wv wrote:

1 Oline (but what exactly is the problem? Age? Nagging Injuries? Somethin else?)

Speculation time. Just jumpin in with summ thotz. I don’t have the benefit of watchin the 22, but I do happen to have 2 cents, which means I qualify as a guy with some opinions.

I would say it’s a combo of things. One is age (Sullivan, Whit).

Another is that they have been scheming around players who are not really standard template starters, like Blythe and Hav. Blythe has physical limitations but he makes up for it, they say, with technique and some wrestler’s skills. He’s a system guard. I would say the same is true of Hav at tackle. These guys are more like Nutten and Gruttadauria and Miller, and obviously not like Pace and Timmerman.

In fact I think that in a lot of ways, it’s more like the GSOT line than not. (That includes the fact that both OLs had/have an absolutely top notch OL coach.) That is, the GSOT OL was very well suited to execute what they did on offense, but line them up against a top DL that can exploit their limitations and they came up short in a couple of areas.

The difference is, that OL had Pace and Timmerman. This one has Saffold. On the “could play OL for any team in the league” scale, Saffold really is it.

Anyway this OL was set up to play outside and inside zone, and if they go against a couple of top DLs that can control that (like Chi and Phil), the run is compromised a bit. They also can’t beat those DLs by just lining up and dominating.

Pass blocking? They all have limitations if attacked by a good to very good DL. I read where Chicago got pressure on 52% of Rams passes while blitzing only 18% of the time. Well. That’s gonna work against this offense.

Another part of it, seems to be that McV was slow to build in an offensive attack built around short quick ball control passing. He DID do that against the Eagles, not against the Bears though (leading one guy in a popular vid on the Bears game, which you post here, to exclaim that Goff refused to throw short, not that they didn’t have a short game built in). And in fact against the Eagles that worked. Until they got behind in the third quarter and had to drop it.

So the other factor in this is that the OL, under seige, had to gut it out in a game where the Rams defense was not getting the kinds of big plays we’re used to seeing from Donald. That’s obviously not on Donald…the Bears and Eagles deliberately set out to control him, and on some of the replays where commentators were showing this, I saw triple team blocking on AD. Sacks subtract points because as it turns out, percentage wise, it is very rare for offenses to convert third downs in a series where the qb gets sacked.

So cause of that the offense had to play uphill a bit more.

You know what we were seeing then. It was the 2016 offense. Gurley less effective because he’s dinged a bit, the OL more out of sync than you would like, and the qb under so much pressure it was affecting his game. (My take on 2016 was that something was wrong with Gurley all year, he was not himself.) (In fact McGinnis came right out and said he was playing hurt all year.)

The differences between the last 2 games and 2016 are that the OL was younger (Hav struggled in 2016) & they had GR instead of AW; they have receivers now; Goff for all his struggles the last 3 games is just not a rookie; and the 2016 offense looked like that against every defense whereas in 2018 it was against 2 TOP defenses. So in fact they had all those disadvantages against the Bears and Eagles and still managed a point differential of 14.5 to 22.5, which is not ideal but is also not 2 blowouts.

Just a footnote. A minor aside really. Some will say the offensive coaching was massively different between 2016 and 2018, which is mostly true except for this–the offensive coordinator for the Eagles, Mike Groh, was the Rams passing game coordinator in 2016. So people IMO get a tad hyperbolic about how miserable the coaching was in 2016. But on the other side of that coin, while McV is certainly superior to any Rams offensive coach since Martz (and since before Martz going back to Zampese), he’s still young and relatively inexperienced and was going against 3 savvy veteran defensive coordinators in a row (Patricia, Fangio, Schwartz). Those 3 guys are going to have the advantage if McV does not have a full deck of cards, which he didn’t.

• This reply was modified 7 years, 8 months ago by zn.

Another take on one aspect of it.

Why is Goff struggling? Because (IMO) all qbs go through stretches where they struggle. That includes all the greats (if memory serves). The bad ones are never that good in the first place so it’s hard to say they did really well and then struggled…more often than not they struggle all along. Heck for that matter JG already went though and came out of a slump in 2017 (he had a stretch of 3 games last year–Seattle, Jagz, ARZ–where his avg. qb rating was 70 and he threw just 2 TDs and 3 INTs….his avg. completion percentage in those 3 games was 52.3%).

You don’t do the good things Goff did this year if you are not a good qb. It’s that simple. And good young qbs have slumps.

Just to offer a good example, here is Brees in his 4th year, his real take off year. In 2004 he completed 65% of his passes, with 27 TDs, 7 INTs, and an avg. qb rating of 104.8 (which ranked 3rd that year).

And that year he also had these games:

SDG NYJ L 28-34 — 42.11%, 146 yds, 1 TD, 2 INT, qb rating of 47.1
SDG @ DEN L 13-23 — 48.28%, 121 yds, 0 TD, 0 INT, qb rating of 59.7
SDG DEN W 20-17 — 51.85%, 106 yds, 0 TD, 1 INT, qb rating of 46.2

So in those games he averaged 48% completions, threw 1 TD and 3 INTs, and his avg. qb rating was 51.0. In 2004 for the season, 48% completions would have ranked 34th (out of 34), and a qb rating of 51.0 would have ranked 34th (out of 34).

