RamView, 8/29/2015: Colts 24, Rams 14 (Long)

RamView, August 29, 2015
Preseason Game #3: Colts 24, Rams 14

The Rams played better than they have been, but no better than last year, in taking their third loss of preseason. A few strong performances could not overcome the team’s natural tendency to find ways to lose, via protection breakdowns, coverage breakdowns, continued lack of pass rush and the usual blizzard of penalties. With the regular season almost here, the Rams look readier, but still not ready, for prime time.

Position by position:
* QB: The best development from the game was the elevated play by Nick Foles, who made a lot of chicken salad out of, um, substandard ingredients in going 10-11-128 for a passer rating of 145.5. The offense got Foles into more than his fair share of trouble but he mostly got out of it, thanks to his arm, feet and head. Down 10-0, Foles escaped from trouble, usually named Trent Cole, several times to sustain a Rams drive. He scrambled left and hit Kenny Britt for 13, beat a funky Colt formation with a screen to Benny Cunningham for 14 and dropped one off to Tre Mason with Cole bearing down on him again for 17 more. The drive still ended in a sack that Foles could do little about, but all his work was not in vain. The Rams flipped field position, got him the ball back at the Colt 44, and Foles got them into the end zone in one play with his first deep ball of the preseason, a pretty one, too, to reborn deep threat Chris Givens. The Rams quickly got to midfield their next drive before Foles took his second sack, on a perfectly timed blitz that Foles never saw coming. The Rams only put up the one TD behind Foles in the first half, but we still got what we’ve been waiting for from him. He looked like the difference-maker the Rams need and made the kind of plays under pressure I don’t think Sam Bradford made often enough. What we don’t need to see is Foles having to outplay all of his teammates like he had to tonight. He’ll need help. Case Keenum and Austin Davis each got one throw apiece, and while I agree Keenum has won the QB2 job, I have to say that Davis has gotten about as unfair a chance to defend his roster spot as I have ever seen. With little experience, the guy started half the games last year, kept them in just about every one and was the best QB on the roster. This year, he’s Tim Jenkins. Sean Mannion’s (6-13-47) efficient summer took a big hit with a rookie INT in the 3rd. Going for Damian Williams a third time in a row, he stared down his receiver and Jalil Brown jumped the sideline route for a pick and return that set up the Colts’ winning TD. The Colt blitz got to him a little bit, but he hung in the pocket well to make some throws and continued to show good timing, accuracy and arm strength. Mannion was hurt by a couple of drops and a 4th-and-10 sack on his last play. Can’t exactly throw it away on 4th down. Mannion’s still had a good summer, but much more importantly for the Rams’ 2015 prospects, Foles has joined him now on the positive side of the QB ledger.

* RB: Rams RBs gained more yards as receivers (75) than as rushers (67), on a meager 2.5 yards per carry. Tre Mason (6 touches-31 yards) started in a 5-yard hole after poor blocking got him buried on his first carry, but bounced back the next drive by taking a shotgun handoff 10 yards around right end on 3rd-and-short. Benny Cunningham (7 touches-37) then beat a weird pass rush (no DEs, 3 Colts lined up over center) with a screen for 14, and Mason leaked out of the backfield for a 17-yard catch before pulling up with a tweaked hamstring. Cunningham showed cutback ability he didn’t last week on a 6-yard run in the 2nd, and beat the Colts for 16 on a well-set-up screen, followed by Isaiah Pead (7 touches-21) popping for 13 off the left side. Pead also broke a tackle and gained 8 in the 3rd, but also got stuffed about 5 times. Pead’s never been a very instinctive runner, and the knee injury understandably seems to have cost him suddenness. Trey Watts (6 rushes-18) walked in from the 3 for the Rams’ 2nd TD and hit a brilliant spin move to beat LB Matt Overton in the hole to convert a 3rd-and-short in the 4th. Watts simply has more game than Pead, now if not in September. Malcolm Brown (9 touches-35) worked hard for garbage time yards but lost a little favor with a sloppy one-handed drop of another well-set-up screen. Even before Todd Gurley takes the field, the Rams have a physical group of RBs who are effective receivers. They just need more consistent blocking.

