Rams DBs are exposed against Giants

By Jim Thomas

http://www.stltoday.com/sports/football/professional/rams-dbs-are-exposed-against-giants/article_d01e990c-65f6-518b-a0a7-f7110c4825c8.html

Just a week ago, the Rams’ secondary looked like the most improved unit on the team this season. With everybody healthy, second-round draft pick Lamarcus Joyner — who hasn’t played badly at all when healthy — couldn’t even get on the field.

So the starters were improving, the depth was good, and looking forward there was the thought that maybe the Rams didn’t need to add much to the secondary for 2015.

Then came the abomination otherwise known as the New York Giants game. There were botched or misplayed coverages, what appeared to be a lack of communication on some plays, and soft coverage that consistently had Rams cornerbacks lining up seven to 10 yards off the line of scrimmage.

As a topper, it didn’t look as if the Rams did anything special scheme-wise to counter the hottest receiver in the NFL in Odell Beckham Jr.

At the end of the day it added up to 391 yards passing, three touchdown throws and a passer rating of 148.8 by Giants quarterback Eli Manning.

“I’ll credit Eli,” Rams coach Jeff Fisher said. “He really played an outstanding game and was in control. Didn’t have much

difficulty on the line of scrimmage getting in and out of things. And he made some big-time throws.”

All true, but the Rams gave Manning plenty of help. For one, it wasn’t the best of days for the front four in terms of the pass rush. And with rare exceptions, the blitzes dialed up by coordinator Gregg Williams were ineffective.

But the secondary made things way too easy for Manning, whose passing total was the most against the Rams since Drew Brees of New Orleans threw for 393 in a 27-16 loss to the Rams on Dec. 15, 2013.

Giving away “freebies” in the passing game is a defensive sin, one that the Rams had seemingly gotten past. But in this season of giving, the freebies returned in droves Sunday, including three plays where Giants wideouts found themselves isolated on Rams safeties.

That’s asking for trouble, creating a matchup that the wide receiver should win the vast majority of times. Three such plays resulted in two touchdowns and 138 passing yards for the Giants.

• Play No. 1: On the fourth play of the game, cornerback Janoris Jenkins was lined up over New York’s Rueben Randle, giving Randle a 7-yard cushion. In what looked like zone coverage, Jenkins followed Randle nearly 25 yards down the field — to about the St. Louis 45 — but then dropped coverage, turning back in the direction of running back Andre Williams, who was in the flat way back at about the New York 30.

That left Randle isolated on free safety Rodney McLeod, who was in pretty good position to make a play but got boxed out. The result was a 49-yard gain to set up a Giants field goal.

• Play No. 2: On the Giants’ next series, Manning threw a 9-yard TD pass to Beckham. Cornerback Trumaine Johnson dropped coverage on the play, which left Beckham isolated on safety T.J. McDonald. Beckham got free by faking inside and then heading out to the right corner of the end zone.

The play gave New York a 10-0 lead before the Rams had run their first offensive play. Fisher said Johnson, who was playing zone coverage, should have been deeper on the play.

“Yeah, he was supposed to sink (into coverage) and have that ball go to the flat,” Fisher said.

Had the lanky Johnson been even a few feet deeper, he probably would’ve been able to tip the ball away.

• Play No. 3: This was the back-breaker play in the game. With the St. Louis offense gaining momentum, the Rams had made it a one-possession game, 27-20, on a Lance Kendricks TD catch late in the third quarter.

But on the third play after the Giants received the kickoff, Manning threw an 80-yard TD pass to a wide open Beckham. This was another coverage bust. With Randle and Beckham lined up wide right, Johnson and Joyner both took the player running the underneath route (Randle).

That left Beckham wide open with only a safety to beat down field — again an unfair matchup. One move later and Beckham was by safety Mark Barron move for a 34-20 Giants lead.

It was a brutally tough day for Johnson, who until Sunday had played well since coming back from a preseason knee injury. Even though he had played only seven games entering the New York contest, Johnson leads the team with interceptions including a 43-yard “pick 6” against Oakland.