That’s Brees in year 4. Goff is in year 3. A BAD qb does not play the way he did against the Chargers, Vikings, and Chiefs. All 3 are winning teams and 2 have top 6 defenses. BUT a good young qb will . slump some games, as Brees did in his 4th year.

Unless someone can think of a qb who never went through this? Having bad “off” stretches as a young qb? I can’t think of one but then again I am not a living memory bank.

You want to know how many “off” games Brady had in his third year? I am counting every game where he has a qb rating below 70 (which is a pretty generous cut-off number). It’s 5. In those 5 games he has 3 TDs and 7 Ints. His avg completion percentage in those 5 games is just under 54.0 % and he has 1 game where it’s in the high 40s.

Anyway, I think I am right on this, that he will come out of it……….

hammer

Goff’s struggles are attributable to more pressure and less time in the pocket to make reads. Why less time? Defenses have mostly taken away the mid to deep routes, playing a bend but don’t break defense and the Rams have been unable to score because of turnovers or failed red zone production resulting in fieldgoals. Certainly Goff could improve ball security and make better decision on throws, but his poor performance stems from an offensive line not performing as well after the bye week.

I don’t think it is entirely attributable to age of the linemen. That could be a factor, but you would think after the bye week they may be somewhat refreshed. I think the offensive line issues began on the first drive against Detroit when Gurley was tacked awkwardly and had to come out. The Rams barely ran after that, when they did it was not as effective as it had been. The jet sweep or even the threat of one was not present and has not been since that game. With little to no running threat, PLAY ACTION IS NOT CAUSING THE DEFENSE TO HESITATE.

Against the Bears I saw the same thing. It looked like things were turning around early for the run game against the Eagles, when two injuries occurred. The center in an early drive and Gurley at some point in the first half. Again no jet sweeps, little to no Run threat and defense for the third game in a row playing 4 deep.

A defense which calls for the offense to RUN, be patient and dump if off to a running back out of the back field. All year screens and catches out of the back field by Gurley have provided significant production until the Detroit game. When the Rams pulled the center out after a potential concussion the offense was immediately stagnant and out of sync.

Under the current McVay offensive scheme, Gurley or some other running back must pick up the slack so the threat of the Run is realized. If the defensive line and linebackers have to respect the threat of the run and can be moved by the jet sweep or threat we will see Goff with more time and we will see the Rams be better able to attack a defense who is playing 4 deep.

Losing Malcom Brown earlier was huge and the Rams depth has been exposed. I am also convinced that losing Kupp has contributed to Goff’s ineffectiveness, he seemed to use Kupp as a very effective safety net. He was such an intriguing part of the offense.

If Gurley doesn’t return to full ability, then McVay better change up his offensive scheme.

JackPMiller wrote:

I never said they were not good at drafting in the 3rd round.

And I didn’t say you DID say that.

I said why leave out the 3rd round, we know they are getting comp picks. That was all that I addressed directly to you.

I then just happened to add, just for conversation’s sake, that btw they’re good at the 3rd round.

JackPMiller wrote:

Right now, our draft picks we have, not including comp picks, if correct looks like this

1
4
6

But then why not count comp picks.

They are most likely going to get 2 3s. And remember, the Rams so far have been absolutely golden with 3rd round picks. In fact in the last 2 drafts they got 2 top starters out of 3 3rd round picks (Kupp and Johnson obviously) and it looks like they scored on the 3rd one too (Noteboom).

IMO? Not Talib. I am for drafting depth behind Talib, but not on cutting him for cap space and then replacing him with a rookie.

wv wrote:

know youve all seen this, but its worth thinkin about. Can Goff ever be patient enough to adjust to defenses taking away his favorite stuff?

Seen and gotten some good responses to it. The issue is Goff in that vid because the guy making the vid wants the issue to be Goff. That’s his focus. So you end up with the construct of an “impatient Goff.” BUT in fact a lot of that against Chicago was play design. People who watched the 22 say the idea that Goff always had short options built into plays does not hold up. In fact that changes with the Eagles game, where McVay DID build an offense around short ball control passing. This was so visible that in fact it was a running theme in Collinsworth;s commentary. We were remarking in it in the chat room during the game.

So I think the whole thing that vid tries to come up with about an “impatient Goff” is in his head. That’s not the issue. For one thing, how likely is it that McVay would stand there and watch his qb overlook shorter options on passes pass after pass and say nothing? Much more likely is what the guys who watch the 22 say: that the issue against Chicago was not Goff ignoring safer options, it was the lack of safer options, something that McVay corrects for the Eagles game.

You might be interested in the discussion that follows that vid, here: http://theramshuddle.com/topic/goff-day-how-the-bears-defense-baited-jared-goff-into-his-worst-game-ever/

wv wrote:

OK, whats wrong with the Rams offense ?

1. Gurley is hurt.
2. They miss Cooper Kupp.
3. Oline is fading for whatever reason.
4. Defenses have developed better strategies for stopping the offense.
5. Goff is pressing big-time because of all of the above.

Is that about it?

w
v

Also against Chicago, they did not adjust to how defenses are playing them now. Defenses are subtracting the intermediate “chunk” passes they thrived on earlier, and then also both (1) attacking the OL and (2) gameplanning Donald out of the picture which means fewer dramatic defensive plays limiting the score.

One answer to the defensive strategy of taking away the 11-25 yard chunk plays is to develop a patient short passing game. They WERE doing that against the Eagles but then getting behind meant they had to junk that approach.