* Receivers: The receivers, on the other hand, appear to need more consistent effort. The exception being Chris Givens (2-63), who locked up the WR5 job emphatically with a 44-yard TD bomb. Play-action sucked up a lot of the Colt secondary, and Givens burned safety Mike Adams handily to get behind all of them. It’s the “stars” of the group that could stand to show up better. Kenny Britt (2-21) was a reliable release valve but his route-running has been pretty lackadaisical (or, in Missouri, “laxadaisical”) all preseason. Jared Cook (1-5) has done little through the air, and even less on the ground, as he is useless and clearly uninterested in inline blocking. He did nothing blocking to create at least three losses for the RBs, including getting Mason buried on the opening play. The one time he was any good was on Mason’s shotgun run, but there, Cook was out front and blocking on the move. A double-TE “power” formation is just a joke with Cook involved when he doesn’t have the power to will himself to block. At this moment, if you benched Cook and started Lance Kendricks, I’m not sure I’d notice other than the running game would improve. Welcome back, Schottyball, as Tavon Austin (0-0) was uninvolved in the offense for a 2nd straight week, though things may have been much different had he not drawn a completely wrong OPI penalty on the opening drive to retract a 25-yard catch. Another sloppy drop late by Bradley Marquez probably has him redirecting his sites at the practice squad. Brian Quick got on the field, but with no targets, I have no way of knowing if he did much more. Other than Britt, the only receivers Foles could rely on when he got in trouble were the RBs. Besides Givens, all of the Ram WRs simply have to offer more than they did tonight.

* Offensive line: The work in progress is still very much that, with alarmingly poor pass pro from both tackles at times. Greg Robinson was beaten by Trent Cole on the edge repeatedly and also got smoked on the opening play to help get Mason buried. Robinson recovered and knocked down Cole from behind to give Foles an escape hatch on an early completion, but his problems with speed rushers are a definite issue. His run-blocking was even an issue tonight, with a couple of glaring losses at the point of attack the Rams just can’t afford from who’s supposed to be their leading run-mauler. What Robinson didn’t do, though, was allow a sack; both of those came from Rob Havenstein’s side. Erik Walden sped by him with ease for the first sack and about bull-rushed him over Foles, with D’Qwell Jackson also blitzing in untouched, for the second. Jackson was a failed blitz adjustment by Foles and/or Pead, but Havenstein getting run over would have been enough by itself. He can get caught really flat-footed on the edge, and it leads to very bad things. The Rams started Barrett Jones at C, moved Jamon Brown to LG with Rodger Saffold still out and started Demetrious Rhaney at RG. Rhaney, in less than a week, has probably already beaten Brandon Washington out of a job. He looked quite good at guard, especially getting out front to lead-block on screens, and delivered a key block on a Cunningham lunge on 3rd-and-short. Jones looked much more credible at center than he did in Oakland. He tied up the nose tackle well on run plays, drove a guy about to the sideline on one run, didn’t get beaten in pass pro that I saw and is probably your opening day starter. Brown came up lame after the TD bomb to Givens, but with “only” a low-grade ankle sprain. Rhaney did miss a couple of run blocks, and penalties by the starters were a problem, with both Jones and Rhaney killing a drive with facemask penalties, Rhaney’s after getting whipped inside by the feared Kendall Langford. The Rams got good run-blocking from Corey Harkey and Justice Cunningham, who’s earned TE4 with his consistent work. On the Watts TD, Garrett Reynolds surged out to the 2nd level at guard while Justice prevailed on a move block and Alex Bayer (!) stoned his man at the line. Reynolds also made a couple of good blocks on Pead’s long run. After that, though, the last unit didn’t create much push at all and the RBs were left to make their yardage on their own. As for the starters, the Rams have GOT to get better blocking from the TEs (ahem, JARED), and much more consistent play from Robinson so they can afford to give Havenstein the help he’s going to need early on. The TEs (ahem, JARED) and Robinson have to control the LOS much better than they did in this game to create the ground game the Rams need.

