits. And the Rams have been too deliberate to just throw darts at the board.
- This topic was modified 10 years, 3 months ago by zn.
August 10, 2014 at 12:04 am #3731znModeratorCoachO
The thing that stands out to me about the Safety play last night and the defense overall, was the bad tackling. But it doesn’t surprise me in the least, and I am not overly concerned about it by the time Sept rolls around. If you watch any of the other games around the league, the one thing that has become a trend is the tackling is really bad in the first couple of games in the Preseason.
They just aren’t able to tackle anymore in training camp, then you ask them to “practice” it in live games, it is going to be inconsistent.
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I can live with the aggression penalties. Its the presnap penalties they need to clean up. Those are the drive killers in offense. And the drive extenders on defense
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That was the best Davis has looked at any time since training camp started. But while he made a couple of nice throws, he also missed badly on others. I am not just talking about the throws themselves, I am talking about the decisions he made.
While Gilbert’s accuracy or lack thereof was obvious, what impressed me was this decision making in his first NFL action. He got the ball to the right guy most of the time, he just had throws sailing on him. Think he may have been just a tad anxious about the setting? There are bound to be things he needs to learn from, but the kid has a ton of talent, and my guess is he is showing enough that he will make the roster. They won’t risk trying to slide him to the PS.
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If you look at the group of CBs past the 1st four who are IMO, Jenkins, Johnson, Joyner and Gaines, Roberson probably has the best cover skills. He just doesn’t want any part of the physical side of the game. To me, for him to have any chance of competing for a roster spot, he HAS to get on Special Teams. There is no way a 6th CB makes any roster without ST contributions. And so far, he isn’t on any of them. Neither is Woodard. Huge Red flag for me.
…for a 6th CB to make the team, he has to be able to play on ST. And because Roberson is so unwilling to tackle, that isn’t gonna happen.
McGee, for his lack of consistency in coverage, at least has shown the ability to be a contributor on most of the coverage teams. So I would put him at the #5 CB spot.
[Daniels:]…at this point, he is certainly viewed as being better than the others. He is on on the 1st units on Kickoff Return, Kickoff Coverage. 2nd unit on the Punt Coverage unit. So that tells me at this point, he is regarded as one of the core players on the core units.
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Rhaney just doesn’t know what he is doing yet, in making all the calls at the LOS. There were many instances where he would make a line call, only to have the QB change it up. I had heard prior to the game, that the plan for the “2nd unit” was to be very run heavy, because of this very thing, and the game situation sort of dictated they throw it more than they wanted.
I would venture a guess and say they keep 10.[O L]. And Barrett Jones will NOT be one of them. I’m fairly confident in saying he won’t be on the 53 man come Sept 7th.
Long, Robinson, Wells, Saffold, Barksdale, Barnes, Joseph, Person, Hooey, Bond.
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As far as having only one starter at LB out, its more a case of who took his place that lead to most of the issues. By having Dunbar slide to the MLB position, and now putting Armstrong on the field to stop the running game….. well you saw how that turned out.
For all those people who still want to beat the drum for Ray Ray taking over for Dunbar at the WLB, I hope you took notice. He couldn’t get off blocks, and over ran plays consistently. I know its ONE preseason game. But this is the same thing that shows up in every practice.
But if history tells us anything, Laurinaitis will be there, barring some serious injury.
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Barring any unforeseen developments, I would imagine the 7 man DL rotation being: Quinn, Long Hayes, Sims, Brockers, Langford, Donald,, with Conrath being the 8th game day activation.
It would not shock me at all, to see Carrington being one of the surprise cuts. He is on a 1-yr deal, ($1.5M with a $1M guarantee) Conrath is in the last year of his original 3 year deal, ($1.44M) but only $6K guaranteed. Again, it should be interesting to see how this battle plays out.
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[Receivers]…the thing that has been interesting to me, and they have stayed very consistent with it throughout camp, and even in the game on Friday, is the tandem concept they are employing.
Britt and Quick are usually paired together, as is Austin and Bailey. Givens and Pettis make up the 3rd duo, and are noticeably behind the other two groups in terms of 1st unit reps.
When you watch the game, is they are in 2 WR sets, these combinations are the foundation, and they bring in other personnel packages off of it.
Britt and Quick got the starting reps, and played the first few series. Then you had Austin and Bailey getting work into the 2nd Quarter. But make no mistake, Givens was still on the field late into the 2nd Half, and no matter how you spin that, it can’t be a good sign.
August 10, 2014 at 12:13 am #3733TackleDummyParticipantI would venture a guess and say they keep 10.[O L]. And Barrett Jones will NOT be one of them. I’m fairly confident in saying he won’t be on the 53 man come Sept 7th.
I find that interesting, but based on what I have been reading the last month or so I guess I am not really surprised.
August 10, 2014 at 4:49 pm #3766znModeratorBump, I have 3 now.
August 10, 2014 at 8:05 pm #3771rflParticipant7) Emory Blake and Austin Franklin made cases for themselves. If not here, then somewhere. Franklin’s route running is special.
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9) Pettis is going to be tough to cut.
OK, I have not seen enough of these lesser WRs to have an opinion. I mean, every year some 4th and 5th string WRs look good in camp and perhaps in a PS game and then they vanish.
Also, I don’t follow rosters closely enough to have much opinion on roster fine tuning.
What I will say is that, for me, points 7 & 9 are contradictory, at least in a general way. If we see quality in young WRs, then, as far as I am concerned, I am delighted to see us jettison Pettis or Givens. Neither of them have ever shown me much that adds up to average level competence at the position. Givens has no heart for the middle of the field and Pettis can’t get himself open with a taser. Neither has anything like a ceiling for potential above what we have seen and what we have seen is weak, lame, and a drag on a contending team.
After an off-season claiming to be prepping for a big season, Givens has shown nothing in camp or in the 1st PS game. As far as I am concerned, he is eminently cuttable.
Pettis has always been a better competitor than Givens, and he gives us something. But it isn’t much, we no longer need his height on the goal line, and, again speaking generally, I would trade a promising youngster who can run routes for him in a heartbeat. I have felt for years that his presence is an indictment of a roster on which no one can beat him out.
I don’t think anyone here will cry a tear over Givens, but I think there are some who value Pettis. That’s fine, of course, but I yearn for the day when we have demonstrably better options than what he offers.
By virtue of the absurd ...
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