But Johnson was so off his game against the Giants that Fisher was asked if Johnson was healthy.

“He’s working through some things,” Fisher said. “I don’t know if he’s 100 percent, but I don’t think anybody was at 100 percent (Sunday). He needs to play better. His technique was poor at times. He gave up uncharacteristic plays. He gave up plays that you would expect him to make.”

All told, Johnsonallowed nine receptions for 150 yards and two touchdowns. Four other completions resulted in third-down conversions.

“We didn’t execute, we didn’t finish, and that’s including myself,” Johnson said. “It starts with me. I put a lot of things on myself. All I can do is go back and fix them throughout the week.”

Off duty, black cops in New York feel threat from fellow police

Reuters

By Michelle Conlin

http://news.yahoo.com/off-duty-black-cops-york-feel-threat-fellow-170110366.html

NEW YORK (Reuters) – From the dingy donut shops of Manhattan to the cloistered police watering holes in Brooklyn, a number of black NYPD officers say they have experienced the same racial profiling that cost Eric Garner his life.

Garner, a 43-year-old black man suspected of illegally peddling loose cigarettes, died in July after a white officer put him in a chokehold. His death, and that of an unarmed black teenager in Ferguson, Missouri, has sparked a slew of nationwide protests against police tactics. On Saturday, those tensions escalated after a black gunman, who wrote of avenging the black deaths on social media, shot dead two New York policemen.

The protests and the ambush of the uniformed officers pose a major challenge for New York Mayor Bill De Blasio. The mayor must try to ease damaged relations with a police force that feels he hasn’t fully supported them, while at the same time bridging a chasm with communities who say the police unfairly target them.

What’s emerging now is that, within the thin blue line of the NYPD, there is another divide – between black and white officers.

Reuters interviewed 25 African American male officers on the NYPD, 15 of whom are retired and 10 of whom are still serving. All but one said that, when off duty and out of uniform, they had been victims of racial profiling, which refers to using race or ethnicity as grounds for suspecting someone of having committed a crime.

The officers said this included being pulled over for no reason, having their heads slammed against their cars, getting guns brandished in their faces, being thrown into prison vans and experiencing stop and frisks while shopping. The majority of the officers said they had been pulled over multiple times while driving. Five had had guns pulled on them.

Desmond Blaize, who retired two years ago as a sergeant in the 41st Precinct in the Bronx, said he once got stopped while taking a jog through Brooklyn’s upmarket Prospect Park. “I had my ID on me so it didn’t escalate,” said Blaize, who has sued the department alleging he was racially harassed on the job. “But what’s suspicious about a jogger? In jogging clothes?”

The NYPD and the Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association, the police officers’ union, declined requests for comment. However, defenders of the NYPD credit its policing methods with transforming New York from the former murder capital of the world into the safest big city in the United States.

EX-POLICE CHIEF SKEPTICAL

“It makes good headlines to say this is occurring, but I don’t think you can validate it until you look into the circumstances they were stopped in,” said Bernard Parks, the former chief of the Los Angeles Police Department, who is African American.

“Now if you want to get into the essence of why certain groups are stopped more than others, then you only need to go to the crime reports and see which ethnic groups are listed more as suspects. That’s the crime data the officers are living with.”

Blacks made up 73 percent of the shooting perpetrators in New York in 2011 and were 23 percent of the population.

A number of academics believe those statistics are potentially skewed because police over-focus on black communities, while ignoring crime in other areas. They also note that being stopped as a suspect does not automatically equate to criminality. Nearly 90 percent of blacks stopped by the NYPD, for example, are found not to be engaged in any crime.

The black officers interviewed said they had been racially profiled by white officers exclusively, and about one third said they made some form of complaint to a supervisor.

All but one said their supervisors either dismissed the complaints or retaliated against them by denying them overtime, choice assignments, or promotions. The remaining officers who made no complaints said they refrained from doing so either because they feared retribution or because they saw racial profiling as part of the system.

