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September 28, 2014 at 9:44 am #8619
znModeratorWhere’s the defense? Where’s the pass rush?
By Jim Thomas
Like a ghost town in the old West, the place known as #SackCity is deserted. No sacks to be found. (OK, one sack to be found.)
Granted, the Rams are only three games into the 2014 season, but their much-ballyhooed defense largely has been a no-show. Opposing quarterbacks aren’t running for their lives. Opposing running backs aren’t cowering in fear.
Although the Rams rank a respectable 13th in total defense, which measures yards allowed per game, they rank 29th in both overall run defense (155 yards per game) and 29th in yards allowed per carry (5.1 yards per carry).
“We’ve got to get better against the run,” coach Jeff Fisher said. “We’re inconsistent. … We’re giving up too many big plays in the run game.”
As for the pass rush? It’s on a milk carton somewhere. A Rams team that had the most sacks over the 2012 and 2013 seasons (105) in the entire NFL has one in three games this season. Not surprisingly, that’s the lowest total in the league. Through the first three weeks of the season, the league average is six sacks per team.
“We practice hard, we’re trying to do everything,” defensive end Robert Quinn said. “I don’t know. For some reason, it’s just not clicking on game day. It’s nothing with the guys’ effort or working technique.
“It’s just that for whatever reason, it’s not happening our way. At the end of the day, we’ve just got to keep pushing. And once we finally get that break, I’m sure the sacks are gonna come in a handful. So we’re gonna just keep working our craft and go from there.”
Rookie defensive tackle Aaron Donald has THE Rams sack of 2014. Certainly the Rams miss Chris Long, who’s out until November following foot surgery. Quinn, who led the NFC with 19 sacks a year ago and was named NFL defensive player of the year by the Pro Football Writers, is still looking for sack No. 1.
“He’s getting attention,” Fisher said. “People are aware of him. The ball’s coming out (quick), there’s no question the ball’s coming out.”
Quinn was active against Minnesota and Tampa Bay with a total of six quarterback hits, four pressures and two tackles for loss. But against Dallas, Quinn had two tackles for loss, but no QB hits, pressures or — obviously — sacks.
For the most part, Dallas Pro Bowl left tackle Tyron Smith got the best of it Sunday. On the 28 passing plays Dallas attempted — a total that includes penalties — Quinn was on the field for 23 of those plays according to Post-Dispatch review of game film. On 16 of those 23 plays, he faced one-on-one blocking with Smith. On six occasions, he was double-teamed. He was tripled-team once.
On three of those 23 plays, Quinn was either held or had his facemask grabbed by Smith. The three were all obvious infractions that should’ve been called. But sometimes they’re called, and sometimes they’re not in the NFL.
“Check and see the pass attempts against us as well,” Fisher said. “We might have the fewest in the league this year. The more pass attempts, the more opportunities he’s going to get to get on the passer.”
The Rams, in fact, have had a league-low 69 passes thrown against them this season, with never more than 25 in any one game. The next-lowest total is the 85 passes thrown against Oakland. The league average is 105 passes per team, so the Rams’ defense is facing a dozen fewer passes a game — which means a dozen fewer opportunities to rush the passer.
In comparison, the Rams’ defense had 107 passes thrown at them in the first three games of 2013, and had seven sacks.
But there’s a reason why the Rams are seeing so few passes so far this season, something Fisher concedes. Namely, opponents are having too much success running the ball against them.
“It’s been our — I don’t want to say inability — but at times difficulty that we’ve had stopping the run,” Fisher said. “We’re creating an opportunity for teams to pick up significant gains on the ground. And if anybody had their preference, they’d do it that way.”
Interestingly, the same Oakland defense that has faced the second-fewest passes in the NFL ranks 31st in run defense. So it’s more than coincidence.
“We’re getting pressure, we’re just not getting there,” Fisher said. “It’ll come. We’ve got the guys that can do it. Like I said, when teams know that you can rush (the passer), that’s a concern of theirs, and they’re going to run the football.”
Stop the run, and you’ll get more chances to rush the passer. It’s just that simple. And as mentioned, the Rams aren’t stopping the run. They’ve yielded a 100-yard rusher in all three games this season. In both 2012 and 2013, Fisher’s first two seasons in St. Louis, the Rams allowed only four 100-yard rushers all season.
Only once in those two seasons did they allow back-to-back 100-yard rushers: Dallas’ DeMarco Murray with 175 yards in Game 3 of 2013 and San Francisco’s Frank Gore with 153 yards in Game 4.
So you can point to lots of factors for the AWOL pass rush, but no matter how you slice it, the overall play of defensive coordinator Gregg Williams’ unit is the biggest reason why the Rams have stumbled to a 1-2 start, with the meat of the schedule coming up after the bye week.
“Not up to our standard, I think is the best way to put it,” linebacker James Laurinaitis said. “We’re more critical of ourselves than any of you (media) guys can be of us. We have our goals, and what we want to accomplish as a unit. And to be blunt, we’ve fallen short of the those expectations.”
September 28, 2014 at 10:39 pm #8662
NERamParticipantWhere’s the defense? Where’s the pass rush?
WHERES THE BEEF?
September 28, 2014 at 11:06 pm #8663znModeratorWhere’s the defense? Where’s the pass rush?
WHERES THE BEEF?
September 28, 2014 at 11:39 pm #8665NERamParticipantNERam wrote:
Where’s the defense? Where’s the pass rush?WHERES THE BEEF?
LOL.
Clara Peller on the Rams DL – “I don’t think there’s anyone there. I really don’t.”