* Defensive line: Slack City held the Colts to 56 rushing yards despite looking like they were going to get run over again early, with Chris Long repeating a disturbing trend of getting handled easily by the TE on the edge to give up nice gains like Daniel “Boom” Herron’s 7-yarder on the opening drive. That and the continued lack of a preseason pass rush got Andrew Luck in scoring range early, though Robert Quinn’s pass knockdown helped hold them to a FG. After the Colts recovered an onside kick, Quinn and Ethan Westbrooks got turned and rendered useless on an 11-yard Herron run, Luck hit Andre Johnson for a TD under little pressure, and the rout appeared to be on. Fortunately, after a punt backed the Colts up inside their 5, Aaron Donald said, “F that,” and put on as dominating a series as you will see, whipping into the backfield to stuff Herron on three straight plays. On the third, he brushed Todd Herremans back like nothing and nearly dropped Herron for a safety. That one-man wrecking crew show turned the tide of the game, with the Rams getting right back in it a couple of plays later with the Givens TD. The defensive tempo continued to increase, and when Long hit Luck to force an INT, it looked like good times were rolling again in -Sack- City, but a penalty took that and the Rams’ momentum away. They still got run stuffs by Ethan Westbrooks and William Hayes to slow the Colts down, but Indy failed to score a TD before halftime mainly because they’d used up their timeouts. Luck was only ever under light pressure at the most. Louis Trinca-Pasat got a decent number of snaps with the starters with Nick Fairley injured and Michael Brockers seeing limited action. He had a run stuff and BLANKET coverage of Dwayne Allen dropping back in coverage near the goal line at the end of the half to show for it. That was fun to watch. None of the other reserves stand out. Marcus Forston usually loses battles at the nose, and Martin Ifedi has shown disappointingly little. He came into camp poised to be Mike Waufle’s next star pupil. That may be Trinca-Pasat this year. I see little good in the stat that the Rams, starters and scrubs alike, have NO sacks in three games, but they did show up against the run (eventually) this week. You have to stop the run before you can pass-rush, right? We’ll have to hope Sack City finds football’s holy grail, the non-existent “switch,” by opening day against Seattle.

* Linebackers: The Rams talked a lot about getting improving their gap fills during the week, but it seems like it was just a lot of talk. Alec Ogletree got fooled by a Herron cutback on an early 7-yard run, then James Laurinaitis got sealed out of a 5-yard run. After the onside kick, Ogletree got blocked out of Herron’s 11-yard run. And Alec apparently committed the crucial holding penalty that took an INT away from Janoris Jenkins (and a probable score by the offense). That was part of Ogletree’s inconsistent coverage of Dwayne Allen; Marshall Faulk thought he was too busy talking trash and not busy enough, well, doing his job. The Colts got a first down inside the 10 before halftime when Ogletree badly blew a tackle on Herron. 10 guys did their jobs on that play. Ogletree’s got too much talent to play like this; he needs to play with better discipline. Bryce Hager got the 2nd half off to a great start by recovering a blown exchange by Josh Robinson, setting up the Rams’ 2nd TD. Jo-Lonn Dunbar had a great possession after that, blowing up a run and defending back-to-back passes in the flat on either side of the field. Hager later stuffed Tyler Varga a couple of times, but also blew a tackle on a Varga reception that allowed a 1st down out of 500-year-old Matt Hasselbeck’s garbage flip throw. Varga also ran through Marshall McFadden at the goal line for the Colts’ winning TD. Once the regular season hits, I think we’ve got to see more out of all the linebackers than we’ve seen so far.