In declining to comment to Reuters, the NYPD did not respond to a specific request for data showing the racial breakdown of officers who made complaints and how such cases were handled.

White officers were not the only ones accused of wrongdoing. Civilian complaints against police officers are in direct proportion to their demographic makeup on the force, according to the NYPD’s Civilian Complaint Review Board.

Indeed, some of the officers Reuters interviewed acknowledged that they themselves had been defendants in lawsuits, with allegations ranging from making a false arrest to use of excessive force. Such claims against police are not uncommon in New York, say veterans.

STUDIES FIND INHERENT BIAS

Still, social psychologists from Stanford and Yale universities and John Jay College of Criminal Justice have conducted research – including the 2004 study “Seeing Black: Race, Crime and Visual Processing” – showing there is an implicit racial bias in the American psyche that correlates black maleness with crime.

John Jay professor Delores Jones-Brown cited a 2010 New York State Task Force report on police-on-police shootings – the first such inquiry of its kind – that found that in the previous 15 years, officers of color had suffered the highest fatalities in encounters with police officers who mistook them for criminals.

There’s evidence that aggressive policing in the NYPD is intensifying, according to data from the New York City Comptroller.

Police misconduct claims – including lawsuits against police for using the kind of excessive force that killed Garner – have risen 214 percent since 2000, while the amount the city paid out has risen 75 percent in the same period, to $64.4 million in fiscal year 2012, the last year for which data is available.

REPORTING ABUSE

People who have taken part in the marches against Garner’s death – and that of Ferguson teenager Michael Brown – say they are protesting against the indignity of being stopped by police for little or no reason as much as for the deaths themselves.

“There’s no real outlet to report the abuse,” said Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams, a former NYPD captain who said he was stigmatized and retaliated against throughout his 22-year career for speaking out against racial profiling and police brutality.

Officers make complaints to the NYPD’s investigative arm, the Internal Affairs Bureau, only to later have their identities leaked, said Adams.

One of the better-known cases of alleged racial profiling of a black policeman concerns Harold Thomas, a decorated detective who retired this year after 30 years of service, including in New York’s elite Joint Terrorism Task Force.

Shortly before 1 a.m. one night in August 2012, Thomas was leaving a birthday party at a trendy New York nightclub.

Wearing flashy jewelry, green sweatpants and a white t-shirt, Thomas walked toward his brand-new white Escalade when two white police officers approached him. What happened next is in dispute, but an altercation ensued, culminating in Thomas getting his head smashed against the hood of his car and then spun to the ground and put in handcuffs.

“If I was white, it wouldn’t have happened,” said Thomas, who has filed a lawsuit against the city over the incident. The New York City Corporation Counsel said it could not comment on pending litigation.

At an ale house in Williamsburg, Brooklyn last week, a group of black police officers from across the city gathered for the beer and chicken wing special. They discussed how the officers involved in the Garner incident could have tried harder to talk down an upset Garner, or sprayed mace in his face, or forced him to the ground without using a chokehold. They all agreed his death was avoidable.

Said one officer from the 106th Precinct in Queens, “That could have been any one of us.”

Dak wrote:

But, the elephant in the room is that the defense didn’t play well. Even with mistakes, the offense did play well enough to win. But, the defense has to get pressure on Eli Manning in this game

Yeah I don’t get this focus on the offense. Even with a banged-up OL starting a rookie LOT and Hill being streaky, they did enough to win.

It was the defense that lost that game.

Zooey wrote:

So this is a completely open thing, I think.

Maybe so. Maybe not. Could be. You never know.

The Rams have no true leaders.

They have no take charge leaders on the team that truly command respect, that the team follows.

When you’re “so called” leader(s) is in the middle of scrums, as a combatant rather than an officer, you gotta problem.

Too many times we have seen this team lose their composure and focus on the task. They become more concerned with showing how tough they are outside the lines, or after the whistle.

