reactions to the FALCONS game

yeah. like i typed in the chat room. losing is not a prerequisite but experience is. mcvay and goff. both young.

even when brady won in his second year. belichick was playoff tested. he had been a head coach for awhile. even as a defensive coordinator, he’d been to and won superbowls.

when roethlisberger won the superbowl, cowher was a veteran head coach.

too much inexperience i think. that and two turnovers. that did the rams in. bad tackling. falcons were laser focused the entire game.

positives. goff flashed. he definitely flashed. some of the throws he made were phenomenal.

bobby woods showed up. what a great signing. donald played well.

but man. hopefully, this is just the start. hopefully, there’s many more playoffs to come in the mcvay era.

Gurley with 2 drops . Watkins with 2 drops Cooper with 2 turnovers not a good effort McVay didn’t call a very good game. Look what Goff did this year , he fixed what he said he would. They’re young and now they’re experienced and know what to expect in the playoffs. I’m disappointed but still happy , the Rams have a good foundation for many years of success . I’d rather be disappointed after a wildcard loss than be out of it in week 11. Oh and Ed Hockaloogy is terrible not one holding call on Alt. and they held for the whole damn game just disgraceful.

• This reply was modified 6 years, 11 months ago by Eternal Ramnation.

The Falcons defense deserves a ton of credit. There were very few instances of Rams receivers running free through the secondary like we’re used to seeing. Watkins had a defender glued to his hip every play.

The Rams’ inability to stop the run when they had to did them in defensively. Not being able to stop it with their base defense forced them to commit extra defenders and the Falcons countered that brilliantly. This opened things up for their offense and allowed them to dictate the game in the second half.

The Falcons run game seemed to come to life after Brockers went down. That was a big loss for the Rams D. On other subjects, a reliable TE would be a nice find before the 2018 season and it’s unfortunate that Cooper waited until his first playoff game to have his worst performance of the season. Perhaps the injury he was dealing with played a factor. Only fourteen carries for Gurley? That disappointed me. I know that the Falcons had the ball a lot and Cooper’s errors kept the ball out of Gurley’s hands early, but there were opportunities for Gurley to run more.

Anyway, my expectations were exceeded this year. Hopefully this young team keeps developing and they can adequately deal with the buzz saw that is Jimmy Garappolo.

Quoting something Wade’s daddy once said after a second consecutive loss in the playoffs… “One year ago, we knocked on the door. This year, we beat on the door. Next year, we’re going to kick the son of a bitch in.”

The Rams knocked on the door this year. Next year they are gonna skip the ‘beating on it’ part and go right to ‘kicking it in’.

Ellard80 wrote:

The more I think about how people (including myself) weren’t really giving much value to experience.

yeah i really just underestimated how valuable experience would be. in a thread before the game, i commented that only losers say you need to lose before you learn how to win.

i think it’s at least partially true. you don’t necessarily need the experience of losing, but you do need the experience of playing games. it’s ok if the quarterback is inexperienced, but he needs to at least be surrounded by experience. instead you have a 31 year old rookie head coach. a young running back. young receivers.

i think the defense played well enough, but then you had two horrendous errors on special teams, and it was too much to overcome.

the crazy thing is if the rams are able to get to the playoffs next year and win, mcvay will still set a record for youngest head coach to win a playoff game. that’s what the rams were up against.

but hopefully they go into this offseason more determined than ever.

lyser wrote:

Rams did not play their best game.

Falcons had a good plan and executed it cleanly. They are going to be a tough draw for anyone in this tournament.

they were focused the entire game. the tackling was crisp. they didn’t make errors. falcons can’t count on teams making those same errors the rams did though.

but yeah. they were definitely prepared.

I think the opening drive of the 2nd half determined the game moreso than the special teams turnovers.

The Rams seized momentum at the end of the 1st half but Atlanta opened the 2nd half with an 8 min drive to take control of the game….

Specially, a missed tackle by Ogltree on 3rd and 9 from ATL’s own 41 yard line on Tevin Coleman. Ogletree read the play beautifully and had Coleman for a brief second behind the LOS but just missed the tackle where Coleman broke free for 14 to keep that time consuming drive alive.

Had Ogletree made that play, momentum stays with LA……. to me that play defined the momentum of the 2nd half.

The turnovers were HUGE obviously. I think they are the complete difference. Hekker had them pinned back. Without those turnovers, they might not score. It changes the complexion of the game. The defense got worn down FAST. They ran so many plays. You just can’t do that to a defense.

Yet I digress.

Once the complete and total pain goes away, I’m sure I’ll be happy with this surprise season.