* Secondary: The back of the defense has outplayed the front this preseason but still can’t resist giving up the big play. Janoris Jenkins broke up an early slant route and had (possibly too-) tight deep coverage on T.Y. Hilton to help hold the first Colt drive to a FG. T.J. McDonald made a couple of great pass breakups after the onside kick, but a botched coverage left Andre Johnson all alone out of the slot for a 32-yard TD. Jenkins got over in time to stop him inside the 10, but his laughable no-wrap shoulder tackle was an even more laughable whiff. Also not helping on that drive: Lamarcus Joyner and Trumaine Johnson getting dominated on decent run plays by that feared, mauling, 178-pound blocker Hilton. Come on. TruJo kept the next drive alive with a 3rd-down hold, but Jenkins appeared to end it in style with an INT and long return. No, another holding call took that back. Trovon Reed got beaten twice on deep out routes to allow Indy into FG range before halftime. Marcus Roberson had a couple of nice pass breakups, including a deflection while coming in on a blitz. Imoan Claiborne defended well but just didn’t contest the throw enough on the 2-point completion to Griff Whalen. The talent to succeed is there when these guys get their assignments right.

* Special teams: The unfortunate special teams highlight was the Colts’ recovery of an onside kick after their opening FG. To Cody Davis’ credit, he was not fooled by the play. To his detriment, like a bad infielder, he let the bouncing ball play him instead of the other way around, Zurlon Tipton beat the ball to him, and the Colts wound up with it. Johnny Hekker returned to normalcy with a couple of punts close to 50 yards, but the Rams did little on returns, with Sergeant Dan Rodriguez making the usual rookie mistake of thinking he’s going to make 20 ninja moves on people and score a TD every punt return, but is lucky to gain a yard instead. After last season, the Ram special teams looked poised to be one of the league’s best units, and I’ll stick with that forecast, though the high use of backups hasn’t allowed us to see that in preseason.

* Strategery: I was ready to fire the whole coaching staff on the spot in the 1st quarter with the team getting off to yet another poor, nonchalant start, but Donald’s goal-line eruption made this a much different section. Gregg Williams called a much more conservative game this week, and though the Rams continue to have a sackless summer, the change didn’t hurt. Some of Williams’ gamesmanship in coverage is worth discussing. Dropping the DT and rushing three actually worked a couple of times before halftime, once with Trinca-Pasat, once with Westbrooks. A couple of failed secondary rotations were killers, though. As Marshall Faulk explained on TV, Andre Johnson was supposed to be covered by a LB on his TD, but no one came over when Jenkins dropped deep and the DBs at the line shifted over. More to the point, what the hell is the benefit of that play supposed to be? Who but a simpleton would want to cover Andre Johnson, even at the age of 100, with a LB? We didn’t need help to see why Hilton was wide open for 16 during the Colts’ drive at the end of the 1st half; Joyner left him unguarded at the line to take a mad pre-snap dash all the way back to deep safety! What was the point of that? It’s been a repeat pattern since Williams got here that the only people fooled on these exotic coverages are Williams’ own players. It’s well past time to simplify things.

Frank Cignetti couldn’t get Austin involved (again) but made some likeable play calls. The double play-action, with the fake Austin end-around, made the Givens TD. Most of the Colt secondary bit. I’d seen that play in training camp, but they only ever screened to Austin out of it. Cignetti also fooled the Colts with the shotgun handoff to Mason on 3rd-and-3 early, though I didn’t like the edge run for Cunningham on a later 3rd-and-short despite it working. It didn’t have the element of surprise of the Mason handoff and was too easy to defend. The Rams counterpunched well with screens against Colt blitzes and odd formations. But personnel tipoffs be damned, the Rams have to quit calling run plays that hinge on Jared Cook making a block. Either that or sending Cook a message by making Kendricks the starter has to be on the table.