There is absolutely no question in my mind, that this team needs real veteran leaders.

Too many cocky young hotheads that want to celebrate a 25yd play. WTF is that when you’re getting your arse whipped??

This team is just poorly coached, and poorly constructed.

I;ve thought that too.

wv wrote:

Well, i think he’s in complete denial about which team
was playing dirty on Sunday.

I don’t know about that. Listen to the (recently posted) new Jeff Fisher show.

wv wrote:

Some interesting stuff in there.

w
v

Such as?

(See this is me fostering conversation.)

Ten Takeaways from Rams’ 37-27 Loss to Giants

By Randy Karraker

http://www.101sports.com/2014/12/22/ten-takeaways-rams-37-27-loss-giants/

On a day that the Rams clinched their eighth straight losing season, but did earn ESPN’s top play with Darren Bates’ spectacular blocked field goal in the fourth quarter, there were more negatives to discuss than positives. And here are 10 takeaways from the Rams 37-27 loss to the Giants…
alec ogletree

Ogletree’s late hit on Beckham Jr. started a brawl in the first half

1) The Rams clearly have some fight. We saw that during the late second quarter rumble as Alec Ogletree roughed up Giants receiver Odell Beckham Jr. out of bounds. William Hayes got involved trying to defend Ogletree, who had been kicked by Beckham. T.J. McDonald and Rodney McLeod, along with James Laurinaitis and Janoris Jenkins and the rest of the defense, got into the heated battle. It happened last season in Carolina and in Seattle at the end of the season. The Rams have passion and desire and will defend their mates to the end, but sometimes that comes at the expense of team success. I love the passion, but I hope it can be lassoed and utilized as a force for good on the field, rather than a mechanism that results in a street brawl.

2) It was a terrible day for the defensive backs. Eli Manning was an astounding 25-32 for 391 yards and three touchdowns without an interception, resulting in a 148.8 passer rating. He was 16-18 for 200 yards and a score in the first half. Certainly, Manning couldn’t miss. But it was rather remarkable how often he had receivers running free down the field.

The Rams didn’t have an interception, and came close to just one pick. He came into the game with thirteen interceptions and had been sacked 27 times, going only two games (at Dallas and Tennessee) without being sacked. Nobody in the front seven had a sack, with T.J. McDonald recording the only one for the Rams. Once again a miscommunication left an opposing receiver wide open for a long touchdown, and ultimately poor pass defense let the Rams down.

3) Where was the defense vs. the run? Jeff Fisher and his regime have drafted and signed defensive players to play in the NFC West and stop guys like Frank Gore and Marshawn Lynch. And indeed, the Rams have been sensational against the run for most of the second half of the season. But on this day, Giant running backs ran 30 times for 131 yards. The defense certainly didn’t slow the run down. The Giants were able to dictate to the Rams defense, which is something that shouldn’t happen with so much physical talent on that side of the ball.

4) Why was Scott Wells playing, anyway? Wells had a high snap that caused quarterback Shaun Hill to panic and overthrow Stedman Bailey late in the first half, then delivered another high snap that went over Hill’s head and caused a fumble that snuffed any Rams comeback chances. The Rams came into the game with a record of 6-8, out of playoff contention. They used a 4th round pick on center Barrett Jones last year, and Fisher admitted that Wells has been fighting through some elbow issues. Why isn’t Jones getting an opportunity? With all due respect to Wells, he turns 34 on January 7 and has not played to the level expected when he signed a free agent contract with the Rams before the 2012 season. If he’s hurt, or is going to play like that, why not give Jones a chance to see if he can play next year? I’d like to see Jones and Brandon Washington…although you might not want to play them at Seattle, either. I think Fisher and his staff missed a chance to see some young talent against the Giants.
odell beckham jr

Beckham Jr.’s antics drew several penalties against the Rams.