September 29, 2014 at 8:04 pm #8697
RamBillParticipant‘Sack City’ is coming up empty for the St. Louis Rams
By Ron Clementshttp://ronclements.blogspot.com/2014/09/sack-city-is-coming-up-empty-for-st.html
When Jeff Fisher took over as the St. Louis Rams head coach in 2012, there was talk of the team breaking the NFL’s single-season sack record. The Rams recorded 52 sacks in 2012 and increased that number in 2013 with 53 sacks.
Leading the way were the Rams’ formidable pass rush duo of defensive ends Chris Long and Robert Quinn. The two combined for 22 sacks in 2012 and Quinn had 19 sacks last year while Long came in with 8.5 sacks a season ago. The two were dubbed Black Lightning – Quinn – and White Thunder – Long – and the Rams defensive line, which was supposed to become even more formidable in 2014 with the addition of rookies Aaron Donald and Ethan Westbrooks free agent Alex Carrington, was dubbed Sack City.
But three games into the 2014 season, the Rams have mustered just one sack. That’s it. Just one.
“We are getting good rushes,” Quinn said Sunday following a 34-31 loss to the Dallas Cowboys. “We have been back there but when we get our opportunities to get them down we have to get them down. Guys are going to constantly continue to work and try to build on that.”
Cowboys quarterback Tony Romo helped to lead a come-from-behind victory after the Rams jumped out to a 21-0 lead. Earlier in the week, Quinn said Romo doesn’t get enough credit for his elusiveness. The Rams rarely got near Romo on Sunday and even allowed Romo to use his legs to convert a third-and-13 early in the fourth quarter. Rams linebacker Alec Ogletree, who forced a DeMarco Murray fumble on Dallas’ first possession, was unable to corral the 34-year-old quarterback in the open field.
“The big third-down run was huge for us,” Cowboys coach Jason Garrett said. “He made that one play with his feet and climbed out of the pocket on the other ones. He did a really good job. Obviously it all starts with the protection and our guys up front did a really good job.”
The one sack belongs to Donald and what hasn’t helped the Rams this year is being without Long, who suffered an ankle injury early in a Week 1 loss to Minnesota. Defensive end Eugene Sims said not having Long is definitely a factor in the struggling pass rush, but not an excuse.
“We’re supposed to have one of the best D-lines in the league,” Sims said. “Teams are scheming against us, but we’ll figure it out.”
Sims got to Romo twice on Sunday, but was flagged both times on questionable calls. His first so-called penalty was a roughing the passer call when he leapt in an attempt to block a Romo pass. He swiped at the ball, barely missing it, and his hand appeared to barely graze either Romo’s helmet or shoulder pad. He later sacked Romo, but that negated because he was called for defensive holding because he allegedly grabbed in-motion receiver Terrance Williams as he ran behind Sims, who was engaged with an offensive lineman.
Referee Clete Blakeman spoke with St. Louis Post-Dispatch Rams beat writer Jim Thomas after the game and said there was “enough restriction there to warrant a call” for holding, but it was a judgment call from the line judge. He didn’t comment on the roughing the passer call, saying he needed to see the replay even though he was the one who threw the flag.
The roughing the passer call kept a Dallas drive alive before halftime and allowed the Cowboys to kick a field goal before the break. Sims let that one go, but the negated sack with 2:31 remaining in a three-point game is the one that really bothered him.
“I was just trying to make a play and he made a bad call,” Sims exclusively told me after the game. “It’s their job to make a call, but we’ll see where it goes in the next couple of days.
“It’s a big stain on the game because, in the last minute, I’m trying to make a play to win the game. Everybody who saw it knew it was a bad call.”
Defensive end William Hayes said the defense isn’t capitalizing on plays they need to make.
“The ball’s coming out quick, but we just haven’t been effective on third downs,” he said. “We’ve got to figure out what we’ve got to do better. We’re not making the plays we normally make.”
Fisher said the team tapered back the pass rush versus the Cowboys to take some other things away. That worked to a degree as Romo was limited to 217 passing yards with two touchdowns and an interception. But Dez Bryant’s 68-yard score to start the second half cut the Rams lead to 21-17 and swung the momentum in Dallas’ favor.
“They matched up well and (Romo) got rid of it when he needed to,” Fisher said. “We knew we were facing a good offensive line and we’ve got a deep one-on-one. We did get there, we missed him, and then we came back and tried to get him again and we hit him in the shoulder and we got a penalty for that. We’re going to keep working. Our defense needs to get better in all areas right now.”
The Rams have two weeks to fix things. But when they come out of their bye week, they’ve got an undefeated Philadelphia team on the road followed by two home games against division rivals San Francisco and Seattle. If the Rams had trouble containing a deceptively elusive Romo, things could go really bad against legitimately elusive quarterbacks Colin Kaepernick and Russell Wilson.
“I wish there was some magic potion we can all drink and forget about it,” linebacker James Laurinaitis said of Sunday’s loss. “Quite frankly, having two weeks to really settle in a loss is going to be hard to get over. But you’ve got to do it. That’s what this profession’s all about. You’ve got to have amnesia in the midst of the game and definitely after the game.
“We’ll look at it and, goodness, we’ve got to correct it. We’ve got to go back to work because we’re getting into the meat of this thing here now. We know what we’re up against…It comes down to what are you doing individually for your craft. How hard do you work individually? Check yourself and say, ‘Hey, am I really doing everything I can?’ Then you go back out there and do more. I trust the guys in this locker room that we’ll do that.”
It’s a good thing Laurinaitis trusts his teammates and coaches to fix their defensive issues because the general public really doesn’t.
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