After three weeks of preseason, we’re ultimately where we didn’t really want to be, hoping Jeff Fisher’s players “find the switch” in time for the regular season. They improved this week, but there’s still a lot they’re doing wrong. (Like 10 of 12 penalties accepted, for 83 yards.) It’s been ten years, if not more, since the Rams have been talented enough to rely on “finding the switch.” If Fisher pulls this one off, he’s Indiana Jones. In that case, throw me the idol. (Yes, I know how that worked out for that character. I’ll be more careful. I’m a patient runner.)

* Upon further review: As a rookie head official, John Hussey is a referee the Rams are likely to see twice this season, and don’t expect either of those games to be well-officiated. The Rams’ opening drive died on a completely bogus OPI call on Austin, who’s the strongest man in the NFL if that was a pushoff, when he barely touched the DB. Most of the other 11 penalty calls on the Rams were legit; I just wish Hussey’d had the courtesy to identify the player on all of them, especially the critical hold that took away the Jenkins INT. No-calls were a bigger problem. Indy converted on 3rd-and-8 and got inside the 10 before halftime after an obvious false start by Allen was missed. They got a long punt return in the 2nd half while the refs ignored Watts getting blatantly shoved in the back in front of the returner and Marquez getting obviously held for about 15 yards. Thanks for missing those but calling everything the Rams did, eagle eyes. Grade: D-plus

* Broadcast news: From TV, it looked like attendance couldn’t have been more than 15,000, and I think we know who to thank for that. Regrettably, I can no longer say “we” when talking about the home crowd, but the brave, hearty few got loud on several first-half 3rd downs and might even have flustered the Colts into one of their timeouts. Marshall Faulk and Torry Holt continue to put on a clinic as Rams analysts. Faulk’s breakdown of the Johnson TD was especially educational. One thing you can say about them is they’re never afraid to criticize the Rams or the referees. If anything, they could take it easier on the Rams. Faulk blamed Damian Williams for Mannion’s TD even though Mannion really stared him down. He blamed Pead for the second sack, but did Foles recognize it? It was very well-disguised. Holt blamed Britt for not converting a hot read into a 1st down, saying he didn’t “net the sticks”, but surely the ball had to come out too fast for Britt to run an 8-yard route. What’s that? Stop calling you Shirley? Anyway, those are quibbles; you rarely come away from a play without Holt or Faulk giving an excellent account of why it worked or didn’t work. We need these guys on regular-season games.

* Waiver bait: With E.J. Gaines headed to injured reserve, by my count, 13 Rams will hear the dreaded words “Coach Fisher wants to see you,” but no sooner than Monday per Les Snead. RamView’s guesses: T Steven Baker, WR Emory Blake, QB Austin Davis, DB Jay Hughes, RB Zach Laskey, LB Keshaun Malone, LS Tyler Ott, K/P Michael Palardy, CB Montell Garner, WR Tyler Slavin, TE Brad Smelley, OL David Wang and T Darrell Williams. Davis, who I stubbornly believe could still start for a half-dozen teams, deserves an early release to try to latch on somewhere. And Sergeant Dan HAS to make it to at least the final cut, doesn’t he?

* Who’s next?: Thursday night could see the final chapter of the most time-honored tradition in sports, and OF COURSE I’m talking about the Missouri Governor’s Cup. There’s a chance the city that wins the trophy will get to keep it forever, though we shouldn’t expect either team to treat the game like forever’s on the line. Nor should we expect the Rams to treat the game like an 0-4 preseason is on the line, not with Fisher recently saying 49 of the final 53 roster spots are already locked up. The main players to watch will probably be backup offensive linemen, backup DBs and Pead/Watts/Brown for the last RB job. I wouldn’t mind the starting o-line getting a lot of work and proving they can protect the QB, though. The Chiefs have vexed the Rams in the regular season for 20 years; whether they know it or not, or care, Fisher and the team owe the hometown fans one here. Maybe, just maybe, the Rams will rally behind Case Keenum and play good football, and St. Louis football fans will always have that glorious grail as a tangible link to the olden days.

— Mike
Game stats from espn.com