5) The Rams were easily offended by Odell Beckham Jr. When asked why the Rams were jawing with Beckham Jr., Fisher said “I don’t know. Someone said he said came out and said he was going to set an NFL record today against the defense early this morning. I was told that, I don’t know. But he’s an outstanding player. He’s a very, very good player and he’s going to be hard to stop over the years.” Seriously? A rookie says he’s going to set a record and your feelings are hurt? Are you kidding? That’s ridiculous. After T.J. McDonald took a taunting penalty because of his involvement with Beckham late in the first half, Mark Barron came out during a time out to calm him down. The Giants scored on their next play. Beckham’s taunt after his first touchdown most certainly helped cause the fracas in the second quarter, when Ogletree manhandled him. If receivers know they can get into the Rams head with antics like that, the Rams are going to see that every week.

Apparently this group didn’t spend enough time with and learn enough from Cortland Finnegan.

6) The Rams and their fans have now suffered eight straight losing seasons. Even the Raiders have had a couple of 8-8’s in that time. The gold standard of late for St. Louis has been the Scott Linehan/Jim Haslett club that went 8-8 in 2006. Do we know bad football? The last team to have a streak this long was the St. Louis/Arizona Cardinals, who had nine straight losing years between 1985-1993. Of course, 1985-’87 were their last three years in St. Louis. So in our last 23 seasons of NFL football in St. Louis, we’ve had four winning seasons, and seventeen losing ones. And folks wonder why people don’t want to spend their hard earned money on going to the Dome.

7) Kenny Britt had a huge play and a great day. With 4:13 left in the first half, Hill was flushed from the pocket, rolled right, and appeared to throw the ball away. But Britt appeared from nowhere to make a brilliant, 27 yard sideline catch and help set up a Rams touchdown moments later. He finished with nine catches for 103 yards. Britt leads Rams wide receivers with 44 catches for 710 yards. He deserves a contract for next year.

Cool There were more devastating penalties. The Rams committed “only’ nine penalties for 76 yards…compared to the Giants 12-149. McDonald’s penalty was tough. But with 10:28 to go in the game and the Giants ahead 30-20, they lined up to punt on a 4th and 1 from the Rams 46. Incomprehensibly, veteran Kendall Langford jumped offsides, giving the Giants a first down that led to their final touchdown and a 37-20 advantage. Even though the volume of penalties is down a bit, their effects are still as great.
jeff fisher

Fisher’s job is likely safe heading into 2015.

9) Is Fisher on the hot seat? I got question on Twitter a couple of times. No, and he shouldn’t be. A good franchise simply can’t continue to churn through regimes every three years and hope eventually it’s going to work out. The Giants should be a model for the Rams. So should the Steelers.

Fisher took over an untenable situation in which nearly half the players on the roster he took over didn’t even make it to a training camp the next year. He heads into year four of the project. Are things perfect? Certainly not. But this is a franchise that needs stability on the football side. Giants fans have wanted Tom Coughlin fired several times, before the team won Super Bowls. I would have to believe that many Cowboys fans wanted Jason Garrett fired after they finished 8-8 for the third straight year last year, but now he’s working out pretty well at 11-4 and as NFC East champs.

I don’t think Fisher’s seat should be hot…or even warm…heading into the off-season.

10) To fill up the stadium, the Rams need their product to be better. As has been mentioned, the Rams have eight straight losing seasons and finished 3-5 at home this year. This after they went 5-3 at home last year. Fisher is 11-12 at the Dome (one home game was in London) and 20-26-1 overall heading into week seventeen. While that’s a dramatic improvement over the 15-65 before he got here, reality is that NFL teams need to win to fill the stadium. If the Rams can reach a deal to remain in St. Louis, they need to know that the novelty of a new edifice lasts only so long. Eventually, if you’re going to be selling a product, that product needs to be of quality for people to buy it…even if it is the only game in town. If the losing persists, people aren’t going to buy…wherever the team plays. The Cardinals and Blues have learned this; the Redskins, Raiders and Buccaneers know it too. Winning sells.