Rams Rid Themselves of The Goose Egg In Win

The Breakdown

The Rams used a beautiful fake field goal, hard running by Steven Jackson, and a strong second half defensive performance to pull out a 17-10 win against the Detroit Lions.  Jackson went into the game knowing he needed to put the team on the back if he wanted a win, and did he ever.  He ran for 149 yards on 22 carries and a touchdown.  His first touchdown run of the season, which consisted of him dodging not only tacklers, but a referee as well, came very late in the fourth quarter and put the Lions in a very difficult spot to come back.

The defense on the other hand, held the Lions to merely 2 points in the first half despite being on the field for the majority of the half.  As much as I’d like to blame the offense, this one was on the defense.  They were able to put the Lions in third down situations several times, but were unable to get off the field as the Lions converted 5 third down conversions in the first half.  The second half saw a much better effort however, as they were on the field for six minutes less than they were in the first half.

It Doesn’t Have to be Pretty Brown

In the final minute of the first half, the Rams were faced with a 4th and short and lined up for a 53 yard field goal.  When the ball was snapped, holder Donnie Jones pitched the ball back to K Josh Brown who then rolled out with the poise of Steve Young, and threw a beautiful pass to TE Daniel Fells, who then raced into the endzone to give the Rams a 10-2 lead with 57 seconds left.

Okay maybe I lied, Brown rolled out very awkwardly and threw a pass that would make Ryan Leaf cringe, but regardless, the end result was the same.  This just goes to show, if it gets positive results, it doesn’t have to look good.

Take a knee Butler

During the first half, the Lions were in the red zone and were poised to scored a touchdown when S James Butler intercepted a Matthew Stafford pass in the endzone.  Great right?  Well, Butler ran it out of the endzone, hesitated, then attempted to cut back through the endzone, where he was tackled by Kevin Smith for a safety.  I understand, the Rams were winless, he wanted to turn the tides dramatically, but at that point in time, taking a knee was the right thing to do.