Sean McVay has L.A. Rams resembling Greatest Show on Turf

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Sean McVay has L.A. Rams resembling 'Greatest Show on Turf' Published: Nov 12, 2017 at 10:18 PM Michael Silver LOS ANGELES -- Halfway through Sunday's home game against the , it was clear that the NFC West-leading L.A. had a problem: a 6-foot-5, 270-pound game-wrecker in an opposing uniform. Thanks largely to the disruptive and destructive efforts of linebacker , the ' high-flying offense had been grounded in the first two quarters of Sunday's game at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum. Limited to a trio of field goals, L.A. held a 9-7 lead as rookie coach Sean McVay and his players filed into the home locker room. Suddenly, an offense being lauded as the second coming of "The Greatest Show on Turf" resembled the sludge stuck in an '80s-style drainage pipe emptying into the Pacific Ocean. And McVay, the 31-year-old, eternally coaching wunderkind, was determined to find a flow. "Well, guys, we can't play any worse -- and I can't put you in any worse positions -- and we're still up 9-7," McVay told his offensive players at halftime. "The good news is, if we don't pi s down our legs, we'll get it together and win this game. We're out of sync, and one guy in particular is killing us. So now let's find a way to fix it and go back to doing what we do." The ' attack stayed stagnant for the first five-and-a-half minutes of the third quarter until -- on the second play of their second po se sion of the second half -- McVay dialed up a call that would break open the game, and second-year quarterback executed it to perfection. With L.A. facing second-and-8 from its own 6-yard line, the came out in a defensive alignment, leaving each of four Houston players responsible for a horizontal quadrant of the secondary Dee Ford Jersey . There was also a wrinkle: The blitzed a cornerback off the weak side and dropped a linebacker into coverage to take his spot. When he recognized the coverage, McVay began speaking excitedly into Goff's headset. "I couldn't wait for us to snap the ball," he said later. The same went for his quarterback: As McVay called the play, Goff was already rushing to the line to take the snap. "We've got Robert here," McVay reminded him -- and the rest was pure artistry: Goff making a sweet play-fake to halfback , who slid to his left and picked up the blitzing Kevin Johnson; Woods running a pinpoint post pattern up the right seam. The only i sue, as usual, was Clowney, who beat right tackle to the inside and bore down on Goff in the end zone as the quarterback prepared to throw. And then, just when it looked like the fourth-year pa s rusher would wreck yet another opportunity, the 60,032 fans at the Coliseum witne sed a sublime sequence that summed up everything that has made the 2017 dramatically different from their scoring-challenged 2016 forebears. As Clowney said afterward, walking from the visitors' locker room toward the ' team buses, "Man, that s--- was crazy. I don't know how they did that." Havenstein, in a desperate measure that offensive linemen refer to as a "backdoor" maneuver, lunged his hand in front of Clowney and diverted him while spinning toward the quarterback. Goff, meanwhile, hung tough and absorbed a hit from Clowney just after delivering a perfect pa s to Woods, who caught it in stride at midfield, with veteran cornerback in futile pursuit. Seconds later, Woods was celebrating , the ' longest play from scrimmage since 1964 -- and the were on their way to that reaffirmed their credentials as a legitimate, if totally surprising, contender. "The greatest trait a quarterback can have is not fearing failure -- and that's how Jared's wired," McVay marveled Sunday night. "He had bra s balls on that play, and he dropped a dime. And that was so big, 'cause it opened everything up -- and after that, we were off and running." McVay had plenty to do with that, revising his game plan to run plays away from Clowney throughout the second half, supplementing that strategy by sliding extra blockers toward the linebacker and favoring calls designed to allow Goff to release the ball quickly. "We had a problem," veteran offensive line coach Aaron Kromer said, "and Sean solved it." In the proce s, McVay also killed the suspense in a mid-November interconference clash whose marquee value had already been depleted, as the (3-6) were -- rookie -- who'd suffered a season-ending ACL tear . Yet, running their winning streak to four was momentous for the (7-2), who hold a one-game lead over the in the NFC West and seem capable of outscoring anyone when they're operating at NFL San Francisco 49ers Jersey peak performance. As with Goff's deep ball to Woods from his own end zone, almost nobody saw this coming. Last year, the had the league's least productive offense, mustering just 224 points en route to a 4-12 record. Goff, the No. 1 overall pick in the 2016 draft, struggled mightily after taking over as the team's starting quarterback in the 10th game of the season, and coach Jeff Fisher was fired with three games remaining in the dismal campaign. After the season the hired McVay, Washington's promising offensive coordinator, who at the time was 30 years old -- making him the youngest head coach in modern NFL history. He and his 23-year-old quarterback , provoking comparisons to the 1999 , who rebounded from a 4-12 record the previous season and on the strength of future quarterback Kurt Warner and an explosive offense that commanded an iconic nickname. Now comprehend this: The Greatest Show on Turf produced 526 points in the '99 regular season, while the current -- the league's highest-scoring team in 2017 -- scored exactly half of that total (263) over their first eight games. Sunday's output kept L.A. on that pace (32.9 points per game) and allowed McVay and his players to feel a lot better upon entering the locker room after the game than they had at halftime. "We needed to hit some adversity, because we hadn't hit any in a while," said veteran left tackle , who has proven to be one of the league's best free-agent signees of the past several seasons. "All week long, we talked about it: Well, we found out. "It's funny, because the week before that, I was talking about how we need to hit some shock plays. We'd been grinding it out and working our way up the field, but leaving those big plays on the table. Then, the last two weeks ... boom. It's pretty impre sive." Goff (25 of 37, 355 yards, three touchdowns, no interceptions) credited the stabilizing efforts of a defense that forced four turnovers. Like Whitworth, he also found value in having overcome Sunday's first-half futility. "Well, yeah -- it's good because we won," Goff said. "As soon as we hit that big bomb, our intensity kind of went up a notch. You could feel that. And then we were rolling, and everyone got involved." While Woods (eight catches, 171 yards, two touchdowns) enjoyed a career day, Goff also had Frank Gore Jersey key connections with receiver (two catches, 41 yards, one TD) and Gurley (who had 68 receiving yards, matching his rushing total). , rookie wideout , hooked up six times for 47 yards. None of that succe s seemed likely after an opening quarter during which McVay's offense bore an unwelcome resemblance to the 2016 ' anemic attack -- something that still bothered the coach hours after the game as he and several friends watched highlights on a large television screen at his home atop the San Fernando Valley. "We had 6 yards of offense in the first quarter," McVay scoffed. " yards! At that point, I thought we were well on our way to a 30-yard game. ... It was a total pukefest. I was ready to crawl into a hole." Instead, he solved the problem and allowed the to regain their stride in the second half. It's becoming a trend -- and the whole football world is starting to take notice. This article has been reproduced in a new format and may be mi sing content or contain faulty links. Please use the Contact Us link in our site footer to report an i sue.
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