Rams offense is historically impotent
BY JIM THOMAS
Tuesday, December 20, 2011
It's not an illusion, the Rams' offense is as bad as it looks. In fact, with just two games remaining in the 2011 season, the Rams' lack of production has reached historic proportions.
With a league-low 166 points scored, the Rams are on pace to score less than 200 points for only the second time since World II. If the Rams stay on their average of 11.9 points per game, they will complete the 2011 season with 190 points scored.
And given the caliber of the defensive competition in their final two games, the Rams might be lucky to score at all.
Entering their Monday night game at Candlestick Park, Pittsburgh was ranked No. 1 in the league in total defense and No. 2 in scoring defense. The Steelers' foe, San Francisco, was No. 4 in total defense and No. 1 in scoring defense.
The Rams travel to Pittsburgh for a Christmas Eve game at Heinz Field. Then on Jan. 1, they ring in the New Year by playing host to San Francisco in the season finale at the Edward Jones Dome.
The Steelers are in a knock-down, drag-out fight with Baltimore for the AFC North title. The *****, who beat the Rams 26-0 on Dec. 4, still could be in the running for a first-round playoffs bye when they face the Rams. So neither team might be resting any regulars when they play St. Louis.
Before coach Steve Spagnuolo's arrival in 2009, you had to go back 65 years and two cities in franchise history to find a Rams team that scored fewer than 200 points. From 1937 through 1944, the Cleveland Rams never scored more than 196 points in any of the franchise's first seven seasons. (The Rams didn't field a team in 1943.)
But in those days, the Rams played only 10 or 11 games a season, not 16. Even the 1982 Rams during that strike-shortened nine-game season managed to score exactly 200 points.
So from the '44 Rams, who scored 188 points in a 4-6 campaign, one must go all the way forward in time to the '09 club —which scored 175 points — to find another Rams team that scored fewer than 200 in a season.
In '09, Spagnuolo stepped into the considerable mess left by predecessor Scott Linehan, one replete with bad draft picks and failed free agents.
The 2010 offense under rookie quarterback Sam Bradford was much improved, scoring 114 more points than the '09 squad, marking the second-best improvement in points scored in the NFL by a team from '09 to 2010.
But despite the signing of offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels, the drafting of two wide receivers and a tight end in Rounds 2-4, the trade for Brandon Lloyd and the signing of offensive lineman Harvey Dahl in free agency, the Rams have regressed noticeably in this injury-plagued 2011 season.
As Dahl said after the Rams' 20-13 loss Sunday to...
-12-20-2011, 09:10 PM
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